has to take a step back in 2012, the reader might have thought the world that Jesus had a wife. Karen King, a distinguished professor at Harvard Divinity School, made headlines when he revealed what they called “the Gospel of Jesus ‘Wife” a small fragment of papyrus with eight cryptic, incomplete lines in Coptic, including “Jesus said to them:’ my wife … “the journalist Ariel Sabar was for his announcement to draw attention to hand in Rome, seized the attention of the media (including this magazine), the tantalizing possibility of an entirely different Christian story the one of Mary Magdalene, the woman in question was not the center of the story of Jesus. the discovery of the King could upset the potential to be an old millennium, history of male-centered. But “My faith and the faith of other Christians, the best is built on good story.” Not exactly what was presented to the world as Sabar examines in his new book Veritas: King said in a Harvard professor, a cheat, and the gospel of Jesus woman. As they had done before in its original and acclaimed work on the Gnostic gospels, King said a brilliant alternative history, beautifully packaged and ready for prime time. But there was one problem: it was not true. Before he went public with his discovery, some scientists and Papyrologists questioned the authenticity of the fragment. Then he died a little ‘until 2014, when it seemed to confirm with the publication in a prestigious theological journal furor story later that this papyrus could be real. But by 2016, thanks Sabar coverage in the Atlantic and a growing list of experts rebuttals and Coptic scholars, the fragment was clear it was nothing but a bad fake put together from publicly available Gnostic texts with sloppy handwriting. King finally admitted that they had been deceived. Sabar revealed in its report that the original king of Fritz Walter text, a German student of Egyptology failed and director of the Stasi Museum turned Florida resident pornographer wife-swapping had been taken. The Fritz secret and why the king did not fully informed about the origin of this wreck investigation is located in the center of Veritas. It ‘made the history of journalism right, right on Sabar able tenaciously to the bottom of sleuthing to get those famous titles. Along the way, Sabar explores the history of alternative Christian texts, eccentric scientists who study them and the inner workings of Harvard. In our time truthiness, a concept by Stephen Colbert, Veritas provides an important lesson less of Christianity to borrow more than what happens when a scientist decides that the most important story of the truth. King had his major scientific consideration career gifts need to spend a revaluation and the canonical history of Christianity to reinterpret, to allow women to play a central role and some of the basic principles and established churches told the world in question provide the most famous story. But convincing Sabar and devastating appraisal when ‘wife came to Jesus, made bypassed colleagues who warned her something was wrong ignored and failed to examine thoroughly how Fritz came to own this amazing artifact. You can imagine the excitement of the moment: to inspire an open discussion about who should be at the center of the history of Christian truth a chance. By the end of Veritas, the reader is left wants to King’s vision of “good story” had stalled and asked tough questions before going public. Instead, they left a piece of papyrus obscure the larger point he had done for decades. Picture copyright
What it happened when a history of Harvard Scholar decided it was more important than truth
