Quote:
Originally Posted by HockeyIlliterate
Educational episode.
Textcritic, when you are asked to examine a document, do you go in to the process believing that it is authentic and try to prove that it is a fake, or do you go in thinking that it is fake and try to prove that it is authentic?
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Good question.
I actually presented a paper this summer at a conference in Warsaw titled "Cartesian Doubt and the Ethics of Discovery: Palaeography, Provenance and Publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls," in which I explore this issue. It was more of an historical study in which I argued that while Jewish "palaeography"—that is, the study of ancient handwriting and scribal practices by which most manuscripts are dated and authenticated—was refined through rigorous scholarly review as a result of the original discovery and publication of the Scrolls in 1953–59, it has been more recently and inappropriately marshalled in defense of newer discoveries without much reflection on methods or the lack of controls. This is a serious problem because of how impressionistic and subjective the study of handwriting is, and how little we actually know about developments of writing techniques and scripts in antiquity. So, right from the outset, I approach my work with a growing awareness of and alarm about the incredibly tenuous nature of many of the tools used in the past for evaluating manuscripts.
My own background also plays into this. No scholar can pretend to be completely objective, and especially now in the increasingly competitive and cut-throat climate of academia biases seem to be becoming more pronounced and unavoidable. My work in authentication started in 2012 when I was invited to help with publishing Dead Sea Scroll fragments in The Schøyen Collection in Norway. When I started in 2012, the notion that there could be forgeries in this or any collection did not even cross my mind. By 2014 I was sufficiently convinced that at least half of Schøyen's collection were most likely forgeries, and when I was asked at that point to help edit the Museum of the Bible fragments, it was impossible for me to not start from a perspective of doubt. Especially now in the light of so many of these fragments missing adequate provenance information, this seems to me to be the most prudent approach. Ultimately, I also think it important to be self reflective and completely transparent about my own biases and how I developed them.
I think as a scholar who respects and believes in science, it is incumbent upon me to eliminate questions of forgery, rather than to work toward rationalisations for authenticity. I am much more comfortable being wrong than I am in being duped.