Dead Sea Scrolls at the Museum of the Bible are forgeries, investigators say

The discovery is one in a series of missteps by the museum's founders and owners of the Hobby Lobby chain of craft stores, Steve and Jackie Green. In 2017, Hobby Lobby Stores  agreed to pay $3 million in fines and return 5,500 antiquities  it purchased in a transaction "fraught with red flags," according to  a civil complaint  filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. 

This ''discovery'' shouldn't be a surprise considering their dealings with the antiquities in 2017.

I think they were duped, but I think they were also pretty easy marks.  Their eagerness to add to their collection made them willing to buy without investigating.

With regard to the antiquities, they were told by experts that they hired not to buy them since there was a high probability the purchase would be illegal. They also ran them through false fronts and misdescribed them to US Customs. 

They were fully aware that what they were doing was illegal. I would have to believe that the same thing happened again.

Nice.  So the transparency with which they are crediting themselves now is a newly-developed trait.

The Greens should go to prison

POS/POTUS would just pardon them in his ongoing campaign of perpetual thumper ass licking.

Did they even do carbon testing to prove the age of the scrolls?

not without admitting a lot of discovered human antiquities are older than 6000 years, and that science is reality.

[deleted]

Some background information :

Washington, D.C., March 13, 2020 -- Museum of the Bible’s two-day conference on the testing of its Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS) collection begins today with an invitation-only academic symposium followed by a public event on Sunday, March 15. Entitled A Journey for the Truth: Investigating the Recent Dead Sea Scrolls Fragments , the conference features Colette Loll of Art Fraud Insights and her team of researchers who conducted a battery of scientific tests to determine the authenticity of the museum’s 16 DSS fragments.

The team utilized multispectral and reflectance transformation imaging (MSI/RTI) as well as traditional and 3D microscopy to examine the museum’s entire DSS collection. A subset was selected and sampled for a full elemental and molecular profile. The specific tools used for this analysis included Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), macro x-ray fluorescence imaging (MA-XRF), scanning electron microscopy-energy dispersive x-ray analysis (SEM-EDS), micro-Raman spectroscopy (Raman), and microchemical testing.

“After an exhaustive review of all the imaging and scientific analysis results, it is evident that none of the textual fragments in Museum of the Bible’s Dead Sea Scroll collection are authentic,” concluded Colette Loll, founder and director of Art Fraud Insights, in a detailed report about the findings. “Moreover, each exhibits characteristics that suggest they are deliberate forgeries created in the twentieth century with the intent to mimic authentic Dead Sea Scroll fragments.”

In 2016,13 of the museum’s fragments were published by a team of scholars in Dead Sea Scrolls Fragments in the Museum Collection (Publications of Museum of the Bible 1; Leiden: Brill, 2016). Since publication, scholars have expressed growing concern about the authenticity of some of these fragments – especially since all were purchased after 2002 when suspected forgeries entered the market. Extensive appraisals of the scribal features revealed inconsistencies with authentic DSS. Pending further analysis, Museum of the Bible displayed, upon opening in November 2017, five of its DSS fragments with exhibit labels indicating that authenticity had not yet been verified.

In October 2018, Museum of the Bible announced the results of scientific testing of the five fragments on display conducted by Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM). All fragments exhibited characteristics “inconsistent with ancient origins” and they were removed from display. The museum then decided to retain Art Fraud Insights to design and implement the scientific research and analysis of its entire collection.

“Notwithstanding the less than favorable results, we have done what no other institution with post-2002 DSS fragments has done,” Museum of the Bible Chief Curatorial Officer Dr. Jeffrey Kloha said. “The sophisticated and costly methods employed to discover the truth about our collection could be used to shed light on other suspicious fragments and perhaps even be effective in uncovering who is responsible for these forgeries.”                       

During the conference, Dr. Kloha will announce plans to repurpose the current DSS exhibit on the museum’s fourth floor to detail both the history and research of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

It is great to have the tools and knowledge today (thanks to science) to better discover frauds.    Unfortunately the frauds of the past are long since covered up by copying and integration into subsequent text so they remain fodder for belief.

It is great to have the tools and knowledge today (thanks to science) to better discover frauds.    Unfortunately the frauds of the past are long since covered up by copying and integration into subsequent text so they remain fodder for belief.

Chances are, some believers might simply dismiss scientific findings just to maintain their belief, kind of like what some do when biblical inconsistencies are pointed out. To those reliant or addicted to dogma, when evidence is presented to contradict religious texts, it is the evidence which must be tossed out and not the texts.

Not that we have seen that before. 

Unfortunately the frauds of the past are long since covered up by copying and integration into subsequent text so they remain fodder for belief.

Some are still revered despite being debunked - the Shroud of Turin, for instance.

Lol maybe this is the reason the Creation museum was able to take the coveted religious museum of the year title this year

the coveted religious museum of the year title this year

Or more like religious sham.

Creation Museum is pure indoctrination.   It teaches kids that the Earth is 6,000 years old, that dinosaurs coexisted with human beings, that Noah's flood actually took place and is responsible for things like the grand canyon, mountains, etc.   It deems all scientific methods of dating to be bullshit.   It is an assault on most every area of science.

It's pure BS that's an assault on logic, reasoning, and critical thinking. It boggles the mind that people in this day & age actually that nonsense. 

Largely it is a function of human genetics in general;  it is how our brains have evolved to work.   Simply stated, if one (however it occurs) allows oneself to accept something as true (suppressing critical thinking) then one can eventually believe almost anything.   Indoctrination as a child accelerates this.   The other key factors are repetition and incrementalism.   Skepticism is the shield, but that shield can be weakened or destroyed.

When people cease being skeptical and buy into the notion that faith (believing sans evidence/reason) is a good thing — something to be strengthened rather than avoided — they become vulnerable to the demonstrably effective historical methods of religions.

I have yet to find someone make a credible case that this (belief sans evidence/reason) is net good for society.

bwah ha ha, suckers!