Wednesday, August 04, 2004

THE SHRINE OF THE BOOK HAS REOPENED:
Shrine of the Book reopens after redesign (Jerusalem Post)
By CALEV BEN-DAVID AND MEIR RONNEN

The Shrine of the Book at the Israel Museum, which holds the Dead Sea Scrolls, the oldest surviving biblical texts, was officially reopened to the public in a ceremony Tuesday night after undergoing three years of restoration and redesign.

[...]

Actually, I thought this happened a couple of months ago.

The Forward also has an article on the reopening:
Iconic Monument of Jerusalem Skyline Shines a Bit Brighter
By EetTa Prince-GIBSON
July 30, 2004

In 1965, the Israel Museum's Shrine of the Book, with its signature white-tiled dome, first graced Jerusalem's skyline. The center was built to hold the Dead Sea Scrolls, the world's earliest evidence of biblical texts and sectarian and apocryphal manuscripts. The scrolls were found in 11 caves along the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, only 40 kilometers due east from Jerusalem, between 1947 and 1956, and the Shrine was designed to evoke the discovery. Its dome was meant to look like the lid of the jars in which the Scrolls were first discovered; the contrast with the free-standing black basalt wall was intended to recall "The War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness," a central theme in the narrative; and visitors passed through a series of openings reminiscent of the deep caves in which the Scrolls were found. Almost immediately, the complex became an iconic monument.

This summer, the shrine reopened after more than a year of extensive refurbishment and renovations. In addition to the physical restoration, which included replacement of the dome's tiles, repaving the entrance plaza and resurfacing the black granite wall, the showcases have been redesigned and rebuilt by a firm in Milan, Italy, utilizing the latest techniques in preservation and climate control.

Museum officials also decided to rotate the scrolls on display � three months on, six months off. In the main center hall, under the dome, a scroll is displayed prominently, wound around a large central column, like a Torah scroll. Visitors can encircle the column to read it. Fragments of other scrolls are displayed along the circular walls. Most of the scrolls were written on parchment, with a few rare examples of papyrus.

[...]

The Aleppo Codex (see also here) is on display there too.

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