Jesus Walked on Ice, Study Says

[Galvatron]

Link

The New Testament story describes Jesus walking on water in the Sea of Galilee but according to a study led by Florida State University Professor of Oceanography Doron Nof, it's more likely that he walked on an isolated patch of floating ice.

The study points to a rare combination of optimal water and atmospheric conditions for development of a unique, localized freezing phenomenon that Nof and his co-authors call "springs ice."

In what is now northern Israel, such ice could have formed on the cold freshwater surface of the Sea of Galilee -- known as Lake Kinneret by modern-day Israelis -- when already chilly temperatures briefly plummeted during one of the two protracted cold periods between 2,500 and 1,500 years ago.

A frozen patch floating on the surface of the small lake would have been difficult to distinguish from the unfrozen water surrounding it. The unfrozen water was comprised of the plumes resulting from salty springs situated along the lake's western shore in Tabgha -- an area where many archeological findings related to Jesus have been documented.

"As natural scientists, we simply explain that unique freezing processes probably happened in that region only a handful of times during the last 12,000 years," Nof said. "We leave to others the question of whether or not our research explains the biblical account."

It isn't the first time the FSU researcher has offered scientific explanations of watery miracles. As a recognized expert in the field of oceanography and limnology -- the study of freshwater, saline and brackish environments -- Nof made waves worldwide in 1992 with his oceanographic perspective on the parting of the Red Sea.

His latest research appears in the April 2006 Journal of Paleolimnology, a scientific publication that addresses the reconstruction of lake history.

Using paleoceanographic records of the Mediterranean Sea's surface temperatures along with analytical ice and statistical models, Nof and his colleagues focused on the dynamics of a small section of Lake Kinneret comprising about 10,000 square feet near the salty springs that empty into it. Their analysis supports the likelihood that a brief blast of frigid air descended over the lake and dropped to 25 F (-4 C) for at least two days, coinciding with the chill that had already settled in for a century or more and quite possibly encompassed the decades in which Jesus lived.

If these atmospheric conditions existed simultaneously over a lake such as Kinneret, a floating ice patch could develop above the plumes generated by the salty springs.

Such a perfect combination of conditions on the low-latitude Kinneret might well seem miraculous. In the last 120 centuries, Nof calculates the odds as roughly once in 1,000 years. However, during the life of Jesus the prevailing climate may have favored the more frequent formation of springs ice -- about once in 30 to 160 years.

Floating springs ice partially or entirely surrounded by unfrozen water could be virtually impossible for distant observers to discern, particularly if subsequent rains had smoothed its surface; and 2,000 years ago, even those with a better view might not have recognized a natural phenomenon so rare in their corner of the world.

"In today's climate, the chance of springs ice forming in northern Israel is effectively zero, or about once in more than 10,000 years," Nof added.

Among numerous honors throughout his career, Nof won the prestigious Nansen Medal from the European Geosciences Union in 2005. He is FSU's Distinguished Fridtjof Nansen Professor of Physical Oceanography and a member of its Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Institute.

In addition to Nof, the co-authors of "Is There A Paleolimnological Explanation for 'Walking on Water' in the Sea of Galilee?" are Professor Ian McKeague (Columbia University biostatistics department and formerly of FSU's department of statistics) and Professor Nathan Paldor (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, department of atmospheric science).

[Flagg]

Or they could have just made it up.

[Molyneux]

Or they could have just made it up.

Oddly enough, I'd think that the evangelical Christians would hate this article...

[AK_Jedi]

Magicians can also make wine out of water by soaking bits of sponge in wine, letting it dry, and then throwing it into pots of water when no one is looking. Its entirely possible that many events described in the bible are true, just that the people writing it put too much significance into the events.

[Solauren]

So, Jesus was a con-artist?

I see his religion follows suit

(Ducks thrown objects)

[Flagg]

Or they could have just made it up.

Oddly enough, I'd think that the evangelical Christians would hate this article...

I meant the walking on water thing, not the article.
I don't exactly know why but I always get really annoyed at TV shows, and magazine articles that try to find scientific explanations for Biblical "miracles". I think it's based on two things these explanations always require to be valid. One, you have to suspend disbelief to the point where you can accept that this rare atmospheric, geological, ect. event would happen jsut at the right time and place for the story to be even remotely accurate, and two, you have to ignore the most obvious and rational answer of all: They made it up or embellished it to the point of unrecognizability.

[Frank Hipper]

I meant the walking on water thing, not the article.
I don't exactly know why but I always get really annoyed at TV shows, and magazine articles that try to find scientific explanations for Biblical "miracles". I think it's based on two things these explanations always require to be valid. One, you have to suspend disbelief to the point where you can accept that this rare atmospheric, geological, ect. event would happen jsut at the right time and place for the story to be even remotely accurate, and two, you have to ignore the most obvious and rational answer of all: They made it up or embellished it to the point of unrecognizability.

And here I was, thinking I was the only one.
I swear I'll throw a brick through the fucking television before I sit through another "Science of the Bible" bullshit extravaganza.

Same thing goes for ghost hunter, catering to the retarded shows...
Here's an original idea, maybe the person claiming that their house is haunted is a fucking liar, or a lunatic, and you're wasting time and money in an indescribably stupid way.

[Duckie]

Shit, we've known this for a long time.

[Baron Scarpia]

Wouldn't a smaller floating piece of ice have major stability problems when a 125-150 lb person is walking on it? And would the ice made under such circumstances be thick enough to support him anyway?

While the phenomenon is interesting, the idea that this is somehow the way Jesus supposedly did his water walking bit looks like an attempt to get headlines than actually offer a rational explanation.

The easiest explanation is the most obvious--the story is just another fable.

[Surlethe]

At the end of the article (.pdf file), the authors write, "Our springs ice calculation may or may not be related to the origin of the account of Christ walking on water. The whole story may have originated in local ancient folklore which happened to be told best in the Christian Bible. It is hoped, however, that acheologists, religion scholars, anthropologists and believers will examine such implications in detail."

From my skimming of the paper, it seems to treat its possible explanation of the walking-on-water story as an interesting side-effect of the research and a hook to draw readers in to the article, rather than a central point.

[God Fearing Atheist]

Or they could have just made it up.

"Made it up" is probably a heavy-handed way to put it, but its ahistoricity seems more plausible than not. Consider:

The nature miracles in general and the water-walking miracle in particular are totally at odds with what I would consider the authentic, historical miracle traditions (though to be clear, im not necessarily saying they were miraculous in the sense that they violated known laws of nature; all we can be sure of historically is that they were thought to). These miracles serve to help someone in need while simultaneously (or as a result) proclaiming God's imminently coming Kingdom. They do not, as Meier (1991, pg. 920) writes, "focus on Jesus' person and status or seek his self-glorification."

Water-walking, with all its sense of Old Testament theophany, is outside that mold. Like the God of Deutero-Isaiah, Habakkuk and Job, Mark and John have Jesus doing little more than showing off.

That OT themes are so pervasive here is itself another hint at inauthenticity. LXX Job 9.8 uses the same language (peripaton epi thallesses) as the two aforementioned gospels which, when applied to Jesus as it is to YHWH in Job, reflects a sort of high Christology thats scarcely imaginable during Jesus' historical ministry or the very early church.

To be fair though, the miracle does enjoy dual attestation of sources (but not forms).

[PainRack]

My comprehension of the English language seems to be at a all time low, let me guess what you're saying. You say that the walking on water is different from other accounts of the bible, in that it doesn't seek to glorify jesus?

Why wouldn't it? The account described the miracle of faith, how Peter could have walked on water to reach Jesus but failed because he lacked faith in God. So, IOW, have faith in god or you drown.


Its about as likely as the Song Emperor crossing the Yangtze river in a clay horse and for the same purpose, aka, god/fate/destiny favours him and you must believe!

[DesertFly]

I think he's saying just the opposite. In his view, the miracle of Jesus walking on water didn't help anybody, all it did was "show off" Jesus and his amazingness. GFA contests that most miracles in the New Testament (and Old Testament?) were actually done to not only show God's power, but to help those in need.

[God Fearing Atheist]

- Authentic miracle traditions 1) help ease some affliction or mortal danger and 2) are linked with the Kingdom of God message. The water-walking is incongruent on both accounts.

- OT images are all-pervasive here, but not in the authentic miracles.

- By linking Jesus to those aspects of the Old Testament, the authors display a high Christology; a conception of who/what Jesus was that developed subsequent to his ministry. Specifically, I mean ascribing to Jesus what is ascribed to YHWH himself in the sources they draw parallels with.

[CmdrWilkens]

Put simply the walking on water is about Jesus being "da man" and most of the rest of the miracles in the New Testament are about Jesus helping others (so its an odd duck out).

[Darth Wong]

Put simply the walking on water is about Jesus being "da man" and most of the rest of the miracles in the New Testament are about Jesus helping others (so its an odd duck out).

Not really. The story about Jesus healing the leper was about him being "da man". After all, according to Jesus, this poor bastard had been afflicted with leprosy and suffered horribly throughout his entire life up to that point just so Jesus could use him as a demonstration of his power. You can paraphrase that passage like this:

FOLLOWERS: Why did God make this man a leper?

JESUS: So I could show off my power. BE HEALED!!! Pretty cool, eh?

[Mange]

Apparently, professor Nof has tried earlier to find a scientific explanation to another fairy tale from the Bible that also lacks all forms of historical and archeological evidence, the parting of the Red Sea. What's next?

[Wicked Pilot]

Sometimes it's just best to call the bullshit bullshit. The whole walking on water story is bullshit.

[God Fearing Atheist]

Not really. The story about Jesus healing the leper was about him being "da man". After all, according to Jesus, this poor bastard had been afflicted with leprosy and suffered horribly throughout his entire life up to that point just so Jesus could use him as a demonstration of his power. You can paraphrase that passage like this:

FOLLOWERS: Why did God make this man a leper?

JESUS: So I could show off my power. BE HEALED!!! Pretty cool, eh?

Can you be more specific, i.e. book/chapter/verse and the evidence for that "showing off/revealing his own nature" reading?

I dont see that in Mark 1.40-45 or the ten lepers in Luke 17.11-19.

[Darth Servo]

Standing on water is no big deal. I've done it multiple times. Of course I had skis on my feet and was being pulled by a boat at the time.

[Surlethe]

Can you be more specific, i.e. book/chapter/verse and the evidence for that "showing off/revealing his own nature" reading?

I dont see that in Mark 1.40-45 or the ten lepers in Luke 17.11-19.

I don't know about lepers, but in John 9:1-3, Jesus tells his disciples that a man was born blind so that Jesus could heal him.

[God Fearing Atheist]

Can you be more specific, i.e. book/chapter/verse and the evidence for that "showing off/revealing his own nature" reading?

I dont see that in Mark 1.40-45 or the ten lepers in Luke 17.11-19.

I don't know about lepers, but in John 9:1-3, Jesus tells his disciples that a man was born blind so that Jesus could heal him.

Aye, that is true. However, I dont think its really that important to the historicity of the water-walking.

History, like all human sciences, is about weighing hypotheses against the available data. I alluded to two distinct approaches when talking about the water-walking miracle; the criterion of congruence, and the criterion of dissimilarity. The first holds that traditions consistent with others well established on other, independent grounds are more likely to be historic than those that are not. If we had, say, several putative statements from Hitler, five of which are determined to be authentic and claim the Jews are the devil, and another more ambiguous according to those other criteria but claiming that Jews are super-neat and a-okay, the fact that this latter statement is inconsistent with the others counts against its historicity. The key point here is that the value of congruence or incongruence really turns on the historical value of what it is you're stacking it against; we could hardly say "Jews are rad" is historically unlikely if "Jews are the worst" was not something we could confidently attribute to Hitler.

Do other independent criteria suggest that John's blind-healing is something historical with which to stack harder cases? This is where something like the criterion of dissimilarity comes in. Essentially, it states that those traditions which cannot be derived from the surrounding socio/political/cultural/religious context are more likely to be authentic. The OT themes in the water-miracle are one example; that it can so easily be an application of a preexisting religious tradition well-known to Jews means we have less reason to think of it as arising independently. But it is not only the beliefs of people who live around an author that are significant, but those of the author himself. Equally important are signs of coloring by the author's own theological beliefs or literary style. The healing at the start of John 9 is full of that sort of stuff.

We can look at other aspects. Is this sort of miracle or its circumstances attested to independently elsewhere? Independent attestation makes creation by either of the authors impossible. Is it consistent with known facts about geography? With known facts about first century Jewish life? Would it have been embarrassing?

In all, I think the "core" of the healing in John might have something to it. The circumstances, including the dialogue, probably do not. Consequently, its value in congruence with water-walking is limited if there at all.

[Braedley]

I'm reminded of this (may not be 56k friendly).

In any case, the non-biblical implications are interesting. Being able to walk across a salty lake (or at least part of a salty lake) would definately freak out some people.

[PainRack]

- Authentic miracle traditions 1) help ease some affliction or mortal danger and 2) are linked with the Kingdom of God message. The water-walking is incongruent on both accounts.

- OT images are all-pervasive here, but not in the authentic miracles.

- By linking Jesus to those aspects of the Old Testament, the authors display a high Christology; a conception of who/what Jesus was that developed subsequent to his ministry. Specifically, I mean ascribing to Jesus what is ascribed to YHWH himself in the sources they draw parallels with.

1. The NIV version of Mark depicted the disciples as being in danger, and Jesus walking from the mountains across the water to them.

2. The disciples were depicted as being afraid, and asking for Jesus help.

These two are messages of god.

[God Fearing Atheist]

1. The NIV version of Mark depicted the disciples as being in danger, and Jesus walking from the mountains across the water to them.

I dont know what sort of NIV you're reading, but in mine, the only danger the disciples face is "straining at the oars, because the wind was against them."

Maybe its just me, but I dont see difficult rowing as a particularly dire state of affairs.

2. The disciples were depicted as being afraid, and asking for Jesus help.

The disciples are not depicted as asking for help, but they are afraid. Why are they afraid? Because Jesus is walking on water and they think he's a ghost!

Jesus does not walk on water to make them less fearful of something. His walking on water is its cause.