Dead Sea Scrolls

While we were in Pennsylvania, we spend a weekend in Philadelphia.  Our daughter treated us to the Dead Sea Scroll exhibit at the Franklin Institute.

The dead sea scrolls were found in 1947 (coincidentally same day when Israel became a nation again) by a shepherd boy who threw a stone in a cave that broke a clay jar that contained an invaluable treasure:  some of the oldest manuscripts we have of Biblical and extra-biblical books.

Great effort had been made to make the exhibit politically correct so-as to not offend, some of it seeming a little over-the-top actually, but that is the world that we live in today.  The exhibit kept building in emotion as an old testament history lesson, that corresponded beautifully for me in my 'read through the bible chronologically' program that I do each year.

They had various artifacts, money, common household items, and some of the pots the documents had been found in.

We were not allowed to take pictures or touch anything (for good reason) where there were pieces of the parchment.  Guards were posted everywhere to watch the exhibit.

In the large room at the end of the exhibit, they had some of the scroll pieces on display and their translations, comparing to the books of the Bible today.

 In this same room, an exhibit of the scroll of the 10 commandments was highlighted and as you pressed a button, the commandment was highlighted and read aloud - so the entire time we are in this part of the exhibit, we were hearing the 10 commandments.

Near the end was a three-ton stone block from the temple in Jerusalem.  It was affixed in a mock-up of the Western wall.   This was the one thing we were allowed to touch and touch it we did as people were brought to their knees - there was something very holy about all of this - like a gift from God - a linking of the dots from the past to the present - I am here, I AM who I AM.  People were praying, touching the rock, sitting on a bench by the rock, and many writing prayer requests to put in the cracks on the mock-up of the west wall in Jerusalem.  We all want to know Him better, to feel His presence and it was a moving time.

The prayer requests were to be gathered from the exhibit and taken to back to Israel - for there is something about Jerusalem....

Ann and I lingered together for some time, hands on the rock, praying, thanking God for His presence, and His working in our lives.

Great exhibit - I think it is one of those traveling deals so if it comes to your city - it is worth going to and cheaper than air fare to the middle east!

We give it five stars!

Much love.

Dave and Ann

"I did not see a temple in the city (the New Jerusalem), because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple.  The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp.  The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendor into it....Nothing Impure will ever enter it, nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb's book of life."  Rev 21: 22-27