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News & Events >
News Archive > Historic Moment as First Word is
Written in The Saint John's Bible, The First Handwritten and
Illuminated Bible in 500 Years
For Immediate Release
HISTORIC MOMENT AS FIRST WORD IS WRITTEN IN THE SAINT JOHN’S BIBLE,
THE FIRST HANDWRITTEN AND ILLUMINATED BIBLE IN 500 YEARS
Following Two Years of Preparation, a Scriptorium of Leading
Calligraphers Convenes to Put Quill to Vellum for First Volume
View Historic Moment at
www.saintjohnsbible.org
COLLEGEVILLE, MINN., March 8, 2000 – On Ash Wednesday, the commencement
of Lent leading to the Easter season, Saint John’s Abbey and Saint John’s
University will announce the writing of the first word in The Saint
John’s Bible, the first handwritten and illuminated Bible commissioned
since the advent of the printing press 500 years ago. Following two years of
intense preparation, calligrapher Donald Jackson wrote the initial verse of
the Gospel of John using a goose quill on calfskin vellum. Video of the
historic moment is available on-demand through The Saint John’s Bible
web site at www.saintjohnsbible.org.
The first written verse reads, “In the beginning was the Word, and the
Word was with God, and the Word was God.” These first words were written in
the volume dedicated to the Gospels and Acts of the Apostles, which will be
completed a year from now. The subsequent six volumes, 1,150 pages
comprising all of the other books of the Old and New Testament, will be
completed in 2004.
“We are finally writing after all of the painstaking preparation --
including work with the theologians and artists at Saint John’s, the
creation of a unique script, the careful selection and preparation of the
vellum, the creation of a computer generated template and the planning of
every page,” said Jackson, who also serves as scribe to Her Majesty Queen
Elizabeth’s Crown Office at the House of Lords.
“We are creating something unique for modern times, not only by reviving
a monastic tradition of writing the Bible, but by creating a working
scriptorium of artists and calligraphers who have come together to create a
work of art that reflects our own place in history,” said Brother Dietrich
Reinhart, OSB, President of Saint John’s University.
An ecumenical undertaking, The Saint John’s Bible was commissioned
by Saint John’s Abbey, a Benedictine monastery, and Saint John’s University,
both in Collegeville, Minnesota. The Saint John’s Bible will be the
first handwritten Bible that interprets and illustrates scripture from a
contemporary perspective, reflecting a multicultural world and humanity’s
enormous strides in science, technology and space travel. The translation
being used is the New Revised Standard Version, a modern translation widely
used by Protestants and Catholics. The Saint John’s Bible has been
blessed by His Holiness Pope John Paul II.
Since the inception of the idea and the unveiling of the first
illuminated page of The Saint John’s Bible in March 1999, Donald
Jackson and a team of theologians from Saint John’s have been working
together to plan each page of the book, including:
- developing theological briefs that provide contemporary
interpretations of scripture to be illustrated;
- creating a unique script that will be used in the Bible;
- investigating and selecting high quality calfskin, prepared and
matched for color;
- creating computer-generated drafts for each of the five books in the
first volume with layouts of each word and illustration; and,
- preparing the scriptorium and training the calligraphers in the
script.
The calligraphy team working at Jackson’s scriptorium in Wales, United
Kingdom, includes artisans Sue Hufton, Sally Teague, and Brian Simpson, all
of the United Kingdom. Jackson plans to invite leading calligraphers and
artists from other countries and cultures to collaborate with the team at
different stages of the project.
The web site will provide on-demand video footage of the writing,
including the scriptorium in Wales, the preparations for the first writing,
and Jackson dipping his goose quill into hand-ground ink to draw the first
verse from the Gospel of John onto calfskin vellum. The video feed is made
possible by Streaming 21 (www.streaming21.com), a company committed to
delivering an integrated suite of streaming servers and advanced
applications that enable streaming for the entertainment, education and
e-commerce markets.
For more information, visit
www.saintjohnsbible.org or call:
Linda Orzechowski
The Saint John's Bible
(320) 363-3514
lorzechowsk@csbsju.edu
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