The Dead Sea Scrolls: A biblical blockbuster | The Economist

The Dead Sea Scrolls: A biblical blockbuster | The Economist

The Dead Sea Scrolls

A biblical blockbuster

Dec 12th 2011, 18:53 by L.O. | NEW YORK

IN 1947 a young Bedouin shepherd wandering the rocky Qumran plateau in what is now the West Bank stumbled upon a cave which looked as if no-one had entered it in years. His explorations yielded no treasures, to his dismay. He spotted a few clay jars filled with old parchments, but he was illiterate and had no use for documents, especially such old ones. He could not have known that he had discovered over 2,000-year-old scrolls containing, among other writings, the oldest known copies of the Hebrew Bible—the founding scriptures of western civilisation.

The Dead Sea Scrolls—so named because the 11 caves where they were found sit a mile inland from the north shore of the Dead Sea—are a collection of 972 texts written between roughly 200 BCE and 70 CE, during the time of the Roman Empire and the birth of Christianity. According to a popular theory, a group of people hid the scrolls in the Qumran caves to preserve that vast library of religious and secular texts from the approaching Romans, prior to the fall of Jerusalem. The shepherd found them by accident two millennia later, and a French Dominican priest named Roland de Vaux collected and analysed them.

Twenty of these precious artefacts are now on view in New York as part of a travelling exhibition, "Dead Sea Scrolls: Life and Faith in Biblical Times", now on at Discovery Times Square. Four of the exhibited scrolls have never been presented to the public before. In addition, some 500 biblical era artefacts found in the nearby Qumran settlement—which dates from roughly 130 BCE—allow the viewers a glimpse of life from an era before and then during the time of Jesus.

The scrolls filled a gap in knowledge about religious beliefs and customs from the time when Judaism flourished and Christianity was still nascent in the region. The documents pre-date what was once considered the oldest-known copy of the Bible by more than a millennium. This has allowed scholars to analyse how accurately the original text has been transcribed over years.

The scholarship over these documents is vast and studded with question marks: Who wrote the texts? (A Jewish sect living in the nearby settlement? People of Jerusalem? first Christians?); Why is Jesus—who was alive at the time—not mentioned in them?; Does one of the scrolls contain clues to a place where treasures are buried?

As befitting a venue amid the razzle-dazzle of Times Square, Discovery turns the exhibition into a bit of a show. (The tourist-friendly space has previously hosted such blockbusters as "Titanic: The Artifact Exhibition", "Leonardo Da Vinci’s Workshop", "King Tut" and "Harry Potter: The Exhibition".) Before the main exhibition hall, visitors will find themselves in a room cloaked in complete silence and darkness, a world away from the noise of the streets. A female voice is then heard reciting a passage from Genesis in Hebrew and English, the words appearing luminous on the wall in complete darkness: “The Lord said to Abram, ‘Go forth from your native land and from your father’s house to the land that I will show you.’”

From there guests move to the next room, or rather a recreation of the site where the ancient scrolls were found—the Qumran plateau—complete with reddish sand under foot. A guide dressed like an archaeologist who could easily feature in an Indiana Jones movie takes visitors through a multimedia environment full of video clips documenting the excavation of the site. From that "desert" guests enter the cavernous hall hosting the main exhibition. Along the walls there are weapons of war, stone carvings, textiles, hairpins, necklaces, cups, coins and beautiful mosaics; all used at some point by people of the Qumran settlement. Scrolls on display include pieces from the biblical books of Genesis, Psalms, Exodus and Isaiah, as well as non-biblical religious writings and secular accounts of everyday life of the time.

"The United States is a place in which there is obviously tremendous interest in the history of Judaism and Christianity," said Lawrence Schiffman of the New York based Yeshiva University, a special consultant to the exhibition. Especially in a city like New York, he added, "people of Jewish or Christian religion are going to come together" to view this show and learn of their shared background.

Curated by Risa Levitt Kohn, a professor of Hebrew Bible and Judaism at San Diego State University, and Debora Ben-Ami, the Iron Age collection curator at the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), the show is organised by the IAA, which has drawn from collections of the Israel National Treasures. After Discovery Times Square, the artefacts will travel to the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia in May.

"Dead Sea Scrolls: Life and Faith in Biblical Times" is on view at Discovery Times Square until April 15th 2012

Read more: A review of "The Story of the Scrolls: The Miraculous Discovery and True Significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls" by Geza Vermes (Feb 2010)