Colonizing Frank Moore Cross: The Dead Sea Scrolls in 1950s Popular Media
Early presentations of the Dead Sea Scrolls in popular media relied on orientalist tropes and a narrow Christian horizon to create relevance and prestige for the scrolls, which contributed to strong religious interest in them and a market for unprovenanced Dead Sea Scrolls fragments and forgeries. S...
| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Article |
| Language: | English |
| Check availability: | HBZ Gateway |
| Interlibrary Loan: | Interlibrary Loan for the Fachinformationsdienste (Specialized Information Services in Germany) |
| Published: |
2024
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| In: |
Journal of Biblical literature
Year: 2024, Volume: 143, Issue: 3, Pages: 463-481 |
| Standardized Subjects / Keyword chains: | B
Cross, Frank Moore 1921-2012
/ Dead Sea scrolls, Qumran Scrolls
/ Qumran
/ Colonialism
/ Colonialism (Motif)
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| IxTheo Classification: | HD Early Judaism HH Archaeology TK Recent history ZB Sociology ZC Politics in general |
| Online Access: |
Volltext (lizenzpflichtig) |
| Summary: | Early presentations of the Dead Sea Scrolls in popular media relied on orientalist tropes and a narrow Christian horizon to create relevance and prestige for the scrolls, which contributed to strong religious interest in them and a market for unprovenanced Dead Sea Scrolls fragments and forgeries. Such a strategy also constructed public authority for the Bible scholars working on the scrolls. This article treats the colonialist approach in the earliest popular works on the scrolls in the United States, written by Edmund Wilson, Frank Moore Cross, and Alex Small, and shows how the stories they tell set the stage for religious veneration of the scrolls and popular acclaim of the scholars. |
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| ISSN: | 1934-3876 |
| Contains: | Enthalten in: Journal of Biblical literature
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