Ooh, this one, this classic episode is for anyone in the audience tonight who is like us, a fan of Indiana Jones. The Arc of the Covenant? Where is it? Can you look at it? Et cetera, et cetera? Will it melt your face off? Right? Or is that the other thing?
No?
That was that was this one? Now? That was the one? Yeah? Yeah, According to according to multiple sources, for quite some time, the Arc of the Covenant is around still today, and it is in a specific location, just maybe not where you might think if you're the West.
Is this the one about Oxen or something else?
This is the idea that the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in Ethiopia is home to the Ark of the Covenant. This is where we learn about the priestly class or cast. They're the only folks who are allowed to enter in view the art. Yes, but they'll talk to you in detail about it as long as you don't try to go in. It's all coming back to me now and soon it'll be coming back to you right in your ears.
Here we go from UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or learn the stuff they don't want you to know.
Hello, welcome back to the show. My name is Matt Nol. He's on an inventor somewhere.
That's true. They call me Ben. We are joined as always with our super producer Paul Decant. Most importantly, you are you, and you are here, and that makes this stuff they don't want you to know. Let's get right into it.
You want to, Yeah, Paul?
Could we get some sweeping Spielberg esque music?
Yeah? Have for a certain you know, character that likes to go spilunking sometimes and other forms of treasure hunting.
Yeah, I guess we should, uh, for legal reasons, call him Illinois smith Yep. Yeah, okay, it's we're We're obviously huge fans of the Indiana Jones series has a bunch of problems. You know, the thuggy cult in Temple of Doom is vastly misrepresented.
You know. I feel like you could listen to that music and watch someone search for their keys in a couch or something and it would feel just as epic. Yes, searching for treasure?
Do you ever do that, Matt? When when you're doing a mundane task, do you ever put on sweeping cinematic music.
No, I just to myself, I'm like, oh, where did I put writer's water bottle? Oh don't see us.
Oh that's that's a great idea. I guilty of playing soundtracks when I am on a mundane task to make it feel more like a mission something righteous, you know, Oh, totally. And today's episode concerns one of the biggest religious questions in modern history, the fate of something called the Arc of the Covenant.
Yes, relic, an artifact, a highly important fixture, physical fixture within the Christian and several other faiths.
Yes, and older obviously than Christianity, but yes, older than we initially suspected.
Yes.
And a long time ago, you and I did a video together, a video episode on this. It was part of a series called Secret Places.
Yep.
Wherein we explored North Sentinel Island, which yeah, I stand by that one, which we have an update on that we'll save for the end of the show. And wherein we explore the fate or the current location of the Ark of the Covenant. But maybe we're getting ahead of ourselves. Let's start at the beginning. Here are the facts, right, the facts about the Arc of the Covenant, We've mentioned that it is ancient, and I'm sure it's familiar to
all of us, right, conspiracy realists listening to this. Regardless of what your spiritual or religious orientation is, you are familiar with the concept of the Arc of the Covenant due to the circumstances of my early days. I learned about the Ark of the Covenant through the Spielberg film Indiana Jones Raiders of Lost Ark.
That's how you learned about it, That's how I learned about it. You know, I bet that's true for a lot of people because it's hidden away kind of not really but a little bit within popular culture until that movie comes out. There are a couple of things that you could maybe point to. And it's also not a major part of this one book of the Bible Exodus.
Yes, and I defer to your knowledge of biblical text. You and Joe McCormick from Stuff to Blow Your Mind are my favorite people to quiz about this literature. So what exactly is the Ark of the Covenant the actual thing, not the Spielberg thing.
Well, the Ark of the Covenant is it's a couple of things. The first thing is a container, this gilded or kind of golden not kind of golden container that has a couple of attributes to it that holds within it something very very precious, and that is stone tablets that Moses held forth that you might remember from some film or television series where he's standing on top of Mount Sinai and he's proclaiming that these this is the word of God. These are the commandments that we must follow.
Right. Thou shalt not kill, that's a big one, right. The sins, yeah, the dos and don'ts of how to be a righteous person.
Correct.
The real thing, yeah, not a metaphor not a some sort of strange analogy. This is a physical container that holds within it the tables of the law, the stone tablets that bear the word of God.
Yes, some of the oldest maintained word of God on stone.
Right. And you can read various translations of these tablets and their construction in Exodus thirty four to one. Correct. So a year after Israelites leave Egypt, the Eod after the Exodus. Yes, the arc is created according to the legend, following the guidelines of a pattern that God gives to Moses when the Israelites are living at the foot of Mount Sinai and thereafter this this chest it is it is gilded, as you said, Matt, it is gold plated.
But it is a wooden chest, which is the kind of wood it's made out of is typically translated as acacia wood. And it is carried like a palanquin like on staves.
Like exactly, there are two staves, staffs whatever you want to call them. Staves is probably the correct word, but their wooden sticks essentially, and they're they're very long, and so you can have at least two people on either side of it on their shoulders carrying the thing. And it's usually portrayed as having cherubs on top of it, yes, or some kind of small winged angel creature that looks
like a young child, yeah, exactly. And there's you know, there are so many depictions of it, of what it possibly could look like. We can't really give you an exact picture, but if you you know, if you go online, you can see some of the circular stuff that a lot of times is depicted as being on the sides of it, right, and just it's basically it would basically be gold finishing work.
Yes, yeah. And these these two figures which we will examine in detail later in today's episode. They have their wings reach out toward one another such that the wings form a seat of sorts, and this is called the Mercy seat. And the belief is that God Yahweh itself sits at this seat. And the arc is sort of
functioning as a footstool. Yeah. And after its construction, when the Israelites are moving or when there is a war occurring, this chest is carried two thousand cubits, which today translates to about twenty six hundred feet or eight hundred meters for the entire rest of the world, in advance of the population.
Yeah, with a mass Okay, don't want to use the word exos. When there's mass migration with this group of people, this thing goes at the front. It's almost like it's the word of God carrying them and taking them on the path.
Yes, And it is a powerful artifact that it's not a passive thing. In the stories. The arc is so powerful in fact, that it is always carried under a veil of skins and cloth. It can never touch the ground. Yeah, pretty much, no one can ever look at it. And God speaks directly to Moses in that space created by the two cherubim or angels that we mentioned earlier.
It's like a portal basically, kind of. I don't mean to, you know, secularize it too much, but that's what it kind of functions as God's little portal.
And you're I don't think you're being dismissive at all, because a lot of the things that we see today in secular fiction descend from these ancient religious traditions. And we're probably going to ruin several sci fi films for you along the way here, because many of the depictions of artifacts in science fiction are essentially just retellings of this original story. So no one can look at it. God speaks to Moses directly through it. It can never
touch the ground, and it is incredibly important. It is credited with parting the sea right, Moses uses it to part the Red Sea. It creates other miracles for the tribe, for the Israelite community. It also brings woe and misfortune upon those who do not treat it respectfully, or who wrong it or attempt to use it.
Yeah, definitely don't try.
To use it for ungodly purposes. And according to the written tradition, the arc is lost in a terrible, terrible battle with the Philistines, and the Philistines take it from the Israelites, and God punishes the Philistines with plagues, with sickness, illness, terrible, terrible, terrible stuff.
And you know, you're looking for a reason, why is this happening. Maybe it's that thing you went and put in the treasure room.
Maybe the Israelites were correct, they say so. Eventually they returned the Ark to its original owners, and the Israelites keep it at a place called Kiriath Jerem for about twenty years, and then King David, again, according to the story, takes the Ark to Jerusalem. At first it is housed in a tent, and then later it is housed in King Solomon's temple.
Solomon's Temple, Yes, that's the big one. That's the one that Freemasonry models all of its buildings after.
And it is one of the most important buildings in history.
Absolutely.
From that point until Jerusalem's destruction by the Battle Bologians, the Arc disappears from the story.
Yeah. From the Bible.
Yeah, poo vanished gone.
Yeah, it says here in the notes kaiser SoSE style.
Yeah, we were talking about that off air A little bit. So that's a spoiler for Usual Suspects, which is a great film. I don't I don't think we spoiled that.
I think we have in the past. Unfortunately, Ah well, it's worth a rewatch. The hint is he's no longer employed by Netflix.
Shots fired, Matt. It's it's true on all these accounts, this mystery person is no longer employed by Netflix, and the arc vanishes from the narrative, and it's it's a strange it's a strange absence because it plays such an important role, this artifact in the story of the people of Israel. So like many physical things, places and artifacts and people even described in ancient text, experts today are still debating over whether or not it's real. And this
is a thing that pops up pretty often. Is King Arthur Reel tell us about its caliber? What happened to Noah's Arc? Is it really in Turkey? You know what I mean?
And one of the things that we find as we look into subjects such as this is that there usually is something genuine there. Perhaps the stories around it have been embellished and grown beyond, well beyond themselves over time, but usually there is something there. If it's recorded in at least two or three places.
True true, and especially if they are independent written yes, by which we mean those two or three sources are not rephrasings of the original source. And now we get to the question with the Arc of the Covenant. This is fascinating because unlike some other ancient artifacts, there does appear to be a genuine physical thing. And ah man, I can't wait until we get into the really cool stuff. We have to do the background first. But let's talk about what could be proven about the arc as a
physical artifact. So we'll put to the side the claims of the extraordinary power of the arc just as a physical artifact. Is there an actual thing? According to Baruch Halpern, who is a professor of ancient history, classics in ancient Mediterranean studies a penn State, as well as religious studies. According to him, there is a thing because from his perspective he is a very well read expert, the references to the arc throughout the religious text are consistent and
do not change or vary over translation. And this means that whatever the original purpose of this artifact was, whatever its actual origin story is, he believes there is a genuine real physical thing, not a metaphor. Yeah, not some sort of symbol that people talk about. You can't look inside yourself and find your own arc of the covenant. You can't have that young adult novel moment where you're like, ah,
it was me the whole time. No, this is a real thing, this real thing you can hold and you shouldn't look at Yeah.
So, whatever it is, it was genuinely taken by the Philistines and then genuinely given back, and it was it genuinely had something in it probably, and it exists, it existed. And yet here's one of the biggest problems. Ben it is so stinkin old, and it was made of wood, well gold plated wood.
Right, right, Yes, that's a question that incorporates some hard science. How long does a wooden construct last. It's that's dependent upon numerous environmental factors.
Exactly where's this thing.
Been, right, and where is it now if it's still around, and how old is it? Actually? Because according to various scholars, this physical thing, again, this very real container, this artifact is so ancient that it may predate Judaism entirely, which sounds.
Crazy, older than Abraham himself.
Right, that's that's the idea, because the various biblical stories of the Arc may all contain echoes of pre judaic religious practices. Holy Moly, you'll see some people calling them ancient cults. And it's very difficult to untangle the layers of history and myth that have been added to this story in the great millennia old game of telephone that has written in oral tradition. But we don't want to let anybody feel as if it is impossible to find
the Arc. We hunted down some rumored locations, places where, according to various people, you can find the arc today in twenty eighteen. Again, don't look.
At it, and don't look at it when we come right back from a word for our sponsors.
And we're back, Matt. You found a number of play where people claim the arc exists.
Yeah, this, I got some information from IO nine that had an article that just kind of had a list is a list article. But then there are a couple other places that have been mentioned just throughout time and rumors that have existed. So let's just go through a couple of these really quickly, and then later on we can expound a lot further on these.
You know, the one I'm excited about.
Oh a, I do so one of the first places, and this one's a bit of a softball. It's a Catholic church. It's the Cathedral of Our Lady of Shot in France, and that's in Shot, France, Ar t r. E s. It's a really interesting place. It's a World Heritage Site. It's it's a very Gothic church, like a in this case French Gothic church. So it's got those jagged lines with the steeples heading up into the sky. It's it's got you know, it's the things that you would see if you're looking at a very old cathedral.
It's got the flying buttresses and it's really I don't know, it's very cool. Is built in like eleven hundred eleven night No. Eleven ninety four is when it was constructed. That's when it began. So you know, perhaps this is one of the places where the arc ended.
Up due to the cathedral's association with the Knights Templar.
Correct another group that we have we done in Knights of Templar episode.
We are far overdue for the see okay, absolutely should that's happening. It's another chance to reference Indiana Jones to be completely candid. So the one of the reasons that people historically believed that the actual arc could be located this cathedral is because of the Knights Templar involvement and a carving at the cathedral depicting the arc itself.
But you know, that's kind of shaky ground to go on.
Yeah, the story here comes from a twentieth century French author that said the original nine members of the Night Templart discovered the arc early on in the Templar's history while they were digging under the Temple mount in search of treasure and secret things.
Yeah.
This is during the Crusades too, where there's lots of slaughter and lots of plundering.
Yes, yeah, absolutely, And that's not the only place. There's also a pretty strong tradition or folkloric narrative that argues the Arc of the Covenant, or an arc of the Covenant. We'll explain that later exists with the Lemba tribe in Southern Africa in Zimbabwe. The Limba tribe may sound familiar to some of us because this tribe has Jewish roots.
Genetic testing infirms the traditional beliefs of this community they've always said that they have these roots, that they are of the people of Israel, and for a long time there were various other forces and institutions that felt this was entirely a legend.
Yeah, but it's really interesting because there is an arc of the Covenant that exists that the Limba tribe has and they're just a place called the Museum of Human Science in Zimbabwe. And the group claims that this arc that they have is a replica, like it's not the actual arc, except that it's built from the remnants of what the arc became after all of these thousands of.
Years and the forces of decay upon the wood. And the argument is that this arc does contain again those physical stone tablets.
Yeah, it's just the wooden part as a rec creation essentially.
And then people say, no, you fools. Of course it is located in modern day Israel.
Oh yeah, that's the thing that's been a rumor for a long time, and it's essentially, well, there are a couple of places where it might be. One of them is deep within tunnels underground basically of Jerusalem, that there's some secret chambers that exist where artifacts such as the Ark of the Covenant are kept.
Right, And I believe you were telling me off air that one of the locations is beneath a lake.
Yeah, this one is. It's a slightly different version of this because it's very close. It's Israel's largest freshwater lake, Lake Tiberius, and it's supposedly just at the bottom of this lake, and it's inaccessible at this point.
Right, which we see as a common theme for a lot of these rumored locations. There's another rumored location, subterranean location rather in modern day Jordan, a secret cave or mountain known to a select few, right people, people who are tasked to guard the Ark. That's another thing we see. It's a very consistent thing throughout the narratives, from the first mention of the arc to the modern day mentions. It always has an elite guard of some sort.
Yeah, and you know, speaking of an elite guard, sometimes it's not a physical elite guard. It's a curse of some sort. Because for a long time it was thought that perhaps King Tut's tomb, for some reason, not sure why, contained in one of these secret chambers that was purported
to exist the Ark of the Covenant. Yeah, yeah, that is up until around this year I think May of this year or a little before that, there was some extensive scientific testing of King Tut and Commons tomb that essentially proved no, there are no super secret, hidden awesome treasure chambers.
Sadly in that particular tomb. Yes, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I agree.
I agree.
It's interesting because the stories about the tomb and the legends of the curse, and the idea that it is a repository for arcane, secret valuable things, A lot, a lot of these legends spring up when Egyptology is experiencing its Western Renaissance. Yeah, you know, and there are a ton of British people saying, ah, yeah, it's there, whatever it is. What did you just did you say? You say the arc of the Covenant. Yeah, yeah, totally that yeah, King Tut Man, Oh.
King Tut's it is?
Yeah, all right, boy, King is We get all the stuff. And that has been our completely accurate reenactment of Egyptology in Britain, So that one has been disproven primarily through the use of modern technology.
Yes, at least, as you're saying, in that particular King Tut's tomb, if there may be, King Tut had multiple tombs. You know, he was an enterprising guy. You never know.
Well, the Valley of the Kings is home to many mysteries still, and it would be wonderful to visit one day, can we? I think you know what, if Paul is in, I'm gonna go.
Okay, Oh he said no, he said no, Yeah, he said no.
Hang on, let me.
I just got daggers. Oh okay, shrugs a little better.
All right, Well, write to us and let us know if you have explored this area of Egypt. Who want to hear your experiences. And while we were waiting to hear from you, we're getting to the crux of today's question. We've done a very high level look at the history of the Ark of the Covenant, the various claims by differing experts about what it actually was, and the various claims about where it might be. And that leads us to the question where is the Ark of the Covenant today?
And we'll take a different trip, this time to Ethiopia. After a word from our sponsor.
Yere's where it gets crazy.
Oh that's the stuff.
Oh, watching the video has really brought it back. We are traveling to northern Ethiopia, come with us on this journey of the mind. We are going to Aksum. Some of some of us who have researched ancient African history in the past will be familiar with this name spelled a x M. It's something that was written out of a lot of Western history books. But Axum was a very powerful kingdom that was founded around four hundred BCE.
And the city in modern day Ethiopia Aksum is the former capital of this ancient kingdom and it is replete with cultural and architectural history and along with that come legends. One legend is that the Queen of Sheba herself lived in this city. And while you can go back and forth about the historosity or that's the fancy word for the accuracy of these claims, we can say that in the modern day UNESCO recognizes these locations, these sites, these
constructs and buildings as World Heritage Sites. Whether or not all the legends are true, everyone can agree that this is Eldridge stuff.
Oh yeah, And there are some incredible ruins that you can find in an Oxom in modern day Oxom, and it's just I mean, it's so cool. Everything from obelisks to entire just I don't know what you would call it. Just a lot of standing stones, a lot of places where there are large parts of stone walls and buildings that are that remain. But it's just it is ruins. But it is just so cool to see. I've used so many pictures of this place over the course of stuff they don't want you to know, as as like
stock footage, just because it is fascinating looking. It's it's very very cool.
Yeah. And in this city there is is a church. It's called the Chapel of the Tablet. It's part of the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion. The Chapel of the Tablet, just if you're a casual passer by, looks like an old building. It's not huge, it's clearly, clearly ancient, but it's something that you might not look at twice as you're strolling through this city that is
filled to the brim with ancient wonders. Absolutely, but this church has a particular claim to fame and importance in Ethiopia, in the world at large, and across the Abramaic religions. It is the home of the actual arc of the Covenant, or so they claim.
Well, here's the deal. There is only one human being that can see this, and it's not unfortunately.
Well it might be it might be one of us. If you happen to be listening, if you're this one person and you happen to be a fam stuff. They don't want you to know.
You lonely, one person with such a burden to bear. Thank you for listening to the show and for taking care of the Ark of the Covenant.
That's right. There is a single guardian, yeah, appointed for life to protect the Ark of the Covenant, and they are not allowed to leave the bounds of the temple. They're also always male. They are the only person allowed to view this artifact.
And it's a lineal thing too. There's a lineage to it because you, as the guardian, you continue protecting and protecting and staying in this place and protecting and protecting, and then you eventually start to die, and when you're on your deathbed and you're laying there taking your last breaths, you have to choose somebody or maybe not in that moment, but you have to choose the next guardian, and then that person has to stay in that place forever, yes.
Until their death. They have to stay so according to the story, this is where the Ark of the Covenant ends up due to the actions of an Ethiopian prince. According to the Axonite Christians, the Ark of the Covenant is first brought to Ethiopia during the reign of King Solomon, and the Queen of Sheba travels to meet Solomon and has a child with him named Menlik, and this is the guy who reputedly takes the ark. So that's according to this version of events, that's how it ends up here.
And it's still around, it hasn't decayed.
Yeah. The story is essentially that because they had this child, at some point the Queen of Sheba travels to meet or for travels to see Solomon with the child so that they can actually meet the father and the son. And then when they return back to where they are in Ethiopia, they take.
It with them. Ah I see. Which is an interesting story plot wise, because this is one of the most powerful artifacts that Solomon possesses, right.
And perhaps it's keep it hidden, keep it safe kind of thing.
Maybe it is. Maybe it is. It's just strange that he would give this away. If he consentually gave it away, it's.
A gift to his son.
There we go. Maybe maybe. Despite the official stance that only the guardian of the ark may gaze upon this artifact, over the years, several other people have claimed that they also happened to see it, one of whom was a former administrator of the church. Here's the thing, though, so it's it's one person typically looking at it, and a couple of other people, for one reason or another, have been able to gaze upon it or glance at it.
Their descriptions all match, just like the descriptions in ancient Judaic text. Everyone is looking at the same physical thing, and the description furthermore of this arc based in Ethiopia, largely jibe with the descriptions of the container mentioned in Exodus Exodus twenty five versus ten through twenty two.
Do you mind if I just go through here and read the NIB version?
Yeah? Please do, please do? And could we bring back the music? Oh?
Okay ooh that sounds so all right. Here we go. So this is Exodus twenty five to ten through twenty two, New International Version of the Bible. Have them make an arc of a kaisha would two and a half half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high. Overlay it with pure gold, both inside and out, and make a gold molding around it. Cast four gold rings for it and fasten them to its four feet, with two rings on one side and two rings on the other. Then make poles of acacia
wood and overlay them with gold. Insert the poles into the rings on the sides of the arc to carry it. Feels very putting together a piece of furniture kind of thing. I guess that's kind of what it is. The poles are to remain in the rings of this arc. They are not to be removed. Then put in the ark the tablets of the Covenant Law, which I will give you Ben.
Do you want to continue, well, think you bet. I would love to make an atonement cover of pure gold two and a half cubits long and a cubit and a half wide, and make two cherublem out of hammered gold at the ends of the cover. Make one cherub on one end and the second cherub on the other. Make the cherubim of one piece with the cover at the two ends. The cherubim are to have their wings spread upward, overshadowing the cover with them. The Cherubim are
to face each other looking toward the cover. Place the cover on top of the ark, and put in the ark the tablets of the Covenant Law that I will give you there above the cover, between the two Cherubim that are over the ark of the Covenant Law, I will meet with you and give you all my commands for the Israelites. Oh, you know, it's very specific, so specific. It reads like assembly instructions. Yeah, which it is, Yeah, it is.
But twice it's said, hey, look, seriously, put the tablets in there. Okay, we got that, or I'm gonna keep going, Okay, put the tablets in there. You got this. But then that last bit of I will meet you and give you all my commands for the Israelites at the end. Yeah, in between those wings.
And the specificity here is crucial to this story. Yeah, because it gives us in the modern day a very very good profile of what to look for, what is the arc.
But it also gives anyone who is anyone instructions on how to make an arc. Yes, so if you want to make a recreation, you could make it to a t like seriously, at any point in history, you could age it let's say you made it in the sixteen hundreds. You could make an arc then, and then it would look so aged at this point, unless you had someone come in and actually do testing on the wood, it would be difficult to prove you know, that it's some not some miraculous ancient thing.
Right. That's that's a really good point. You got me. It's not gotcha, man, come on, I go my hands up about that one, because it is it is true. The specificity is a sword that swings both ways cognitively and makes it difficult for people who are attempting to track down the actual location of the physical arc. This is the stuff they don't want you to know about it. Which which of the claimed arcs is replica? Which is
the real deal? And the most important aspect of the arc that would separate it from a replica is going to be that it can the true arc contains these two tablets.
Yes, two tablets made of stone. Yeah, that are stone cold chisel if you really wanted.
To oh man, yeah, you're on fire today. That's just it's a really good point. It's a really good point. So then if that doesn't work as the indicator of the true arc, the last thing we are left with is the God or the ability of the arc to do extraordin supernatural things. Miraculous things will probably be a better word in this context, so accept no substitutions. The true arc of the Covenant is occupied by God right
sitting there on the mercy seat. The arc is a footstool talking to Moses, or in this case, talking to the single guardian there at that church in Axham.
And you get to ask yourself, what is this guardian doing with all the information that he's getting, right? Is he like one of the most powerful men on earth or perhaps of the most.
Or does the guardian only guard it and never really upon it.
See, this is what we need. We need to have a team of people who are willing to look into the arc and try and use it to see whether or not faces melt and you know, anything bad happens to those people. That's how we begin testing all of these various arcs.
And we have I think we have yet to talk about the idea that the arc is a piece of anachronistically sophisticated technology. The oh man, that's almost a different episode. It maybe we should do that for a different episode.
But let me just tell you right now. My favorite one, personally is that it was some form of radioactive either material or weapon, or something that was very, very bad that you should not ever open because there's nuclear or radioactive energy in there.
Right, which sounds as if it would be something straight out of science fiction. However, I believe a few years ago you and I were both startled to discover that ancient nuclear reactors did exist.
In a technical.
You got it. It's okay, they're not as far as we know, they're not man made, but there are on the African continent. In modern day Gabon. I want to say, there are clear indications that there were three naturally occurring nuclear reactors.
But if you look at ancient Indian texts, perhaps you may believe that there was an ancient war of some kind with flying machines and weapons that could light up the sky and turn deserts to glass, and maybe it's a remnant of that war.
Right. And furthermore, as insane as some of this sounds, we're going down a rabbit hole. Please come with us or send help. As insane as this stuff sounds, the fact of the matter is that human beings are extraordinarily bad. At holding on to stuff over time. We've lost people and thought they were fictional, to find out they were real. We've lost cities and thought they were legends or pure acts of symbolism, only to the or find out they
are real. And we have lost entire civilizations. We have done that.
Humans.
Now, is it probable that there is ancient sophisticated technology that was somehow lost? Yeah, it's only probable because we have found or rediscovered ancient technologies, But we haven't found anything like a spaceship. They're usually going to be something like Greek fire or Damascus steel, you know what I mean. They're more techniques and the unique mixes of chemicals. But it would be really cool to find an ancient aircraft please please see. And one of the arguments against that
is that if something like that. First off, the argument is no, you're crazy, that would never happen because we would have heard more about it. And then the second argument is, oh, even if someone somehow did something like that, it would have decayed due to the vast span of time and the chasm between the ancient world and the modern day. But that brings us back to your original point, which I love about a gilded wooden artifact. How could
it be intact for so long? This question leads many scholars to assume that the object within the church in Ethiopia is itself a replica. You can call it a forgery and call it a replica. I think forgery has some negative connotations, so let's just say replica. But they think the arc or the artifact in that church, while
being a replica, is a very old one. Yeah, it wasn't made in nineteen seventy or something, right, And this is a believable claim because the forgery of holy objects, relics of saints, pieces of the True Cross, and so on are historically quite common. Yeah there. I cannot remember who said it, but there is a great quotation wherein someone says They're shown a piece of the quote unquote true.
Cross, the one that held Jesus right.
Upon which Jesus Christ was crucified, And they say, you know, I've seen so many of these, they're enough to make a forest. Wow, how big is this cross? Right? And while that is true, while counterfeit relics and artifacts are ubiquitous in the ancient world, that doesn't prove or disprove the Church's claims it's just something that's important for us to know. And of course not everyone agrees spoiler alert
that this is the actual arc. There are people like Ron Wyatt who claimed to have discovered the arc for themselves. Wyatt specifically claims that he discovered it in Jerusalem. And now we get to the case of Zimbabwe, where the Lemba people who we mentioned earlier, claimed to have once in the past possessed the original arc and reconstructed it.
According to their traditions, the original container was destroyed and so the Limba, following the word of God, created a new container called the Ngoma Lungundhu for these holy stone tablets. That translates Goma Lungundhu translates to the drum that thunders. I know what an amazing name, right, And this container fits our criteria for the true arc in that it
contains those stone tablets and suitedly has extraordinary powers or capabilities. However, as you mentioned earlier in the show, Matt, big problem is people can look at this. Yeah, you look directly at.
It, no no consequence whatsoever.
Maybe it's I mean, we're being a big clib with this. According to the legends, you're not supposed to look at the container out of respect. It's opening it that presents the problem. Right. So our big buzzkill for this is that other people claim the arc was real, did exist, and is not around today, is not extant because the
Babylonians destroyed it. So these are our options. The arc does exist, was destroyed, or was destroyed and then recreated to contain these tablets, or it exists in any number of coincidentally inaccessible.
Places like the Vatican Archives.
I'm so glad you brought this up. Now.
This is just I did not read this anywhere. This is just something that came to mind. If you were going to safely store an ancient artifact such as this a relic, you might want to do it at the Vatican Archives because they've got some technology going on there to really protect things like this. And it would make a whole lot of sense if this is where it ended up, if you like think about it, it could.
I don't know, it would be safe for it to be there, and it would be relatively unknown because there the Vatican Archives are very difficult to gain access to, and if you do gain access, you don't get to see everything.
And it's so oh man. The whole process of accessing the Vatican Archives is strange. So there are parts of there are parts of the archives wherein you have to go there in person and you all are allowed to read a restricted work or view a sacred object, but you're not allowed to say, hey, so what stuff do
you have here? Yeah? What's the where's the directory? You have to know, you have to know exactly what you're looking for, which is such an effective way to prevent the curious from casually investigating things.
Hi, excuse me, I'm looking for the ark of the Covenant. Oh yes, I come right this way. I'll show you what it is. Sorry, that's perfect.
No, that's perfect. That's perfect. And that was the Pope right.
Oh yes, he's a papa.
Yeah that's true. From nine thirty am to about four thirty pm Vatican time, you can just swing by and speak to His Holiness himself. It's it's kind of like a bookstore. We are at absolutely kidding.
We're joking, so sorry that that is not meant to so.
I think I think the Pope himself would find it funny.
I think at any time you have to be able to poke phone a little bit at very very powerful people just a tiny bit just to make everything else feel okay. No matter what your beliefs are. If it's super powerful, you just kind of go, you know what, it's okay, right, we can be silly.
Well, the question holds though. The recreation that that you depicted met it still holds up because it leads us to another question. If this were in the archives, wouldn't someone have talked about it at some point? Yeah?
Oh yeah, And wouldn't it wouldn't okay, If you're a major institution like that, rather than just protect it, why wouldn't you have it in a protected place?
Right?
You know where it can be displayed for tourists. Can you imagine the tourism dollars you could get out of that Vatican Church and Vatican Bank.
Or probably more importantly, for that institution. Can you imagine the validity? Yes, it gives to adherents, to believers, to practitioners. People would come from across the world just version ratio for that, Yeah, just for a chance to view it. Why would it be a secret. A poor example of this would be the constitutions of various countries, many of which are on display, and they in a secular sense
are sacred objects, right, the foundation of various nations. But the states that function under these constitutions and these declarations and so on, they want people to see them. They have lines out the door for people to go look at these things. So it's an interesting conundrum because if the arc is stored somewhere and someone knows about it, then why is it a secret? So a great question.
In two thousand and nine, the patriarch of the Ethiopian Church had planned to publicly display it display the ark of the Covenant that is based there in axiom. However, this may have been a rumor. The claim was quickly withdrawn and the church said the original reports were disinformation, attempting who was implied to pressure the church to allow at least photographs of the arc to be disseminated. There's another question that you may have been wondering about as
we were exploring this story. Could there be multiple arcs?
Yeah? At this point we could say there are at least two.
Right, Yeah, the Limba arc, right, and the Drum that thunders, and then this original arc at least too, at least two. And that's if all the stories, that's if the Limba narrative and the ancient Jedaic narrative are both correct, Yes, but it turns out there are references in other ancient
text of similar containers used to transport sacred relics. There's an author named Thomas Roemer who created a book called The Invention of God and Roma writes that throughout the Levant, it was common for pre Islamic Bedouins and Arab communities to carry a holy chest that contained two sacred stones or the statues of two gods, and that later after the rise of Islam, these statues were replaced by copies
of the Qur'an. Oh Wow, and even stranger. This is something that I don't think either of us expected to find. Matt even stranger. The arc may have originally contained two statues, one representing yahweh and one representing a Shira.
I don't know Ashira.
Ashira, according to this folkloric research, was the divine consort of the god yahweh Aha. So if we're trying to be buzzfeedy about it and make a headline God's wife, pretty strange.
Stuff, Yeah, definitely.
So that's where we leave it for now. We are going to return with an episode on the claims of ancient technology perhaps associated with the arc, to which we can add other historical anachronistic objects such as the Antithera mechanism.
Dude, So it sounds like we need to start just traveling the world trying to prove whether or not this thing exists, because I don't think we can do it from here. We got to actually get in these rooms, tackle the guardians. It'd be like I'm opening this.
Thing and we can only do this with your help.
Oh no, no, no, wait, don't don't tackle any guardians. Don't please, don't do that. I'm totally joking. Yes, but we do need you to go explore the world for us, if that's okay.
And let us know if you have been to one of the places that we mentioned in this episode, let us know what your take is on the art. Now, we're pretty careful to separate our opinions from our research in every episode of every show we do, and in this case, I'll put my opinion out there. I believe it was a real historical object. Yeah, yeah, the descriptions are consistent enough. Now what did it do? What was really inside? How many instances or iterations or versions of
this thing exist. Those are questions that I don't have the answers to. However, there clearly was a physical thing and may still be a physical thing there.
Yeah, I tend to agree with you. Yeah, I think the physical thing though, if it did exist, it would go the way of the limbo one, where it was broken down into almost nothing and then it was recreated into a new version of itself.
And that also that makes me wonder about the old ship of Thesis problem.
You remember that one ship of thesis.
Yeah, the Ship of Thesis. It's a thought experiment and it's baffling. So the idea is the idea is this, Let's take a ship and say that over the course of the ship's existence, it is repaired and pieces of it are replaced, and eventually the ship is made of entirely new materials. None of the original ship exists. It's just been slowly and completely repaired and replaced. Is it the same ship in this case? Is the arc? The same arc?
Is any human being the same human as we constantly lose and replace ourselves.
That's true, that's true. These are huge questions. We want to hear. We want to hear your take. We hope that you enjoyed this episode as always. Thank you to our super producer Paul Dekkantt, thank you to the Guardians of the Arc, whomever they may be and wherever they are located. And thank you Matt for hanging out here. I can't believe we went the whole episode and only did a few tasteful Indiana Jones references.
Yeah, we got through it. Well, we did some tasteful full references. Then we read the Bible Indiana Jones style.
Okay, yeah, we did do it all all right. Well, that's that's our cue. That's our cue to call it a day. This concludes our episode, but not our show. We will be back very soon with more strange and fascinating stuff they don't want you to know. In the meantime, you can find Matt, Nole, Paul, and myself on the internet. We're all over the place. We're on Instagram, we're on Facebook, we're on Twitter. We'd love to see you over at
our community page. Here's where it gets crazy, where we're getting a lot of stuff and there's actually I don't know if you saw this, Matt, there's a guy who I've just decided to never reply to. Oh really, with anything other than the phrase and all caps, all Hail the King of toast.
Oh. I saw that. I just saw that. It was right before we came in here.
Yeah, I'm gonna take this. I'm gonna run with it. We are active on the page and we would like to hear from the most important part of every show we do, which is you, specifically you.
If none of that really, and that's the end of this classic episode. If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode, you can get into contact with us in a number of different ways. One of the best is to give us a call. Our number is one eight three three STDWY. If you don't want to do that, you can send us a good old fashioned email.
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