Coming to San Diego, June 29–December 31, 2007!
While the scrolls have been exhibited in the U.S. before, Dead Sea Scrolls will be the most comprehensive exhibition of the scrolls ever assembled, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. Dead Sea Scrolls was created by the San Diego Natural History Museum for the Museum specifically, and will not travel to any other venue.
To ensure preservation of the 2000-year-old parchment, the IAA only allows scrolls to be exhibited for a three-month period. The Museum has been granted the unusual opportunity for a six-month exhibition with 12 scrolls displayed for the first three months, replaced by another set of 12 for the last three months.
San Diego Natural History Museum Website has all the info. The left hand panel on their website has a link to ticket information and lecture tours.
For those who don’t know about the Dead Sea Scrolls – Wikipedia has a good article on it. –
For those interested in Dead Sea Scroll trivia Centuryone.com has 25 Fascinating Facts About the Dead Sea Scrolls
– prying1 –
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3 users commented in " Dead Sea Scrolls Coming To San Diego "
Follow-up comment rss or Leave a TrackbackJudging from the description on its website, the San Diego museum plans to present a biased and distorted account of the present state of Scrolls scholarship.
The Cambridge History of Judaism features two articles on the origins of the Dead Sea Scrolls: one defending the so-called Essene theory, the other defending the Jerusalem-libraries theory. Similarly, many important news accounts over the past decade (including, most notably, several by John Noble Wilford in the New York Times) have described a polarization of Scrolls scholars into two schools.
For years, the American Association of Museums, in a document entitled “Standards and Best Practices for Museums”, has recommended a policy of neutrality for topics that are the object of scientific controversy.
Yet the San Diego museum, in a departure from its mission to educate the public, intends to favor only one of the two salient theories of Scroll origins. Clearly, the museum’s duty is to present both of the theories, along with the evidence that supports them, so that the public can be properly informed and judge for itself.
This entire issue is dealt with at length at http://pacific-science-scrolls-scandal.blogspot.com/
The Forward has now published a fascinating opinion piece by U. of Chicago prof Norman Golb, attacking the current series of Scrolls exhibits. http://www.forward.com/articles/take-claims-about-dead-sea-scrolls-with-a-grain-of/
And Golb now has a full critique out, entitled “Fact and Fiction in Current Exhibitions of the Dead Sea Scrolls–A Critical Notebook for Viewers.” The link is http://oi.uchicago.edu/pdf/dss_fact_fiction_2007.pdf
The Los Angeles Times had an interesting piece last week, by Mike Boehm, on the exhibit. They asked the curator, Dr. Risa Levitt Kohn, why the museum has carefully excluded all scholars who oppose the old, and increasingly contested, theory of Scroll origins from the lecture series accompanying the exhibit, and she came up with a good reply–“You don’t want to confuse people with so many competing theories, so they walk away, saying, ‘Well, nobody really knows anything!'”
I for one find that extremely convincing. The last thing in the world we would want is for people to understand why there is more than one interpretation of the facts. After all, that would only confuse them, and in their confused state they might become depressed, or behave in an irrational manner. They might even start asking why the museum has not explained how it has come about that an entire series of major scholars have rejected the old theory over the past decade, not in favor of “so many competing theories,” but in favor of one competing theory. Yes, we must protect people from the truth at all costs. And we wouldn’t want to do anything that might upset Dr. Kohn’s academic friends!
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