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Mcgill University Deplores Jordan’s Voiding of Sale of Dead Sea Scrolls

May 10, 1961
See Original Daily Bulletin From This Date
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A McGill University dean said today that the university “strongly deplores” the action of the Jordanian Government in voiding a sale made six years ago of 100 fragments of the Dead Sea scrolls to the school.

Dean Stalley Frost of the University’s Divinity School reported the university paid $20, 000 for the fragments and had a contract signed by Jordan. Calling the cancelation a serious blow to North American biblical scholarship, he said Jordan had neither a moral nor a legal right to the fragments and its action would only “further undermine western confidence in the Arab countries.”

The Jordan cancelation, Dr. Frost stated, also affected the Vatican library, the Chicago McCormick Seminary, and Heidelberg and Manchester Universities but that McGill University had paid the most money and was to have received the most valuable collection.

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