Jeremy L. Berg

I went today. I am fascinated by the Dead Sea Scrolls, and have had the opportunity to take classes on them a number of times — including with Dr. Michael Wise, a renowned DSS expert who teaches at Northwestern College and Bethel Seminary. I have taught a class on them, and have read several books on them including the English translation of most of the scrolls themselves.

So, when I heard they were coming to the Minnesota Science Museum I was stoked.  After listening to a lecture by Dr. Youngblood and Dr. Gurtner from Bethel Seminary I purchased tickets and waited for the day to arrive.  This morning I stood inches away from ancient Hebrew scrolls that are over 2,000 years old. Cool!

How was it?  This is a great learning opportunity for beginners who love history and especially ancient biblical history and the world leading up to the time of Jesus.  Like most museum exhibits, you wander for a long time through everything surrounding the actual scrolls — ancient pottery, ink wells, animal skins, fabrics, jars, utensils, and other archaeological finds from this same time.  After 90 minutes in the exhibit we still hadn’t seen any sign of any scrolls.  “I bet they’re around this corner.”  Nope.  The build up is of course intentional.  The rooms get progressively darker as you get nearer the actual scroll manuscripts on display.

As an amateur Bible history junkie and well read on the era of Jewish history called “Second Temple Judaism”, I was a bit bored through this part as I was not learning anything new.  I was antsy to see the scrolls.  So, closing in on 2 hours in the exhibit we arrived at last in one small dimly light room where they had just 5 small scroll fragments on display.  I was not expecting to see the most famous and significant documents, but I was a bit let down by only seeing five fragments after all of that build up.

So, for the beginner who loves the Bible, ancient history and learning in general, this is going to be a great experience for you as you learn about these scrolls for the first time.  For the more advanced history buff and biblical scholar, this is a bit of a disappointment all in all.  I didn’t learn anything new, though I saw a lot of neat jars and stuff. Plus, the hand held audio tour device adds a nice touch, and it was nice to hear Dr. Wise’s voice on that device opening our minds to the treasures and mysteries of these ancient documents.

Have you seen the scrolls yet?  What did you think?