Jots & Tittles

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Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck—and the Bible?

The Scriptorium, one of America’s most important collections of New Testament manuscripts and early printed Bibles, has been moved from Michigan to a Christian theme park near Disney World, in Florida—allowing more people to view the collection but causing some scholars to worry that it will be less accessible for academic research.

Research facilities at the new site were not completed when the Scriptorium opened in Florida in August and were not expected to be ready until well into 2003, BR has learned.

The collection was amassed by Robert Van Kampen, a Chicago businessman who made his fortune in the stock market. Van Kampen built a palatial home along the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, both as his residence and to house his collection. His original Scriptorium opened to the public in 1996.

Highlights of the Scriptorium’s holdings include the world’s best private collection of 16th-century first editions of English Bibles, including the Wycliff, Tyndale, Geneva (the translation used by the Mayflower Pilgrims) and King James Bibles; the best collection in the United States of pre-Luther German Bibles; 1,200 cuneiform tablets from Ur, in ancient Babylonia, dating to 2000 B.C.; 2,500 papyri, most of them unpublished; several ninth-century gospel manuscripts; and the private library of Eberhard Nestle (scholar of New Testament manuscripts and of the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible), which Van Kampen acquired from Cambridge University.

In addition to his passion for collecting, Van Kampen had a strong interest in end-time prophecy and developed a close relationship with evangelist Marvin Rosenthal, who shared his views. Rosenthal directs Zion’s Hope ministry, which focuses on convincing Jews to accept Jesus as their savior (Rosenthal was born Jewish). When Van Kampen died in 1999, his widow, Judith, and their children decided to make the collection available through permanent loan to Rosenthal’s ministry. At the time Rosenthal was planning to open the Holy Land Experience, a Christian theme park, in Orlando, Florida. The Van Kampen family felt that the collection would reach a much wider public in Orlando than it would in sparsely populated western Michigan.

The Scriptorium opened in the Holy Land Experience this past August and drew more than 10,000 visitors in its first two months, according to Stu Kinniburgh, director of operations of Sola Scriptura, the ministry that serves as the custodian of the Van Kampen collection. In its new location, the Scriptorium is housed in an 18,000-square-foot Byzantine-style building. Visitors are led through 13 display areas with historical re-creations and recorded narration; stops include a room in ancient Babylon with authentic cuneiform tablets; a medieval monastery showing monks copying manuscripts and containing a display of medieval manuscripts; and Johann Gutenberg’s print shop, with some of the collection’s early printed Bibles.

Bastiaan Van Elderen, the collection’s director when it was still in the Midwest, told BR that the Scriptorium under his tenure had a strong academic focus, steered away from theological issues and tried to focus on how the Bible was written and transmitted.

In contrast, the new Scriptorium’s emphasis is clearly not on objective scholarship but on religious faith and inspiration; the Holy Land Experience Web site says that the Scriptorium “exalts God’s Word and charts its preservation throughout history.”

The Holy Land Experience, of which the Scriptorium is now a part, opened in February 2001 and sits in the heart of theme-park country, halfway between downtown Orlando and Walt Disney World. The 15-acre site features a one-third-size replica of the Jerusalem Temple, a re-creation of the Garden Tomb (believed by some to have been the burial place of Jesus) and a model of Jerusalem in 66 A.D. Costumed actors re-create events from biblical times, and hungry visitors can stop by the Oasis Palms Café for a Goliath Burger or a Tabgha Tuna.

Holy Land Experience director David Rosenthal, Marvin’s son, told BR that the theme park draws more than 100,000 visitors per year and that he expects “the vast majority” of visitors will go to the Scriptorium while at the park. When asked about the Scriptorium as a scholarly resource, Rosenthal admitted that that “was not a featured element” of the new Scriptorium but added that the collection’s wider exposure justified its move to a new locale. “The collection is worthy of being seen by the public, not just scholars. It’s wonderful that it can be exposed to average people, who can be blessed by it,” Rosenthal said.

When the Scriptorium is ready to accommodate scholars, they will need to make an appointment and indicate their area of research. Kinniburgh told BR that there would be no theological litmus test determining who can conduct research there. But when we asked if the Scriptorium would bar a scholar who does not believe in the inerrancy of the Bible, Kinniburgh paused 019for a moment and replied, “We haven’t crossed that bridge.”

Scholars reached by BR felt the theme-park-going-public’s gain would be the scholarly world’s loss. Van Elderen, the Scriptorium’s former director, told BR, “It was a big disappointment to me to see this great collection leave. They no longer have the academic and scholarly emphasis we had.”

Bruce Metzger, longtime professor at Princeton Theological Seminary and a major figure in the field of New Testament textual studies, also lamented the Scriptorium’s reincarnation at the Florida theme park. “[Van Kampen’s] wife and daughters were more interested in the evangelistic uses of what he had acquired rather than in technical research of what he had acquired,” Metzger told BR. He added, “It’s too bad it moved to a place like the Holy Land project in Orlando. I doubt that many people will go there to do research.”

Jonah the Asparagus

Do your kids find the Good Book’s moral lessons a bit hard to swallow? Try enlisting the help of Hollywood’s newest (or is that freshest?) movie stars Archibald Asparagus (as Jonah), Larry the Cucumber and Pa Grape. The wisecracking computer-animated vegetables are currently starring in the feature film, Jonah—A VeggieTales Movie, which took in $6.2 million on its opening weekend. The vitamin-packed characters first crept into the limelight with their popular children’s videos. Don’t worry: Big Idea Productions, the media company behind the tasty tales, promises it will never portray the Messiah as a vegetable.

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The Bible in the News

It all came back to me when I saw Courtney Love compared to a youthful David in the New York Times. The image of Kurt Cobain’s rocker widow doing battle against a Goliath-sized recording conglomerate brought to mind similar comparisons I had uncovered when writing my BR article “Philistines in the Newsroom” two years ago (BR 16:04). At the time, misguided allusions to these mismatched biblical combatants were among the most frequent Old Testament references in the popular press. Have things changed? Hardly.

A few examples from business: Computer maker Uzi Nissan vs. Nissan Motors (“It’s a David vs. Goliath dispute over the rights to an internet Web site”) and inventor Tom Woolston vs. eBay is “a David-and-Goliath confrontation.”

In sports: The New Zealand Warriors (described as “the born-again Auckland side”) vs. the Sydneysiders (“Their David and Goliath appearance is what will make this a truly gripping game”), San Bernardino Arroyo Valley vs. San Bernardino Cajon (“This game is like David and Goliath. We [Arroyo Valley] have a sling shot and we have to take that one shot and make it work”), Sam Allardyce vs. his own team (“Sam Allardyce is a Goliath of a man but the Bolton team keep playing David”).

And politics: Andy Wojcicki vs. incumbent Jim King for the Florida state senate (“One of the greatest mismatches since David took on Goliath is under way in northeast Florida…At least David had a slingshot”), Steve Williams vs. Marion Ashley (“Worlds collide in race for 5th district, from Moreno Valley to Palm Springs. It’s unfolding as a classic David vs. Goliath contest”), Daniel Matthias and Tim Davis vs. Martin Sabo of Minnesota (“Republican and Green Party Davids battle the Fifth District’s Goliath”).

And everywhere else: the 4.5-inch Florida grasshopper sparrow vs. Brazilian orange growers, Green Point, Australia, residents vs. a leading developer threatening rain forests, the village of Sleepy Hollow, New York, vs. General Motors—they’re all said to be David and Goliaths of sorts.

Folks named David are especially susceptible to the comparisons: So, “In his first Ryder cup, Shreveport’s favorite David [David Toms] turned into a golfing Goliath” and Australian chef David Thompson’s “Goliath” is a huge cookbook.

Generally, just mentioning the biblical antagonists by name is deemed sufficient. But occasionally full-blown accounts of the ancient narrative introduce the contemporary comparison, as in this story about one David Britts, an entrepreneur preparing to leave J.P. Morgan Partners: “Imagine for a moment that you were back in biblical times as a member of King Saul’s court. You see a small boy offer to fight the mighty Goliath, and then watch in stunned silence as he graciously declines the protection of a bronze helmet and a suit of armor. His confidence is disarming, but you can’t help but think that he’ll soon recognize his own foolishness.” Or, again, from the world of sports: “For all but 10 minutes of what threatened to be the biggest mismatch since the bookies calculated the odds of David beating Goliath with a catapult, the Spaniard [Ivan Campo] was the central figure in another heroic Wanderers performance [they lost 2–1 to Arsenal].”

Finally, one sportswriter commenting on Philadelphia Flyers player Dave Babych’s suit against his old team (he claims they pressured him to play when injured) waxes nostalgic for the good old days: “While Babych has an interesting and at times compelling case and is wished well by virtually every pro hockey player, David generally does a lot better against Goliath in the Old Testament than when the arena is the U.S. court system.” Or, put more succinctly, in the sports world—and the real world—the Davids rarely beat the Goliaths.

Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck—and the Bible?