64 Friday, July 29, 1983
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Caring for the Ancient Dead Sea Scrolls
By MARLIN LEVIN
(.1
Israel Govt. Press Service
JERUSALEM — When a
bored shepherd boy, wan-
dering with his flock along
the Dead Sea, aimlessly
threw a stone into a cave in
the summer of 1947, he
struck an archeological
treasure of priceless worth.
Investigating a tinkle he
heard from the cave, he
found he had hit an old clay
jar which contained a rolled
parchment.
That incident sparked the
most momentous archeolog-
ical discovery of the 20th
Century. Further probes
into the shoreline limestone
caves, used as places of ref-
uge in antiquity, turned up
more jars and parchment
scrolls. Eventually, biblical
scholars had at their dis-
posal the earliest biblical
manuscripts ever found —
1,000 years older than they
had previously known.
Besides the books of the
Bible, there were commen-
taries on the Old Testa-
ment, apocryphal stories
based on the Bible, and
documents relating to the
Essenes, an ascetic Jewish
sect that lived in the Dead
Sea area from the First Cen-
tury BCE to the First Cen-
tury CE. All of the scrolls
were written in meticul-
ously scripted Hebrew.
Today, the most impor-
tant documents are
ensconced in a specially
built vault room and
shritie in the center of
Jerusalem. "The Shrine
of the Book," located on
the grounds. of Israel's
•
7
Qumram, where the ancient Dead Sea Scrolls
were found.
national museum, is one
chemists and isotope ex-
of Jerusalem's most dis-
perts was unique. Never
tinctive works of archi-
before had anyone tried
tecture.
to qualify the deteriora-
The Shrine's curator,
tion of a 2,000-year-old
Magen Broshi, a veteran ar-
parchment. At first they
cheologist, ordered a full-
tried spectrophotometry
scale scientific study of the
on tiny blank pieces of
condition of the parchments
the scrolls. They got
in 1975.
nowhere.
Says Broshi, "We wanted
Visually, it was obvious
to know exactly what hap-
that the darker areas of the
pens in the course of time to
scrolls had deteriorated.
the parchment material,
When they examined those
why the parchments tend to
areas they found them to be
deteriorate, how best they
gelatinous. By comparison,
can be preserved, and not
the lighter areas of the
least whether they had de- parchment were clean and
teriorated since they were
healthy. Why had some
found in 1947."
areas turned into gelatin
The project landed in the
while others had not?
lap of a South African-born
Weiner and his team
biogeochemist, Stephen
turned to infrared examina-
Weiner. Now on the staff of tion. This showed them that
Israel's prestigious Weiz-
in the darker portions the
mann Institute of Science,
collagen of the parchment
Weiner was trained at the fibers had broken down.
California Institute of (Collagen is a fibrous pro-
Technology.
tein existing in all living
The puzzle that faced matter and parchment is
him and his team of made from animal skin.
When collagen comes in
contact with heat and water
it turns gelatinous.)
Clearly, the deterioration
had taken place because
moisture had gotten to the
parchment scrolls. But
when? Rumors had been
circulating among
politically-sensitive schol-
ars that the deterioration
had taken place while the
documents were in Israeli
hands. Broshi was con-
cerned. The outcome of the
study could be politically
explosive.
One member of
Weiner's team, Prof.
Emanuel Gil-Av, was an
authority on the use of a
process known as
racemization — the con-
version of an organism's -
amino acids after its
death. By studying the
conversion with gas
chromatography, it is
possible to determine the
time when the conversion
from one type of amino
acid to another stopped.
Gil-Av used the process
to study moon rocks
brought back to earth by
the U.S. astronauts.
After careful work on
pieces of the parchment,
Gil-Av found an "extraordi-
narily high rate" of "right-
handed" amino acids. Since
such a high percentage
takes hundreds of years to
develop from "left-handed"
acids, he concluded that the
degradation of the parch-
ment could not have possi-
bly taken place during the
relatively-brief period in Is-
rael's custody.
Weiner's assessment:
"The damage may even
have begun while the scrolls
were still being used by the
Dead Sea sect, some 2,000
years ago. We have found no
evidence whatsoever that
deterioration took place
since they were taken from
the caves (in 1947)."
Broshi and the Shrine's
directors could now breathe
easier. But they were tak-
ing no chances. They estab-
lished a monitoring system
to warn them if degradation
is resumed. Small samples
of the parchment have been
placed in various sections of
the vaults. Periodically
they are sent to the Weiz-
mann Institute for analysis.
but degradation of the col-
lagen.
The 750,000 visitors who
annually tour the Shrine of
the Book never see all the
Dead Sea Scrolls. The
Isaiah, for example, is
shown only in facsimile in
the Shrine's rotunda.
Those on display ("The
War of the Sons of Light and
the Sons of Darkness," "The
Habakkuk Commentary"
and the Essenes' code of be-
havior called "The Manual
of Discipline," among
others) are sufficiently
healthy to be shown.
Broshi's staff keeps a
daily watch on the
scrolls. Every fragment
— some of them no bigger
than a dot — has been put
between sheets of highly
absorbent rice paper and
laid between sheets of
heavy cardboard. They
are kept in complete
darkness between 50 and
55 percent humidity.
Authorities on the
preservation of documents
had suggested placing the
scrolls in glass filled with
helium as has been done the
the American Declaration
of Independence. But the
scrolls are too long. The
complete book of the Pro-
phet Isaiah is 24 feet.
Moreover, the use of gas is
designed to prevent bac-
teria from attacking the
parchment. The real danger
to the scrolls is not bacteria
The partially-rolled
"Thanksgiving Scroll" of
the Dead Sea Scrolls con-
tains 40 hymns, all start-
ing with "I thank Thee, 0
Lord."
Technion Scientists Lead Israel Into Modern Age of Robotics
By SHEILA
EVAN-TOV
American Society for Technion
Cosmetically and func-
tionally, today's robots con-
trast the silver-bodied an-
droids that are the darlings
of science fiction.
The Unimatic robot arm,
for example, stands unpre-
tentiously in a corner of the
Robotics Laboratory at the
Technion in Haifa, resem-
bling an oversized dentist's
drill.
Despite its humble ap-
This robot-gripper, developed at the Technion in
Israel, enables industrial robots to handle delicate
objects that human hands would crush._
pearance, Unimatic repre-
sents a breakthrough in the
way future industry will
manufacture products. Able
to "handle" fragile items
that are as thin as half the
diameter of a human hair,
Technion's robot gripper is a
significant milestone in the
brave new world of auto-
matic assembly-line man-
ufacturing.
Robotics is an ideal in-
dustry for Israel. The
country possesses an
abundance of engineers
and scientists to bring Is-
rael the high-technology
enjoyed by other post-
industrial nations. What
Israel lacks, however, is
the necessary unskilled
labor needed to perform
the routine and toilsome
tasks in factories and
fields — the kind of work
robots do effectively and
efficiently. Not only will
industrial robots boost
productivity, but robot
technology can be ex-
ported as a major source
of revenue for Israel.
The Robotics Laboratory
of the Robotic Labora-
at the Technion in Haifa is
tory. Research at the
the source of Israel's robotic
Robotic Laboratory em-
industry. Technion intro-
phasizes computer-like
duced robots to Israel four
programs which trans-
years ago when the Robotics
late into improved con-
Laboratory opened its doors
trol for robotic arms, and
with an $80,000 grant from
new designs for sensors
the country's Ministry of endowing robots with the
Commerce and Industry.
ability to see, feel and
Presently, it is still the only even hear. It is innova-
institute in Israel provid-
tion, in this area of sen-
ing course work in robotics.
sory, or "smart robots
Graduates go on to assist
that enable the Unimatic
private industry and robot gripper to manip-
kibutz-owned enterprises ulate delicate, easily-
on robotic projects.
All the industrial robots
on the drawing boards for
Israeli industry have their
genesis at the Technion.
These include a device that
JERUSALEM — Re-
assembles 20 components cently, an Israeli psychol-
into a stovetop range, a ogist discovered that the
"robot doctor" that diag- patient's perception of the
noses other robots' ills and causes of a heart attack
instructs a technician how strongly affects his ability
to cure them, and a to return to normal life.
"sighted" robot that picks
The doctor's awareness of
fruit.
this attitude can go a long
Technion's robotic ex-- way in helping him guide
perts have focussed their the patient towards getting
ingenuity on the develop- well, according to Dr. Dan
ment of robots for small- Bar-On, who conducted a
scale manufacturing and study for the Hebrew Uni-
production, rather than versity of Jerusalem.
competes' with the giant
Dr. Bar-On's observation
robot-makers of Japan and of male first-time heart at-
West Germany.
tack victims revealed that
"Our strength is in the the more a patient admitted
laboratory," explains to himself the contribution
Prof. Yoram Koren, of his own style of living to
senior lecturer at Techn- his heart attack, the more
ion's Faculty of Mechani- likely he was to make
cal Engineering and head "healthful" changes in his
i;
crushed parts with
greater sensitivity than
ever before possible.
Eventually, says Prof.
Koren, oranges and av-
acadoes grown in Israel will
be picked and packaged by
mechanical hands. Com ,
pletely automatic factories
will design and manufac-
ture products by computer.
"All phases of production,
assembly and testing will be
robot operated," predicts
Koren, "with the minimum
of human intervention."
Patient's Attitude Is Key
to Fast Coronary Recovery
habits. The more the
patient viewed himself as
nothing more than a
"chance victim," the less
likely he was to take an ac-
- tivist approach • toward re-
covery and, in fact, his re-
covery was retarded.
Born in Israel and a
member of a kibutz for the
past 25 years, Dr. Bar-On,
43, conducted the study as
the basis for his doctoral
dissertation. He spent two
years studying 89 male
patients aged 34-60, from
various social, ethnic and
economic groups, who were
hospitalized in the inten-
sive care unit of Israel's
Soroka Medical Center in
Beersheva after suffering
their first coronaries.