Biblical Archaeology Editor and Controversial Figure in Dead Sea Scrolls Debate to Speak at Smith

Hershel Shanks, founding editor of the influential journal "Biblical Archaeology Review," and author, most recently, of "The Mystery and Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls," will present "Jerusalem: An Archaeological Biography" at 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, November 4.

The talk, which is free and open to the public, will be held in Seelye Hall 106, with a reception to follow.

Described as "perhaps the most visible, quotable, divisive figure in the world on ... the Dead Sea Scrolls," Shanks is a self-made expert in the field who, when he began his journal, "had never taken a course in Bible or archaeology and knew nothing about publishing." A lawyer by profession, he started "Biblical Archaeology Review" or BAR as a hobby in 1974, writing the entire first issue himself.

In the mid-1980s and early 1990s, as archaeologists debated how and when to translate and publish the texts of the Dead Sea Scrolls, which are thought to hold clues to understanding the birth of rabbinic Judaism and Christianity, Shanks and his magazine gained visibility by providing a forum for those advocating swifter and broader access to the scrolls by non-scholars and by scholars not associated with the official translation project. The fall 1991 two-volume issue of BAR created particular controversy because it contained more than 1,700 photographs of then-unpublished scrolls, obtained by Shanks from an anonymous source.

Today, BAR has a circulation of more than 250,000 and a self-proclaimed commitment to "make available in understandable language the current insights of professional archaeology as they relate to the Bible."

In addition to BAR, Shanks is also the publisher of "Bible Review;" editor of "Moment," a Jewish opinion magazine; and founder and president of the Biblical Archaeology Society, a non-profit publishing, travel and seminar organization. He is the author and editor of 12 books, including "The City of David: A Guide to Biblical Jerusalem" (1973), "Understanding the Dead Sea Scrolls" (1992), and "Jerusalem: An Archaeological Biography" (1995), described by The New York Times as "a sober, straightforward, politically neutral summary of the amazing history of Jerusalem as revealed by the archaeological findings of the last century and more."