5 highlights from Wes Huff's interview with Shawn Ryan about suffering, giants and Dead Sea Scrolls

By Jon Brown, Christian Post Reporter Saturday, February 14, 2026

4. 'Most important archaeological discovery of the 20th century'

Huff described the finding of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Qumran caves along the Dead Sea from 1947 to 1956 as "probably the most important archaeological discovery of the 20th century," which "revealed a ton" about the fidelity of the Bible throughout the centuries. The scrolls, most of which pre-date Jesus, range in completion from fragments to entire texts.

"They shed so much light on ancient Judaism leading up to the time of Jesus, in understandings of different Jewish thought and practice," he said. "But also, every book of the Bible, apart from two, of the Old Testament, was discovered in these. And some of them were so well-preserved, that what they did is they pushed back our understanding of the text of the Bible close to a thousand years, sometimes even further than that."

Huff said the biblical texts contained in the scrolls match the 11th-century Leningrad Codex, the oldest complete Hebrew Bible, almost exactly, refuting claims of major later changes while affirming pre-Christian canon stability. 

"The testimony of the fidelity between the time when we get something like the Leningrad Codex in the Middle Ages to something like the Dead Sea Scrolls is a huge gap," he said. "And yet, you have now evidence of this faithful copying process over the centuries of scribes, to the point where you can follow them to the letter and see the fidelity of these texts."

Huff also noted that he will be providing a public tour on March 28 of the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibit at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C., where they are being displayed until September.