Museum wants people to engage with the good book
WASHINGTON Throughout history, the Bible has been the subject of controversy. Perhaps it’s appropriate, then, that some controversy has accompanied the planning stages for the US$500 million (NZ$733m) Museum of the Bible, which opened yesterday in America’s capital.
Arts and crafts store chain Hobby Lobby, whose president Steve Green is chairman of the museum board, paid a US$3m fine in July for illegally smuggling Iraqi biblical artefacts. Thousands of tablets and bricks written in cuneiform, one of the earliest systems of writing, were among 5000 artefacts that were forfeited.
Still, about 1000 biblical artefacts are displayed on six floors of the the 40,000-squaremetre museum, which Green says aims to educate visitors on the history and impact of the Bible.
‘‘Our mission is to invite and get people to engage with the Bible,’’ said Steven Bickley, vicepresident of marketing finance for the museum.
He said the museum took a non-sectarian approach, not involving a specific religious sect or political group, because organisers wanted every visitor to feel comfortable and learn something about the Bible.
Green says he even wants atheists to feel welcome at the museum. Admission is free, but donations are encouraged.
The desire to educate is reflected in the museum’s proximity to the United States Capitol and Supreme Court, where Green has sought to defend his religious beliefs.
‘‘I think [the Bible is] foundational to our government,’’ Green said during a preview of the museum this week. ‘‘There are many principles this nation was built on that many people today may not even understand that connection. Like religious freedom.
‘‘Our freedoms, our economic system, our political system, many of those were built and influenced from the Bible, and many people may not know that, and we want people to understand that.’’
In 2014, the Supreme Court ruled in a case involving Hobby Lobby that requiring familyowned corporations to pay for insurance coverage for contraception for employees under the Affordable Care Act violated a federal law protecting religious freedom.
Green said he wanted to tell the story of the Bible in an engaging and creative way.
The museum features a 30-minute, walk-through experience of the Old Testament on the third floor. The narrative expedition takes groups of 30 people through the exhibit, which is brought to life with special effects using lights and holographlike images.
Visitors can also sit in a small theatre seating about 100 people, where the New Testament is condensed into a 12-minute film on a 180-degree screen.
On the second floor, visitors learn how the Bible has been part of past and present cultural developments. Issac Newton is one of the scientists whose story is on display. ‘‘For Newton, to understand more was to understand God,’’ his information plaque reads.
Galileo Galilei is featured as well. He was condemned by the Catholic Church for his discovery in the 1600s that Earth revolves around the Sun. The Vatican acknowledged that his findings REUTERS were right in 1992.
More modern influences that the Bible has had are on display as well, such as biblical references in fashion. Visitors can enter a dome-like egg where music inspired by the Bible plays, including tracks from bands The Offspring and Good Charlotte. USA Today