1. Today I had the good fortune, and fulfilling experience of visiting with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
2. And, I was lucky enough to have them come to me, rather than having journey to the Holy Land for the experience.
3. Whether one is religious, or not so much, so enamored of the ability to be part of history, and make the acquaintance of a genesis of Western Civilization I unreservedly endorse a visit to Discovery Times Square, 226 West 44th Street, New York City. The show remains until April 15th.
4. From the start, the specific relalationship of the exhibit and both Judaism and Christianity is made clear as is the connections with the earlier peoples of the area and Islam.
5. These two thousand year-old parchments and fragments of parchment demonstrate that in the days of Hellenistic and Roman control of the Land of Israel the Hebrew Bible was already a collection of writings upon which these people relied to understand and express their history and their relationship with God.
6. The archeology is stressed, explained, documented and presented. There is an initial lecturer who is aided by a multi-screen presentation .no more than five to ten minutes.
7. Each person gets an audio-phone which can be coordinated with the exhibits, based on a number next to each display.
8. The huge round display of the dozen or so sections of the Scrolls themselves is accompanied with a blow-up of the fragment, with translations, and explanation.
9. One is privileged to see, read, the earliest iterations of the Old Testament, from a time when there was no one agreed-on version. Many of the scrolls are non-biblical, and give a view of legal writing and those things important in day-to-day ventures.
10. We spent two hours, and my children loved the movies and artifacts. One could spend twice that time there.
11. This is a taste of the exhibit:
a. [ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAi7ZDY2q4s]Discovering The Dead Sea Scrolls - YouTube[/ame]
