The exhibition will include many ancient artifacts from the Israel Museum in Jerusalem and will highlight the 28-foot Temple Scroll, the longest of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
The Dead Sea Scrolls were publicly unveiled in 1949 at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. and are permanently housed at the Shrine of the Book wing [pictured above] of Jerusalem’s Israel Museum. While selected documents from the Dead Sea Scrolls have been previously displayed outside of Israel, this tour will grant North Americans the opportunity to view the popular documents for the first time in over 50 years. The Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood, Cleveland will be the first stop of a tour that will include two additional North American museums yet to be announced.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are ancient manuscripts that were discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven caves near Khirbet Qumran, located on the northwestern shores of the Dead Sea. Some 800 documents were found, written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. The scrolls are dated from the third century BCE to the first century CE and contain biblical, apocryphal, and sectarian texts. Scholars attribute the writing of the scrolls to the Essenes, a breakaway Jewish sect.
Israel Museum staff describe the historical significance of the scrolls as follows; “The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls represents a turning point in the study of the history of the Jewish people in ancient times, for never before has a literary treasure of such magnitude come to light. Thanks to these remarkable finds, our knowledge of Jewish society in the Land of Israel during the Hellenistic and Roman periods as well as the origins of rabbinical Judaism and early Christianity has been greatly enriched.”
The Dead Sea Scrolls were publicly unveiled in 1949 at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. and are permanently housed at the Shrine of the Book wing [pictured above] of Jerusalem’s Israel Museum. While selected documents from the Dead Sea Scrolls have been previously displayed outside of Israel, this tour will grant North Americans the opportunity to view the popular documents for the first time in over 50 years. The Maltz Museum of Jewish Heritage in Beachwood, Cleveland will be the first stop of a tour that will include two additional North American museums yet to be announced.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are ancient manuscripts that were discovered between 1947 and 1956 in eleven caves near Khirbet Qumran, located on the northwestern shores of the Dead Sea. Some 800 documents were found, written in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek. The scrolls are dated from the third century BCE to the first century CE and contain biblical, apocryphal, and sectarian texts. Scholars attribute the writing of the scrolls to the Essenes, a breakaway Jewish sect.
An ancient Dead Sea Scroll housed in Israel Museum
Israel Museum staff describe the historical significance of the scrolls as follows; “The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls represents a turning point in the study of the history of the Jewish people in ancient times, for never before has a literary treasure of such magnitude come to light. Thanks to these remarkable finds, our knowledge of Jewish society in the Land of Israel during the Hellenistic and Roman periods as well as the origins of rabbinical Judaism and early Christianity has been greatly enriched.”