VANDERKAM RESPONDS: I e-mailed Jim VanderKam to ask whether the presentation of his views in the Altman and Crowder article was accurate. I quote his reply with his permission:

Altman called me and sent me some photographs. I told him something similar to what you wrote in your response: those shapes to which he directed my attention did look like Arabic numerals but that did not mean they were Arabic numerals. That is, the quotation farther along in the article is closer to what I said. I did not wonder who could have put Arabic numerals in the Isaiah scroll margins or other spaces. I did say that to check something like this it would be necessary to look at the scroll itself. Incidentally, I do not say "gonna"!

For context, here are the paragraphs in the article which mention VanderKam:

For many years Notre Dame professor James C. VanderKam has studied photos of the Dead Sea Scrolls. But he was startled recently when he noticed what appeared to be the Arabic numerals �3� and �2� written between lines and in the margins of the documents supposedly written more than 2,000 years ago.

�When could that have been put on there?� the veteran scholar wondered after seeing what looked like an upside-down number �3� in the margin of the Great Isaiah Scroll, one of many scrolls considered to be the greatest archaeological discovery of the 20th century.

Here's what puzzled this scrolls scholar: Ancient Hebrew, the language used by scribes copying the scrolls, did not have the symbols �3� or �2.�

[...]

Notre Dame's VanderKam, who noticed the �3x� in the Great Isaiah Scroll, said, �If they (the numbers) are actually there, and we're not just looking at some grain in the manuscript, it still does not make them 3's and 2's. We're gonna have to look at the original manuscript.�

To put it simply, the treatment of VanderKam in the article is inaccurate and self-serving. In particular, the opening paragraphs quote him as saying something he did not say and they give the impression that he "noticed" these marks when it was Altman who sent him photos and telephoned him about them. The word "noticed," used twice, misleads one to think that this arabic numerals business was VanderKam's idea. (The article did cause confusion about what VanderKam thought over on the Textual Criticism list.) The later paragraph is more accurate, apart from the "gonna." I'm not going to bother resenting Altman and Crowder. As I said earlier, they have been pushing this notion (I don't think it deserves to be called a "theory") for years. No one who is actually a specialist in the Dead Sea Scrolls takes them seriously.

But what I really do resent is that the Kansas City Star, in theory a reputable news organization, seems to have accepted the article as-is, without first running it by some specialists in Dead Sea Scrolls (or ignoring them if they did) and without fact-checking even to the point of asking VanderKam if his views were properly represented. I've always been suspicious of the media, but running this blog for more than a year has really opened my eyes to just how irresponsible they are. And it they weren't so irresponsible, the Altman's and the Crowders of this world would not get the undeserved public attention that they do get. Shame on you, editors of the Kansas City Star.

I haven't the time and energy to check with everyone else quoted byAltman and Crowder to see if the quotations are accurate. But if you are one of those quoted please let me know. And if you are in touch with one of those quoted, I would be grateful if you would alert them to the article and ask them to let me know what they think of how what they said was presented.

UPDATE (15 June): I didn't link to the Textual Criticism list above because it was configured to be readable only to subscribers. But the listowner has now changed the configuration so that the messages are available to the public. To follow the discussion of the Altman and Crowder article, start here and just keep moving forward. A message from VanderKam is relayed as well.