Exhibition and lectures on the St. John’s Bible, “America’s Book of Kells”

7:00 pm

Location: Salem Covenant Church, 25 Mountain St. East, Worcester, MA

Contact: Joyce Simon, Andover Newton Bookstore, (617) 964-1100 ext. 262 jsimon@ants.edu

The Massachusetts Bible Society, in partnership with Salem Covenant Church, Worchester, MA and in cooperation with the Andover Newton Bookstore, sponsors this special appearance of Father Eric Hollas, OSB, senior associate for arts and culture, St. John’s University, and Jim Triggs, executive director of the Heritage Program, the St. John’s Bible. Both will lecture on the extraordinary St. John’s Bible project. The hand-illuminated St. John’s Bible has been called “a work of art and a work of theology” and “America’s Book of Kells.”

Father Hollas and Jim Triggs will be exhibiting the Heritage Editions of the three volumes of the Saint John’s Bible: Wisdom, Prophets, and Psalms, hand-tooled leather books that scrupulously reproduce the the artistry of the original hand illuminated Bible.

Father Eric Hollas, a member of the Benedictine order of St. John’s Abbey, Minnesota will describe the gorgeous illuminations and calligraphy of the SJB.  It was Father Hollas who initially proposed the project to Donald Jackson, calligrapher to the Queen of England, to create the first hand written, hand illuminated Bible in 500 years.

Jackson and his staff have been working for the past 11 years at his scriptorium in Wales, combining the ancient practices of scraping calf skins for the vellum pages, shaping goose quill pens, and blending egg yolk with hand-ground inks to create a vibrant text and iconographic illustrations. These ancient practices combine with 21st century technology to incorporate images as diverse as voice prints of Navajo chants, cosmological details inspired by the Hubble Space Telescope, and spirals of DNA. The St. John’s Bible has been called by Newsweek magazine, “America’s Book of Kells”.

The Andover Newton Bookstore staff will provide a booktable to accompany the talks and displays of the three books. There are currently five published volumes of the seven-volume originals, which will be completed in 2010-11, as well as giclee prints of many of the Bible’s most striking illustrations printed on museum quality paper suitable for framing.  Also available for a beautiful gift for your church, an ordinand, or friends or family members, are notecards, prayer books, and DVD’s that replicate the bible’s illustrations.

The Andover Newton Bookstore is an official distributor for the St. John’s Bible and all the related prints and DVDs. Please visit the Bookstore web page for more information.

Come see this wonderful gift to the world and to Christians everywhere, a magnificent, inspiring celebration of the scriptures that have sustained our faith through thousands of years.

Illustration: Aidan Hart with contributions from Donald Jackson and Sally Mae Joseph, The Parable of the Sower and the Seed (Mark 4:3-9)

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