The Earliest Records of Christianity

E.L. SUKENIK

INTRODUCTION BY GEORGE A. KIRAZ

GORGIAS PRESS 2008

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INTRODUCTION

It was Sukenik’s The Earliest Records of Christianity that gave birth to the se- ries Analecta Gorgiana. The title was not unfamiliar to me since I had read it many times even when I was a kid. My father, Anton D. Kiraz, had a copy—an extract from the American Journal of Archaeology—given to him by Sukenik himself. This was not just any booklet, for it was on my father’s property that the site described here was discovered. In the late summer of 1945, my father was putting the last touches on his newly built house in the Talpioth suburb of Jerusalem. Next he wanted to flatten a rocky area behind the house to create a garden. This was done using dynamite; first one drills a hole through the top of the rocks, then inserts dynamite, and blasts the rocks. The workers began drilling, measur- ing the depth of the hole with a rod. Father insisted they go deep. They kept drilling, and all of a sudden the rod fell into the rocks and disap- peared. My father realized that there was a cave. He had the workers go down to the ground level, and had them dig horizontally to find an opening to the cave. After some time, they man- aged to make an opening. My father and the workers entered the cave. What they saw was a burial place with “boxes of stones,” as father later recalled. In fact, these were ossuaries with inscriptions on them. Fa- ther thought it best to inform the Department of Antiquities of the Gov- ernment of Palestine. Before doing so, he picked a few nice pots—he planned to plant nice flowers in them and put them in his new house— and hid them away in a separate location. The Department of Antiquities dispatched Eleazar Sukenik to exca- vate. Between the 10th and the 13th of September, 1945, the site was ex- cavated by Sukenik and N. Avigad. During the process, my father got to know Sukenik at a personal level. Later, father would introduce some of the Dead Sea Scrolls to Sukenik. Sometime later, probably in late 1945, Sukenik phoned father. — “Anton. There is something missing from the site.”

— “What do you mean?” replied father. Sukenik asked if anyone took anything from the tomb. Father really wanted the pots for his plants. “No. I was there all the time,” he claimed. — “Anton. Some pots are missing, probably three or four.” Father started laughing. “How did you know?” — “It is our job,” replied Sukenik. — “Okay. Come over, I’ll give them to you.” Sukenik came to visit my father and they both went to the location where the pots were hidden (if I recall correctly, it was at the YMCA with Mr. Tannourji, who later would keep the Dead Sea Scrolls for a few days when father was negotiating with Sukenik). When they arrived, father went to grab the pots to give them to Sukenik. — “Anton, stop!” Sukenik shouted. Father was astonished. “Why? What’s going on? I am going to carry them for you.” — “No Anton. This is not how we carry pots. I’ll show you.” Father always narrated how Sukenik carried the pots himself very deli- cately, with a few fingers so that he did not make marks on the pots. — “Professor Sukenik,” father said “Don’t call me tomorrow to say there are more things missing. I give you my word. This is everything. I just thought they will be nice for plants.” The two men parted. Two years later, the two men were to meet again. This time father showed up to the meeting holding in his hands the Dead Sea Scrolls (for details, see George A. Kiraz, Anton Kiraz’s Archive on the Dead Sea Scrolls, 2005). The house and the property on which it was built, including the cave, were captured by the newly established State of Israel during the 1948 war. Anton Kiraz became a refugee and went to live in Bethlehem in the West Bank. He could no longer go to his home as the West Bank and Israel were separated. After the 1967 war when the West Bank was open to Is- rael, Anton Kiraz visited with Mushe Daya, Sukenik’s son and Israel’s de-

fense minister, and pleaded for the return of his house and property. Dayan’s answer was “Would Turkey return your property back?” (Kiraz’s family had lost its properties in Ottoman Turkey during the 1915 massa- cres). As far as I can remember, on every visit to Jerusalem we had to peak out of the bus window to see the house. It was a ritual. We made sure to sit on the right side of the bus. After passing the Monastery of Mar Elias, we would look to the right attentively. That was our landmark to start pay- ing attention. As the bus enters Talpioth, we would pay more attention. As we approach the house, my father or my mother would point to the house—on every single trip to Jerusalem. In 1983, when I was eighteen years old, we immigrated to the United States. Before our departure, my father took us to visit the house. He wanted us to know the house in case it was ever returned. As we arrived, I first asked about the cave, and my father showed us where the opening was. The locals closed it with a big rock to prevent kids from playing in- side. Then my father rang the bell of the house. A gentleman appeared and opened the door. — “Shalom! My name is Anton Kiraz, and this is my house. I want to show it to my kids before immigrating to the United States. May we look around.” — “Please come in,” the gentleman replied. The family living there was kind. The adults had coffee, while we were offered juice and sweets. They were east European Jews who had lost their homes their and immigrated to Israel. The State of Israel housed them in my father’s house. Everyone took the whole thing is part of life. The house and the property remain in the hands of the Israeli govern- ment. Whether it will ever be returned, or if compensations will be offered, depends on the Palestinian-Israeli future for peace, which seem not near in sight.

Sunday Before Christmas December 21, 2008

George A. Kiraz

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