James Tabor recently provided a very helpful summary of the arguments in favor of what we have called the Talpiot Hypothesis. I have attempted to categorize the arguments under his twofold division as stated above, looking first at the Talpiot data, and then comparing it to the family of Jesus of Nazareth.
First are the findings from the Talpiot Tomb:
“Nothing like this [statistical grouping of names] occurs anywhere else.” This is especially so when we consider that the names were discovered as belonging “in one family.”
To illustrate the statistical likelihood of these names being together in a single family, Tabor uses a range of population figures for Second Temple Jerusalem, estimating that between 25,000 and 75,000 people lived in the city. Consulting with several statisticians, he then compares Jerusalem to a football stadium filled with 50,000 persons, including men women, and children. In that group, an estimated 2,796 men would be named Jesus. Of these, 351 would have a Joseph for a father and 173 of them would also have a mother named Mary. Only 23 of these men named Jesus would also have a brother named Joseph. If we also added having a brother named James, we would be left with only one person named Jesus. This presumes a “modest pre-70 CE family burial cave”with a “tighter time span” than three generations.
Then we compare these figures to the family of Jesus of Nazareth:
Jesus' father Joseph probably died earlier and so he would have been buried in Galilee.
Jesus' four brothers also seem to fit the Talpiot Tomb scenario, too. Simon and Jude probably lived past A.D. 70, but Jesus and James died before then. The simple interpretation is that “Jose” is Jesus' brother, rather than his father, and is also the one buried in the Talpiot ossuary.
Of the two “Marys” buried in the tomb, we have “the likelihood that Maria could well be the mother” of Jesus.
There is also the “logical possibility” that “Mariamene” is Mary Magdalene, as indicated by “several early Christian texts” like the Gospel of Mary, Hippolytus, and the Acts of Philip, and based on research regarding Mary Magdalene's “place in earliest history of the Jesus movement.”
If Judah is Jesus' son, then “Mariamene” is “a likely candidate” for being Judah's mother, although we really “have no way of knowing” for sure.
Matthew could be a family member.
Tabor's conclusion regarding the evidence is that it is “possible-to-likely” that the Talpiot Tomb is that of the Jesus of Nazareth family. But if the supposition is correct that the James ossuary was also in the Talpiot Tomb, then Tabor thinks that this would make the identification “close to certain.”15
“Nothing like this [statistical grouping of names] occurs anywhere else.” This is especially so when we consider that the names were discovered as belonging “in one family.”