A 'Dead' day at the Museum

Looking for something “cool” to do on a hot Sunday in Wisconsin, Janet and I decided to head to the Milwaukee Public Museum to take in the traveling exhibit of the Dead Sea Scrolls. A generous church friend had asked if we were interested in going and sent me a check to cover the admission cost. Thank you, Laura!

Now, no one cared to tell us that it was also commencement day for Marquette University (so 2,000 graduates and their families were vying for parking spaces downtown…). But once we settled in to a nearby parking garage we were soon learning all about the history of the Qumran community near the Dead Sea, and the “chance” discovery of the first of many Biblical and extra-Biblical scrolls found in the late 1940s and 1950s.

Probably the most interesting was the very faithful reproduction of the 24-foot scroll of Isaiah. A young Bible scholar (and trained photographer) John Trever–also the first American to see the scrolls–was given permission to photograph that precious document in 1948. And he had to do it under some adverse physical and technical conditions. Those pictures remain as the most detailed images of the original.

Janet loved the fact that some later manuscripts (upon which many Bible translations relied) were the same as these more ancient finds. God had preserved the integrity of His Word.

I’m not sure where the display heads next, but if you’re in the Milwaukee area you still have a couple of weeks to see it. I heard other people say that the Milwaukee exhibit surpassed the one hosted in Chicago, with much more information and “build-up” before presenting some of the actual scroll fragments. It was an interesting and faith-affirming day at the museum.