Displaying the sacred

At the British Museum, founded as the home for Enlightenment values, Ethiopian tabots are wrapped in cloth and hidden in the basement. Curators, conservators and even the director of the museum, Neil McGregor, cannot look at the 11 wooden tablets regarded by Ethiopian Christians as representing the original Ark of the Covenant. Only priests are permitted entry into the locked room. Jonathan Williams, international adviser at the British Museum, defends the hiding of the tablets, telling me the move “contributes to increased public accessibility”. He explains: “Before, we were not informed properly of their (the tablets’) meaning. Now we are better informed, we know who can, and cannot, see them.” This, in his eyes, means that we know much more about them. However, the decision could confuse understanding religious ritual with the practice of it.

Curators will not display part of the collection at the Hancock Museum in Newcastle. Behind closed doors, they have separated parts of this hidden trove into segregated boxes. Only men may look at the set of churinga totems, given to young men of the Arrernte tribe in Australia when they became adults. Any female researchers who make a special request to examine the material will be “actively discouraged”.

Increasingly, museums and galleries are considering the sacredness of all collections… This trend is not the work of a few errant managers. It is operating across the museums sector in both the US and the UK. Professional bodies, unfortunately, endorse the policy as gospel. The American Association of Museums recently published the manual Stewards of the Sacred, which “spells out the benefits” of considering the sacred, because museums have “increasingly an obligation to consider spiritual needs and concerns”…

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Museum directors must not act as priests, nor must they treat the public as their flock. Idolatry has no place in museum policy. Those with faith already have other places to venerate religious icons. If museums continue to be confused with places of worship, we will all suffer, as the pursuit of truth is sacrificed on the altar of veneration.

Excerpted from an article by Tiffany Jenkins in the July 11 issue of ‘New Statesman’