Scrolls

Went to see the Dead Sea Scroll Exhibition in Singapore. It was very, very, good trip.

WE went to see the scrolls on the second day. It was held in a big museum-like building near the parliament. The exhibition had three rooms, one containing scrolls, one containing books, and one with a lot of biographies about people. The people and book rooms had lots and lots of old bibles, sheets of information and copies of the books and lives of Wycliffe, Tyndale, Bunyan, and Luther (not in that order!). They displayed centuries-old copies of the King James Bible, Geneva bible, Spanish and German manuscripts, and even one of the first-printing editions of "Pilgrim's Progress." I kept snapping pictures and pictures and pictures. It was such an odd, interesting feel to be so near such old things, handed down from one generation to another.

But the scrolls were the most eye-opening. Just four little fragments of paper (only a few pieces were released to exhibition), very old, weather-stained, and hard to perceive until you looked very closely. And when i peered through the glass, something flashed in my mind. Some old Jewish scholar, a rabbi or Pharisee, perhaps, squinting in the evening light to meticulously scribe a letter into a word.

Line by line, as each drop of precious ink was exactly meted out for each character. Each sentence unmarred with any grammatical or contradictory errors. What thoughts went through this poor rabbi's mind as he spent such time and energy into copying out the sacred Word of God.

How tired he must have been, and then, to think that the work of this weary scholar was to be smashed apart by Roman swords! To think, that, one little fragment from this entire piece would itself a spectacle of wonder to the world. To think, that one man's efforts to preserve the law would end up giving evidence pointing to its, powerful, uncorrupted, message. To think of all the people who had worked on this bit of ink and paper, not realizing what this parchment would do to ring down eternity? The skinner of the goat, the scholar who wrote it, the ink-maker, the editing priest, the scholars-in-training who may have read it -how could they have known?

It is interesting, really, to think how much difference one person's work can do.