8 ms·

Dead Sea Scrolls Now Available Online

180 points by mootothemax 15y ago

joshu 15y ago
no spoilers for those of us that haven't read them.
scottmp10 15y ago
Created in partnership with Google: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/from-desert-to-web-bringing-dead-sea.html http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/from-desert-to-web-br...
teilo 15y ago
The DSS have been online for a while now, and this is only a few of the scrolls. However, it is very nicely done, and clearly the best online edition of these particular scrolls.
lotharbot 15y ago
Other online Bible manuscript projects I'm aware of: http://www.aleppocodex.org/ http://www.aleppocodex.org/ - complete Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), dating from about 930 AD http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/ http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/ - Greek Bible (includes complete New Testament) http://www.greek-language.com/Manuscripts.html http://www.greek-language.com/Manuscripts.html - links to a ton of Greek Bible manuscripts It's unfortunate there isn't a better clearinghouse for this. There's a tremendous wealth of data out there.
- blendergasket 15y ago
  http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhlcodex.html http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhlcodex.html - The Nag Hammadi Codex. Gnostic scriptures, some of which are of the Gnostic Christian varieties that were circulating around the time of Jesus and after. These offer a fascinating counterpoint to the officialized, hierarchical Christian dogma the ideas of the time were honed into.
  - lotharbot 15y ago
    Gnostic and other "non-canonical" writings are also of interest. www.earlychristianwritings.com/ is another quite fascinating source, with lots of letters and such. (Neither site seems to have manuscript scans, unfortunately.) I would love to see a good source on the "circulating around the time of Jesus" claim. I've never been able to track down anything credible on that front. http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/Pagels-Gnostic-Gospels.html http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/Pagels-Gnostic-Gospels.html notes the existing manuscripts date to 350-400, that "some" must date to somewhat prior to 180 AD because Irenaeus speaks of "other gospels", and cites a Harvard professor who speculates that the Gospel of Thomas "may include some traditions even older" than the official gospels. Those are fairly weak claims; do you have support for your stronger claim?
    - jpdoctor 15y ago
      > Gnostic and other "non-canonical" writings are also of interest. www.earlychristianwritings.com/ Is there any tl;dr versions of the above? I have curiousity about noncanonical writings, but don't have the time or inclination to go out and become a scholar of such things in order to sift wheat from chaff.
      - photophotoplasm 15y ago
        I've read a few non-canonical writings from that time (I'm a Christian). The most interesting orthodox writings are probably the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas. Among the unorthodox writings, probably the Gospel of Thomas and the Sophia of Jesus Christ. The Sophia of Jesus Christ being particularly, erm, "interesting".
    - photophotoplasm 15y ago
      > I would love to see a good source on the "circulating around the time of Jesus" claim. I've never been able to track down anything credible on that front. Me too. The earliest writings I know of are Paul's letters and possibly the Didache, and neither of them were written until a couple of decades after Jesus' ministry.
blendergasket 15y ago
Does this make seeing the real dead sea scrolls more or less impressive I wonder?
ErrantX 15y ago
It confuses me somewhat how they can claim copyright over documents that are thousands of years old :S http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/terms_pg http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/terms_pg Copyright in the digital images of the manuscripts, created by the Israel Museum and displayed on this site, is held by the Israel Museum. Reproducing these digital images in any manner other than for research or private study requires prior permission or licensing. The Wikipedia crowd are (rightly) griping about this; we've long held that faithful digital reproductions of 2D copyrighted work simply inherit the copyright of the original. It's sad to see such a nice thing marred by a silly approach to copyright. As if they are scared people are going to, what, misuse the material and make a fortune out of it?
- keeperofdakeys 15y ago
  It is the copyright of the images themselves, not the documents. The irony of it is, since they own the original pieces, they can prevent you from taking photos.
- NolF 15y ago
  It's how copyright works unfortunately :( The creator of the content/picture own that picture unless they state it otherwise. Considering the nature of the document, it should be considered of public domain due to the broad public interest the document has.
  - ErrantX 15y ago
    Not necessarily. In the US, for example, this is not true (and this is the only place I know of it being tested in court). It was ruled that faithful reproductions of 2D works lacked originality (even if they required work to produce) and so PD work does not become copyrightable :) See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Corel_Corp http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Corel_.... So in the US, certainly, I doubt this is copyrightable.
  - malkia 15y ago
    There was a case time ago, where apes, monkeys or gorillas (not sure) "stole" a camera a took pictures of themselves - now you have a copyright by a thousand monkeys...
sgarrity 15y ago
It’s about time.
robchez 15y ago
as an aside, for a great book discussing the evolution of the current bible, you should read Misquoting Jesus by Bart D. Ehram
- javert 15y ago
  *Ehrman
- lotharbot 15y ago
  Ehrman's book mixes fact with a great deal of speculation. I would not recommend it as a starting place. For a more factual treatment, I'd recommend starting with the wikipedia article on "textual criticism" (the process of reconstructing documents from imperfect copies). Its section on the New Testament has a list of the major textual problems, most of which have their own wikipedia articles. If you want to get into books, David Alan Black wrote a fairly nice introduction to New Testament textual criticism. Bruce Metzger and Kurt Aland's books are both pretty widely respected as well. If you want to see the changes passage-by-passage during study, consider using the NET Bible (net.bible.org) and watching for notes marked "tc".
- PakG1 15y ago
  I wrote a commentary on a commentary of that. Getting meta, I know. :) But I think it's valid to consider both sides because Ehrman seems a bit misinformed about some things. http://www.pakg1.net/2011/05/is-bible-full-of-forgeries.html http://www.pakg1.net/2011/05/is-bible-full-of-forgeries.html
Sabaqa2011 15y ago
Definitely still worth seeing in person if you can. Many people are unaware they were written by an estranged puritanical sect of the ancient Israelites that were not accepted by the mainstream community, which is why the scrolls were found in Qumran, and not Jerusalem. Another important related issue is that the Dead Sea is losing one meter of water/year and will shrivel to the size of a small lake in 50 years if we do nothing. http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,71715312001_2016083,00.html http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,71715312001_20...
prawn 15y ago
Clever implementation. Pay attention when browsing the Isaiah scroll to how the rolled up ends of the scroll change in size as you scroll it left to right.
jackfoxy 15y ago
I hope this will be a model for all archaeological literature. It’s a real shame how controlling scholars sit on caches of the world’s cultural heritage not for years, not for decades, but for generations (in the case of the Oxyrhynchus papyri), dolling it out to the public only as they reconstruct and interpret the fragments. If humanities scholars aim to rise to the level of the hard sciences, let them emulate XArchive.
- jackfoxy 15y ago
  I should have called it literature archaeology.
jfb 15y ago
OK, I'm no Google fan (far from it), but this is pretty goddamn cool.
- natch 15y ago
  Not really that cool, when you see how they've ensured it will be available only as long as the web site and the institutional support continues. If there was a download link for the whole thing, documents and UI+backend source, now that would be cool.
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
wslh 15y ago
What's interesting to study is the difference between the dead sea scrolls and the "current" or canonical version of the old testament. See more on http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/dss.htm http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/dss.htm and http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/symposiums/1st/papers/Anderson96.html http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/symposiums/1st/papers/Anderson9... Think that Judaism, Christianism and Islamism, and a big part of world culture are based or influenced on that.
TheRevoltingX 15y ago
Pretty neat, I'm most interested in Daniel. Prior to the dead sea scrolls people would speculate the prophecies in Daniel were written after the fact. The carbon dating in the dead sea scrolls seemed to prove otherwise.
bdz 15y ago
Archive.org also digitalizing old Bibles. And you can download them too! For example: http://www.archive.org/details/novumtestamentum00eras http://www.archive.org/details/novumtestamentum00eras

180 points by mootothemax 15y ago

joshu 15y ago

no spoilers for those of us that haven't read them.

Created in partnership with Google: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/from-desert-to-web-bringing-dead-sea.html http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/09/from-desert-to-web-br...

teilo 15y ago

The DSS have been online for a while now, and this is only a few of the scrolls. However, it is very nicely done, and clearly the best online edition of these particular scrolls.

lotharbot 15y ago

Other online Bible manuscript projects I'm aware of: http://www.aleppocodex.org/ http://www.aleppocodex.org/ - complete Hebrew Bible (Old Testament), dating from about 930 AD http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/ http://codexsinaiticus.org/en/ - Greek Bible (includes complete New Testament) http://www.greek-language.com/Manuscripts.html http://www.greek-language.com/Manuscripts.html - links to a ton of Greek Bible manuscripts It's unfortunate there isn't a better clearinghouse for this. There's a tremendous wealth of data out there.

blendergasket 15y ago
http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhlcodex.html http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/nhlcodex.html - The Nag Hammadi Codex. Gnostic scriptures, some of which are of the Gnostic Christian varieties that were circulating around the time of Jesus and after. These offer a fascinating counterpoint to the officialized, hierarchical Christian dogma the ideas of the time were honed into.
- lotharbot 15y ago
  Gnostic and other "non-canonical" writings are also of interest. www.earlychristianwritings.com/ is another quite fascinating source, with lots of letters and such. (Neither site seems to have manuscript scans, unfortunately.) I would love to see a good source on the "circulating around the time of Jesus" claim. I've never been able to track down anything credible on that front. http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/Pagels-Gnostic-Gospels.html http://www.gnosis.org/naghamm/Pagels-Gnostic-Gospels.html notes the existing manuscripts date to 350-400, that "some" must date to somewhat prior to 180 AD because Irenaeus speaks of "other gospels", and cites a Harvard professor who speculates that the Gospel of Thomas "may include some traditions even older" than the official gospels. Those are fairly weak claims; do you have support for your stronger claim?
  - jpdoctor 15y ago
    > Gnostic and other "non-canonical" writings are also of interest. www.earlychristianwritings.com/ Is there any tl;dr versions of the above? I have curiousity about noncanonical writings, but don't have the time or inclination to go out and become a scholar of such things in order to sift wheat from chaff.
    - photophotoplasm 15y ago
      I've read a few non-canonical writings from that time (I'm a Christian). The most interesting orthodox writings are probably the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas. Among the unorthodox writings, probably the Gospel of Thomas and the Sophia of Jesus Christ. The Sophia of Jesus Christ being particularly, erm, "interesting".
  - photophotoplasm 15y ago
    > I would love to see a good source on the "circulating around the time of Jesus" claim. I've never been able to track down anything credible on that front. Me too. The earliest writings I know of are Paul's letters and possibly the Didache, and neither of them were written until a couple of decades after Jesus' ministry.

blendergasket 15y ago

Does this make seeing the real dead sea scrolls more or less impressive I wonder?

ErrantX 15y ago

It confuses me somewhat how they can claim copyright over documents that are thousands of years old :S http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/terms_pg http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/terms_pg Copyright in the digital images of the manuscripts, created by the Israel Museum and displayed on this site, is held by the Israel Museum. Reproducing these digital images in any manner other than for research or private study requires prior permission or licensing. The Wikipedia crowd are (rightly) griping about this; we've long held that faithful digital reproductions of 2D copyrighted work simply inherit the copyright of the original. It's sad to see such a nice thing marred by a silly approach to copyright. As if they are scared people are going to, what, misuse the material and make a fortune out of it?

keeperofdakeys 15y ago
It is the copyright of the images themselves, not the documents. The irony of it is, since they own the original pieces, they can prevent you from taking photos.
NolF 15y ago
It's how copyright works unfortunately :( The creator of the content/picture own that picture unless they state it otherwise. Considering the nature of the document, it should be considered of public domain due to the broad public interest the document has.
- ErrantX 15y ago
  Not necessarily. In the US, for example, this is not true (and this is the only place I know of it being tested in court). It was ruled that faithful reproductions of 2D works lacked originality (even if they required work to produce) and so PD work does not become copyrightable :) See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Corel_Corp http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridgeman_Art_Library_v._Corel_.... So in the US, certainly, I doubt this is copyrightable.
- malkia 15y ago
  There was a case time ago, where apes, monkeys or gorillas (not sure) "stole" a camera a took pictures of themselves - now you have a copyright by a thousand monkeys...

sgarrity 15y ago

It’s about time.

robchez 15y ago

as an aside, for a great book discussing the evolution of the current bible, you should read Misquoting Jesus by Bart D. Ehram

javert 15y ago
*Ehrman
lotharbot 15y ago
Ehrman's book mixes fact with a great deal of speculation. I would not recommend it as a starting place. For a more factual treatment, I'd recommend starting with the wikipedia article on "textual criticism" (the process of reconstructing documents from imperfect copies). Its section on the New Testament has a list of the major textual problems, most of which have their own wikipedia articles. If you want to get into books, David Alan Black wrote a fairly nice introduction to New Testament textual criticism. Bruce Metzger and Kurt Aland's books are both pretty widely respected as well. If you want to see the changes passage-by-passage during study, consider using the NET Bible (net.bible.org) and watching for notes marked "tc".
PakG1 15y ago
I wrote a commentary on a commentary of that. Getting meta, I know. :) But I think it's valid to consider both sides because Ehrman seems a bit misinformed about some things. http://www.pakg1.net/2011/05/is-bible-full-of-forgeries.html http://www.pakg1.net/2011/05/is-bible-full-of-forgeries.html

Sabaqa2011 15y ago

Definitely still worth seeing in person if you can. Many people are unaware they were written by an estranged puritanical sect of the ancient Israelites that were not accepted by the mainstream community, which is why the scrolls were found in Qumran, and not Jerusalem. Another important related issue is that the Dead Sea is losing one meter of water/year and will shrivel to the size of a small lake in 50 years if we do nothing. http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,71715312001_2016083,00.html http://www.time.com/time/video/player/0,32068,71715312001_20...

prawn 15y ago

Clever implementation. Pay attention when browsing the Isaiah scroll to how the rolled up ends of the scroll change in size as you scroll it left to right.

jackfoxy 15y ago

I hope this will be a model for all archaeological literature. It’s a real shame how controlling scholars sit on caches of the world’s cultural heritage not for years, not for decades, but for generations (in the case of the Oxyrhynchus papyri), dolling it out to the public only as they reconstruct and interpret the fragments. If humanities scholars aim to rise to the level of the hard sciences, let them emulate XArchive.

jackfoxy 15y ago
I should have called it literature archaeology.

jfb 15y ago

OK, I'm no Google fan (far from it), but this is pretty goddamn cool.

natch 15y ago
Not really that cool, when you see how they've ensured it will be available only as long as the web site and the institutional support continues. If there was a download link for the whole thing, documents and UI+backend source, now that would be cool.
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]

wslh 15y ago

What's interesting to study is the difference between the dead sea scrolls and the "current" or canonical version of the old testament. See more on http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/dss.htm http://www.bibleandscience.com/archaeology/dss.htm and http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/symposiums/1st/papers/Anderson96.html http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il/symposiums/1st/papers/Anderson9... Think that Judaism, Christianism and Islamism, and a big part of world culture are based or influenced on that.

TheRevoltingX 15y ago

Pretty neat, I'm most interested in Daniel. Prior to the dead sea scrolls people would speculate the prophecies in Daniel were written after the fact. The carbon dating in the dead sea scrolls seemed to prove otherwise.

bdz 15y ago

Archive.org also digitalizing old Bibles. And you can download them too! For example: http://www.archive.org/details/novumtestamentum00eras http://www.archive.org/details/novumtestamentum00eras