For two millennia the Dead Sea Scrolls lay hidden in pottery jars in caves in the Judean desert until their accidental discovery in1947. Who found them? Who hid them? How do we know they are “real”? What do they tell us about the Bible? Do they conflict with existing scriptures?

During four evenings in March, Alice Hunt, associate dean for academic affairs and lecturer in Hebrew Bible at the Divinity School, will lead the next Relevant Religion class in an exploration of the scrolls and what they reveal about scripture.

Hunt currently chairs the Social-Scientific Studies of the Second Temple Period section of the Society of Biblical Literature. For the last several years she has been a regular participant in Tel Aviv University’s archaeological excavations at Megiddo, the only site in the Levant (the countries bordering on the eastern Mediterranean Sea from Turkey to Egypt) which is mentioned in all great records of the Ancient Near East: the Old Testament, New Testament as well as Egyptian, Assyrian and Hittite sources.

This community education course, co-sponsored by the Divinity School and Scarritt-Bennett Center, will meet March 10, 17, 24 and 31 from 7-8:30 p.m. in the Laskey Building.

The program is open to the public for $50 for the four sessions. CEUs are available to the clergy. For more information and to register, call 615/340-7543 or e-mail spiritus@scarrittbennett.org. Registration is also available on-line at: http://divinity.library.vanderbilt.edu/div/events/rr_register.html

Posted 3/05/03 at 10 a.m.