News of a potentially big development in archaeology broke over the weekend:

A three-foot-tall tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew that scholars believe dates from the decades just before the birth of Jesus is causing a quiet stir in biblical and archaeological circles, especially because it may speak of a messiah who will rise from the dead after three days.

If such a messianic description really is there, it will contribute to a developing re-evaluation of both popular and scholarly views of Jesus, since it suggests that the story of his death and resurrection was not unique but part of a recognized Jewish tradition at the time.

The tablet, probably found near the Dead Sea in Jordan according to some scholars who have studied it, is a rare example of a stone with ink writings from that era — in essence, a Dead Sea Scroll on stone.

Interesting. If it pans out, it will certainly add to our understanding of the social and political situation in Palestine around the time of Jesus. The key word there, of course, is if. Anybody remember the ossuary supposedly belonging to James?

There's no reason to think the new tablet is a forgery. But there is every reason to be skittish about complicated and incomplete evidence that has yet to pass through academic scrutiny.

And this part is clearly bull:

“This should shake our basic view of Christianity,” he said as he sat in his office of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem where he is a senior fellow in addition to being the Yehezkel Kaufman Professor of Biblical Studies at Hebrew University. “Resurrection after three days becomes a motif developed before Jesus, which runs contrary to nearly all scholarship. What happens in the New Testament was adopted by Jesus and his followers based on an earlier messiah story.”

...

“His mission is that he has to be put to death by the Romans to suffer so his blood will be the sign for redemption to come,” Mr. Knohl said. “This is the sign of the son of Joseph. This is the conscious view of Jesus himself. This gives the Last Supper an absolutely different meaning. To shed blood is not for the sins of people but to bring redemption to Israel.”

I'm reminded of one of Luke Johnson's declarations: that even if the body of Jesus were found, it wouldn't touch the core of the Christian faith. The gospels, he invariably reminded seminarians, were not histories or biographies. They were testaments to the life-changing power their authors experienced in Jesus.

By that score, it makes little difference if early Christians adapted free-floating messianic stories to describe the inbreaking of God's presence in the man of Nazareth. Of course they would: they were struggling to describe a earth-shaking event without parallel. No wonder they reached for the language of Hebrew scripture, and yes, probably contemporary narratives. As for the distinction between the "sins of people" and bringing "redemption to Israel", duh. That's a point that's been well-understood for decades, at least outside of fundamentalist circles.

Not that any of that will forestall the inevitable stories in Time and Newsweek and US News about the new challenge to traditional faith, all timed to come out around Christmas or Easter. Nor will it stop anyone from writing a book on how this proves that we have to give up on Christianity in favor of some obscure and often nonsensical tradition. No, it doesn't.