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(10-23) 04:00 PDT Mar Theodosius, West Bank — Until today, the main claim to fame of this sleepy monastery on the edge of the Judean wilderness was the tradition that the Three Wise Men slept in the caves here after visiting the infant Jesus in Bethlehem.

But a new book claims that the Greek Orthodox Monastery Mar Theodosius was the last hiding place of one of the greatest treasures of antiquity: the gold and silver vessels of the first century B.C. Temple in Jerusalem, the central shrine of Judaism that once housed the Holy Ark containing the sacred tablets brought down from Mount Sinai by Moses.

British archaeologist Sean Kingsley said he has traced the journey of the legendary vessels from the first time they disappeared from public view more than 1,500 years ago to their current location in this walled monastery east of Bethlehem in the West Bank. He said the items include “the central icons of biblical Judaism” — a seven-branched gold candelabra, the bejeweled Table of the Divine Presence and a pair of silver trumpets.

But many people, including Israeli government officials, believe the treasures are hidden somewhere in Vatican vaults. In 1996, Israeli Religious Affairs Minister Shimon Shetreet officially asked the pope to return them.

But Kingsley contends they were taken from Rome when it was sacked by the Vandals in A.D. 455. He bases his theory on new archaeological sources and contemporary accounts by ancient historians.

In his new book, “God’s Gold: The Quest for the Lost Temple Treasure of Jerusalem,” just published in Britain this month and due in U.S. bookstores in the spring, Kingsley describes the odyssey of the priceless haul from Jerusalem to Rome and back again via Carthage and Constantinople, to its final resting-place at Mar Theodosius.

“I am the first person to prove that the temple treasure is no longer in Rome,” he said.

Kingsley said the vessels were hidden in the caves under the monastery to escape the sacking of Jerusalem by Muslim invaders in A.D. 614.

“If you were the Bishop of Jerusalem and a massive Persian force was sweeping down like locusts from the north, you would want to get the treasure out of the city,” he said.

But at least one Israeli expert has scoffed at Kingsley’s theories.

“I’ve been there several times, studying the skeletons of monks who were massacred by the Persians in the seventh century,” said Israeli anthropologist Joe Zias, a former curator for the Israel Antiquities Authority. “It doesn’t have any such treasure — and if it did, it was plundered by the Arabs or Persians centuries ago.”

Kingsley said he was unable to gain access to the monastery to prove his theory, and conceded that he had not discussed the matter with local church officials or archaeologists for fear of tipping them off before publication of his book.

The dilapidated monastery was once home to monks, but today its only inhabitants are 10 nuns. One of them, who declined to give her name, told a visitor that there was no treasure buried at Mar Theodosius, which was destroyed during the same Muslim invasion and left abandoned until the late 19th century. During a visit to the caves beneath the monastery, a Chronicle contributor was told that no precious artifacts had ever been recovered from the site, probably because it was left in ruins for nearly 1,300 years and any valuables were looted by grave robbers.

Although Kingsley may be mistaken about Mar Theodosius, his reconstruction of the odyssey of the temple treasure is compelling.

According to the first century historian Josephus, 50 tons of gold and silver vessels were plundered from the temple by the Roman Emperor Vespasian and his son Titus during the conquest of Jerusalem in A.D. 70.

“They used the treasure to help finance the building of the Colosseum in Rome and paraded it through the streets in triumph in A.D. 71,” said Kingsley. The moment, he said, was captured in a frieze carved into the Arch of Titus in Rome, which clearly shows the menorah, the seven-branched temple candelabra that was the symbol of ancient Judaism, being paraded through the streets.

“Contemporary sources show that it survived on public display in the Temple of Peace in the Roman Forum from A.D. 75 into the early fifth century. Then it suddenly disappeared. Who stole God’s gold?”

According to his research, it was Gaiseric, king of the Vandals.

“In A.D. 455, Gaiseric looted and burnt Rome in 14 days and threw everything he could, including the temple treasures, into ships and took them to the temple of Carthage,” he said. “They would not have liquidated the loot. It gave them power.

“In A.D. 534, the emperor Justinian brought the Vandal king into Constantinople. The records show that they resurrected the triumphal procession in A.D. 71. The historian Procopius of Caesarea clearly describes the treasures of Jerusalem being paraded at head of this triumph.”

In Constantinople — today’s Istanbul — Kingsley found the Church of St. Polyeuktos, a unique Byzantine structure which appears to have been built according to the dimensions of the Temple in Jerusalem. Its patron, Princess Juliana, was described in terms that compared her to the builder of the original temple. One church inscription read: “She alone has conquered time and surpassed the wisdom of renowned Solomon, raising a temple to receive God.”

“The relevance of the Church of St. Polyeuktos to the temple treasure is obvious. Where would be more fitting to deposit the birthright of the chosen people than in a temple fit for God?” asked Kingsley.

But the treasure did not remain in Constantinople for long, he says.

“The emperor Justinian was a student of classical antiquity, and he was aware that every civilization that controlled the temple treasure had eventually been consumed by it. Fearful, he sent the treasure back to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem in around A.D. 560,” said Kingsley.

“At this point our evidence peters out, and the story becomes a question of interpretation,” he said. “But we know that the Jews of Jerusalem allied with the Persians during the invasion of A.D. 614, and one chronicler describes them violating the cave beneath the tomb of Christ in the Holy Sepulchre. What were they looking for? I can only suppose they were looking for the temple treasure.”

At that point, said Kingsley, a monk called Modestus from Mar Theodosius found himself in charge of the priceless vessels. It would only be natural for him to hide them in the isolated desert caves, not knowing that the location would also be overrun by the invading Persians a few weeks later.

Kingsley said he had peered over the wall of the monastery and seen evidence of archeological looting in the area, but hoped the temple treasures would remain undisturbed.

“It’s very important this universal treasure is not used for political purposes,” he said. “I wouldn’t want to see this deadly treasure come to life. It’s much safer left under the shifting sands of the West Bank.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2006/10/23/MNG9NLU97U1.DTL&type=printable