 A Lifetime's Dream
"I asked the Brethren at Saint John's: Do you want it?
Do you want me to make the Word of God live on a page?
And they came back and said, 'We want it.' And that's
why I'm creating The Saint John's Bible."
—Donald Jackson
In 1970, the American-based Church Aid Foundation asked Donald Jackson to design, letter and illuminate a copy of the Book of Revelation. As Donald Jackson explained in an article in the New York Daily News (April 1, 1970), he wanted to do it, but it would have taken two years, and he had other commitments at the time. "But it opens up all sorts of wonderful possibilities" he said. "Other books of the Bible and things like Dante's Inferno. No one has done such things in 600 years. I could be happy doing them for the rest of my life."
The same year, during an interview with Barbara Walters on The Today Show, Donald Jackson expressed his life's dream. When asked about his ultimate ambition, he indicated that one day he would like to write the Bible. Later he would describe it this way: "The Bible is the calligraphic artist's supreme challenge (our Sistine Chapel), a daunting task."
And the dream would not die. In 1984, Donald Jackson visited Saint John's for the second time to participate in the Calligraphy Connection. During an interview with Minnesota Public Radio, he repeated desire to write the Bible by hand.
As the saying goes, the third time's the charm. In November 1995, the Hill Monastic Manuscript Library at Saint John's sponsored a calligraphy presentation by Donald Jackson at the Newberry Library in Chicago. Over lunch the next day, in a restaurant on LaSalle Street in downtown Chicago, having just visited the last day of the Monet exhibition at The Chicago Art Institute, Donald Jackson voiced his desire to handwrite and illuminate the Gospels to Fr. Eric Hollas, OSB, the Director of the Hill Monastic Manuscript Library and a member of Saint John's Abbey. Only this time, he asked if Saint John's would commission him to create this monumental book, recreating the same dynamic relationship as existed between the medieval scribe and the Benedictine houses which engaged their talents. Before long in transposition, the "Gospels" became "The Bible."
And so began the dialogue. In Saint John’s estimation, the Queen’s Scribe and the foremost Western calligrapher of our time was the clear choice to undertake a project of this magnitude. And in Donald Jackson’s mind, Saint John’s was the logical candidate because of its 1,500-year monastic tradition and its long-standing commitment to manuscript preservation, the book arts and calligraphy.
For the better part of a year, the Saint John’s Board of Regents and the monastic community engaged in a spirited debate (yes, monks do debate) about the wisdom and value of embarking on this journey. In the end, both the board and the monastic community decided, "Yes, we want to embark on this monumental project. We want Donald Jackson to bring the Word of God to life on vellum for the next 500 years."
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