All language subtitles for Forbidden.History.S05E05.The.Dead.Sea.Scrolls.Conspiracy.1080p.UKTV.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-BTN_track3_[eng]

The Dead Sea Scrolls were one of
the most important archaeological

finds of the time. They were
discovered here in the caves

of Qumran, near the Dead Sea.

But what was written on them?

What secrets about the time
of Jesus do they reveal?

Why did the Roman Catholic Church
keep them out of the public domain

for nearly 30 years?

Why were they considered
so controversial?

And what still lies...

..buried out here?

To modern Israel, the Dead Sea
Scrolls are of immense significance

and they're treated with enormous
respect and reverence.

They bridge a gap in knowledge
about Jewish history.

The most fascinating document
that came out of Qumran

was undoubtedly the Copper Scroll.

The records that it kept
were about treasure,

and it laid out in precise details,
with X marks the spot.

This was pure Indiana Jones stuff.
It seemed to reveal the locations

of bundles of treasure
in the Holy Lands.

I have no doubt that there's
really sexy, really heretical

information in the Dead Sea
Scrolls that we may never see.

The scrolls were not published
for 40, 50 years.

When they were asked repeatedly,
"When are you going to publish

"the scrolls?" They kept saying,
"It's on a need-to-know basis."

I mean, can you imagine any
historical discovery where

that will be tolerated today?

The Dead Sea Scrolls are made up
of thousands of written fragments,

the remains of larger manuscripts,
damaged by natural causes

or through human interference.

However, there are a small number
of well-preserved, almost-intact

manuscripts that have survived.
Fewer than a dozen.

And using radiocarbon tests,
scholars have dated them

from about three centuries BC
to around the first century AD.

Now, they were all discovered in
just 11 caves here around me,

in Qumran, just about a mile from
the Dead Sea, over in the distance.

The question everyone has is this...

..what else is buried out here?

One of the reasons for the great
mystery about the Dead Sea Scrolls

is the fact that after they were
found, they were kept secret

for decades and it wasn't
for a very long time

until they were
released to scholars.

In that atmosphere, particularly of
Biblical research, where there's

very little new material for people
to look at, this became explosive.

People were wondering,
"What is in them?"

The texts have great historical,
religious and linguistic

significance because they are some
of the oldest written works

about the Jewish people ever found.

The texts are written on
parchment, some on papyrus,

and one on copper.

Some in Hebrew, some in Aramaic,
and some in Greek.

Archaeologists have long associated
the scrolls with the ancient Jewish

sect called the Essenes.

Although, recent interpretations
have challenged this,

and some scholars argue that priests
in Jerusalem or other Jewish groups

actually wrote the scrolls.

When the scrolls were discovered,
they were, as often happens

with artefacts, they were sold on
the market, a vast number of them.

And so it took a while to bring them
all back together again, and a

number of authorities had control
over them at different times.

The Jordanians, the Israelis,
the Vatican... And of course,

in an environment when these
weren't being released,

there was suspicion that they
weren't being released for a reason.

The Vatican wasn't letting people
know what was in them

because there might be something
there that didn't suit the Vatican.

People think the conspiracy
around the Dead Sea Scrolls

is because the Catholic Church
didn't want us to find out some

really juicy stuff about Jesus
that would alter our perception

of the Church.

Actually, it appears that maybe
it wasn't about Jesus at all.

It was about John the Baptist.

Because one of the first people
involved with the with the dig

at Qumran...

..um, has said that they found a
headless body there. A skeleton.

And it was believed that this might
be the body of John the Baptist.

And anything to do with John
the Baptist sends shock waves

and terror into the heart of the
Vatican because they know that

John the Baptist is
theological dynamite.

Because he was a rival to Jesus.

Organised religion was
really fearful about what

the Dead Sea Scrolls could reveal,
cos they date to the time

of Jesus Christ and earlier.

So, what if they had the truth
about the nature of Jesus

and Mary Magdalene?

All sorts of things that are just
completely opposed to what's been

taught ever since. Now,
that's a lot to fear.

Because of the poor condition of
some of the scrolls, scholars have

not been able to
identify all of them.

But here's what we do know.

Some 40% are made up of copies of
texts from the Hebrew Scriptures...

..around about another 30% of text
from the Second Temple period,

and the remainder, roughly 30%, are
non-religious manuscripts that

shed light on the rules and beliefs
of a particular Jewish group.

One theory is that around 2,000
years ago, a small group of people,

who opposed the main religion in
Jerusalem, came here to get away

from the worldliness of the city,
and to practise their variation

of Judaism that they documented
in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

This area of Qumran is remote,
arid, and not lived in today.

However, it is here that many
archaeological digs have been

conducted in search of the scrolls.

Historian and archaeologist
Danny Herman has been involved

in a number of them and
has a particular interest

in the Copper Scroll.

The Copper Scroll is really a
big mystery on so many levels.

OK? If this group was living
in the middle of nowhere,

how could it have so much wealth?

The wealth that is described
in the Copper Scroll.

I personally believe that the Copper
Scroll is a league of itself.

It's not part of the
Dead Sea Scrolls.

It was created by the
priests in Jerusalem,

and taken to be hidden with
the Dead Sea Scrolls...

..as the Romans were advancing.

And, that would explain why the
other scrolls are all on papyrus

or parchment, and this one
was on copper, right?

That they were actually different?

That could also explain
how could someone

both mention such treasures, and
also afford such expensive material

to write on or incise the letters
on.

And that's a copper sheath.

It's way more expensive than
the papyrus or parchment.

In 1956, English archaeologist John
Allegro was the first to transcribe

the Copper Scroll and identified
locations where Temple treasures

were hidden around Qumran.

Danny was part of an archaeological
dig that went to one of the

locations listed as a potential
hiding place for some

of the treasures.

So here we are...

..in an area of the valley
that becomes a canyon.

But it's all natural.

And yet...

..on the left side of this canyon...

..in the 1960s, Allegro publishes
the existence of a man-made tunnel.

And the reason he got so interested
in this tunnel is because he argued

that it could be the tunnel
mentioned in Section A

of the Copper Scroll.

And if it was indeed the one it
could be containing huge amounts

of treasures, of silver,
of Temple tools.

Who knows what could
be hidden in there.

It's actually above our heads.

With no mark around it.

No steps leading into it.

And nowadays, it's got a big
piece of cement protecting it

from flash floods.

Can I go and have a
look? Yeah, go ahead.

Did I mention the snakes?
THEY LAUGH

Oh, wow.

Well, the Copper Scroll was the most
exciting, the most, kind of,

headline-grabbing, most
media-friendly discovery cos it was

like a sort of Biblical
treasure map.

The frustrating thing
about the Copper Scroll,

it doesn't seem to align
with actual places.

So, perhaps it was always a fake
map, perhaps the names of the places

are written in code and we haven't
quite cracked the code yet.

That's a possibility.

But there are still people to this
day who are out there looking

for the treasure that's been
promised by this map.

The Copper Scroll lists
60 hiding locations

and containing maybe 100 or 200
tonnes of gold and silver.

That by itself sounds like
a hallucination, you know?

Who could have so much wealth?

But let's remember, up in Jerusalem,
the priests were collecting huge

amounts of wealth from the Temple
tax and from donations of Jews

from all around the world.

So such quantities of
wealth are possible.

But why would they be hidden and
why would they be documented

on a copper scroll, and why would
that Copper Scroll be hidden

with the Dead Sea Scrolls
next to the Dead Sea?

If we were to find at least one of
the treasures, we could at least

tell that Copper Scroll is a real
documentation of real treasures.

I don't think it's a hoax because
you've got the Romans bearing

down on you, you know?
They're coming for you.

What are you going to do? Sit there
and write a huge lengthy hoax

on a copper scroll? Doesn't
seem like a good idea.

Probably better to run,
actually, at that point.

So these are people desperately
writing this stuff down in the hope

it will be found. I don't
think it was a hoax.

I think it's somewhere out there.

Although there was nothing found
in the first tunnel, the leader

of the dig took Danny and the team
to a second location nearby,

that fits the description as a
possible hiding place for treasure.

It's just down the stream...

..over here. All right. OK.

Another tunnel similarly designed on
the left side of the dry riverbed...

..going in a very sharp angle.

Maybe this one will
contain the treasures.

Can we go in there? Can we climb in?

We can but it's a bit dangerous.
You could be running out of air

at a certain depth, OK? And
we'll also need torches. OK?

OK. Well, I've got a camera, so...

But if you're feeling
uncomfortable... Yeah.

..if you're feeling you're running
out of air, we should stop.

OK. OK. I'll let you know.
I'll lead. Yeah. OK.

A massive amount of rock and debris
was cleared from this tunnel

and it now extends 40 metres
down into the cliff.

So you... You excavated this cave.

Yeah. I joined Oren when he
was working on this cave.

It was very hard...

A lot of dust.

But it's clearly man-made.

OK? You can see the chisel
marks, you can see the steps.

This cannot be natural.

OK?

And why would someone
care to do all of this?

What are you benefiting
from carving here?

There's not even...
green ores.

Yeah, there's no... This
is not a copper mine.

No, it's definitely not.
It's not to get water.

This is not an aqueduct
or a cistern.

It's just a man-made tunnel
that goes to nowhere.

OK. But we were excited...

Sure. ..cos the potential was huge.
You know, such a tunnel could be

hiding the treasures of the Copper
Scroll, or at least some of it,

that was the hope. And
that's what kept you going?

That's what kept you digging? That
was, for me personally,

a big motivation. Sure. And
finding nothing at the end,

that was quite disappointing.

Inevitably, when there is wealth
of that magnitude hidden around

somewhere, this gets the
attention of archaeologists

and of treasure hunters.

And since the release of the Copper
Scroll and the details, people have

tried very hard to
locate these places,

not with great success but it hasn't
stopped armies of them trying.

It wasn't until 1991, a full 44
years after they were discovered,

that general access was made
available to photographs

of the scrolls.

In November of that year, those
photos were published by the

Biblical Archaeological Society, and
the Huntington Library promised to

open all the microfilm files of
all of the scroll photographs.

I don't think people immediately
realised how important this

discovery was. Bits went
in different directions.

The Hebrew University ended up with
some, and a Syrian archbishop ran

off to New York with another bit of
it, but I think as it became

evident what this was, then
the excitement rose hugely.

It was not immediately clear
that these were objects

of particular Scriptural value.

So they really do the rounds.

They kind of... A lot of
them travel to America.

They end up in the hands of various
academics and scientists.

But the Vatican quickly got wind of
this and locked on to it and then

sent its agents out and did
everything possible to scoop them up

and then kept them under lock
and key for a long, long time.

For a suspiciously long amount of
time before any kind of results

of their investigation
were published.

The Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered
in Qumran, about an hour and a half

away from Jerusalem by car today.

And yet this city is literally
alive with historic treasures

right under our feet.

Khader Baidun is one of Jerusalem's
most famous antique dealers.

I've met him a few times before at
his shop here in the Old City.

It really is a treasure trove of
artefacts that cover the last

5,000 or 6,000 years.

Historic relics are big
business here in Jerusalem.

It's not only relics that
Khader is an expert on.

40 years after the discovery
of the first scrolls,

he actually met the Bedouin
shepherd who found them.

So, Khader, tell me how the
Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered.

It was by accident when he
lost his... One of his goats.

He was looking to find it and
it was in a cave, that cave.

And when he went down to see,
to look after his goat,

he found the jars around the cave
and it was full of scroll.

Each jar with one scroll.

And when you say jar, what...
What, like a, um...?

It is like... Here.
Here's, like this jar.

Oh, wow. That's from the
same period, 2,000 year ago.

This is 2,000 years old? Yes. Yes.

And so the scrolls were...
Was stored in the jar.

Hidden... They hide it
in a jar. Right. OK.

And then he find it, and he
pick one or two of them,

in that time, just for curiosity...

He didn't know what it was. Sure.

And then he was walking in Bethlehem
where he met...

..the guy who fixed the sandals.

Yeah. And then he say, "I've found
this thing here, do you know..."

What it is? What is it, is
it worth money or whatever?

Then he said to him, "OK.

"You know what...

"..we can sweep it. Just
give you one sandal, and..."

He... So one of the most important
discoveries of all time,

he swapped for a pair of sandals?
Yes, he swapped it, with him.

And then...

..he had no idea how
much it's worth.

The story of what happens to the
scrolls is really interesting

because at first they were
completely invalidated.

The boys take them back to the
village, the village elders take
them

to various places, and in Bethlehem
they were told, "No, these...

"These are fakes, they are
worthless, they're probably stolen

"from some synagogue."

But eventually... You know, shortly
thereafter, in 1947,

someone who understands what they
really are, buys the first

few of them in Jerusalem.

And then, before you know
it, there's advertisements

in The Wall Street Journal for these
scrolls, and they've been trying to

sell them to universities
for large sums of money.

So, I mean, how much would they be
worth, the Dead Sea Scrolls?

If someone was to find them today?

In that time, it wasn't... I mean,
in that time, there was not...

..much money in the
hands of people. Sure.

When you talk about in that time,
one million.

Like you are saying now...

..900 million.

Wow. Yeah. So, worth
a lot of money? Yeah.

And so, could there be more scrolls
hidden in caves around Qumran now?

Certainly, there is more.

Because, what I believe, that

there is the possibility.
Because of this 2,000 year...

Raining and the weather, and there
was earthquake and it cover...

..one of these caves and that's
the possibility, that it's still

in one of these caves.

It might come as some surprise,

but the black market for the Dead
Sea Scrolls is still alive and well

and has been since 1947 when they
first were, kind of, discovered and

acknowledged as existing
in the first place,

and they trade because there's
always going to be interest

from wealthy patrons who want
to get their hands on these.

And it's also reflective of the fact
that while we have an official

Israeli organization that holds the
known Dead Sea Scrolls,

there are many others that are
not part of that library.

We shouldn't assume that there isn't
a whole load more scrolls out there.

I mean, about 50,000
fragments have been discovered,

but they still think there's
many more out there.

But a sizeable chunk of the Dead
Sea Scrolls that were discovered

ended up in private hands and these
were passed around. The dealers...

Some people thought they were
fake, other people didn't.

Some ended up in the hands of
academics, and even to this day,

it could be the case that, sort
of, the bounty is fragmented

and there are interesting
discoveries to be made, you know,

just in someone's loft.

Even though there could be some
fragments of the scrolls in private

collections, today, the vast
majority can be found here...

..at the Dead Sea Scrolls laboratory

at the Israeli Antiquities
Authority.

The preservation and research
on the scrolls by the Israelis

is led by the head of the Dead Sea
Scrolls projects, Pnina Shor,

who has given us special permission
to see some real pieces

of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Now, I'm desperate to see... OK.

So we'll show you. Can you... Can
you show us? So we'll show you. OK.

Fantastic. Can you come
and help us, please?

Now, obviously you don't
want me to touch them or...

I don't touch them. So, of course,
you don't. I don't touch them. No,

no, no. OK. It's only the
conservators... There's five women

conservators who... They're the only
ones allowed to touch these scrolls.

And as you can see, they don't touch
them with bare hands either.

So, what you see here is one of the
1,200... Or five...

1,500 plates that has still...
that has not been undone yet.

So, hang on... But
this... This isn't....

These are fragments
of the scrolls?

These are... These tiny... Yes.

These are minute fragments
of scrolls. OK?

In this case, we're holding a plate
with unknown fragments that

were collected together.

But as you can see...

..and as you realise...

Uh, the big scroll is as important
as, or might be as important as,

this minute fragment, because it can
be the missing link in the jigsaw

puzzle and therefore, every single
fragment is being treated.

But, hang on. So, is there writing
on these tiny fragments? Yes.

Yes, there's writing on these
fragments but because it has been

taped... Can you turn it back?
Because it has been taped...

Oh, I can see the sellotape. See?
The residues of the tape enter,

or they penetrate the
parchment or the papyrus,

and they cause their disintegration.

The work being done is
painstaking beyond belief.

We say scrolls, but actually many
of them are fragments no bigger

than your fingernail.

This is like putting together a
jigsaw of the Mona Lisa that's

the size of four football pitches.

But the reason it's being done is
because the information in those

scrolls about that crucial period
of Judaism, as they're moving

from Temple Judaism through to the
more synagogue-based version

that we would recognise today,
and the evolution in that time

of sects and cults,
like Christianity,

is fascinating to the history of
Judaism and there are no other

sources for it.

This is unique and therefore is very
important to those who specialise

in this area.

Do you have any other...

..maybe larger, fragments that
I can take a look at? Yes.

Sure.

So, here you see a plate
still waiting for treatment.

You can still see the tape,
you can see binding paper.

What are these made of? Is
it papyrus or parchment?

This is parchment. Parchment.
These are parchment.

Most of their religious
writings that we have

are written on parchment.

The documentary material
is written on papyrus.

So is this now... Is it, like,
hard? Would it snap? Yes.

It's not flexible or malleable like
paper? It's not flexible

because it was in the rubble
or because it came in contact

with humidity - it blackens
and it becomes like a gel.

OK? And so it becomes dark
and you cannot actually see

with your eyes what is written on
some of it. You see some of it is...

Yeah. I can see writing on this one
but this is impossible

to read. But if you look
at this plate, this plate has been

treated already. So you cleaned it?
Yes. So what happens is they cover

the front, because the majority of
the scroll's original parchment are

written on one side, so
they cover the front.

They turn it on the back and
they try and cleanse it...

SPEAKS OWN LANGUAGE

..from previous treatments. OK?

And so, in this case, for example,
OK? They covered it, they turned it,

they cleansed it from all the gooey
and dirt and all the materials that

had been applied beforehand.

They strengthened the edges.

OK?

And when they're through and they
turn it back and they take off

the cover, many times the
writing comes back to life.

Wow. And this is very,
very exciting.

I think you almost have to look
at the Dead Sea Scrolls

as the foundational document
of the State of Israel.

You know, the US has the Declaration
of Independence,

Israel has the Scripture, has
the Old Testament.

And this is the oldest, by far
the oldest,

version of the Old Testament.

So, of course, they're going to
guard it jealously,

plus the fact they've had other
people taking bits of it,

it's shot off in all
different directions,

they've desperately tried to get
it back.

So, clearly, when they do get the
scrolls back into one place,

they're going to make sure nobody
else gets a look in.

So, what you see in front
of you here

is a sheet of the big sand scroll
from Cave 11,

it's a complete sheet. You see the
sewing on one end,

and the other sewing in the
other end,

and we have about five of them
that were, of course,

sewn together, rolled.

And to keep them safely, they were
put in a jar in the cave.

As it was rolled and put, the bottom
part touched the ground

or touched the humidity. This
bit? This bit.

And therefore what
looks to you as if it is burnt,

it's actually gelatinised, meaning
the material, through the humidity,

becomes like a gel, and
slowly disintegrates.

So the scroll we just saw is from
the first century CE,

this scroll is first century BC, and
what you're seeing in front of you

is part of the book of
the Torat Kohanim.

All the copies of The
Book of the Torat Kohanim,

this is the only one that preserves,
all of the Ten Commandments.

Wow. So these are the Ten
Commandments?

These are the earliest copy of the
Ten Commandments that we have.

The complete Ten Commandments.

It begins here, with "I am your
God," and goes through this column

and this column. And the most
important one is,

the Fifth Commandment, it says...

SHE READS IN HEBREW

"Honour thy father and thy mother...

"..you will have a long and
healthy life."

Today, the Jewish people hold
the Dead Sea Scrolls as sacred,

and as they should, because they
represent the earliest,

sort of, full description of their
religious origins.

There isn't a more important
library in all of Israel than this,

because it's the foundation of their
religion, and of their state.

The preservation of the scrolls
is clearly a massive task,

with thousands of fragments
still to be catalogued and archived.

However, some of the processed
scrolls are on display in museums

around the world, for the public
to see in all their glory.

What's fascinating is that
some archaeologists believe

there is still more to be found.

A team of archaeologists in Qumran,

working under the
banner Operation Scroll,

excavated a 12th cave, known
as Cave 53, early in 2017.

Unbelievably, despite the cave
having been looted,

the experts confirm that it did
once hold scrolls.

One of the men in charge of the team
was Oren Gutfeld.

I've spoken to several experts
who say that the whole area around

Qumran has been surveyed once,
twice, three times,

and there's nothing more
to be found. Do you agree?

Well, that's not true, because of
the attitude that our professor told
us,

at the university, is - "There's no
more scrolls over there.

"The Bedouins' Operation Scroll
found everything."

In the last five to seven years,
more and more small pieces,

or fragments of parchments of
scrolls arrived to the markets

here in the Old City of Jerusalem.

You're telling me that fragments
of scrolls are traded by dealers

here in the Old City?
That's correct. That's correct.

Of course people are still looking
for this treasure,

and why wouldn't they?

There is a Jewish archaeologist,
by name of Doctor Oren Gutfeld,

who is doing a lot of work in this
area and he's finding things

in caves around Qumran that
are suggesting that there

were scrolls there.

There's fragments of papyrus,
there's shards of pottery.

So it's really quite encouraging
that we might be beginning

to decipher this Copper Scroll,
after all these years.

Today, the State of Israel
established a new survey programme,

Operation Scroll Two, sponsored by
the government,

with teams, now this
minute, are serving on the cliffs

and working in the caves. So I don't
know how, from that,

they got the idea that there's
nothing more to look over there,

and look, my cave, Cave 53, is the
proof that there's more over there,

we have found a new scroll cave.

The Dead Sea Scrolls are held up
as a cornerstone of historic

discoveries concerning the
Jewish people.

But how much do we actually learn
about them from these scrolls?

And are there still more
scrolls to be found?

Dr Noam Mizrahi is a celebrated
academic who agreed to meet with me

and give me the unvarnished truth.

So, Noam, tell me,

what actually is contained

in the manuscripts?

What can they, what do they tell us?
What is actually written down on the
scrolls?

It's a bit of a bewildering
collection of text, to be honest.

We can divide the scrolls
into three or four major groups

of texts. One group of text, which
is about 25% of the material -

so, about, let's say, 250 scrolls -

is what we call Biblical scrolls,

the earliest copies of books
that we know as parts

of the Hebrew Bible. Right. But...

..the kind of stuff that we knew
anyway, stuff we've read.

Absolutely.

However, it's very important for me
to emphasise that almost none

of these copies is identical

to the text of the Bible
as we know it. OK.

Sometimes the differences
are very slight -

there are methods of spelling,
of orthography, of language.

Sometimes, however, these
are major differences.

The text, it's like that you read
a different edition

of the same text. So should we be
updating the Bible? Should we be

updating the Old Testament
with these discoveries?

Well, we should definitely know
that even the Old Testament

had a history.

So, before the Dead Sea Scrolls,
the oldest version of the

New Testament we had was from about
the 400s, but the oldest version

of the Old Testament was actually
a lot more recent, was only

1,000 years old, so this meant we
now had a 2,000-year-old version

of the Old Testament -

everything except the Book
of Esther - so that in itself,

obviously, was fascinating
to both Jews and Christians.

But also we learnt a lot
about this strange community out

there in Qumran, who were a kind
of mix of radical Jews

and proto-Christians.

You know, I think you have
to see it as a very fluid
environment. It tells us a lot about

the sort of people who invented
modern Judaism

and modern Christianity.

Do you think that there
are still secrets hidden

within the scrolls, within
the documents, that we are yet

to find out?

I would say that all the scrolls
by now are known,

but the scrolls have disintegrated
to so many small fragments

and the assortment of these
fragments is, like, a huge number

of jigsaw puzzles

that we're still playing with.

So, every year there is a new
publication, more than one

publication, which offers
a new identification of fragments,

a new assortment, new joining
of fragments, and then this

in turn recolours our
understanding of the text.

Do you think it's possible
that there are more scrolls hidden

in Qumran or in the mountains
nearby.

Personally, I very much hope that
there are.

It would be wonderful, of course,
if we get other scrolls,

even if we get other copies
of the same text

that we have in Qumran, even that
would be a major help,

because so many of the texts
are so hopelessly fragmentary that

every new bit of information
would be crucial.

It's possible there's a lot more
to find at Qumran, because we don't

know the extent of the cave network.

People did bury stuff, and certainly
around the time of the Roman

suppression, about 130 AD,
a lot of those

documents have gone missing.
Something of a dark age

in historical knowledge.

And, yes, there probably is a lot
more stuff, but whether it's going

to be explosive or sensational, you
know, to the, to outsiders,

or just some more academic stuff, is
absolutely open to question.

Apart from the excavation
of the 12th cave in Qumran,

there is another equally
fascinating story related

to the Dead Sea Scrolls.

A man came forward in March 2011,
claiming that he had found a small

leather codex in a cave in Jordan.

His name is David Elkington.

According to the story,

these ring-bound lead and copper
codices were in the possession

of an Israeli Bedouin farmer
named Hassan Saeda,

who claimed that they had been found
by his great grandfather in a cave

a century ago.

Elkington believes the codices
could contain the earliest

historical evidence of Jesus'
existence, and was quoted in the

press that they might be as
important as the Dead Sea Scrolls.

However, the Israeli Antiquities
Authority considered them

inauthentic and worthless, saying
the books are a mixture

of incompatible periods and styles
without any connection or logic.

But could the codices really contain
genuine information on the formation

of Christianity in Qumran
over 2,000 years ago?

The group at Qumran were
obviously Nazoreans,

OK, call them Greek Essenes.

There's obviously a lot of evidence
of connections between Jesus

and this group, although he perhaps
wasn't specifically a member

of that group.

My personal theory is that he
was not a member of that group

because he superseded them.

In other words, they were on a kind
of a programme to bring

about the real,
the true King of Israel,

in the proper Hebrew-Jewish
messianic sense of the word,

and I think that when it
came to Jesus, they had succeeded.

So, therefore, he is not a Nazorean
as the Gospels referred to him,

he is THE Nazorean. He's the A-1,
number one, "That's it, we've done
it."

I think that gives us quite a few
pointers as to the connection

between the teacher of righteousness
and Jesus, the codices and the Dead

Sea Scrolls, because the codices
share much with the scrolls,

and I believe that the codices
will show the scrolls to be

proto-Christian documents.

I think that's why they've
caused such an enormous

amount of controversy.

The David Elkington codices are
probably the best example of the

fact that the world wants to
maintain the status quo.

Nothing new.
Don't rock the boat.

Immediately, everyone jumps on them
and says, "No, they're fake!

"They're frauds!" So the Israelis,

every institution in the world says,

"No, no, don't believe anything
they say, because they're frauds,"

and it makes you, makes you wonder,

if a real discovery, and maybe this
is one, comes out, will anyone

believe it? Is everyone that intent
on maintaining the status quo?

We had no other option
than to pursue it, in order

to quell the vilification.

It was the only way we could go
about this, otherwise we would have

to run and hide and be forever
scarred by this appalling

campaign. So I called Roger Webb -
we looked him up online and I called

him, and we had a chat,

and he was very jolly about
the whole thing. He said, "Well,"

he said, "yeah, they might
well be fakes."

He said, "Let's prove it."

All the official channels have
written off the codices as fake,

but Elkington decided to
have the age of the lead tested

by Professor Roger Webb, a leading
expert on ion beam physics.

His first tests on the front cover
found radioactive isotopes

still active in the lead, meaning
they are less than 150 years old.

Not satisfied with the results,

he ran some more
tests on the inside pages.

So, the second test showed the,
showed no activity for the inner

pages of the lead, the book,
demonstrating the lead now is

actually, was genuinely old, at
least over 150 years old.

Compared quite favourably to both

a 400-year-old sample we had
from a sash window.

So this was old lead, the weight
from a sash window,

and also a sample we had that was an
example of Roman lead

that had been in the ground for
2,000 years.

So this was quite favourable
and suggested that we had

actually real, old lead,
greater than 150 years.

There are aspects to the codices
that could not have been faked.

I mean, one of them being that, over
the course of 2,000 years,

the metal matrix has disturbed.

So what's happened is that
the impurities in the metal have

gradually leached out of the metal,

and they've appeared on the surface,
where they've taken crystalline

form and then fallen out, OK?

And you can see on some
of the codices, there are holes

in the pages.

And if you look on others, you can
see the crystalline growth.

Now, according to
our expert, he said,

"Well, you're looking here at a
process that takes 1,600-1,800
years.

"2,000 years, easily."

I mean, I certainly believe
they are more than 150 years - that

I don't have a problem with.
The going back 2,000 years,

I'm, I don't know, I can't put an
age on that at all.

There are other evidences that it
is actually quite old.

The patina on them does
actually indicate that these have

been around and in contact with the
ground for a long period of time.

They look very similar to lead that
we've dug up out of the ground

from 2,000 years ago.

So it's been in contact
with the ground in the same way.

And they look very similar to that,
so in terms of the way they look,

they look very authentic.

I've never believed them
to be fake. If you follow a logical

progression, why and how
they exist and the circumstances

in which you found them, it simply
does not tally that they are fake.

And, furthermore,

nobody has yet convinced
us of how they were faked.

We've seen fakes. We've seen modern
ones, and they are remarkably
different.

I mean, so remarkably different that
you want to fall about laughing

at how crude they are,

because when you're using lead, it
can only be crude when you're using

it in a modern circumstance.

It seems that experts are saying
there are multiple dates

ascribed to various bits
of the codices,

so it looks like it's been a bit
of a mishmash, put together at some

point, not necessarily very
recently.

There is still a wall of silence.

There is still a wall of dogma
preservation, that, "I don't care

"what you've discovered or how
accurately it dates or how authentic

"the non-biased laboratories
say it is,

"it's not going to be accepted."

It's really quite worrying.

The Jordan codices' legitimacy
is inconclusive at best,

but the mystery of the Dead Sea
Scrolls is very much alive.

In the vast open space of Qumran,

there may well be fragments waiting
to be discovered by archaeologists

still digging the site today.

Almost habitually, the authorities,
the Catholic Church have dismissed

all of these as fakes.
"They must be fakes,

"they can't possibly be real,"
and that could be the case.

But it's also the case that you
never know what the earth is going

to spit out, and it could be that
one day the earth is going to spit

out something that does undermine
the whole value system of

Christianity, of Judaism,
of another religion.

So it is a little bit suspicious
that whenever something new is dug

up, seemingly promising artefacts,
it's often conked on the head

and instantly dismissed.

I think what's more

fascinating about the Dead Sea
Scrolls than what's in them

is actually why they were written,
why they were hidden.

You know, this was a community
that was about to be slaughtered,

basically, by the Romans.

You know, they were on their way
out, and we learn more about, you

know, the desperate measures they
took to hide the knowledge they had,

how much importance they put
on this knowledge,

and then of course, The Copper
Scroll, you know, the treasure map,

which is fascinating, you know.
But we get to see a community that

knew its number was up.

You know, that's basically what
the Dead Sea Scrolls show us.

But, in terms of what they say,
not so interesting.

Indications are

that we may have in the Dead Sea
Scrolls the tip of the iceberg.

There's probably a lot more.
And local and recent

excavations are validating
that there are signs of

shards of pottery and little
fragments of papyrus that indicate

that even more of the Dead Sea
Scrolls are on the black market,

and there's probably all sorts
of caves and hideaways around

the Dead Sea that we've
yet to find.

They are without doubt a significant
historical and Biblical discovery.

But how many other texts and scrolls
still lie buried at Qumran

and other sites in Israel and
Jordan?

And, importantly, how different

are their facts from what we know
from the Bible?

Is this difference, or perhaps
a fear of it,

the reason why the authorities
covered up the release

of the Dead Sea Scrolls for over 40
years? And how much else is buried

out here in the caves, in the
deserts, that would challenge the

Church's view of events
of 2,000 years ago.

I'll see you next time.

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