Museum Of The Bible Says 5 Of Its Most Famed Artifacts Are Fake

The Museum of the Bible said Monday that five of its 16 famous Dead Sea Scrolls fragments are fake.

A team of German experts analyzed the privately funded Washington, D.C., museum's fragments and found they had "characteristics inconsistent with ancient origin." The fragments will no longer be displayed at the museum.

"Though we had hoped the testing would render different results, this is an opportunity to educate the public on the importance of verifying the authenticity of rare biblical artifacts, the elaborate testing process undertaken and our commitment to transparency," said Jeffrey Kloha, chief curatorial officer for the museum, said in a news release.

I'll put another light on this: NO genuine Dead Sea Scroll fragments belong in any museum in the U.S.

They belong with the rest of the scroll fragments -- to contribute to decipherment of the documents.

TXnMA

I have no argument with what you have written. There is a problem with the word Fake based on the findings.

"BAM's report raised further suspicions about the authenticity of all five fragments that were tested, the museum said."

I don't see the word "FAKE" in the above statement. No respectable, analytical laboratory is going to make a definitive statement. We are taught, for legal reasons, to use weasel words such as appears to be, doesn't appear to match certain criteria or characteristics inconsistent with ancient origin (A good technical writer would have written, "characteristics appear inconsistent with ancient origin" ... use whatever weasel words you like, but definitive statements take you out of the domain of public opinion into the courts of law.

Don't be too impressed with Scanning Electron Microscopy. The fluorescence techniques are fairly good for pigments as long as the metal is aluminum or higher molecular weight. Also, SEM has uses on analyzing the substrate for fillers. However, I'm not impressed with the choice of instrumentation ... very poor choice for dyes. The analytical results may well be correct, but the written results or translation there of, are horrid from a legal point of view. What is going on here?

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