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Artists Replicate Handwritten Medieval Bible
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http://enews.voanews.com/t?r=279&ctl=13F112D:A6F02AD83191E160365441C4BED1DA909574F7DCC14957C0 Saint John's Bible
is a contemporary work created in tradition of handwritten medieval
manuscripts The first handwritten and illustrated Bible since the
invention of the printing press over 500 years ago is touring
historical institutions in the United States. Amanda Cassandra has the
story on the Saint John's Bible.







Saint John's Bible The Saint John's Bible is a contemporary work
created in the tradition of handwritten medieval manuscripts. The new
Bible melds techniques of traditional scribes with modern computer
technology. Still a work in progress, the completed St. John's Bible
will consist of seven volumes with more than 1,000 pages, all
hand-gilded. A selection from the Bible is on view at the Museum of
Biblical Art in New York.

The Benedictine monks of St. John's University and Abbey in Minnesota
commissioned the Bible in 2000. Since then, artists and scholars have
labored on the massive text using quills (a hollow end of a bird
feather used for writing) and paints made from hand-ground precious
stones like lapis lazuli, silver, copper and 24-karat gold to adorn
the pages.

The Bible is displayed at the museum along side 50 embellished prayer
books and individual leaves, which Curator Holly Flora says help
visitors to understand the history of scripture production.

"The tradition that the St. John's Bible is based on is that of a
handwritten and hand embellished and hand illuminated, which is a word
that basically means, 'the giving of light' and it refers to the use
of gold in the actual pictures and script to give the sense of
reflective quality to the pages," said Holly Flora. "But it also, of
course, refers the idea illuminating someone mentally and
intellectually through the word itself, so it's kind of a double
meaning."

Flora says The St. John's Bible is about returning to a time of
reverence for the art of making holy books.

"When the printing press was invented, bibles were printed and mass
produced," she said. "But in the Middle Ages, you have these handmade
Bibles that were really treasures in themselves. They were part of
church treasuries, monastic treasuries and they were designed to used
on special occasions to be revered as sacred objects and I think
essentially that is what the St. John's Bible is also about."

The director of the project, Carol Marrin, says St. John's Bible is
intended to help people reconnect with it in a new way.

"Our culture today is pretty visual," said Carol Marrin. "We're
accustomed to television and computers and iPods and pod casts, so
we're used to seeing things. And so the illuminations and the special
treatments and the art in the St. John's Bible are really intended not
to give you a picture, not to be a literal interpretation of a
passage, but rather to say read this differently. Read this scripture
for today."

The St. John's Bible is bigger than most traditional biblical
manuscripts. It is 61 centimeters high and when opened, a two-page
spread is almost one meter across.

Marrin says senior calligrapher Donald Jackson believed the dimensions
of the Bible should be grand to reflect the content.

"If we really take this seriously, there should be something
monumental about it, so that's really what got him to think about
doing something of this scale and this scope," noted Carol Marrin.

The pages of original medieval manuscripts are too fragile to be
handled and must be protected from light. The St. John's Bible is more
durable so visitors will be able to touch the Bible and turn the
pages.

The St. John's Bible is scheduled for completion in 2008, when it will
be permanently housed at the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library at St.
John's University, available to scholars and the public.