Dead Sea Scroll Fragments

21. Dead Sea Scroll Fragments
Originally uploaded by Lee Howard.

There are thousands and thousands of fragments in existence, but here's one from the museum at the Citadel in Amman. The Scrolls, discovered in jars in caves in the 20th century, include copies of Biblical books as well as new material unique to a sect, probably Essenes, that lived at Qumran. This sect believed a final war between good and evil was imminent, and when the Jews revolted against Rome in 70 AD it seems they went off to fight. Alas, the end of the world had not arrived—except for them.