- The Ark of the Covenant,
a gold-covered wooden chest containing the stone tablets
of the 10 Commandments,
thought to be an artifact of legend only,
some evidence has presented itself
that not only does it exist
but that it is still discoverable in this world today.
The following places may be where
it actually exists right now.
(dramatic music)
Here are 10 places the ark of the covenant might be.
Number 10 is a cave in Jordan.
According to two Maccabees, a book of the Bible
that's written in Hebrew and is said to be an account
of Jewish history, the Ark of the Covenant
was taken from King Solomon's temple
and entrusted to Jeremiah, a prophet of the Lord.
Jeremiah, also known as the weeping prophet,
barely avoided capture by enemy soldiers with the Ark
and hid it along with several other valuable items
in an unmarked cave in a mountain range in Jordan.
His hope was to protect it forever from the Babylonians
and anyone else who wished to covet its power.
The text of two Maccabees was written during
the second century BC while Jerusalem
was under Babylon's rule.
Considering the centuries that have passed,
if the Ark is still hidden in a mountain,
it could be a very long time before it's discovered again.
Number nine is Chartres Cathedral.
Also known as the Cathedral of Our Lady of Chartres,
this 12th century Roman Catholic Cathedral
in Chartres, France, is incredibly well-preserved
and is still open today for mass and prayer
but with all the wonder and amazing gothic-style
architecture comes a number of mysterious tales
from the days of the crusades.
One such story told by Louis Charpentier in his book
The Mysteries of Chartres Cathedral tells of
the Knights Templar who were soldiers
for the temple of Solomon.
According to Charpentier, the Templar found
the Ark of the Covenant at an undisclosed location
and brought it to the church
where it remains in secret today.
Though the people responsible for the Cathedral's upkeep
haven't claimed to know of such an artifact
inside of the church, many still believe that it's in there.
Number eight is Zimbabwe.
In the late 20th century, a lot of media attention
was focused on Zimbabwe in South Africa
where a local tribe, the Lemba, came forward
with claims that they'd descended from ancient Jewish people
calling themselves the Lost Tribe of Israel.
In 1999, a DNA survey confirmed that there were indeed links
between their people and Priestly families
of the Jewish faith.
While this evidence has been disputed,
such arguments haven't stopped the Lemba
from revealing their replica of the Ark of the Covenant,
specifically a 700 year old copy that they claim
was made with the original Ark's core.
The tribe treats the artifact the way ancient followers
of Solomon did, never touching it with their hands
and carrying it on poles.
Could this replica be the real Ark
sitting in a museum in Zimbabwe?
Number seven is Lake Tiberias.
Also known as the Sea of Galilee or Lake of Gennesaret,
Lake Tiberias is a freshwater lake in Israel
which might just hold an ancient secret under its surface.
In addition to apparently being the very lake
that Jesus Christ and Peter, his apostle,
miraculously walked on as told in the Bible.
The body of water is said to be hiding
the Ark of the Covenant way down in its depths.
According to a sect of Shia Muslims citing passages
from Muhammad, the Ark will rise from Tiberias
after Mahdi, the redeemer of Islam comes to power
but before the Day of Judgment when the world
will ultimately end.
Could the world's most powerful artifact
be at the bottom of this lake?
It's possible that we will not know
until the end of days.
Number six is a government complex.
If the Ark of the Covenant is as powerful
as has been prophesied, then it stands to reason
that those who lead human king would make sure
it was safely out of the hands of those
who would abuse its power.
Enter the theory that says the religious artifact is,
in fact, gathering dust in a government complex
underground somewhere and its existence has been
kept secret from all but a select few individuals
whose job is to protect it and ensure nobody ever finds it.
But the question is, which government?
What country is it in?
No one knows but the writer of the movie Indiana Jones
and the Raiders of the Lost Ark felt a similar theory
was good enough to be the plot.
Sadly, no solid evidence exists to prove the Ark
was discovered and discreetly stored away
but we'll know if a leader suddenly gains unreal powers.
Number five is Ethiopia.
A common story among certain Christians
says that the Ark resides in a small church
called Saint Mary of Zion in Axum Ethiopia.
Apparently, 3,000 years ago, the Ark was moved
from Solomon's Temple to Axum by King Solomon
and Queen Sheba's son, Menelik, before the temple fell.
45 million orthodox Christian Ethiopians
believed the Ark of the Covenant is in Saint Mary's.
Many claim that if it was, it would have been revealed
to the world but arguments abound claiming its unveiling
would lead to its theft or damaging soon after
or, worse still, that a reckoning would come upon the earth
for touching or looking inside of it.
If you do happen to ask the Devout,
they will claim that they don't have to see it
because they can feel the Ark's presence.
Number four is the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
Whether the Ark was a powerful religious relic,
history seems to think it was, at the very least,
a real physical box and one that was last reported
to be within the temple of King Solomon,
so it stands to reason that if nobody can confirm fully
that it left, it must still be there.
Legends tell of a deep and secretive complex
of hidden chambers under the ancient foundations
where the temple and it's successor,
the Second Temple of Solomon, once stood.
It's there that it's believed that faithful guards
hid away the Ark while the temple collapsed
under the siege of the Babylonians.
Could the search for the Ark end where it began
at Temple Mount in Jerusalem or is this tale just
a distraction to slow treasure hunters down
before the true location can be determined?
Number three is wherever the dead sea scrolls lead.
In the mid to late 1940s, a number of papyrus scrolls
where discovered in the Qumran Caves
near the Dead Sea in Western Asia.
After being translated from Hebrew in which it was written,
one of the scrolls told of all of Solomon's treasures
being documented on a bronze tablet.
When the forces of Babylon conquered and burned
King Solomon's Temple, they plundered a large amount
of treasure from the building and it's been feared
that the Babylonians left with the Ark itself.
The Hebrew text, which was translated in 2013,
claims that the treasures were scattered
and put under the care of prophets
and even angels shortly after the siege.
Unfortunately, much of the Dead Sea scrolls
have been lost to time and actual thievery,
so we may, sadly, never know where specifically
those treasures are.
Number two are aliens took it back.
The Ark is said to possess many powers
including creating food, destroying stone walls,
and bringing forth God himself which is why it was always
covered and out of sight so not to accidentally
invoke his wrath, however, one theory suggests
that the artifact wasn't, in fact,
the creation of Moses at all but actually a device
brought to earth by extraterrestrial beings.
That's right, aliens.
As ridiculous as this may sound,
there's some interesting evidence to support it.
For one thing, the Ark was a weapon and communication device
but why would God need such things?
He's omnipotent, so he could simply appear before a person
to communicate with them.
Allegedly, before the Temple of Solomon fell,
the Ark's alien owners returned and reclaimed the technology
that they had left behind for the inferior humans.
And number one is that it's destroyed.
A number of people don't believe the Ark of the Covenant
is hidden anywhere and was, in fact, destroyed.
Believe to have been in Solomon's Temple where Jerusalem
fell to Babylon in 587 AD, it's possible that,
when the city was destroyed, instead of taking the Ark
with the rest of the loot back to Babylon,
the soldiers simply destroyed it.
This would explain why the Ark has yet to be unveiled
to the world, though it also suggests that not one
but every place that claims to hold the Holy artifact
is either lying or completely wrong about it being
the real one.
Other stories claim that the Ark was broken by a person
who was overwhelmed with its power
and the later stories of its existence
were simply a cover up so nobody would know the symbol
could be so easily destroyed.
(ominous music)