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New York Times Inaccurately Reports on Projected Edition of Dead Sea Scrolls
On July 31, 1985, the New York Times reported that a projected new edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls will include “all the major new documents discovered since 1947.” According to James H. Charlesworth of the Princeton Theological Seminary, who will serve as editor of the new three-volume set, the Times report is inaccurate; the new edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls will not include documents that are still unpublished. The new set will contain new transcriptions and translations of previously published Dead Sea Scrolls.
The project is estimated to be completed in 1991. More than a dozen translators will participate in the project.
The Sale of Artifacts by Archaeologists—An Idea Whose Time Has Come
In the January/February 1985 BAR, we published a radical proposal that archaeologists should sell common ancient Near eastern artifacts to support excavations and to decrease the market for such artifacts from illegal excavations (
Then in our July/August issue we reported that the Association of Archaeologists in Israel supports a similar proposal (“Israeli Archaeologists Support Sale of Artifacts,”
“It is difficult to justify an ethic that calls for every Caddoan pot and pirate doubloon to repose in a museum or laboratory when proper storage of the stuff is becoming a national problem, and nobody has demonstrated a research imperative for having them all there.”
Now we have learned of a similar proposal being made with respect to Mesoamerican artifacts. The problems of illegal traffic in antiquities are much more complex and intense in this part of the world, and we would least expect to hear of such a suggestion regarding Mesoamerica. However, in the Journal of Field Archaeology (JFA), Roy C. Craven, Jr., professor of art 008and director of the University Gallery of the University of Florida, makes a proposal similar to the one made in BAR:
“The host country’s national museum would have first choice of the artifacts discovered by the expedition. Other materials and artifacts duplicating cultural patrimony already adequately documented and held in the national museum would go to the OAS [Organization of American States], which would then arrange for the sale of these items at an open international auction. …
“With such items of world patrimony openly available to museums and collectors through a controlled and documented system, the illegal traffic in such items should, by contrast to present-day activities, dry up. Such a program could assure art-rich countries documentation and protection for their major threatened patrimony and at the same time make first-class documented artifacts available to the world’s museums and collectors. Such a program could go a long way toward bringing our hemisphere’s countries together in mutual cooperation and at the same time significantly reduce the traffic in illegal items of pre-Columbian patrimony.”
“A Suggested Format for Funding the Preservation of Pre-Columbian Patrimony in the Americas,” (JFA 11 [1984], p. 424)
The voice in the wilderness is becoming a chorus.
Different Formats for Scholarly Meetings—The International Society for Biblical Literature and the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas
Summer is the time for scholarly colloquia, congresses, meetings, conferences, seminars and assemblies all over the world—especially at pleasant places with nonscholarly attractions as well.
Last August BAR editors attended two of them—the international meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature (ISBL) in Amsterdam and the meeting of the Studiorum Novi Testamenti Societas (SNTS) in Trondheim, Norway.
We did not go to the August meeting of the World Congress of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem, opting instead to go to Jerusalem next August for the already planned meeting of the International Organization for the Study of the Old Testament (IOSOT).a There were others we missed—impossible to go to all of them.
The contrast between the ISBL meeting in Amsterdam and the SNTS meeting in Trondheim was striking, illustrating the variety such meetings offer. At the SNTS the University of Trondheim was the host, and the entire scholarly community of the university made sure that all their guests felt welcomed and well cared for.
At the beautiful 11th-century Trondheim cathedral, the group was welcomed by the bishop; at a reception at the old residence of the archbishop, the group was welcomed by the mayor of Trondheim wearing the chain of his office draped over his shoulders. At an elegantly served banquet in the University of Trondheim dining room, the group was welcomed by the rector of the University and by the Preses of the Royal Norwegian Society for Science and Letters. The new SNTS president Professor Martinus de Jonge of Leiden University responded with grace and charm on each occasion, varying his remarks so that they were not only different but appropriate to the occasion. Courses at the banquet were separated by beautifully articulated songs by Edvard Grieg, performed by members of the music department.
The main Trondheim University building, called the Dragvoll, has a huge glass-covered central corridor that rises several stories and is decorated with green plants that climb nearly to the glass roof. Here, after the banquet, the conference guests were treated to a concert of baroque music by Handel, Bach, Telemann and Frescobaldi, performed by a trio—a harpsichordist, a musician playing a recorder (he doubled on a wooden flute) and a soprano.
Somehow, all the pomp, the ceremony, and the beauty enhanced the scholarship.
At Amsterdam, the ISBL meetings began without any ceremony whatever—just begin to go to the lectures. At the final banquet, held in an impressive 17th-century round church hall, there was no program whatever—no speeches, no music, no warmth.
The scholarly program at the two congresses contrasted as well. At the SNTS in Trondheim there was a variety of formats—the distinguished presidential address that opened the conference; a 010number of invited lectures to which an hour and a half was assigned, allowing time for questions and comments; a series of short papers (45 minutes including discussion time) given simultaneously; and 14 different seminars that met on three successive days for two hours each day on a single topic, with a different paper each day. Half-hour coffee breaks in the morning and afternoon for all participants at the same time provided an informal opportunity for scholarly talk and fellowship.
At the ISBL in Amsterdam, aside from a few specialized sessions, the scholarly program consisted entirely of wall to-wall, 45-minute lectures. The lectures bore little relationship to one another and simply jumped from one topic to another without any unifying theme or even subject matter.
Unfortunately, there was also a difference in the scholarly level at the ISBL and SNTS. The Trondheim meeting was filled with senior scholars, mostly giving invited papers. At Amsterdam, there were few senior scholars, and the quality of the lectures varied widely. Some were very good; others were very bad. One had the impression that in some cases, the lecturer’s university agreed to provide transportation to a conference if a paper was to be delivered, and Amsterdam proved to be the most attractive city. Amsterdam is indeed an attractive city, full of canals, charming houses, old churches with beautiful sounding organs, the Anne Frank House, the Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh museum for starters; but, alas, this proved not to be the most effective motivation for offering to deliver a paper.
Both the ISBL and the SNTS were equally deficient in one respect. Neither paid much attention to archaeology. At the ISBL, one lecturer reported on an archaeological survey in Jordan; that was all. This is particularly surprising because archaeology sessions could easily have been given by working archaeologists from all over Europe as well as Israel and the United States, if they had been invited.
At the SNTS, one of the seminars was devoted to the social background of early Christianity, an area of study to which archaeology can make a special contribution. Generally, however, archaeology’s potential contribution to New Testament studies is unappreciated by New Testament scholars; it is a hopeful sign that this SNTS seminar, among its other concerns, considered the methodology by which archaeology’s potential can be realized.
New York Times Inaccurately Reports on Projected Edition of Dead Sea Scrolls
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