THE JAMES OSSUARY is the subject of a recent article in the Washington Post. I noted this on the 21st, but have only had time this morning to read it carefully, after a reprint came up on Google and reminded me of it.

Find or Forgery, Burial Box Is Open to Debate

By Guy Gugliotta and Samuel Sockol
Special to The Washington Post
Monday, February 21, 2005; Page A13

The first group of experts heralded it as one of archaeology's greatest discoveries, a burial box inscribed with the earliest reference to Jesus ever found. But after a closer look, another group of specialists debunked the find as an elaborate hoax.

Now Israeli authorities have indicted the box's owner as a serial forger. But far from putting the case of the "James Ossuary" to rest, the indictment has further polarized opposing sides in an increasingly vitriolic dispute.

Magazine editor Hershel Shanks, the most outspoken advocate of the box's possible authenticity, last week published an article in his Biblical Archaeology Review detailing mistakes in what he called a "badly bungled" investigation by the Israel Antiquities Authority.

The response was immediate. Antiquities Authority Deputy Director Uzi Dahari dismissed Shanks as "totally crazy" and his claims as "pathetic." Dahari denounced ossuary owner Oded Golan as a "scoundrel" and a career criminal who lives off the proceeds of doctored artifacts.

[...]

It goes on to rehearse the story, which by now is well known to PaleoJudaica readers. It sounds as though the latest comments of Hershel Shanks in the current Biblical Archaeology Review precipitated the piece. The article is mostly accurate as far as I can see. However, even if it were genuine, calling the ossuary "one of archaeology's greatest discoveries" seems to me a bit of a stretch. It would offer some confirmation that Jesus lived in the first century and had a brother named James (assuming the same Jesus and James are involved), but we do already know that. That would be exciting, but it wouldn't tell us anything new about biblical antiquity, let alone anything on the scale of, say, the Dead Sea Scrolls or the Ugaritic texts, each of which really is one of the greatests archaeological discoveries. I'm sure I've made this point before, but it bears repeating.

There's one other point to nitpick:

The District Court of Jerusalem indictment last December named Golan and four co-defendants in forgeries of items ranging from more than two dozen bullae -- clay relics used to seal documents from the time of King Solomon -- to the ossuary and the "Jehoash Inscription," an ancient tablet purported to be the 2,800-year-old instructions for maintaining the Jewish temple in Jerusalem.

No inscribed bullae from as early as the time of Solomon have ever been found, more's the pity.