Simcha Jacobovici

Simcha Jacobovici (Template:PronEng) (born April 4, 1953 in Petah Tikva, Israel) is an Israeli and Canadian controversial film director, producer and free-lance journalist and writer. He holds a B.A. in Philosophy from McGill University and an M.A. in International Relations from the University of Toronto. He currently hosts the The Naked Archaeologist on VisionTV in Canada and The History Channel in the U.S.

Filmography

Jacobovici's films are (starting with most recent):

• Sex slaves
• Impact of Terror
• James, Brother of Jesus?
• The Exodus Decoded
• Falasha: Exile of the Black Jews
• Deadly Currents
• Hollywoodism: Jews, Movies & the American Dream
• Quest for the Lost Tribes
• The Struma
• The Lost Tomb of Jesus, also co-wrote with Dr. Charles Pellegrino its companion book "The Jesus Family Tomb" (Harper Collins 2007).
• Charging the Rhino

Criticism of Jacobovici's Films

Much criticism has focused on Jacobovici since the announcement of the release of his 2007 work with James Cameron. This included an opinion piece by David Warren, a religious affairs columnist for the Ottawa Citizen who criticized Jacobovici’s work on The Lost Tomb of Christ as a “disgusting little exercise in money-making,” and calling Jacobovici “an appalling, disrespectful man”. The column cited Amos Kloner, the first archeologist to examine the site where the ossuaries were taken, "They just want to get money for it. It was an ordinary middle-class Jerusalem burial cave. The names on the caskets are the most common names found among Jews at the time." It also cited the film’s own archeologist Dr. Shimon Gibson who stated his own skepticism on Jacobovici's interpretation of the finds. Kloner’s opposition has appeared in several media outlets who points out that Cameron and Jacobovici “are not archeologists” and calling their claims “impossible” and “nonsense.” Archaeologists Joe Zias (of Rockefeller University in Jerusalem) said that “Simcha [Jacobovici] has no credibility whatsoever.” Jacobovici’s critics also point to a 2006 episode of Jacobovici’s The Naked Archaeologist were he defended the possibility that an ossuary found in 2002 actually belonged to “James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus” despite the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) in 2003 condemning part of the inscription (not the name itself) as a modern addition added by a forger.

On an episode of the Naked Archaeologist an accredited archaeologist pointed out that Jacobovici's theory that an earthquake may have been responsible for the walls of Jericho falling was neither supported by the Bible nor any archaeological evidence. When Jacobovici persisted in his claim the archaeologist accused him of being a follower of the scientifically discredited Immanuel Velikovsky.

Controversy And Misinformation Over Jacobovici's Filmography Views

The Exodus

Archaeologists and biblical scholars have raised numerous complaints against Jacobovici's films, including that they downplay the speculative nature of "controversial claims," that they present theory as fact, and even that they falsify facts. For instance, Bryant G. Wood criticizes The Exodus Decoded, saying that "Jacobovici does more harm than good since he mishandles the archaeological evidence, hence providing fuel to skeptics who wish to undermine the Exodus."

The Talpiot Tomb

Another controversial work, Jacobovici and James Cameron's The Lost Tomb of Jesus, presented the theory that the Talpiot tomb was the burial place of Jesus' family. The heart of Jacobovici's theory is that while Jesus, Joseph, and other names found in the tomb were common names in Jesus' time, the probability of finding the particular combination of names found there pointed to the possibility that this was, in fact, Jesus' family tomb. This theory has been widely denounced by biblical scholars.

A symposium at Princeton University in January 2008 reignited media interest in the Talpiot tomb. Time magazine covered the event as a re-opening of the argument about the tomb. and CNN "I feel vindicated," Jacobovici told TIME. "It's moved from 'it can't be the Jesus' family tomb' to 'it could be.' " After three days of vigorous debate, the panel remained deeply divided. Opinions ranged from "definitely yes" to impossible."

Some scholars present at the symposium accused Simcha Jacobovici and James Cameron of misleading the media by claiming that the symposium bolstered the viability of their theory. Several scholars, including all of the archaeologists and epigraphers, who had delivered papers at the symposium issued an open letter of complaint at what they viewed as misrepresentation, saying that Jacobovici and Cameron's claims of support from the symposium "could not be further from the truth."

The list of scholars who signed the open letter's critical of Jacobovici's presentation of the symposium and its findings included:

• Professor Jodi Magness, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
• Professor Eric M. Meyers, Duke University
• Choon-Leon Seow, Princeton Theological Seminary
• F.W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Princeton Theological Seminary
• Lee McDonald, Princeton Theological Seminary, visiting
• Rachel Hachlili, Haifa University
• Motti Aviam, University of Rochester
• Amos Kloner, Bar Ilan University
• Christopher Rollston, Emmanuel School of Religion
• Shimon Gibson, University of North Carolina at Charlotte
• Joe Zias, Science and Antiquity Group, Jerusalem
• Jonathan Price, Tel Aviv University
• C.D. Elledge, Gustavus Adolphus College

Joe Zias, Senior Curator of Archaeology/Anthropology for the Israel Antiquities Authority from 1972-1997, cited a leaked memo issued by James Tabor before the symposium as proof of "outside intervention by Jacobovici and Cameron in order to distort the agenda and skew the proceedings in a way that was favorable to their pre-conceived plan." Geza Vermes issued a statement saying that the arguments for the Talpiot tomb are not "just unconvincing but insignificant." Vermes added, "[d]iscounting a handful, headed by James Tabor and Simcha Jacobovici, the maker of the documentary, The Lost Tomb of Jesus, most of the fifty or so participants shared this opinion"

Princeton Theological Seminary issued a letter following the controversy and reiterated concerns that:

the press following the symposium gave almost the exact opposite impression [of the symposium's results], stating, instead, that the conference proceedings gave credence to the identification of the Talpiot tomb with a putative family tomb of Jesus of Nazareth. As is abundantly clear from the statements to the contrary that have been issued since the symposium by many of the participants, such representations are patently false and blatantly misrepresent the spirit and scholarly content of the deliberations.

Graves in Mycenae

Jacobovici has also theorized that the graves found in Mycenae by Heinrich Schliemann belonged to runaway Jews. In particular, he claimed that one of the artifacts found at the site had a visual depiction of the Ark of the Covenant. According to Michael Wood in "In Search of the Trojan War," the graves were 1000 years older than the Trojan War and would, therefore, be about 750-800 years older than the Exodus. Additionally Jacobovici doesn't take his argument further than the supposed visual depiction of the Ark on the artifact. In short Jacobovici's claim is highly conjectural and has less validity than Schliemann's that one of the graves belonged to Agamemnon.

Other controversial claims and inferences

• The Trojan gold and graves in present day Turkey are not actually Trojan (or Greek) but are those of a group of Hebrews that were fleeing Egypt, got separated and lost, and somehow ended up in Turkey!
• Hebrew slaves invented the alphabet. In one of the Naked Archaeologist episodes, Jacobovici makes the argument that Hebrew slaves invented the Proto-Sinaitic script, rather than the Phoenicians.
• Jacobovici discovered the tomb of Jesus Christ.
• Jacobovici claims that the reasons why Egyptian authority didn't grant him permission to dig around the border with Gaza and Israel during the making of the The Exodus Decoded was because the Egyptians didn't want him to expose the truth that the biblical story of the Exodus is actually fact.
• Hebrew slaves built the pyramids of Giza in Egypt. (Although no religious, historical (Egyptologists or other) or scientific proof exists to validate such claim especially when the tombs of the builders have already been found, near the pyramids of Giza.
• Jacobovici claims that the water at El Balah descended into sinkholes so that the Hebrews could pass, although the old testament clearly states that the water parted and the Hebrews walked on dry land.

Personal life

Simcha is an Orthodox Jew. He is married to Nicole Kornberg and has 4 girls and a boy.

Awards

• Gold Medal from the International Documentary Festival Visions du réel of Nyon.
• Certificate of Special Merit from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in Los Angeles
• Genie Award
• U.S. Cable Ace Award (three times)
• Canadian Gemini Award (twice)
• Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award
• Broadcast Award (UK)
• Royal Television Society Award
• Edward R. Murrow Award from the Overseas Press Club (US)
• Emmy for "Outstanding Investigative Journalism" three times (1996, 1997 and 2007)

Bibliography

• Jacobovici, Simcha; Pellegrino, Charles (2007). The Jesus Family Tomb: The Discovery, the Investigation, and the Evidence That Could Change History. New York: HarperLuxe. ISBN 0061252999. {{cite book}}: Unknown parameter |month= ignored (help)

External links

• Simcha Jacobovici at IMDb
• Official Site for The Lost Tomb of Jesus
• Simcha Jacobovici Interview