“Is it possible that we have a few illicit (artifacts)?”
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According to Candida Moss and Joel Baden at The Daily Beast, store CEO Steven Green and his family “have been under federal investigation for the illicit importation of cultural heritage from Iraq” since 2011. In 2017, they are slated to open a nonprofit Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., funded by the billionaire family.
In 2011, a shipment of between 200 and 300 small clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform – the writing script of ancient Assyria and Babylonia, present-day Iraq – was seized by U.S. Customs agents on their way to a Hobby Lobby center in Oklahoma City.
Gilgamesh “dream episode” cuneiform tablet.
It emerged in the ancient civilization of Sumer in Mesopotamia, known today as Iraq.
The Museum of the Bible’s president, Cary Summers, told The Daily Beast that “improper paperwork” and bureaucratic red tape were to blame for the seizure.
The tablets were shipped from Israel to the United States in 2011.
‘Sometimes this stuff just sits, and nobody does anything with it’.
However, the Beast’s investigation found that hundreds of hours of interviews had been recorded relative to the case, which would make it far more serious than Summers implied.
According to the Daily Beast report, the FedEx shipping labels on the packages misrepresented their contents. A senior law enforcement source with extensive knowledge of antiquities smuggling confirmed that these ancient artifacts had been purchased and were being imported by the deeply-religious owners of the crafting giant, the Green family of Oklahoma City.
Last year, the Supreme Court ruled Hobby Lobby’s can’t be forced to adhere to an ObamaCare provision that mandates employers provide contraception to its employees. “The Museum of the Bible is a separate not-for-profit entity made possible, in part, by the generous charitable contributions of the Green family”.
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The Green family has accumulated a $4.5billion fortune since launching their craft store in 1970, with more than 600 shops now doting the nation.
