Dead Sea Scrolls on exhibit at Philly's Franklin Institute

Credit: Matthew Peyton

The Dead Sea Scrolls, a collection of ancient manuscripts from the Hebrew Bible, are on exhibit along with hundreds of ancient biblical artifacts at the Franklin Institute, 222 N. 20th Street in Philadelphia through Sunday, October 14, 2012.

Credit: Donna Brown

While the scribes of the scrolls are unknown, the ancient texts shed light on the language used in the Bible, much of which remains unchanged to this day. The scrolls were written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Nabataean on parchment, papyrus and bronze.
 

Credit: Donna Brown

The world debut exhibition, Dead Sea Scrolls: Life and Faith in Ancient Times , features one of the largest collections of the 2000-year-old Dead Sea Scrolls ever displayed in North America as well as a three-ton stone from the Western Wall in Jerusalem. Twenty scrolls are accompanied by more than 500 items from the biblical era including many newly discovered Holy Land artifacts.
 
Visitors can also experience a compelling scale recreation of a section of Jerusalem’s Western (or Wailing) Wall complete with an authentic three-ton stone from the Wall in Israel. Prayer slips left on the wall during the exhibition will be taken to Jerusalem and placed on the Western Wall itself.

Credit: Donna Brown

The first cache of scrolls was discovered in 1947 when a Bedouin shepherd casually tossed a rock into a cave and heard a pot shatter. Over the next eight years, archaeologists excavated a series of caves and found thousands of parchment fragments that included the oldest known copies of the Hebrew Bible.

This exhibition is created by the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) from the collections of the Israel National Treasures and produced by Discovery Times Square and The Franklin Institute.

For ticket information, go to: http://www.fi.edu/scrolls/.


Credit: Donna Brown