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Saturday, October 07, 2006

THE DISCOVERING THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS EXHIBIT in Seattle is reviewed in the Oregonian:
THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS IN SEATTLE

Saturday, October 07, 2006
NANCY HAUGHT

SEATTLE -- Next time you stick a postage stamp on an envelope, think of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Why? Because many of the thousands of scroll fragments discovered in 11 Judean caves between 1947 and 1956 are about the size of a 39-cent stamp. Which helps explain why they haven't all been published -- and why the display of scroll fragments at Seattle's Pacific Science Center is so absorbing.

There are lots of reasons to make the trip to see "Discovering the Dead Sea Scrolls" before it closes Jan. 7. The joint effort of the Pacific Science Center and the Discovery Place in Charlotte, N.C., is a rare opportunity to see scrolls that have never been exhibited before, to lay eyes on the oldest biblical manuscripts recovered to date, and to learn what they can teach us about history, culture and human life outside of religion.

It's also an opportunity to see how cutting-edge science, which often promises to take us far into the future, can also take us back into the past.

[...]
The postage-stamp comparison is pretty good, but all the scrolls have been published now, unless you're counting bits with only a letter or two on them. Also, I'm not sure I would describe any of the Dead Sea Scrolls as "secular" and I think it's anachronistic to describe the Yahad as "what might have been the first kibbutz." I could nit-pick some more, but the article does have some useful information for beginners.

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