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Arch-fi (or Fantastic Archaeology) refers to a series of theories developed outside (or against) the established canons of critical archaeology.

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Overview

Unsubstantiated claims of newly found historical documents or overt forgery have affected the field of Biblical Studies since its inception. These Modern Apocrypha aimed to offer alternative views and new meanings to familiar events and familiar characters, while longing for scholarly attention.

A new phenomenon, however, emerged in the 19th century, when some ancient or new legends about the past exited the realm of fiction and began to be developed in scholarly form, as if they were genuine historical facts. The new genre of Fantastic Archaeology (arch-fi) was born. What all arch-fi theories have in common is a total disregard for, if not an overt opposition against, the rules of the historical method. Instead of testing the evidence to see what hypotheses it fits, Arch-fi frames the archaeological data to fit a "desired conclusion." Since the beginning, the phenomenon was not restricted to the biblical field as is proved by the extraordinary success of books like Atlantis: The Antediluvian World (1882) by Ignatius L. Donnelly.

The first "pseudo-scholarly" books were published around thesis like the Jesus Survival and speculations about Jesus Hidden Years, and concerned the alleged discovery of secret documents from the time of Jesus. The Essenes provided a good example of a secret society that could be easily connected either with the education of Jesus or with the "staging" of his resurrection.

A new chapter was open in 1894 when Notovitich claimed to have found written evidence that Jesus lived in India during his Hidden Years. Notovitch's work prompted a revival of the theory that Jesus survived the crucifixion and consequently, went (or returned) to India and died there. The theory was largely exploited in Anti-Semitic circles and by Nazism as evidence that Jesus was an Aryan, persecuted as such by the "inferior Jewish race"; see Der ewige Jude (1940 Hippler), film. Not accidentally, the two major non-fiction books to revive the Jesus Survival Hypothesis after the Second World War and the Holocaust, namely, The Nazarene Gospel Restored (1953) by Robert Graves and The Passover Plot (1965) by Hugh J. Schonfield, would be very careful to distant themselves from racial theories, emphasizing the Jewishness of Jesus.

In the 1970s The Jesus Scroll (1972 Joyce), arch-fi initiated a new trend by claiming that Jesus had a wife and fathered a child. The work also introduced as a historical fact the idea of an ongoing conspiracy by Church authorities to hide the true nature of Christianity. In the 1970s it also became popular to take some biblical events as evidence for the presence of aliens on earth; see Alien Jesus.

In the 1980s, such beliefs developed in more and more elaborated theories. In 1982 Holy Blood, Holy Grail by Michael Baigent, Richard Leigh, and Henry Lincoln connected theories about the marriage of Jesus and Church conspiracy, with the legend of the Holy Grail. The book claimed that Jesus of Nazareth married Mary Magdalene, had children and started a royal dynasty championed today by a secret society called the Priory of Sion.

In the 1990s it was the delay in the publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls that generated a new wave of non-fiction literature speculating on the conspiracy by the Vatican to hide material that could have a devastating effect on the credibility of the Christian faith.

The 2000s saw an unprecedented spread of Fantastic Archaeology. The Internet, the world-wide success of the Da Vinci Code and the general fascination for conspiratory theories, have popularized the genre and prepared the setting for some sensational, highly-publicized (and quickly forgotten) media events. Simcha Jacobovici has specialized in the production of highly elaborated and very entertaining TV shows, such as the premiere in 2007 of the documentary on The Jesus Family Tomb, which promised nothing less than the rediscovery of the tomb of Jesus and his family.

References

• Francis B. Harrold and Raymond A. Eve, eds., Cult Archaeology and Creationism: Pseudoscientific Beliefs About the Past (Iowa City, IA: University of Iowa Press, 1987)

External links

• Wikipedia