Oldest scroll of Book of Lamentations from Qumran

ANT KATZ

“Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, this evening (Sunday, July 26), met in his Jerusalem office with Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) personnel who showed him a 2 000-year-old Book of Lamentations scroll that was found in the Qumran caves,” Netanyahu’s media adviser told Jewish Report on Sunday evening.

The scroll was put on display for the first time at the Bible Lands museum in Jerusalem last week.

RIGHT: Part of the scroll which was first put on display to the public last week at the Bible Lands Museum

IAA Curator in Charge of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Pnina Shor updated Prime Minister Netanyahu on the scroll, which has been dated to between 30 BCE and 70 CE.

Shor said that the scroll is the earliest known example of the Book of Lamentations and added that due to its importance the scroll is stored at an IAA laboratory.

Prime Minister Netanyahu said: “This is an important and moving find. It is very significant that that this scroll has been brought to the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem, our united capital, on the Fast of the Ninth [of the Hebrew month] of Av.”