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Re: orion Woody Allen?

According to dwashbur@nyx.net:
> 
> Orionites,
> Many years ago when I was still in school, I attended a lecture by 
> Jacob Milgrom, I think it was about the Temple Scroll.  He opened the 
> lecture by citing Woody Allen's tale of the Scrolls' discovery.  As 
> you can imagine, this account was completely absurd and incredibly 
> funny.  He went on to say that the actual story was no less 
> fantastic, and of course he was right.

Last year, while on fellowship at the University of Judaism in Los
Angeles, I attended a similar lecture by Jacob Milgrom on the Temple
Scroll, which opened in the same way. The Woody Allen story was so 
funny as Milgrom told it that I waited afterwards, reintroduced myself
to him, and asked for the reference. 

The tale is found in the selection "Scrolls" in <b>Without Feathers</>, by
Woody Allen, published by Random House, copyrighted 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975
by Woody Allen. It originally appeared in <s>The New Republic</>. 

For those who are not able to find it, and since there is definitely a
Phildelphia connection, I will quote below the part that Milgrom
excerpted, as near as I recall. 

%*%*%*%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%--quoted excerpt--%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*

Scholars will recall that several years ago a shepherd, wandering in the
Gulf of Aqaba, stumbled upon a cave containing several large clay jars and
also two tickets to the ice show. Inside the jars were discovered six
parchment scrolls with ancient incomprehensible writing which the
shepherd, in his ignorance, sold to the museum for $750,000 apiece. Two
years later the jars turned up in a pawnshop in Philadelphia. One year
later the shepherd turned up in a pawnshop in Philadelphia and neither was
claimed.
  Archaeologists originally set the date of the scrolls at 4000 B.C., or
just after the massacre of the Israelites by their benefactors. The
writing is a mixture of Sumerian, Aramaic, and Babylonian and seems to
have been done by either one man over a long period of time, or several
men who shared the same suit. The authenticity of the scrolls is currently
in great doubt, particularly since the word "Oldsmobile" appears several
times in the text, and the few fragments that have finally been translated
deal with familiar religious themes in a more than dubious way. Still,
excavationist A. H. Bauer has noted that even thought the fragments seem
totally fraudulent, this is probably the [[22]] greatest archeological
find in history with the exception of the recovery of his cuff links from
a tomb in Jerusalem. The following are the translated fragments (21f.).

   <italics>One. . . </> [from an apocryphon of Job :-)  ]
    [omitted]

   <italics>Two. . . </> [an apocryphal version of the sacrifice of Isaac,
    very interesting]
    [omitted]

   <italics>Three. . . </> [fragment is unrelated to Biblical material; no
information about the mss appearance is given. It is therefore difficult
to determine whether the writing follows Qumran practice (Tov, various
articles), and therefore whether or not the text is sectarian. The
absence of "community" language, and God's proffered advice on an
individual business matter, suggest that it is not sectarian.]
   [omitted]

[The following fragment was quoted by Milgrom to lead into the subject
matter of the lecture on the Temple Scroll.]

			LAWS AND PROVERBS
			. . . . . . . . .

Doing abominations is against the law, particularly if the abominations
are done while wearing a lobster bib.

   The lion and the calf shall lie down together but the calf won't get
much sleep.

   Whosoever shall not fall by the sword or by famine, shall fall by
pestilence, so why bother shaving?

   The wicked at heart probably know something.

   Whosoever loveth wisdom is righteous but he that keepeth company with 
fowl is weird.

   My Lord, my Lord! What hast thou done, lately? (25)

%*%*%*%*%*%%*%*%*%*%*%--END quoted excerpt--%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*

[...]
> I realize this is a silly request, but it would mean a lot.

Yes. It's a fairly risky undertaking, since humor has been discouraged on 
this list. Milgrom's delivery adds a lot, as well.

> Thanks, and I apologize for taking up bandwidth.
> Dave Washburn
> dwashbur@nyx.net
> http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur/home.html
> 

My own added apology for the length of this posting.
Sigrid Peterson   UPenn   petersig@ccat.sas.upenn.edu