Meditation 368
Noah's Ark: Still searching after all these years
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In 1960, Life magazine published a photograph taken by a Turkish Air Force Pilot of a landslide below Mt. Ararat. A roughly boat-shaped object appears in the image, and enthusiasts were quick to identify it as Noah's Ark, a claim which Wyatt Archeological Research continues to advance.
In 2003, satellite photos show an object poking through a glacier high up on Mt. Ararat. Once again enthusiasts have come forward claiming that Noah's Ark has been found.
Or could it just be a part of the mountain projecting through the ice?
Just about every year in between these two astonishing discoveries of what is claimed to be the very same object, yet somehow located miles apart, there have been other reported discoveries of fragments, parts, and sections of Noah's Ark. The Ark has been reported to be high on the mountain, below the mountain, in the rocks, in the ice, and remarkably, in an inaccessible chasm. Though the details of determining the contents of an inaccessible chasm are not addressed.
Usually these "discoveries" are covered in the tabloids, but occasionally, they find their way into mainstream media as they did in 1960 and in 2003.
There was an article in Monday's paper[1] on a new expedition this year to find the ark . Notwithstanding that the complete ark has apparently been discovered at least twice, and parts and fragments of the ark discovered in numerous places, numerous times, this new team from the Archaeological Imaging Research Consortium is hoping to find the complete boat on their expedition. As Rex Geissler, the president of the consortium said "Alleged eyewitnesses have said they saw portion of entire ark or barge sticking out of the ice cap, so we're looking for the whole shebang."
And these expectations of finding "the whole shebang", I suppose, constitute faith. Faith that the ark existed once upon a time, faith that it still exists, faith that it has not been already discovered by others even though they claim to have done so, and faith that this team can succeed where others have failed.
And when they fail, as they surely will, I expect that not one member of the expedition will have his faith in the literal interpretation of the bible shaken. And new teams will continue to head out every year in a fruitless search for the non-existent evidence of Noah and his mythical ark.