Hopefully, but the Coptic Christians control the Nag Hammadi texts, and are less than thrilled about it. The Nag Hammadi (3rd c.? Gnostic) texts have been widely available and translated, but the Coptics would never be interested in promoting them the way the Dead Sea Scrolls have been. The texts, btw, are in Coptic and anything found in
Egypt in Coptic is in the purview of the Coptic
Church. Don't misunderstand me, the Copts have done okay by the Nag Hammadi texts, they understand people are interested in them and have acted (in a minimal way) that has answered scholarly concerns. But, they are heretical and they are not necessarily thrilled with them.
My guess is that things like the Dead Sea Scroll scandal go on all the time, granted to a lesser extent. There is a "
good" reason for the Dead Sea Scrolls scandal, monopolistic control secured job
security and prestige for a few generations of scholars. Of course, the scholars and curators have a legitimate interest in preventing cranks and fraudsters have access to the
collections. And it is not necessarily easy to tell which is what. Years ago, a fly fishermen scoped out the
Wallace tropical bird
collection, and broke in stealing a few hundred bird specimens. He originally got in to photograph the
collection for a "friend's doctoral thesis." He was on the museum guest list and got caught, but I don't know if he
had already tied a few flies with
his plunder. Listening to it in the
car and didn't hear the end. It was on "Radiolab."
Wasn't there a case of stamped gold bars being smuggled out of some museum in Australia? But I do think that sometimes there is a
bit of attitude and pretension that way institutions sometimes
handle and protect their
collection. We all put our pants on the same way, (although some of us may wear dresses or skirts instead.)
(I forget Wallace's first name, but he is probably as important as Darwin, and Darwin's
collection of Finches.)