2008.05.08, 1030   Yᵊru•shâ•laꞋyim Time

Talpiot Tomb: Pâqid Yirm^әyâhu Invalidates Kilty-Elliot Reasoning

Pâ•qidꞋ Yi•rᵊmᵊyâhꞋu

In reading about the Talpiot Tomb in Prof. James D. Tabor's blog (chair of the department of religious studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte), I noticed what gave every appearance of being a glaring, high school logic blunder: two instances each having a 50% probability produce a certainty that one 'would be' the desired outcome:

"Based on the calculations of Elliot and Kilty, whose paper can be downloaded from the Web, and as discussed by Camil Fuchs, who along with Andrey Feuerverger, sat on the panel at the Jerusalem conference dealing with statistics, the name cluster, even leaving Mariamene out entirely, with no assumptions regarding Mary Magdalene, shows a probability factor of .48. This result is far from "virtually nil," in fact it is very close to 1/2, meaning if we had two tombs to examine, one of them would be the Jesus tomb." [emphasis added]

As any coin-tosser can easily prove for himself, that is no certainty.

Upon inquiring of Prof. Tabor, he advised that, as his statement above suggests, he relied entirely upon Kevin T. Kilty, Ph.D., P.E., and Mark Elliot, Ph.D. at the Laramie County Community College (LCCC) in Cheyenne, Wyoming, authors of Probability, Statistics, and the Talpiot Tomb (2007.06.10). The glaring statement was neither a conclusion nor interpretation of Prof. Tabor.

I, therefore, redirected my inquiry to Drs. Kilty and Elliot resulting in the following exchanges (different time zones can be confusing):

Shalom Drs. Kilty and Elliot,

Please clarify for me an interpretation of the (approximately) 50% probability relative to the Talpiot Tombs, published by Dr. James Tabor (quotation below; whom I am CC-ing), which seems to defy what I learned in statistics, probability and several math and logic courses. I've asked Dr. Tabor and he indicated he obtained the interpretation below from you:

"...very close to 1/2, meaning if we had two tombs to examine, one of them would be the J*esus tomb." (http://www.jesusdynasty.com/blog/).

A 50% probability, as I learned it, does not remotely mean that two instances guarantee a 100% certainty. How is this different from claiming that flipping a coin twice guarantees at least one result will be a head?

Is this not a huge blunder by someone? Or did I miss a class?

Thanks. I'd like to publish your response on my website (below, in our Convention Center blog).

Paqid Yirmeyahu
(Yirmeyahu Ben-David, Paqid 16)
The Netzarim
Ra'anana, Israel
www.netzarim.co.il

Dear Paqid Yirmeyahu

Yes, this 48% calculation has raised a goodly amount of confusion, so please let me try to clarify it for you. First let me state that it is an example calculation, and one might do others like it beginning with different assumptions and arrive at a different result. We, for example, made a second such calculation using the name Joseph rather than Yoseh and arrived at substantially lower probability. Second, all statistical calculations are conditioned by some set of assumptions. In our case we assumed 1) that Jesus and some portion of his family are entombed in the Jerusalem area in a structure like the Talpiot Tomb; and 2) that there are in the neighborhood of some 1000 tombs similar to Talpiot in the area. The first of these assumptions means that if one were to excavate all tombs in the area then one of them would be, in fact, a Jesus Family Tomb. Many people cannot accept this assumption, but Mark Elliott and I think it is quite reasonable. The second of the two assumptions places an "a priori" probability of any randomly located tomb being that of the Jesus Family at one in a thousand.

Third, using the cataloged distribution of names for first century Palestine, we find that the set of inscribed names from Talpiot is unusual enough that one would expect only two such occurrences, approximately, among the 1000 stated tombs. Therefore the posterior probability of Talpiot being the Jesus Family Tomb is one in two, approximately. James Tabor's statement catches the essence of this in that if we excavated all tombs in the area we would expect to have two of them with a similar set of names to examine, and what then follows logically from our first assumption is that one of the two would be that of the Jesus Family. [emphasis added]

Mark Elliott and I plan on doing a more thorough job of examining probabilities in a following paper.

Regards,
Kevin Kilty

Note that, contrary to a subsequent denial, Dr. Kilty here defends the statement in question as their conclusion that, he claims, derives from their assumptions!

Shalom Kevin,

Thank you for your reply and information. Personally, I think the Talpiot Tomb probably is that of Ribi Yehoshua. So I'm not grinding an axe when I advise you that your premises cannot logically imply your conclusions -- no matter if the statistics demonstrate certainty. It would be certainty of something else, not your stated conclusion. You have one (or more) fatal flaw(s) in your logic.

I see your reasoning from assumption 1. Moreover, the first assumption itself is easy to deal with (by assigning some probability signifying confidence).

However, I don't see where you have designed any logical implication (much less certainty) from the similar inscriptions that either of them "would be" the tomb of the family of Ribi Yehoshua. The "real" tomb, while your assumption indeed assumes it will be there somewhere, might be one with no inscriptions, might be one bearing all of the inscriptions in the family, etc. I don't see where finding a second tomb with a similar inscription guarantee that either of them "would be" the tomb of the family of Ribi Yehoshua. I don't see where you have logically linked the implication of the inscription to the tomb of Ribi Yehoshua or his family.

Perhaps, before you even get into the statistical end of it, it might be helpful to set up the desired logic in Discrete math so that you can test the logic with a computer and determine whether the conclusions indicated by the statistics will provide the desired logical implications -- before going to work on the stats.

Please advise me if I'm mistaken and I'll consult with some discrete mathematicians in the computer science department of some university to verify my error(s), Hope this helps.

BTW, as a matter of historical record, "first-century Palestine" is anachronistic. It wasn't until 135 C.E. that the Romans crushed Judea, expelled the Jews and renamed the area "Palestine" and renamed Yerushalayim (Jerusalem) "Aelia Capitolina." In the first-century, it was Yehudah (Judea). I hope you will be historically accurate rather than political.

All the best,
Paqid Yirmeyahu

Shalom Paqid,

You are correct about the term "Palestine" being an anachronism. Mark, who teaches the Bible course here, knows that Hadrian changed the name of the area. However, we are using common nomenclature. We think everyone understands what we mean, at least.

I do not see that the perfectly valid points you make identify any sort of fatal flaw in our logic. Indeed you are correct that the actual tomb of the Jesus Family might be some other one that contains unmarked ossuaries, might contain other name associations, and so forth. This is implied in our other 52%, if you will, that the Talpiot Tomb is not the true tomb of the Jesus Family. What we are saying is that the combination of names in this tomb is unusual enough, and our combination probabilities are found using name probabilities from the region and time period involved, that we see a high likelihood of this being the correct tomb. Would you suggest, that if the "real" tomb is some other one, yet to be found with unmarked ossuaries, that one should not view the Talpiot Tomb to be of any interest at this time? Mark and I see scholars using erroneous arguments of all sorts to deflect interest in this tomb—we are saying that it is an improbable find if it is not the tomb of the Jesus Family and therefore deserves attention.

Consider just one additional observation which Mark and I have not alluded to in any paper so far. Tal Ilan lists 712 ossuaries in her compendium of names from various sources, which constitutes quite a large sample, and there are only two "Jesus Son of Joseph" among the lot. Considering that Talpiot has other interesting inscriptions in addition to this one, it is certainly an unusual find. Yet only a few scholars are willing to look at this tomb seriously.

By all means go ahead and pass my arguments on to your discrete mathematician associates. I'd be interested in their impressions.

Regards to you,
Kevin

Shalom Kevin,

You didn't merely say that "it is an improbable find if it is not the tomb of the J*esus Family." I don't take issue with that. Nor have I made any assertion to the contrary. To repeat what I stated in my initial email, "Personally, I think the Talpiot Tomb probably is that of Ribi Yehoshua." However, you have endorsed the statement that the probability is "...very close to 1/2, meaning if we had two tombs to examine, one of them would be the J*esus tomb."

Unless your logic is found in a technical paper that I haven't yet seen, you haven't demonstrated logic to support that conclusion in any way that is recognizable to a logician. I've attached one example of a format that every logician would recognize. You can also use set theory if you prefer or any of the other formats accepted in discrete mathematics. In any case, the methods are equivalent and translate into discrete math -- which means the logic can be verified by a computer. That means that neither you nor I are likely to need to consult anyone to see if it works. If you can make it work on a computer it works. If not, not. This is why I hinted that you should consult a discrete mathematician in your computer science dept. I've done Master's work in that area and assure you that I can recognize logic when I see it -- and I haven't yet seen logic that supports that conclusion. Chances that I will need to consult someone in that area are nil; first, I'm persuaded, because you will find, when you attempt to formulate and demonstrate your logic, that you cannot design logic to get you from your assumption to your conclusion, much less get a computer to confirm it.

The validity of the logic framework is entirely separate from the statistics about the various factors.

I'm confident that my reliance on logic and discrete math allows my inclusion among the "few scholars [who] are willing to look at this tomb seriously" -- particularly since I'm as meticulous in scrutinizing the logic of assertions with which I agree (e.g., yours) as I am in scrutinizing the logic of assertions with which I disagree. However, I'm careful not to adopt arguments merely because they agree. That way, I don't find myself relying on faulty logic.

Thanks for permitting me to share our discussions with other logic enthusiasts. I'll post them in my blog and, if you manage to formulate a logic design that proposes to bind your conclusion to your assumption and premises I'll be happy to verify it, check the computer code if necessary, and post the results.

I do understand what you mean -- the logical implications -- by your use of the term "Palestine" rather than "Judea" despite the historical anachronism and inaccuracy. The logical implication is that you prefer the bias over historical veracity. Such bias against Jews and Israel is misojudaism (popularly antisemitism) and is highly offensive.

Paqid Yirmeyahu

Dear Sir;

It appears that your real quarrel is with James Tabor over some issue and not with me. I did not endorse Prof. Tabor's paraphrasing of our result. I only suggested how he may have arrived at it. His paraphrasing, in fact, may be the result of how a journalist heard him, and not precisely what he said. I do not know. Yes, the press statement attributed to him is not accurate, however, I do not have time to quarrel with everything I read in the popular press. But I have high regard for Prof. Tabor , and you will not drive any sort of wedge between us over an inconsequential issue.[emphasis added]

However, I am deeply offended by your e-mail. You will be hard pressed to find a more ardent supporter of the State of Israel and the Jewish people as a whole than I. Not only is your conclusion utterly wrong, but you arrived at it using a logic that is far worse than anything you complain of by me. I consider our correspondence at an end and will not answer any more of your e-mail.

Regards,
Kilty

Note from the emphasized text that Dr. Kilty concedes that their logic, upon which their claim was based, has been invalidated.

Concerning my logic relative to his preference for an acknowledged historical anachronism that wrongly implies invalidation of the right of the Jews to the land of Israel as its indigenous people, no person who attempts to erase the history of Judea and the Jews in Israel to write in "Palestine" of the Arabs in its place is any kind of supporter of the State of Israel or the Jewish people. Exactly the opposite, that person is a misojudaic (popularly, anti-Semite)!

As for my logic in this matter:

• Dr. Kilty admitted that "the term 'Palestine' [in the first century is] an anachronism"
  
  
• Dr. Kilty persists in his bias of preferring the anachronism of "first-century Palestine" despite contradicting historical documentation, which he acknowledges.
  
  
• Bias against Judaic (i.e. Judaism) Israel and Jews is misojudaism by definition
  
  
• Sadly, Dr. Kilty is a misojudaic.

Whereas Dr. Kilty has been forced to back away from the conclusion he initially defended, my logic stands. Dr. Kilty's stand in the matter of "first century 'Palestine' " however, is unscientific and carries extreme misojudaic implications. I hope, and would be elated if, Dr. Kilty will reverse his position in this matter and adopt a scientific, historically accurate, practice.

Nᵊtzâr•imꞋ… Authentic