Using modern science and technology to solve historical puzzles is becoming commonplace. It is now possible to use advanced DNA analysis to shed new light on old subjects. High-tech tests have been conducted on the bodies of such notables as King Tut, Mozart and Napoleon in an effort to determine how they died, or what diseases they may have had.
When such studies appear in peer-reviewed medical journals, they are expected to be grounded in good evidence, science, and valid research methodologies. Yet the Virology Journal recently published a paper, ''Influenza or not influenza: Analysis of a case of high fever that happened 2000 years ago in Biblical time," which examines a Biblical miracle attributed to Jesus....