The Science Museum of Minnesota opened its “Dead Sea Scrolls: Words that Changed the World” exhibit in conjunction with the St. John’s Bible Project. The exhibit, which runs until Oct. 24, offers an inter-religious look at the scrolls that are the earliest known texts of the Bible.
The exhibit includes three sets of five scrolls, with excerpts from Genesis, Psalms, Isaiah, Deuteronomy and more. It also displays artifacts from the time period (about 2,000 years ago) and place (along the western shores of the Dead Sea in the caves of Qumran) in which the scrolls were discovered.
“The Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition is one of the most important exhibitions the Science Museum has ever hosted,” said Mike Day, the senior vice president of museum enterprises at the Science Museum of Minnesota. “In bringing the scrolls to Minnesota, we are offering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for all visitors, regardless of their religioius faith, to witness something truly remarkable.”
Along with the exhibit, the Science Museum of Minnesota is showing the new “Arabia” film in the Omnitheater. This is the first film in which the production crew has been granted access to more than 20 different locations across the Arabian peninsula. The movie looks beyond the discovery of the scrolls, focusing instead on the location of that discovery. Viewers are shown birds’-eye views of the peninsula’s biggest metropolitan cities, as well as a look at the ancient lifestyles of the Beduin people. Although many associate the Dead Sea Scrolls with Christianity and Judaism, the film places the scrolls within the context of Islam by showing viewers a hajj, the annual pilgrimage where millions of Muslims travel to Mecca.
The last part of the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit features the St. John’s Bible, the newest hand-scribed illustrated Bible and the first to be commissioned in 500 years.
“It’s a wonderful tale of two Bibles,” said Janine Hanson, director of public relations for the Science Museum. “Displaying The St. John’s Bible, which is the newest hand-written, illustrated Bible, alongside the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are the oldest written record of the Hebrew Bible, provides an intriguing juxtaposition between ancient and modern manuscripts.”
Though the exhibit requires some travel time for many students in St. Joseph and Collegeville, Hanson believes the trip would be worth it.
“Well, traveling 75 miles to the Science Museum in St. Paul is certainly a lot easier than the 6,200 mile journey one would generally have to take to Israel to see the scrolls in person,” Hanson said. “On a more serious note, our visitors are telling us that seeing these authentic, 2,000-year-old scrolls, written around the time when Jesus lived, is a truly remarkable and personal experience. I can’t imagine a college student who wouldn’t want to be able to say that they witnessed these in person when they had the chance to do so.”