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A recent New York Times article describes the dramatic increase in the United States in what it calls “cultural tourism,” tourism that includes museums, operas, symphonies and the like. This is occurring not just in big cities, but in places you might least suspect—like Orlando, Florida, better known as the home of Disney World. Bisbee, Arizona, another example, boasts 27 art galleries, three museums and an art festival. Even Roswell, New Mexico, the article tells us, “is busily marketing its planetarium, museums, art center and the Roswell Symphony Orchestra.” Hotels in Boston and Philadelphia are offering packages that include visits to museums.
According to the former director of the Fresno Art Museum, in Fresno, California, “Cultural tourism is probably the fastest-growing kind of tourism in the country.”
This got me to thinking. There is not a single high-quality museum of Biblical archaeology in the entire United States—not even in New York. I’m not sure why.
But I’m sure there should be.
A few years ago, I tried to raise money for a Biblical archaeology museum, but got nowhere. The sums needed were too huge, the obstacles too many. And it would take a unique imagination.
A Biblical archaeology museum in this country would have to be for the layperson, not for the connoisseur. It would have to feature more than pots from the various Biblical periods. It would have to include the settings of the Biblical world—Mesopotamia, Egypt, Anatolia, Greece and Rome, and how tiny Israel fit into this so-much-richer (materially), more beautiful (artistically) world. The museum I envisage would depict not simply daily life in the Biblical world, but the spiritual struggle, the context out of which Israel’s attachment to the divine grew; and how, out of this, Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism evolved side by side.
What about a full-size replica of Solomon’s Temple? In addition to the Temple, an adjacent building would explain the architectural history of the Temple and its decorations, as well as the Biblical description of the building and its problems. An archaeological exhibit would explain how the Temple functioned and the part it played in the lives of the Israelites.
Here’s another, perhaps more feasible, idea. We know what the original Church of the Holy Sepulchre looked like. But no one has ever seen it. The present church is nothing like the original, which included a magnificent Constantinian rotunda around the tomb of Jesus, a peristyle garden in front of the rotunda and a large, imposing basilical church on the other side, fronting on Jerusalem’s column-lined Cardo Maximus. A full-size replica of this complex could even serve as a modern church. An exhibit in an adjacent building would explain how we know what the original church complex looked like, how it evolved into the church we know today and what it has meant to Christians through the ages.
Perhaps our readers have some improvements to suggest—or completely new ideas. Perhaps there is even someone out there with the means and the will to undertake one of these projects.
A recent New York Times article describes the dramatic increase in the United States in what it calls “cultural tourism,” tourism that includes museums, operas, symphonies and the like. This is occurring not just in big cities, but in places you might least suspect—like Orlando, Florida, better known as the home of Disney World. Bisbee, Arizona, another example, boasts 27 art galleries, three museums and an art festival. Even Roswell, New Mexico, the article tells us, “is busily marketing its planetarium, museums, art center and the Roswell Symphony Orchestra.” Hotels in Boston and Philadelphia are offering packages that include […]
