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T&T Clark Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls
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To the memory of Richard Charles Cave (1962–2018) and Philip R. Davies (1945–2018)
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T&T Clark Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls Edited by George J. Brooke and Charlotte Hempel With the Assistance of Michael DeVries and Drew Longacre
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T&T CLARK Bloomsbury Publishing Plc 50 Bedford Square, London, WC 1B 3DP, UK 1385 Broadway, New York, NY 10018, USA Bloomsbury, T&T CLARK and the T&T Clark logo are trademarks of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc First published in Great Britain 2019 Copyright © George J. Brooke and Charlotte Hempel, 2019 George J. Brooke and Charlotte Hempel have asserted their right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as Editors of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publishers. Bloomsbury Publishing Plc does not have any control over, or responsibility for, any third-party websites referred to or in this book. All internet addresses given in this book were correct at the time of going to press. The author and publisher regret any inconvenience caused if addresses have changed or sites have ceased to exist, but can accept no responsibility for any such changes. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress. ISBN :
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Contents List of Illustrations Notes on Contributors Abbreviations
ix xi xiii
Introduction George J. Brooke and Charlotte Hempel Part I
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Background
1
Discoveries Hans Debel
2
Archaeology of Qumran
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The Manuscript Collections: An Overview Mladen Popović
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4
Acquisition and Publication Weston Fields and Herman Fields
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Scholarly and Popular Reception Matthew A. Collins
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Dennis Mizzi
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Part II Context 6
Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context for the Scrolls Robert Kugler
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7
The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation Benedikt Eckhardt
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The Regional Context of the Dead Sea
Joan E. Taylor
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Qumran and the Ancient Near East Henryk Drawnel
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10 Scrolls and Early Judaism George J. Brooke
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11 Scrolls and Early Christianity
129
Albert L. A. Hogeterp
12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: a. Philo Joan E. Taylor b. Josephus James McLaren c. Other Literature Matthias Henze 13 Scrolls and Non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer
139 148 153 156
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vi Part III
Contents Methods
14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture
Ingo Kottsieper
15 Scientific Technologies Ingo Kottsieper 16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts
167 178
Annette Steudel
186
17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek Holger Gzella
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18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies Reinhard G. Kratz
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19 The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Study of the Ancient World Benjamin G. Wright III
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20 Historiography
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†Philip R. Davies
21 Social Scientific Approaches: a. Sectarianism David Chalcraft b. Sociolinguistics Trine Bjørnung Hasselbalch c. Identity Theory Lloyd K. Pietersen 22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies Part IV
Maxine L. Grossman
237 241 244 246
Key Texts
23 Aramaic Job David Shepherd
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24 Aramaic Levi Vered Hillel
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25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related Texts Katell Berthelot
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26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related Texts Roman Vielhauer
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27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related Texts Ulrich Dahmen
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28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts Kelley Coblentz Bautch and Jack Weinbender
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29 Barkhi Nafshi Daniel K. Falk
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30 Bar Kokhba Letters
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Lutz Doering
31 Beatitudes Dorothy M. Peters
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32 Berakhot
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Daniel K. Falk
33 Commentaries on Genesis (4Q252–254) George J. Brooke
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Contents 34 Copper Scroll
Jesper Høgenhaven
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35 Damascus Document (D) Liora Goldman
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36 Genesis Apocryphon Daniel A. Machiela
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37 Hodayot (H) Angela Kim Harkins
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38 Instruction Benjamin Wold
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39 Messianic Apocalypse Eric F. Mason
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40 Milh.amah (M)
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Brian Schultz
41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah (MMT) Hanne von Weissenberg
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42 Mysteries
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Samuel I. Thomas
43 New Jerusalem Michael Langlois
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44 Pesharim Shani Tzoref
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45 Rule of Blessings (Sb) Judith H. Newman
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46 Rule of the Congregation (Sa)
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Corrado Martone
47 Serekh ha-Yahad (S) Stephen Hultgren
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48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice
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Judith H. Newman
49 Son of God Text Eric F. Mason
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50 Tanh.umim Jesper Høgenhaven
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51 Temple Scroll
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Joseph L. Angel
52 Testimonia Eva Mroczek
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53 Wiles of the Wicked Woman Michael Lesley
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54 Words of the Luminaries Judith H. Newman
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Part V
Types of Literature
55 Bible
Mika Pajunen
56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture
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Molly M. Zahn
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57 Exegesis and Interpretation Michael Segal
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58 Halakhah
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Vered Noam
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Contents
59 Rules Charlotte Hempel
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60 Poetry and Hymns
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61 Liturgical Texts
Daniel Stökl Ben Ezra
Daniel K. Falk
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62 Calendars Helen R. Jacobus
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63 Wisdom
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Matthew Goff
64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination
Gideon Bohak
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Part VI Issues and Topics 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions
Ariel Feldman
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66 Revelation Hindy Najman and Nicole Hilton
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67 God(s), Angels and Demons
Hanne von Weissenberg
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68 Eschatologies and Messianisms Kenneth E. Pomykala
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69 Jerusalem and the Temple Mila Ginsburskaya
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70 Purity and Holiness Cecilia Wassén
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71 The Scribes of the Scrolls Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar
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72 Forms of Community Alison Schofield
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73 Daily Life Cecilia Wassén
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74 Ethics and Dualism Marcus Tso
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75 War and Violence Alex P. Jassen
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Appendices A–F Drew Longacre Indexes Michael DeVries Index of Ancient Sources Index of Modern Authors Subject Index
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595 627 640
Illustrations Map: Textual finds by the Dead Sea and Judaean Desert © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. 1.1 View of Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 170–1). 1.2 Cave 1, in the hills above Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 291–1). 2.1 Plan of Khirbet Qumran in Period II . Reproduced from Jean-Baptiste Humbert OP et Alain Chambon, Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân et de Aïn Feshkha I Album de photographies; Répertoire du fonds photographique; Synthèse des notes de chantier du Père Roland de Vaux OP, NTOA 1 (Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994), 17. Courtesy of the École biblique et archéologique française, Jerusalem. 2.2 Chronological chart outlining the seven major models of Qumran’s architectural development during the Second Temple period. Abbreviations: MB = Main Building; WB = Western Building. Reproduced from Dead Sea Discoveries 22 (2015): 18. © 2015 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. 2.3 Ritual bath at Qumran with earthquake damage from 31 bce (Zev Radovan Image 309). 3.1 Large terracotta jar: one of the several types of jar into which scrolls were put (Zev Radovan Image 735). 3.2 First century ce pottery from Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 2215). 5.1 The studio set design for QI (BBC , 2003–), including the composite Hodayot image used from Series 5 onwards (2007–). © TalkBack Thames (with thanks to Andy Spence, Jonathan Paul Green and Stephen Fry). 5.2 Lika Tov, ‘Noah’s Ark in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ (utilising 4Q252 frag. 1, chronicling the biblical flood). © Lika Tov. 5.3 A Peanuts comic strip from Christmas 1962. PEANUTS © 1962 Peanuts Worldwide, LLC . 46.1 The Rule of the Congregation (1QS a). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan. 51.1 Professor Yigael Yadin at work on the Temple Scroll (Zev Radovan Image 2529). 52.1 Testimonia (4Q175). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan. 61.1 Qoheleta (4Q109). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan.
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Testimonia (4Q175). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan.
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Contributors Joseph L. Angel (Yeshiva University, USA ) Katell Berthelot (Centre Paul-Albert Février/CNRS , France) Gideon Bohak (Tel Aviv University, Israel) George J. Brooke (University of Manchester, UK ) David Chalcraft (Liverpool John Moores University, UK ) Kelley Coblentz Bautch (St. Edward’s University, USA ) Matthew A. Collins (University of Chester, UK ) Ulrich Dahmen (University of Freiburg, Germany) †Philip R. Davies (University of Sheffield, UK ) Hans Debel (KU Leuven, Belgium) Michael DeVries (University of Birmingham, UK ) Lutz Doering (University of Münster, Germany) Henryk Drawnel (Catholic University of Lublin, Poland) Benedikt Eckhardt (University of Bremen, Germany) Daniel K. Falk (Pennsylvania State University, USA ) Ariel Feldman (Brite Divinity School, USA ) Herman Fields (Gothenburg, Sweden) Weston Fields (Dead Sea Scrolls Foundation, Israel and USA ) Mila Ginsburskaya (Jerusalem, Israel) Matthew Goff (Florida State University, USA ) Liora Goldman (University of Haifa, Israel) Maxine L. Grossman (University of Maryland, USA ) Holger Gzella (Leiden University, The Netherlands) Angela Kim Harkins (Boston College, USA ) Trine Bjørnung Hasselbalch (Copenhagen, Denmark) Charlotte Hempel (University of Birmingham, UK ) Matthias Henze (Rice University, USA ) Vered Hillel (Israel College of the Bible, Israel) Nicole Hilton (Toronto, Canada) Jesper Høgenhaven (University of Copenhagen, Denmark) Albert L. A. Hogeterp (University of the Free State, South Africa) Stephen Hultgren (Australian Lutheran College, Australia) Helen R. Jacobus (University College London, UK ) Alex P. Jassen (New York University, USA ) Ingo Kottsieper (Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany) Reinhard G. Kratz (Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany) Robert Kugler (Lewis & Clark College, USA ) Michael Langlois (University of Strasbourg, France) xi
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Contributors
Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer (University of Aberdeen, UK ) Michael Lesley (Harvard University, USA ) Drew Longacre (University of Groningen, The Netherlands) Daniel A. Machiela (McMaster University, Canada) Corrado Martone (Università degli Studi di Torino, Italy) Eric F. Mason (Judson University, USA ) James McLaren (Australian Catholic University, Australia) Dennis Mizzi (University of Malta, Malta) Eva Mroczek (University of California, Davis, USA ) Hindy Najman (University of Oxford, UK ) Judith H. Newman (University of Toronto, Canada) Vered Noam (Tel Aviv University, Israel) Mika Pajunen (University of Helsinki, Finland) Dorothy M. Peters (Trinity Western University, Canada) Lloyd K. Pietersen (Newman University, UK ) Kenneth E. Pomykala (Calvin College, USA ) Mladen Popović (University of Groningen, The Netherlands) Alison Schofield (University of Denver, USA ) Brian Schultz (Fresno Pacific University, USA ) Michael Segal (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel) David Shepherd (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland) Annette Steudel (Georg-August-University Göttingen, Germany) Daniel Stökl Ben Ezra (École pratique des hautes études, France) Joan E. Taylor (King’s College London, UK ) Samuel I. Thomas (California Lutheran University, USA ) Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar (KU Leuven, Belgium) Marcus Tso (Ambrose University College, Canada) Shani Tzoref (University of Potsdam, Germany) Roman Vielhauer (Göttingen, Germany) Cecilia Wassén (Uppsala University, Sweden) Jack Weinbender (University of Texas at Austin, USA ) Hanne von Weissenberg (University of Helsinki, Finland) Benjamin Wold (Trinity College Dublin, Ireland) Benjamin G. Wright III (Lehigh University, USA ) Molly M. Zahn (University of Kansas, USA )
Abbreviations Please note that only abbreviations not included in B. J. Collins, B. Buller, and J. Kutsko (eds), The SBL Handbook of Style for Biblical Studies and Related Disciplines. 2nd edn. Atlanta: SBL , 2014 are listed below. AGAJU
Arbeiten zur Geschichte des Antiken Judentums und Urchristentums
Athen. dipn.
Athenaeus, The Deipnosophists
CIL
Corpus Inscriptionem Latinarum
DJDJ
Discoveries in the Judaean Desert of Jordan
DSS
Dead Sea Scrolls
DSSSE
F. García Martínez and E. J. C. Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 vols Leiden: Brill, 1998
HAWTTM
R. G. Kratz, A. Steudel and I. Kottsieper (eds), Hebräisches und aramäisches Wörterbuch zu den Texten vom Toten Meer. Einschließlich der Manuskripte aus der Kairoer Geniza, Band 1 ב – א. Berlin: De Gruyter, 2017
IG II 2
J. Kirchner (ed.), Inscriptiones Graecae II : Inscriptiones Atticae Euclidis anno posteriores, Berlin: De Gruyter, 1913–40
ISDCL
International Society for the Study of Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature
JAJ
Journal of Ancient Judaism
L.
Locus
MDAI[A]
Mitteilungen des deutschen archäologischen Instituts. Athenische Abteilung
MPG
Migne Patrologia Graeca
ThWQ
H.-J. Fabry and U. Dahmen (eds), Theologisches Wörterbuch zu den Qumrantexten. 3 vols Stuttgart: Kolhammer Verlag, 2011–2016
TLG
Thesaurus Linguae Graecae http://stephanus.tlg.uci.edu/inst/textsearch
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Map Textual finds by the Dead Sea and Judaean Desert © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands. xiv
Introduction George J. Brooke and Charlotte Hempel
The term Dead Sea Scrolls covers manuscripts that come from several different sites in the Judean wilderness region not far from the Dead Sea. Such sites range from Wadi Daliyeh, some 14 kilometres north of Jericho, to Masada at the southern end of the Dead Sea. Those manuscript finds have been made since the end of the Second World War and the vast majority of the finds have been Jewish texts from the late Second Temple period (fourth century bce to first century ce ) or shortly thereafter. In some places, the finds have been mostly of documentary texts such as contracts relating to marriages or property. Elsewhere there has been a mixture of documentary and literary texts such as biblical, liturgical or wisdom compositions. Distinctively the finds from the caves at and near Qumran, on the north-west shore of the Dead Sea, are remarkably almost all literary texts. Over the years, a standard system for referring to the Dead Sea Scrolls has emerged in which some abbreviation of the find site is prefixed to a designation for the particular manuscript, either a number or an abbreviated title. So, for the principal copy of the Rule of the Community from Qumran Cave 1, the technical designation is 1QS (Cave 1, Qumran, S = Serekh ha-Yahad = Rule of the Community); some Hebrew names of compositions have become so widely used that they are customarily anglicized without diacritical marks whereas others such as Milh.amah are less common and so retain suitable Hebrew transcription. Those new to the study of the Scrolls might find this slightly bewildering at first, but lists of the manuscripts can be found in reference works listed in Appendix D in this volume. It is important always to distinguish between a manuscript, that is the material remains of skin, papyrus, or even copper, and the text or composition written or engraved on the manuscript. The same composition, for example, can come on manuscripts of different sizes and material; and such variation might signify something important. More problematic for how the Scrolls and their significance are understood is the need to negotiate the classification of the material proposed by the first generation of scholars. To begin with they listed the so-called ‘biblical’ manuscripts for each find site and for each cave at Qumran first, not least because they were copies of works that were already known; ‘quasi-biblical’ works would follow, such as might include commentaries on biblical works or examples of the so-called pseudepigrapha (such as parts of 1 Enoch); sectarian manuscripts are listed next before other texts, with Hebrew 1
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compositions generally being listed before Aramaic or Greek ones. Such a system of listing has some common sense to it, but it might convey assumptions about the greater authority of certain manuscripts over others, or be an indication of the relative date of compositions, when in fact such things might be far from certain. If the Scrolls were to be discovered now, it is quite possible that scholars would have a different way of categorizing them based on a different set of assumptions. The same goes for the names that have been given to the texts on some of the fragmentary manuscript remains. Very few titles survive on the manuscripts themselves; in any case, the standard way that Jews of the time named texts was by using the first word or words of the composition itself, a method which is not an effective way to offer a clear indication of the contents of a composition. As a result of the lack of ancient evidence, Scrolls scholars have come up with a set of titles for the non-biblical material which may or may not be deemed suitable. Some of the titles pick on certain key phrases in a composition or indicate something about the overall content of what survives. Some impose a generic classification on the fragments that might be questionable. Other titles suggest a relationship of what was written on the extant fragments with other compositions; sometimes such titles indicate that the relationship implies that one partner is secondary or inferior or even ‘false’ (pseudo-). A further problem has arisen over the years as some scholars have argued that it is necessary to change the titles of certain compositions which has resulted in the same composition sometimes being known by more than one name. This T&T Clark Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls is significantly different from other major introductory volumes on the Scrolls and related literature. As editors, we have had several objectives. First, this Companion is concerned to provide a basic introduction to the Scrolls and to some of their contexts, including the archaeological contexts. However, such introductory material is not set out in a standard set of chapters, but rather a rich variety of material is dealt with in six sets of articles. The table of contents is a good place to start and see what the book has to offer, but some of the information that some readers might be seeking can be found in unexpected places. If you are unable to find a topic in the table of contents or through the many cross-references throughout the volume, there are comprehensive indexes which should enable you to find your way around the Companion. There are some standard items, such as short introductory descriptions of some of the principal manuscripts and their contents which can be found in Section IV. Second, this Companion describes and engages with the complete history of research on the Dead Sea Scrolls. There is treatment of the history of research from the very first discoveries until the present. This is to be found particularly in Section I, but there are references to the history of scholarship in several other places too. With the process of the identification and editing of the manuscripts largely complete – though with plenty of room for updating and revision – scholarly discussion has moved on to a reconsideration of the whole corpus of finds. For the manuscripts from the caves at and near Qumran this has seen a notable change of emphasis in recent years. The first generation of scholars generally gave priority to compositions that described the various aspects of the life and beliefs of the sectarian group responsible for gathering
Introduction
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together the Qumran collection. In more recent times, those clearly sectarian compositions are seen as only a small proportion of the collection (perhaps about 25 per cent of the extant manuscripts). Attention has shifted towards the analysis and appreciation of the majority of the non-biblical collection (over 50 per cent of the manuscripts) which is non-sectarian in nature, though the sectarians certainly used and even copied some of it. The Scrolls have also had a long popular reception which needs to be noted and discussed, and they have something to contribute to many of the areas of contemporary discourse in the Humanities. Third, the concern to cover the wider contexts of the Dead Sea Scrolls is a further reflection of where contemporary study of the Scrolls has shifted. For a few years the study of the Scrolls has been less exclusively concerned with the Qumran site and the community that lived there, but increasingly with the wider context of the Dead Sea region and even areas beyond. Particularly for the Scrolls from the caves at and near Qumran, this means that the discussion of their contents is not controlled first and foremost by the manuscripts containing the so-called sectarian compositions, such as the Rule of the Community, but by the overall collection of texts, three-quarters of which is non-sectarian. From this perspective, a much wider frame of reference is required for appreciating the significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and this volume has sought to supply such a wider frame of reference, even including an article on the significance of the Scrolls for the study of antiquity. Fourth, the Dead Sea Scrolls are a remarkable set of finds because they contribute so much to a very wide range of topics. As a result, they have stimulated and been the basis for several new or renewed areas of study. They have played a significant part in encouraging scholars to look behind text to material culture. As such, they have also been a major stimulant in the reconsideration of scribal practices in antiquity, particularly Jewish scribal practices. They have contributed to the revitalization of the study of the text of the Hebrew Bible in all its forms, including the Samaritan Pentateuch, and its versions, especially the Septuagint. They have provided much information for the study of Hebrew and Aramaic language, providing both diachronic and synchronic evidence. As primary source material, they have been part of the reconsideration of how the social sciences might be properly used in the analysis of Jewish antiquity. This Companion has tried to engage with those stimulating and novel ways of approaching the Scrolls especially in Part III and elsewhere. Fifth, the editorial intervention in each article has been limited to what makes for accessibility and ease of comprehension according to the contributor’s own style and manner of organizing the subject material that was set. The editors have tried to ensure that readers can easily see if an author is discussing a particular manuscript (such as 1QS ) or a particular composition (such as the Rule of the Community) – it is common for people, experts and novices alike, to confuse such terms. However, it has not been possible, for example, to impose a standard view of the Qumran site and its occupants throughout the volume, not least since there is still lack of clarity about when and by whom the site was first occupied in the late Second Temple period. Readers should be aware that they will need to be sensitive to each author’s approach to the subject at hand, perhaps interrogating each article about what its author intends by using or not using such phrases as ‘the Qumran community’ or ‘the Yahad.’
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Sixth, each article is accompanied by a significant bibliography, either highlighting some principal scholarly items where yet further information can be found or providing something innovative by way of a collection of scholarly literature that many scholars concerned with the Scrolls might have overlooked. Such bibliographies can be readily supplemented from several resources, including the searchable bibliographical database of the Hebrew University’s Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature which covers the period since the whole corpus became accessible (orion.mscc.huji.ac.il). There are many resources available for the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls both in electronic and printed forms. Many of those are listed in Appendices C to F. Of note for images of the fragments themselves are the freely available photographs of the Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library (deadseascrolls.org.il). Translations of the principal Scrolls are available in many languages. In English three translations have been particularly appreciated by users: those translations made over several decades by Geza Vermes (The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English, 7th edition, London: Penguin Books, 2011), those made with a fresh set of descriptive labels by Michael Wise, Martin Abegg and Edward Cook (The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation, San Francisco: Harper Collins, 1999), and those put together with parallel transcriptions of the texts in Hebrew and Aramaic by Florentino García Martínez and Eibert Tigchelaar (The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition, Leiden/Grand Rapids: Brill/Eerdmans, 2000). In this volume, the reader will find much that continues the best traditions of scholarly introduction; but there is also much that is fresh in the field of Dead Sea Scrolls studies. As editors, we have been concerned to rejuvenate the study of the Scrolls and to that end we have paid attention to inviting many junior scholars to offer their opinions alongside more senior voices in the field. That decision has certainly resulted, in our opinion, in an innovative and exciting volume, which makes a distinctive and creative contribution to the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and their place in Judaism of the late Second Temple period.
Part One
Background
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1
Discoveries Hans Debel
According to standard legend, it was a goat gone astray which, around the middle of the twentieth century, set into motion a radical change of course – a revolution, as some prefer to call it – in the study of the Hebrew Bible and of Second Temple Judaism. Even if Sir Frederic G. Kenyon had emphatically stated in his Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts, of which the fourth edition appeared in 1939, that ‘[t]here is, indeed, no probability that we shall ever find manuscripts of the Hebrew text going back to a period before the formation of the text which we know as Masoretic,’ fortuitous circumstances led some Bedouin shepherds to a jar that contained a few manuscripts which the noted palaeographer and vice-president of the American Schools of Oriental Research William Foxwell Albright would soon hail as ‘the greatest manuscript discovery of all times.’ In retrospect, these manuscripts turned out to be only the tip of the iceberg, as the fragmentary remains of many more manuscripts dating to late Second Temple times were to surface in the ensuing decade. Even in recent years, some scattered hitherto unknown fragment is occasionally announced, but the ‘golden age’ of discoveries in the Judean Desert has clearly elapsed. In an attempt to separate the actual facts from the many fictional tales surrounding them, the present contribution sets out to describe the remarkable string of events that led to these phenomenal discoveries which biblical scholars had never dared to dream of.
A Handful of Manuscripts from a Deserted Cave As with other accidental finds of great importance, the actual discovery of the first Dead Sea Scrolls is clouded with so many uncertainties that we find ourselves faced with what could be described, in the nomenclature developed by biblical scholars in the wake of the discoveries, as a pluriformity of variant editions from which no original text can be reconstructed. These rival versions concur that between the fall of 1946 and the spring of 1947, Muhammad, nicknamed ed-Dib (‘the wolf ’), entered a cave on the north-western shore of the Dead Sea in which he found a jar with three scrolls. The accounts part company on the precise circumstances that led this young Ta’amireh Bedouin shepherd into the cave, on the role played by his fellows Jum’a Muhammad and Khalil Musa, on the time the Bedouin allowed the scrolls to further deteriorate in 7
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their camp, as well as on the presence of a fourth scroll which some children in the camp would have torn to snippets irrevocably gone with the wind. The first established fact in the modern history of the Dead Sea Scrolls is that, in March 1947, three Bedouin were scouring the Bethlehem market in order to make some money out of the three scrolls that would later become known as the ‘great’ Isaiah Scroll (1QI saa [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]), the Rule of the Community (1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]) and the pesher on Habakkuk (1QpHab [→44 Pesharim]). Hoping that the leather could be recycled into straps for shoes or sandals, they offered them to a local cobbler, Khalil Eskander Shanin (nicknamed Kando), who agreed to act as an intermediary in finding a buyer for the scrolls. He showed them to George Isha’ya, a member of the Syrian-Orthodox church of Jerusalem, who in turn brought the scrolls to the attention of Mar Athanasius Yeshue Samuel, the Metropolitan of St. Mark’s monastery in Jerusalem. Suspecting that the scrolls may be ancient – and thus of great value – the Metropolitan insisted that the Bedouin should show him all the scrolls in their possession, whereupon they returned to the desert and succeeded in unearthing four more scrolls, which are now called the ‘small’ Isaiah Scroll (1QI sab), the War Scroll (1QM [→40 Milh.amah]), the Hodayot (1QH [→37 Hodayot]), and the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]). Despite the generally held assumption that these scrolls were found in the same cave as the three discovered at an earlier date, there is no archaeological evidence supporting the common provenance of the seven first Dead Sea Scrolls, as later excavations in ‘Cave 1’ would only yield additional fragments for the War Scroll and the Hodayot. Somewhat similarly, it remains unclear how these seven scrolls ended up in two groups that do not coincide with their order of discovery: some say that three of the four scrolls discovered on this second occasion – the Genesis Apocryphon not included – never saw the inside of Kando’s shop and were never taken to St. Mark’s because the Bedouin offered them to another antiquities dealer; others maintain that the Bedouin took all seven scrolls to the monastery on 5 July 1947 but were brutally shown the door by a monk who had not been informed of their visit and could not imagine the Metropolitan would be interested in these dirty clumps of leather, after which one of them felt so offended that he decided to sell his three scrolls elsewhere. At any rate, on 19 July 1947 a momentous agreement was reached at St. Mark’s when the Metropolitan decided to purchase the as yet unidentified ‘great’ Isaiah Scroll, the Rule of the Community, the Habakkuk Pesher and the Genesis Apocryphon. The three other scrolls that had been found in the desert disappeared from the radar for a few months, until an Armenian antiquities dealer showed them to Eleazar Lipa Sukenik, Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, who at the end of November – exactly in the same week as the United Nations voted for the foundation of the State of Israel – agreed to buy them in the name of the university.
An Eventful Week and Its Long-Lasting Consequences As soon as he had acquired the scrolls, the Metropolitan sought his suspicions on their value to be confirmed by consulting Ignatius Afrem I Barsoum, the Syrian-Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, and A. Sebastianus Marmadji, Professor of Arabic at the
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Dominican École Biblique et Archéologique Française in Jerusalem. On his second visit to St. Mark’s, Marmadji was accompanied by the Dutch Dominican Johannes P. M. van der Ploeg, who immediately identified one of the scrolls as a copy of the book of Isaiah, but like the other scholars involved so far was not convinced of its alleged antiquity. Such was also the opinion of some scholars from the Hebrew University, who informed Sukenik of their encounter with the Metropolitan only after he had bought the three other scrolls a few months later. Through the mediation of Anton Kiraz, another member of the Syrian-Orthodox church, Sukenik gained permission to investigate the Metropolitan’s scrolls, but his attempts to purchase them turned out to be of no avail. Still hoping that some authoritative voice might confirm his suspicions, the Metropolitan had his assistant Butros Sowmy contact the local American School of Oriental Research on 18 February 1948. During a short telephone call with John C. Trever, who was serving as acting director of the School in the absence of Millar Burrows, Sowmy dished up the familiar story of the Syrians – designed to avoid the British law of antiquities, which did not apply to findings made when the territory was still part of the Ottoman empire – that the Metropolitan was seeking advice on some scrolls that had been found forty years earlier in the desert and had recently turned up again in the monastery’s library. When they actually met one another the next day, Trever quickly copied some lines from the Isaiah Scroll, which he and Brownlee were able to identify in the evening as part of Isa 65.1 – a verse that aptly states: ‘I was ready to be sought out by those who did not ask, to be found by those who did not seek me.’ As Brownlee and Trever also realized that the scroll was written in a script similar to that of the Nash Papyrus, dated by Albright to the second century bce , they decided that swift action was needed before the scrolls would perish in the political turmoil to which the city had fallen prey. Cautious not to repeat Tischendorf ’s error and being denied further access to these potentially invaluable manuscripts, they kept the Syrians uninformed of their preliminary observations, but still made the urgent request to be allowed to photograph the scrolls, to which the Metropolitan agreed after some hesitation. From 21 to 24 February 1948, Trever – who was also a skilled photographer – produced a set of photographs of the Isaiah Scroll, the Rule of the Community and the Habakkuk Pesher that would remain one of the most important sources for the study of the scrolls for almost five decades. The Genesis Apocryphon, however, could only be photographed on the outside, because it was too brittle to be unrolled at the time. Once the Isaiah Scroll and the Genesis Apocryphon had been returned to St. Mark’s, Trever and Brownlee set to work to read the other two scrolls, which they quickly identified as a commentary on Habakkuk and a Manual of Discipline for a religious community. They also sent a copy of the photographs to Albright, who confirmed their suspicions on the antiquity of the script. As Albright saw no reason whatsoever to question the authenticity of the scrolls, Burrows – who in the meantime had returned from Baghdad – judged that the time was ripe to inform the rest of the world of this unimagined discovery by means of a press release that was published in the New York Times and the London Times on 11 April 1948. When Sukenik read the article, stating that the scrolls had been hidden ‘for many centuries’ in St. Mark’s monastery, he suspected foul play and issued a second press release announcing the existence of three other scrolls that supposedly came from the same cache near the Dead Sea. The actual
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scrolls were soon to leave Jerusalem, and after a few months in a vault in Beirut travelled to the United States with the Metropolitan, where they enjoyed several exhibitions and were eventually acquired by the State of Israel through a secret transaction set up by Sukenik’s son, Yigael Yadin.
Further Explorations and Successes in the Desert Elsewhere too, people were taken by surprise to read the article on the Scrolls, particularly in the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, recognized by the United Nations as a sovereign state in 1946. As Jordan claimed (and occupied) the area northwest of the Dead Sea, the Jordanian authorities considered the scrolls to have been illegally removed from Jordanian territory. Because of the War of Independence in 1948, the search for ‘the Cave’ where the Scrolls had been found had to be postponed until the declaration of a cease-fire in January 1949. As soon as its actual location had been established by the Belgian captain Philippe Lippens, however, the Jordanian Department of Antiquities headed by Gerald Lankester Harding set up an archaeological expedition to investigate the area. This expedition would be led by Roland de Vaux, director of the École Biblique and president of the international Board of Trustees of the Palestinian Archaeological Museum on which Harding also held a seat as curator of the Museum. From 15 February to 5 March 1949, de Vaux and his team retrieved dozens of potsherds and smaller textual fragments from the cave, which Dominique Barthélemy and Józef T. Milik would later publish in the first volume of the official Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series (DJD [→4 Acquisition and Publication]). At this juncture, no firm link had as yet been established between the cave and the nearby ruins of Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] (see Figure 1.1). During their 1949 survey, de Vaux and Harding paid a short visit to the site and decided to subject it to a more thorough investigation, which was effectively carried out in the fall of 1951. At that time, it nevertheless seemed to them as if an incredible adventure was nearing its end and no further discoveries were to be expected. The Bedouin, however, refused to throw in the towel and hunted the desert for additional scrolls that had survived the ravages of time. In November 1951, Kando – who would continue to act as the Bedouin’s middleman – presented a batch of Hebrew and Greek fragments to the Museum, at first claiming that they came from ‘the Cave’ and then refusing to specify their provenance. De Vaux, however, entered into direct negotiations with the Bedouin and adroitly outwitted them: he raised doubts about the fragments’ authenticity until they proposed to show him the cave where they had found the fragments. De Vaux then graciously offered the logistic support of the Jordanian Department of Antiquities and a military escort for their own safety. And so it happened that, on 21 January 1952, de Vaux and Harding launched an expedition to the caves of Wadi Murabbaʿat, which produced numerous fragments dating to the Bar Kokhba period – mostly documentary texts, but also some scraps of biblical scrolls and phylacteries [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. While de Vaux and Harding were digging further south along the coast of the Dead Sea, the Bedouin returned to the area where fortune had first struck them and located
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Figure 1.1 View of Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 170–1).
another cave some 150 metres south of ‘the Cave,’ which would now come to be called ‘Cave 1’ (see Figure 1.2). With fragmentary remains of approximately thirty manuscripts, Cave 2 turned out to be somewhat less spectacular, but it confirmed suspicions that the surroundings of Qumran had not yet divulged all their secrets. Fearing that the Bedouin’s clandestine actions would lead them to further successes, de Vaux and Harding cut short their work at Murabbaʿat and, with three archaeological teams, systematically surveyed more than two hundred caves and cavities in the cliffs near Qumran in March 1952. About 1 kilometre north of Cave 1, the team led by Henri de Contenson entered a partly collapsed cave that contained remains of the books Ezekiel, Psalms, Lamentations [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] and Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] as well as a massive lump of green, oxidized copper that would stir the imagination of quite a few scholars and treasure hunters in the years to come [→34 Copper Scroll]. Another team, led by J. T. Milik, came upon a cave with a great number of neatly arranged, unbroken – but empty – scroll jars covered with a thick layer of dust. Recalling the eighth-century ce account of Timothy I, the Nestorian patriarch of Seleucia, on the discovery of ancient Hebrew manuscripts near Jericho, Milik named the cave ‘Timothy’s Cave.’ Notwithstanding these significant discoveries by the archaeologists, luck largely remained on the side of the Bedouin. In the summer of 1952, they unearthed sixthand seventh-century ce Christian manuscripts near Khirbet Mird. They also offered the Museum some fragments which they claimed to have found at Wadi Seiyal – which implied that they had not violated the Jordanian antiquities law, as Seiyal lay in the
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Figure 1.2 Cave 1, in the hills above Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 291–1).
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Israeli part of the Judean Desert [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. Among the latter were the remains of a Greek translation of the Minor Prophets that would quickly overturn Septuagint studies, since Barthélemy identified it as a missing link in the history of the pre-hexaplaric recensions. However, this extraordinary find was soon eclipsed by the Bedouin’s epoch-making discovery of a new, fourth cave in September 1952. Retracing the steps of an old man who, in his prime, had once chased a partridge into a cave that contained potsherds, the Bedouin stumbled across thousands of fragments hidden in two adjacent caves – sometimes referred to as ‘Cave 4A’ and ‘Cave 4B’ – in the marl terrace near Qumran, which de Vaux had disregarded because he did not expect any fragment to have survived the moisture in this softer rock. When the first fragments reached the Museum, de Vaux and Harding promptly alerted the local police to secure the area, and only a few days later started excavating the cave which, for the most part, had already been looted by the Bedouin. In the course of this expedition, Milik discovered a new, fifth cave in the marl terrace, whereas the Bedouin came upon another cave in the limestone cliffs that had been systematically surveyed by the archaeologists only a few months earlier. Both caves yielded the fragmentary remains of a few dozens of manuscripts, which in itself would have been a significant find, but paled before the myriads of fragments from Cave 4. With the discovery of Cave 4, the project of acquiring and publishing the fragments took on unprecedented proportions. As the Museum’s reserves quickly reached their limits, Harding had to devote a considerable amount of time to fund-raising, while de Vaux entered into time-consuming negotiations with Kando and the Bedouin. By the end of 1952, Harding had also reached an agreement with the Clarendon Press to publish the texts in a series which he estimated to comprise about five volumes [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. Up until then, de Vaux had entrusted the preparation of these critical editions to four fellow Dominicans residing at the École Biblique, but the magnitude of the task at hand led him and Harding to establish a team consisting of representatives of the various international ‘schools’ active in Jerusalem at the time. While the team was gradually formed, and its members began to sort out the fragments that found their way to the Museum, de Vaux continued his archaeological work at Khirbet Qumran during four springtime archaeological campaigns (1953–6), after which he would also excavate the nearby ruins of ‘Ein Feshkha [→8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea]. Important as they were for the interpretation of the site, these campaigns yielded little textual material. No literary texts emerged from the site itself, and the new caves discovered in 1955 scarcely contained a readable fragment: Cave 7 produced the scraps of a small number of Greek manuscripts (some of which would later become the subject of a heated controversy on the presence of early Christian texts at Qumran [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]); Cave 8 some snippets of Genesis, Psalms and an unknown hymn, along with a phylactery and a mezuzah; Cave 9 an unidentified piece of papyrus, and Cave 10 a potsherd inscribed with a few letters. Once more, the Bedouin’s efforts turned out to be more fruitful, as they located a fifth cave at Murabbaʿat with remains of a Minor Prophets scroll that only lacked Hosea and Malachi, and in January 1956 worked their way through the rocks blocking the entrance to Cave 11. For the first time since the beginning of their soundings, they brought to light some actual ‘scrolls,’ among them a paleo-Hebrew Leviticus scroll
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[→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], a remarkable Psalms scroll that would generate discussion on the development of the Psalter, and an Aramaic Version of Job, as well as the monumental Temple Scroll, which would only leave Kando’s shop manu militari during the Six-Day War in 1967. Finally, in the spring of 1962 the Bedouin discovered some ancient papyri further to the north, at Wadi ed-Daliyeh, which added new data to the study of the Persian period.
A New Player in Town Yadin’s acquisition of the Temple Scroll, and the State of Israel taking control of the fragments preserved in the Palestinian Archaeological Museum, now renamed the Rockefeller Museum, during the Six-Day War marks an important shift in the modern history of the Dead Sea Scrolls. For almost twenty years, the Scrolls had been a bone of contention between the State of Israel and the Kingdom of Jordan, which during the Suez crisis had briefly moved them to Amman in 1956, and in 1961 claimed absolute ownership of the Scrolls by revoking all past agreements concerning the transfer of certain manuscripts to benefactors who had provided funds for their purchase. Already in the 1950s, the State of Israel had begun to explore the Judean Desert. Rumours about the Bedouin’s actions in the Israeli part of the desert resulted in the ambitious ‘Judean Desert Operation’ in 1960–1, during which four teams – led by Yohanan Aharoni, Nahman Avigad, Pessah Bar-Adon, and Yadin – systematically explored the numerous valleys under Israeli jurisdiction, such as Nah.al Mishmar, Nah.al Harduf, Nah.al Arugot, and Nah.al David (Wadi Sdeir), where the Bedouin had found a Genesis fragment in 1952. In one of these hideouts from the Bar Kokhba period, at Nah.al H·ever, additional fragments originally claimed to have been found at Wadi Seiyal (Nah.al Se’elim) were recovered, confirming scholarly suspicions about the Bedouins’ claims. Moreover, on the northern slope of Nah.al H·ever, the ‘Cave of the Letters’ yielded some fifteen letters written by Bar Kokhba himself, as well as the private archive of the wealthy widow Babatha (Esler, 2017) with some thirty-five documentary texts dated between 93 and 132 ce . From 1963 to 1965, Yadin conducted excavations at Masada, the fortress built by King Herod on top of a spectacular rock formation on the south-west shore of the Dead Sea, and subjected to a preliminary survey by Michael Avi-Yonah in 1956. As the other sites had only yielded a limited number of (often very fragmentarily preserved) texts, all dating to the Bar Kokhba period, Masada quickly established itself as second in rank in comparison to Qumran, with remains of approximately fifteen (biblical and non-biblical) Hebrew texts, some thirty Greek and Latin papyri and many more ostraca inscribed in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin. Initially, the State of Israel’s appropriation of the scrolls preserved in the Museum did not radically alter the publication endeavour, which had already been slowing down for years, particularly since the Rockefeller funds were discontinued in 1960. While some members of the editorial team lost interest in the scrolls, others had to cope with severe personal issues or inevitably passed away. Outside of the team scholarly dissatisfaction with the delay in publication was steadily building up – despite
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some attempts at speeding up the process through the involvement of promising doctoral students and other scholars familiar with certain texts in particular. At about the same time when the campaign to ‘liberate’ the scrolls reached its apex in the late 1980s, the Israeli Department of Antiquities (later the Israel Antiquities Authority) began to intervene more directly in the publication process, appointing an oversight committee and deposing John Strugnell as editor-in-chief. On the archaeological plane, however, the period between 1967 and 1990 saw less isolated surveys in the northern part of the Judean Desert, now under the control of Israel, but the first new documents only came to light in 1986, when a few papyri were found at Wadi el-Mafjar (Ketef Jericho), and Joseph Patrich also discovered some inscriptions at Nah.al Michmash (Wadi Suweinit). It was only in the wake of the storm that raged through Dead Sea Scrolls studies in the early 1990s that another large-scale operation was launched, ‘Operation Scroll,’ which systematically explored the northern part of the Judean Desert and re-investigated several sites that had already been examined in the 1970s and 1980s. During new excavations at Khirbet Qumran, two ostraca were found near the wall that separates the main building complex from the cemetery, one of which has been identified as a deed of a gift and, according to some scholars, supports the Essene hypothesis on the identity of the ancient inhabitants of the site [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature; 72 Forms of Community].
Scattered Announcements of Hitherto Unknown Fragments Despite the use of ground-penetrating radar during ‘Operation Scroll,’ no new caves containing a large batch of fragments or scrolls have been found in recent years. This, however, did not prevent Bedouin and scholars alike from continuing their efforts in attempting to track down new or forgotten fragments. In 2004, the Bedouin found four fragments of a Leviticus scroll, along with some pottery, in a small cave in Nah.al Arugot. Re-examining the photographs and glass plates, scholars have succeeded in identifying fragments that were formerly published as ‘unidentified,’ usually by assigning them to an already known manuscript; thus, to name only one example, one of the fragments belonging to XHev/SeNumb is now considered part of the Genesis scroll from Wadi Sdeir. In addition, various fragments from private collections have been published in recent years. The phenomenon is not new – Mar Athanasius possessed some fragments that were published in 1965; an anonymous collector had his fragment from the Murabba’at Genesis scroll published in 1980; and various unknown snippets were found in Yadin’s drawers after his death in 1984 – but such publications clearly intensified as the DJD Series was nearing its completion. These recently published fragments from private collections comprise both additional fragments from known manuscripts (e.g. from 1QS b [→45 Rule of Blessings], 4QG enf, 4QIsab, 4QpapTobitaar [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related], 4QpsJubb, 4QS hirShabbb [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice], 4QI nstructiond [→38 Instruction]; and 8QG en) as well as the remains of new copies of known compositions (e.g. XL ev, XJosh, XJudg, XQ papEnoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]). Even if it is difficult to retrieve their exact provenance or time of discovery, some fragments from private collections contain intriguing
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surprises. For example, a fragment of Nehemiah from the Schøyen collection, reportedly found at Qumran, was announced in 2010, so that Nehemiah’s presence at Qumran no longer needs to be inferred from the sole fragment of the book of Ezra. Another recently published fragment, XQD eut, sheds new light on the textual history of Deut 27.4, where ‘Ebal’ is increasingly considered a secondary alteration of ‘Garizim.’ However, some of the proposed identifications have not survived closer scrutiny, and the authenticity of many of these privately owned fragments has recently been called into question – among them the Nehemiah fragment from the Schøyen collection. Finally, reference may also be made to a privately-owned inscription on stone published in 2007, which has been dated to the first century bce and contains a hitherto unknown composition featuring the angel Gabriel. Although the example of Kenyon’s statement quoted above should warn us not to put on a prophetic mantle by excluding the possibility of new discoveries in the Judean Desert, it seems likely that any major progress is first to be expected from fragments in private hands, some of which are said to be safely locked up in a vault in Switzerland, as well as from advanced techniques of digital imaging, which in 2016 allowed the virtual unrolling of a hitherto unidentified Leviticus scroll from Ein Gedi.
Bibliography Cross, F. M. (1995), The Ancient Library of Qumran. 3rd edn. Minneapolis, MN : Fortress. Dimant, D. (2012), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Scholarly Perspective: A History of Research. STDJ 99. Leiden: Brill. Eshel, H. (2010), ‘Gleaning of scrolls from the Judean Desert,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 49–87. Esler, P. F. (2017), The Yadin Papyri and an Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold. Oxford: OUP. Fields, W. W. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Short History. Leiden: Brill. Fields, W. W. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. Vol. I. Leiden: Brill. Milik, J. T. (1959), Ten Years of Discovery in the Wilderness of Judaea. Trans. J. Strugnell. SBT 26. London: SCM . Samuel, A. Y. (1966), Treasure of Qumran: My Story of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philadelphia: Westminster. Trever, J. C. (2003), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Personal Account. Rev. edn. Piscataway, NJ : Gorgias. Yadin, Y. (1957), The Message of the Scrolls. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
2
Archaeology of Qumran Dennis Mizzi
The region of Qumran has yielded some of the most renowned archaeological remains of the ancient Near East. From accounts written in the course of the first millennium ce , we learn of various ancient discoveries of manuscripts, some of which are reported to have been found in jars near Jericho, ‘in a rock-dwelling near Jericho,’ and in a cave by a Jewish group (see Driver, 1965, pp. 7–15). It is possible – though it cannot be proven – that one or more of these reported discoveries were made in the environs of Qumran (see, for example, Stegemann, 1998, pp. 68–71, 76–7), in which case one of these could represent the earliest documented ‘archaeological’ discovery in the region. We are on more certain ground with the reports by various travellers and explorers who roamed the region west of the Dead Sea during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries; these refer to the existence of various ruins – including walls, cisterns and graves – specifically in the area of Qumran (see Magness, 2002, pp. 22–4; Cargill, 2009, pp. 19–27). However, it was only in the mid-twentieth century that the archaeology of the region was propelled to mainstream status, the catalyst being the discovery of the so-called Dead Sea Scrolls in eleven caves in this region. Since then, the ‘archaeology of Qumran’ has almost become a sub-field within the archaeology of the Second Temple Period as well as a pop-culture phenomenon. But why should the archaeology of Qumran have a place in the T&T Clark Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls? From the very outset of the discovery of the Scrolls, a general scholarly consensus emerged that upheld the view that this collection of manuscripts belonged to the Essenes, one of various Jewish groups in existence during the Late Second Temple Period [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature], and that the region of Qumran was essentially an Essene settlement and, probably, the place where many of the Scrolls were copied or composed [→8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea; 15 Scientific Technologies; 71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. As a result, the archaeological ruins at Qumran received a great deal of attention and, ever since, studies of the Dead Sea Scrolls and of the archaeology of Qumran have been intricately intertwined. However, this view has been challenged in the past two or three decades, and the question remains: what is the significance of the archaeology of Qumran for study of the Dead Sea Scrolls? This chapter will present a concise and selective survey of Qumran archaeology, with a particular focus on the remains from the Second Temple Period. Owing to 17
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constraints of space, I will adopt a more conceptual approach with selective engagement with technical details. The aim is to offer a methodological framework within which the state of the field at present can be assessed (for a more detailed treatment, with a fuller bibliography, see Mizzi, 2017; and especially Mizzi, forthcoming).
The Archaeological Remains at Qumran The archaeological remains in the Qumran area are multifarious. They comprise the ruins of a built settlement, various adjacent cemeteries and a landscape replete with traces of human use and exploitation. However, the exact relationship between these archaeological features remains the subject of much discussion. In fact, in the scholarly literature, the terms ‘Khirbet Qumran’ (in its sense as a proper noun) and ‘the site of Qumran’ are used – somewhat inconsistently – either in an exclusive or an inclusive manner, that is, either to refer specifically to the ruins of the built settlement or to refer to all the archaeological remains in the Qumran region. We will return to this issue further below. The ruins of the built settlement are situated on top of a marl plateau overlooking Wadi Qumran. The most intensive excavations of these ruins were conducted by Roland de Vaux in the 1950s (see his synthesis in de Vaux, 1973 [→1 Discoveries]), although there have been other investigations of the settlement since then, the most extensive of which were by Yizhak Magen and Yuval Peleg (see Magen and Peleg, 2007). At its most developed stage, this settlement consisted of a number of interlinked buildings (see Figure 2.1). The main building, as it is customarily referred to, comprised a two-storey structure with a central courtyard flanked by rooms and with a tower in its northwestern corner. To its east, there is a triangular annex, which appears to have functioned as a pottery workshop, as suggested by the presence of pottery kilns (in L.64–L.84) and small piles of pottery. To the west of the main building, there is another two-storey structure, the lower part of which appears to have been largely used as an industrial complex; here, four circular ovens (in L.101, L.105 and L.109), a large furnace (in L.125), mill-stones (in L.100, and in the nearby fills L.102 and L.104), cisterns (L.110 and L.117–118), as well as plastered installations and compartments (in L.121, and in L.100 and L.101, respectively) were uncovered. Further plastered installations were exposed in other parts of the settlement (for example, in L.52, L.55, L.57, and L.88). To the south of the main building, the settlement is characterized by further structures (for example, L.77 and L.86–89), numerous cisterns (for example, L.56–58, L.91, and L.71), a pressing installation (L.75), and a cobble-paved esplanade to the south of L.77. Finally, the area northwest of the main building is characterized by a series of open spaces enclosed by various walls (for example, L.130, L.131, L.132, and L.135). One of the most conspicuous features of the settlement is the intricate water system which fed water to the various stepped and un-stepped cisterns scattered throughout the site; remnants of this water system can also be seen in the surrounding landscape. In terms of material culture, thousands of pottery fragments and complete vessels have been retrieved during the various excavations, together with some glass vessels, stone vessels, metal tools, clothing accessories, personal items and a large number of coins (including three silver hoards in L.120). The most notable artefacts excavated are,
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Figure 2.1 Plan of Khirbet Qumran in Period II . Reproduced from Jean-Baptiste Humbert OP et Alain Chambon, Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân et de Aïn Feshkha I Album de photographies; Répertoire du fonds photographique; Synthèse des notes de chantier du Père Roland de Vaux OP, NTOA 1 (Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994), 17. Courtesy of the École biblique et archéologique française, Jerusalem. perhaps, the open-mouth ovoid and cylindrical jars, which have become synonymous with the archaeology of Qumran. But the most enigmatic finds are probably the buried bone deposits, which comprise animal bones [→73 Daily Life] that were buried in the ground either within ceramic vessels or covered by such vessels (for more details on the various archaeological features of the built settlement and on the finds excavated
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from it, see de Vaux, 1973, pp. 1–48; Humbert and Chambon, 1994; Donceel and Donceel-Voûte, 1994; Magness, 2002; Hirschfeld, 2004; Magen and Peleg, 2007; Cargill, 2009; Humbert, Chambon, and Młynarczyk, 2016; and Mizzi, forthcoming). The majority of the portable objects were excavated both from within the ruins of the settlement and from various dumps located immediately to its north, east and south. Although these dumps are, strictly speaking, situated outside the various interlinked buildings, no one questions the fact that they contain objects that were used by the inhabitants of the settlement and that they are intrinsically connected with it. However, not everyone extends this outlook to the other archaeological features in the surrounding landscape. Indeed, the Qumran landscape is replete with traces of human activity. The cemeteries adjacent to the built settlement were a prominent feature of the region long before the buildings themselves attracted any significant attention (Harding, 1952, p. 104). There are approximately 1,200 shaft graves – marked on the surface by a heap of stones – concentrated in a large cemetery to the east of the settlement and in smaller cemeteries to its north and south [→73 Daily Life]. The majority of the graves are laid out in orderly rows and oriented north–south, with a small minority oriented east–west. Only a little over a hundred graves have been excavated, and reliable anthropological data are available for even fewer (see Schultz, 2006; Hachlili, 2010; Nagar, Hizmi, and Aharonovich, 2017). The Qumran landscape is also distinguished by the hundreds of natural caves and crevices in the limestone cliffs to the north, west and south of the settlement, circa forty of which were found to contain traces of human activity, mostly dating to the first centuries bce and ce (de Vaux, 1962, pp. 3–25; 1973, pp. 49–52; Patrich, 1994; Baruch, Mazor, and Sandhaus, 2002). In addition, around fifteen artificially hewn caves were discovered in the marl bedrock in the immediate environs of the buildings, containing material remains contemporaneous with those emanating from the settlement (de Vaux, 1962, pp. 26–31; 1973, pp. 52–3; Broshi and Eshel, 1999). Much of the pottery from the caves has clear links with the pottery from the settlement, a connection that is particularly highlighted by the discovery of ovoid and cylindrical jars in many of the caves. It is in eleven of these caves that the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered, in total comprising a collection of over nine hundred extant Jewish manuscripts, the large majority of which are written in Hebrew, with others written in Aramaic and Greek [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]; some of these manuscripts are purported to have been found within cylindrical jars. To the south of Qumran, a small built settlement was excavated at ‘Ein Feshkha, which appears to have been partly contemporary with the Qumran settlement [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview; 8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea]. The relationship between these two sites remains debatable and unclear (see, for example, de Vaux, 1973, pp. 59–60; Magness, 2002, pp. 210–23; Hirschfeld, 2004, pp. 183, 185, 209; Humbert, 2006, pp. 24–7; Taylor, 2007, p. 256). In the region between them, the area is particularly suitable for the cultivation of palm trees, owing to the presence of various springs (Broshi and Eshel, 2006, p. 251). It is not possible to discuss the relationship between these two settlements here; however, as argued below, it is very likely that the inhabitants of Qumran cultivated date palms, and this was probably done in the stretch of land between these two sites.
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Chronologies in Contention Sixty years on, important issues such as the settlement’s chronology and its architectural development as well as the dating of the various archaeological features in the Qumran landscape remain, to an extent, unresolved. In this section, I would like to highlight some of the main problems that permeate the debate on the development of the built settlement. Roland de Vaux surmised that the Second Temple occupation at Qumran commenced sometime in the second half of the second century bce (Period Ia), although it was only during the first half of the first century bce (Period Ib; ca. 100 bce – 31 bce ) that the settlement reached its definitive form, as described earlier. According to de Vaux, the settlement experienced an occupation gap after the earthquake of 31 bce and was re-settled (by the same group of people) at the end of the first century bce (Period II ; ca. 4 bce –68 ce ). During Period II , the site’s plan remained more or less the same, except for the fact that some loci were abandoned (e.g. L.48–49) and that some areas of the site were expanded (e.g. L.19–26–27) or strengthened (e.g. the tower). The settlement was eventually abandoned around 68 ce , in the middle of the First Jewish Revolt, after which, according to de Vaux, it was occupied for a few years by a Roman garrison (de Vaux, 1973, pp. 3–45). Jodi Magness has largely followed de Vaux’s understanding of the settlement’s development and, like him, believes that Qumran reached its fully developed plan during the first half of the first century bce . However, on the basis of the published pottery and the dearth of late second century bce coins, which can only provide a terminus post quem for the establishment of the settlement, Magness concludes that Qumran was first inhabited sometime in the first half of the first century bce . Moreover, on the basis of the numismatic evidence, Magness has argued that there probably was no gap of occupation following the earthquake of 31 bce and that, therefore, the pre-earthquake occupation practically stretched through to the late first century bce (ca. 9/8 bce ), which is where she locates the end of Period Ib. Magness has posited that a conflagration led to the site’s abandonment and that Qumran was reoccupied around 4 bce . However, Magness has since revised her position, and now maintains that there was no break in occupation between Periods I and II (Mizzi and Magness, 2016, pp. 301–20). Like de Vaux, Magness argues that Qumran was always a sectarian settlement during the Second Temple Period (Magness, 2002, pp. 47–69). This remains the most widely accepted hypothesis, but it is certainly not the only one to have been proposed. In fact, various other scholars have put forth alternative chronologies for the phases of occupation at Qumran and for the architectural development of the settlement (see Humbert, 1994, 2003; Hirschfeld, 2004; Magen and Peleg, 2007; Stacey in Stacey and Doudna, 2013 [henceforth Stacey, 2013]; Cargill, 2009). There are various fundamental differences between these models: there are differences in the number of phases or sub-phases identified and in the dating of their termini; there are significant variations between the proposed architectural plans that characterize the respective phases of occupation; and there are radical differences of interpretation (see Figure 2.2). Clearly, this state of affairs raises a red flag. There are two main problems: first, we lack good, datable material excavated from critical contexts, such as foundation trenches; and secondly, coins and pottery typology
Figure 2.2 Chronological chart outlining the seven major models of Qumran’s architectural development during the Second Temple period. Abbreviations: MB = Main Building; WB = Western Building. Reproduced from Dead Sea Discoveries 22 (2015): 18. © 2015 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
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are either ambiguous or imprecise for the narrow range of dates proposed in the various Qumran chronologies. Consequently, one must acknowledge the fact that all the proposed hypotheses are highly speculative, with little or no proper archaeological basis; this is particularly the case with those parts of the models that deal with the Hasmonean Period occupation. Indeed, in some cases, the architectural layout of the settlement during this period is largely reconstructed on the basis of historical considerations. Some scholars, for example, consider Qumran to have originally been part of the Hasmonean fortification system in the region and hence reconstruct the settlement’s Hasmonean plan in a way that resembles a fortress or a military outpost, arguing that the buildings acquired their fully developed form at a secondary stage (e.g. Hirschfeld, 2004; Magen and Peleg, 2007; Cargill, 2009). While on historical grounds this may be plausible, there is very little archaeological evidence to support any of these reconstructions. In this case, preconceptions about the site end up shaping the understanding of the archaeological evidence, when the interpretative process should be in the reverse. Some of the models are on slightly firmer ground when they employ architectural logic and create a ‘stratigraphic’ sequence for the building of the various walls of the khirbeh; most scholars, with the exception of Stacey, conceive an original courtyard building to which subsequent additions and alterations were made during the first century bce (e.g. Humbert, 1994, 2003; Hirschfeld, 2004; Magen and Peleg, 2007; Cargill, 2009). In this case, the problem lies in the relative nature of the ‘stratigraphic’ sequence, which means that different architectural stages cannot be dated in absolute terms. As a result, historical events that might have had an impact on Qumran’s architectural development are used to chronologically calibrate this relative sequence. However, this chain of cause-andeffect is likewise unsupported by any archaeological evidence, a fact that is illustrated by the plurality of models proposed. Stacey’s model (Stacey, 2013) differs from earlier ones in that it is rooted in detailed archaeological and stratigraphic observations, but much of his far-reaching conclusions are nevertheless based on several questionable assumptions, largely because he adduces evidence that is highly ambiguous and because he establishes unverified links between the archaeology of Qumran and local historical circumstances. This does not mean that Magness’ revision of de Vaux’s chronology is de facto correct. Indeed, both de Vaux and Magness rely heavily on the 31 bce earthquake as a reference point for the site’s chronology, based on the assumption that the earthquake affected certain critical loci (e.g. L48–49 and L89). However, for various reasons that cannot be explored in this brief discussion, there remains much uncertainty on this issue (for a detailed discussion of this question, see Mizzi, 2015; the issue is treated in greater detail in Mizzi, forthcoming). Despite high expectations, the final publication of the material from de Vaux’s excavations will not resolve these issues. Due to the lack of unequivocal evidence from good contexts, it will be very difficult to trace the development of the settlement’s architectural plan in detail, or with the kind of certainty that many scholars expect. This much has been proven by the recent publication of the first of two volumes intended as the final report on the site’s stratigraphy and pottery (Humbert, Chambon, and Młynarczyk 2016). The volume is rife with speculation and unsubstantiated reconstructions, and the dating of the various technical sub-phases relies not on hard archaeological evidence but on presuppositions about the history of the site, particularly
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Humbert’s improbable hypothesis that Qumran was originally a Hasmonean villa. Ultimately, we may have to profess a degree of ignorance on the matter of the settlement’s exact development, which is unsurprising from an archaeological point of view. In fact, the amount of precision typically expected by scholars in their delineation of phases at Qumran is unrealistic for the narrow time range under consideration. Of course, this does not mean that there is nothing we can actually say, only that this requires a rigorous attention to detail and a more sober approach to the data (see further Mizzi, forthcoming). On the other hand, the publication of the material resolves the issue concerning the beginning of occupation at Qumran. Recently, Cargill (2009) has restated the case for a late second century bce beginning. However, the recently published pottery continues to confirm that this cannot be correct. The types which could date to the late second century bce are very limited in number, and these are types that remained in circulation during the first century bce . Moreover, the limited extent of possible second century types in comparison with the large assemblage of first century bce pottery is especially significant; if there was any intensive occupation at Qumran during the late second century bce , one would expect more remains of second century pottery. The above chronological issues may seem pedantic, but their importance cannot be emphasized enough. It is obvious that the settlement developed in stages, meaning that its function(s) (though not necessarily its inhabitants) changed over the 170 or so years of its occupation. A proper understanding of the architectural history of the settlement, therefore, allows us to draw a more nuanced and dynamic portrayal of the Qumranites. If the settlement was linked to the group(s) mentioned in the Scrolls, an appreciation of the changing nature of the settlement could act as a counterbalance to the static portrait of daily life we tend to get from the texts. This brings us to another critical question.
The Relationship between the Settlement of Qumran and the Scrolls Another big debate in the field revolves around the extent of connectedness between the various archaeological remains in the Qumran region: do the different remains within the landscape reflect different social processes and are they the result of different social actors? Different answers to these questions have been proposed. For example, Yizhar Hirschfeld argues that the caves in the Qumran region were used as temporary living quarters by passers-by, shepherds, or hermits (Hirschfeld, 2004, pp. 43, 45), who had no relationship whatsoever with the inhabitants of the settlement. Moreover, Karl Rengstorf (1960) and Norman Golb (1995) contend that the manuscripts deposited in the eleven caves were brought over either from a Temple library or from various disparate libraries in Jerusalem, thus severing the connection between the Scrolls and the settlement’s inhabitants as well. Similar arguments have been made by various other scholars (e.g. Cansdale, 1997, pp. 94–7, 189; Magen and Peleg, 2007, pp. 63–6; Stacey and Doudna, 2013, p. 63). Hirschfeld (2004, pp. 41, 43) emphasizes the fact that the only archaeological link between the Scrolls and the
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settlement is the pottery, particularly the ovoid and cylindrical jars within or alongside which some of the Scrolls were discovered. At most, this indicates that those who deposited the Scrolls in the surrounding caves might have obtained ceramic jars from the inhabitants of Qumran. On this view, the proximity of the caves to the settlement and the presence of the same types of pottery in these two contexts are somewhat irrelevant. Rachel Bar-Nathan has also claimed, on typological grounds, that the cylindrical jars in the Qumran caves actually date to the period between 66–68 ce and 74 ce and that ‘there is no necessary link between the jars found in the caves and those found at the site’ (Bar-Nathan, 2006, pp. 275, 277). In principle, the argument that the archaeological evidence does not create an explicit link between the Scrolls and the inhabitants of Qumran is not incorrect; archaeology can only take us so far. However, the archaeological evidence does not exclude a more intrinsic connection between them either. One needs to look at the larger picture to determine the extent of this connection, and this reveals a significant convergence of evidence that actually underpins arguments in favour of an intrinsic relationship; on the contrary, hypotheses that divorce the Scrolls (and other remains found in the caves) from the built settlement create more problems than they solve. First, there is an overall thematic and ideological unity across several different manuscripts found in different caves, which suggests that these documents largely belonged to a specific group or movement; the contents of various documents do not seem to be congruent with what one would expect either from a Temple library or a multiplicity of disparate libraries. Secondly, some of the manuscript caves (Caves 7Q– 9Q) were only accessible through the built settlement; therefore, unless the material remains within these caves represent post-68 ce activity, it is hard to divorce them from the pre-68 ce inhabitants of Qumran. Thirdly, it seems quite implausible that someone would have travelled all the way to the Qumran settlement to hide manuscripts in the adjacent caves, when the area of Jerusalem, Jericho and the area north of the settlement are replete with natural caves; interestingly, the two caves that constitute Cave 4Q, which are located right across from the built settlement, contained the largest concentration of manuscripts, exceeding five hundred. Fourthly, the claim that the cylindrical jars in the caves probably date to 66–73/4 ce is misleading. This claim is based on a typological argument, which is highly dubious, since the same types of pottery could have had different histories of use at different sites; therefore, the fact that analogous cylindrical jars are attested in post-68 ce contexts at Masada does not mean that they could not have already been in circulation decades earlier. In addition, one could also add various other pointers which underscore the connection that must have existed between the settlement, the caves and the Scrolls, such as the geographical proximity of these archaeological features, the ceramic links that exist between them, the synchronous chronological timeframes of the settlement’s occupation, of the caves’ use during the Second Temple Period, and of the Scrolls’ palaeography, and the presence of numerous inkwells within the buildings at Qumran [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Although ovoid and cylindrical jars are found beyond Qumran, they still remain virtually unique to the site, as attested by the large number and variety of types present, a feature unparalleled elsewhere. It is also significant that the only caves in the Judean Desert to yield ovoid or cylindrical jars are the caves at Qumran. On their own, many
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of these pointers constitute circumstantial evidence; but taken altogether, they create a very strong argument for the connection between the settlement, the manuscript caves and most of the non-manuscript caves, and the Scrolls. The burden of proof really rests on those who question this link. The connection between the inhabitants of Qumran and the adjacent cemeteries is perhaps more obvious, but likewise not straightforward. In this case, the argument of proximity to the settlement is also applicable. The probable link between the two archaeological features is strengthened further by the fact that a number of tombs contained complete or restorable vessels dating to the first centuries bce and ce (T4, T15, T23, T26, T1000, and G9), and that C-14 dating of the wooden coffin in tomb T18 and of the interred remains in tomb BE 2 places these burials within the Second Temple Period (Hachlili, 2010, p. 61 [→15 Scientific Technologies]). In addition, two of the nine graves investigated by Magen and Peleg contained fourteen sealed jars dating to the late second and early first centuries bce (Magen and Peleg, 2007, p. 45). Nonetheless, we must be cautious with regard to attributing all of the graves to the Second Temple Period. The general consensus is that the majority of the tombs oriented north–south are contemporaneous with the Second Temple occupation of the settlement, with a minority of graves – namely many of those oriented east–west – representing later burials (Hachlili, 2010, pp. 57, 61). However, the limited number of excavated graves – approximately 10 per cent of the total – obliges us to tread cautiously on this matter, for the possibility that some north–south graves post-date 68 ce cannot be completely excluded. Moreover, the possibility that some Second Temple burials contain interred individuals who were brought over to Qumran should also not be ignored. From the above discussion, it emerges that the majority of the archaeological features scattered across the Qumran landscape are somehow connected, without excluding the distinct possibility that later activity continued to intrude onto already existing features. For this reason, it seems preferable to define the ‘site of Qumran’ or ‘Khirbet Qumran’ – as far as its occupation in the Second Temple Period is concerned – in an inclusive manner, incorporating the archaeological data within and without the built settlement. To ignore any of these features is essentially tantamount to using selective archaeological evidence and to overlooking important pieces of the puzzle. Nevertheless, the exact nature of these archaeological links at Qumran needs to be explored further, and once again, here we encounter a plurality of views.
Conflicting Interpretations of the Archaeology of Qumran Currently, the state of the field is characterized by several competing perspectives concerning the function of the site and the identity of its inhabitants. These views can be categorized into two major paradigms: namely, that Qumran was a sectarian settlement related to the group(s) behind the Scrolls or that it was anything but a sectarian settlement. The former category is characterized by views containing a number of variations of the same theme. The so-called sectarian hypothesis, as formulated by de Vaux – and promulgated further by various other scholars (most notably Jodi Magness) with
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minor modifications – remains the most widely accepted interpretation of the archaeology of Qumran, representing what is dubbed as the consensual view. In a nutshell, on the basis of the overall archaeological evidence from the Qumran area and of the textual sources, this view maintains that Khirbet Qumran served as a community centre for a rather large sectarian community – the members of which lived in the various caves around the site as well as in tents – where various religious texts were written, copied and studied, and where various communal activities were carried out, including prayer, work and the partaking of ritual meals (traces of which are reflected in the buried bone deposits [→73 Daily Life]). Indeed, de Vaux attached great importance to the spacious and public aspects of the settlement’s architecture, which he identified as communal spaces for the assembly of the community. Moreover, on this view it is argued that the community comprised a celibate male membership who led a relatively austere life – without necessarily implying that the community could not have been collectively wealthy – and who were, for the most part, cut-off from general society (although this notion has recently been softened); members of this community were buried in the adjacent cemetery. Various archaeological features that seemingly attest to the importance of ritual purity for the Qumranites have also been highlighted [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. In particular, the presence of at least eight (possibly ten) miqwa’ot – as the stepped cisterns have been interpreted – has been taken to be quite significant, especially in view of the relatively small size of the Qumran settlement (see Figure 2.3). Likewise, the presence of a pottery kiln at a desert site has been imbued with ritual significance, with the production of pottery at Qumran linked with a concern for producing ritually pure vessels (for a synthesis of the sectarian hypothesis, see de Vaux, 1973; Magness, 2002; for an interpretation of various archaeological features within a purity model, see Magness, 2011, passim). There are a few scholars who, while largely adhering to the sectarian interpretation of Qumran, have re-formulated minor aspects of it. For example, some have presented a slightly different history of the site, suggesting that, before becoming a sectarian settlement, Qumran functioned as a villa (Humbert, 1994, 2003) or as a fortress (Cargill, 2009). Some scholars have taken issue with the site’s function and the nature of its habitation, arguing, for example, that the built settlement was used for residential purposes – as opposed to a community centre – by a small community (Patrich, 2000), or that it functioned as a centre for the production of manuscripts (Stegemann, 1998, pp. 51–5), or that it was a hub for the burial of scrolls and the production of pharmaceuticals (Taylor 2013) or that it was a kind of sacred centre (Humbert, 1994, 2006). It is not possible to discuss these alternative formulations in any detail here; therefore, I will limit myself to just a few points. In principle, the notion that Qumran might have had different functions throughout its occupation in the Second Temple Period is not implausible. The main problem, as stated above, is the lack of any unequivocal archaeological evidence regarding the architectural development of the settlement, although definite knowledge about this will not necessarily solve the question. What is often missing in the Qumran debate is the important distinction between the function(s) of a settlement and the identity of its inhabitants. A change in the former does not necessarily imply a change in the latter, not unless there is an essential transformation of the nature or character of the settlement. Thus, while it is unlikely that Qumran was
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Figure 2.3 Ritual bath at Qumran with earthquake damage from 31 bce (Zev Radovan Image 309).
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once a fortress or a villa, before its occupation by a sectarian group, it is not implausible that some of its functions as well as its economic basis went through various changes over the course of its occupation, even if the basic character of its population remained unchanged (see Mizzi, forthcoming). Another point I would like to underline is that even though some of these alternative formulations have not won many adherents, some of them do highlight significant assumptions that are often readily accepted. For example, Patrich’s view that only a small population inhabited Qumran deserves further consideration. It is often assumed that a large population inhabited the region, and that the Qumranites resided in caves. However, the archaeological evidence from the caves is not conclusive in this regard; it is equally possible that the caves were only utilized as temporary dwellings (one possibility could be, for example, that the caves were used by those individuals who acquired ritual impurity, until their purification period was over). It is also quite probable that some caves were used for a purpose other than dwelling (e.g. Taylor, 2013, pp. 272–303; see also Mizzi, 2016). Furthermore, the percentage of excavated graves from the cemetery does not constitute a representative sample with which we can say anything substantial about the population profile and size at Qumran. We do not really know how many tombs date to the Late Second Temple Period, and we do not know how many of the graves actually contain interred individuals (note that from nine excavated graves, Magen and Peleg found four completely devoid of human remains! [Magen and Peleg, 2007, p. 45]). Finally, the thousands of pottery vessels that have been excavated from the settlement do not necessarily indicate that a large population inhabited Qumran. It is equally possible to interpret this as evidence of a small group that consumed a lot of pottery; within a purity model, one could argue that ceramic vessels were frequently discarded owing to purity concerns. The brevity of this discussion does not do justice to the complexity of the data; however, this should be enough to show that we are still operating on various assumptions as far as the sectarian hypothesis is concerned. The second category of perspectives on Qumran is characterized by a variegated array of unrelated interpretations, all of which have the rejection of the sectarian interpretation in common. Among these, one finds hypotheses stating that, in the Second Temple Period, Qumran functioned as a fortress (Golb, 1995; for such an interpretation of the site during an earlier phase of its Second Temple Period occupation, see Hirschfeld, 2004; Magen and Peleg, 2007), as a villa or a wealthy manor estate (Donceel and Donceel-Voûte, 1994; Hirschfeld, 2004), as a way-station (Cansdale, 1997), as a pottery-production centre (Magen and Peleg, 2007), or as a multi-industrial (seasonal) site related to the Hasmonean and Herodian royal palaces in Jericho (Stacey, 2013). Once again, it is simply impossible to discuss these various theories in any detail, although it seems to me that many of these interpretations are based on a number of logical fallacies. Therefore, I would like to focus on some methodological issues, which can simultaneously be applied to test the validity of the aforementioned hypotheses. An important issue that many proponents of the non-sectarian perspective raise is that of the regional context (see also Zangenberg, 2004 [→8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea]). Approaching Qumran through a contextual framework, various scholars have emphasized the many similarities between the archaeology of Qumran
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and that of other regional sites, such as Jericho, Masada, ‘Ein ez-Zara, ‘Ein Gedi and ‘Ein Boqeq. Consequently, they have argued that Qumran appears to have been well integrated within the regional economy, that there is little evidence for a group with peculiar practices, and that, therefore, it is quite unlikely that a sectarian group inhabited the site. The fact that the archaeology of Qumran is not as unique or peculiar as scholars used to think is more or less correct. However, this does not in any way negate the sectarian interpretation of the site; indeed, the conclusion that the dearth of idiosyncrasies at Qumran negates a sectarian interpretation is based on a logical fallacy, namely the assumption that a sectarian group – even one that may have been viewed as peculiar by outsiders – would have necessarily left a peculiar archaeological record. Similar logical fallacies underlie arguments which state that the evidence for female presence at Qumran (still debatable [→73 Daily Life; 72 Forms of Community]) or for wealth is incongruent with a sectarian presence at the site. These arguments tell us more about modern perceptions of ancient Jewish sectarianism than they tell us about the actual sects themselves [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism]. In fact, none of this evidence is really incongruent with a sectarian understanding of Qumran, certainly not one which links Qumran with the movement behind the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Essenes. It is for this reason that the differences – for there are some lingering idiosyncratic features at Qumran – are more important than the similarities. Indeed, the presence of an adjacent cemetery and the burial of bone deposits remain quite distinctive – these features remain without parallels at other contemporary fortresses, villas, estates, way-stations or farmsteads – and none of the non-sectarian hypotheses have explained these features convincingly. The tendency of interpreting the function of the settlement on the basis of its plan represents another methodological fallacy. For example, the fully developed plan of the settlement has been compared to that of a fortress or of a semi-luxurious fortified manor, and the site’s function at this stage in its architectural history has been interpreted accordingly (e.g. Golb, 1995; Hirschfeld, 2004); in theory, one could even argue that the site’s architectural layout resembles that of sites identified as waystations. However, if there is anything that these similarities tell us, it is that the Qumranites were using the same architectural metaphors and designs prevalent at other contemporary settlements. Indeed, the fact that the Qumran settlement can be positively compared to different types of sites cautions us that we have to go beyond superficial similarities. Thus, for example, the fact that Qumran is not located near a major trading route puts a serious dent in the hypothesis that the settlement was a waystation. The lack of proper architectural decoration makes it hard to classify Qumran as a semi-luxurious fortified manor. The few decorative elements discovered at Qumran were found in secondary contexts, and the evidence is very erratic which might suggest that these elements were imported from elsewhere and used as building material rather than as decorative elements; the fact that opus sectile tiles were found at Qumran but no floor impressions of an opus sectile floor were detected (cf. such floor impressions at Jericho, for example [Netzer, 2001, ills. 346, 339, 340, 343, 349–50]) continues to strengthen this conclusion (Mizzi, 2015). Also, the plan of the Qumran settlement is simply too cluttered for it to have served as a fort, at least once it achieved its full-fledged form. At most, one could argue that the
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presence of various industrial installations, including a potter’s workshop, shows that Qumran was an industrial site (though not a pottery-production centre, for various reasons which cannot be outlined here [see Magness, 2007]; moreover, there is no evidence for many of the industries that Stacey believes to have been present at Qumran [Stacey, 2013, pp. 52–65]). But does this mean that Qumran could not have been sectarian? Absolutely not, for this would again assume that there was such a thing as a sectarian building and that a sectarian settlement would have had a specific plan that we can identify in the archaeological record. Although there are specific archaeological features which could reflect specific ‘sectarian’ practices, we cannot say that there is such a thing as an archaeology of sectarianism; a sectarian group would not necessarily have left distinct archaeological remains. The fact that we have no other definite ‘sectarian’ sites with which to compare the remains at Qumran only makes such comparative endeavours more difficult. This brings us to the next important issue, which relates to another common methodological pitfall that one often encounters in the Qumran debate: namely, the propensity for one interpretation to be ruled out on account of another. Essentially, this tendency eliminates the possibility that two or more interpretations could be sustained simultaneously, without necessarily being mutually exclusive. On the contrary, I think that it is crucial that we adopt a multi-functional approach to the archaeology of Qumran. After all, sectarians had to earn a living like any other person. Therefore, there is no reason why an industrial site, for example, could not have also been, simultaneously, a sectarian settlement. I specifically mention this type of site because the various industrial installations at Qumran suggest that one of the primary functions of the settlement was that of an agro-industrial site. In view of the fact that the date palm was one of the most important and precious resources in the region, it is most likely that the Qumranites were involved in the date industry. This probability is further corroborated by the discovery of large quantities of dates and date pits (Magen and Peleg, 2007, pp. 5, 7, figs. 9–10), sealed jars containing date honey (Magen and Peleg, 2007, p. 45, figs. 46–7), a press (L.75) that was probably used for the production of date wine, and possibly by the discovery of an ostracon which appears to suggest (on Yardeni’s reading [Yardeni, 1997] [→72 Forms of Community]) that residents from Qumran possessed palm groves. Moreover, although the function of the various plastered installations remains uncertain, it is possible to relate some of them to the production of various date products (see Patrich, 2006, p. 248; Mizzi, forthcoming). At the same time, the archaeological evidence reveals a heightened focus on matters of ritual purity. A detailed contextual approach to the archaeology of Qumran reveals the existence of some idiosyncratic features (mentioned above) and, more importantly, it shows that the occupants were particularly concerned with ritual purity at a level that goes beyond what was typical at other Second Temple Period settlements (Mizzi, 2009). This is a clearly distinguishable aspect of the archaeology of Qumran, and it becomes all the more significant when one considers that notions of ritual purity are ubiquitous in the Dead Sea Scrolls, found in close proximity to the same settlement. The force of the evidence makes it impossible to ignore the distinct probability that Qumran was inhabited by a community related to the movement behind the Scrolls
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without excluding the fact that this community cultivated palm groves and produced date products (and that it perhaps engaged in other industries) at the same site. The two interpretations are definitely not mutually exclusive.
On the Relationship between Text and Artefact Undeniably, the interpretation of the archaeology of Qumran along sectarian lines has been influenced by prior assumptions about a connection with the Scrolls. Indeed, we need to ask ourselves whether we would have interpreted Qumran any differently without the Scrolls. Probably, the answer would be in the positive since, as noted above, we cannot really speak of an archaeology of sectarianism (and the discernible idiosyncrasies in the archaeology of Qumran are not, in themselves, concrete pointers of a sectarian presence). Thus, to what extent is it justifiable to use the Scrolls as an important datum in support of the sectarian understanding of the site? This brings us to the crucial matter of the relationship between textual and archaeological evidence. And here, it is essential to recognize that text and artefact can be integrated – after all, they are both human products – but they must not be confused (de Vaux, 1970, p. 70). In the case of Qumran, the physical nature of the Scrolls constitutes archaeological evidence, and this must be taken into consideration in studies about Qumran archaeology [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. Earlier, it was argued that from the various explanations that have been brought forth to explain the presence of the Scrolls at Qumran, the one which posits a connection with the inhabitants of the site remains the best explanation; whether the whole collection belonged to a local group or whether parts of it belonged to the wider movement of which Qumran was a part is irrelevant [→72 Forms of Community]. Therefore, the Scrolls present us with a very important datum as to the general identification of the site and its inhabitants. Nonetheless, this does not mean that we can interpret specific archaeological features at Qumran through the lens of the Scrolls. Textual and archaeological evidence require different methodological rubrics: texts need to be subjected to various forms of textual and literary analyses; on the other hand, archaeological evidence needs to be analysed in terms of its stratigraphy, the typology of its artefacts, and its place in the regional context, and this evidence must undergo various specialized studies. Therefore, the contents of the Scrolls cannot be used to interpret the archaeological evidence and vice versa. In the first stage of the research process, these two sources of information must be studied separately, and they should only be considered together at a secondary stage. Moreover, it is the interpretations (not the data) of both sources of information that should be integrated. This is important for various reasons. First, the complex literary history of some of the sectarian Dead Sea Scrolls, such as the Community Rule (see, for example, Metso, 1997; Schofield, 2009 [→47 Serekh haYahad; 59 Rules]) and the Damascus Document (see, for example, Davies, 1983; Hempel, 1998 [→35 Damascus Document]), as well as the uncertain relationship between these two documents – do they legislate for different branches within the same movement, do they diachronically represent the same movement at two different points in time, or do they reflect two separate but closely-related movements? – preclude one from applying,
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uncritically, the data inferred from the Scrolls onto the archaeological remains at Qumran. Thus, for example, which document are we to relate specifically to Qumran, the Community Rule or the Damascus Document? What if the sectarian texts do not represent direct windows on daily practices at Qumran [→59 Rules; 73 Daily Life]? And if they do, which of these documents’ literary strata are we to relate with the site? What if the archaeological remains at Qumran and the descriptions in the sectarian Dead Sea Scrolls pertain to two different chronological realities? Similarly, the archaeology of Qumran has sometimes influenced the interpretation of the Scrolls in such a way that their reading becomes too Qumran-centric. For example, various scholars equate the inhabitants of the site with the Yahad of 1QS , thus limiting the Yahad largely to Qumran. However, the literary evidence is ambiguous as to whether the Yahad consisted of one unified large community or whether it was a conglomeration of many communities, large and small (see the debate in Regev, 2003; Metso, 2006; Schofield, 2009; Collins, 2010; and Hempel, 2013, pp. 79–96). At present, there is no reason to limit the Yahad exclusively to Qumran [→72 Forms of Community]; in this regard, one must acknowledge the undue influence that Qumran may play in the interpretation of the textual sources. Secondly, by leaving the textual sources out of the equation in the first stage of the research process, one could study the archaeology of Qumran without any preconceived notions dictated by these texts. In particular, one could focus on archaeological aspects which are often neglected in scholarly treatments of the site. In this way, a thorough archaeological analysis becomes indispensable for a full understanding of the site because the archaeological evidence becomes the primary source for reconstructing the history and nature of the settlement and its inhabitants. This may in turn lead to the questioning of widely held assumptions about the archaeology of the region.
The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls On the basis of the current evidence, the sectarian hypothesis remains the most convincing interpretation of Qumran. However, we are a long way from closing the book on the subject; indeed, the road forward will be one characterized by further scholarly disagreements, which is to be welcomed: we should not shy away from questioning old theories and from challenging long-held assumptions. There are many aspects of the site which are not yet fully understood. Some of these have been discussed in this brief overview but many others have not. What role did Qumran play within the wider sectarian movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls? How and when were the Scrolls deposited in the area? Does the collection represent a library that was in use at Qumran or were the Scrolls brought to the site specifically for their final deposition? What was the function of the caves? Is it possible that women were present at Qumran? What can the cemetery really tell us about those interred and their relationship to the site? And what new insights can we gain on daily life at Qumran from its material culture? These are but a few of the lingering questions. Despite the fact that the field appears to be in a state of flux, few scholars will question the fact that the Scrolls are an integral part of the archaeology of Qumran. For
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this reason, the latter remains significant for understanding the historical and cultural background of these manuscripts. Qumran archaeology can provide insights into the lifestyle and practices of at least one community within the wider sectarian movement behind this collection. At the same time, however, we must not forget that the significance of the Scrolls goes well beyond these matters, and in this regard, the archaeology of Qumran is not of overarching importance. On the other hand, Qumran archaeology is important for reasons other than the Scrolls. Besides its contribution to Second Temple archaeology in general, we must not forget that the site has the potential to shed important light on the Iron Age II and the post-70 ce period. In the end, it may not be such a bad idea sometimes to disassociate the study of the Scrolls from Qumran.
Bibliography Bar-Nathan, R. (2006), ‘Qumran and the Hasmonaean and Herodian winter palaces of Jericho: The implication of the pottery finds on the interpretation of the settlement at Qumran,’ in K. Galor, J. -B. Humbert, and J. Zangenberg (eds), Qumran: The Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Archaeological Interpretations and Debates: Proceedings of a Conference held at Brown University, November 17–19, 2002. STDJ 57. Leiden: Brill, pp. 263–77. Baruch, Y., G. Mazor, and D. Sandhaus (2002), ‘Region XI : survey and excavations of caves along the fault escarpment above H . orbat Qumran,’ ‘Atiqot 41 (1), 189–98 [Hebrew]; ‘Atiqot 41 (2), 177–83 [English]. Broshi, M. and H. Eshel (1999), ‘Residential caves at Qumran,’ DSD 6, 328–48. Broshi, M. and H. Eshel (2006), ‘Was there agriculture at Qumran?,’ in Galor, Humbert and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran: The Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 249–52. Cansdale, L. (1997), Qumran and the Essenes: A Re-evaluation of the Evidence. TSAJ 60. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Cargill, R. R. (2009), Qumran Through (Real) Time: A Virtual Reconstruction of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Piscataway, NJ : Gorgias. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Davies, P. R. (1983), The Damascus Covenant: An Interpretation of the ‘Damascus Document.’ Sheffield: Sheffield University Press. Donceel, R. and P. Donceel-Voûte (1994), ‘The archaeology of Khirbet Qumran,’ in M. O. Wise et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. New York: The New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 1–38. Driver, G. R. (1965), The Judaean Scrolls: The Problem and a Solution. New York: Schocken Books. Golb, N. (1995), Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls? New York: Scribner. Hachlili, R. (2010), ‘The Qumran cemetery reassessed,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 46–78. Harding, G. L. (1952), ‘Khirbet Qumran and Wady Muraba‘at: Fresh light on the Dead Sea Scrolls and new manuscript discoveries in Jordan,’ PEQ 84, 104–9. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill.
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Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hirschfeld, Y. (2004), Qumran in Context: Reassessing the Archaeological Evidence. Peabody, MA : Hendrickson. Humbert, J. -B. (1994), ‘L’espace sacré à Qumrân: propositions pour l’archéologie,’ RB 101–2, 161–214. Humbert, J. -B. (2003), ‘Arguments en faveur d’une résidence pré-essénienne,’ in J. -B. Humbert and J. Gunneweg (eds), Khirbet Qumrân et ‘Aïn Feshkha II: Études d’anthropologie, de physique et de chimie (Studies of Anthropology, Physics and Chemistry). Switzerland: University Press Fribourg; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 467–82. Humbert, J. -B. (2006), ‘Some remarks on the archaeology of Qumran,’ in Galor, Humbert, and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran: The Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 19–39. Humbert, J. -B. and A. Chambon (eds) (1994), Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân et de Aïn Feshkha I: Album de photographies, repertoire du fonds photographique, synthèse des notes de chantier du Père Roland de Vaux OP. Fribourg: University Press Fribourg; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Humbert, J. -B., A. Chambon, and J. Młynarczyk (2016), Khirbet Qumrân et Aïn Feshkha: Fouilles du P. Roland de Vaux: IIIA: L’archéologie de Qumrân. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Magen, Y. and Y. Peleg (2007), The Qumran Excavations, 1993–2004: Preliminary Report. Judea & Samaria Publications 6. Jerusalem: Staff Officer of Archaeology – Civil Administration of Judea and Samaria; Israel Antiquities Authority. Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Magness, J. (2007), ‘Qumran: The site of the Dead Sea Scrolls. A review article,’ RevQ 88, pp. 641–4. Magness, J. (2011), Stone and Dung, Oil and Spit: Jewish Daily Life in the Time of Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Metso, S. (2006), ‘Whom does the term yahad identify?,’ in C. Hempel and J. M. Lieu (eds), Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in Honour of Michael A. Knibb. JSJS up 111. Leiden: Brill, pp. 213–35. Mizzi, D. (2009), ‘The Archaeology of Khirbet Qumran: A Comparative Approach.’ (Ph.D. diss., University of Oxford). Mizzi, D. (2015), ‘Qumran Period I reconsidered: An evaluation of several competing theories,’ DSD 22, 1–42 Mizzi, D. (2016), ‘Miscellaneous artefacts from the Qumran Caves: An exploration of their significance,’ in M. Fidanzo (ed.), The History of the Caves of Qumran. Leiden: Brill, pp. 137–60. Mizzi, D. and J. Magness (2016), ‘Was Qumran Abandoned at the End of the First Century BCE ?’ JBL 135: 301–20. Mizzi, D. (2017), ‘Qumran at seventy : Reflections on seventy years of scholarship on the archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Strata: BAIAS 35: 9–45. Mizzi, D. (forthcoming), An Archaeology of Qumran: A Contextual Approach to the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Leiden: Brill. Nagar, Y., H. Hizmi, and Y. Aharonovich (2017), ‘The people of Qumran: New discoveries and paleo-demographic interpretations,’ paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the ASOR Boston, MA , 16 November 2017.
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Netzer, E. (2001), Hasmonean and Herodian Palaces at Jericho: Final Reports of the 1973–1987 Excavations. Volume I: Stratigraphy and Architecture. Jerusalem: IES ; Institute of Archaeology, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Patrich, J. (1994), ‘Khirbet Qumran in light of new archaeological explorations in the Qumran Caves,’ in Wise et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea, pp. 73–95. Patrich, J. (2000), ‘Did extra-mural dwelling quarters exist at Qumran?,’ in L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years after their Discovery: Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20–25, 1997. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society; The Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, pp. 720–7. Patrich, J. (2006), ‘Agricultural development in antiquity: Improvements in the cultivation and production of balsam,’ in Galor, Humbert, and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran: The Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 241–8. Regev, E. (2003), ‘The Yah.ad and the Damascus Covenant: Structure, organization and relationship,’ RevQ 21, pp. 233–62. Rengstorf, K. H. (1960), Hirbet Qumrân und die Bibliothek vom Toten Meer. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Schultz, B. (2006), ‘The Qumran cemetery : 150 years of research,’ DSD 13, 194–228. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Stacey, D. and G. Doudna with a contribution by G. Avni (2013), Qumran Revisited: A Reassessment of the Archaeology of the Site and its Texts. BAR S2520. Oxford: Archaeopress. Stegemann, H. (1998), The Library of Qumran: On the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Taylor, J. E. (2007), ‘Ein Fashkha,’ in F. Skolnik and M. Berenbaum (eds), Encyclopaedia Judaica (second edn; 22 vols). Detroit: Macmillan, Vol. 6, pp. 255–6. Taylor, J. E. (2013), The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea. Oxford: OUP. Vaux, R. de (1962), ‘Archéologie,’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux, Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumran: Exploration de la falaise, les grottes 2Q, 3Q, 5Q, 6Q, 7Q à 10Q, le rouleau de cuivre. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 3–36. Vaux, R. de (1970), ‘On right and wrong uses of archaeology,’ in J. A. Sanders (ed.), Near Eastern Archaeology in the Twentieth Century: Essays in Honor of Nelson Glueck. New York: Doubleday, pp. 64–80. Vaux, R. de (1973), Archaeology and the Dead Sea Scrolls (revised English edn). Oxford: OUP. Yardeni, A. (1997), ‘A draft of a deed on an ostracon from Khirbet Qumrân,’ IEJ 47, 233–7. Zangenberg, J. (2004), ‘Opening up our view : Khirbet Qumran in a regional perspective,’ in D. R. Edwards (ed.), Religion and Society in Roman Palestine: Old Questions, New Approaches. London: Routledge, pp. 170–87.
3
The Manuscript Collections: An Overview Mladen Popović
Introduction During the last 65 years the region west of the Dead Sea has become one of the most important find locations of ancient manuscripts outside Egypt. These modern discoveries, however, are not the first to have been made. Origen (ca. 185–254 ce ) apparently used a Psalms manuscript that was found in a jar near Jericho for his Hexapla at the time of the Roman emperor Caracalla (211–217 ce ) (Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 6.16.3). In addition, a letter from 800 by the Nestorian patriarch of Seleucia, Timotheus I (780–823 ce ), tells of an Arab hunter discovering a cave in the vicinity of Jericho that contained many scrolls of the Hebrew Bible and other Hebrew texts, among which were more than 200 Psalms ascribed to King David. The Dead Sea Scrolls in a strict sense relate to eleven caves near the ancient settlement of Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], but since their discovery during the years 1947–56 important manuscript collections at other sites were discovered as well. The find spots of these other collections cover an area from Wadi Daliyeh, 14 kilometres north of Jericho, to Masada in the southern part of the western Dead Sea basin. Most of these sites are located in the Judean Desert, although some, such as Wadi Daliyeh in the central hill country, are not. During the two decades after the discovery of the first Qumran cave in 1946/7, and also more recently in the 1990s and 2000s, the mountainous desert area west of the Dead Sea was intensively searched and hundreds of caves were discovered. Many of these caves were empty, but a significant number of caves showed signs of human presence and activity in antiquity, such as pottery and metal objects, coins, textiles and wooden objects. In addition, a number of caves yielded manuscript finds, as did excavations at the Hasmonean/Herodian stronghold Masada, where the Romans suppressed the last stand of Jewish rebels in 73/74 ce . Aside from more isolated finds or manuscript fragments of unknown provenance, we reckon with eighteen sites, Qumran included, where manuscript collections have been discovered (Reed, 2007; Eshel, 2010; Tov, 2010) (see Table 3.1). The different manuscript collections differ in scope, age and profile. It is not always possible to give an exact number of manuscripts for each site. This is because of the state of the material in relation to the question of what constitutes a manuscript 37
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Table 3.1 1. Qumran 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.
Wadi Daliyeh Ketef Jericho (Wadi al-Mafjar) Nah.al Michmas Khirbet Mird Aïn Feshkha Wadi Nar Wadi Ghweir Wadi Murabbaʿat Wadi Sdeir Nah.al Arugot Ein Gedi (Har Yishai Cave) Nah.al H.ever
14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19.
Nah.al H.ever/Seiyal Nah.al Mishmar Nah.al S. eʾelim Masada Khirbet Qazone Unknown provenance
Around 900–1000 mss (+ 4 ostraca, 1 inscription on weight and 62 pottery inscriptions) 39 mss ca. 30 mss 4 inscriptions ca. 160 mss (ca. 50 mss unpublished) 4 inscriptions 5 mss (unpublished) 2 mss (unpublished) 152/153 mss (+ 20 ostraca) 4 mss 1 ms 2 mss 68 mss (64 manuscripts from Cave 5/6 of which 5/6H.ev 64 is an uninscribed roll of leather; and 4 manuscripts from Cave 8, 2 ostraca and some ostraca fragments) 95 mss 8 mss 5 mss 46 mss (+ 897 ostraca and 17 graffiti) 2 mss (unpublished) ca. 30 mss (more than half unpublished)
[→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. From the caves near Qumran, for example, only a very few more or less complete scrolls were found. For the most part the original scrolls are not intact anymore. What we call manuscripts consist largely of fragments that have been assorted together by researchers as belonging to an original scroll or document. Sometimes we find several columns of a scroll or a sheet or leaf still more or less intact, but more often we are dealing with larger and smaller fragments that have been joined together by scholars for various reasons. The exact allocation of all the thousands of fragments has been a daunting scholarly enterprise, and while most of these allocations seem to have met with consensus there are also some telling examples of disputed cases. The concept of manuscript in Dead Sea Scrolls studies is, therefore, to a certain extent, a scholarly construct (Tigchelaar, 2010a). Nevertheless, it is clear from the general overview of finds and sites that the caves near Qumran have yielded by far the largest number of manuscripts. The chronological period covered is impressive: from the first half of the seventh century bce (a palimpsest from Wadi Murabbaʿat) and the Persian period (mid-fourth century bce : Wadi Daliyeh and Ketef Jericho) to the period of the first Jewish revolt against Rome in 66–70/74 ce (Qumran, Masada, Wadi Murabbaʿat and the surroundings of En Gedi), the second Jewish revolt against Rome under the leadership of Bar Kokhba in 132–135 ce (Wadi Murabbaʿat, Nah.al H.ever and En Gedi) and the Arabic period (eighth to eleventh centuries: Khirbet Mird and Wadi Murabbaʿat). The languages used in the manuscripts are likewise very diverse: Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, Nabatean and Arabic [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. The material used for writing ranges from leather and papyrus to pottery, stone and even, in one case, copper.
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As a general observation, most of the manuscripts found at places other than the Qumran caves are non-literary, documentary texts such as deeds of sale of slaves or land, wedding or divorce documents, contracts, accounts and personal letters. Just a dozen or so of the manuscripts are literary, religious texts such as fragments or scrolls of Leviticus, Deuteronomy, Psalms, Ezekiel, Ben Sira and the Twelve Minor Prophets. The Dead Sea Scrolls from the eleven caves near Qumran can be distinguished from the other manuscript finds in the area west of the Dead Sea Basin because they are primarily literary, religious texts. Only a few examples of documentary texts, such as accounts, lists of names and scribal practices, were found, and the provenance of a number of them is disputed (Cotton and Yardeni, 1997, pp. 6, 283–317). These general observations regarding scope, age and profile should not distract from a more detailed analysis of the different collections, with regard to aspects both of their ‘lived’ and their deposition context (Popović, 2012, 2016, 2017). However, in this entry I will limit myself mainly to the evidence from Qumran.
Qumran As with many of the other manuscript collections from the Judean Desert, what is referred to as the Qumran collection consists of multiple manuscript caches distributed over various caves, some very close to the settlement of Qumran, a few others farther away (between 1 and 2 km). The Qumran caves in a strict sense refer to eleven caves (for the suggestion of two Caves 1 see Fields, 2009, pp. 110–13), although many more caves in the direct vicinity have yielded evidence of human activity but no manuscripts. However, with respect to the number of manuscripts found, these eleven caves are not all the same. Cave 1 contained around 80 manuscripts, among which a number of largely or partially intact scrolls. In Cave 2 the remains of 33 manuscripts were found. Cave 3 contained 15 manuscripts, among them the unique Copper Scroll [→34 Copper Scroll]. Cave 4 stands out as it yielded by far the biggest number of manuscripts amounting to almost seven hundred manuscripts and perhaps even more. Cave 5 revealed 25 manuscripts, while Cave 6 surrendered 31 manuscripts, a relatively large number of which were of papyrus. Cave 7 contained the remains of 19 manuscripts, all of which of papyrus and in Greek. Also, in some caves (4, 6, 7, 8 and 10) a small number of inscribed pottery and shards were found, comparable to the inscribed material from the Qumran settlement (Lemaire, 2003). Cave 8 contained the remains of only five manuscripts. Cave 9 yielded not much more than one small papyrus fragment with a few letters that are the remains of three lines in Hebrew or Aramaic, while Cave 10 contained only one pottery shard with the remains of two letters. These two caves hardly qualify as manuscript caches. Finally, Cave 11 gave up 31 manuscripts, among which, like in Cave 1, there were a handful of largely intact scrolls. When we take other aspects into account, such as manuscript material, language and age, some caves seem to stand out. More than half of the manuscripts from Cave 6 were of papyrus, a higher amount than is attested for the other caves, except Cave 7. Significantly, Cave 6 is the only other Qumran cave, apart from Cave 4, to have yielded
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the fragmentary remains of a documentary text on papyrus, an account or a contract (6Q26; Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, pp. 138–9). In Cave 7 all fragments were of papyrus and also in Greek (in general about 85 per cent of the Dead Sea Scrolls are written in Hebrew, 12 per cent in Aramaic and only 3 per cent in Greek), although de Vaux (1956, p. 572; cf. Stökl Ben Ezra, 2011, p. 331 n. 20) notes one small leather fragment in Hebrew, which apparently has since disappeared, and one should also add the inscription reading the name Romʾa in Aramaic characters that occurs twice on a large jar from this same cave (7Q-Arch 2 heb/ar; Lemaire, 2003, pp. 375–6). In terms of age, according to the customary palaeographic dating [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls] manuscripts from Caves 1 and 4 are on average of significantly older date than manuscripts from Caves 2, 3, 5, 6 and 11 (Stökl Ben Ezra, 2007, 2010, 2011; cf. García Martínez, 2010a, 2010b). These statistical averages certainly demand an explanation, but this data cannot simply be converted into a historical scenario according to which the manuscripts in Cave 1 and 4 were deposited near the end of the first century bce , while the others were deposited during the revolt in 68 ce . Such a scenario ignores the texts from Caves 1 and 4 that paleographically date to the first century ce (for a different scenario see Eshel, 2009, pp. 114–15, 124–5). When other material remains are taken into consideration, Caves 1, 4, 8, 9 and 10 seem somewhat striking. Although Cave 8 yielded the remains of only five manuscripts (a few small fragments of Genesis and Psalms, seventy fragments of a phylactery, a fragmentary mezuzah and two small non-biblical hymnic fragments), what is noticeable is the large number of leather reinforcing tabs and thongs, more than one hundred, a number that is matched by approximately one hundred more leather reinforcing tabs and thongs from Cave 4 (Carswell, 1977 [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]). Moreover, the caves that yielded phylactery manuscripts also contained the remains of phylactery cases: Cave 1 (Barthélemy and Milik, 1955, p. 7, plate 1), Cave 4 (de Vaux and Milik, 1977, pp. 34–5, plate 6), Cave 5 (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 178, plate 38) and Cave 8 (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 31, plate 8). Finally, on the floor of Cave 10 a partially preserved reed mat was found (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 31 and cf. 8, plate 2 #3), in addition to a lamp with a paired nozzle and date pits (remains of fruit were also found in Caves 8 and 9, in the latter cave together with three ends of pieces of rope and a few shards of pottery [Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 31]). This brief discussion of other material remains is relevant to assess the ancient context of the caves and their use, which relates directly to the nature of the Qumran collection or collections of manuscripts. Not all of the Qumran caves were used for storing or hiding manuscripts: Caves 1, 4 and 11 are evidently different from Caves 7–10. Moreover, in terms of understanding ancient activities around and in these caves, it is important to take into consideration both caves where manuscripts were found and caves where that has not been the case. Almost thirty additional caves in the Qumran vicinity indicate human presence contemporary with the settlement and the manuscript caves (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962; Patrich, 1994; Broshi and Eshel, 1999). This spatial and temporal context raises the question whether and if so how the different activities might have been interrelated.
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Scholars distinguish between two kinds of caves: natural caves in the hard limestone cliffs (Caves 1, 2, 3, 6 and 11) and artificial caves made in antiquity in the marl terrace on which also the settlement of Qumran is situated (Caves 4, 5, 7, 8, 9 and 10). It is often said that some of the artificial caves were used as dwelling places, while the natural caves were not. In addition to remains of storage or so-called scroll jars (see Figure 3.1),
Figure 3.1 Large terracotta jar: one of the several types of jar into which scrolls were put (Zev Radovan Image 735).
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Figure 3.2 First century ce pottery from Qumran (Zev Radovan Image 2215).
particularly from Caves 1 and 3 (but also from cave 29 where no manuscripts were found), excavators found the remains of household pottery such as jugs, plates, bowls and even a few cooking pots in various quantities in various caves (see Figure 3.2), except for Cave 5 where no pottery was found (Barthélemy and Milik, 1955; Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962; De Vaux and Milik, 1977). Regarding the manuscript caves, scholars often suggest that Caves 7–10 were used as living quarters by single inhabitants, based on material and manuscript evidence or a combination thereof. The date pits and other fruit in Caves 8–10 indicate their use as dwelling places, while the reed mat on the floor in Cave 10 reinforces that assessment for that cave. Such assessments not only relate to the use of the caves and the character of their habitation, but also to the nature of the Qumran collection. Thus, Cave 7 is singled out as the cave of a single inhabitant with a particular interest in Greek manuscripts. Of course, some Greek manuscripts were also found in Cave 4. In addition, comparative evidence from Augustan libraries does not suggest that books were divided along linguistic lines so that Greek and Latin collections were shelved separately (Nicholls, 2010). Likewise, Cave 6, although probably not a dwelling place (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 10), is sometimes identified as the personal collection of an individual, because of the relatively large number of papyri, the use of semi-cursive writing and the presence of at least one documentary text (6Q26; cf. Wise, 1994, pp. 131–2). For Cave 8, scholars point to the presence of a mezuzah as evidence for its habitation. The numerous leather reinforcing tabs and thongs from Cave 8 would then indicate it was some sort of one-man workshop for manufacturing scroll fasteners. The amount of leather reinforcing tabs and thongs is matched by those from Cave 4, as is the presence of mezuzot. However, the manuscript evidence from Cave 4 seems far too large in number to have been possessed by a single individual (the papyrological
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evidence from the Villa of the Papyri at Herculaneum, with an estimated number of 1,100 rolls, seems of a different order; see Houston, 2009). This raises the question whether such material and manuscript evidence unequivocally indicates single habitation (that only one mezuzah was found in Cave 8 is beside the point; cf. the evidence from Wadi Murabbaʿat below). Moreover, what can one say about the duration of such habitation? For the Qumran caves it is debated whether the archaeological evidence indicates habitation in terms of temporary refuge or long-term dwelling (Patrich, 1994, 2000; Broshi and Eshel, 1999; regarding Cave 11, cf. García Martínez, 2010b; Stökl Ben Ezra, 2010). Turning to comparative evidence, the material and manuscript evidence from Wadi Murabbaʿat indicates those caves to have been used for temporary refuge, and the presence of a possible mezuzah (Mur 5) matches the evidence from Qumran. But we do not know for what period of time the refugees dwelt there. If we take evidence from the Cave of the Letters of Nah.al H.ever (Cave 5/6) into consideration, it seems clear that at least some refugees could not have arrived there before November 134 ce (this pertains to the Babatha and the Eliezer bar Shemuel archives; cf. Katzoff, 2000, p. 73; the Bar Kokhba letters do not give precise dates, but they are assumed to date to the last months of the revolt; Cotton, 2002, p. 351). Depending on the end date of the Bar Kokhba revolt (135 or 136 ce ), one has at least something of a concrete basis or a bandwidth for the possible time-span of their stay. On the other hand, we do not know whether these refugees were among those who died in the cave or whether they left earlier and if so how much earlier. Finally, regarding the use of the caves it is interesting to note what was not found in them, both those that yielded manuscripts as well as those that did not. No coins were found (Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, pp. 17, 35; Patrich, 1994, p. 92 reports one Roman coin from the first or second century in FQ 37 but that comes from the terrace, not from the cave; Broshi and Eshel, 1999 report the find of various coins from the areas between the caves but not in the caves). Does the absence of coins somehow indicate the kind of use that was made of the caves, in terms of duration and function? We do not know, but this apparent absence of coins from the caves in the vicinity of Qumran is interesting in light of some of the other caves where manuscripts turned up and alongside coins as well as other objects (e.g. Wadi Murabbaʿat and Nah.al H.ever; although Masada is not a cave or a complex of caves it seems somewhat comparable in the sense of having been a place of refuge for families affected by revolt or some of whose members were involved in revolt). The various distinctive characteristics of the different caves near Qumran bear directly on the nature of the manuscripts as a collection. In previous research differences between the various caves were acknowledged, but that did not distract from the view that all manuscripts from the different caves originally belonged to a single collection. The fundamental question is: what is a collection? Or, what is a single collection? If Caves 6 and 7 were private collections and Caves 1, 4 and 11 communal collections, what makes all of them belong to a single collection? Distinctions between individual Qumran caves, not including Caves 7–10, based on content seem less straightforward (Pfann, 2007; White Crawford, 2012). Tov (2004) suggests that Cave 11 has a more
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pronounced, sectarian profile than the other caves, but García Martínez (2010b) contests this. Scholars now increasingly stress that the manuscripts did not originate from a single collection before their deposit. Instead, one needs to reckon with the possibility that manuscripts originated from different localities and in time ended up at the caves near Qumran. This has of course long been acknowledged for those manuscripts that predate the Qumran settlement in the Hellenistic or early Roman period. The point emerging from recent research, however, is that, despite whatever framework of thought or paradigm one might have regarding the date of the Qumran settlement or the relation between the settlement and the surrounding caves with the manuscripts [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], many scrolls were not copied at Qumran (e.g. Alexander, 2003), although their origins are still hypothesized within a larger movement of which Qumran was a part (e.g. Collins, 2010). From a statistical point of view it seems unlikely that all the manuscripts came from a single, ‘living’ collection that at one point in time was randomly divided among the different caves (Stökl Ben Ezra, 2011, p. 337). On the other hand, palaeographic cross-connections between the different caves, such as, for example, between Caves 1 and 11 (1QpHab [→44 Pesharim] and 11QT b [→51 Temple Scroll]), argue against straightforward conversions of statistical data into historical scenarios that set apart what seems to belong together. Textual and scribal connections between various manuscripts from the Qumran caves [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls] indicate that many of the texts are interlinked and cannot be seen as a random selection of all kinds of available Jewish texts at the time. Instead they reflect a current of Jewish thought that goes back to different but related groups and movements with shared traditions regarding scriptural interpretation [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation] and legal issues or [→58 Halakhah] (Tigchelaar, 2010b). Thus, elements of content show varying degrees of interdependence between the different texts. These considerations, which pull in different directions as regards the origin and character of the collection being single or multiple, add further complexity to scenarios regarding the deposition context of the scrolls at and near Qumran, whether it concerns a quick-hiding scenario or a genizah/genizot scenario (see recently, and with references to previous research, Pfann, 2007; García Martínez, 2010a; Stökl Ben Ezra, 2011; Taylor, 2012; and White Crawford, 2012). From a comparative point of view, the evidence from Philodemus’ library at the Villa of the Papyri at Herculaneum is important for material reasons (number, age, multiple copies; cf. Lapin, 2010, p. 126) as well as for understanding the character of the collection or collections having been shaped by people’s preferences of thought. The movement behind the Dead Sea Scrolls can be characterized as a textual community (Stock, 1983). People may gather texts for a variety of reasons, but texts also gather people around them and thus a book collection can create an intellectual community, whether real or one that only exists in the imagination (cf. Too, 2010; Woolf, 2013). The Rule of the Community [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules] portrays ongoing study of texts as part of the community’s collective life (1QS 6.6–8; cf. 1QS 8.11–12; Fraade, 1993 [→73 Daily Life]). One may observe that whatever textual community or communities stood behind the Dead Sea Scrolls it was a very different one from
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Philodemus’ Epicurean school at Herculaneum, although Philodemus originated from close-by Gadara in the first century bce when most of the manuscripts from the Qumran caves were being copied. Being different reading communities caused these parallel literatures to be kept apart (Johnson, 2010; Woolf, 2013, p. 11).
Some of the Other Manuscript Finds A brief comparison with other manuscript collections from the Judean Desert may shed some more light on certain aspects of the Qumran manuscripts being a reflection of a collection or multiple collections over time and space. From a comparative perspective aspects such as lived and deposition contexts, the useful life of manuscripts, chronological range including ‘outliers,’ and the presence of single or multiple collections at the same location – both diachronically and synchronically – put the manuscript caches from the Qumran caves into perspective. Considering the lived context of manuscript collections, one needs to distinguish between libraries and archives as well as public, private or institutional contexts. For example, the thirty-five legal papyri of Babatha written in Greek, Aramaic and NabateanAramaic carefully packed together in a leather purse or the six legal papyri in Hebrew and Aramaic, originally probably also packed in a leather bag, of Eliezer bar Shemuel from Nah.al H.ever represent private archives. These archives were found placed on top of each other, but it seems that in real life, except perhaps during the time in the cave, the people behind these archives we not related to each other. They somehow ended up with their archives in the same cave. The archive of Salome Komaïse, however, is from a woman that came from the same village as Babatha, Maoza, and indicates that families from that village probably fled together (Esler, 2017). Another, but different, example of private collections is provided by the evidence at Masada, where the excavators interpret some of the manuscripts as belonging to individual families. It is different from the Nah.al H.ever evidence because it concerns literary texts instead of documentary texts. At different spots on Masada manuscripts were discovered. Some of these were found in rooms that, from an archaeological perspective, seemed to have belonged to individual families, such as a Psalms manuscript (MasPsb) or one of Ben Sira (Mas1h Sir) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related], although the evidence is meagre (often not more than one copy per locus, excluding locus 1039 where the accumulation of manuscripts is probably mainly secondary). Given the large number of literary manuscripts from Qumran, as well as numerous multiple copies of the same composition, scholars often assume that these were not part of a personal collection, despite Caves 6 and 8 perhaps being singled out as private collections (see above). If not a personal collection, and if ‘public’ also is not the most apt term, should it rather be seen as a communal collection or is private better? Perhaps in a sense it is comparable to Philodemus’ library in Herculaneum, which was in fact a private library but existed for quite some time after he lived (cf. Houston, 2009). In this sense the collection from Qumran may be perceived as a school-like collection (cf. Taylor, 2012). Given the debate over the single or multiple origin it is less clear whether
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we are dealing with the remains of what was originally one collection of which the formation was suddenly halted by external factors or rather the remains of various collections (libraries?) that at various moments were brought to Qumran and the nearby caves (Taylor, 2012 understands the Qumran manuscripts in the different caves as the result of the halted process of both genizah storage and preservation burial). Whether the manuscripts were stored in the caves at the same time or at different moments, the Qumran evidence seems to combine snapshots of two aspects: what was deemed to be recopied over a certain period of time as well as catastrophic loss that caused a great number of texts to disappear from subsequent transmission. Different from Philodemus’ Villa of the Papyri at Herculaneum, or Masada for that matter, the loss of manuscripts at Qumran was not caused by some catastrophic event, unless one takes the Jewish revolt against Rome as the historical context and cause that led to the scrolls ending up in the caves, being hidden there and not retrieved afterward. This brings us to a second aspect, namely that of the deposition context of the manuscript collections in the Judean Desert. When one considers the evidence that caused manuscripts being deposited in the places where they were found, the context is often determined by factors of violence and refuge, rather than, for example, trash disposal, such as at Oxyrhynchus. From the Persian period come two manuscript finds, those of Wadi Daliyeh and Ketef Jericho (Wadi al-Mafjar). The thirty-nine legal papyri in Official Aramaic, the numerous bullae and other artefacts from Wadi Daliyeh probably once belonged to wealthy citizens from the city of Samaria. They were perhaps implicated in the rebellion against Alexander’s prefect in Syria around 332/331 bce and sought shelter in the cave on the way south. The large number of human remains indicates that they perished in the cave. The evidence from Ketef Jericho is less conclusive for the Persian period. Especially due to activity in the cave in the Mamluk period (fourteenth century), some of the finds were in an inverted stratigraphic sequence. But the skeletal remains of thirty-five individuals (men, women and children) may indicate that the Roman period documents in Greek, Aramaic and possibly Hebrew came with these refugees to the caves, perhaps when they escaped the city of Jericho to the west during the Bar Kokhba revolt. Conversely, this may also explain the deposition context for the Persian period documents. The documents may have been brought there by people fleeing Jericho, perhaps in 312 bce or somewhat later when Ptolemy I took inhabitants from Judea and Samaria to Egypt. When we come to the Roman period finds, the evidence for violence and refuge as factors determining the deposition context of manuscripts accumulates. The four inscriptions in a cistern in Nah.al Michmas may date to the first Jewish revolt and were perhaps written by people hiding there. The archaeological evidence from the caves of Wadi Murabbaʿat points to their use during the first as well as the second revolt. However, these contexts do not apply to all manuscript evidence from Wadi Murabbaʿat (see below). The evidence in the caves in Nah.al H.ever evidently points to violence and refuge as the context of deposition for the manuscripts, given the two Roman camps above some of the caves on the northern and southern bank and the skeletal remains in the various caves. Considering the two aspects of lived and deposition context, the Qumran manuscripts stand apart, being perhaps the remains of a communal, school-like
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collection or collections and are perhaps similar in that they too were hidden in the face of imminent danger. However, an important difference seems to be that the archaeological evidence (such as lack of coins or other valuable items) seems to indicate that the Qumran manuscripts were stored in the caves without refugees remaining there at the same time. When one considers the aspect of the useful life of manuscripts, the evidence from the Judean Desert seems to agree with papyrological evidence from elsewhere in the ancient world that indicates that manuscripts could remain in use for two centuries or more (Houston, 2009). This evidence argues against assumptions about much shorter time-spans for manuscripts until they needed to be recopied (van der Toorn, 2007). Even if one assumes that some of the Qumran caves contained manuscript collections that were closed just before the turn of the era, some of the manuscripts in them were at least two hundred years old by that time. Although the date of the Hebrew Masada manuscripts may have to be adjusted somewhat, some of them evidently significantly predate the period of the revolt (such as MasGen, MasSir). When one takes into account evidence from places such as Nah.al H.ever and Wadi Murabbaʿat, the documentary manuscripts date relatively close to the time of deposition (e.g., for the Babatha archive between 94 ce and 132 ce ), but some of the literary manuscripts may be considerably older. Thus, the Greek Minor Prophets scroll from Nah.al H.ever (1/8H.evXIIgr) dates to the late first century bce , and a non-biblical text from Wadi Murabbaʿat (Mur 6) possibly dates to the middle of the first century bce . If refugees brought the first manuscript to Nah.al H.ever during the Bar Kokhba revolt and the second one to Wadi Murabbaʿat perhaps during the first revolt, this indicates a life span of at least one hundred years or more. One must also take into account the chronological range of the manuscripts found at the various locations. We have already seen that at Ketef Jericho manuscript caches date to both the Persian and the Roman periods. The Hebrew, Aramaic, Nabatean, Greek and Arabic manuscripts from Wadi Murabbaʿat date to various periods from the early first century bce until the ninth–tenth centuries ce . At Masada the Hebrew and Greek papyri predate the site’s destruction, while the Latin papyri, which include not only documentary texts and letters but also a fragment of Virgil’s Aeneid, belong to the Romans stationed there during and after the siege. There are also some interesting ‘outliers.’ For example, at Wadi Murabbaʿat clusters of documents date from around the two Jewish revolts. Some texts, however, fall outside these ranges. Thus, ostracon Mur 72, a legal text in Aramaic that mentions Masada, dates to the early first century bce . Does that indicate a separate deposition context? Or Mur 114, a recognition of debt between two Roman soldiers from 141 or 171 ce , or the latest document from the Roman period, Mur 117, mentioning emperor Commodus (180–192)? How did these texts end up with the other documents? This is interesting in light of the discussion regarding some of the Qumran documentary texts in Cave 4 the provenance of which is debated. Finally, a palimpsest on papyrus (Mur 17), both texts dating to the first half of the seventh century bce , clearly falls outside the chronological range. In fact, the evidence provided by Mur 17 from Wadi Murabbaʿat finds something of a parallel at Qumran. In Qumran Cave 9 a shard of Iron Age II pottery was
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found, dating to the same period as Mur 17, and in Cave 11 some more fragments of Iron Age II pottery were retrieved (see Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, p. 31; De Vaux 1956, p. 574; cf. Baillet, Milik and de Vaux, 1962, pp. 7, 8, 10, 12, 16, 24–5 for some Iron Age II pottery from four more non-manuscript caves). At Qumran this Iron Age II activity in the caves is contemporaneous with the Iron Age II settlement, and can be explained thus. The chronological range makes a simple point clear, namely that at sites other than Qumran the finds did not consist of single collections, but of multiple collections. We find multiple collections at the same location, both diachronically and synchronically. At Ketef Jericho and Wadi Murabbaʿat the evidence indicates that the same spot was visited repeatedly during different periods. We have already considered the Babatha and Eliezer bar Shemuel archives from Nah.al H.ever. In the same cave but in a different locus fifteen letters on papyrus in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek from Bar Kokhba were found in a water-skin together with other artefacts. These personal collections of manuscripts do not belong together but were deposited in the cave during more or less the same time. The evidence from Masada is interesting because, as already mentioned above, some of the manuscripts at the various spots are thought not to have originated from a single collection but to have belonged to individual families that lived there during the revolt. It is not apparent that the Deuteronomy and Ezekiel manuscripts buried in locus 1043 (the ‘synagogue’) were communal rather than personal copies. These two manuscripts were found near the sides and bottoms of the two pits in a corner room of the ‘synagogue.’ Their deposition context need not necessarily be understood as genizot, in whatever way that should be exactly understood. The two pits were also filled with a mixture of gravel, shards and organic material. The manuscripts may simply have been hidden there for safe keeping in the face of impending danger.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (2003), ‘Literacy among Jews in Second Temple Palestine: Reflections on the evidence from Qumran,’ in M. F. J. Baasten and W. Th. van Peursen (eds), Hamlet on a Hill: Semitic and Greek Studies Presented to Professor T. Muraoka on the Occasion of his Sixty-Fifth Birthday. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 3–24. Baillet, M., J.T. Milik and R. de Vaux (1962), Les ‘Petites Grottes’ de Qumrân. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon. Barthélemy, D. and J. T. Milik (1955), Qumran Cave I. DJD 1. Oxford: Clarendon. Broshi, M. and H. Eshel (1999), ‘Residential caves at Qumran,’ DSD 6, 328–48. Carswell, J. (1977), ‘Appendix I: Fastenings on the Qumrân manuscripts,’ in R. de Vaux and J. T. Milik, Qumrân Grotte 4. II: 1. Archéologie, 2. Tefilin, Mezuzot et Targums (4Q128– 4Q157). DJD 6. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 23–8. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Cotton, H. M. (2002), ‘Greek letters,’ in Y. Yadin et al. (eds), The Documents from the Bar Kokhba Period in the Cave of the Letters: Hebrew, Aramaic and Nabatean-Aramaic Papyri. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, pp. 351–66.
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Cotton, H. M. and A. Yardeni (1997), Aramaic, Hebrew and Greek Documentary Texts from Nah.al H.ever and Other Sites, with an Appendix Containing Alleged Qumran Texts (The Seiyâl Collection II ). DJD 27. Oxford: Clarendon. Eshel, H. (2009), Qumran: Scrolls, Caves, History. Jerusalem: Carta. Eshel, H. (2010), ‘Gleaning of scrolls from the Judaean Desert,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 49–87. Esler, P. F. (2017), The Yadin Papyri and an Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold. Oxford: OUP. Fields. W. W. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. Volume One, 1947–1960. Leiden: Brill. Fraade, S. (1993), ‘Interpretive authority in the studying community at Qumran,’ JJS 44, 46–69. García Martínez, F. (2010a), ‘Reconsidering the Cave 1 texts sixty years after their discovery: An overview,’ in D. K. Falk et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 1 Revisited. STDJ 91. Leiden: Brill,), pp. 1–13. García Martínez, F. (2010b), ‘Cave 11 in context,’ in Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 199–209. Houston, G. W. (2009), ‘Papyrological evidence for book collections and libraries in the Roman Empire,’ in W. A. Johnson and H. N. Parker (eds), Ancient Literacies: The Culture of Reading in Rome and Greece. Oxford: OUP, pp. 233–67. Johnson, W. A. (2010), Readers and Reading Culture in the High Empire: A Study of Elite Reading Communities. Oxford: OUP. Katzoff, R. (2000), ‘Babatha,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam, Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I:73–5. Lapin, H. (2010), ‘Dead Sea Scrolls and the historiography of Ancient Judaism,’ in M. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans, pp. 108–27. Lemaire, A. (2003), ‘Inscriptions du khirbeh, des grottes et de ‘Aïn Feshkha,’ in J.-B. Humbert and J. Gunneweg (eds), Khirbet Qumrân et ‘Aïn Feshkha II: Études d’anthropologie, de physique et de chimie, Studies of Anthropology, Physics and Chemistry. Fribourg: Academic Press Fribourg; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 341–88. Nicholls, M. (2010), ‘Bibliotheca Latina Graecaque: On the possible division of Roman public libraries by language,’ in Y. Perrin (ed.), Neronia VIII: Bibliothèques, livres et culture écrite dans l’empire romain de César à Hadrien. Brussels: Latomus, pp. 11–21. Patrich, J. (1994), ‘Khirbet Qumran in light of new archaeological explorations in the Qumran Caves,’ in M. O. Wise et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. New York: The New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 73–95. Patrich, J. (2000), ‘Did extra-mural dwelling quarters exist at Qumran?,’ in L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years After their Discovery. Jerusalem: IES , pp. 720–7. Pfann, S. (2007), ‘Reassessing the Judean Desert caves: Libraries, archives, genizas and hiding places,’ BAIAS 25, 147–70. Popović, M. (2012), ‘Qumran as a scroll storehouse in times of crisis: A comparative perspective on Judaean Desert manuscript collections,’ JSJ 14, 551–94. Popović, M. (2016), ‘The Ancient “Library” of Qumran between urban and rural culture,’ in S. White Crawford and C. Wassen (eds), The Scrolls from Qumran and the Concept of a Library. STDJ 116. Leiden: Brill, pp. 155–67.
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Popović, M. (2017), ‘When and why were caves near Qumran and in the Judaean Desert used?’ in M. Fidanzio (ed.), The Caves of Qumran: Proceedings of the International Conference, Lugano 2014. STDJ 118. Leiden: Brill, pp. 171–7. Reed, S. A. (2007), ‘Find-sites of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 14, 199–221. Stock, B. (1983), The Implications of Literacy: Written Language and Models of Interpretation in the Eleventh and Twelfth Centuries. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Stökl Ben Ezra, D. (2007), ‘Old caves and young caves: A statistical reevaluation of a Qumran consensus,’ DSD 14, 313–33. Stökl Ben Ezra, D. (2010), ‘Further reflections on Caves 1 and 11: A response to Florentino García Martínez,’ in Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 211–13. Stökl Ben Ezra, D. (2011), ‘Wie viele Bibliotheken gab es in Qumran?,’ in J. Frey, C. Claußen and N. Kessler (eds), Qumran und die Archäologie: Texte und Contexte. WUNT 278. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 327–46. Taylor, J. E. (2012), ‘Buried manuscripts and empty tombs: The Qumran Genizah theory revisited,’ in A. M. Maeir, J. Magness and L. H. Schiffman (eds), ‘Go Out and Study the Land’ (Judges 18:2): Archaeological, Historical and Textual Studies in Honor of Hanan Eshel. JSJS up 148. Leiden: Brill, pp. 269–315. Tigchelaar, E. (2010a), ‘Constructing, deconstructing and reconstructing fragmentary manuscripts: Illustrated by a study of 4Q184 (4QWiles of the Wicked Woman),’ in Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 26–47. Tigchelaar, E. (2010b), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. J. Collins and D. C. Harlow (eds), The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans, pp. 163–80. Too, Y. L. (2010), The Idea of the Library in the Ancient World. Oxford: OUP. Toorn, K. van der (2007), Scribal Culture and the Making of the Hebrew Bible. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press. Tov, E. (2004), ‘The special character of the texts found in Qumran Cave 11,’ in E. G. Chazon, D. Satran and R. A. Clements (eds), Things Revealed: Studies in Early Jewish and Christian Literature in Honor of Michael E. Stone. JSJS up 89. Leiden: Brill, pp. 187–96. Tov, E. (2010), Revised Lists of the Texts from the Judaean Desert. Leiden: Brill. Vaux, R. de (1956), ‘Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân: Rapport préliminaire sur le 3e, 4e et 5e campagnes,’ RB 63, 533–77. Vaux R. de and J. T. Milik (1977), Qumrân Grotte 4.II: 1. Archéologie, 2. Tefilin, Mezuzot et Targums (4Q128–4Q157). DJD 6. Oxford: Clarendon. Wise, M. O. (1994), Thunder in Gemini and Other Essays on the History, Language and Literature of Second Temple Palestine. Sheffield: JSOT. White Crawford, S. (2012), ‘Qumran: Caves, scrolls, and buildings,’ in E. F. Mason et al. (eds), A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam. JSJS up 153. Leiden: Brill, pp. 253–73. Woolf, G. (2013), ‘Approaching the ancient library,’ in J. König, K. Oikonomopoulou and G. Woolf (eds), Ancient Libraries. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 1–20.
4
Acquisition and Publication Weston Fields and Herman Fields
Discovery, Identification and Acquisition The first Dead Sea Scrolls were accidentally discovered by three Bedouin shepherds close to the northwest shore of the Dead Sea in a cave near Khirbet Qumran in about January–February of 1947 [→1 Discoveries]. By March, they had shown the scrolls to several people in Bethlehem: Ibrahim ‘Ijha, George Isha’ya and Khalil Iskander Shahin (Kando), the latter an antiquities dealer. George mentioned the scrolls to the Metropolitan Mar Athanasius Samuel, Archbishop of the Syrian-Orthodox Church in Jerusalem, and Archbishop Samuel asked George to contact the Bedouin and find out more about the scrolls. As yet, no one fully appreciated the value of what they had, least of all Kando. Eventually, he would sell four scrolls (Isaiaha, Manual of Discipline [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], Habakkuk Commentary [→44 Pesharim], and the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]) to Archbishop Samuel for £24.00 (Palestine pounds = US $97.20) adding the comment, ‘much dirty paper for little clean paper.’ (Samuel, 1966, p. 149). In July 1947 neither Samuel nor Kando knew exactly what these ancient documents were. Over the next several months Samuel repeatedly attempted – with little success – to obtain scholarly confirmation of the antiquity of the scrolls as well as more information about their contents. Stephan Hanna Stephan of the Transjordan Department of Antiquities pronounced them ‘late’ (medieval). Some Jerusalem scholars who had been invited to look at them did not take the story seriously enough to come to St. Mark’s. Additional scrolls (Isaiahb the War Scroll [→40 Milhamah], the Thanksgiving Scroll [→37 Hodayot], Genesis Apocryphon) were removed by George and Jum‘a (one of the Bedouin who discovered the first scrolls) from the ‘first cave’ sometime after the initial discovery. The first three of these came into the hands of an Armenian antiquities dealer Nasri Ohan, while the Genesis Apocryphon reached Archbishop Samuel alongside three other scrolls already in his possession. Ohan contacted Prof. Eleazar L. Sukenik, Professor of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, a specialist in Hebrew epigraphy and the archaeology of ancient synagogues, and a personal friend. At the time Jerusalem was partitioned into different areas and one needed a pass to move between them. Since Sukenik did not have the documents to cross to Ohan’s side, they met across a barbed wire fence at the gateway to Military Zone B. Through the fence Ohan related that 51
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Bedouin had brought him some parchment scrolls which they claimed to have found in a cave. He wanted to know from Sukenik whether he considered them genuine, and if so, whether he would be prepared to buy them for the Museum of Jewish Antiquities of the Hebrew University. After initially suspecting the scrolls might be forgeries Sukenik recognized similarities between the letters and those he had seen on small coffins for bones (ossuaries) dating to the period before the destruction of the Temple in 70 ce which he had discovered in ancient tombs in and near Jerusalem. Sukenik asked Ohan to proceed at once to Bethlehem, bring back more samples, and telephone him upon his return. In the meantime, Sukenik would obtain a military pass so that he could visit Ohan at his store and examine the parchments more closely. After considerable bargaining, Sukenik was allowed to take the scrolls home for further examination. While Sukenik was examining the scrolls in his study one Saturday night, the late news on the radio announced that the United Nations would be voting on the resolution for the partition of Palestine (29 November 1947). While he was working, his son rushed in, shouting that the vote in favour of the Jewish State had been carried. As Sukenik later wrote, ‘This great event in Jewish history was thus combined in my home in Jerusalem with another event, no less historic, the one political, the other cultural.’ (Yadin, 1957, p. 25). The following Monday Sukenik bought Isaiahb, the War Scroll and the Thanksgiving Scroll with initial funds made available by Dr Magnes of the Hebrew University. Toward the end of January 1948, Sukenik received a letter from an acquaintance in the Arab Quarter, Anton Kiraz, informing him that he had in his possession a number of ancient Hebrew scrolls. Unfortunately, Sukenik was unable to secure funds in time, and Kiraz decided not to sell these scrolls to him. At the time of his death in 1953 Sukenik still believed that those other scrolls which he had held in his hands were lost to the Jewish people forever. In fact, in 1954 they were purchased by his son, Yigael Yadin, who became one of the leading Dead Sea Scrolls scholars in Israel. Meanwhile in Arab East Jerusalem and the Old City Archbishop Samuel’s assistant, the Rev. Fr. Butros Sowmy, suggested soliciting the expertise of the American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR , now the Albright Institute) for dating and identifying the scrolls. At ASOR Sowmy met two young scholars, John Trever and William Brownlee. As far as they knew, Trever and Brownlee were the first scholars to learn of the spectacular discovery, but in fact some of the scrolls had also been seen by J. P. M. van der Ploeg, a Dominican priest visiting the École Biblique, during the summer of 1947. Trever soon compared the text of the Isaiah Scroll to a photo of the Nash Papyrus which Prof. W. F. Albright of Johns Hopkins University had dated to about 100 bce . In light of the rapidly deteriorating political situation in the city Trever and Brownlee realized that these documents must be photographed and set up a camera in the basement of ASOR . After starting with the twenty-four feet long Isaiah Scroll, Trever was able to send prints from Jerusalem to Prof. Albright in Baltimore on 25 February 1948. A second set of photos was taken in March 1948. On 15 March 1948 Trever finally received the answer he had been awaiting. Albright agreed the scrolls predated the time of Jesus and wrote, My heartiest congratulations on the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times! There is no doubt in my mind that the script is more archaic than that of the
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Nash Papyrus. . . . I should prefer a date around 100 bce . . . . What an absolutely incredible find! And there can happily not be the slightest doubt in the world about the genuineness of the manuscript. Trever, 1965, p. 94
With war impending, the Metropolitan Samuel accompanied by Fr. Sowmy left Jerusalem with the scrolls on the morning of 25 March 1948. Travelling via Homs, Syria, to report on the dire financial and social situation of the Syrian Christians in Palestine, they arrived in Beirut, where they deposited the scrolls in a vault for safe keeping. There the scrolls remained until the very end of 1948. Shortly after midnight on 14 May 1948 the British withdrew from Jerusalem, signalling the end of British Mandate Palestine and the beginning of Israel’s War of Independence. The next day, Sowmy was struck in the head and killed by shrapnel while standing in the courtyard of St. Mark’s Monastery. Once armed conflict began political control of Qumran and its vicinity was uncertain. As it turned out, Qumran, East Jerusalem and the Old City of Jerusalem all became part of a new country, Jordan. After Israeli independence relations between Jordanian East Jerusalem and Israeli West Jerusalem were severed. Almost all future discoveries of scrolls in the area of Qumran took place under Jordanian control, and hence all the antiquities were under the jurisdiction of the Jordanian Department of Antiquities. This would continue to be the case until June 1967 when Israel captured both the West Bank, where Qumran is located, and East Jerusalem including the Old City.
Managing the Market The discovery and a description of the Scrolls were first presented to the scholarly world during 1948 and 1949 in learned journals. It was through such publications that G. W. L. Harding (Chief Curator [later, Director] of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan) and Fr. Roland de Vaux (President of the Board of Trustees of the Palestine Archaeological Museum) first learnt about this important discovery. Since the discovery of any antiquities ought to have been reported to the Jordanian Department of Antiquities immediately, both were understandably angry. It was entirely illegal for George and the Bedouin to carry out private treasure hunting, and they probably damaged and lost many artefacts that would have been important for research. Even more disturbingly – and unknown to Harding and de Vaux – Archbishop Samuel had decided to take the Scrolls in his possession to the United States. Mar Samuel was able to realize his plans in 1948 when the Patriarch appointed him Apostolic Delegate to the United States and Canada. With everyone distracted by the war, Samuel made his way to Beirut, where he collected the scrolls from storage and boarded the S. S. Excalibur. The Dead Sea Scrolls were transported, hidden in the Metropolitan’s luggage, to the United States. Those were the Scrolls later acquired for Israel by Sukenik’s son, Yigael Yadin, in 1954 and returned to Israel. A serious controversy arose over the failure to notify the authorities on the part of the Bedouin and Kando, but especially Sukenik, Trever, Brownlee and Burrows had
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broken the law. Harding was on the verge of prosecuting those he could. Eventually, however, Harding and de Vaux realized that scrolls discovered subsequently would never be recovered through official channels. It is against this background that a system of accommodation with the facts on the ground was drawn up in liaison with Yusef Saad, Curator of the Palestine Archaeological Museum. An agreement was entered with Kando, the Bedouins’ main contact, stipulating that if he would give first right of refusal to the Palestine Archaeological Museum for purchase of any scrolls coming on to the antiquities market, neither he nor his sources, would be prosecuted. The ‘Harding-de Vaux Plan’ bore fruit almost immediately. During the spring of 1950, Saad succeeded in purchasing further fragments from Kando in Bethlehem. Without fully realizing what they had done, Harding and de Vaux had put in place an apparatus for saving most of the scrolls discovered during the next decade.
The First Phase of Publications Publication of the Dead Sea Scrolls went in three different directions from the beginning, mainly because by 1950 there were three separate collections. a. In the new State of Israel Sukenik had at his disposal three scrolls: Isaiahb, the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah], and the Thanksgiving Scroll [→37 Hodayot; Appendix C]. He began to prepare publications consisting of photographs, transcriptions and lists of textual variants. b. In the United States Trever, Brownlee and Millar Burrows had been given permission by Mar Samuel to publish photographs and transcriptions of three scrolls: Isaiaha, Manual of Discipline [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], Habakkuk Commentary [→44 Pesharim; Appendix C]. A fourth scroll also in the possession of Mar Samuel, the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon], was not yet unrolled. c. In Jordan, Harding and de Vaux had ambitious publication plans with Oxford University Press and assigned two young scholars based at the École Biblique in Jerusalem, Fathers D. Barthélemy and J. T. Milik, to edit the texts. Exceedingly gifted both worked fast and efficiently, setting the standard for future volumes. The first volume of the new OUP Series Discoveries in the Judaean Desert was sent to the press in 1953, and appeared in 1955 (Barthélemy and Milik, 1955).
Further Discoveries While Barthélemy and Milik were editing DJD 1 the discovery and purchase of substantial new hoards at Wadi Murabba’at and Caves 2–6, particularly Cave 4, completely overwhelmed the financial resources of the Palestine Archaeological Museum [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. Large numbers of fragments were purchased under the agreement with local treasure hunters, and money began to be scarce. In addition, what was to be done with thousands of fragments now in the
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possession of the Museum? In the spring of 1953, just as Barthélemy and Milik were finalizing DJD 1, Barthélemy became seriously ill and returned to France leaving Milik as the only experienced scrolls scholar in Jordan. Harding and de Vaux decided to enlarge the team of scholars appointed to work specifically on the thousands of fragments from Cave 4. Harding took charge of the appointment of the Cave 4 Team. The team was to be composed of two representatives from each of the four prominent schools of archaeology represented on the Museum’s Board: French, American, British and German. The political situation made it impossible to include representation from Israel. Harding contacted each of the four schools. The École Biblique put forward Milik and Fr. Jean Starcky. The American Schools’ members were Frank Moore Cross Jr. and Fr. Patrick Skehan. The British contingent was made up of John Strugnell and John Allegro. The German School was represented by Claus-Hunno Hunzinger. Initially the team numbered seven and was brought to eight a few years later with the addition of a third member from the French School, Fr. Maurice Baillet. This team of five junior and two senior scholars began their work during an exhilarating time as new discoveries and new identifications of fragments were an almost daily occurrence. Fragments were fitted together, documents were reconstructed [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts], biblical and other previously known texts were identified, and a whole world of previously unknown Jewish literature emerged from the past. Little by little groups of manuscripts emerged: biblical texts in Hebrew [→55 Bible], biblical texts in paleo-Hebrew script, non-biblical Hebrew texts, non-biblical Aramaic texts, etc. [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. A system evolved by which manuscripts were grouped in ‘lots’ on the basis of content, language, script or a combination of these, and ‘assigned’ to each team member by consensus. Those ‘assignments,’ casual at first, became increasingly firm until some years later they came to be jealously guarded. In the various archives of letters surviving from those first two years there is evidence of a warm camaraderie among the members of the international team. Towards the end of 1955 one begins to gauge tensions emerging. British team member John Allegro became persuaded that elements in the scrolls called into question the very foundations of Christianity. Like many formerly enthusiastic religious adherents he was now ardently against what he had once defended. His fellow team members did not share his views about the scrolls and challenged him to substantiate his claims. Allegro publicized his views both in print and on air, making what other team members contended were unfounded, even dishonest, claims. On 16 March 1956 in an open letter to the Times of London several team members distanced themselves from him and his views. Increasingly heated accusations were exchanged, and Allegro whipped both himself and the public into a frenzy of suspicion about conspiracies of silence and deception. Allegro was an exceedingly prolific popular writer, and to his credit he was the first of the Cave 4 team to publish his texts in Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series (DJD 5) in 1968. However, scholars noted shortcomings in the edition, and DJD 5 is currently being revised (see Brooke and Høgenhaven, 2011). Meanwhile the remainder of the team avoided publicity and controversy. They worked hard and were productive, especially Milik and Strugnell, whose personal situations enabled them to
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live in Jerusalem nearly full-time. More than the difficulty of the work itself, personal and professional factors slowed down progress during those early years. Those were the normal vicissitudes of life. Political events continued to impact upon the work of the team, including relocating the scrolls for safe keeping to Amman during the Suez crisis where they were inaccessible from 1956–7. Upon their return to Jerusalem a number of scrolls had suffered damage, and the German team member Hunzinger spent much of the summer of 1957 cleaning them.
After 1967 The project was essentially in limbo for several years after 1967; Benoit succeeded de Vaux as editor-in-chief in 1971. Over a period of years, Israel, first through its Department of Antiquities and Museums, later reorganized as the Antiquities Authority, assumed responsibility for the safe keeping, publication and conservation of the scrolls. In the 1970s and into the 1980s impatience with the seemingly slow pace of publication started to grow. By the late 1980s outrage over the delayed publication of Cave 4 scrolls was championed by the Biblical Archaeology Review. This delay and the inevitable conspiracy theories it engendered were the subject of several books and articles in scholarly journals as well as the popular press. Scrolls scholars were bombarded with criticism, much of it ill-informed. The truth was that work had been ongoing. The team had been slightly expanded, albeit somewhat belatedly. Cross and Strugnell supervised a number of dissertations on the Scrolls at Harvard, many of which served as the basis for subsequent publications, though they themselves were not as prolific. Strugnell, who began taking over officially as editor-in-chief only in 1984–5 was blamed for all the ‘sins of the fathers.’ Many of his critics still do not realize he was editor-in-chief for only a little more than five years, and that in no small degree his years at the helm, during which only one volume appeared, bore fruit on the next editor’s watch. Nevertheless, by the summer of 1990 his personal and professional struggles had called into question his ability to continue to lead the publication team as editor-in-chief. In one sense the story of the publication of the Scrolls has been a microcosm of life. It was not a perfect project and it was not run by perfect people. By October 1991 matters had reached breaking point and something had to be done. The final decision to make the scrolls accessible to the public was made by the Director of the Israel Antiquities Authority, Amir Drori, the Authority’s Scrolls Oversight Committee, and the new editor-in-chief, Prof. Emanuel Tov of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. An edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls on microfiche, edited by Tov with the collaboration of S. Pfann, was published in 1993 by Brill and IDC . The microfiches contained more than 3,000 photographs of the scrolls from Qumran and other sites in the Judean Desert [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. The publication team was eventually expanded to nearly 100 members from many countries, representing diverse branches of Christianity and Judaism, and in some cases, no religion at all. This national and religious diversity led to a long international
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cooperation on a level many organizations and countries can only dream about. What others have talked about, the Dead Sea Scrolls Publication Team has actually accomplished: an almost seamless interfaith, international working relationship with few difficulties based on differences of religion, race or nationality. The official publication series Discoveries in the Judaean Desert now numbers 40 volumes [→Appendix C].
Conserving the Scrolls The first decades of scroll research were largely consumed with putting fragmentary pieces back together, categorizing, transcribing and deciphering [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture; 16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. Little, however, was accomplished in the area of long-term conservation. During the early 1990s the Israel Antiquities Authority set up a conservation laboratory specifically to restore and, as much as possible, preserve the Scrolls for future generations. After more than a decade of work, it is estimated that it will take another twenty years or more to complete the process.
The Significance of the Scrolls The Scrolls from the Qumran caves are commonly sorted into three groups: ‘biblical’ manuscripts [→55 Bible], sectarian compositions (one of which was known before 1947 [→35 Damascus Document]), and other Jewish literature (some of which was previously known about in translation [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]). Each category has significance. First, the implications for improved understandings of the formation and transmission of the Jewish scriptural texts quickly became apparent. Notably, the Scrolls have provided the earliest forms of many passages of the books now found in the Hebrew Bible. Before their discovery there was no complete form of the Hebrew Bible earlier than the ninth century ce . The scriptural scrolls from the Qumran caves demonstrate the faithful continuity of the medieval Hebrew Bibles with their textual predecessors in the Late Second Temple Period. But the manuscripts from the Qumran caves also demonstrate numerous differences from the later medieval copies. Some of those differences contribute to the view that some of the biblical books, such as Exodus and Jeremiah existed in at least two editions in antiquity. Other differences from the medieval copies are a wide range of minor variant readings, some of which are deliberate and some of which are errors. In some cases, the error can now be seen in the medieval Bibles. So, for example, Psalm 145 in 11QPsa [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] the LXX and the Syriac tradition contains a full acrostic, including a verse for the letter nun (‘The LORD is faithful in all his promises and loving toward all he has made;’ NIV ) which is now included in several modern translations; the verse is absent from MT, which probably reflects an early scribal error, an accident of omission.
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Second, the sectarian compositions provide evidence for the movement that collected the Scrolls together and deposited them in the caves. Because the Scrolls are Jewish, mostly penned in the late first century bce and early first century ce , it is not surprising that scholars from the outset began to make comparisons and connections between the Scrolls and Judaism [→10 Scrolls and Early Judaism; 20 Historiography], as well as especially with Jesus and early Christianity as reflected in the New Testament [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. The many similarities in terminology between some parts of the New Testament and the sectarian scrolls show, at least, that much in the Gospels in particular is authentically Jewish. In social practice too there are overlaps, such as the sharing of property or ‘community of goods’ [→73 Daily Life], though precisely how such practices took place is still under investigation. However, it is important to stress that such similarities do not necessarily indicate any direct influence or connection from the Scrolls to early Christian communities. And there are obvious differences too that need to be accounted for, not least with regard to attitudes to meal practices, the observance of the Sabbath [→58 Halakhah], and the application of purity regulations [→70 Purity and Holiness]. Third, the non-scriptural and non-sectarian Jewish literature from the Qumran caves can be read as strongly indicating some facets of the diversity of Judaism in the Late Second Temple Period to be set alongside other sources. This literature indicates interests amongst some Jews in the patriarchs [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] in Enochic traditions [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], and in particular genealogies of priesthood [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. There are also various views on resurrection and messianic expectation [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms].
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. and J. Høgenhaven (eds) (2011), The Mermaid and the Partridge: Essays from the Copenhagen Conference on Revising Texts from Cave Four. STDJ 96. Leiden: Brill. Collins, J. J. (2012), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Biography. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Davies, P. R., G. J. Brooke, und P. R. Callaway (2002), Qumran: Die Schriftrollen vom Toten Meer. Trans. A. Bertram. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Davies, P. R., G. J. Brooke, and P. R. Callaway (2011), The Complete World of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 2nd edn. London: Thames and Hudson. Fields, W. W. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Short History. Leiden: Brill. Fields, W. W. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. Vol. I. Leiden: Brill. Mebarki, F. and E. Puech (2004), Les Manuscrits de la Mer Morte. Paris: Poche. Samuel, A. Y. (1966), Treasure of Qumran: My Story of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philadelphia: Westminster. Trever, J. C. (1965), The Untold Story of Qumran. Westwood, NJ : Revell. VanderKam, J. C. (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls Today. 2nd edn. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. VanderKam, J. C. and P. Flint (2002), The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Significance for Understanding the Bible, Judaism, Jesus and Christianity. London: T & T Clark. Yadin, Y. (1957), The Message of the Scrolls. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
5
Scholarly and Popular Reception Matthew A. Collins
Introduction For more than two-thirds of a century, the Dead Sea Scrolls have left a trail of intrigue and controversy in their wake. They have had an immeasurable impact, not only within the realms of academia and scholarship, but also upon the wider world, thanks to the widespread permeation of the Scrolls into popular culture. On the one hand, they have provided scholars with a previously unimaginable wealth of textual material from the Second Temple Period (538 bce –70 ce ) shedding light, for instance, on the literature and social, political and religious world of the period, as well as the transmission history of scriptural texts [→55 Bible]. On the other, the infamy resulting from years of restricted access and the consequent perceived secrecy surrounding their content has made the Scrolls attractive to a fascinated public, for whom ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls’ constitutes ‘a cultural “buzz-phrase” signifying mystery, conspiracy, and ancient or hidden knowledge’ (Collins, 2011, p. 227). Indeed, both the extent to which the Scrolls have permeated the public sphere and the position which they occupy can be aptly demonstrated by their inclusion in the studio set design for the popular BBC quiz programme QI (‘Quite Interesting’ [prod. John Lloyd and Piers Fletcher; BBC , 2003–]). A section of the large Cave 1 manuscript of the Hodayot (the Thanksgiving Hymns [→37 Hodayot]) appears in a prominent position directly behind the host, Stephen Fry, alongside an astrological chart, the Rosetta Stone, and a series of scientific equations (see Figure 5.1). The original image was of 1QHa 17–19 (Series 1–4 [2003–6]), later replaced, due to licensing costs, with a composite image comprising parts of 1QHa 16, 17 and 19 (Series 5 onwards [2007–]). That viewers have one of the Dead Sea Scrolls staring them in the face for most of the duration of the programme (whether they are aware of it or not) is ‘quite interesting’ in itself, but for those who do recognize it, the choice of this image and the context in which it is depicted are also rather telling, betraying an implicit association with higher learning and obscure or concealed knowledge. How have the Dead Sea Scrolls come to occupy this conceptual space in the public consciousness, and how might we begin to examine and explain the impact they continue to have upon both the academic and popular spheres?
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Figure 5.1 The studio set design for QI (BBC , 2003–), including the composite Hodayot image used from Series 5 onwards (2007–). © TalkBack Thames (with thanks to Andy Spence, Jonathan Paul Green and Stephen Fry).
The Popularization of the Scrolls The significance of the Scrolls for scholarship is immediately apparent, though the nature of this impact is something we shall unpack in more detail shortly. However, perhaps less obvious is how a collection of ancient and heavily fragmented Hebrew, Aramaic and (very few) Greek manuscripts [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek] have managed to become so well-known outside of academia. It was the American literary critic Edmund Wilson who, in 1955, wrote an extensive article for The New Yorker entitled ‘A Reporter at Large: The Scrolls from the Dead Sea’ (14 May 1955 [pp. 45–131]), reporting at length on the recent findings from Qumran. This article formed the basis for his subsequent book, The Scrolls from the Dead Sea (W. H. Allen, 1955; later revised and expanded as The Dead Sea Scrolls 1947–1969 [W. H. Allen, 1969]), specifically written for the lay public. Although the Scrolls had made regular appearances in the popular media since the April 1948 announcement of their discovery (see Du Toit and Kalman, 2010, pp. 24–5), it is Wilson’s book which is usually
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deemed to have had the greatest impact in terms of bringing the Scrolls to the masses and transforming ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls’ into a household name. The original book ‘remained near the top of the bestseller lists from the time of its publication in the fall of 1955 until the summer of 1956’ (Silberman, 1995, p. 123). Indeed, Lawrence Schiffman suggests that Wilson (who brought André Dupont-Sommer’s views about the possible Essene origins of Christianity to public attention): because of his substantial reputation, influenced all subsequent development of the depiction of the scrolls in the popular media. . . . In light of this article and its formative influence, it has been extremely difficult to achieve a hearing for scrolls research in the media that is not integrally – indeed directly – connected to issues of Christian origins. Schiffman, 2005, pp. 27–8
The Christian angle was similarly promoted by John M. Allegro, a member of the official editorial team, whose concerted popularizing efforts (largely in the form of books, lectures and radio broadcasts) contributed to a growing lay association of the Scrolls with the anticipation of earth-shattering revelations about the origins of Christianity. The public clash between Allegro and the rest of the editorial team (exemplified by opposing letters to The Times on 16 and 20 March 1956), coupled with the painfully-slow publication process and secretive ‘closed-door’ policy of the early editors, only served to reaffirm accusations of suppression, conspiracy and cover-up in the popular imagination (what Schiffman terms an ‘inversion of reality’ [2005, p. 28]), further fuelling public fascination with these apparently ‘hidden’ texts [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. Despite the presence of more balanced popular introductions to the Scrolls (see Du Toit and Kalman, 2010), books such as Michael Baigent and Richard Leigh’s The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception (Jonathan Cape, 1991) were able to capitalize on (and indeed feed) existing sensationalist understandings of the Scrolls’ significance. As the heated debate over access to the Scrolls reached a climax in the early 1990s, so too did public interest, with the popular media making increasingly significant and outspoken contributions to the campaign to ‘liberate’ the Scrolls (Brooke, 2005; Grossman, 2005; Schiffman, 2005). By the time this liberation came about, the Scrolls had already acquired an infamy within the public sphere which lasts to this day. Even with all of the material now freely available, the persistent popular perception continues to be one which views the Scrolls as mysterious and subversive. The price paid for the widespread popularization of these ancient texts has been the overshadowing of reality by their acquired mythic status, resulting in the simple fact that ‘[m]any people have heard of the Dead Sea Scrolls, but few know what they are’ (Lim, 2005, p. 1).
Copyright, Ownership and ‘the Curse of the Scrolls’ Other battles from the rather peculiar history of the Scrolls have also spilled over from the academic realm into the public arena. The much-publicized Qimron v. Shanks
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copyright case (the result of a dispute over the publication of reconstructed fragments of 4QMMT [→41 Miqsat Maʿaseh ha-Torah]) went to the District Court of Jerusalem (1993) and later the Supreme Court of Israel (2000). The subsequent ruling (the establishment of Elisha Qimron’s copyright to the ‘composite text’) has significant implications for the issue of copyright and intellectual property in modern academia – in particular, in relation to the study and reconstruction of ancient texts. Consequently, the lawsuit has since become not only a topic of discussion and debate among Qumran scholars, but also a highly controversial case-study within the field of copyright law itself (e.g. Lim, MacQueen, and Carmichael, 2001; Nimmer, 2001; Tempska, 2002), raising questions of originality, authorship and ownership with respect to textual reconstructions [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. In a similar vein, the publication of Robert Eisenman and Michael Wise’s The Dead Sea Scrolls Uncovered (1992), amid accusations of plagiarism, led to a very public letter of condemnation signed by nineteen scholars (forming the basis for an article in The New York Times [‘New Accusations Erupt Over the Dead Sea Scrolls’; 13 December 1992]) and an impromptu ‘ethics panel discussion’ (more closely resembling a ‘mock trial’) on the first day of a Scrolls conference held at the New York Academy of Sciences (14–17 December 1992). The transcript of this unusual and heated discussion (published in the conference proceedings: Wise, 1994, pp. 455–97) betrays something of the charged atmosphere of the time, revealing the bitterness and striking emotional investment of Scrolls scholars on both sides of the debate. More recently, Scrolls scholarship returned to the media spotlight in 2009–10 with the arrest and trial of Raphael Golb (son of the Scrolls scholar, Norman Golb) for identity theft, criminal impersonation and aggravated harassment in his efforts to promote his father’s theories concerning the origins of the Scrolls and attack the reputations of those scholars who disagree with them (see Davila, 2011). One of his victims, Lawrence Schiffman, characterized Golb’s behaviour as ‘the Curse of the Scrolls’: People lose balance, even scholars . . . It’s like Jerusalem Syndrome, when people go there and think they are biblical figures. From the moment that the Scrolls were found, there have been people who have gone completely overboard. Krausz, n.d.
The controversy and court case were very much played out in the public arena, with ‘The Curse of the Scrolls’ even being employed as the headline for a National Post article on the subject (6 March 2009). In an article in the Chicago Tribune (7 March 2009), Raphael’s father, Norman Golb, commented that ‘This has everything to do with the politics of the scrolls.’ Small wonder then, in the light of all this, that the Scrolls continue to be regarded as scandalous and subversive among the wider community. In the context of questions of ownership, we should not fail to briefly mention the politicization of the Scrolls and their role in ‘national identity formation’ (Kalman and Du Toit, 2010, p. 19). The contested political, historical and geographical nature of the territory in which the Scrolls were written and discovered has led to a variety of competing ownership claims. The majority were nationalized by the Jordanian government in 1961 (replacing previous arrangements to transfer ownership to foreign
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institutions in return for funds) but later acquired by Israel (a rival claimant) as a result of the 1967 Six-Day War. Palestinian officials likewise claim rightful ownership, calling for ‘repatriation of the scrolls’ (2010, p. 131) and the recent boycotting of ‘illegal’ exhibitions (see Palestine House, 2009). The thorny issues of cultural heritage and national property, common to all debates regarding contested ‘movable cultural objects,’ are thus likely to continue to influence discussions concerning ownership or stewardship of the Scrolls (see further Kalman and Du Toit, 2010, pp. 18–20, 123–34).
Academic and Scholarly Impact The discovery of the Scrolls has understandably had a huge impact upon scholarship, especially the fields of Biblical Studies and Jewish Studies. The sudden and unexpected appearance of biblical texts [→55 Bible] 1,000 years older than some of the most prominent hitherto extant manuscripts (along with textual variations, commentaries [→44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation] and so-called ‘rewritten Scripture’ [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]), offered a previously unimaginable wealth of evidence for the development of ‘biblical’ texts and their status in the Second Temple Period, especially as regards issues of fluidity and pluriformity (van der Kooij, 2002). This evidence has in turn influenced post-Qumran Bible translations (Daley, 2002; Scanlin, 2002), with, for instance, the NRSV ’s well-known inclusion of a variant reading from 4QS ama after 1 Sam 10.27. The Scrolls have similarly provided us with rich insights into the religious, historical, literary and social world of the Second Temple Period, information about linguistic developments of the time [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], and a greater understanding of the context and backdrop against which the rabbinic period and even the early Jesus Movement can be understood. While of tremendous significance, we need not dwell upon these aspects here, since each will be addressed in more detail elsewhere in the present volume [→20 Historiography; 6 Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context of the Scrolls; 7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation; 10 Scrolls and Early Judaism; 72 Forms of Community]. More interesting for our immediate purposes, however, are the ways in which scholarship itself has reacted to the discovery. At the fiftieth anniversary of the discovery of the Scrolls, Hartmut Stegemann noted that: . . . there are still very few Hebrew Bible scholars who have begun to include the new Qumran evidence into their framework of describing the interrelationship between the different biblical traditions, sources, books, and their final redactions. Most Hebrew Bible scholars still regard the new Qumran evidence as basically ‘post-canonical’ and of no special interest for them. Stegemann, 2000, p. 947
Despite the seemingly obvious ways in which the Scrolls impact upon existing areas of study, there is still very much a sense that Qumran Studies is yet to be fully integrated within the wider field (see Lange, Tov and Weigold, 2011). The long-drawn-out publication process may have played its part, while its very nature as a separately designated field of study may likewise have hampered its proper contextualization
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within the broader remit of Biblical and Jewish Studies (Collins, 2011, pp. 236–7). The result, according to Edna Ullmann-Margalit, is: . . . the eerie yet pervasive feeling that in dealing with the Dead Sea Scrolls one is facing a sectarian phenomenon not only as regards the authors of the scrolls, but as regards their researchers as well. Ullmann-Margalit, 2008, p. 64
This ‘scholarly sectarianism,’ however, offers us a valuable opportunity to turn our attention to the internal processes of Scrolls scholarship itself (‘not the scrolls but the study of the scrolls; . . . research about scrolls research’ [Ullmann-Margalit, 2006, p. 17]). Into this category would fall those works which attempt to record and document (through interviews and archival work) a reflective history of Scrolls scholarship (e.g. Fields, 2009; Kalman and Du Toit, 2010; Lyons, 2013) or endeavour to examine objectively trends and agendas within Scrolls scholarship, both chronologically (across the last seventy or more years) and regionally (across the globe) (e.g. Dimant, 2012; Nickelsburg et al., 1999). Weston W. Fields observes that ‘there is frequently a skewed view of who made what important decisions, or took significant actions, even of when, and why’ (2009, p. 17). By contrast, such examinations, focusing on Scrolls scholarship itself, have begun to open up the field to an engagement in ‘self-reflective’ critical analysis, shedding light upon the inner workings and dynamics of scholarly processes, in the hope of leading to a deeper, more nuanced understanding of the impact the Scrolls have had within the academic realm.
Popular and Cultural Impact The popularization of the Scrolls and the prevalent public impression that they are in some manner the source of controversy and conspiracy has resulted in an arguably disproportionate degree of public interest and thus their widespread permeation into popular culture. These popular representations of the Scrolls often have little or no relation to any academic reflections upon the material (though may on occasion present themselves as such – a phenomenon we might term ‘pseudo-scholarship’). However, the diverse means by which they have infiltrated the public imagination and cultural sub-consciousness (as typified in the QI set design discussed previously), as well as the manner of their representation, make such appearances a useful indicator of the nature of the popular and cultural impact they have had. A widely available greetings card depicting a group of squirrels in a dark room, with the caption, ‘Suddenly, in a cave, they discovered the Dead Sea Squirrels,’ can only exist because of the assumption that the phrase ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ is commonplace enough for the pun to be recognized (card #410 www.simondrew.co.uk). The card relies upon the public’s ability to recognize and respond to a humorous reference to the Scrolls, though neither requires nor evidences any knowledge of their content. Maxine Grossman makes a similar observation: Consider the iconic New Yorker cartoon (‘Who could have imagined that such a wonderful recipe for brownies would be hidden away in the Dead Sea Scrolls?’) . . .
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The cartoon is funny because we know that a recipe for brownies would never be found in these ancient texts, but its resonance lies in the perception that no one really knows what is ‘hidden away’ in them. Grossman, 2005, pp. 75–6
Grossman concludes that the Scrolls have become ‘open signifiers’: ‘a category whose basic frame is recognizable (“ancient documents found in the region of the Dead Sea”) but whose specific content is not’ (2005, p. 76). In end effect, recognition (and thus both impact and frequency of usage) of the term‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ tends to be disproportionate to the general level of understanding as to their true nature and content. As a result, they are particularly vulnerable to ‘unorthodox’ interpretation (or decontextualized reinterpretation) in popular retellings and representations. Some examples of the Scrolls’ employment in non-academic contexts might help to illustrate the manner and breadth of their popular and cultural impact. Within the literary genre of ‘religio-thriller’ (infamously epitomized by Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code [Doubleday, 2003]), no novel seems to be complete without the inclusion of some (often inaccurate) reference to the Dead Sea Scrolls, most commonly in the context of Christian origins. The Da Vinci Code mentions the Scrolls only briefly (ch. 55) but suggests that they contain lost apocryphal gospels, thus erroneously associating them with the Nag Hammadi manuscripts. Others, such as Elizabeth Peters’ The Dead Sea Cipher (Dodd, 1970), Peter Hernon’s Earthly Remains (Carol, 1989), Daniel Easterman’s The Judas Testament (HarperCollins, 1994), Graham Joyce’s Requiem (Tor, 1995), or Eliette Abécassis’ The Qumran Mystery (Orion Books, 1998), give a more central role to the Scrolls but likewise connect them primarily with early Christianity and the Jesus Movement. Each concerns some discovery which challenges or threatens to undermine traditional Christian doctrine, with an ensuing conflict between protagonist, attempting to uncover the truth, and antagonist (usually the religious authorities), attempting to suppress the discovery. The influence of Edmund Wilson and John M. Allegro’s brand of scrolls popularization can be detected here, most notably in Philip K. Dick’s The Transmigration of Timothy Archer (Timescape, 1982) which even explores some of the outlandish theories in Allegro’s The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross (Hodder & Stoughton, 1970) regarding the use of psychotropic mushrooms in early Christianity. In similar fashion, it is Robert Feather’s fringe theories about links between the Copper Scroll and the pharaoh Akhenaten (The Mystery of the Copper Scroll of Qumran [Bear & Co., 2003]) which form the basis of Will Adams’ novel The Exodus Quest (Harper, 2008). In all of these examples (to name but a few), Dead Sea Scrolls fiction would appear to draw far more readily upon the sensational and revisionary than upon mainstream scholarship, resulting in the further perpetuation of such perceptions of the Scrolls (further Kissinger, 1998; Segal, 2000 and 2002). The Japanese anime series Neon Genesis Evangelion (dir. H. Anno; 1995–6) focuses on the apocalypse and, in doing so, utilizes an abundance of religious symbolism, drawing primarily upon the Judeo-Christian tradition. The Dead Sea Scrolls play a prominent role, being apparently of extra-terrestrial origin and said to contain prophecies concerning the coming apocalypse and the arrival of the ‘Angels’. The series explains that only those scrolls which were deemed insignificant were slowly released to the public, while others were kept back, thus attempting to account for the
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delays and accusations regarding the publication of the real Scrolls. Another bizarre occurrence of the Scrolls is in episode 5, season 3 of the U.S. television series Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman, titled ‘Just Say Noah’ (dir. D. Jackson; aired 22 October 1995). In the context of a modern retelling of the flood narrative, Superman discovers part of a ‘Dead Sea Scroll’ (albeit torn from a codex) and asks a medium, channelling an ancient philosopher, to help him decipher it. The popular impression that the Scrolls are in some way significant, even if the true nature of that significance is not widely understood, seems to lie behind the rather peculiar choice of including Qumran Cave 4 in the music video for Greg Lake’s 1975 Christmas hit, ‘I Believe in Father Christmas’ (Atlantic Records). As Lake stands with a guitar at the entrance to the cave while singing ‘I believe in Father Christmas; I look to the sky with excited eyes,’ it is hard to know quite what to make of this unusual association. Elsewhere, the Scrolls feature prominently in the lyrics to the Manic Street Preachers song ‘So Why So Sad’ (from Know Your Enemy [Epic Records, 2001]). The chorus ends with the line ‘Searchin’ for the Dead Sea Scrolls, so why, so why so sad?’ and, in the context of the rest of the song, seems to identify this with a more general search for truth, happiness or meaning. Kim Cunio’s album Music of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Lotus Foot, 2000) undertakes to set the actual texts of certain scrolls to musical accompaniment (see Cunio, 2002), a far cry from the Bollock Brothers album The Dead Sea Scrolls (SPV Records, 1991; remastered and re-released, MBC Records, 2001), whose eponymous penultimate track, ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls’, attempts something similar but (somewhat inexplicably) uses Revelation 20–21 (specifically, 20:1–6a, 7–8a, 10, 12, 14–15; 21:1–2, 9b–11a [KJV ]). This would again seem to support Grossman’s characterization of the Scrolls as ‘open signifiers’ (2005, p. 76). Artistic works inspired by the Scrolls have tended to be far less given over to the sensational than, say, the works of fiction mentioned above. Lika Tov, for instance, utilizes the distinct shapes of the fragments themselves in order to create images: . . . they stimulated my imagination, as in a Rorschach-test. . . . As one watches clouds and sees images in them, I studied the shapes of the fragments that looked special to me. Tov, 2010, pp. 29–30
Tov often draws simultaneously upon the content of the Scrolls, for instance using the shape of 4Q252 frag. 1 (chronicling the biblical flood) in a depiction of Noah’s ark (see Figure 5.2 and http://www.likatov.info/). Another artist to find inspiration in the Scrolls is Shraga Weil, whose colourful abstract illustrations of the Scrolls and Qumran community adorn the Limited Editions Club edition of Geza Vermes’ The Dead Sea Scrolls (Westerham Press, 1966, see http://www.safrai.com/liste. php?artist=11). Similarly, one might note Joshua Neustein’s art installation at the Royal Ontario Museum (Toronto, Canada), ‘Margins: Contemporary Art Unraveling the Dead Sea Scrolls’. Running from 27 June 2009 to 28 March 2010 (and specially commissioned to coincide with the Scrolls exhibition there [‘Dead Sea Scrolls: Words that Changed the World’, 27 June 2009–3 January 2010]), the stated goal of the project was to ‘[shape] a dialogue with the historical and cultural contexts of the
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Figure 5.2 Lika Tov, ‘Noah’s Ark in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ (utilising 4Q252 frag. 1, chronicling the biblical flood). © Lika Tov.
Dead Sea Scrolls . . . [p]ositioning the themes of the Scrolls within a contemporary discourse’ (cited in http://www.rom.on.ca/en/exhibitions-galleries/exhibitions/pastexhibitions/joshua-neustein-margins-contemporary-art). One particularly interesting (and surprisingly informative) occurrence of the Scrolls within popular culture is a ‘Peanuts’ comic strip from Christmas 1962 (see Figure 5.3). As Charlie Brown, Linus and Lucy walk to school, Linus reveals that he has brought homemade facsimiles of the Dead Sea Scrolls for ‘show and tell,’ prompting Charlie Brown to think twice about his ‘little red fire engine.’ Written and illustrated by creator Charles M. Schulz, the strip suggests that Linus has copied 1QIsaa (cols 31–33) and 4QS amb (frgs 5–7). Although the fragments depicted in the strip do not match up, the descriptions themselves are fairly accurate, conveying in just a few lines basic information about the physical construction, the relative dating, the scriptural content and their importance for modern scholars. Only the comment that ‘it might be at least faintly appropriate to the season’ betrays a residual inherent association with Christianity. The phenomenon of modern esoteric movements presenting themselves as a continuation of the Essenes (often attempting to embody the teachings found in the Dead Sea Scrolls) is indicative of the wider impact the Scrolls have had. Some groups, such as ‘The International College of Essene Healing’ (https://www.naturaltherapypages.co.nz/ therapist/2091) and ‘The Modern Essenes’ (http://www.treeoflifefoundation.org/service/ peace/modern-essenes/) focus on the supposed healing abilities of the Essenes, while others, such as ‘The Essene Church of Christ’ (http://www.essene.org/), ‘The Nazarenes of Mount Carmel’ (http://essene.com/), ‘The Nazarean Essene Order of Mount Carmel, UK’
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Figure 5.3 A Peanuts comic strip from Christmas 1962. PEANUTS © 1962 Peanuts Worldwide, LLC . (https://nazareanessene.co.uk/) and ‘The Essenia Foundation’ (http://www.essenespirit. com/), associate the Essenes in some way with the early Jesus Movement. The Scrolls similarly form the foundation for Kenneth Hanson’s self-help book Words of Light: Spiritual Wisdom from the Dead Sea Scrolls (Council Oak Books, 2000), which draws upon passages from the texts in order to provide ‘a handbook of spiritual living.’ In discussing Hanson’s book, Grossman notes ‘the centrality of spiritual seekers as audiences for the scrolls, at least in the context of this sort of interpretation’ (2005, p. 86). The extent of the popular and cultural impact of the Dead Sea Scrolls can likewise be seen in the wider use and employment of the name itself. The media and internet have given us: ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Buddhism,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of John Dillinger,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Information,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Rock,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of IT,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Genomics,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Nature Conservation,’ ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Fort Lee’ and ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls of Fairy Tales,’ to name but a few.* Timothy H. Lim suggests that: * ‘DSS of Buddhism’ (The Independent [20 November 2004]); ‘DSS of John Dillinger’ (http:// therumpus.net/2009/07/the-dead-sea-scrolls-of-john-dillinger/ [2 July 2009]); ‘DSS of Information’ (http://www.bnpositive.com/blog/dead-sea-scrolls-of-information/ [30 October 2009]); ‘DSS of Rock’ (http://www.thestar.com/entertainment/movies/article/782787--film-of–1964-show-is-thedead-sea-scrolls-of-rock [20 March 2010]); ‘DSS of IT ’ (http://mrpogson.com/2011/10/17/us-doj-vm-the-dead-sea-scrolls-of-it/ [17 October 2011]); ‘DSS of Genomics’ (http://blogs.discovermagazine. com/gnxp/2011/10/otzi-the-dead-sea-scrolls-of-genomics/ [24 October 2011]); ‘DSS of Nature Conservation’ (http://www.greenprophet.com/2011/11/hula-painted-frog/ [20 November 2011]); ‘DSS of Fort Lee’ (http://fortlee.patch.com/articles/the-dead-sea-scrolls-of-fort-lee#photo–8940467 [20 January 2012]); ‘DSS of Fairy Tales’ (http://thehairpin.com/2012/03/the-dead-sea-scrolls-offairy-tales [8 March 2012]).
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. . . the Dead Sea Scrolls have taken on a symbolic status. They are no longer just the scrolls of a Jewish sect that lived by the Dead Sea, but represent any important discovery of ancient manuscripts. Lim, 2005, pp. 2–3
The examples we have just listed, however, would appear to suggest that the cultural application of the term ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ is in fact even wider. In the public consciousness, the phrase ‘Dead Sea Scrolls’ can justifiably be used of any discovery (manuscript or otherwise) of perceived significance (e.g. the Hula painted frog [‘the DSS of Nature Conservation’]) or any relic of a bygone era (e.g. phonebooks [‘the DSS of Information’]). The term is thus simultaneously both meaningful and meaningless; there is some agreement as to its parameters and general associations, but sufficient lack of specificity as to allow terminologically-nonsensical wider application. This brief overview of some of the ways in which the Scrolls have been employed in non-academic contexts suggests that they are largely recognizable within the popular sphere and there is a widespread sense that they are important and of significance, but, broadly speaking at least, there is often a lack of clarity about the true nature of that significance. Since popular representations are generally more readily accessible to the public than academic ones, the result is the self-perpetuation of such misconceptions and thus, if unchecked, the continuation (and engendering) of public confusion about the Scrolls. It is in this context that the issue of education and knowledge transfer comes to the fore.
Education and Knowledge Transfer While we here have space to give only the briefest of overviews, a further indication of the wider impact the Scrolls have had can be found by examining the ‘official’ channels through which information about the Scrolls is relayed to the public. Over the past two-thirds of a century, it has become increasingly clear that ‘[t]he gap between academic scholarship and popular understandings of the scrolls is a void which is in continual need of being re-bridged’ (Collins, 2011, p. 241; see also Mahan, 2005; Du Toit and Kalman, 2010). Particular attention has been paid to the role played by public exhibitions of the Scrolls, television documentaries and the news media (e.g. Brooke, 2005; Collins, 2011; Roitman, 2001; Schiffman, 2005). However, against the backdrop of scholarly disagreement and diversity, it is important to recognize that any such process is forced to be selective about the information it includes and omits, and thus the narrative it presents. As George J. Brooke notes, ‘the multi-faceted truth would be hard to tell’ (2005, p. 40). Moreover, in each case the level of academic control over the selection of material and the manner of its presentation varies. Generally speaking, scholars might be quite heavily involved with the establishment of an exhibition, but have little or no influence on the final shape of a newspaper article. The resulting difficulty in identifying the agenda behind a particular presentation can make it much harder for an unsuspecting public to discern between mainstream theories and fringe ideas, since both can be presented as equally authoritative. However,
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a quick glance at the examples above, demonstrating the extent to which the Scrolls have permeated the public consciousness, may suggest that ‘the sensational is not ipso facto bad’ (Silk, 2005, p. 95). While often a source of irritation for scholars keen to educate the public about the true significance of the scrolls, the flipside of the coin is that it is precisely because of these popular misconceptions (not in spite of them) that we are guaranteed a ready and eager audience outside of the academic sphere. Collins, 2011, p. 245
Nevertheless, there has, particularly in recent years, been a more concerted effort to develop strategies for educating the public about the Scrolls. Adolfo D. Roitman (Curator of the Dead Sea Scrolls at the Shrine of the Book, Jerusalem), suggests that: it has become truly necessary to start developing systematically a new field of expertise, with its own theory and methods: the teaching and popularization of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Roitman, 2011, p. 722
In addition to a series of creative works and educational initiatives taking place at the Shrine of the Book itself (see Roitman, 2011), there has been a marked increase in the use of new technologies and availability of online educational resources (see Hazan, 2011), one significant manifestation of which has been both the Israel Museum’s ‘Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Project’ (http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/) and the Israel Antiquities Authority’s ‘Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library’ (http://www.deadseascrolls. org.il/). Launched in 2011 and 2012 respectively, both in partnership with Google, these involve digitizing the Scrolls and making them freely available online, so that visitors to these websites can access not only information and videos about the texts but also high-resolution searchable images of the Scrolls themselves. It is certainly a far cry from the situation of the late twentieth century and, for both academics and nonacademics alike, a clear and welcome indication of how far Scrolls scholarship has come.
Conclusions The Dead Sea Scrolls continue to have a significant and far-reaching impact both within the academic and popular spheres. The different ‘rules’ governing academic and popular discourse (Grossman, 2005) can lead and have led to differences of interpretation and perception, resulting in what may at times seem like a yawning chasm between the two – a chasm which educational initiatives have often sought to bridge. Although their significance for scholarship is clear and undisputed, there is no inherent reason why this obscure collection of ancient and heavily fragmented Hebrew and Aramaic manuscripts should have captured the public imagination in quite the way it has. Indeed, given the frequently occurring misapprehension within popular
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culture that the Scrolls contain scandalous revelations about Jesus and early Christianity, it is curious (to say the least) that, while many people may well have heard of the Dead Sea Scrolls, it is likely that far fewer would recognize the term ‘Nag Hammadi.’ The fact that these texts were discovered just two years before the Scrolls and do contain ‘new’ (often controversial) accounts of Jesus and his teachings, at odds with those of the canonical gospels, makes the apparent disparity between the popular impact of the two collections all the more surprising. We may hazard, however, that contrasting the relatively straightforward publication of the Nag Hammadi texts (far fewer in number and better preserved, and available in facsimile and in English translation by the 1970s) with the years of restricted access to the Scrolls (and the increasingly-public media-charged campaign to ‘liberate’ them) provides us with at least part of the answer. The Scrolls were considered scandalous before people even knew what was in them. As a result, they have come to play a disproportionately prominent role in popular culture and the public imagination, attesting to an ongoing widespread engagement and fascination with these ancient manuscripts. No matter what one may think of the diverse ways in which they have been used and appropriated, one thing remains clear – the world’s love affair with the Dead Sea Scrolls is far from over.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘The Scrolls in the British media (1987–2002),’ DSD, 12, 38–51. Collins, M. A. (2011), ‘Examining the reception and impact of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Some possibilities for future investigation,’ DSD, 18, 226–46. Cunio, K. (2002), ‘Music of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Baghdadian Jewish music oral tradition as the basis for realizing texts of the Qumran Sectarians (Essenes),’ Australian Journal of Jewish Studies, 16, 26–40. Daley, S. C. (2002), ‘Textual influence of the Qumran Scrolls on English Bible versions,’ in Herbert and Tov (eds), The Bible as Book, pp. 253–87. Davila, J. R. (2011), ‘The Golb affair’. Religion in the news, 13/2. Online: http://www.trincoll. edu/depts/csrpl/RINVol113No2/GoldAffair.htm Dimant, D. (ed.) (2012), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Scholarly Perspective: A History of Research. STDJ 99. Leiden: Brill. Du Toit, J. S. and J. Kalman, (2010), ‘Albright’s legacy? Homogeneity in the introduction of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the public,’ Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages, 36, 23–48. Fields, W. W. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History. Vol. 1. Leiden: Brill. Grossman, M. L. (2005), ‘Mystery or history : The Dead Sea Scrolls as pop phenomenon,’ DSD, 12, 68–86. Hazan, S. (2011), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls online: Taking on a [second] life of their own,’ in Roitman, Schiffman and Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture, pp. 665–82. Herbert, E. D. and E. Tov (eds) (2002), The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries. London: The British Library. Kalman, J. and J. S. du Toit (2010), Canada’s Big Biblical Bargain: How McGill University Bought the Dead Sea Scrolls. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press.
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Kissinger, J. (1998), ‘Archaeology as “wild magic”: The Dead Sea Scrolls in popular fiction’. Journal of American Culture, 21, 75–81. Krausz, Y. (n.d.), ‘What are the Dead Sea Scrolls? Professor Lawrence Schiffman discusses the Qumran Scrolls.’ Online: http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/1725431/ jewish/What-Are-the-Dead-Sea-Scrolls.htm Lange, A., E. Tov, and M. Weigold (eds) (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures, VTS 140. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Lim, T. H. (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [esp. Chapter 1: ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls as cultural icon’.] Lim, T. H., H. L. MacQueen, and C. M. Carmichael (eds) (2001), On Scrolls, Artefacts and Intellectual Property. JSPS 38. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Lyons, W. J. (2013), ‘Dead Sea Scrolls and Penguins: A Relationship in Fragments,’ in W. Wootten and G. Donaldson (eds), Reading Penguin: A Critical Anthology. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, pp. 65–90. Mahan, J. H. (2005), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls in popular culture: “I can give you no idea of the contents,” ’ DSD, 12, 87–94. Nickelsburg, G. W. E., et al. (1999), ‘Part Two: The intellectual history of scrolls research – An overview with responses,’ in R. A. Kugler and E. M. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls at Fifty. Atlanta, GA : Scholars Press, pp. 77–146. Nimmer, D. (2001), ‘Copyright in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Authorship and originality,’ Houston Law Review, 38, 1–222. Palestine House (2009), ‘Palestine House calls to boycott the Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition at the ROM .’ Online: http://www.marketwire.com/press-release/palestine-house-calls-toboycott-the-dead-sea-scrolls-exhibition-at-the-rom–1009412.htm Roitman, A. D. (2001), ‘Exhibiting the Dead Sea Scrolls: Some historical and theoretical considerations,’ in N. A. Silberman and E. S. Frerichs (eds), Archaeology and Society in the 21st Century: The Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Case Studies. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, pp. 41–66. Roitman, A. D. (2011), ‘The quest for new strategies in teaching and popularizing the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Roitman, Schiffman and Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture, pp. 719–30. Roitman, A. D., L. H. Schiffman and S. Tzoref (eds) (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Proceedings of the International Conference Held at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem (July 6–8, 2008). STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill. Scanlin, H. P. (2002), ‘Text, truth and tradition: The public’s view of the Bible in the light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Herbert and Tov (eds), The Bible as Book, pp. 289–99. Schiffman, L. H. (2005), ‘Inverting reality : The Dead Sea Scrolls in the popular media,’ DSD, 12, 24–37. Schiffman, L. H., E. Tov and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (2000), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years After Their Discovery, 1947–1997. Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20–25, 1997. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Segal, B. L. (2000), ‘Holding fiction’s mirror to the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Schiffman, Tov and VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 906–12. Segal, B. L. (2002), ‘The Copper Scroll: Novel approaches,’ in G. J. Brooke and P. R. Davies (eds), Copper Scroll Studies. JSPS 40. London: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 271–5. Silberman, N. A. (1995), The Hidden Scrolls: Christianity, Judaism, and the War for the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: Book Club Associates. Silk, M. (2005), ‘Why the papers love the scrolls,’ DSD, 12, 95–100.
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Stegemann, H. (2000), ‘Qumran challenges for the next century,’ in Schiffman, Tov and VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 944–50. Tempska, U. (2002), ‘ “Originality” after the Dead Sea Scrolls decision: Implications for the American law of copyright,’ Marquette Intellectual Property Law Review, 6, 119–46. Tov, L. (2010), ‘Some Dead Sea Scrolls fragments as a source of inspiration for my art’, in N. Dávid and A. Lange (eds), Qumran and the Bible: Studying the Jewish and Christian Scriptures in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 29–41. Ullmann-Margalit, E. (2006), Out of the Cave: A Philosophical Inquiry into the Dead Sea Scrolls Research. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press. Ullmann-Margalit, E. (2008), ‘Spotlight on scroll scholars: Dissecting the Qumran-Essene hypothesis’. BAR, 34/2, pp. 63–7. van der Kooij, A. (2002), ‘The textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible before and after the Qumran discoveries,’ in Herbert and Tov (eds), The Bible as Book, pp. 167–77. Wise, M. O., et al. (eds.) (1994), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site. New York Academy of Sciences.
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Context
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6
Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context for the Scrolls Robert Kugler
With few exceptions scholars have understood the people of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Scrolls themselves and the context in which they were situated in religious terms. If read as a coherent corpus, they evince one form of Early Judaism among others; because their views and self-imposed social and physical location meet certain standards, they are further defined as a sect within ancient Judaism [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism]; and as such they should be interpreted largely within the context of the religious ideas of their time and place. This framework, however, overlooks a fundamental fact: if we trust the ancients’ testimony, the human phenomenon we call ‘religion’ and its specific iteration ‘Judaism’ (let alone other ‘religions’) were not categories available to the people of the Scrolls; human imagination had not yet created those taxonomic tools. To be sure, one could argue that just because the people of the Scrolls and their contemporaries had not developed the language for ‘religion’ and ‘Judaism’ does not mean that the corresponding realities were absent. On this view, we are simply using a modern framework to describe a pre-modern reality. But to do so – as we have done for decades – is to bypass an essential step, to first hear out the people of the Scrolls and examine them within the framework that was available to them, that of ethnic identity. In the following I circumscribe how that framework functioned among the peoples of antiquity. I then examine within that framework those aspects of ethnic identity characteristic of the modern construct ‘religion’ as the people of the Scrolls and their neighbours expressed them. As we see below, providing this more appropriate definitional framework helps dispel some of the perennial confusion regarding a variety of aspects of the Qumran movement. First, however, I offer a brief description of three attempts to address in a general way ‘religion in/of the Dead Sea Scrolls’ both as a concise history of scholarship on the topic and as an indicator of the degree to which that scholarly pursuit has, to its detriment, neglected the basic question of locating, let alone defining, ‘religion’ in the ancient world.
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A Brief History of Scholarship The history of scholarship devoted to the religion of the Dead Sea Scrolls is marked by a striking failure to first define ‘religion’ as a human phenomenon. By contrast, in the general academic study of religion the definitional question is almost always the starting point for critical inquiry and almost as often the end point, as well; essentialist notions of religion were long ago abandoned; and the very category of ‘religion’ is viewed in any case as largely a modern construct, a name given to a recurring list of human activities that few in the pre-modern world would have thought of as constituting a part of their existence separable from all other aspects of their being and acting (see Strenski, 2006; Preus, 1987). So it is especially striking that the earliest attempt to address the religion of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Helmer Ringgren’s 1963 The Faith of Qumran, treats ‘religion’ almost entirely as a matter of belief, speaking almost exclusively to theological topics and themes. The volume’s chapter headings speak for themselves: ‘God,’ ‘Dualism,’ ‘Angels and Demons,’ ‘Man,’ ‘Eschatology,’ ‘The Community,’ ‘Identification’ and ‘Relationship with Other Forms of Religion.’ Even the one chapter title that holds out promise of engagement with practice, ‘The Cult,’ mostly offers thoughts on the ideas the Scrolls express, not the acts they mandated. To be sure, in the years following Ringgren’s book, there was no shortage of studies focused on single aspects of what scholars deemed to be ‘religion’ in the Scrolls, but it was nearly four decades before anyone ventured another stand-alone volume dedicated to the general topic of religion of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Collins and Kugler, 2000). The failure to come anywhere near to complete publication of the Scrolls until the end of that period is certainly one reason that scholars eschewed further syntheses like the one offered by Ringgren. Also, as more and more scrolls became available the list of topics one might include under the abidingly unspoken, undefined notions of religion operative among Dead Sea Scrolls scholars repeatedly changed, discouraging new syntheses and encouraging instead more targeted studies of the new and longstanding sub-topics (e.g. calendars [→62 Calendars], ritual [→70 Purity and Holiness], priesthood, etc.). Finally, in 2000 John J. Collins and I published a co-edited volume that, at least by title, constituted a fresh attempt to tackle the broad question of ‘religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ (Collins and Kugler, 2000). Credit goes to Collins for making what remains among the three works surveyed here the only attempt to answer directly the question of what constituted the religion of the Qumran movement. Collins observed that the essays included in the volume, nearly all the result of a conference on the religion of the Dead Sea Scrolls, treat four main topics – the understanding of divinity, halakhic issues [→58 Halakhah], Hellenistic influence in the Scrolls [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation], and apocalypticism and messianism [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. He went on to note that a ‘comprehensive discussion of the religion of the scrolls would need to encompass many other topics,’ including ‘the cultic practice of the community,’‘the evidence for mysticism in the Scrolls,’‘the Bible at Qumran’ (including its form and interpretation among the people of Qumran [→55 Bible]), ‘the nature of the community reflected in Qumran rule books, and its relation to other forms of community organization in the Hellenistic world’ [→72 Forms of Community], ‘the wisdom
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teachings found at Qumran’ [→63 Wisdom], ‘the use of horoscopes and texts that fall under the category of magic, which reflect the popular practices current within the sect, rather than its theology,’ [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons] and ‘the calendar of the Qumran community’ (Collins and Kugler, 2000, pp. 6–7). The advance over Ringgren’s implicit understanding of religion is considerable: Collins is explicit at least in his enumeration of relevant topics that fall under the category embracing both practice and belief. But what Collins and I both neglected to do in that slim volume – as did each of the contributors – was to offer even a rudimentary definition of ‘religion’ that formed the basis for creating a list of sub-topics. The only other attempts to address in a broad way the religion of/in the Dead Sea Scrolls subsequent to our 2000 volume are the collection by Avery-Peck et al. (AveryPeck, Neusner and Chilton, 2001) and a subsequent essay by Alex Jassen on ‘Religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ (Jassen, 2007). The approach by Avery-Peck et al. presupposes a uniform religious system underlying the texts from Qumran. Jassen also offers no definition of religion, although he joins Collins and Kugler in believing that it entails aspects of thought and practice; he focuses his survey of ‘the current state of research on religion at Qumran as articulated in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ on God, dualism, and predestination, eschatology and messianism on the one hand (referred to as matters of thought or belief by Jassen), and on the other hand on the formation of Jewish law, Temple, sacrifice, prayer, ritual, and purity (all referred to as practice, ‘the way that religious ideals of the Qumran community were actualized in daily life,’ Jassen, 2007, pp. 3–4 [→73 Daily Life]). Jassen does acknowledge that this list is not ‘comprehensive’ and that a full treatment of religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls would need to wrestle (at least) with the other topics Collins announced in 2000. In that sense, his essay does not advance beyond the edited volume Collins and I produced seven years earlier, although his lengthy bibliography, though oddly selective, does point to how much work has been done in the years since Ringgren on selected items from the (disparate) lists of topics scholars implicitly assign to the category ‘religion of/in the Dead Sea Scrolls.’
Ethnicity, not Religion In spite of our modern confusion about ‘religion’ as the proper category for thinking about the people of the Scrolls, they and their contemporaries did have a term for the sort of human grouping they exemplified: like other Jews of the era (or Greeks, Persians, Cretans, Scythians, Thracians, Arabs and others), they were an ethnos. A few thinkers have recently made the case for this notion, none more compellingly than Steve Mason (2007; but see also Miller, 2010); while I accept Mason’s judgment that the Jews of the Greco-Roman world were members of an ethnos, not adherents of a religion, I do not embrace replacing the terms ‘Jew’ and ‘Jewish’ with ‘Judean’ (Kugler, 2017, p. 673, n. 2). It suffices to reiterate two central claims made by Mason. First, the Greek term we rely on to posit Judaism in Greco-Roman antiquity, Ioudaismos, is scarce among Jewish writers and means nothing more than what other forms of the -izo verbs built from place names mean: to go over to, adopt or align with the people, the ethnos denoted in the verb and noun. Second, that such a practice is not ‘religious’ nor the adoption of a
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‘religion’ is just as clear. There was in fact no such category in the Greco-Roman imagination that stood apart from ethnicity; what we have called in English ‘religion’ was but one of the dimensions of ethnic identity in antiquity (on the absence of language for ‘religion’ in antiquity see further Rives, 2007, pp. 13–14). But what exactly was an ethnos in Greco-Roman antiquity? The classicist Jonathan Hall argues that in the Greek world an ethnos was typically associated with a territory and foundational discourses. An ethnos was socially constructed and publicly expressed through interpretation of foundational discourses. Those interpretative traditions typically were the sources for, among other things, the organizational features that characterized a group’s identity. Because of changing internal and external conditions and influences, ethnic identity was dynamic, fluid and permeable. Indeed, it was contact and conflict with other groups inside and outside an ethnic group that engendered it and assured its continued evolution, and that made conflict highly likely within the subgroups of an ethnic group as they experienced and reacted to those influences differently. And notably for our interests, because of the unevenness of the give-and-take between and among competing ethnic groups over time, the unpredictability of external pressures and opportunities, and the inevitable diversity of views within groups, one should assume that the literary evidence of even a single ethnic group or subgroup’s self-defining processes will be a highly differentiated, even self-contradicting record of the competing groups’ discursive, interpretative self-accounts. A further and not inconsiderable dimension of ethnic identity in antiquity was that groups typically called on a god or gods as the authors of their existence and character as an ethnic group (for the following see Rives, 2007, pp. 14–53; Warrior, 2006, pp. 1–11). To ensure the benevolence of their gods, ethnic groups developed their own ritual practices, both in the public and private sphere, to help ensure the success of group pursuits (e.g. its wellbeing and success in conflict with others) and to guarantee smooth transitions across important thresholds in the human life cycle (e.g. birth, coming-of-age, marriage, death). Further, professionals – sacerdotalists – were necessary to help ensure the efficacy of such acts of piety and devotion (e.g. priests, augurs, prophets and scribes). Integral to this was keeping to prescribed calendars of observances, including festivals and special commemorations, and using typical language for the prayers and other utterances associated with ritual activity. And just as the interpretation of foundational discourses was an important factor in establishing the other dimensions of ethnic identity, the same held true for their value in negotiating the legitimacy of an ethnic group’s particular forms of prayer, ritual, calendar and priestly leadership.
Characterizing the People of the Scrolls as an Ethnic (Sub) Group The people of the Scrolls – and virtually all of what Scrolls scholars have tacitly assigned to the ‘religion of the Dead Sea Scrolls’ – fit this description of ethnic groups in antiquity. Further, their expression of many of those characteristics underscores the degree to which they viewed themselves as a minority within their own ethnic group, a subgroup at odds with others in the ethnicity. I enumerate the evidence for this claim,
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and doing so, survey what passes for most of the key aspects of ‘religion in/of the Dead Sea Scrolls.’ Like any other ethnic group in antiquity, the people of the Scrolls declared themselves unequivocally tied to a particular place – the land of Israel, and especially Jerusalem and its environs. But they also distinguished their connection to that place as unique among the wider Jewish ethnicity, routinely viewing themselves as alienated from the land, even as they dwelt in it; see, for example, references to their existence within the land of Israel as if in exile ‘in the land of Damascus’ (CD 6.5, 19; 7.15, 19 [→35 Damascus Document]). Concomitantly, they anticipated their triumphant ‘return’ to the land under God’s guidance: 1QM 1.1–3 [→40 Milh.amah] declares that in the eschatological war between the Sons of Light and Sons of Darkness the group’s forces will return from their exile in the wilderness to Jerusalem, the centre of their land of origin. Another trait of ethnic identity (usually deemed an aspect of Qumran religion) is evident in the group’s reliance on the then-emerging Hebrew Scriptures, the foundational discourses shared broadly among Jews. There is extensive evidence that the people of the Scrolls were unusually vigorous in their reliance on those discourses, the Torah in particular. They kept many copies of key books (e.g. approx. 24 of Genesis; 18 of Exodus; 17 of Leviticus; 33 of Deuteronomy; 39 of Psalms; and 22 of Isaiah). We find substantial numbers of works that reflect the community’s deep commitment to extending these foundational discourses through interpretation and expansion (e.g. there are over twenty manuscripts of Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], and around a dozen manuscripts containing material from 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]), as well as numerous passages that articulate the importance the group attached to interpreting its foundational discourses (e.g. 1QpHab 2.7–10 [→44 Pesharim]; 1QS 6.6–7 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]). And underscoring their position as a subgroup in sharp conflict with their ethnic confrères, they declared the singularly authoritative nature of their particular interpretative traditions (e.g. the pesher method of exegesis with its claim to superiority; cf. 1QpHab 7.3–5), their unique access to the laws hidden (nistar) in those discourses from all other Jews (cf. CD 3.14), and their own commitment to keeping secret from others in their ethnic group the saving mysteries of God (1QS 9.21–22; see also their development of a cryptic script, used in texts like 4Q249 [Midrash Sefer Moshe] recto, etc.). These are further hallmarks of ethnic groups in Greco-Roman antiquity, and especially ones engaged in intra-ethnic conflict with a more powerful opponent. Like other ethnic groups they constructed key aspects of their group organization and identity precisely by interpreting their foundational discourses. Their ‘genetic’ selfunderstanding that eventually took centre stage in their imagination, as a community led by and even perhaps composed of Zadokites (at least imaginatively), was certainly rooted in the privileging of the sons of Zadok as a uniquely pure priestly line (CD 4.3–4; cf. Ezek. 44.15; see further on priesthood below). Still more, their community structures were also likely rooted in their reading of their foundation discourses. For example, the name the community assigned to itself, ha-Yahad, may derive from reading themselves into passages like Mic. 2.12 that use the term in describing the elect of Israel [→59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community].
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Further, the Qumran movement grounded all of these characteristics not just in their interpretations of their foundational discourses, but also in direct appeal to the authority of the God they and other Jews revered, the God of Israel. Parenthetically, to be sure this point is what triggers the modern assumption that the people of Qumran were religionists, but one must not forget that in their world belief in a deity was not a matter of religion (a category that was in any case foreign to them), but a core part of ethnic self-definition. Here too they worked to differentiate themselves from their fellow Jews. This is evident in the insistence on being the unique recipients of God’s truth noted above. This stress is also apparent in many other aspects of self-expression, not least of which the striking claim to have a record of God’s direct, first-person speech in the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] and its broad-ranging, templefocused instructions that also build on the foundational discourses they shared with fellow Jews. There could hardly be clearer testimony to the group’s insistence that they alone were the true Jews. Such exceptional closeness to God meant that this subgroup within the ethnicity also declared its ritual life and its standards for purity to be uniquely sanctioned from heaven above and by their superior reading of Jews’ foundational discourses [→70 Purity and Holiness] (see also Harrington, 2004). A host of texts testify to the community’s sense of its distinctive ritual life, marked in particular by the replacement of temple worship with prayer and praise [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns] (cf. 1QS 9.4–5 and Kugler, 2002; on prayer see Falk, 1998), and the gathering of texts that express the group’s intense devotion to more refined purity standards than other Jews is well known (see, for example, 1QS a 1.25–27; 4Q284 [Harvesting]; 4Q414 [Ritual of Purification A]; and 4Q512 [Ritual of Purification B] [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]). It is in their view of ritual specialists (priests), more than anything else, that the people of Qumran marked themselves out as a subgroup within the Jewish ethnicity that sought to set itself apart from and against the rest of the ethnos. Whatever we make of the use of a non-priestly title (‘the Many’) in some recensions of the Community Rule where Zadokites are mentioned in other copies of the same work (cf. 1QS 5.2–3 and 4Q256 [Sb] 5 3 and 4Q258 [Sd] 1 2; 1QS 5.9–10 and 4Q256 5 7–8 and 4Q258 1 7; see further below) and the seemingly interchangeable character of the titles ‘Zadokites’ and ‘Aaronites’ (see, for example, Zadokites, 4Q163 [pIsac] 22 3; 1QS 5.2, 9; 1QS b 3.22; Aaronites, 1QS 5.6; 8.9; 11.6; 1QS a 1.16, 23), there can be little doubt about the importance this group attached to a pure priesthood endowed with substantial authority over against the priesthood of the dominant Jewish ethnicity (see, for example, the community’s adoption of priestly expectations of purity for itself in 1QS 4.13; 6.16–17; 1QS a 2.3–10; CD 15.15–17). Highlighting the group’s assigning to priests the role of guaranteeing the integrity of their identity is their literature’s special regard for the original lineage from which priests derived, the Levites (see, for example, the elaboration of Levi’s life and career in Aramaic Levi [→24 Aramaic Levi; 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]; the elevated status of Levites throughout the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] and in other texts from Qumran, e.g. 11Q19 23.9– 10; 24.11; 39.12; 40.14–15; see further Kugler, 1999; 2000). The community leaves no doubt that it saw itself as the home and guardian of the authentic sacerdotal class
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among Jews, the guarantor of the purity and functionality of the Judean ethnicity’s central office. A close second in importance to the group’s obsession with the purity and uniqueness of its priestly leadership is its concern to master all calendrical reckoning, to have a complete grasp of God’s measurement of time and human history (see, for example, 4Q319–21, 4Q324–30 [→62 Calendars]). The group aimed to reckon all of time according to the priestly courses, the chronologies of Israel’s history, the festivals and the movements of the heavenly bodies implied by Jewish foundational texts. Indeed, true to the nature of ethnic subgroups in conflict with their ethnos of origin, they sought to achieve their own hegemony over their estranged compatriots in whatever ways they could, and what better way to do so than to claim for themselves an exclusive understanding of the divine order of time – daily, weekly, monthly, seasonal, annual and even cosmic time. Finally, the diversity of views present in the Scrolls on the matters described above indicates that, like other emerging ethnicities or ethnic subgroups in antiquity, the intensity with which they differentiated themselves from their ethnos of origin did not develop in a linear fashion, but rather seems to fluctuate relative to internal and external influences and opportunities. Likewise, the diversity of views indicates that the group was never univocal in its self-understanding, but rather accommodated a range of selfdifferentiating perspectives simultaneously that could nonetheless gather under the big tent of opposition to another major ethnic perspective. To cite but one example, the presence in the Scrolls of recensions of the Community Rule that differ on how to call the community’s leaders – ‘the Many’ (e.g. 4Q256 5 3; 4Q258 1 2) or ‘Zadokites’ (1QS 5.2–3, 9–10) – may be more easily explained in this way than positing successive recensions over time. The politics of relations with the rest of the Jewish ethnicity outside of the Qumran movement and within the subgroup naturally produced synchronous and diachronic diversity among the members of the movement.
Conclusion Some readers might find fault with this treatment of ‘religion in/of the Dead Sea Scrolls’ for, among other reasons, not addressing some of the topics others have assigned to the category, such as theology, dualism, angelology, anthropology, eschatology (including messianism and apocalypticism) and more. In defence of such surprising exclusions I point out that each of these topics was not primary to, but rather a derivative of, the basic concern for ethnic self-definition in antiquity. And while they are key characteristics of what we have come to call religious imagination in modernity, among the ancients most of them were invariably assigned to their category of philosophy, a category that formed the intellectual ‘superstructure’ for ethnic groups’ and subgroups’ self-understanding, the intellectual justification for a group’s constructed, selfidentifying characteristics. As I have already noted in passing, this approach also explains some of the characteristics of the Scrolls and their people that have proved to be most vexing to scholarly assessment, for example the diversity of perspectives on anthropology and
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human fate before God or the different views on appropriate community structures and leadership. In the case of the former, we can point to numerous competing efforts of subgroups among Greeks, a key ethnicity in the ancient world, to assert particular views of the human being and her fate; we have long labelled those efforts the anthropology of various philosophical positions (e.g. Stoics, Cynics, and so on). Diverse expressions of community structure and governance patterns have also long had their place in ethnic self-expression in antiquity; see the Greek imperial rulers’ embrace of the local politeuma as a means of allowing ethnic groups their own communal structures and governance, especially in Hellenistic Egypt. Diversity on both levels among the people of the Scrolls is hardly surprising, especially as the ethnic subgroup developed over time. A fitting conclusion to this essay, then, might be to point to a text among the Scrolls that hints at the origin of the subgroup, one that reflects the ‘rub’ with the broader ethnicity that prompted its gradual formation, development, and diversification, 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]. One would expect to find there a greater degree of homogeneity of thought on topics we assign to religion, as well as a greater affinity and willingness to work out differences with the broader ethnic group. And that is the case with MMT. So-called part B exemplifies an early intra-ethnic attempt to negotiate a redistribution of resources; and not surprisingly, through alternative interpretations of the foundational discourses: the text’s halakhic rulings all relate directly or indirectly to the temple, its personnel and the disposition of resources its operation entailed. Moreover, they are all based on self-differentiating interpretations of the foundational discourses of the Jewish ethnos. The admonition in part C is a compelling example of what we would expect to hear from two parties wrestling with, yet still negotiating over, competing notions of ethnic identity: it appeals to a third party to arbitrate identity disputes, it claims the inerrancy of its authors’ understanding of the foundational discourses, it invokes the ethnic group’s history of blessings and curses on leaders to compel assent from the addressee, and it claims God for its side of the debate and commends God as an aid and assistance to the addressee in deciding rightly. But of course, we know that this early attempt at negotiating a way forward for the ethnos in unity came hard against reality, and from that collision came the people of the Scrolls and their long, complex and diverse history of raging against the dominant ethnic expression. From this came the Dead Sea Scrolls and their diverse expression of things we are inclined to assign to ‘religion,’ but that their authors were surely inclined to assign more fundamentally to the most basic expression of who they were as an ethnos among the ethnē.
Bibliography Avery-Peck, A. J., J. Neusner, and B. Chilton (eds) (2001), Judaism in Late Antiquity 5. The Judaism of Qumran: A Systemic Reading of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Handbook of Oriental Studies 1/57. Leiden: Brill. Collins, J. and R. Kugler (eds) (2000), Religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.
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Falk, D. (1998), Daily, Sabbath, and Festival Prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 27. Leiden: Brill. Hall, J. (1997), Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity. Cambridge: CUP. Harrington, H. (2004), The Purity Texts. London: T. & T. Clark. Jassen, A. (2007), ‘Religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Religion Compass 1, 1–25. Kugler, R. (1999), ‘The priests of Qumran: The evidence of references to Levi and Levites,’ in D. Parry and E. Ulrich (eds), The Provo International Conference on the Dead Sea Scrolls: Technological Innovations, New Tests, & Reformulated Issues. STDJ 30. Leiden: Brill, 1999, pp. 465–79. Kugler, R. (2000), ‘Priests,’ in J. VanderKam and L. Schiffman (eds), The Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, pp. 688–93. Kugler, R. (2002), ‘Making all experience religious: The hegemony of ritual at Qumran,’ JSJ 33, 131–52. Kugler, R. (2017), ‘What really troubled Andronikos? A Note on P.Polit.Jud. 1,’ in J. Baden, H. Najman and E. Tigchelaar (eds), Sibyls, Scriptures, and Scrolls: John Collins at Seventy. JSJSup 175/1. Leiden: Brill, pp. 673-87. Mason, S. (2007), ‘Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of categorization in ancient history,’ JSJ 38, 457–512. Miller, D. (2010), ‘The meaning of Ioudaios and its relationship to other group labels in Ancient “Judaism,” ’ Currents in Biblical Research 9, 98–126. Preus, James S. (1987), Explaining Religion: Criticism and Theory from Bodin to Freud. New Haven: Yale University Press. Ringgren, H. (1963), The Faith of Qumran: The Theology of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philadelphia: Fortress Press. Rives, James B. (2007), Religion in the Roman Empire. London: Blackwell. Strenski, I. (2006), Thinking About Religion: An Historical Introduction to Theories of Religion. London: Blackwell. Warrior, V. M. (2006), Roman Religion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation Benedikt Eckhardt
‘Those Who Freely Volunteer’ The Rule of the Community (S) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules] contains a number of positive designations for members of a sectarian movement with several cells (cf., e.g. 1QS 6) that is normally called the Yahad. The term is not exclusive to but characteristic of S, and although current scholarship no longer considers S, and the well-preserved manuscript 1QS in particular, the only normative text for describing the movement, the image of the Yahad it presents will form the basis of the discussion here. Insiders are referred to as ‘men of holiness,’ ‘sons of light,’ or simply ‘Israel.’ Alongside these wellknown labels, another important self-designation is easily overlooked. From the beginning, it is made clear that this is a rule book for ‘those who freely volunteer to carry out God’s decrees’ (1.7),‘who submit freely to his truth’ (1.11),‘who freely volunteer to convert from all evil’ (5.1). That the Yahad consisted solely of voluntary members (hamitnadbym) seems to have been important to the authors of S, more important in fact than a more spectacular name like ‘sons of light,’ to judge from frequency. The terminology has biblical roots, alluding to voluntary, temple-related activities. It therefore supports the notion of the community as a ‘temple for Israel’ (Dimant, 2007). The novelty lies in the use of mitnadbym as a group designation that can stand without an object or a corresponding verb (5.8). Insistence on the voluntariness of membership conveys a clear implied message: It was your own choice to come here, so you better stick to the rules. It is noteworthy that the relevant passages occur both at the very beginning of 1QS and throughout the first half of the rule section (5.1, 6, 8, 10, 22; 6.13). But there is another aspect to the repeated references to ‘those who freely volunteer.’ In the Hebrew Bible, the formation of groups and their organization are normally based not on voluntary agreement between members, but on kinship relations and natural hierarchies. In the Hasmonean period, some elements of this genealogically defined world order were challenged (Cohen, 1999, pp. 109–39). However, at the time 1QS was written, the possibility of voluntary membership in a ‘people’ was still remarkable. Several scholars have therefore looked beyond the biblical tradition in order to establish precedents for the Yahad’s insistence on voluntary membership. One 86
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particularly promising approach is to identify the Yahad as the Judean version of a Hellenistic voluntary association. As similar arguments have a long tradition in studies on ancient synagogues and early Christian communities, this hypothesis would root the Yahad firmly both in an increasingly globalized Hellenistic world and in the historical development of the Jewish cult beyond the temple. The aim of this chapter is to assess the validity, usefulness and implications of comparisons between the Yahad and Hellenistic associations.
Hellenistic Voluntary Associations Hellenistic associations were a pluriform phenomenon that met various demands, depending on their location (be that a major trade centre or a remote village) and on the social background of the membership. Some common characteristics can nevertheless be identified: a) In the self-presentation of associations, religion took pride of place (Gabrielsen, 2007). Almost all associations defined themselves as worshippers of a deity (Dionysians, Poseidonians, etc.) or performers of rituals (‘fellow sacrificers’ [synthytai], ‘those who prepare a meal for the god’ [theoxeniastai], etc.; for the names: Poland, 1909, pp. 5–172). Many possessed their own sanctuary, others had close relations with public sanctuaries. While the decision to join an association was certainly motivated by a number of reasons, including business interests and networking, religion was the primary element used by an association to identify itself. This stands in contrast to the later Roman Era, when a common profession became the main marker of group identity. b) In their internal organization, associations imitated titles, designations and procedures that were used in their respective cities. They thus replicated the state, as is to some degree common for associations across different periods. c) With very few exceptions the context in which associations operated was decidedly local. We have no evidence for trans-local relationships between associations, no movements with several cells. Associations of foreigners could entertain relations with their homeland (Harland, 2009, pp. 99–122), and the Dionysiac artists were a special case, privileged by kings and cities on a trans-local basis because their service was needed during the festivals (Aneziri, 2003). But in general, associations were tied to their respective cities, promoted civic values, and fostered the integration of resident aliens. By far the best attested activities are honorific procedures. Associations took care to publicly render thanks to benefactors, who received financial privileges, crowns, honorary positions at banquets, or even cultic honours (e.g. IG II 2 1326 [Dionysians in the Piraeus, 176/5 bce ]; SEG 57.1188 [Heroists in South-West Lydia, mid-second century bce ]). The values evoked in the relevant inscriptions are those of the city (Batten, 2007), and the formulae used are often copied from civic honorific decrees. Other inscriptions by associations are short dedications or (very rarely in
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the Hellenistic period) ‘statutes’ containing penal codes (e.g. IG II 2 1275 [worshippers (orgeones) in Athens, third/second century bce ]; IG II 2 1339 [Heroists in Athens, 57/6 bce ]). While the characteristics of associations have received close study in comparative research, less attention has been given to geographical factors. In commercial centres like Athens with the Piraeus, Rhodes, Delos or Cos, the number of associations was very high (sixty-nine are attested on Cos alone: Maillot, 2013, pp. 201–2). Evidence for other regions in Greece or for the coastal cities of Asia Minor is less abundant, but still solid. For the Hellenistic Near East, evidence for associations is limited to a polemic by Posidonius of Apamea against drinking clubs in Syrian cities (cited in Athen. dipn. 5.210e–f and 12.527e–f) and scraps of epigraphic evidence from Gerasa (a fellowship [hetaireia] of Zeus: SEG 56.1920, second century bce ), Maresha (an association [koinon] “of Kosadar”: Ecker & Eckhardt, forthcoming) and Sidon (an association [koinon] of knife-makers: SEG 55.1660, 48/7 bce ) that do not reveal organizational details. Such paucity of evidence reflects the general lack of Hellenistic inscriptions from this area. This geographical distribution of the evidence does not invalidate the assumption that the Yahad was surrounded by a Greek associational culture, nor does it support such claims. This therefore raises the question whether or not there were models other than Greek associations that could be of relevance. Two of them should be mentioned briefly: a) In some comparative studies (Weinfeld, 1986; Gillihan, 2012), Egyptian associations are treated on a par with Greek ones. A number of Demotic papyri contain regulations of group life with striking similarities to Greek sources, such as mutual assistance, fines for absence at meetings, and common participation at members’ funerals (Cenival, 1972). As Greek influence seems to be ruled out on chronological grounds, the reasons for the overlaps cannot easily be explained. However, the Egyptian rules, often issued by groups that define themselves as priests of a temple, were apparently valid for only one year. Fluctuation of members was so high that these groups do not seem to have been stable organizations, but temporary constructs following a standard pattern (perhaps along the lines of state service?). b) The marzeah. has often been argued to reflect an independent Near Eastern tradition of voluntary associations (for the evidence: McLaughlin, 2001). The term is attested in Ugaritic and early biblical texts as well as in Phoenician inscriptions; however, in no case is it clear that a marzeah. was an association rather than a feast. In Late Hellenistic Nabatean inscriptions, the interpretation ‘association’ is more plausible; in Roman Palmyra, marzeah. was translated as symposion and could mean both. The details of internal organization escape us, although attempts have been made to correlate the history of Greek and Syrian associations (Millares Maciá, 2007), or to reconstruct an ideal ‘Semitic thiasos’ (= marzeah.) of ten or twelve members (Milik, 1972, based on the DSS , rabbinic literature and very ambiguous lists of names from Dura Europos and Palmyra). Given the restrictions of the evidence, the value of the marzeah. for comparisons is negligible.
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The Greek tradition of forming permanent associations on a voluntary basis thus remains a plausible a priori context, not least because the influence of Hellenism on the Yahad has been noted in other areas as well (Hengel, 1978; Cohen, 2001).
What (and Why) to Compare? It is, however, clear from the overview above that associations had a very different position in Hellenistic cities than the Yahad had in Judea (cf. also Baumgarten, 1998). If a local mechanism of social and religious inclusion is to be compared with a movement that boasts of its own radical separation from society, convincing parallels in internal organization have to be named. Points of contact that seem to go beyond trivial analogies have been noted in four areas: Terminology: It is undeniable that the designation ha-Yahad is grammatically equivalent to the Greek to koinon, the most general term for ‘association’ (Dombrowski, 1966). In both cases, a noun derived from an adjective or adverb meaning ‘in common, together’ is used to describe the group as an organization. The nature of the term Yahad is still debated (Schofield, 2009, pp. 139–41; Van der Kooij, 2011 [→72 Forms of Community; 73 Daily Life]). The step from ‘together’ to ‘community’ is perhaps not so extraordinary that external influence is needed to explain it, but if other factors suggest such influence, terminology may be a supporting argument. Officials: Priests were the most important officials in the Yahad, and held prominent positions in many Hellenistic associations as well (Poland, 1909, pp. 337–51; Herrmann, 2007, pp. 179–84). The formal similarity is weakened by the different status of priests in the respective societies, but the general pattern is comparable: in both Hellenistic associations and the Yahad, ‘religious’ and ‘secular’ officials held authority, and the distribution of power among them could reflect state patterns. Not much is known about democratic voting procedures in the Yahad. In Hellenistic associations, officials were normally elected for a certain time, but then again, different practice in the Yahad would reflect different procedures in the respective states. Membership: The significance of voluntary membership, the most important commonality, has already been mentioned. The average size of the Yahad’s cells is unknown, but they could be as small as ten men (1QS 6.3–4, if the number is not symbolical). Where the size of Hellenistic associations is known, it normally varies between ten and fifty members. In the Yahad, potential members had to undergo a preliminary examination with regard to their understanding of the law and their deeds (1QS 5.20–22; Herrmann, 2007, pp. 185–9). Preliminary examination (dokimasia) is known from associations in Athens as well (IG II 2 1361, 22–23 [orgeones, later fourth century bce ]; cf. from Roman times IG II 2 1368, 32–41; 1369, 31–36). It is more difficult to find parallels for the different stages that characterize the Yahad’s procedure of admission; such systems are better known from ancient mystery cults. In the Yahad, there were apparently no regular membership fees like in Hellenistic associations;
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instead, members had to give up their private property, which amounts to a much more radical solution to the problem of sustaining a private group. Meetings: As in Greek associations, meals were among the most important activities of the Yahad. Apart from their alimentary function, they were a tool for monitoring and enforcing internal discipline and offered opportunities for visualizing hierarchies (Eckhardt, 2010). They were exclusive, segregating forms of interaction that continually reproduced the difference between insiders and outsiders. The same is true for Hellenistic associations, where special positions and the right to bring a friend could be given as privileges to influential benefactors (IG XII Suppl. 365 [Sarapiasians on Thasos, second century bce ]; Inscriptions de Délos 1520 [Berytian Poseidonians, 153/2 bce ]; in general: Ascough, 2008). But it would also be true for any family dinner, which suggests that more specific parallels are needed. The rules on discipline during the meetings find parallels in the statutes of Egyptian and later Greek and Roman associations: insulting officials or other members, non-participation in meetings, or ‘defaming’ the association (e.g. by bringing internal quarrels to external courts?) lead to exclusion from the ‘pure food’ [→70, Purity and Holiness] or even from the Yahad itself (Weinfeld, 1986). Fines were thus not monetary as in Hellenistic associations, and a number of rules are unusual from a Hellenistic point of view (e.g. rules on gestures or clothing). Before combining these different elements of the puzzle, it is important to ask what it is we want to know. The outcome and value of a comparison obviously depend on the aims and assumptions that motivate it in the first place. In the case of the Yahad and Hellenistic associations, it is possible to identify three major (and roughly successive) motives for comparative research: a) The original motivation was that it seemed to clarify the legal status of the ‘Qumran community’ (Bardtke, 1961). Given that the Hebrew Bible does not make provisions for groups with voluntary membership, the modalities of organization, including the purchase of land, could be regarded as legally problematic. Explaining the Yahad as a Hellenistic voluntary association would root its establishment in Hellenistic state law. The problem with this legalist approach is that evidence for Hellenistic laws on associations is largely lacking (for a debated case from the vicinity of Sardeis, see SEG 46.1519); in addition, the concept of ‘Hellenistic state law’ itself has been abandoned. b) If the Yahad were regarded as a Hellenistic voluntary association, this might say something about the degree of Hellenization both within this conservative sect and, by way of an a fortiori argument, in Judea as a whole (Hengel, 1978). One may argue for or against Greek influence, or for an adaptation of Greek forms, but with Jewish content (the Yahad as the more sober, more serious, more religious alternative to Greek ‘drinking clubs’). Leaving aside the dangers of moralizing argumentation, this line of thought is intimately connected with debates on material vs intellectual Hellenization that have not become irrelevant, but seem to be less important in recent scholarship than they used to be in the 1970s.
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c) More recently, attempts have been made to use the comparison for a more precise description of group-society relations. As Hellenistic voluntary associations affirmed the prevalent social order by adapting its institutional inventory, one possible argument would be to take parallels as evidence for rather unproblematic relationships between the Yahad and the rest of society. The various cells of the Yahad could then be regarded as normal expressions of Jewish group identity (Klinghardt, 1994). Another approach turns this argument around and places the Yahad within a Hellenistic context of associations with an ‘alternative civic ideology’ (Gillihan, 2012). The most important examples are philosophical schools, known through (often very late) literary sources. This rather broad definition of associations somewhat obscures the fact that the epigraphically attested associations may provide formal parallels to the community structure envisaged in 1QS , but presuppose completely different group-society relations. Lumping cult associations and philosophical groups together as a single associative phenomenon that could develop both assimilative and alternative ideologies is an interesting way to solve the dilemma, but it lacks plausibility. All the epigraphically attested associations would fall into the assimilative category, leaving only certain philosophical schools with unclear degrees of organization in the alternative corner. The specific parallels in organization between the Yahad and Hellenistic associations would become irrelevant. It emerges both from the comparison and from the consideration of its history that the question should not be whether or not the Yahad was a Hellenistic association like any other. Parallels between Hellenistic associations and the Yahad do exist, but not a single one can be adduced without reservations. This also makes the assumption of direct influence rather difficult to maintain. Gillihan argues that similarities are to be explained by the common replication of state patterns rather than by direct influence (2012, pp. 505–6). But this only displaces the problem, because ‘the state’ was no more a coherent entity throughout the ancient world than were associations. To give just one example: if the prior testing of prospective members is seen as one important analogy between the Yahad and Hellenistic associations, it is important to note that the procedure is only attested in Athenian associations. Now in Athens, dokimasiai of magistrates, new citizens and coins are well documented; it is easy to argue that Athenian associations used the term in replication of state patterns. For Jerusalem (as well as for most other Greek, Anatolian or Near Eastern cities), no comparable information exists – the assumption that they simply replicated universal state patterns is unwarranted. A valid argument would be to regard the prior testing of members as a self-evident necessity for a sectarian movement that was extremely distrustful towards its societal environment. But then no Hellenistic parallel would be needed at all. In the light of these considerations, new ways have to be found to make use of the comparative insights gathered since Bardtke. Gillihan’s approach to focus on the attitude of groups towards ‘civic ideology’ is an important step forward, but modifications are necessary. I will briefly outline two possible ways to move beyond the mere enumeration of details and to avoid undue generalization.
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Associations, Private Cult and State Religion One way to deal with the differences noted above is to employ a mutatis mutandisargument: different state structures lead to different characteristics of associations. To put it another way: if Hellenistic cities had been organized like Jerusalem, their associations might have looked like the Yahad. Such counter-factual reasoning is obviously irrelevant for explaining details of organization discussed in 1QS ; it marks a shift in focus, from the association itself to the Judean society of the second and first centuries bce that nourished it. The comparison between the Yahad and other voluntary associations can serve to describe the limited potential of religion as an enabler of group identity in Hasmonean Judea more clearly (Eckhardt, 2017). Without religion, Hellenistic associations would not have existed. Gods, temples and priests were their main identifying symbols. They copied various aspects of state organization, but the focus was clearly on religion, and this in turn facilitated their integration into their respective societies. Associations could be in direct contact with the religious activities of the city. They could participate in civic festivals although the evidence is often ambiguous (Suys, 2005), and in one case, a magistrate is honoured for having procured good omens for the Athenian people (MDAI[A] 66 [1941]: 228 no. 4 [Athens, 138/7 bce ]). But most importantly, they simply offered additional contexts of worship within an existing social order. Associations did their best to adapt the language of their decrees to the religious discourse of their cities and to designate sacred space as was done in official sanctuaries (for a good example from Delos see Trümper, 2002). Religion was not just one among several features of Hellenistic associations, but their primary argument for claiming a place in society. Building a new temple community was presented by Hellenistic associations as an expansion of the religious field constituted by civic sanctuaries and festivals. It was the logical way for a private organization to gain acceptance. In Judea, this mechanism for societal differentiation was unknown and would have been bound to fail. Groups like Pharisees or Sadducees could operate within Judean society only because they did not make any religious claims that led their members away from the one temple in Jerusalem, and did not perform their own rituals (Goodman, 2009). The status of the Jerusalem temple as the only legitimate place of worship left no room for peaceful coexistence with private replications of state cult. This did not prevent the covenanters from creating one, and Hellenistic influence cannot be ruled out with certainty. But in a Judean environment, their aims must have been very different from those of associations elsewhere. The private and exclusive foundation of a ‘temple for Israel’ did not mark the beginning, but the end of groupsociety relations (Kapfer, 2007), and 1QS gives every reason to think that this was precisely the aim pursued. This is not an attempt to re-establish traditional dichotomies about the ‘seriousness’ of religious discourse in Greece and Israel. Religion was not less important in Athens than it was in Jerusalem, but it was organized in a different way, with important ramifications. In Greece, group-specific religion, and particularly the independently organized replication of state cult, could stimulate intra-societal differentiation; in Israel, it could only stimulate exclusion from society. This may not dramatically change
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our understanding of Judean society in the Hellenistic era, but it further refines it in relation to others – and that is about as much as can be expected from comparative research. With these reflections in mind, it is worthwhile to look not simply for parallels in organization between the Yahad and other groups, but for analogous group-staterelationships – as Gillihan did, albeit with questionable assumptions. One parallel that has escaped his attention is the Bacchanalian affair of 186 bce . The historical details are known solely from Livy’s highly problematic account that combines fact and polemical fiction (39.8–19). According to Livy, the Bacchanalian cult spread like a pestilence in Italy and Rome; its adherents became ‘like a second people,’ with their own values and abhorrent practices that ranged from group sex to murder. An investigation led to charges against more than 7,000 suspects; many were put to death, and measures were taken against the cult. The senate’s decree has survived in an inscription from Tiriolo (CIL I2 581). It does not forbid the cult of Bacchus, but severely limits its spatial and organizational scope. Whoever wants to have a place for a Bacchanalian cult needs the senate’s permission. In addition, there may not be Bacchanalian groups of more than five people and they may not have male priests, common funds, or officials (magistratus). This incident was without precedent in the religious history of Rome, and a number of different explanations have been proposed. It is plausible to assume that – despite Livy’s polemical account – the problem for Rome was not the god or his cult (known in Italy much earlier), but new forms of the cult’s organization. Although neither Livy nor the inscription use terms like collegium or corpus (the later terms for ‘association’), it may be surmised from the details regulated in the senate’s decree that Bacchanalian groups in Italy were organized as associations like Dionysiac groups in Greece. Livy, in fact, attributes the introduction of the cult to a nameless Greek. The Bacchanalian groups confronted the Roman state for the first time with a phenomenon that was well known in Greece, but intimately connected to the polis-context. Roman authorities apparently saw this mechanism of religious differentiation as a threat to civic religion (cf. North, 1979 on ‘disembedded’ religion and Linke, 2000, pp. 269–73). In his comparison between Rome and Jerusalem, Goodman has noted that associations were widespread in the Roman world, but virtually unknown in Judea (2007, pp. 231–42). However, both the Yahad and the Bacchanalian groups were movements of religious innovation (or, in the latter case, perceived as such by outsiders); both replicated patterns of state organization; both excluded themselves from mainstream society up to the point of violent conflict – the Jerusalem high priest attacking the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography], the Roman authorities legally persecuting members of Bacchanalian groups. This seems to suggest parallels rather than differences. In both cases, the issue at stake was a state’s first confrontation with the mirror images of itself created by voluntary associations. As was the case in the Yahad, the frequency of Bacchanalian meetings was higher than in normal Hellenistic associations. Also like the Yahad, and unlike associations in Greek cities, Bacchanalian groups seem to have formed some sort of coherent movement. One could argue that it was their capacity for mobilization that sparked conflicts between these groups and their respective societies. Perhaps this potential
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was inherent in private religious organizations but never realized in Greek cities, presumably because associations were hedged in by the local religious systems and were encouraged to create replications of state structures. Republican Rome and Jerusalem seem to have been structurally similar in not allowing for such replications, and both had to deal with the consequences. It may seem preposterous to compare an austere and morally rigid sect like the Yahad with groups that were infamous for revelry and murder, but the origin of our information is very different in both cases. We do not know what derogatory legends circulated in Jerusalem about the Yahad. Structural similarities do exist. They point to different ways of embedding religion into society, and at least in this regard Jerusalem seems to have much more in common with Rome than with Athens. In sum, Hellenistic inscriptions set up by associations reveal organizational features that are in part similar to those described in the Community Rule. However, even if Greek influence were postulated, there is little to be gained by comparing isolated details of organization that are devoid of their social context. It is precisely the similarities that make the modern reader aware of the very different relations between these groups and their respective societies. Directing attention to the societal conditions that enable the emergence of associations deprives the comparison of the little value it may have had for better understanding S. But it opens up new horizons beyond ‘antiquarian’ data collection, and enhances the value of comparative studies as a research tool.
Bibliography Aneziri, S. (2003), Die Vereine der dionysischen Techniten im Kontext der hellenistischen Gesellschaft. Stuttgart: Steiner. Ascough, R. (2008), ‘Forms of commensality in Greco-Roman associations,’ Classical World 102, 33–45. Bardtke, H. (1961), ‘Die Rechtsstellung der Qumrāngemeinde,’ TLZ 86, 93–104. Batten, A. (2007), ‘The moral world of Greco-Roman associations,’ Studies in Religion 36, 135–51. Baumgarten, A. (1998), ‘Greco-Roman voluntary associations and ancient Jewish sects,’ in M. Goodman (ed.), Jews in a Graeco-Roman World. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 93–111. Cenival, F. de (1972), Les associations religieuses en Égypte d’après les documents démotiques. Cairo: Institut Français d’archéologie orientale du Caire. Cohen, S. (1999), The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. Berkeley: University of California Press. Cohen, S. (2001), ‘Hellenism in unexpected places,’ in J. Collins and G. Sterling (eds.), Hellenism in the Land of Israel. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, pp. 216–43. Dimant, D. (2007), ‘The volunteers in the Rule of the Community: A biblical notion in sectarian Garb,’ RevQ 23, 233–45. Dombrowski, B. (1966), ‘ היחדin 1QS and τὸ κοινόν: An instance of early Greek and Jewish synthesis.’ HTR 59, 293–307. Ecker, A. and Eckhardt, B. (forthcoming), ‘The Koinon of Kosadar at Maresha: A Hellenistic Private Association in the Levant’, IEJ.
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Eckhardt, B. (2010), ‘Meals and politics in the Yah.ad: A reconsideration,’ DSD 17, 180–209. Eckhardt, B. (2017), ‘Temple Ideology and Hellenistic Private Associations,’ DSD 24, 407–23. Gabrielsen, V. (2007), ‘Brotherhoods of faith and provident planning: The non-public associations of the Greek world,’ Mediterranean Historical Review 22, 183–210. Gillihan, Y. (2012), Civic Ideology, Organization, and Law in the Rule Scrolls: A Comparative Study of the Covenanters’ Sect and Contemporary Voluntary Associations in Political Context. STDJ 97. Leiden: Brill. Goodman, M. (2007), Rome and Jerusalem: The Clash of Ancient Civilizations. London: Allen Lane. Goodman, M. (2009), ‘Religious variety and the temple in the Late Second Temple Period and its aftermath,’ JJS 60, 202–13. Harland, P. (2009), Dynamics of Identity in the World of the Early Christians: Associations, Judeans, and Cultural Minorities. New York: Clark. Hengel, M. (1978), ‘Qumrān und der Hellenismus,’ in M. Delcor (ed.), Qumrān: Sa piété, sa théologie et son milieu. Paris: Peeters, pp. 333–72. Herrmann, R. (2007), ‘Die Gemeinderegel von Qumran und das antike Vereinswesen,’ in J. Frey, D. Schwartz and S. Gripentrog (eds), Jewish Identity in the Greco-Roman World. Leiden: Brill, pp. 161–203. Kapfer, H. (2007), ‘The relationship between the Damascus Document and the Community Rule: Attitudes toward the temple as a test case,’ DSD 14, 152–77. Klinghardt, M. (1994), ‘The Manual of Discipline in the light of statutes of Hellenistic associations,’ in N. Golb et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. New York: New York Academy of Science, pp. 251–70. Linke, B. (2000), ‘Religio und res publica: Religiöser Glaube und gesellschaftliches Handeln im republikanischen Rom,’ in B. Linke and M. Stemmler (eds), Mos Maiorum: Untersuchungen zu den Formen der Identitätsstiftung und Stabilisierung in der Römischen Republik. Stuttgart: Steiner, pp. 269–98. McLaughlin, J. (2001), The marzēah. in the Prophetic Literature: References and Allusions in Light of the Extra-Biblical Evidence. VTS up 86. Leiden: Brill. Maillot, S. (2013), ‘Les associations à Cos,’ in P. Fröhlich and P. Hamon (eds), Groupes et associations dans les cités grecques (IIIe siècle av. J.-C. – IIe siècle apr. J.-C.). Genève: Droz, pp. 199–226. Milik, J. (1972), Dédicaces faites par des dieux (Palmyre, Hatra, Tyr) et des thiases sémitiques à l’époque romaine. Paris: Geuthner. Millares Maciá, L. (2007), Marzeah y thíasos: Una institución convival en el Oriente Próximo Antiguo y el Mediterráneo. Madrid: Publicaciones Universidad Complutense de Madrid. North, J. (1979), ‘Religious toleration in republican Rome,’ Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society 25, 85–103. Poland, F. (1909), Geschichte des griechischen Vereinswesens. Leipzig: Teubner. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Suys, V. (2005), ‘Les associations cultuelles dans la cité aux époques hellénistique et impériale,’ in V. Dasen and M. Piérart (eds), Ἰδίᾳ καὶ δημοσίᾳ: Les cadres ‘privés’ et ‘publics’ de la religion grecque antique. Liège: Centre International d’Étude de la Religion Grecque Antique, pp. 203–18.
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Trümper, M. (2002), ‘Das Sanktuarium des “Établissement des Poseidoniastes de Bérytos” in Delos: Zur Baugeschichte eines griechischen Vereinsheiligtums,’ Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique 126, 265–330. Van der Kooij, A. (2011), ‘The Yah.ad – What is in a name?,’ DSD 18, 109–28. Weinfeld, M. (1986), The Organizational Pattern and the Penal Code of the Qumran Sect: A Comparison with Guilds and Religious Associations of the Hellenistic-Roman Period. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
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The Regional Context of the Dead Sea Joan E. Taylor
The Dead Sea region was well-known in antiquity for its barren lake, but also for its abundant resources, particularly bitumen and other minerals, salts, balsam and date palms. These products were very valuable commodities and whoever owned land around the lake could profit enormously. Cultural, political and economic aspects of the lake are inextricably related, with three different main cultural zones that can be distinguished as waxing and waning over time, depending on different political circumstances. In the east and south (including the southwest) the region was dominated by Moabites in the east and Edomites/Idumeans in the south until the rise of the Nabateans in the fifth century bc . Judahites/Judeans controlled the area from En Gedi to Jericho in the northwest, with expansions into Idumea and the south-western regions under the Hasmoneans (see Taylor, 2012, pp. 220–1, 225). The two major Judean towns were Jericho and En Gedi, both located beside freshwater springs that provided irrigation, allowing zones of great fertility. However, during the Second Temple Period occupation of Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] the Nabatean/ Idumean city of Zoara and its territory in the far south functioned as the key Dead Sea port and trading centre. The Dead Sea has been discussed in a number of studies (Zangenberg, 1998; 2000; 2004; Hirschfeld, 2004, pp. 211–30; 2006 and Taylor, 2012), and will be reviewed here with a view to considering how Qumran was situated within a particular environment of human activity over time.
The Iron Age The area of Qumran was first settled in the Iron Age (de Vaux, 1973, pp. 1–3, 59–60; Magen and Peleg, 2006, pp. 72–9; 2007, pp. 24–8). Evidence from the time of the Judean monarchy (eighth to seventh centuries bce ) indicates that there was a rapid development of this vicinity, especially after the fall of the Kingdom of Israel in 721 bce , after which refugees fled to Judah (cf. Jer. 41.5 and 2 Chron. 30.10–11, 34.9; see Faust, 2008, p. 170). From Jericho in the north to En Gedi in the south there was a chain of small fortified settlements, likely built to support the opobalsam and other industries. The higher region of the Judean Desert to the west (Buqeiʿa) was farmed, using flood irrigation methods. Qumran formed part of this network. 97
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However, the Babylonian invasion of ca. 586 bce laid waste the many settlements here. The site of Tell es-Sultan (ancient Jericho) was thought to have been largely abandoned at the end of the Iron Age, with a shift towards the area of Tulul Abu el-Alayiq. The latter site is a Hasmonean-Herodian palace complex rather than a town, but joint Italian–Palestinian archaeological excavations have brought to light remains from the Persian, Hellenistic, Roman and later periods on Tel es-Sultan itself (Nigro and Taha, 2006, p. 4), the likely centre of the Persian district of Mizpah (Neh. 3.15, 19). En Gedi is evidenced by Stratum IV at Tel Goren, and its cosmopolitan and trading aspect is indicated by Persian seal impressions, Egyptian cosmetics and Attic pottery (Stern, 2001, pp. 535–37; Shai, Porath and Eshel, 2007). One seal impression contains images of Babylonian worship (Shai, Porath and Eshel, 2007, p. 396). Crops grown here included palm trees (Wis. 24.14) and henna (Song 1.14). Apart from these two towns, along with the rich agricultural areas they supported, the region of the north-western Dead Sea lay undeveloped from ca. 586 bce until the beginning of the first century bce .
The Hellenistic and Early Roman Periods After the conquest of Syria Palaestina by Alexander the Great in 333 bce , there was widespread western interest in the peculiar character of the Dead Sea. Classical authors discussed the significance of the Dead Sea both in terms of its valuable resources, and also regarding the paradoxical nature of its combination of extreme aridity, a lake so salty no fish could survive in it, with pockets of extraordinary fertility, natural freshwater cold and hot springs, and its concentration of medicinal plants and minerals [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. The economic resources exploited here were of great importance in antiquity (see in particular the discussions in Hammond, 1959; Safrai, 1994, pp. 187–8; Zangenberg, 2000, pp. 129–63). The Dead Sea appears to have struck the Western imagination after the conquest by Alexander the Great in 333 bce . Thus, for example, Aristotle states in Meteorologica 2.4: There is a lake in Palestine, such that if you bind a man or beast and throw him into it he floats and does not sink . . . they say that this lake is so bitter and salty that no fish live in it and that if you soak clothes in it and shake them it cleans them.
In 311 bce there was a war between the Macedonians and the Nabateans, recorded by Hieronymous of Cardia, who indicates Nabatean and Idumean hegemony over much of the lake (Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca Historica 2.48.6–9; 19.98–100, see Taylor 2012, pp. 211–13). Hieronymous focuses on the value and exploitation of local resources, particularly asphalt. Eratosthenes, in the third century bce , discussed the lake’s origins scientifically, proposing that it was once a bigger lake that was partly filled up by volcanic eruptions (Strabo, Geogr. 6.2.44). It was also discussed by the philosopher and scientist Posidonius, in the middle of the first century bce (in Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca 2.28; 19.98). We
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see the lake mentioned also in Strabo, Geogr. 6.2; Pliny, Historia Naturalis 5.15; Tacitus, Historia 5.6–7; Pausanias, Græcæ Descriptio 5.7.50, and in other sources (see Taylor, 2012, pp. 209–39). The lake’s tendency to belch up asphalt (bitumen) from its depths gave it the name ‘Lake Asphaltitis’ (Josephus, J.W. 4.476–485). The Egyptians were eager to buy this substance for their mummification procedures, but it was also widely used as a medicine (Galen, De Simplicium Medicament Facultatibus 9.2.10; Josephus, J.W. 4.481), so people on both sides exploited the lucrative resource, sailing on reed rafts to where the asphalt rose up and carrying it off ‘like plunder of war, since they are hostile to one another’ (Erastosthenes, in Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca 19.99.1). The fumes emanating from the rising of the asphalt were considered noxious, and could tarnish metal. Because of these, and bad odours, the inhabitants of the region were believed to be susceptible to disease and prone to die early. They were also considered sorcerers: Posidonius (in Strabo, Geogr. 16.2.43) states that the people used incantations and weird practices in processing the asphalt. The strange substance was believed to require peculiar methods of treatment. Josephus (J.W. 4.480) includes the tale that asphalt sticks to boats and is only unglued by menstrual blood, referring to uses of asphalt not only for medicinal purposes but also for caulking boats. Along with asphalt, people also collected sulphur (Piacenza Pilgrim, Itinerarium 10/166), alum and tar (Descriptio locorum 31–32). There was also the industry of salt, referred to in the writings of later Byzantine and medieval authors (Adomnan, De Locis Sanctis 2.17.2; Descriptio locorum 32). The tenth-century Muslim writer at-Tamimi wrote that a special type of salt was collected on the north-western shores of the Dead Sea (At-Tamimi, Al-Murshid 36b–37a; 54b–55a, see Amar, 1998, p. 4). Another type of salt, called ‘Andarani’ was produced around the village of Zara, that is az-Zara, which is identified as Callirhoe (Amar, 1998, p. 5). The boats depicted on the Madaba mosaic map (dated to the sixth century ce ) may be carrying cargoes of salt, shown as different colours to illustrate the distinction between sea and rock salt (Bloch, 1962; Amar, 1998, p. 5, cf. Rosenson, 1986). Classical authors were also astonished by the fact that despite the harsh environment of the Dead Sea, the land was good for palm-growing where it was watered by springs, and the highly-valued opobalsam plant grew here. Posidonius (in Strabo, Geogr. 16.2.41–42) describes Jericho as a well-inhabited and fruitful area of special palms, especially the caryotic palms, as well as other fruit trees. Jericho was situated in a lush area of date groves (Josephus, J.W. 4.469–72). Opobalsam cultivation became an extremely lucrative industry in this region (Donceel-Voûte, 1998; Patrich and Arubas, 1989; Patrich, 2006; Taylor, 2012, pp. 311– 13), the cultivation of which began east of the Jordan and Dead Sea, where it was known as the ‘balm of Gilead’ (Taylor, 2012, pp. 208–9); it is referred to as growing in the ‘valley’ of Syria (Palæstina) by Theophrastus (Historia Plantarum 9.6.1–2). Opobalsam is first attested as growing specifically in the Jericho region only under the Hasmoneans (Posidonius, in Strabo, Geogr. 16.2.41–2, cf. Pompeius Trogus in Justinus, Epitome 36.3), in the middle of the first century bce . It is likely that it was also cultivated by the Hasmoneans in En Gedi, as a royal monopoly; Strabo (Geogr. 17.1.15) notes the ‘shrewd practices of the Judaeans . . . in the case of both the palm tree, particularly the
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caryotic palm, and the balsam’ in not permitting it to be grown in many places, in order to increase its price. Opobalsam produced an enormously expensive sap remarkable for its cure of headaches, cataracts and dimness of sight, so it was highly valued by physicians (see Theophrastus, Historia Plantarum 9.6.1–4, cf. Pliny, Historia Naturalis 12.54 [111–123]), and, like asphalt, it was also sold to Egyptians for embalming the dead. Greek and Roman writers also knew about the destruction of Sodom – one of the few stories of the Bible (Gen. 19) mentioned in classical texts. Strabo points out that near Masada you can see scorched rocks, fissures and ashy soil, as well as ruined settlements, and that the local inhabitants state that there were once thirteen cities in the region, with Sodom as the metropolis, which were swallowed up in the destruction. Tacitus knew a similar story (Historia 5.7). In a lengthy passage, Josephus (J.W. 4.452–485) describes the Dead Sea region. It includes Jericho, lying in a plain, with bare, uninhabited mountains framing it. Within these two mountain ranges are what Josephus calls ‘the Great Plain,’ the Aulon, which we know as the Jordan Valley, from the Sea of Galilee to Lake Asphaltitis, which is ‘salty and barren.’ Josephus notes the palm trees near the River Jordan and explains how extremely fertile the region of Jericho is because of the perennial spring (Ain es-Sultan) which irrigates the Jericho plain where palms of many varieties and with different medicinal properties as well as the precious opobalsam, the cypress and the myrobalan grow. So rich was this area in fertility, combined with the warm air and the plentiful water, that Josephus calls it ‘divine,’ the inhabitants relying so much on the climate that they wear linen, all year round (J.W. 4. 473). Josephus notes that Lake Asphaltitis was bitter and unproductive with a famous buoyancy. He tells the story that when Vespasian came to this lake (in 68 ce ) to put an end to the Jewish revolt he ordered his troops to test the buoyancy by throwing nonswimmers into the deep water with their hands tied behind them. Josephus passes over this horror without comment, noting only that they floated, before going on to describe the colour of the lake, which apparently changed three times every day (J.W. 4.476–7). The curative baths of Callirhoe on the eastern side of the northern Dead Sea are mentioned by Pliny (Naturalis historia 5.15 [73]). Pliny then notes a detail not mentioned in the work of previous known authors: that a people named the Esseni – Essenes – lived on the western side of this lake [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus, Philo, Other Literature]. On the west the Essenes flee all the way from the shores which are harmful, a people alone and in all the world remarkable above the rest, [being] without any woman, abdicating all sexual acts, without money, companioned by palms. Daily the swarm is renewed with equal multitudes, filled with huge numbers of those, wearied of life and the fluctuations of fortune, who keep to their ways of life. So through a thousand ages – incredible to say – it is an eternal people, in which no one is born, so fecund is this dissatisfaction of life in others. Below these was the town of En Gedi, second only to Jerusalem [read: Jericho] in fertility and groves of palms, now another ash-heap. Then Masada, a fortress on a rock, and this not far from Asphaltites. And to here is Judaea. (Translation author’s own).
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Pliny did not consider the Essenes so much exemplary as plain weird, an example of the paradoxical nature of the vicinity he was describing. While the lake was dead, these celibate men managed to renew their ‘people’ by accepting those who had given up on life, with only the palm trees for company in this barren land. Pliny’s evidence is one of the most important reasons for identifying the famous Dead Sea Scrolls, found in caves close to the site of Qumran on the western side of the Dead Sea, as brought together by Essenes. It is important to note, however, that Pliny himself seems to refer to a wide area, relating to the ‘shores’ on the western side (Taylor, 2009; 2012, pp. 131–40). Such a portrayal alerts us to the fact that not all information obtained by Greeks and Romans was reliable. Pompeius Trogus, in the first century bce , discussed Jericho accurately as a fertile valley between ridges of hills, with opobalsam and palm groves, and defined the lake as being named the ‘Dead Sea,’ mare mortuum. He thought, however, this was because of the stillness of its waters, which were congealed with asphalt, so that no wind would move it, and no one could sail on it – inanimate matter would sink, and wood would only float if smeared with alum (Justinus, Epitome 36.3). There was extensive copying of information by authors of the Greco-Roman era, so that both truth and falsehood could multiply in attestations. In regard to the Dead Sea, Pausanias (Græcæ Descriptio 5.7.50) stated that ‘living creatures float in it naturally without swimming; dying creatures sink to the bottom. Hence the lake is barren of fish; their danger stares them in the face, and they flee back to the water which is their native element.’ This representation of fish struggling to swim back up the Jordan River is shown in the sixth-century Madaba mosaic map. In fact both living and dying creatures float in these waters.
Archaeology of the Dead Sea Region Archaeological work around the Dead Sea and lower Jordan Valley correlates well with literary evidence to indicate that the north-western and eastern areas were developed at the time of the Hasmonean dynasty. The first Hasmonean winter palace of Jericho was built at the time of John Hyrcanus (134–104 bce ) and much extended by Alexander Janneus (ca. 90–75 bce ) (Netzer, 2001b, pp. 28–39). At this point some fortified Iron Age sites from Jericho to En Gedi were re-occupied and developed, and Qumran was included in this chain (Bar Adon, 1977; 1998a; 1998b; Taylor, 2012, pp. 219–21). Herod the Great developed the area of the north-western Dead Sea by expanding on Hasmonean structures in Jericho (Netzer, 2001a, pp. 40–2, 79–87), as well as at the palace-fortress Masada in Idumea (Netzer, 1991; Forster, 1996) and at Macherus in Perea, the place where Josephus indicates that John the Baptist was killed by Herod Antipas (Ant. 18.116–19, cf. Strobel, 1974; Corbo, 1978; 1979; 1980; Corbo and Loffreda, 1981). Callirhoe, with its healing hot springs on the other side of the lake to Qumran, was developed along with an impressive harbour. Beside the Herodian palace complex there were field systems, villae rusticae, and also pools with significant similarities to those at Qumran (Clamer, 1989; 1997; 1999; Strobel and Wimmer, 2003). This Herodian development may be understood in light of both exploitation of economic and medicinal resources and against the background that from 63 bce to 106 ce this was
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the borderland between the Roman Empire and Nabatea. The maintenance of both trading and defensive positions was, therefore, critical. Herod the Great’s rule here from 37 bce was interrupted by the fact that Mark Antony gave the region to Cleopatra in 34 bce , and Herod had to lease areas back until 31 bce (Josephus, J.W. 1.386–396; Ant. 15.187–201). In the same year a significant earthquake (J.W. 15.121–22) struck the area, but Herod’s keen interest in building projects around the Dead Sea is clearly indicated by archaeological remains. The main urban centre of Jericho has yet to be studied fully by archaeologists. Likewise the town of Livias (Tell er-Rame) in present-day Jordan has not yet been excavated. However, the excavations in the palace complexes have provided important repertoires of pottery with similarities to Qumran pottery of the Hasmonean-Herodian periods (Bar Nathan, 2002; 2006). That the pottery from Qumran has strong similarities with that of other regional sites such as Callirhoe is to be expected, as is also the appearance of Nabataean ware with a cream slip in its repertoire, indicating some contact with traders from the southern and eastern sides of the lake (see Magness, 2004, p. 12). All of the sites along the Dead Sea in Judaea, including the part in the eastern region of Peraea, suffered damage during the Jewish Revolt (66–70 ce ), with Masada falling to Roman troops in 73 ce . En Gedi was also destroyed and, according to documents from Nah.al H·ever, became the property of the Roman emperor. According to Pliny, Jericho – with its lucrative opobalsam groves – passed to direct Roman ownership (Pliny, Nat. Hist. 12.54 [111–15]). The area of the Judean wilderness, the Buqeiʿa, previously only settled in the Iron Age, was re-occupied in the period after 68 ce (Cross and Milik, 1956), corresponding to the final occupation period of Qumran (which most likely continued until an earthquake in ca.115 ce , with the nearby site of Ain Feshkha continuing through this period also, see Taylor, 2006; 2012, pp. 261–5). Judean occupation of the region ceased as a result of the Second Revolt: the last surviving evidence of Judean inhabitants in this area is found in the many refugee caves west of the Dead Sea dating to 135 ce (Eshel, 2010; 2012).
Burials The sites around the Dead Sea employed similar burial practices of shaft graves, often with loculi, with stone markers piled on top in an oval shape, oriented either northsouth or east-west, very like those of the Qumran cemeteries (Taylor, 1999; and see Hachlili, 2010 for a comprehensive discussion and bibliography). These burials also resemble Bedouin graves of modern times, making dating and identification very difficult, nor is excavation decisive since grave goods are rarely attested. Similar types of graves (on the basis of surface appearance) may be found in numerous sites in the Buqeiʿa and even extend south of Wadi Qumran on the plain, all around the remains of the rectangular Iron Age structure (personal observation, cf. Humbert and Chambon, 1994, p. 367). The earliest shaft graves of this type in the region have been found associated with the Persian-Hellenistic town of Zarethan (Tell es-Sa’idieh), north of Jericho in the Jordan Valley. In particular tombs T210 and T298A are noteworthy with T210 including an
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Achaemenid style of fluted bronze bowl and a ‘Nabu-type seal’ (Tubb, 1990, p. 42). Such graves were also found in the Jericho necropolis north of Tell-es-Sultan (Bennet, 1965, pp. 532–39, Pl. 25). South of Qumran they appear at Ain el-Ghuweir (Bar Adon, 1977, pp. 12–17), at Hiam es-Sagha (Eshel and Greenhut, 1993; Reshef and Smith, 1993) and on the eastern side of the southern Dead Sea in a huge cemetery at Kh. Qazoun (also spelled as Qazone) (Politis, 1998a; 1998b). While the ethnic identity of those interred is variable, particularly in the case of Qazoun, in Ain el-Ghuweir the cemetery included a jar with the Hebrew name ‘Yehonanan’ (Bar Adon, 1977, p. 17; Fig. 21: 3, 23). Such shaft graves should probably also be associated not only with settlements but also with caves where Bar Kokhba refugees hid. The cemetery of H·iam es-Sagha (also spelled Sagaha or Sa’raha), for example, is not related to a settlement, and the twenty graves are actually located on a hill at a higher level than the coastline.
Communications In antiquity routes of trade and communication over distances were primarily by water. It is worth remembering the large amount of traffic that went by way of rivers, lakes and seas in the ancient world, and the Dead Sea was no exception (Nissenbaum, 1991). These – not roads – were the motorways of antiquity. Land travel was slower and more cumbersome. In other words, whenever we have a site situated next to a river, sea or lake that may now seem isolated, we need to remember that the transportation routes of antiquity were different from ours. One sees on the sixth-century Madaba mosaic map that there are boats on the Dead Sea carrying cargo. Josephus therefore notes ships on the Dead Sea (J.W. 4.439, 475–481), and Nabatean reed boats are mentioned in Strabo (Geogr. 16.2.42) and Diodorus Siculus (Bibliotheca 19.99, 100). Archaeological discoveries have confirmed the importance of shipping, with stone anchors and ship ropes being found in several places (see Hadas, 1992; 2008; Shimony, Yucha and Werker, 1992). Between Jericho and Qumran, on the Dead Sea itself, there was the tower and anchorage of Rujm el-Bahr, one of the chain of Iron Age fortified settlements that were re-developed most likely in the time of Alexander Janneus, ca. 85 bce (Bar Adon, 1989a). A Hasmonean-Roman anchorage has been uncovered at Ain es-Zara – ancient Callirhoe (Schult, 1966; Hadas, 2008). South of Qumran, there was a Hasmonean-era ship shed at Qasr al-Yahud/Kh. Mazin, built to house four boats, and accessing the water via a broad ramp (Bar Adon, 1989b; Netzer, 2001b, pp. 77–78). The dating of this site to the time of Alexander Janneus has been confirmed by the discovery of a hoard of coins from his reign (Hirschfeld and Ariel, 2005). It is likely that boat ramps were used in relation to any site along the shores of the Dead Sea, including Qumran. De Vaux (1973, pp. 5–6) noted that an ancient path leading from the ruins of Qumran to the water indicates that it was accessed from the sea. The roadway system of the northern Dead Sea has been the subject of some speculation, with the suggestion made that Qumran functioned as a commercial trading post and way station guarding the pass to the Buqeiʿa (Crown and Cansdale, 1994; Cansdale, 1997, pp. 123–4). In the study by Taylor and Gibson (2011), however, the pathways were dated by typology, sherds and roadside huts to the Iron Age II
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period. The paths clearly connected the Iron Age sites in the Buqeiʿa with the site of Qumran and other sites along the western coast of the Dead Sea, creating a track network that stretched northwards to Jericho and southwards to En Gedi (Tel Goren). This system consisted of simple cleared paths edged by large stones and included passes from the Dead Sea up to the Buqeiʿa plain above. In the Hasmonean-Roman period there were important main roads running east– west located to the north and the south of the Dead Sea that were in due course paved and edged in Roman style. The northern and southern roads connected with a main trade route going north–south on the eastern side of the Dead Sea, known as the ‘King’s Highway’. This highway stretched from the Gulf of Aqaba (connecting to the Red Sea) to Damascus and beyond, via a confederation of independent cities known in GrecoRoman times as the Decapolis. At various points along this highway there were smaller roads leading to the Mediterranean Sea. The east-west main road north of the Dead Sea connected Jerusalem with Jericho, and then crossed the Jordan River to Livias, then on to the major cities of Heshbon (Esbus) and Philadelphia. The southern east-west route ultimately led to Egypt, and skirted the south of the Dead Sea, allowing for uploading of the lake’s riches from Zoara in the south, a town of Nabataea (Har-El, 1978). The road network itself indicates that it was Zoara that was the key port and trading centre of the lake. In between these main roads, however, lay a region that was largely wilderness. Access to various settlements along the lake shore was via the old Iron Age tracks and passes suitable only for people walking on foot, probably also with donkeys and camels. The terrain drops into the huge basin in which the Dead Sea is set, so anyone coming or going to the Dead Sea had to descend or ascend along various steep passes. The north-western Dead Sea, though linked at its northern and southern points to main road systems, remained a remote place in antiquity, with a minimal population around its perimeter. It was for this very reason that refugees and rebels, fleeing in the First and Second Revolts, would come here for safety, far away from urban centres and main roads [→3 Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. On account of its sterility Josephus therefore characterizes the rugged hill district along the western side of the lake as being without human habitation (Josephus, J.W. 4. 453; see Taylor, 2010b, pp. 474–6).
Water Dead Sea settlements from the Iron Age II onwards were built close to springs that functioned better in ancient times than today, such as at Ain ej-Jahir in the north, supporting the settlement of Rujm el-Bahr, and south of Qumran on the way to En Gedi at the fortified settlements of Ain el-Ghuweir and Ain et-Turaba. In some places around the Dead Sea these fresh springs continue abundantly, such as Ain Feshkha, En Gedi and En Boqeq in the west, or Ain ez-Zara (Callirhoe) and the extraordinary valley of Zarqa Main in the east. The very fertile zones of Jericho in the north and Zoara in the south are also as lush today as in antiquity (cf. Josephus, J.W. 4.469–72). By deeming the springs ‘fresh’ this is not to say they are devoid of degrees of salinity in places, but they irrigate plant life, can support freshwater fish (in Ain Feshkha) and
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are potable. Other sites required harnessing of water from a wadi at times of flooding in order to supply water for human settlement and cultivation. The small site of Kh. Mazin (Qasr el-Yahoud), for example, would have been supported by the intermittent water of the Kidron (Wadi en-Nar), though any water system that harnessed it has either not survived or not been identified as yet. A cistern with hydraulic plaster, found beneath the floor of the tower of Kh. Mazin, could hold 30 cubic metres of water, but it is not clear where the water came from (Hirschfeld and Ariel, 2005, p. 76). Despite the catchment of water from winter floods via the aqueduct at Qumran, the best drinking water for the site would have been supplied by the spring of Ain elGhazal, not far from an ‘isolated building’ 1,500 m further south (Taylor, 2012, p. 267; de Vaux, 1956, p. 576; de Vaux, 1973, p. 74). Though ignored, the building actually stood at the time of the Hasmonean-Roman settlement of Qumran, since the pottery was consistent with the site at this time and an unreadable coin was discovered here (de Vaux, 1956, p. 576; 1973, pp. 59–60; Humbert and Chambon, 1994, Figs. 533–8; Hirschfeld, 2004, pp. 185–7). This would have been a field house for agricultural work, since water channels and agricultural enclosures were found to be connected with the spring (Porath, 1995; cf. Hirschfeld 2004, p. 185, who suggests it might have been a dovecote [columbarium]). Another spring was located at Ain et–Tannur, closer to Ain Feshkha (see the map in Hirschfeld, 2004, p. 184). The availability of fresh water for drinking was essential for the survival of any settlement. Overall, both literary and archaeological evidence combines to present us with a consistent picture of the development of Judean enterprise and building in the region of the northern Dead Sea by John Hyrcanus, at the end of the second century bce , but most especially by Alexander Janneus (103–76 bce ), with even more development under Herod the Great (37–4 bce ). This development enabled the exploitation of precious commodities around and in the lake and the creation of military outposts and palaces. While the roadways around Qumran were not significant at this period, the site of Qumran was somewhat connected to other places, both north to Jericho and south to En Gedi, via a land route, as well as inland via the pass through to the Judean wilderness and beyond as well as being linked via water to other settlements. Overall, the strongly royal developments of the Hasmonean and Herodian periods show the interests of the ruling class in maintaining control in this area of Judaea with royal estates, anchorages and fortified settlements. How Qumran and the nearby site of Ain Feshkha fits in with these continues to be a matter for consideration.
Bibliography Amar, Z. (1998), ‘The production of salt and sulphur from the Dead Sea region in the tenth century according to at-Tamimi,’ PEQ 130, 3–7. Bar Adon, P. (1977), ‘Another settlement of the Judaean Desert sect at En el-Ghuweir on the shores of the Dead Sea,’ BASOR 227, 1–25. Bar Adon, P. (1989a), ‘Rujm el-Bahr,’ ‘Atiqot 9, 4–14 (Hebrew), 4–5* (English summary). Bar Adon, P. (1989b), ‘Qasr el-Yahud,’ ‘Atiqot 9, 18–27 (Hebrew), 5* (English summary). Bar Nathan, R. (2002), Hasmonean and Herodian Palaces at Jericho: Final Reports of the 1973–1987 Excavations III: The Pottery. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society.
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Bar Nathan, R. (2006), ‘Qumran and the Hasmonean and Herodian winter palaces of Jericho: The implication of the pottery finds on the interpretation of the settlement at Qumran,’ in K. Galor, J.-B. Humbert and J. Zangenberg (eds), Qumran, the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Archaeological Interpretations and Debates. Leiden: Brill, pp. 264–77. Bennet, C. M. (1965), in K. Kenyon, Excavations in Jericho II: The Tombs Excavated in 1955–1958. London: The British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem, pp. 516–46. Bloch, R. M. (1962), ‘Red salt and grey salt,’ Mad’a 6, 3–8. Cansdale, L. (1997), Qumran and the Essenes: A Re-Evaluation of the Evidence. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Clamer, C. (1989), ‘ʿAin Ez-Zara excavations 1986,’ Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 33, 217–25. Clamer, C. (1997), Fouilles archéologiques de ʿAïn ez-Zâra/Callirrhoé, villégiature hérodienne. Beirut: Institut Français d’archéologie du Proche-Orient. Clamer, C. (1999), ‘The hot springs of Kallirrhoe and Baarou,’ in M. Piccirillo and E. Alliata (eds), The Madaba Map Centenary 1897–1997. Jerusalem: Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, pp. 221–5. Corbo, V. (1978), ‘La fortezza di Macheronte: Rapporto preliminare della prima campagna di scavo: 8 settembre – 28 ottobre 1978,’ Liber Annuus 28, 217–38. Corbo, V. (1979), ‘La reggia-fortezza erodiana: Rapporto preliminare alla seconda campagna di scavo: 3 settembre – 20 ottobre 1979,’ Liber Annuus 29, 315–26. Corbo, V. (1980), ‘La fortezza di Macheronte (Al-Mishnaqa): Rapporto preliminare alla terza campagna di scavo: 8 settembre – 11 ottobre 1980,’ Liber Annuus 30, 365–76. Corbo, V. and S. Loffreda, (1981), ‘Nuove scoperte alla fortezza di Macheronte: Rapporto preliminare alla quarta campagna di scavo: 7 settembre –10 ottobre 1981,’ Liber Annuus 31, 257–86. Cross, F. Moore and J. T. Milik, (1956), ‘Explorations in the Judaean Buqeʿah,’ BASOR 141, 5–17. Crown, A. D. and L. Cansdale, (1994), ‘Qumran: Was it an Essene settlement?,’ BAR 20, 24–35, 73–4, 76–8. Donceel-Voûte, P. (1998), ‘Traces of fragrance along the Dead Sea,’ Res Orientales 11, 93–124. Donner, H. (1963), ‘Kallirhoë: Das Sanatorium Herodes’ des Großen,’ ZDPV 79, 59–89. Eshel, H. (2010), ‘Gleaning of scrolls from the Judean Desert,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Contexts. Leiden: Brill, pp. 49–87. Eshel, H. (2012), ‘Excavations in the Judean Desert and at Qumran under Israeli jurisdiction,’ in D. Dimant (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Scholarly Perspective. Leiden: Brill, pp. 381–99. Eshel, H. and Z. Greenhut, (1993), ‘Hiam el-Sagha, a cemetery of the Qumran type, Judaean Desert,’ RB 100, 252–9. Faust, A. (2008), ‘Settlement and demography in seventh-century Judah and the extent and intensity of Sennacherib’s campaign,’ PEQ 140, 168–94. Forster, G. (1996), Masada V: The Yigael Yadin Excavations 1963–1965, Final Reports, Art and Architecture. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Galor, K., J.-B. Humbert and J. Zangenberg, (eds) (2006), Qumran, the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Archaeological Interpretations and Debates. Leiden: Brill Gibson, S. and J. Taylor (2008), ‘Roads and passes round Qumran,’ PEQ 140, 225–7. Hachlili, Rachel (2010), ‘The Qumran Cemetery Reassessed,’ in The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Ed. Timothy H. Lim and John J. Collins. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 46–78. Hadas, G. (1992), ‘Stone anchors from the Dead Sea,’ ‘Atiqot 21, 55–7. Hadas, G. (2008), ‘Dead Sea sailing routes during the Herodian period,’ BAIAS 26, 31–6.
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Hammond, P. C. (1959), ‘The Nabataean bitumen industry at the Dead Sea,’ BA 22, 40–8. Har-El, M. (1978), ‘The route of salt, sugar and balsam caravans in the Judaean Desert,’ GeoJournal 2/6, 549–56. Hempel, C. (ed.) (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill. Hepper, N. and J. Taylor (2004), ‘Date palms and opobalsam in the Madaba mosaic map,’ PEQ 136, 35–44. Hirschfeld, Y. (2004), Qumran in Context: Reassessing the Archaeological Evidence. Peabody: Hendrickson. Hirschfeld, Y. (2006), ‘The archaeology of the Dead Sea valley in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman periods,’ Geological Society of America Special Papers 401, 215–29. Hirschfeld, Y. and D. T. Ariel (2005), ‘A coin assemblage from the time of Alexander Jannaeus found on the shore of the Dead Sea,’ IEJ 55, 66–89. Humbert, Jean-Baptiste and A. Chambon, Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân et de Aïn Feshkha I. NTOA SA 1. (Fribourg: Editions Universitaires, 1994). Magen, Y. and Y. Peleg (2006), ‘Back to Qumran: Ten years of excavation and research, 1993–2004,’ in Galor, Humbert and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran, the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 55–113. Magen, Y. and Y. Peleg (2007), The Qumran Excavations 1993–2004: Preliminary Report. Judea and Samaria Publications 6. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority. Magness, J. (2004). Debating Qumran: Collected Essays on its Archaeology. Leuven: Peeters. Netzer, E. (1991), Masada III, Buildings, Stratigraphy and Architecture. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Netzer, E. (2001a), Hasmonean and Herodian Palaces at Jericho. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Netzer, E. (2001b), The Palaces of the Hasmonaeans and Herod the Great. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Nigro, L. and H. Taha (eds) (2006), Tell es-Sultan/Jericho in the Context of the Jordan Valley: Site Management, Conservation and Sustainable Development. Proceedings of the International Workshop held in Ariha 7th – 11th February 2005 by the Palestinian Department of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage – Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, UNESCO Office – Ramallah, Rome ‘La Sapienza’ University. Rome: La Sapienza. Nissenbaum, A. (1991), ‘Shipping lanes of the Dead Sea,’ Rehovot 11, 19–24. Patrich, J. (2006), ‘Agricultural development in antiquity: Improvements in the cultivation and production of balsam,’ in Galor, Humbert and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran, the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 241–48. Patrich, J. and B. Arubas (1989), ‘A juglet containing balsam oil (?) from a cave near Qumran,’ IEJ 39, 43–59. Politis, K. (1998a), ‘Khirbet Qazone,’ American Jounral of Archaeology 102.3, 596–7. Politis, K. (1998b), ‘Rescue excavations in the Nabataean cemetery at Khirbat Qazone 1996–1997,’ Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 42, 611–14. Porath, Roi (1995), ‘Horbat Qumran,’ Hadashot Arkheyologiot: Excavations and Surveys in Israel 13, 84. Porath, Roi (2006), ‘Bar Kokhba Refuge Caves in the Area Between Ein Gedi and Qumran in Light of the Renewed Research Jerusalem Project in the Judean Desert.’ M.A. thesis. Jerusalem: Hebrew University (in Hebrew, English abstract). Porath, Roi (1995), ‘Qanats in the Aravah,’ in Eilat: Studies in the Archaeology, History and Geography of Eilat and the Aravah. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society in Co-operation with the Israel Antiquities Authority, pp. 243–60 (Hebrew) Reshef, D. and P. Smith (1993), ‘Two skeletal remains from Hiam El-Sagha,’ RB 100, 260–9.
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Rosenson, J. (1986), ‘What were the ships sailing on the Dead Sea in the Map of Madaba carrying?,’ Halamish 3, 16–20. Safrai, Z. (1994), The Economy of Roman Palestine. London: Routledge. Schult, H. (1966), ‘Zwei Häfen aus römischer Zeit am Toten Meer: Rujum el-bahr und el-beled (ez-Zara),’ ZDPV 82, 139–48. Shai, I., R. Porath, and H. Eshel, (2007), ‘The Morinaga Cave,’ in E. Stern (ed.) Ein-Gedi Excavations I: Conducted by B. Mazar and I. Dunayevsky, Final Report (1961–1965). Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, pp. 391–403. Shimony, C., R. Yucha and E. Werker, (1992), ‘Ancient anchor ropes from the Dead Sea,’ ‘Atiqot 21, 58–62. Stern, E. (2001), Archaeology of the Land of the Bible II: The Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian Periods, 733–332 bce . New York: Yale University Press. Stern, E. (2007), En-Gedi Excavations I: Conducted by B. Mazar and I. Dunayevsky, Final Report (1961–1965). Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society. Strobel, A. (1974), ‘Das römische Belagerungswerk um Macharus: Topographische Untersuchungen,’ ZDPV 90, 128–84. Strobel, A. and S. Wimmer (2003), Kallirrhoë (‘En ez-Zara). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Taylor, J. (1999), ‘The cemeteries of Khirbet Qumran and women’s presence at the site,’ DSD 6, 285–323. Taylor, J. (2006), ‘Kh. Qumran in period III ,’ in Galor, Humbert and Zangenberg (eds), Qumran, the Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 133–46. Taylor, J. (2007), ‘Qumran in context (Review Article),’ BAIAS 25, 171–83. Taylor, J. (2009), ‘On Pliny, the Essene location and Kh. Qumran,’ DSD 16, 129–49. Taylor, J. (2010a), ‘The classical sources on the Essenes and the scrolls communities,’ in T. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 173–99. Taylor, J. (2010b), ‘Dio on the Essene landscape,’ in Hempel (2010) (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context, pp. 467–86. Taylor, J. (2012), The Essenes, the Scrolls and the Dead Sea. Oxford: OUP. Taylor, J. E. and S. Gibson (2011), ‘Qumran connected: The paths and passes of the north-western Dead Sea,’ in J. Frey and C. Claussen (eds.), Qumran und Archäologie – wechselseitige Perspektiven. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 1–51. Tubb, J. (1990), ‘Preliminary report on the fourth season of excavations at Tell esSa‘ideyeh,’ Levant 22, 21–42. Vaux, R. de (1956), ‘Fouilles de Khirbet Qumrân,’ RB 63, 533–77. Vaux, R. de (1973), Archaeology and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Trans. D. Bourke. London: British Academy. Zangenberg, J. (1998), ‘Das Tote Meer in neutestamentlicher Zeit,’ in E. A. Knauf, U. Hübner and R. Wenning (eds), Nach Petra und ins Königreich der Nabatäer: Festschrift Manfred Lindner. Bodenheim: Beltz Athenäum, pp. 49–59. Zangenberg, J. (2000), ‘Wildnis unter Palmen? Khirbet Qumran im regionalen Kontext,’ in B. Mayer (ed.), Jericho und Qumran: Neues zum Umfeld der Bibel. Regensburg: Friedrich Pustet, pp. 129–63. Zangenberg, J. (2004), ‘Opening up our view: Khirbet Qumran in regional perspective,’ in D. R. Edwards (ed.). Religion and Society in Roman Palestine: Old Questions, New Approaches. London: Routledge, pp. 170–87.
9
Qumran and the Ancient Near East Henryk Drawnel
This contribution concentrates on the impact of Late Babylonian culture on the preQumranic Aramaic literature found at and near Qumran. These texts attest the interest of Jewish scribes from the Dead Sea region in traditions that originated in Babylonia. Attention is drawn particularly to the priestly composition Visions of Levi (also known as Aramaic Levi [→24 Aramaic Levi; 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]) and the early strata of Enochic literature [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]. Some further texts from Qumran that indicate possible Babylonian influence are also dealt with.
Scribal Craft in the Visions of Levi At the end of the nineteenth century two large portions of the Visions of Levi were found in the Ezra Synagogue in Cairo. Seven fragmentary Qumran manuscripts (1Q21; 4Q213; 4Q213b; 4Q213a; 4Q214; 4Q214a; 4Q214b) dated to the early and late Hasmonean period mostly overlap with the Genizah documents and with their Greek translation found in one of the Mt Athos manuscripts (Ms. Koutloumousiou 39). This priestly composition contains a large didactic section, in which Isaac teaches Levi priestly law. One section (vv. 31–47) is dedicated to different quantities of wood, salt, frankincense and other material used in the preparation of the sacrifice. A detailed analysis of the numbers that express different weight and capacity measures shows that these numbers are presented according to a certain numerical pattern that finds its antecedent in Babylonian lexical lists. Such lists preserve the earliest tool of encyclopedic learning used in Babylonian scribal education from the most remote periods to the extinction of the cuneiform culture (Drawnel, 2004, pp. 269–93). Thus, Jewish priestly education inherited numerical schemes based on a sexagesimal counting system attested in the Babylonian lexical lists, and the priestly author of Visions of Levi presented it as part of priestly knowledge. After Levi has learnt how to prepare the holocaust and accompanying meal offerings together with the fraction notations, he then instructs his children/students in a wisdom poem not to neglect the study of scribal craft (səphar). Thus, priestly education is characterized as belonging to a scribal type of knowledge which indicates a strong Babylonian background as well as a clear link with the pseudepigraphic books of 1 Enoch where astronomic, meteorological and 109
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geographic knowledge inspired by Babylonian tradition is revealed to Enoch, scribe of truth and justice, in a didactic context (Drawnel, 2006).
Enochic Astronomy and Babylonian Celestial Knowledge The Qumran caves brought to light eleven Aramaic fragmentary manuscripts of 1 Enoch, the Ethiopic translation of which has been known since the end of the eighteenth century. Four of them (4Q208–4Q211) partially overlap with the astronomical part of the Ethiopic Enoch (1 En. 72–82). They contain, however, a longer Aramaic version of the lunar computation (4Q208 [early third century bce ] and 4Q209 [late first century bce ]), which opened up a fresh insight into the meaning of the original text. Since the beginning of the twentieth century scholars have indicated a certain relationship between Babylonian antediluvian traditions about Enmeduranki, the seventh antediluvian king of Sippar, and Enoch the seventh antediluvian patriarch and main recipient of Jewish antediluvian knowledge in 1 Enoch (Zimmern, 1902). Additionally, the astronomical part of 1 En. (chs 72–82) describes a peculiar system of astronomical computations that deal with the monthly stay of the sun in twelve ‘gates’ (ch. 72). The proportion of daylight and nighttime on the solstices is here expressed by a 2:1 (or 1:2) ratio. Then the lunar section contains a truncated description of the first two days of the lunar month (ch. 73), together with calculations concerning the stay of the moon in the ‘gates’ (ch. 74) and calculations of the length of the 364-day year (ch. 74). Another section is dedicated to the division of the horizon into twelve ‘gates’ that indicate geographical directions where twelve harmful and beneficial winds originate (chs 76–77). Finally, we have a section that describes the order of the stars that divide the year into four seasons and their ‘leaders’ (chs 79 and 82; 4Q211). Scholars have long suspected a Babylonian origin for the astronomical system in 1 En. 72–82. E. Weidner (1916) found the ratio 2:1 or 1:2 for the length of day and night on the solstices in an Akkadian astronomical text and thus was able to suggest a Babylonian origin for 1 En. 72 where the same ratio appears. Otto Neugebauer (1964), a German scholar who specialized in the history of ancient astronomy, first explained the meaning of the ‘gates’ for the sun and moon in chapters 1 En. 72 and 74. With algebraic calculations he proved that each gate, described in the Ethiopic text as the place where the sun rises and sets, corresponds to a fixed arc on the horizon that is related to the rising and setting amplitude of the sun during the year. By comparing the fragmentary data concerning the moon in 1 En. 74 with an Ethiopic astronomical manuscript he was able to reconstruct a full pattern of lunar gates throughout the year. This enabled him to refute earlier interpretations connecting the gates with the zodiac signs. He also noted that the Enochic text preserves a purely schematic outline of astronomical phenomena found in the early phases of Babylonian and Greek astronomy. Neugebauer subsequently pointed out that the use of thirty-day schematic months could have been inspired by Babylonian arithmetical schemes similar to those found in the Babylonian astrological composition called MUL .APIN (i.e. ‘The Plow Star,’ see 1 En. 72.6–32; [Neugebauer, 1985]). The linear pattern for the variation of the length of daylight as well as the ratio 2:1 at the solstices suggest an early Babylonian background.
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James VanderKam (1984) based his analysis of the Enochic astronomy on the work of O. Neugebauer, E. Weidner, and B. L. van der Waerden, eminent historians of Babylonian astronomy and astrology. He proposed to interpret the Astronomical Book against the context of early astrological/astronomical cuneiform works, such as astrolabes, MUL .APIN , and the Enūma Anu Enlil, official series of Babylonian celestial divination. The Enochic astronomy was originally based on a year composed of twelve thirty-day months (1 En. 72.35; 74.10a, 11; 75.1b) attested in many cuneiform sources. It is possible that the Enochic author elaborated that schematic year of Babylonian origin and created a 364-day sabbatarian system that better corresponded to his theological presuppositions. VanderKam also noted that the geographic and meteorological descriptions in 1 En. 76–77 are not unexpected in an astronomical treatise since schematic divisions of the earth and sky together with meteorological observations occur also in Babylonian astrological texts. Additionally, he argued that some older Babylonian astronomical texts use 1/15 fraction in order to describe the variation in the moon’s rising and setting during a month. Thus, the scheme of the daily illumination of the lunar disc found in 1 En. 78.6–8 and 4Q210 1 iii 3–9 that uses the 1/15 fraction may simply represent the transfer of this Babylonian arithmetic progression to the description of the lighted portions of the lunar surface by the writer of this part of 1 Enoch. VanderKam’s approach proved to be fruitful in subsequent research, but some of his conclusions were questioned. On the basis of MUL .APIN and some other cuneiform texts M. Albani (1994) and W. Horowitz (1996; 1998) claimed to have found the 364day year in the cuneiform sources [→62 Calendars]. This suggests such a calendar should be considered a borrowing from the cuneiform tradition rather than a Jewish creation. Since the cuneiform evidence does not expressly confirm the use of the 364day year in the Babylonian tradition, and the arguments in favour of Albani’s and Horowitz’s interpretation are inferential, their opinion was harshly criticized by J. Koch (1996; 1997; 1998), and the problem does not seem to be definitively settled. VanderKam’s interpretation of 1 En. 78.6–8 and 4Q210 1 iii 3–9 is obviously wrong, for these two texts do not use the 1/15 fraction for the arithmetic progression of light in the lighted portions of the lunar surface (cf. Drawnel, 2011, pp. 374–83). However, the connection between the arithmetical progression of lunar visibility in the Babylonian astrological sources and the Aramaic lunar calculation found in 4Q208 and most of 4Q209 proved to be crucial for the explanation of the latter. The lunar calculation found in 4Q208 and most of 4Q209 partially overlaps with the fragmentary 1 En. 73.4–8 that describes the beginning of the lunar month. The Aramaic text was first interpreted as referring as a whole to the illumination of the lunar surface (Neugebauer, 1979, pp. 195–6 and n. 8), but such an approach proved to be wrong (Drawnel, 2007). The lunar calculation is, in fact, a composite text that describes the lunar visibility periods during night and day according to a repetitive two-month scheme, in which the full moon occurs either on day 14 or day 15 of the month. In this schematic monthly disposition each lunar day is divided into four parts in accordance with the changing pattern of lunar visibility; in this way the nychthemeron (a period of 24 hours) is divided into four parts in the waxing (col. B: from sunset to moonset; col. D: from moonset to sunrise; col. E: from sunrise to moonrise; col. H:
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from moonrise to sunset) and in the waning phase (col. D: from sunset to moonrise; col. B: from moonrise to sunrise; col. E: from sunrise to moonset; col. H: from moonset to sunset). Each column uses the same basic fraction 0.5/7 (= 1/14) as the factor of arithmetical progression of lunar visibility or invisibility during night and day; the numerical entries oscillate between 0.5/7 and the integer of 1. One additional column (col. F) uses the same basic fraction 0.5/7 to express the progression or diminution of the illumination of the lunar surface. Since both in the waxing and in the waning period column F stands after the column that indicates the period of lunar invisibility in the sky, one has to assume that the illumination of the lunar surface is computed, not observed. It appears that the whole schematic computation of periods of lunar visibility is a numerical schematic construction rather than an actual record of the lunar movement. Once the text of 4Q208 and 4Q209 had been properly interpreted, it was possible to establish its dependence on the Babylonian astrological literature (Drawnel, 2011, pp. 301–10). Tablet 14 of the Enūma Anu Enlil (EAE, cf. Al-Rawi and George, 1991–92) ends the first section of the EAE text dedicated to divination based on the periods of lunar visibility. It contains four different numerical tables, the first two (Tables A and B) indicate periods of lunar visibility during the ideal equinoctial month composed of thirty days. Although the tables compute these periods with the use of a Babylonian arithmetical system and with the application of two different methods, the computed periods correspond to those found in the Aramaic calculation. In the waxing period Table A presents the lunar period from sunset to moonset, which corresponds to col. B in the Aramaic text. In the waning phase the same cuneiform table divides the night into two periods: from moonrise to sunrise (part I) and from sunset to moonrise (part II ); such a division corresponds to col. D (= Table A, part II ) and col. B (= Table A, part I) in the Aramaic text. Table B of EAE Tablet 14 describes the lunar period from sunset to moonset in the waxing phase and from sunset to moonrise in the waning period; such a division of the night corresponds to col. B (waxing phase) and col. D (waning phase) in the Aramaic text from Qumran. Although both Table A and B use the fraction 1/15 as the factor of arithmetical progression, the Aramaic text prefers the fraction 1/14 (= 0.5/7) either for theological reasons (number 7 in the denominator) or because that fraction quite closely reflects the daily motion of the moon. Most of the remaining periods of lunar visibility preserved in the Aramaic calculation find their corresponding lunar measurements in the text of Babylonian astronomical diaries, that is regular observations (nas.āru ša ginê) of the sky (Drawnel, 2011, pp. 308–10).
The Myth of the Fallen Watchers and its Late Babylonian Social Context The Jewish appropriation of some parts of Babylonian scholarship evidenced in the Visions of Levi did not take place in a religious and cultural vacuum. Inspired by the biblical account, the priestly author of the Aramaic document dedicated to Levi included into the literary framework of Isaac’s didactic instruction (Vis.Lev. vv. 13–61) a section inspired by Akkadian lexical texts (vv. 31–47). Thus he presented the
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arithmetical knowledge of Babylonian origin as part of Jewish patriarchal and didactic tradition. The same process can be detected in the Ethiopic Astronomical Book, where Chapter 81 points to Enoch as the recipient of ‘angelic’ astronomical knowledge and its tradent to his sons/pupils. The creation of the Jewish religious and narrative framework for some elements of Babylonian scholarship did not solve the problem of the origin of Babylonian knowledge that, although transmitted in a polytheistic context, was clearly superior to the Jewish religious tradition, at least in its description and explanation of natural phenomena. It is reasonable to assume that the myth of the fallen Watchers, a text at least contemporary with the Aramaic Astronomical Book and the Visions of Levi, contains a critique of Babylonian knowledge and of its main representatives (Drawnel, 2010). The fallen Watchers of the myth are presented as sinful and rebellious angels who transmit to humanity arts and crafts that cause violence and lawlessness on earth. The list of crafts taught by Shemihazah and other angels in 1 En. 8.3 (4Q201 1 iv 1–4 and 4Q202 1 iii 2–3) is easily divided into two groups. The first six items include spellbinding, cutting of roots, loosening of spells, sorcery, magic, and sapiential skills [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Syncellus’ Greek translation adds to the first part of the list an additional expression, not attested in Aramaic, that is ‘natural impulses against the mind’, which implies that Shemihazah teaches also different types of psychological disturbances that might affect man. The next six items in the Aramaic list indicate various elements of celestial divination, that is, signs of lightning flashes, signs of the stars, signs of shooting stars, signs of the earth, signs of the sun, signs of the moon. In the context of knowledge transmission present in the myth the question concerning the social background of this type of knowledge has to be raised. In the Persian and Hellenistic periods in Babylonia there existed only one group of professional priestly scribes, astronomers, astrologers and physicians, who occupied themselves with all the crafts listed in the Enochic text. These scribes were called in Akkadian āšipu, that is ‘enchanters,’ and in the Late Babylonian period they not only practiced medicine linked with spells, magic, loosening of spells and cutting of roots for medicinal purposes, but were also versed in mathematical astronomy, celestial and terrestrial divination, and star watching in general. Thus it is reasonable to assume that the author of the Enochic myth disguised the priestly tradents of the Babylonian sciences as fallen Watchers in order to denigrate their role in the transmission of scribal knowledge. The denigration becomes evident when one notices that the fallen angels also practice sorcery (4Q201 1 iv 2 kšpw; cf. 1 En. 9.8 [GS misēthra]). The real āšipu in Mesopotamia, closely connected with the functioning of the Babylonian temple in the Late Babylonian period, did not practice sorcery, but used all their skills to free their patients from the malefic influence of sorcerers and demons, witches and warlocks. The presentation of Asael in 1 En. 8.1 as smith and goldsmith, expert in precious stones and dyes, points to a different type of crafts, not associated with the Babylonian āšipu. It seems that Asael and his crafts represents a different type of Babylonian craftsmanship (ummânūtu) that, similarly to the professional āšipu, was closely connected with the functioning of the Babylonian temple and its economy (Drawnel, 2012). Thus, when read in the social context of Late Babylonian period, the
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myth of the fallen Watchers in 1 En. 6–11 amounts to a manifesto directed against the main bearers of cuneiform scholarship and craftsmanship that functioned within the walls of the Babylonian temple, the last bastion of cuneiform polytheistic culture and religion. Such an interpretation suggests that the origins of the earliest strata of the Enochic Aramaic compositions should be sought for in Babylonia, not in Israel. The negative depiction of Babylonian scholars and craftsmen disguised as Watchers paved the way for the introduction of Enoch as the scribe of righteousness who not only proclaims the imminent doom for the Watchers and the lack of mercy on the side of God (1 En. 12–16), but what is more important, becomes the recipient of the knowledge of the sky transmitted to him by angels faithful to God (1 En. 17–36; 72–82). Thus the Jewish author of the Enochic myth officially sanctioned the inclusion of Babylonian astral knowledge vested in Aramaic garb into the structure of Jewish religion. The subsequent interest in astrology and calendars of the Qumran covenanters who inherited Levi priestly literature and Enochic writings was a consequence of the religious and literary absorption of some parts of Babylonian science into the structures of Second Temple Judaism.
Additional Lunar Data and Babylonian ‘Lunar Three’ Measurements The Qumran library preserved other calendrical and astrological texts that according to some interpreters indicate some knowledge of cuneiform tradition. The three Hebrew calendric texts 4Q320, 321 and 321a contain lists of priestly courses together with some calendric phenomena, the precise meaning of which has been the object of much disagreement. They often mention three types of regular calendric data: the number of days (29 or 30) in the preceding lunar month, an unnamed phenomenon, commonly called ‘X’ by scholars, and the otherwise unknown term duqâ or duqô. These three elements are synchronized in the manuscripts with a six-year cycle of priestly courses and with a three-year cycle of the schematic 364-day year. According to the interpretation of Ben-Dov and Horowitz (2005), since the texts speak about lunar months composed of 29 or 30 days, the two remaining entries (‘X’ and dwq) have to deal with lunar phenomena that occur monthly. Then the two scholars note that between the term dwq and its subsequent X there occurs a regular 13 day interval that is kept throughout the list, while the time interval between X and the next dwq alternates between 16 and 17 days. By taking recourse to Babylonian astronomical almanacs from the first millennium bce and other cuneiform texts from the Seleucid period, these two scholars note that Babylonian astronomers observed and noted three kinds of data related to the cyclic movement of the moon. First, the numbers 30 or 1 were cited, which meant that the previous month contained 29 or 30 days respectively. Then every paragraph in the almanac contained the date (around the middle of the month) of a lunar phenomenon called in Sumerian NA that indicated that on that day the moon set for the first time after sunrise. The third lunar entry called KUR referred to the last visibility of the moon before the conjunction. Additionally, the cuneiform lists indicate that KUR
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usually occurs 13 or 14 days after NA , and NA occurs 16/17 days after KUR . When these measurements are compared with the lunar data in the Qumran scrolls discussed above, then it is possible to compare not only the slightly different notation concerning the length of the preceding month (29 or 30 days) with the Akkadian notation of the month length, but one can also identify the Sumerian NA with Hebrew ‘X’ and the Sumerian KUR with Hebrew dwq, which indicates at least the functional correspondence between the two traditions. The distance between dwq and ‘X’ is 13 days, which is fairly close to 13 or 14 days of difference between Sumerian NA and KUR ; the distance between ‘X’ and dwq amounts to 16 or 17 days, which corresponds to the usual 16 or 17 days between KUR and NA . Thus the same set of lunar phenomena with the same numerical relations appear both in the cuneiform literature from the Late Babylonian period and in the Qumran texts.
Astrology and Physiognomy Qumran Cave 4 also contained fragments of an Aramaic astrological text, 4Q318 (4QZ odiology and Brontology ar), the first part of which contains a selenodromion that indicates the movement of the moon through the various zodiacal signs during the twelve months of the year. The second part contains a brontologion, that is a prediction of future events based on thunder in a particular zodiacal sign. It appears that the best cultural background for the two parts of this Aramaic text constitutes Mesopotamian cuneiform tradition (Pingree, 2000). The selenodromion operates with a schematic 30-day month, hence with a year composed of 360 days, which originates in the early periods of Babylonian astronomy and was used in the late second millenium bce in the MUL .APIN composition and the astrolabes. The reconstruction of the schematic year in the selenodromion indicates that the month of Nisan, the first month of the year, began in the zodiacal sign of Taurus, since Adar, the last month of the year, begins and ends in Aries. Since in traditional Babylonian astrology and astronomy Nisan always began in Aries, it seems that the Aramaic text follows the cuneiform tradition found in MUL .APIN , where the year began with the constellations Pleiades and Taurus in Nisannu and concluded with Aries (I iv 33–39). The probable reason for such an order of the zodiacal signs is that MUL .APIN originated in the third millennium bce , when the constellations Pleiades and Taurus corresponded to the month of Nissanu (Albani, 1993, pp. 27–32). Thus, the Aramaic selenodromion would also in this respect depend on early Babylonian astrology. The brontologion contains only two omina (viii 6–9) that predict future events on the basis of thunder in the zodiacal signs of Taurus (?) and Gemini. The prognostication of future events on the basis of weather phenomena is abundantly attested in Akkadian omen literature, where the omens are arranged according to the months of the year. By contrast, the Aramaic text 4Q318 indicates in its protasis the zodiacal sign. Thus it seems that Akkadian literature became a source of inspiration for the Aramaic writer who arranged the omina, it seems, according to the same zodiacal order as the one found in the selenodromion. The earliest examples of Greek brontologia come from the Byzantine period only. According to Pingree (2000, p. 272) the Aramaic
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brontologion might be considered as an Aramaic adaptation of an Akkadian astrological text such as Tablet 44 of the Enūma Anu Enlil astrological series. The Qumran library yielded two fragmentary scrolls, 4Q186 and 4Q561 that describe the traits of human physiognomy in relation to some astrological terms (Popović, 2007). Since the texts are fragmentary and their terminology obscure, it is difficult to discern their sources of inspiration. Although some late Greek astrological texts seem to be of some help, it is not excluded that the two Qumran manuscripts contain the Aramaic version of Babylonian physiognomic treatises, such as Alamdimmû, read in the context of astrological science.
Qumran Dualism and its Origins The question of the origin of Qumran dualism [→74 Ethics and Dualism] is a thorny one, and a definitive solution has not yet been found. The conviction that linked the cosmic, ethical and sapiential dualism of especially the ‘Treatise on the Two Spirits’ (1QS 3.13–4.26) with the Iranian religion expressed in the old Gathas attributed to Zoroaster (e.g. Winston, 1965–66; Kobelski, 1981, pp. 84–98; Philonenko, 1995) has been regularly disputed by those who see the dualistic thought as grounded in biblical teaching (e.g. Duhaime, 1988). Jörg Frey (1997) distinguishes in Qumran writings between an ethically oriented cosmic dualism with a sapiential background in the ‘Treatise,’ on the one hand, and a priestly type of sheer cosmic dualism found in 4QVisions of Amram, War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah], and 11QApocryphal Psalmsa [→61 Liturgical Texts; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination], on the other. Although the Visions of Levi (4Q213–4Q214a), a priestly Aramaic composition from the third century bce , introduces some elements of incipient dualism (such as a contrast between the satan and the spirit of truth [1a v. 8–10], between the kingdom of the sword and a kingdom of peace [vv. 3c–7]; and light and darkness terminology [v. 102]), the Visions of Amram (4Q543–4Q549), a priestly Aramaic text dated to the first part of the second century bce , contains a full-blown cosmic dualism concerning the angelic world [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. According to the latter text, there exists an angel of darkness, a prince of the angelic hosts, whose name is Malkirešaʿ, that is ‘evil king,’ or ‘my king is evil.’ The name of the angel of light, prince of his angelic hosts, is not preserved, but it most probably was an anithesis of the name of the prince of darkness, probably Malki-s. edeq, ‘king is justice,’ or ‘my king is justice.’ The two contrasting angels exercise their rule over humanity, try to extend their respective dominion over Amram and to ascribe to him their respective lots. Since the Visions of Amram is a composition related to the Visions of Levi, one is tempted to look for the origin of the dualism in this type of priestly composition in the angelic world. The Visions of Levi indicates an incipient dualistic worldview and is clearly influenced by Babylonian didactic tradition. Additionally, its literary form and arithmetical scribal knowledge show clear contacts with the Aramaic Astronomical Book (Drawnel, 2006). Scholars have also noticed that the Visions of Levi uses an Enochic type of calendar (Greenfield and Stone, 1979, p. 224), which makes the connection with the Enochic tradition even more pronounced. Thus one is tempted to look for the origins of Jewish
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cosmic dualism in Jewish Aramaic literature influenced by, and also opposed to, the Babylonian polytheistic world. The interpretation of the myth of the fallen Watchers in 1 En. 6–11 suggested in this essay bolsters such a proposal. Additional study is, however, necessary to find a definitive solution to the question of the origins of Qumran cosmic dualism.
Bibliography Al-Rawi, F. N. H., and A. R. George (1991–92), ‘Enūma Anu Enlil XIV and other early astronomical tables,’ Archiv für Orientforschung 38/39, 52–69. Albani, M. (1993), ‘Der Zodiakos in 4Q318 und die Henoch-Astronomie,’ Forschungsstelle Judentum Mitteilungen und Beiträge 7, 3–42. Albani, M. (1994). Astronomie und Schöpfungsglaube: Untersuchungen zum Astronomischen Henochbuch. WMANT 68. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag. Ben-Dov, J. and W. Horowitz (2005), ‘The Babylonian Lunar Three in calendrical scrolls from Qumran,’ Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 95, 104–20. Drawnel, H. (2004), An Aramaic Wisdom Text from Qumran: A New Interpretation of the Levi Document. JSJS up 86. Leiden: Brill. Drawnel, H. (2006), ‘Priestly education in the Aramaic Levi Document (Visions of Levi) and Aramaic Astronomical Book (4Q208–211),’ RevQ 22, 547–74. Drawnel, H. (2007), ‘Moon computation in the Aramaic Astronomical Book,’ RevQ 23, 3–41. Drawnel, H. (2010), ‘Between Akkadian ·tupšarrūtu and Aramaic ספר: Some notes on the social context of the early Enochic Literature,’ RevQ 24, 373–403. Drawnel, H. (2011), The Aramaic Astronomical Book (4Q208–4Q211) from Qumran: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Drawnel, H. (2012), ‘Professional skills of Asael (1 En. 8:1) and their Mesopotamian background,’ RB 119, 518–42. Duhaime, J. (1988), ‘Le dualisme de Qumrân et la littérature de sagesse vétérotestamentaire,’ Eglise et Théologie 19, 401–22. Frey, J. (1997), ‘Different patterns of dualistic thought in the Qumran library: Reflections on their background and history,’ in M. Bernstein, F. García Martínez, and J. Kampen (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge 1995. STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 275–335. Greenfield, J. C. and M. E. Stone, (1979), ‘Remarks on the Aramaic Testament of Levi from the Geniza,’ RB 86, 214–30. Horowitz, W. (1996), ‘The 360 and 364 day year in ancient Mesopotamia,’ Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society 24, 35–44. Horowitz, W. (1998), ‘The 364 day year in Mesopotamia, again,’ Nouvelles Archéologiques Brèves et Utilitaires 2, 49–51. Kobelski, P. (1981), Melchizedek and Melchirešaʿ. CBQMS 10. Washington, DC : The Catholic Biblical Association of America. Koch, J. (1996), ‘AO 6478, MUL .APIN und das 364 Tage-Jahr,’ Nouvelles Archéologiques Brèves et Utilitaires 4, 97–9. Koch, J. (1997), ‘Kannte man in Mesopotamien das 364 Tage-Jahr wirklich seit dem 7. Jahrhundert v. Chr.?,’ Nouvelles Archéologiques Brèves et Utilitaires 4, 109–12. Koch, J. (1998), ‘Ein für allemal: Das antike Mesopotamien kannte kein 364 Tage-Jahr,’ Nouvelles Archéologiques Brèves et Utilitaires 4, 112–114.
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Neugebauer, O. (1964), ‘Notes on Ethiopic astronomy,’ Orientalia NS 33, 49–71. Neugebauer, O. (1979), Ethiopic Astronomy and Computus. Veröffentlichungen der Kommission für Geschichte der Mathematik, Naturwissenschaften und Medizin 22. Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-Historische Klasse. Sitzungsberichte 347. Wien: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Neugebauer, O. (1985), ‘The “Astronomical” chapters of the Ethiopic Book of Enoch (72–82): With additional notes on the Aramaic fragments by Matthew Black,’ in M. Black (ed.), The Book of Enoch or I Enoch: A New English Edition with Commentary and Textual Notes. STVP 7. Leiden: Brill, pp. 386–419. Philonenko, M. (1995), ‘La doctrine qoumrânienne des deux esprits: Ses origines iraniennes et ses prolongements dans le judaïsme essénien et le christianisme antique,’ in G. Widengren et. al. (eds), Apocalyptique iranienne et dualisme qoumrânien. Recherches Intertestamentaires 2. Paris: Adrien Maisonneuve, pp. 163–211. Pingree, D. (2000), ‘4QZ odiology and Brontology ar: Astronomical aspects,’ in S. J. Pfann et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4 – XXVI: Cryptic texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. In consultation with James Vanderkam and Monica Brady. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 270–4. Popović, M. (2007), Reading the Human Body: Physiognomics and Astrology in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Hellenistic-Early Roman Period Judaism. STDJ 67. Leiden: Brill. VanderKam, J. C. (1984), Enoch and the Growth of an Apocalyptic Tradition. CBQMS 16. Washington, DC : The Catholic Biblical Association of America. Weidner, E. F. (1916). ‘Babylonisches im Buche Henoch,’ OLZ 19, cols. 74–5. Winston, D. (1965–66), ‘The Iranian component in the Bible, Apocrypha, and Qumran: A review of the evidence,’ History of Religion 5, 183–216. Zimmern, H. (1902), ‘Religion und Sprache,’ in E. Schrader et al. (eds), Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament. 3rd edn. Berlin: Reuther & Reichard, pp. 343–654.
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Scrolls and Early Judaism George J. Brooke
This chapter outlines some of the principal contributions of the Dead Sea Scrolls to the modern understanding of Early Judaism. Some of these contributions are discussed more fully in other more focused studies in this volume, but this article brings some of the major items together. The term ‘Early Judaism’ requires some explanation, because over the last two centuries various terms have been used to label the Judaism of the period. ‘Early’ in this essay is used to refer to the 350-year period before the fall of the Temple in 70 ce when the Persian province of Yehud was transformed through its existence in the context of the Hellenistic Levant. That transformation took place at first under the various influences of the Ptolemies of Egypt and the Seleucids of Syria. Then, after a short period of relative political independence and territorial expansion under the Maccabees and their Hasmonean successors, the transformation continued under the Romans and their vassals, such as Herod the Great. This article is about the period between what might be characterized as biblical Israel, last fully attested in the late fourth century bce Books of Chronicles, and the explicit presentations of rabbinic Judaism, which are visible most explicitly in the production of the Mishna (ca. 200 ce ). ‘Judaism’ is also a complex term. In an entry like this there is no need to enter into too much highly contestable detail about when the term was first used and in what sense (Cohen, 1999; Mason, 2007). What is at stake from a pragmatic perspective is some understanding of the social and religious life of the dominant population of the region of Judea, focused in particular but not exclusively in and around Jerusalem and its Temple. The relationship of the Jews in the region of Judea to Jews living elsewhere, both in Galilee and in places further afield such as Egypt, Babylon and Asia Minor, is also important. Some scholars have even used the term ‘Judaisms’ to refer to such social and religious life, thinking that it is predominantly characterized by its rich diversity, but such a plural term is no longer particularly fashionable, even though the description of the diversity has remained very much in the foreground. The principal significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls for the better appreciation of Early Judaism as defined in the preceding paragraphs is that they are the most extensive primary written source material for the time and place, for the region out of which emerged rabbinic Judaism and early Christianity. The Scrolls fill many gaps in our 119
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knowledge, though they do not fill them as completely as many might wish. As is most obviously demonstrated with the contents of the Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Schiffman and VanderKam, 2000), it is immediately apparent that the Dead Sea Scrolls from all the sites in the Judean wilderness [→3 Manuscript Collections: An Overview], and especially those from the caves at and near Qumran, need to be put into a much wider context of multiple finds, a long view of Jewish history, and the rich diversity of Jewish life and practice, as well as being linked to other literary corpora (see also Hempel, 2010; Lange, Tov and Weigold, 2011). In recent years Dead Sea Scrolls scholarship has tended to fragment into numerous sub-disciplines so that scholars operate with specialist interests in order to interrogate the evidence ever more closely. This article is an attempt at setting out the broader parameters of how the Scrolls fit with some aspects of Judaism at the time. Most of the article will concern the Scrolls from the Qumran caves, but other finds will also be mentioned as appropriate.
Aramaic, Hebrew and Greek The languages of the Scrolls are a good place to start [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Of the nearly 1,000 scrolls from the Qumran caves, over 80 per cent are in Hebrew. The language of such scrolls varies to some extent. Sometimes some compositions seem to contain deliberate archaisms, imitating earlier scriptural works; in other instances some of the compositions, such as Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah (MMT ), seem to be anticipating the dialectical Hebrew of later times [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]. Hebrew appears to be not only the primary language of scripture, but also of those areas that depend upon it, such as law [→58 Halakhah], prayer and liturgy [→61 Liturgical Texts; Poems and Hymns], and wisdom teaching [→63 Wisdom]. In other words, at least within the Qumran group and the wider movement of which it was a part, and quite probably amongst many other Jewish groups Hebrew was the language of jurisprudence, worship and study. However, about 130 of the manuscripts from the Qumran caves are in Aramaic, both literary and documentary. Significant work has been undertaken to assess the kinds of Aramaic present in the literary corpus, and also to identify the ideological profile of the Aramaic corpus (e.g. Berthelot and Stökl Ben Ezra, 2010). Particularly prominent in such analysis has been the description of the place of the pre-Sinaitic ancestors, patriarchs and matriarchs, in the Aramaic texts [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. Within that concern with the ancestors, particular attention is paid to the figure of Enoch and the revelations associated with him, many of which seem to emerge strongly in the third and second centuries bce [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other; 66 Revelation]. Moreover, there is interest in the transmission in books of priestly lore from one generation to another, particularly since the time of Noah and through the figure of Levi. Many of the Aramaic compositions connect with the Torah in one way or another. In addition, there are some that contain literary traditions that can be variously associated with Esther and Daniel [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. Some documentary texts from Qumran are in Aramaic; at other sites where inscribed fragments have been found those in Aramaic
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are almost exclusively documentary texts, perhaps indicating that it was the dominant language of daily life for Jews in late Second Temple Judea and beyond. The thirty or so Greek manuscripts from the Qumran caves include translations of some scriptural books, and of parts of the Enoch corpus, as well as paraphrases of scripture. There is no clear evidence of the existence at Qumran of Jewish literature originally composed in Greek [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]; nor is there any non-Jewish Greek literature. However, many of the small fragments in Greek remain unidentified. From other sites, there are considerable numbers of documentary texts in Greek, indicating that it was an entirely suitable language for various kinds of transactions. The occurrence of scrolls in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek in the caves at and near Qumran and variously at other sites is evidence of some degree of multilingualism amongst Jews in the region at the time. What such multilingualism indicates about the Jews of Judea in the late Second Temple Period has yet to be fully worked out; this evidence also has implications for the understanding of interactions with Jews elsewhere, especially those in Babylonia and in Egypt.
Pluralism amongst Elites The debates about the characterization of the diversity of Judaism in Judea and beyond continue to reverberate in Dead Sea Scrolls scholarship. With the reconsiderations of the date of the occupation of the Qumran site (now thought to be ca. 75 bce ) and of its purpose (no longer necessarily a sectarian HQ ) [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], and with the recognition that previous models of sectarianism for understanding the specific community at Qumran no longer seem appropriate [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism], there has suitably been a renewal of scholarly reflections on the wider movement of which the Qumran community was a part and less attention to the function of the Qumran community itself (see Collins, 2010; Schofield, 2009). Some scholars have presented their views as ongoing resistance to the identification of the movement with the Essenes (Goodman, 1995; Mason, 2011) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus]. For such the Jerusalem orientation of many of the so-called sectarian compositions from the Qumran caves seems to indicate that it is there that some overall sense for the collection should be sought [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. Nevertheless, a majority of scholars remain convinced that those at Qumran and elsewhere in the movement of which the inhabitants were a part, whether in camps or communities of some sort, were Essenes of some kind. Joan Taylor’s recent review of the evidence from a much broader contextual perspective has redesigned the Essene hypothesis in a more convincing fashion (Taylor, 2012). Whatever the case with the identification of the Qumran community and the wider movement of which it was a part, a larger debate has taken place in the previous generation concerning how the pluralism of Jewish elite groups should best be understood. Whereas Josephus, writing largely for a non-Jewish audience, tended to emphasize what was distinct about each group, recent scholarship has debated the
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extent to which a common Judaism might be identified at the core of the diversity. Such commonality might rest in a particular view of God, the place given to the Law and other texts, the attention paid to the Temple, and various regular observances, such as the keeping of the Sabbath, the practice of circumcision and the application of food laws. However, within each aspect of such commonality, there is such apparent diversity that a common core becomes problematic; there is even diversity of views and of skills within each elite group too. Such commonality as there might have been between the elite groups probably rests not in distinctive doctrines but rather on the culture of the Hellenistic Levant [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation; 19 The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Study of the Ancient World]. We appear to be dealing with some form of descriptive ethnicity with a concern to identify the make-up of the ethnos, its metropolis (Jerusalem) and metropolitan area, its particular cult, and its set of behavioural features which non-members could recognize as marks of identity [→6 Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context of the Scrolls]. The elite groups of Judea, especially Pharisees, Sadducees and Essenes, were all variously part of such an ethnos, though each retained their own customs and ways of life. And they all had political views, with the contemporary debates about kingship, for example, featuring in the Temple Scroll (the king is subservient) [→51 Temple Scroll] and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (God is king) [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons].
Scribal Practices and the Transmission of Texts The completion of Discoveries in the Judaean Desert, the principal set of textual editions, in 2010, and the production of revisions of earlier editions both in a series promoted by Princeton Theological Seminary (Charlesworth et al., 1994–2011) and in a three-volume work by Elisha Qimron (2010–15) have provided scholars with a sound basis for beginning to think again about the significance of the Scrolls [→4 Acquisition and Publication; Appendix C]. The ready availability of images of the Scrolls both online and in other electronic formats supports such fresh thinking [→Appendix D]. Because the finds from the Judean wilderness are written texts [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls], scholars have tended to give priority to writtenness over orality in the transmission of texts, assuming or even creating something of a distortion for Jewish practices at the time. Even so, of most importance in the manuscripts themselves, especially those from the Qumran caves which are predominantly literary texts, is what they display of the material culture of manuscripts and the scribal practices current in the late Second Temple Period. In particular the collection of manuscripts from the caves at and near Qumran shows that manuscripts were produced in various sizes for various purposes. Most were made of animal skin, but about a hundred are papyrus, almost certainly imported from Egypt and representing a kind of cultural complexity [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]; the best quality papyrus in Egypt was reserved for priestly use and its use by some in the movement associated with Qumran might indicate emulation of such priestly practice, perhaps with the particular aim of creating archival copies of some of the principal compositions in the
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collection (Brooke, 2017). For scribal practices themselves the attention to their rich diversity as brought to a climax in the work of Emanuel Tov (Tov, 2004) has stimulated and become a reference point for a growing interest in all forms of scribal culture in the Second Temple Period and earlier (e.g. Carr, 2005). In addition, the recognition of textual development in the transmission of compositions as attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls has reinvigorated the study of textual criticism (e.g. Tov, 2012) and the assessment of editing processes in Jewish antiquity (e.g. Müller, Pakkala and Romeny, 2014) [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies]. More specifically, it is certainly the case that the textual variety in those texts which were emerging in the Second Temple Period as having increasing authority has promoted an interest in revisiting the processes of the transmission of the whole text of the Hebrew Bible, including the Samaritan Pentateuch, and also the major versions, most notably the Septuagint and its production by Jews in Egypt. All those ventures are significant ways in which the implications of the textual variety that has been found in the Dead Sea Scrolls have been applied to much wider issues in Judaism of the Second Temple Period. Several issues in the study of texts and textuality have been brought into focus by the Dead Sea Scrolls. First, the Scrolls show that there are varieties of forms of the same composition, whether it is two or more editions of some of the scriptural books, such as Exodus [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] or Jeremiah [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], or the multiple versions of works like the Rule of the Community [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. The variety indicates that scribes generally took an active role in the transmission of texts and did not function as mere copyists, as became more dominant in later times. Second, the Scrolls present modern scholars with a very rich range of compositions that rework, rewrite or rephrase parts of other works [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture], especially those that were to end up as part of the Jewish scriptures (see Lange, 2010) [→55 Bible]. Much of such rewriting presents itself as articulating the authentic voice of earlier tradition, perhaps even claiming to displace it [→66 Revelation]. What that indicates about perceptions of textual authority is still under discussion. Third, the rich range of Jewish compositions amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls, especially those from the Qumran caves, has indicated that previous ways of classifying Jewish texts of the period, often in ways that indicate that much of it was highly derivative, are no longer appropriate. There is ongoing discussion about what meta-categories are suitable (e.g. apocrypha, pseudepigrapha, apocalyptic, wisdom) as well as debate about the specific genres to be assigned to certain compositions. In addition, the naming of individual compositions remains problematic, since very few titles survive; in any case, those that do, seem to indicate the normal Jewish naming practice of using the text’s first word or words, a practice which rarely conveys a sense of the overall content of the work (see, e.g. Najman and Tigchelaar, 2014). The Dead Sea Scrolls have shown that Early Judaism was increasingly a society where oral and written texts co-existed dynamically, with written forms of text probably becoming ever more significant and commonplace. Eventually, at some point near the end of the Second Temple Period or shortly thereafter, a standard form of the Hebrew text of the Jewish scriptures appeared [→55 Bible].
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The Torah and Daily Life From any cursory overview of the literary compositions from the Qumran caves it is clear that the Torah had pride of place [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. That is apparent not only in the number of copies of the various books of the Pentateuch, but also in the ways in which the various books of the Torah are engaged with in both the non-sectarian and the sectarian compositions found in the caves. The non-sectarian compositions include those Aramaic texts already mentioned which give pride of place to the pre-Sinaitic ancestors, often indicating ways in which the ancestors anticipated the keeping of the Law in their behaviour. Three issues are now lively parts of the discussion of the place of the Law in Jewish life in the late Second Temple Period. First, there are matters of diachronic concern. Is it possible to map clearly lines of continuity (or discontinuity) in the ways in which the Torah was interpreted and applied to daily living [→73 Daily Life]? Are any of the developments in the understanding and application of the Torah clearly traceable and indicative of later practices in rabbinic times? Because much in rabbinic halakhic interpretation is recognized as the heir of earlier Pharisaic views, it is no surprise that the sectarian legal interpretations from the Qumran caves have only a few resonances in later rabbinic works. Nevertheless, the Scrolls show that much of the intra-Jewish debates of the period were disputes concerning legal interpretation (e.g. Fraade, Shemesh and Clements, 2006) [→58 Halakhah]. Second, it is increasingly evident that there are varieties of emphasis in the ways in which interaction with the Law took place. For some, priority is given to learning and applying various matters of practical wisdom with little or no reference to the Torah, even with a deliberate strategy of avoiding it as might be the case in Instruction [→38 Instruction]. For others, such wisdom traditions are adapted so as to be brought into dialogue with the Torah, as in the case of 4Q525 (Uusimäki, 2016) or as is apparent in Ben Sira 24, where Law and wisdom are equated [see also Hempel, 2017]. For yet others, it is the Torah itself which seems to be dominant, whether associated directly with Moses or with its re-presentation by a figure such as Ezra or, for the sectarians of the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document], its interpretation by the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography], or whether in some rewritten or adapted form such as in the Temple Scroll. Third, there are particular matters of interpretation and practice [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. At play in several of the sectarian compositions from the Qumran caves is a concern with stringency, such as for various issues of purity [→70 Purity and Holiness]; stringency is in effect a means of guaranteeing that the letter of the Law is kept. In some instances, a degree of practicality emerges, such as might influence how contact might be worked out with non-Jews with whom it was necessary to do business. Sometimes social institutions influence the application of the Law, such as might concern matters of gender or age or hierarchy [→73 Daily Life]. On some occasions, daily living is just as much influenced by current cultural mores, often quite apart from the Law, such as might involve certain burial practices over against others. In addition, there are matters of hybridity in which in certain circumstances or in relation to certain needs, aspects of more than one system are combined together; such seems to be the
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case in some of the documents in the Babatha archive (Esler, 2017) [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview].
Prophecy, History and the Present The Scrolls from the Qumran caves have forced a change of view concerning prophecy in the Second Temple Period [→55 Bible; 26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. The former dictum that ‘prophecy ceased’ with the time of Ezra has been shown to be in need of qualification. It is now commonly agreed that prophecy continued, but that its forms changed. Although compositions like the Jeremiah Apocryphon, Second Ezekiel, and the Book of Daniel continue to record oracles and visions, in some other compositions, such as the pesharim [→44 Pesharim], prophecy is more about inspired interpretation as, with divine backing, the Teacher explains what the original prophet himself could not fully understand. And that inspired pesher interpretation has been variously interpreted. For some it has affinities with the handling of oracles and materia sacra in the East [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East], for others its affinities lie more with dream interpretation (as in Daniel), and for yet others its technical practices are best understood in light of the Greek commentators on Homer (Hartog, 2017). It is also worth noting that pesher interpretation is about bringing the unfulfilled oracles and blessings of the past into the present where their fulfilment is anticipated. As such pesher represents one particular view of historical processes whereby the divine will is experienced with immediacy. There are other approaches to past time in the Scrolls from the Qumran caves, and it is notable that those responsible for collecting them together did not seem particularly concerned with chronicling the past as in the Books of Samuel and Kings [→55 Bible; 20 Historiography]. Rather they were concerned with periodizing history with weeks and jubilee periods, or with various perceptions of the experience of exile, or with Urzeit and Endzeit ideologies in which their end-time rehearses anti-typically the events of the beginning. For the sectarians, messianic hopes were a further historical reflection on contemporary political circumstances [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms].
Prayer and Worship For hymns, prayers and blessings, there is a sense that scholarly discourse is near its beginning, though it is developing rapidly (Falk, 2010) [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts]. To my mind three features have become dominant in the scholarly discourse. The first is that it has become widely recognized that a large amount of the rich and varied liturgical material, both non-sectarian and sectarian, from the Qumran caves reflects scriptural tradition of one sort or another. This seems to be a phenomenon of two kinds. On the one hand, it is a deliberate use, re-use and reflection of earlier authoritative texts and traditions. On the other hand, it is an ongoing practice that seems to reflect the increasing authority of certain traditions that were later to be found
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in the Hebrew Bible. This whole process is the scripturalization of prayer in the late Second Temple Period (Newman, 1999). If it is indeed the case that many of those texts which eventually were included in the Hebrew Bible were collected or authorized by the hierarchies in the Temple, then it is most likely that the context to be considered for the developments in cultic and liturgical compositions are to be viewed primarily in terms of the power and influence of the Temple in late Second Temple Judea. It is that context which might also explain how liturgical contexts generally can be the conveyors of traditions of various sorts, not least scriptural rewritings and explicit scriptural interpretation. The second feature of the discussion of all kinds of prayer texts as now known from the materials that have survived in Qumran caves is the significant issue of continuity and discontinuity. ‘One thing that is distinctive is that the community of Qumran put their prayers into written form. This was in marked contrast to the practice of subsequent centuries in rabbinic Judaism which discouraged the setting down of prayers in writing (t. Shabb. 13:4)’ (Schuller, 2006, p. 59). This feature of discontinuity is striking not just for what it says about how modern scholars might have access to primary sources on prayer, but also because it indicates something particular about the practice of prayer in at least one part of Jewish antiquity. It seems as if there was a perceived need to control verbal interaction with the divine through the preferential use of written forms of prayer; free experience or spontaneity was for some reason challenged or marginalized. Third, there has been an increasing interest in early Jewish calendars since the publication of the editions of calendar texts from the Qumran caves [→62 Calendars]. Details can be found elsewhere in this Companion, but one matter is clear. The calendar texts from the Qumran caves reflect broadly the astronomical knowledge of the Near East at the time [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. They are not peculiar sectarian inventions, but witnesses to wider cross-cultural interaction.
Study A considerable number of non-sectarian or pre-sectarian wisdom compositions have come from the Qumran caves. Some of the compositions do indeed carry markers or motifs that were certainly taken up by the authors and redactors of sectarian works; most well-known of those is the common idiom raz nihyeh in Instruction (4Q415–418; 4Q423 [→38 Instruction]) which is also found in 1QS 11.3–4 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. So, several of the wisdom compositions fall on a line of development whose trajectory is taken forward by the sectarian movement, and that accounts for the multiple copies of some compositions in the Qumran caves. However, these pre-sectarian works represent a wider literary, educational and pedagogical set of contexts in Judaism than those of sectarian groups alone; indeed, some of the wisdom compositions may convey elements of non-Jewish speculative tradition. It is time for scholars to consider in detail how the Jewish wisdom curriculum, as developed in late Second Temple Period Judea, might be illuminated through its juxtaposition with more explicit Greek philosophy, even though in the collection of compositions from the eleven caves at and near
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Qumran there is no philosophical text in Greek. In addition, there needs to be further study of the place of cosmological speculation in some apocalyptic writing and of how that might intersect with some of the concerns with the workings of the universe and the spirit world that are the realms of magic (Bohak, 2008) and demons (Lange, Lichtenberger, and Römheld, 2003) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic and Divination].
Conclusion This brief survey has indicated that there is an increasing tendency in recent scholarship to take into account the wider context of the Scrolls found in the Qumran caves. Although some scholars have developed ever more precise specialist knowledge and competence in one area, it is becoming increasingly difficult for such specialists to remain exempt from considering further issues that arise out of information now available that describes multiple aspects of early Jewish life and practice through the late Second Temple Period and in various regions. Contexts of all kinds are forcing the reconsideration of many previous views on the Scrolls from Qumran and from elsewhere.
Bibliography Berthelot, K. and D. Stökl Ben Ezra (eds) (2010), Aramaica Qumranica: Proceedings of the Conference on the Aramaic Texts from Qumran in Aix-en-Provence, 30 June–2 July 2008. STDJ 94. Leiden: Brill. Bohak, G. (2008), Ancient Jewish Magic: A History, Cambridge: CUP. Brooke, G. J. (2017), ‘Choosing between papyrus and skin: Cultural complexity and multiple identities in the Qumran library,’ in M. Popović, M. Schoonover, and M. Vandenberghe (eds), Jewish Cultural Encounters in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern World. JSJS up 178. Leiden: Brill, pp. 119–35. Carr, D. M. (2005), Writing on the Tablet of the Heart: Origins of Scripture and Literature, New York: OUP. Charlesworth, J. H. et al. (eds) (1994–2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations. PTSDSSP. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck/Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. Cohen, S. (1999), The Beginnings of Jewishness: Boundaries, Varieties, Uncertainties. HCS 31. Berkeley : University of California Press. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Esler, P. F. (2017), The Yadin Papyri and an Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold. Oxford: OUP. Falk, D. K. (2010), ‘The contribution of the Qumran Scrolls to the study of Ancient Jewish Liturgy,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 617–51. Fraade, S., A. Shemesh and R. A. Clements (eds) (2006), Rabbinic Perspectives: Rabbinic Literature and the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 62. Leiden: Brill. Goodman, M. (1995), ‘A note on the Qumran sectarians, the Essenes and Josephus,’ JJS 46, 161–6.
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Hempel, C. (ed.) (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context, STDJ 90, Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2017), ‘Wisdom and law in the Hebrew Bible and at Qumran,’ JSJ 48, 155–81. Hartog, P. B. (2017), Pesher and Hypomnema: A Comparison of Two Commentary Traditions from the Hellenistic-Roman World. STDJ 121. Leiden: Brill. Lange, A., H. Lichtenberger and K. F. D. Römheld (eds) (2003), Die Dämonen/Demons, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lange, A. (2010), ‘In the second degree: Ancient Jewish paratextual literature in the context of Graeco-Roman and Ancient Near Eastern literature,’ in P. S. Alexander, A. Lange and R. Pillinger (eds), In the Second Degree: Paratextual Literature in Ancient Near Eastern and Ancient Mediterranean Culture and Its Reflections in Medieval Literature. Leiden: Brill, 3–40. Lange, A., E. Tov and M. Weigold (eds) (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages and Cultures. VTS up 140. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Mason, S. (2007), ‘Jews, Judaeans, Judaizing, Judaism: Problems of categorization in ancient history,’ JSJ 38, 457–512. Mason, S. (2011), ‘The historical problem of the Essenes,’ in P. W. Flint, J. Duhaime, and K. S. Baek (eds), Celebrating the Dead Sea Scrolls: A Canadian Collection. SBLEJL 30. Atlanta: SBL , pp. 201–51. Müller, R., J. Pakkala and B. ter Haar Romeny (2014), Evidence of Editing: Growth and Change of Texts in the Hebrew Bible. RBS 75. Atlanta: SBL . Najman, H. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (2014), ‘A preparatory study of nomenclature and text designation in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ RevQ 26, 305–25. Newman, J. H. (1999), Praying by the Book: The Scripturalization of Prayer in Second Temple Judaism. SBLEJL 14. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Qimron, E. (2010–15), The Dead Sea Scrolls: The Hebrew Writings, 3 vols. Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi. Schiffman, L. H. (ed.) (2003), Semitic Papyri in Context: A Climate of Creativity. Papers from a New York University Conference Marking the Retirement of Baruch A. Levine. CHANE 14. Leiden: Brill. Schiffman, L. H. and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (2000), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, New York: OUP. Schofield, A. (2009), ‘Between center and periphery: The Yahad in context,’ DSD 16, 330–50 Schuller, E. M. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: What Have We Learned 50 Years on? London: SCM Press. Taylor, J. E. (2012), The Essenes, the Scrolls, and the Dead Sea, Oxford: OUP. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (2012), Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, rev. and enl. edn 3rd edn. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Uusimäki, E. (2016), Turning Proverbs towards Torah: An Analysis of 4Q525. STDJ 117. Leiden: Brill.
11
Scrolls and Early Christianity Albert L. A. Hogeterp
Introduction Since the earliest days of the Dead Sea discoveries, the Dead Sea Scrolls have been ascribed a great potential to illuminate the Jewish background of early Christianity. The texts discussed in early comparative studies of the Scrolls and the New Testament (Stendahl, 1958) were limited to texts found in Qumran Cave 1: the Rule Scroll (1QS , 1QS a, 1QS b [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 46 Rule of Congregation; 45 Rule of Blessings), the Thanksgiving Scroll or Hodayot (1QH [→37 Hodayot]), the War Scroll (1QM [→40 Milh.amah]), the Pesher to Habakkuk (1QpHab [→44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation), and 1QMysteries [→42 Mysteries; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Next to Qumran Cave 1 texts, the Damascus Document, already known from the Cairo Genizah (CD -A, CD -B), was included in comparative discussion (and later supplemented by the publication of fragments from Qumran Cave 4 [→35 Damascus Document]). Some attention early on was given also to 4QpPsalm 37 (4QpPsa). Major themes for comparative study in these early stages of Scrolls scholarship included messianism and eschatology [→68 Eschatologies and Messianism], communal meals, communion of goods [→73 Daily Life], baptisms and purification rites [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah], dualism between two spirits and between flesh and spirit [→74 Ethics and Dualism], religious ideas about sin, grace and atonement, cultic imagery for the religious community and criticism of the Jerusalem temple cult [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. By the 1960s the corpus of published texts from the desert of Judah gradually expanded with the publication of fragments from the smaller Qumran Caves 2, 3, 5, 6, 7–10, texts from Murabbaʿat, the Psalms Scrolls 11QPsa, 11QPsb [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 60 Poetry and Hymns], 11QMelchizedek (11Q13) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianism], 11QS efer ha-Milh.amah, and exegetical and other texts from Qumran Cave 4 (4Q158–186 [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]); by the 1970s with 11QTargum of Job [→23 Aramaic Job], 11QapocrPs (11Q11 [→61 Liturgical Texts; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]), 11QJubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll], Aramaic fragments of Enoch from Qumran Cave 4 [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], phylacteries, mezuzot and Targum fragments from Cave 4 (4Q128–157 [→65 129
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Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]); and by the 1980s with a set of texts, 4Q482–520, comprising Cave 4 fragments, Cave 4 manuscripts of the War Scroll, 4QR itual of Marriage, prayer texts, Songs of the Sage (4Q510–511) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination], purity texts and legal texts [→58 Halakhah; 70 Purity and Holiness], and with 11QL eviticusa and 11QS ongs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (11Q17) [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]. Yet it is since the 1990s, when the bulk of the Qumran Cave 4 texts and fragments became published, that the landscape of Dead Sea discoveries was enormously extended. This new evidence includes the following major examples of texts: ●
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biblical texts [→55 Bible] in Hebrew (4Q1–118), witnesses to the Aramaic section of Daniel 2,4b–7, 28 (in 4Q112–113, 115), and biblical texts in Greek (4Q119–122); 8HevXIIgr; cf. 4Q127 (pap4QP araExod gr) [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. sectarian texts, texts identified as literary products of the (parent) movement of the Yahad by community terminology, literary parallels with longer known Qumran texts and/or sectarian outlook [→72 Forms of Community; 59 Rules]. These include Cave 4 recensions of the Rule of the Community (4Q255–264 [4QS a-j] [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]), the Damascus Document (4Q266–273 [4QD a-h], and the Hodayot (4Q427–432 [4QH a-f ]); 4QH alakha A (4Q251); 4QM iscellaneous Rules (4Q265); 4QMMT (4Q394–399 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]); 4QMysteriesa-c (4Q299–301); new exegetical texts, such as 4Q252– 254a (4QC ommentary on Genesis A-D [→33 Commentaries on Genesis]); new purity texts (4Q274, 276–278 [4QTohorot A-C], 4Q284(4QP urification Liturgy), 4Q414 [4QR itPur A]); calendrical texts (4Q320–330) with features of a 364-day solar calendar and synchronisms with a 354-day lunar calendar [→62 Calendars]; the Hebrew Apocryphon of Jeremiah (4Q383, 385a, 387, 388a, 389, 390, 387a [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture); Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q400–407 [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]); 4QWays of Righteousnessa-b (4Q420–421 [→63 Wisdom]); 4QB arki Nafshia-e (4Q434–438, Hebrew [→29 Barkhi Nafshi]); 4QN ew Jerusalema-c ar (4Q554–555 [→43 New Jerusalem]). Early Jewish literature, more generally defined in view of a broader literary transmission history, the lack of parallels with sectarian terminology and social outlook, and/or an early paleographical date: Hebrew fragments of Jubilees (4Q216–224) and Pseudo-Jubilees (4Q225–227 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]); Aramaic (4Q196–199) and Hebrew (4Q200) fragments of Tobit; the Aramaic Levi Document (4Q213–214b); the Apocryphon of Levia-b ar (4Q540–541 [→24 Aramaic Levi]); the Hebrew Apocryphon of Joseph (4Q371– 373); the Testaments of Naphtali (Hebrew, 4Q215) and of Qahat (Aramaic, 4Q542); Aramaic Visions of Amram (4Q543–548) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]; the Hebrew Apocryphon of Moses (4Q375–376); the Hebrew Apocryphon of Joshua (4Q378–379); the Hebrew text Pseudo-Ezekiel (4Q385, 386, 385b, 388, 385c, 391); an Aramaic cycle of texts around Daniel (4Q242 [4QP rayer of Nabonidus ar]), 4Q243–245 (4QpsDana-c ar), 4Q552–553a [4QF our Kingdomsa-c ar]); eschatological texts, mostly in Hebrew, such as
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4QT ime of Righteousness (4Q215a), 4QA ramaic Apocalypse (4Q246), 4QR enewed Earth (4Q475) and 4Q521 (4QMessianic Apocalypse); 4QNon-Canonical Psalms A-B (4Q380–381, Hebrew); 4QApocryphal Psalm and Prayer (4Q448, Hebrew); 4QS apiential Text (4Q424, Hebrew); 4QJews at the Persian Court ar (4Q550). Several texts are difficult to classify along longer known categories of biblical, sectarian and not clearly sectarian and more broadly defined early Jewish, texts. For instance, 4QR eworked Pentateuchb-e (4Q364–367; cf. 4Q158 [4QRP a]) are categorized among ‘parabiblical texts’ in the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert series [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. The distinction between sectarian and non-sectarian texts is also a matter of ongoing debate. In certain cases, the provenance of Qumran Cave 4 texts published since the 1990s is debated in terms of their affiliation with, or rather difference from, the sectarian movement of the Yahad (1–4QS [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad]) and its parent movement affiliated with the Teacher of Righteousness (cf. CD -A 1.11; 1QpMic 8–10 6; 1QpHab 1.13; 2.2; 5.10; 7.4; 8.3; 9.9–10; 11.5; 4QpPsa 3.15; 3.19; 4.27 [→72 Forms of Community; 20 Historiography]). Hebrew Qumran texts whose provenance is debated include 4QI nstruction (4Q415–418c, 423 [→38 Instruction]); 4QpapAdmonitory Parable (4Q302), and 4QB eatitudes (4Q525 [→31 Beatitudes; 63 Wisdom]), because of the absence of community terminology and an arguable balance between similarities and differences in outlook with longer known Qumran sectarian literature (cf. Goff, 2007, pp. 61–5, 223–28, 266). The possibilities for studying Judaism in Israel at the turn of the common era at large and the Jewish origins of Christianity in particular have consequently broadened. As this essay intends to illustrate, the study of the Scrolls, mainly the literary evidence of the Scrolls found in the caves near Khirbet Qumran, may contribute significantly to the following domains of study about Christian beginnings: ● ● ● ● ●
methodological debates about the Jewish origins of early Christianity Bible and biblical interpretation in the Scrolls and the New Testament the Scrolls and the language of the New Testament literary traditions in the Scrolls and the formation of New Testament texts religious beliefs in the Scrolls and early Christianity.
This entry will deal with each of these areas in turn.
The Scrolls and Methodological Debates on the Jewish Origins of Christianity The survey of different categories of Qumran texts outlined above effects methodological discussion about the Jewish origins of Christianity in various new ways. A contextualization of the Scrolls in Early Judaism is no longer necessarily limited to a description of the sectarian movement of the Essenes [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Literature; 72 Forms of Community]. The Qumran community has become identified
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with them according to the Essene hypothesis which is based on observed similarities in the movement’s geographical locations, practices and beliefs as described in Pliny the Elder, Josephus, Philo, the Rule of the Community (1QS /4QS ) and the Damascus Document. Several Qumran Cave 4 texts published since the 1990s, such as the 4QMessianic Apocalypse and 4QPseudo-Ezekiel, which are of great comparative interest for the study of Christianity’s Jewish background, have been assigned an early date of composition. These compositions antedate late second- or early first-century bce chronologies of the establishment of the Qumran community [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] and are generally considered pre-sectarian. The setting for comparison between the Scrolls and the New Testament has thereby become more diversified than illumination of commonalities between Essene practices and beliefs and Jewish contexts to the Gospel accounts of John the Baptist and Jesus and to the milieus of the early Jesus-movement in Israel and early Christianity at large. Recent evaluations of the significance of the Scrolls for the understanding of early Christianity also point to the Scrolls as part of a broader Palestinian Jewish matrix (Frey, 2001) and as evidence of pre-sectarian strands of thought and praxis in Early Judaism (Brooke, 2009). A second point of methodological consideration for comparative study is the recent tendency in the study of the Rule of the Community, a core rule text among sectarian texts, to move away from a strict Qumran-centrism in the understanding of the term Yahad. Compared to a traditional understanding of Yahad as a strictly Qumran-based community, the term has become re-interpreted as an umbrella term for the organization of a sectarian movement with several settlements, which included the elite group within the Yahad at Qumran (Collins, 2003; Metso, 2008; Schofield, 2008; Collins 2010: 52–87). This new scholarly hypothesis about the Yahad as a sectarian movement with several settlements implies a less isolated geographical position and social setting in Judean society. This in turn renders comparison between Qumran sectarian literature and New Testament texts less a matter of Essene influence and more a question of possible intersections between sectarian and non-sectarian strands of Early Judaism as background to emerging Christianity. Finally, a third methodological issue concerns recent scholarly critique of older distinctions between Judaism and Hellenism as contexts for Jesus and the Jesusmovement (Porter, 2011) and the place of the Scrolls in this discussion [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature; 19 The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Study of the Ancient World] (see also Jokiranta and Hartog, 2017). Documentary texts from Nah.al H·ever published since the 1990s comprise forms of Greco-Semitic bilingualism determined by indigenous use of Aramaic and Nabatean languages by the early second century ce [→3 Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. This evidence of language contacts differentiates Jewish Hellenism in Israel from forms of Hellenism in other parts of the Greco-Roman world. The Scrolls from Qumran are not isolated from the discussion of Judaism and Hellenism, in that they contribute in various ways to our understanding of biblical and early Jewish traditions previously preserved in Hellenistic Greek. That is, the Scrolls comprise some biblical Greek texts and paraphrase (4Q119–122, 127), and they provide Aramaic and Hebrew source materials to texts previously preserved as part of the Septuagint (Ps 151 – 11QPsa 28.3–14; Tobit – 4Q196–200) or as part of Josephus’ additional material in
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Ant. 6.68–71 as compared to 1 Sam. 11 (cf. 4QS ama X frg. a 9). The Scrolls also furnish concepts such as the Hebrew legal expression ‘works of the Law’, mʿśh h-twrh (4QMMT C 27 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]), and the Aramaic messianic terms ‘son of God,’ brh dy ʾl and ‘son of the Most High,’ br ʿlywn (4Q246 2.1), which occur as part of New Testament Greek, ‘works of the law’ erga nomou (Gal. 2.16, 3.2, 3.5, 3.10; Rom. 3.20, 3.28), ‘son of God’ huios theou (cf. Mk 3.11; Lk. 4.3 [Q]; Mt. 16.16, 26.63; Lk. 1.35 [L]; John 1.34; Acts 9.20; Rom. 1.3–4), and ‘son of the Most High’ huios hupsistou (Lk. 1.32), but which are semantically unparalleled in the Septuagint and in other Hellenistic Greek texts. As noted above, such intersections imply that a strict compartmentalization between Semitic literary milieus in Palestinian Judaism and the Greek-speaking world of Hellenism is not tenable with reference to the Scrolls. Conversely, the Qumran Scrolls voice a great versatility of Aramaic and Hebrew as literary languages in Israel into the first century ce as part of a semi-Hellenized Semitic East.
Bible and Biblical Interpretation in the Scrolls and the New Testament The Scriptures as transmitted among the Dead Sea Scrolls reflect a measure of pluriformity, which indicates the absence of a fully closed canon at the time of Jesus. Historical Jesus scholarship takes into account that Jesus employed Scriptures in Aramaic or Hebrew form in his teachings (Moyise, 2011). Certain traces of Targum, for instance Isa. 6.9–10 in Mark 4.11–12, have been discerned as possible echoes of Aramaic synagogal culture of scriptural reading in previous scholarship. The Jesus tradition in Luke 16.9, 16.11, 16.13 that one cannot serve God and Mammon, recurrently labelled as ‘unrighteous mammon,’ has general parallels as regards mammon in Qumran Hebrew (CD -A 14.20; 1QS 6.2; 1QMyst 1 ii 5; 4QS g 3 3), [m]m[wn]h in Qumran Aramaic (11QtgJob 11.8 [Job 27.17]), and in Mishnaic Hebrew, but specific parallels with the expression ‘deceitful mammon’ mmwn dšqr, mmwnh dšyqrʾ , mmwn šyqrʾ in rabbinic Targumim on Exod. 18.21 (Tg. Neof., Tg. Ps.-J.), 1 Sam. 8.3, 12.3, 2 Sam. 14.14, Isa. 5.23, Ezek. 22.27, Hos. 5.11, Amos 5.12, Hab. 2.9, Job 27.8 and Prov. 15.27. Even if one would consider the Septuagint to be the Bible of emerging Christianity at the redactional level of the Gospels, the study of biblical texts and biblical interpretation in the Scrolls is of great potential significance for the understanding of Christianity’s Jewish background. Examples of their significance include scriptural backgrounds to the envisaged role of John the Baptist in terms reminiscent of a Nazirite vow (Num. 6.3, Lev. 10.9, 1 Sam. 1.11) as described in Luke 1.15 (cf. Lk. 1.48a). To these scriptural backgrounds 4QS ama II a-d 3–4 adds an envisaged dedication of Samuel: ‘I will [dedic]ate him as a Nazirite for ever, all the days of his life’ [wnt]tyhw nzyr ʿd ʿwlm kwl ymy [h.yyw], a phrase unparalleled in MT or LXX witnesses to 1 Sam. 1.22. The reference to scribal assertions that Elijah would have to come first to fulfil the expectation of the resurrection of the dead in Mark 9.11 alludes to Malachi 3.23. The importance of this scriptural text in Early Judaism is witnessed not only by a Hebrew biblical scroll of the Twelve Prophets from Qumran, 4QXIIa IV 16–17 [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related; 55 Bible], but also by an Aramaic
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wording in 4Q558 (4QpapVisionb ar) 51 ii 4, ‘thus I will send Elijah be[fore]’ lkn ʾšlh. lʾlyh qd[m]. Apart from the Qumran biblical scrolls, the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nah.al H·ever (8HevXIIgr), published in 1990, constitutes major evidence of early Jewish revision of the Greek Bible by the turn of the common era [→3 Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. An example of its exegetical interest could be the different reading of Micah 1.2 in 8HevXIIgr IV 31 kai to pl[ēr]ōma, as compared to kai hoi pantes in LXX Mic. 1.2. The reading of 8HevXIIgr, which supposedly approximates wmlʾh, occurs in a context of prophetic exhortation against the transgressions of Israel (Mic. 1.5) which rhetorically addresses all peoples on earth (Mic. 1.2). By comparison, the references to ‘the fullness’(to plērōma) in Rom. 11.12, 25 concern Israel and the Gentiles in Paul’s covenant theology, but Paul’s terminology had a precursor in prophetic exhortation, as the Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nah.al H·ever indicates. The prophetic understanding of Scriptures in Early Judaism at the time of emerging Christianity is illustrated by the understanding of Daniel as a prophet [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. This is apparent from formulas of citation in both Matthew 24.15, ‘that spoken by Daniel the prophet’ (to rēthen dia Daniēl tou prophētou) and 4Q174 (4QE schatMidr A) 1–3 ii 3 ‘in the book of Daniel the prophet’ (bsfr dnyʾl hnbyʾ). In this connection, the Danielic vision of one like a Son of Man (Dan. 7.13) echoed in Mark 13.26 par. could also be understood as a prophetically inspired vision.
The Scrolls and the Language of the New Testament The Scrolls impact our understanding of the language of the New Testament in several ways, in terms of a Semitic background in the Jewish milieu of the historical Jesus and of Semitic language influence in a multilingual context [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Semitic contexts of language are relevant in connection with transliterated Aramaic words of Jesus, such as Boanērges (Mk 3.17), Talitha koum (Mk 5.41), Ephphatha (Mk 7.34), and in relation to Greek-Aramaic bilingualism in earliest Christianity, as illustrated by references to abba ho patēr (Mk 14.36; Rom. 8.15, Gal. 4.6), by Paul’s expression marana tha (1 Cor. 16.22), and by the information in Acts 6.1 that the Jerusalem church comprised Hebrews as well as Hellenists. The Dead Sea Scrolls comprise many literary texts in Hebrew and Aramaic from the time before and during Jesus’ ministry. The Aramaic texts from Qumran and Aramaic documentary texts from Nah.al H·ever and other places are of great significance to achieve an accurate picture of literary and non-literary registers of language in Middle Aramaic (200 bce –200 ce ). This evidence is of crucial importance for the study of the role of Aramaic in reconstructing the teaching of Jesus. The early Jesus-movement operated in a multilingual Greco-Semitic context in Israel and abroad, where Greek was a major language of culture and communications. The language of the New Testament, as reflected in the Synoptic Gospels, also reflects Semitic language influence from a multilingual context of language contact. The
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Semitic side of this context may well be illuminated by the Scrolls. For instance, Synoptic Greek variously employs the restricted collocation ‘son’ huios with genitive as a figurative noun of relationship. Luke 16.8 refers to ‘sons of light’, which has exact and historically close parallels outside the New Testament only in the Hebrew and Aramaic texts from Qumran. Another instance is ‘peace’ eirēnēn as a greeting to a house in Luke 10.5, which has a parallel in Qumran Aramaic fragments of Tobit (4Q196 14 ii 6–7 // 4Q197 4 iii 3–4), but not in the corresponding Greek text of Tobit 7.1.
Literary Traditions in the Scrolls and the Formation of New Testament Texts The Scrolls are further of form-critical significance for our understanding of literary forms and genres in Hebrew and Aramaic texts of Early Judaism in at least two ways. First, the literary picture of Qumran texts necessitates a new understanding of the Jewish background in which Jesus’ sayings may be situated. The literary-historical study of the sayings source Q discerned in the double tradition passages of Matthew and Luke has tended to distinguish blocks of sayings identified as sapiential or apocalyptic/eschatological respectively. Qumran literature gives occasion to include more mixed trajectories of literary tradition on the part of Early Judaism. That is, texts such as 1–4QI nstruction [→38 Instruction; 63 Wisdom] and 1–4QMysteries [→42 Mysteries; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination] reflect partly intersecting trajectories, including sapiential and apocalyptic features (on the further possibility of comparing traditioning processes in the Scrolls and the Gospels, see Stuckenbruck 2016: 304–28). Second, the literature of Qumran comprises many new texts concerned with the patriarchs (e.g. Genesis Apocryphon [→Genesis Apocryphon], Aramaic Levi Document [→24 Aramaic Levi], Visions of Amram, Apocryphon of Joseph, Apocryphon of Levi [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]). This literary evidence provides a primary traditio-historical context for Early Judaism in Israel against which the formative role of the patriarchs in New Testament texts may be revisited.
Religious Beliefs in the Scrolls and Early Christianity The Kingdom of God The Kingdom of God constitutes a primordial theme in the Jesus tradition across the Synoptic Gospels. The Scrolls illuminate Jewish horizons of religious expectations and beliefs about God’s dominion, which put the historical context that may touch a historical-critical exegesis of the New Testament into perspective in several ways. The language of the prayer Our Father in Matthew 11.9–14 and Luke 11.2–4 comprises the phrase ‘hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come’. This language could have a partial parallel in the Hebrew text 4Q448 (4QApocryphal Psalm and Prayer) II .8–9. After having addressed God as the Holy One (4Q448 II .1), lines 8–9 address God in the following way: ‘and as regards your kingdom (mmlktk) that your name
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be blessed (wytbrk šmk).’ A fragmentarily preserved Hebrew narrative text, 4Q462 (4QN arrative Ca) 1 9–10 renders clear-cut associations with ‘the [full]ness of the kingdom,’ wm]l[w]ʾt hmmšlh, in terms of the end of a time of darkness and the arrival of the age of light, wqs. hʾwr bʾ. This association, possibly related to God’s dominion, could provide further context from Early Judaism to Synoptic passages such as Matthew 4.16 and Luke 1.79 which refer to the dawning of light for those sitting in darkness in narrative settings that set the stage for Jesus’ proclamation of the kingdom of God. A third example of illumination concerns discussion about the eschatological dimensions to the Kingdom of God in the Gospels, frequently characterized in terms of an eschatological tension between a present or inaugurated kingdom of God and an expected kingdom of God. An analogous interchange between the present and expected dimensions of God’s dominion is found in the Hebrew text 4QT ime of Righteousness (4Q215a). This text employs perfect tenses for the arrival of the time of righteousness, of the age of peace, and the dominion, mmšl, of goodness (4Q215a 1 ii 5, 6, 10), but imperfect tenses for the destruction of all iniquity (4Q215a 1 ii 3) and for a universal harmony in worship of God (4Q215a 1 ii 7–8). This interchange of tenses may reflect a proleptic formulation of the envisioned time of righteousness. Proleptic formulation may also be an aspect of the Kingdom of God in the Gospels.
Messianism Messianism has constituted one of the subjects of comparative interest since the early days of Scrolls scholarship. The identification of Jesus as the Christ by Peter in the Synoptic Gospels (Mk 8.29, Mt. 16.16, Lk. 9.20) is presented in a setting of discussion with Jesus’ disciples that reflects various other expectations surrounding his identification as Christ: John the Baptist, Elijah, one of the prophets. This diffuse spectrum of expectations may correspond to diverse expectations of a prophet to be raised up after Moses (Deut. 18.18) which can be discerned in early Jewish literature, including Qumran literature, at the time of Jesus. For instance, 1 Maccabees 4.46 and 14.41–43 mention certain intermediate or unfulfilled conditions until the coming of a prophet who would provide answers and be entrusted with a ruling position. The Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] envisages an age of wickedness ‘until one who teaches justice arises at the end of days’ (CD -A 6.10–11). The Serekh ha-Yahad from Qumran Cave 1 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] stipulates regulations for communal life ‘until the coming of a prophet and the Messiahs of Aaron and Israel’ (1QS 9.10–11), whereas a parallel recension from Qumran Cave 4 (4QS e III ) omits this messianic reference. The full published corpus of Qumran texts attests to priestly, prophetic and royal contours to early Jewish messianism. The study of prophetic contours has been given fresh impetus through the publication of additional texts from Qumran Cave 4 since the 1990s. A prophetic setting of messianism occurs in 4Q521, known as the Messianic Apocalypse. This text comprises allusions to Isaiah 35.5, 61.1, and Psalm 146.7–8, and has received much comparative attention with a view to the double tradition passage in Matthew 11.2–6 and Luke 7.18–23. In this passage Jesus answers the question of
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John the Baptist on whether he is the one to come or whether someone else is to be expected. The relationship between the Scrolls and these New Testament passages has been labelled ‘shared intertextual interpretations’ (Brooke, 2005, pp.79–82; see also Hogeterp, 2009, pp. 277–81, 446–8, 464).
Bibliography Black, M. (1961), The Scrolls and Christian Origins: Studies in the Jewish Background of the New Testament. London: Thomas Nelson and Sons. Brooke, G. J. (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress. Brooke, G. J. (2009), ‘The pre-sectarian Jesus,’ in F. García Martínez (ed.), Echoes from the Caves, pp. 33–48 Charlesworth, J. H. (ed.) (2006), The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls. 3: The Scrolls and Christian Origins. The Second Princeton Symposium on Judaism and Christian Origins. Waco: Baylor University Press. Collins, J. J. (2003), ‘Forms of community in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in S. M. Paul et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. VTS up, 94. Leiden, Brill, pp. 97–111. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Collins, J. J. and C. A. Evans (eds) (2006), Christian Beginnings and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Acadia Studies in Bible and Theology. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic. Fabry, H.-J. (1998), ‘Qumran und das frühe Christentum,’ in S. Talmon (ed.), Die Schriftrollen von Qumran: Zur aufregenden Geschichte ihrer Erforschung und Deutung. Regensburg: Pustet, pp. 71–105. Fitzmyer, J. A. (1971), Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament. London: G. Chapman. Fitzmyer, J. A. (1979), A Wandering Aramean: Collected Aramaic Essays. SBLMS , 25. Chico: Scholars Press. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2000), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Christian Origins. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Frey, J. (2001) ‘Die Bedeutung der Qumranfunde für das Verständnis des Neuen Testaments,’ in M. Fieger, K. Schmid, P. Schwagmeier (eds), Qumran – Die Schriftrollen vom Toten Meer. Vorträge des St. Galler Qumran-Symposiums vom 2./3. Juli 1999. Freiburg: Universitätsverlag – Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 129–208. García Martínez, F. (ed.) (2009), Echoes from the Caves: Qumran and the New Testament. STDJ 85. Leiden: Brill. Goff, Matthew J. (2007), Discerning Wisdom: The Sapiential Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. VTS up 116. Leiden: Brill. Hogeterp, A. L. A. (2009), Expectations of the End: A Comparative Traditio-Historical Study of Eschatological, Apocalyptic and Messianic Ideas in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. STDJ 83. Leiden: Brill. Holmén, T. and S. E. Porter (eds) (2011), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus. 1: How to Study the Historical Jesus, 2: The Study of Jesus, 3: The Historical Jesus. Leiden: Brill. Jokiranta J. and P. B. Hartog (eds) (2017), Dead Sea Discoveries. Thematic Issue: The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Hellenistic Context
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Metso, S. (2008), ‘Whom does the term Yahad identify?,’ in F. García Martínez and M. Popović (eds), Defining Identities: We, You, and the Other in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 70. Leiden: Brill, pp. 63–84. Moyise, S. (2011), ‘Jesus and the Scriptures of Israel,’ in Holmén and Porter (eds), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus (2011), pp. 1137–67. Porter, S.E. (2011), ‘The context of Jesus: Jewish and/or Hellenistic?,’ in Holmén and Porter, (eds), Handbook for the Study of the Historical Jesus (2011), pp. 1441–63 Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yahad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for The Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Stendahl, K. (1958), The Scrolls and the New Testament. London: SCM . Stuckenbruck, L.T. (2016), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls: Insight into traditioning processes and the growth of Gospel traditions’, Dead Sea Discoveries 23: 304–28.
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Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: a. Philo Joan E. Taylor
The philosopher Philo (ca. 20 bce to 40 ce ) was one of the foremost Jewish leaders of the Jewish community in the city of Alexandria, well connected with Judaea and with Judean rulers, an intellectual with wide access to the best sources for what he wrote (see Barclay, 1996, pp. 158–80; Hadas-Lebel, 2012; Kamesar, 2009; and Morris, 1987). The original Greek texts of Philo, with English translations, are most easily found in the Loeb editions (Colson and Whitaker, 1929–62). On at least three separate occasions Philo describes the Essenes (Essaioi) in his writings (see Bilde, 1998, pp. 34–9; Taylor, 2003, pp. 48–50, 68–72; Taylor, 2007; and Taylor, 2012, pp. 22–48) as an example of the excellence of Jewish philosophy as a whole. Philo’s accounts remain our earliest sources on the Essenes, written some fifty years before Josephus [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]. The Greek texts of Philo on the Essenes, with translations, are provided in collections of the classical sources in Adam (1972) and Vermes and Goodman (1989). Only two of these passages are extant: Quod Omnis Probus Liber Sit (Every Good Person is Free) 75–91, and a section of his treatise normally called the Hypothetica— Apologia pro Iudaeis (Apology for the Jews) – found in Eusebius’ Praeparatio Evangelica, (Preparation for the Gospel) 8.11.1–18). The third is noted, though not preserved, at the start of Philo’s treatise De Vita Contemplativa (On the Contemplative Life). Both treatises were part of a larger work called On Virtues which was designed to argue for the superiority of Jewish philosophy (Taylor, 2003, pp. 31–46). It is interesting that Philo indicates here that the Essenes were used to illustrate the virtue inherent in an active life of philosophy. Contempl. goes on to describe another example of a Jewish group to illustrate the excellence of a contemplative life, a group usually called the Therapeutae. The latter have in the past been confused with the Essenes, but the differences between the groups as described by Philo are multiple and significant: unlike the Essenes, the very ascetic Therapeutae are few; they live in a single location outside Alexandria, comprise men and women; the seniors do nothing but study in small huts during the week, where they also compose music and contemplate; juniors serve the reclining seniors at Sabbath and festival meals, after which they all sing and dance in ecstatic trances. Moreover, many defining features of the Essenes, particularly purifications, are lacking (for further discussion Taylor, 2003, pp. 68–72). 139
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In Contempl. 1 Philo writes: Having spoken about Essenes, those who have emulated the active life and excelled in all or – at least to speak more tolerably – maintained it in most parts, I will now also say what is fitting about those embracing contemplation, in accordance with the next subject.
Philo’ s notion of a philosophical life being manifested in an active and a contemplative way is standard in Greco-Roman philosophy (see Aristotle, Nicomachian Ethics 1.5; 10.7–8; Porphyry, Abstin. 1.53; Diogenes Laertius, Lives 7.130). Philo thought the active and contemplative were both ‘best lives’ (Dec. 101), since virtue involved both (Alleg. Interp. 1. 52–8; Rewards 11). Jewish philosophy involved six days devoted to the active life and one to the contemplative (Decalogue 100; Spec. Laws 2.64). So in using the Essenes as an example of this best active life the focus might have been on their work during six days of the week, while the focus in Contempl. is clearly very much on the seventh day, both in terms of the Therapeutae’s Sabbath day assemblies and forty-ninth day festivals, and the seniors’ Sabbath-like daily lifestyle of quiet study and meditation in private. In Stoicism the ‘active life’ was essentially superior (Seneca, de Otio 1.4), and was one engaged with public life (Diogenes Laertius, Lives 7.121, from Chryssipus, On Various Types of Life) in politics and in work, while the ‘contemplative’ was one which was withdrawn from this public or community engagement, focusing on private study and philosophical rumination (Seneca’s de Otio). Thus we would expect Philo’s lost treatise to have dealt with the Essenes in terms of their work and activity, especially public and community work, and it is a great shame that this has been lost.
Quod Omnis Probus Liber Sit (Every Good Person Is Free) The account of the Essenes in Good Person 75–91 is contained within a treatise that is dedicated to the Stoic paradox that ‘only the wise person is free, and every fool is a slave’ (Cicero, Paradoxa Stoicorum Pro. 4). In Philo’s thesis goodness equates to true liberation, with various examples given, and this work is usually considered a work of Philo’s youth. The Essenes are defined by specific qualities: ‘land and sea are full of wealthy, distinguished and pleasure-seeking people, but small is the number of the wise, righteous and decent’ (Good Person 72). Philo notes good men in Greece (the Seven Sages whose maxims are inscribed on the Temple of Delphi), Persia (the Magi), India (the Gymnosophists), and arrives at the Essenes as the prime example of ‘Syria Palestina’, which a ‘not small portion of the very populated nation of the Jews hold’. Here, there are among the Jews over 4,000 ‘Essaioi (Essenes),’ a name which Philo believes should be associated with the Greek hosiotēs, meaning ‘holy piety,’ since they are attendants of God (therapeutai theou), not by means of offering animal sacrifices (in the Temple, as priests), but by sanctifying their minds (75). Philo then states that they live instead in villages/towns (kōmai) ‘avoiding the cities (poleis) because of the lawlessness (anomia) tolerated by citizens’ (76). In these villages/towns they work on
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land or in peaceful artisanal crafts, benefitting themselves and those living nearby (76). They do not try to acquire large amounts of land or wealth, but they just want life’s necessaries (76). They practise frugality, choosing this lifestyle themselves, and are thus considered (by others) to be very rich (77). They do not make their business from anything ‘according to war’ nor ‘according to peace,’ in that they neither manufacture weaponry nor engage in commerce-driven enterprise concerned with pleasure or profit, but avoid anything leading to greed (78). They do not employ slaves, rejecting slavery on principle as an outrage against Nature’s equality of humanity (79). Their philosophy largely concerns God, creation and ethics, not logic and physics, and they study the ethical part earnestly in the ancestral laws (80). They are instructed by these laws at all times, but particularly on seventh days, at which times they rest and congregate in places ‘they call synagogues (sunagōgai)’. Here they sit by rank, in order from older to younger, and ‘in right fashion with ears pricked up’ (81). Someone reads the books aloud, another comes forward and expounds, usually ‘via (hidden) codes (sumbola),’ by emulating an ancient form interpretation (82). The Essenes are taught in piety, holiness, righteousness, domestic conduct, civil conduct, understanding of what is truly good and bad or indifferent, how to choose one and avoid the other, using three landmarks: i. love of God; ii. love of virtue; and iii. love of humanity (83). Love of God is demonstrated by the maintenance of continual and repetitive purification in all of life, rejection of sworn oaths, truthfulness, belief in the goodness of God who is responsible for nothing bad. Love of virtue is shown by detachment from wealth, reputation or pleasure, by their self-control, endurance, frugality, simple lifestyle, contentment, humility, lawfulness, steadiness and other qualities. Love of humanity is shown by benevolence, equality and their superlative community (84). Members of the community share a house which is open to others of their persuasion (85). They have a common fund and disbursements, common clothing, common food at mealtimes. All their wages go into a common fund (86). The costs of medical treatment are paid for from the fund, and older members are cared for by younger members as if they are relatives (87). According to Philo the Essenes actively practise their philosophy, and this freedom cannot be enslaved (88); proof of that is found in the fact that the country’s ferocious and violent past rulers, who even mutilated people, could never fault the throng of the Essenes or ‘holy ones,’ and treated them as self-governing (autonomos) and free, even praising their mealtimes and superlative sense of community (89–91). Aspects of this description worthy of note have already been defined (in Taylor 2007; Taylor 2009; and Taylor 2012), and only a few points will be reiterated and developed here. To begin with, it is important to note that this description incorporates standard tropes of philosophical excellence (see Mendels, 1979). The pooling of possessions was advocated by Plato for the guardians of the city (Republic 3.416d; 5.462c) and was practised by Pythagoreans (Iamblichus, De Pyth. Vita 167–69). The common practices of all Jews are also shown: going to a synagogue on the Sabbath, studying the law, practising virtue, and so on (Good Person 80–81). In terms of distinctive features, Philo’s evidence overlaps quite strikingly with the later work of Josephus, as well as Philo’s description in the Hypothetica. Thus, the Essenes assert that Nature has given birth to all humanity as free as a result of which they do not own
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slaves (Good Person 79; cf. Ant. 18.21); they practise a special type of exegesis ‘via (hidden) codes (sumbola),’ according to an ancient tradition (Good Person 82; cf. Ant. 18.11, 20); they do not swear oaths (Good Person 84, cf. J.W. 2.135); they maintain exceptional purity in all aspects of life (Good Person 84, cf. Ant. 18.19; J.W. 2.129); they live in communities (Good Person 85; Hypothetica 11.1, 5; Ant. 18.21); they share houses, clothes and meals in common (Good Person 86, cf. 91; Hypothetica 11.4–5, 10, 12; Ant. 18.20; J.W. 2.122, 129–32); they look after their sick and elderly in common (Good Person 87; Hypothetica 11.13, cf. Ant. 18.21). The Essenes are not said to call themselves Essaioi as a self-reference, but rather others call ‘certain people among them (the Jews) by the name’ (Good Person 75, so also in Philo, Hypothetica 11.1 they ‘are called’ by this name, cf. Josephus, J.W. 2.119). The Greek would then have been hosioi, though it is curious that Philo does not make that exact correlation. Whether this name indicates Greek hosiotēs, ‘holy piety’ is debated, with various other etymologies being suggested using Aramaic or Hebrew as a basis. Vermes (1960) notes that ‘āsē occurs as a standard term for “physician” or “healer” in Aramaic dialects (e.g. Exod. 15.26, ‘for I, the LORD, am your healer’ is translated in the Syriac Peshitta as ‘āsē). Stephen Goranson’s (1999) suggestion of ’osei ha-torah, ‘doers of the Torah,’ seems unlikely as there is no indication that ‘ha-Torah’ was attached to the name, and calling people ‘doers’ is meaningless without this. Philo clearly suggests that Essaioi is a designation of esteem, which relates to other commending indications, for example that Jews consider the Essenes as ‘rich’ (77) and no ruler could fault them (89–91). Much more likely is Lightfoot’s (1875) old suggestion that Jews called this group hasidim, ‘pious ones,’ in Hebrew which in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic was found in a form much the same as the Syriac hasi’in. Indeed in Syriac the word hasya’ is used to translate Greek hosios, ‘pious’, in the Peshitta (Acts 2.27; 13.35; Titus 1.8); thus Philo has rightly indicated the meaning of the Aramaic word, and assumed it is a form of Greek, when it is a curious case of two languages having near homophones for words of similar meanings. The Essenes have not withdrawn from society, but simply avoid cities, in favour of villages/towns, where their work benefits both themselves and their neighbours (Good Person 76). In Philo’s understanding there are clearly numerous places where Essenes live throughout Syria Palestina. The avoidance of poleis (cities) may be a case of technical language being used here, since a polis, strictly speaking, was a political entity involving city law within a designated territory. Philo states that they avoid living in these because of anomia, ‘lawlessness,’ or the negation of law, ‘tolerated by citizens’ (cf. Good Person 47). The question of how to define poleis in Syria Palestina or even Judea proper is problematic; clearly poleis existed in the ‘Decapolis’ in the east, along the Mediterranean coast in the west, and elsewhere, for example in Samaria in the ‘polis’ of Sebaste, or in Tiberias in Galilee, but what made a city a polis was not just about size, it was about law and government. To what extent Jerusalem itself was a polis, given that it had avoided that fate when Antiochus Epiphanes wanted to engineer this transformation, has been questioned by Tcherikover (1964). In Good Person, then, Philo might be indicating a separation from poleis in terms of law, but we should not necessarily read from this that they rejected Jerusalem. Alternatively, Philo presents a kind of standard ‘good’ here; he himself has a grim view of cities (cf. Contempl. 2).
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However, while in Contempl. the seventh day is particularly exemplified by the contemplative practices of the Therapeutae, here in Prob. the Essenes – like all Jews – are described as honouring this day. The paradigm of the active life is not essential in this description, though it might somewhat underpin it, since the Essenes here do not so much rest but ‘set aside the other work’; they are otherwise actively listening, reading and expounding Scripture. While Philo knows of course that the Sabbath days involve rest from work, and used this as indicative of a contemplative side of Jewish philosophy (see above), the practice of public engagement in synagogue assemblies could still fall into the category of ‘active’ or ‘public’ life in accordance with the ‘philosophical lives’ model. The contemplative model should involve private activity only, completely away from the world of public life. Here, the Essenes do remain in villages/towns; they are not in private spaces away from them. Even their houses are rather open spaces, hosting visitors, and are the site of community rather than anything of one’s own (hidia) (85): ‘no one’s house is his own.’ There is, essentially, no privacy, no private property, no possibility of being ‘away’ from the public as conceptualized as for those who belong to the throng of the Essenes, all 4,000 or more of them. Nothing here is said of women and children, but the maleness of the Essenes seems assumed. As such, it is quite likely that this description in Prob. overlaps somewhat with Philo’s lost treatise mentioned above. Note that in Prob. 83 the Essenes are trained in both domestic conduct (oikonomia) and public conduct (politeia), indicating the element of public engagement we would expect from Philo’s presentation of them exhibiting an ‘active life.’ However, it could be that the two areas of conduct are shown as blending into each other. There are clearly laws for the Essenes, in that they are called autonomos (91), and their independence in those terms does not equate to a withdrawal from public life but rather a freedom to pursue their own type of life, not governed by the laws of cities (poleis). In Philo’s writings this word carries the sense of ‘self-governing’ or ‘independent of outside rule’ (Dreams 2.100, 293; Joseph 136, 242). On seventh days the Essenes ‘come into sacred places “they call synagogues” (sunagōgai)’ (81).‘They’ here may be the Jews of Syria Palestina or the Essenes. Elsewhere Philo refers to such buildings by a slightly different word, sunagogion (Embassy 311; Dreams 2. 127), while in his usage the actual word synagōgē only refers to the assembly of Israel (Post. 67; Agr. 44), not a ‘synagogue’ as a building, which for him was a proseuchē (Flaccus 41, 45, 47–49, 53, 122; Embassy 132, 134, 137–138, 148, 152, 157, 165, 191, 346, 371, cf. Acts 16.13; Josephus, Life 54). In Spec. Laws 2.62 Philo writes, On seventh days, in fact in every city, thousands of schools of good sense, temperance, courage, righteousness and the other virtues are open, schools in which the (people) sit in [right] fashion in silence, ears pricked up with complete attention because of the quenching draughts of words, when a certain person of the most experienced gets up and sets out what is best and profitable which will give over the whole of life to the better.
Thus the description in Good Person 81–82 is very close to the standard notion of the Jewish synagogue in Philo’s writings. That the Essenes or Jews of Syria Palestina ‘call’ a synagogue building by the term synagōgē when Philo does not do so himself is likely
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Philo’s accuracy in terms of historical actuality; clearly this was a term used by Hellenistic Jews in Syria Palestina itself and elsewhere: Josephus has it for the synagogue in Dora (Ant. 19.300–305) and Caesarea (J.W. 2.285–89); this term is also found in the Theodotion inscription from Jerusalem, and frequently in the New Testament (Luke 7.2; Acts 9.2 inter alia; James 2.2). The difference is simply that Philo’s usage was in line with Egyptian nomenclature. The rejection of slavery is striking, and parallels what Philo states about the Therapeutae in Contempl. 70: They are not served by slaves, considering the possession of servants to be utterly against Nature; for she has given birth to all free, but the vices and greeds of some who crave the source of evil, inequality, having imposed a yoke, have fastened strength to the more powerful over those who are weaker.
That this was a view espoused already at the time of Aristotle is indicated by the fact that he argues against it in his Politics (1253b–1255b); Aristotle stated instead that Nature dictated that there were ‘natural’ inferiorities of people. This was the usual view. However, in Spec. Laws Philo states that ‘no one is by Nature a slave’ (2.69; 3.137). Despite this, he does endorse biblical rulings on slavery found in Exod. 21.1–6 and Lev. 25.44–6 (Spec. Laws 1.50–53); he thinks slave service essential (Spec. Laws 2.123). Thus, he seems to have looked to both the Essenes and the Therapeutae as very unusual in not having slaves for services. Despite what is often assumed (e.g. Bilde, 1998, p. 35), Philo does not indicate that the Essenes rejected animal sacrifice or Temple worship, but he states that the Essenes have taken on the role of being divine attendants (like priests) by prioritizing a holy lifestyle (Marcus, 1954, p. 158; Beall, 1988, p. 118). This is an emphasis that is already found in the Hebrew Bible (Isa. 1.10–16; Amos 5.21–3; Jer. 7.21–6; 1 Sam. 15. 22), and does not necessarily imply an anti-Temple stance or a rejection of priestly functions (cf. Josephus, Ant. 18.22; J.W. 2.111, 131), but rather an absorption into the category of true ‘priestliness’ those who live a certain lifestyle. Philo himself thought the actions of Temple sacrifice essential (Migration 92, Heir 123; Drunkenness 87). However, Philo also considered this kind of outward action of piety as a model for the deeper sacrifice of bringing one’s mind and whole life to God (Spec. Laws 1.269–72) via the practice of piety (cf. Moses 2.107): ‘God takes pleasure from altars on which no fire is burned, but which are visited by virtues’ (Planting 108). Since Philo’s words in Good Person 75 are perfectly consistent with the prioritizing emphasis that we find elsewhere in his work, there is no reason to presuppose a dichotomy or to suggest that the Essenes rejected the Temple (see Taylor, 2007; Taylor, 2012, pp. 28–30). Likewise, Philo’s emphasis on Essene industry (78) as involving a rejection of making instruments of war, does not mean that they were total pacifists (see Taylor, 2007; Taylor, 2012, pp. 31–4). Philo uses the paradigms of war and peace as a framework of binary oppositions to show that Essenes were not engaged in the manufacture of things that would lead to either conflict or greed. With this rhetoric Philo situates the Essenes as being the antithesis of the wealthy, highly-regarded and pleasure-seeking people he initially defines as filling the world.
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In terms of historical situation, Philo presents an issue between bad rulers of the past and the Essenes. The mutilation he describes best relates to the actions of the Hasmoneans: Judas Maccabeus cut up Nicanor after his death (2 Macc. 15.29–36) and Antigonus Mattathias ripped off his uncle Hyrcanus’ ear (Josephus, J.W. 1.120; Ant. 14.366). In Good Person. 89–91, then, the Essenes are tolerated by the Hasmoneans, even though these violent rulers may have wished to find fault with them.
The Hypothetica The Hypothetica is preserved in a quotation of Eusebius, Praeparatio Evangelica (see Inowlocki, 2006, pp. 290–3) where the Essenes are portrayed as an ancient philosophical elite not unlike Christians, especially in their use of allegorical interpretation, and there is some question about the exactness of the quotation in all respects, though it is basically sound (Inowlocki, 2006, pp. 127, 254–62). The passage about the Essenes in the Hypothetica differs slightly from Good Person in Greek style but also somewhat in content. There are more correlations with Josephus, Ant. 18.18–22, and the suggestion has been made that Philo and Josephus both used a common Hellenistic Jewish source (Smith, 1958; Bergmeier, 1993, pp. 66–107; Argall, 2000). However, since Josephus wrote Antiquities some fifty years after Philo, it is equally possible that he found useful material in Philo’s treatises (Rajak, 1994, see Taylor, 2012, pp. 39–40). The focus in the Hypothetica is very much on koinōnia, the ‘life in common’ or ‘fellowship’ of the Essenes, which seems to indicate that the broader themes of the work concerned the fellowship of the Jewish people as a whole, with the Essenes here being illustrative of this. Certain parts of Mosaic law had been quoted prior to the section on the Essenes, since it begins with: ‘Our lawgiver prepared multitudes of the pupils towards community life/fellowship, who are called Essenes’ (11.1). Again this is considered by Philo to be because of their holy piety (hosiotēs) and ‘they dwell in many cities of Judaea, and many villages, and in great and much-populated throngs’ (11.1, cf. 11.5). They are not born into their proairesis, ‘persuasion’, but rather this is voluntary (11.2). There are no Essenes who are young, as young men are considered unstable, but they are all mature men, mostly inclining to old age, no longer carried away by passions but free (11.3), as attested in their life, since they have no private property (house, slave, estate, cattle, possessions) but everything is held in common (11.4). They live together in societies with companionship and common meals and everything serves the common welfare (11.5). Each one has a different manual job in which they work hard, never minding about hot or cold weather, going off before the sun rises to their usual tasks, training like athletes in competitions (11.6). They see these as exercises more valuable than those of athletes as they can do these even when their bodies are past the age of vigour (11.7). Some work in agriculture, sowing and planting, some work in animal husbandry, some in bee-keeping (11.8). Others work in artisanal crafts, all for requirements of life to avoid sufferings (11.9). They give over their wages to the treasurer, who does the purchasing of food and other things required (11.10). Each day they eat and live together, avoiding luxury (11.11). They share the same clothes: thick
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mantles for winter and light, cheap mantles for summer, and they take whichever garment they want (11.12). Anyone sick is treated from the common resources, and cared for by all, while the old, even if childless, are looked after as they would be by the young people in a family (11.13). However, they beg off marriage because it is a danger to communal life, and do not bring wives into the community, because wives cause problems for community living (11.14–17). So wonderful are the Essenes that both ordinary individuals and ‘great kings’ look at them with admiration and wonder, giving them honours (11.18). Unlike in Good Person here we get an image of the individual Essenes in terms of age and gender, and they are described as older men, with no one young here (11.1, 7). This ties in with Philo’s own ideas in terms of a philosophical life: this is not for the young (Flight 30–8). That they ‘beg off marriage’ and ‘none of the Essenes leads a wife . . .’ (11.14) connects with this too; it is not said that no Essene has ever had a wife. Philo does not present a man who is resisting all passions throughout his life, but rather he is at an age in which he is somewhat free of these passions (11.3). Philo thought that men should fulfil the commandment of God to have children (Worse 147–48, cf. Gen. 1.28; m.Yebam. 6:6; b.Yebam. 63a): ‘all genuine attendants (therapeutai) of God will fulfil the law of Nature for the procreation of children’ (Rewards 108–9). Thus, by implication, these men have left their wives and children outside the community in which they live, in order to join a male group co-habiting together, perhaps somewhat like in an army or priests on duty in the Temple. Wives would not have been divorced, but they were not brought into the community. Not all have had children, for Philo writes that ‘even if the older men, however, happen to be childless . . .’ they are looked after as if they had many children (Hypothetica 11.13). Philo does not indicate that the Essenes join the communal life at an early age and forever remain celibate and childless, any more than he indicates that they are poor: the Essenes here are older and have had property which they put into a communal resource, but not their wives, and not slaves either. This may actually be a model that makes better sense of elements in the Serekh texts (see Taylor, 2011 [→59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 73 Daily Life]). Philo describes the Essenes as being ‘many,’ with huge throngs, but since he gives a figure in Good Person of over 4,000 (Good Person 75, 91, as also in Ant. 18.20), the figure must refer to ‘many of their class’ and not ‘many in comparison with the population of Judaea.’ The reference to the antiquity of the way of life of koinōnia is important to note, and it is directly connected with Moses. This may reflect the Essenes’ own claims that the mandate for their lifestyle was already laid down by Moses: since the law is interpreted allegorically, this lifestyle is then indicated by their interpretation of Scripture. That they live in ‘many cities of Judaea and many villages’ (11.1) is quite different from what we find in Good Person, where cities are avoided, possibly – as noted above – because here Philo is using a legal notion of a city or else inserting his own notions. In Hypoth. the term poleis is much looser, and relates to Josephus, J.W. 2.124, where Essenes live in both cities and villages. As with Prob. there is an indication of the Essenes’ relationship with rulers, but here the reference point is not the savage rulers of the past but the ‘great kings’ of the present,
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who most likely refer to Herod the Great and Agrippa I, both of whom were designated as ‘kings of the Jews’ by the Romans, and with whom Philo had a family connection. These great kings gave the Essenes ‘honours’ or ‘honorific gifts’ (timai), but these are not explained (though see Taylor 2012, pp. 109–30 on the ‘Herodians’). Overall, Philo is the foundational source for our knowledge of the Essenes and provides important information about them.
Bibliography Adam, A. (1972), Antike Berichte über die Essener, 2nd edn. Kleine Texte für Vorlesungen und Übungen 182. Berlin: de Gruyter. Argall, R. A. (2000), ‘A Hellenistic Jewish source on the Essenes in Philo, Every Good Man Is Free 75–91 and Josephus, Antiquities 18.18–22,’ in R. A. Argall, B. A. Bow and R. A. Werline (eds), For a Later Generation: The Transformation of Tradition in Israel, Early Judaism and Early Christianity. Harrisburg, PA : Trinity Press International, pp. 13–24. Barclay, J. M. G. (1996), Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora: From Alexander to Trajan (323 bce – 117 ce ). Berkeley : University of California Press. Beall, T. S. (1988), Josephus’ Description of the Essenes Illustrated by the Dead Sea Scrolls. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bergmeier, R. (1993), Die Essener-Berichte des Flavius Josephus: Quellenstudien zu den Essenertexten im Werk des judischen Historiographen. Kampen: Kok Pharos. Bilde, P. (1998), ‘The Essenes in Philo and Josephus,’ in F. H. Cryer and T. L. Thompson (eds), Qumran Between the Old and New Testaments. JSOTS up 290. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Cohn, L. and P. Wendland (eds) (1915), Philonis Alexandrini opera quae supersunt. Editio maior, Vol VI, Quod omnis probus liber sit. De vita contemplativa. De aeternitate mundi. In Flaccum. Legatio ad Gaium, Berlin: George Reimer. Collins, J. J. (1992), ‘Essenes,’ The Anchor Bible Dictionary. New York: Doubleday, II : 619–26. Colson, F. H. and G. H. Whitaker (eds and trans.) (1929–62), Philo, 10 vols. Loeb Classical Library. London/Cambridge MA : Heinemann/ Harvard University Press. Dillon, J. (2002), ‘The Essenes in the Greek sources: Some reflections,’ in J. R. Bartlett (ed.), Jews in the Hellenistic and Roman Cities. London: Routledge, pp. 117–28. Goranson, S. (1999), ‘Others and intra-Jewish polemic as reflected in Qumran texts,’ in P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, 1999, II : 534–51. Hadas-Lebel, M. (2012), Philo of Alexandria: A Thinker in the Jewish Diaspora, trans. by R. Fréchet. Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2001), ‘The Essenes,’ in D. Cohn-Sherbok and J. M. Court (eds), Religious Diversity in the Graeco-Roman World: A Survey of Recent Scholarship. The Biblical Seminar 79. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 65–80. Inowlocki, S. (2006), Eusebius and the Jewish Authors: His Citation Technique in an Apologetic Context. Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity 64. Leiden: Brill. Kamesar, A. (ed.) (2009), The Cambridge Companion to Philo. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
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Lightfoot, J. B. (1875), ‘On some points connected with the Essenes,’ in idem, The Epistles of St. Paul iii. The First Roman Captivity. 2. The Epistle to the Colossians, 3. Epistle to Philemon. London: Macmillan. Marcus, R. (1954), ‘Pharisees, Essenes and Gnostics,’ JBL 63, 157–61. Mendels, D. (1979), ‘Hellenistic utopia and the Essenes,’ HTR 72, 207–22. Morris, J. (1987), ‘The Jewish philosopher Philo,’ in E. Schürer with G. Vermes, F. Millar and M. Goodman (eds), The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 bc –ad 135). Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1987, III /2: 809–70. Riaud, J. (1987). ‘Les Thérapeutes d’Alexandrie dans la tradition et dans la recherche critique jusqu’aux découvertes de Qumran’, ANRW 2:20 2. Berlin and New York: de Gruyter, pp. 1189–295. Smith, M. (1958), ‘The Description of the Essenes in Josephus and the Philosophumena,’ HUCA 29, 273–313 Taylor, J. E. (2003), Jewish Women Philosophers of First-Century Alexandria: Philo’s ‘Therapeutae’ Reconsidered. Oxford: OUP. Taylor, J. E. (2007), ‘Philo of Alexandria on the Essenes: A case study on the use of classical sources in discussions of the Qumran-Essene hypothesis,’ SPhiloA 19:1–28. Taylor, J. E. (2010), ‘The classical sources on the Essenes and the Scrolls communities,’ in T. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 173–99. Taylor, J. E. (2011). ‘Women, children and celibate men in the Serekh texts,’ HTR 104, 171–90. Taylor, J. E. (2012), The Essenes, the Scrolls and the Dead Sea. Oxford: OUP. Tcherikover, V. (1964), ‘Was Jerusalem a polis?,’ IEJ 14, 61–78. Vermes, Geza. (1960), ‘The Etymology of “Essenes,” ’ RevQ 2, 427–43. Vermes, G. and M. Goodman (eds) (1989), The Essenes according to the Classical Sources. Sheffield: JSOT Press.
b. Josephus James McLaren The writings of Josephus are a key source in discussions about the Essenes and the Dead Sea Scrolls for a number of related reasons (Beall, 1988, p. 2). Josephus is a direct contemporary of the later part of the history of the settlement at Qumran; as a native of Jerusalem he is well connected with public life in the city and its environs; and, in the context of writing about life in Judea he provides several explicit references to the Essenes. What makes his information especially attractive to the modern reader is that he claimed to have direct, personal knowledge of the Essenes. Josephus refers to the Essenes in three of his works. In Jewish War Essenes are mentioned on six occasions: 1.78–80 (Judas, a seer); 2.113 (Simon, a seer); 2.119–61 (summary of the philosophy); 2.567 and 3.11 (John, a general); 5.145 (name of a Jerusalem gate). In Jewish Antiquities Essenes are also mentioned on six occasions: 13.171–73 (summary of the philosophy); 13.298 (reference to the J.W. 2 summary); 13.311 (Judas, a seer); 15.371–79 (Menahem, a seer); 17.346 (Simon, a seer); and 18.11,
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18–22 (summary of the philosophy). There is one reference to the Essenes as one of the three Jewish philosophies that he personally examined in Life 10–11. From these thirteen references two issues have attracted ongoing scholarly interest. One is the question of sources used by Josephus. The other issue is the possible connection between the people described by Josephus as Essenes and the people responsible for writing the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Josephus’ Source Material Of particular interest is establishing both the number and the possible identity of any source(s) used. Among the key issues are: the variation in the terminology employed (e.g. Essenos and Essaios); comparison with other sources that refer to the Essenes (e.g. Philo [→12 Philo]); and, occasions where Josephus appears to provide additional and/ or distinctive information (e.g. references to those Essenes who marry). While it has been argued that all the references can be linked to specific sources (Bergmeier, 1993) any such confidence in being able to assign references to specific sources has been thoroughly critiqued (Frey, 2003, pp. 23–57). Josephus clearly drew upon several sources as best suited his requirements. They include: one that described the three philosophies; one that was common to Josephus and Philo; and, possibly one that referred to individual Essenes as part of a narrative text (Collins, 2009, pp. 68–9). A crucial aspect of the role played by source material is the extent to which Josephus used first-hand, insider knowledge to shape what he wrote. It is widely accepted that Josephus did have personal experience of the Essenes (Rajak, 1994, p.145; Beall, 1988, p.2; Mason, 2009, pp. 276–7). There is, however, good reason to support the opposite view (Smith, 1958, p. 278; Collins, 2009, p. 56). The key issue is the claim that Josephus personally investigated all three philosophies (Life 10). The literary context is crucial, indicating the statement lacks credence. It is part of a series of exaggerated comments pertaining to his supposed intellectual prowess (Life 8–9, 11–12) in a text concerned with defending his honour and integrity (Life 336–39, 355–67). Therefore, all the information Josephus provides about the Essenes should not be viewed as that of an insider or a person with any direct interest in the group. It also follows that any assessment of the references to the Essenes should be understood by determining the function of the subject matter within the literary interests of Josephus.
Josephus’ Essenes and the Dead Sea Scrolls Josephus’ detailed description of the Essenes in Jewish War (J.W. 2.119–61) has been the focus of attention. There is a broad consensus among many scholars that the Essenes are the same people as the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Beall’s (1988, pp. 123–9) comparative lists of the information contained in the two sources have become a standard reference point. His work is complemented by the approach of Rajak (1994, pp. 144–5), who focuses on the impact of literary form on both the manner and choice of information provided by Josephus. More recently Atkinson and
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Magness consider the significance of the archaeological context in assessing the comparisons (Atkinson and Magness, 2010, pp. 325–42). There are, however, dissenting voices that call for greater, explicit attention to the crucial point noted above that any discussion regarding the references to the Essenes in Josephus must have an assessment of what he was trying to achieve at its core (Mason, 2009, pp. 240–1). There are two preliminary comments which we should bear in mind when approaching the references to the Essenes. First, providing detailed information about Jewish customs and beliefs was not part of Josephus’ agenda (Ant. 20. 267–68). Second, it is important to review all of the occasions that Josephus refers to the Essenes rather than focus on the extensive summary in J.W. 2. There are six main observations to note about the thirteen references. First, two basic types of information are provided: comments regarding individuals and descriptions of the group. Viewed in combination, the main feature of the Essenes is their reputation for prophetic activity. The second observation is that the vast majority of the references are paralleled within J.W. and Ant., and the few that are not can readily be explained. Third, the paralleled references to the individuals named as Essenes do not vary in any significant manner. Fourth, there is major variation in the presentation of the three summary passages. While there is substantial overlap regarding the depiction of the Pharisees and Sadducees that encourages direct comparison, this is not always the same regarding the Essenes. In Ant. 13 the Essenes are directly compared with the two other philosophies. In Ant. 18, although clearly embellished, some direct comparison occurs. In J.W. 2, however, direct comparison is not intended and the embellishments regarding the Essenes are extensive. Fifth, although the Essenes are listed with the Pharisees and Sadducees as the three longstanding Jewish philosophies, they do not feature prominently in the narrative. Treatments of the Essenes clearly outnumber the references to the Sadducees, but they fall well short of the number of occasions the Pharisees feature. A final observation to be made is that the extensive summary in J.W. 2 provides a carefully selected range of subject matter that clearly resembles the style of Greco-Roman ethnographies (Rajak, 1994, p. 145). It provides information about family, household, cultic practices, social structures, education, the system of governance and the character of the group, all cast in a manner intended for a Greco-Roman reader. In light of these observations, two related issues require further comment: why did Josephus embellish his summary of the Essenes in Ant. 18 and in J.W. 2 in such different ways? Second, why did Josephus provide more detail on the Essenes than on either the Pharisees or the Sadducees? We commence with what Collins (2009, p. 66) has labelled as the ‘disproportionate length’ of the summary in J.W. 2. It is not simply a case of Josephus referring the reader in Ant. 18 to the longer account provided in J.W. 2. The summary of the other three philosophies is longer in Ant. 18 than it is in J.W. 2. Instead, the explanation lies in understanding the reason Josephus chose to mention the philosophies. This task requires us to look at the context in which the summaries are placed, both the immediate narrative context and the larger context of J.W. 2 and Ant. 18. The immediate narrative context is the same for both versions of the summary. It is part of Josephus’ account about the transition from Herodian rule to the introduction
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of direct Roman rule (Smith, 1958, pp. 276–7; Goodman, 2007, pp. 140–1; cf. Mason, 2009, pp. 261–2). With the removal of Archelaus and the shift to direct Roman control Josephus refers to a rejection of this change that he associated with Judas. In order to explain Judas Josephus offers a summary of the main Jewish philosophies. At the end of the summary Josephus returns to the change of administration (J.W. 2.167; Ant. 18.26). The broader literary context to consider is the place of the summary within the subject matter of each respective book. In J.W. 2 Josephus covers the period from the death of Herod through to the start of the war in 66 ce . The vast bulk of J.W. 2 is devoted to the events related to the outbreak of the war (J.W. 2.277–568). There is also a substantial account of events associated with the rule of Archelaus, particularly his acquisition of power (J.W. 2.1–116). The description of events from 6–66 ce constitutes approximately one-quarter of the book (J.W. 2.117–277). Among the few incidents described the extensive summary on the Essenes covers a quarter of that section of the narrative. There is a narrower chronological span in Ant. 18, covering the introduction of direct Roman rule through to the statue incident during the reign of Gaius. All of the subject matter covered in J.W. 2 for the period of 6–41 ce is also described in Ant. 18. Significantly, the account in Ant. 18 includes a number of extra events and information about life, both within and outside of the Jewish homeland. Josephus is not simply repeating the account found in J.W. 2 (Mason, 2011, pp. 238–40). Although there are some minor variations in the details of the paralleled events the key change is that Ant. 18 is a greatly expanded account of the early period of direct Roman rule. There are two related explanations for the major change between J.W. 2 and Ant. 18 regarding the nature of the two accounts. One is thematic and the other is practical. The thematic reason is a change in how Josephus conveys the primary message at that point of the chronological narrative: all revolutionary thinking was associated with a radical breakaway group in Jewish society, the fourth philosophy. In J.W. 2 the fourth philosophy is named as the culprit but Josephus silences them in the narrative. This he undertakes by placing the focus on the supposedly mainstream Jews, especially through the detailed description of the Essenes. In Ant. 18, however, Josephus adopts the opposite approach. He gives detailed commentary on the fourth philosophy (Ant. 18.4–10, 25) and provides detail about the group and their relationship to other Jews (Ant. 18.23). There he no longer tries to draw the reader’s attention away from the fourth philosophy. The practical reason for this change is that the information was not essential for the narrative; it was extraneous ‘fill’ that could be altered according to Josephus’ thematic interests. In J.W. 2 the number of events from 6–66 ce is rather low, especially regarding 6–41 ce . The lengthy summary on the Essenes helps fill out the account. In Ant. 18 Josephus significantly expands the scope of what he describes regarding the same time period. However, while providing far more detail about some of the events described in J.W. and much new subject matter Josephus chooses to provide a substantially shorter summary on the Essenes. The summary was extraneous fill. It could easily be replaced by additional information that Josephus was able to provide his readers.
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The notion that the long version of the Essene summary in J.W. 2 was, in part, space filler draws attention to the one other issue requiring comment: the reason Josephus described the Essenes in detail rather than either of the two other named philosophies. The explanation is probably linked to three related factors. First and foremost, Josephus had access to a ready-made detailed description of the group that could easily be incorporated into his narrative. Second, the group was already a known entity within the Roman world through the writings of Pliny. Third, it was relatively easy for Josephus to depict them in a manner that might appeal to a Roman readership when he was trying to draw attention away from a supposedly rogue element of the community. The conclusions we can draw from Josephus’ treatment of the Essenes reveal much more about him than about the Essenes. Three comments should be noted. First, there is no reason to view Josephus as a source that provides direct, first-hand testimony about the Essenes. What he does provide is general knowledge, accessible to anyone who resided in the environs of Jerusalem during the middle part of the first century ce . Second, Josephus referred to the Essenes primarily as one of three Jewish philosophies and its main characteristic was a strong reputation for engaging in prophetic activity. When he wrote about the Essenes he did so drawing on sources that helped him portray the group in a manner that allowed comparison with other Jews and non-Jews. Third, while there are a number of points of overlap between Josephus’ detailed description of the Essenes and some of the features described in the Scrolls the need for caution regarding the specific nature of the relationship remains paramount (Goodman, 2007, pp. 142–3). Such caution is especially appropriate because Josephus provides no information regarding the details of the way of life adopted by the Pharisees, Sadducees or any other specific Jewish group.
Bibliography Atkinson, K. and Magness, J. (2010), ‘Josephus’s Essenes and the Qumran community’. JBL 129 (2), 317–42. Beall, T. S. (1988), Josephus’ Description of the Essenes Illustrated by the Dead Sea Scrolls. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Bergmeier, R. (1993), Die Essener-Berichte des Flavius Josephus. Kampen: Kok Pharos. Collins, J. J. (2009), ‘Josephus on the Essenes. The sources of his information,’ in Z. Rodgers with M. Daly-Denton and A. Fitzpatrick McKinley (eds), A Wandering Galilean: Essays in Honour of Seán Freyne. Leiden: Brill, pp. 51–72. Frey, J. (2003), ‘Zur historischen Auswertung der antiken Essenerberichte: Ein Beitrag zum Gespräch mit Roland Bergmeier,’ in J. Frey et al. (eds), Qumran Kontrovers: Beiträge zu den Textfunden vom Toten Meer. Paderborn: Bonifatius, pp. 23–57. Goodman, M. (2007), Judaism in the Roman World: Collected Essays. Leiden: Brill. Mason, S. (2009), Josephus, Judea, and Christian Origins: Methods and Categories. Peabody : Hendrickson. Mason, S. (2011), ‘The historical problem of the Essenes,’ in P. W. Flint, J. Duhaime, and K. S. Baek (eds), Celebrating the Dead Sea Scrolls: A Canadian Collection. EJL 30. Atlanta: SBL, pp. 201–51.
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Rajak, T. (1994), ‘Ciò che Flavio Giuseppe vide: Josephus and the Essenes,’ in F. Parente and J. Sievers (eds), Josephus and the History of the Greco-Roman Period. Leiden: Brill, pp. 141–60. Smith, M. (1958), ‘The Description of the Essenes in Josephus and the Philosophumena,’ HUCA, 29, 273–93.
c. Other Literature Matthias Henze By the time the members of a Jewish reform movement settled at Khirbet Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], Hellenism had spread throughout the region. Judea, too, was pervaded by Hellenic culture, and Hellenistic Jewish authors had been industrious for two centuries (Gruen, 1998). This raises the question of the place of the Qumran movement vis-à-vis Hellenistic Judaism. Our assessment of the relationship between the Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish literature depends largely on what exactly we mean by ‘Hellenistic Jewish literature.’ The term is ambiguous, and different definitions, carrying different connotations, will yield rather different results (see further Jokiranta and Hartog, 2017) Taken in its narrowest sense, ‘Hellenistic Jewish literature’ consists of Jewish works originally composed in Greek during the Hellenistic period (traditionally defined as the period from the conquests of Alexander the Great to the battle of Actium, though perhaps for our purposes we should take it up to the first century ce and the work of Josephus). Included under this definition are texts such as the Books of Maccabees, Book 3 of the Sibylline Oracles, and the Letter of Aristeas, to name but a few (Nickelsburg, 2005, 102–10, 193–9). None of these books were found at Qumran, nor is there any clear evidence that they had any bearing on the community. The reasons for this absence are not altogether clear, though we may find a possible explanation when we turn to our next definition. Adopting a less restrictive understanding, the term ‘Hellenistic Jewish literature’ comprises Jewish books that are extant in Greek but were originally composed in Hebrew or Aramaic. Included under this definition are the writings of the Septuagint [→55 Bible]. The Qumran library contains a fairly small number of scrolls written in Greek, most of them biblical manuscripts: Greek fragments of all the books of the Torah except for Genesis; a Greek paraphrase of Exodus (4Q127); an unclassified Greek text (4Q126); the Letter of Jeremiah (pap7QEpJer gr); and a Greek scroll of the Minor Prophets (8HevXII gr [→3 Manuscript Collections: An Overview; 17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. These finds are of particular importance, since they prove that the members of the community were aware of Greek texts and that they had at least some contact with Greek-speaking Jews. The Pesharim with their thinly veiled allusions to the Seleucid and Roman atrocities in Judea are further evidence of the community’s awareness of its political and literary surroundings [→44 Pesharim; 20 Historiography]. In addition, a number of Hebrew scrolls from Qumran represent a version of the biblical text that is identical with, or at least close to, the Hebrew parent text of the
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Septuagint. 4QJ erb (4Q71) and 4QJ erd (4Q72a), for example, have preserved a text that differs from the MT but is known from the Septuagint. Likewise, the Hebrew text version of 4QS ama (4Q51) and 4QS amb (4Q52) is closely related to the text of the Septuagint (Ulrich, 2000, pp. 865–6). Either the scribes from Qumran knew the Greek version or both the Scrolls and the Septuagint go back to the same Vorlage. It has been pointed out that the authors of the scrolls, who wrote in Hebrew, tried to avoid using Greek loan words in their own writing. This, together with the absence of any explicit references to any unambiguously Hellenistic ideas or practices in the Scrolls, can be seen as evidence that ‘the Dead Sea Scrolls clearly stand out as representing an extremely conservative Jewish milieu’ (Bohak, 2000, p. 351). In other words, while the scribes at Qumran were clearly aware of the Greek version of at least parts of the Jewish Bible and, more broadly, of the Hellenistic culture all around them, there appears to have been a deliberate effort on their part to shun any cross-cultural borrowings or direct influences. But we should not overstate our case. Some have argued, for example, that the ‘Treatise on the Two Spirits’ (1QS 3.13–4.26) shows Greek influence [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. According to the third and broadest definition, the term ‘Hellenistic Jewish literature’ designates all of Jewish literature composed during the Hellenistic period, regardless of its language of origin or attestation. Understood this way, the corpus of Hellenistic Jewish texts expands dramatically and includes a considerable range of books, spanning from the Bible to the works of Josephus. Included are the latter half of the book of Daniel (Daniel 7–12), virtually all of the apocryphal writings of the Septuagint, the books attributed to Enoch that are now part of 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], as well as several other writings now considered part of the Pseudepigrapha, such as the book of Jubilees, the Psalms of Solomon and the Testament of Moses. Indeed, according to this definition, most of the Qumran corpus itself would have to be subsumed under the label ‘Hellenistic Jewish literature’ (Nickelsburg, 2005, pp. 119–89). The relationship of the former texts with the Scrolls is complex, and each text needs to be assessed separately. Daniel, for example, was a popular and influential book at Qumran, and eight scrolls survive [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. The literature attributed to Enoch, too, was popular, with no fewer than twelve Aramaic and Greek fragments of 1 Enoch found among the Scrolls. Language and motifs in Daniel and 1 Enoch are also attested in the sectarian writings from Qumran [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 35 Damascus Document; 40 Milh.amah], a testimony to the books’ considerable standing in the community. From among the Apocrypha, the Scrolls have yielded copies of the Hebrew and Aramaic texts of several compositions. Five manuscripts of Tobit survive, for example, four in Aramaic and one in Hebrew. Of the Wisdom of Ben Sira, two copies were found, one at Qumran (2Q18) and one at Masada. The large Psalms Scroll from Cave 11 (11QPsa) also contains an acrostic version of the poem now found in Sirach 51, as well as a Hebrew version of Psalm 151, which prior to the discovery of the Scrolls had only been known from the Septuagint [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. The Scrolls have not only preserved Semitic text versions of apocryphal texts, however. Several, hitherto unknown writings have also come to light, so that the
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Qumran library significantly expands the known corpus of Hellenistic Jewish literature. Some of these re-discovered texts are related to previously known books (e.g. PseudoDaniela-c, 4Q243–45), while others are not (e.g. the Genesis Apocryphon (QapGen) [→Genesis Apocryphon]). Several of these texts include Hellenistic ideas, tropes, images and language, though they may not have been composed at Qumran. The movement did not live in a hermetically sealed environment, and as a result their library was itself a corpus mixtum.
Bibliography Bohak, G. (2000), ‘Hellenism,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I: 350–2. Gruen, E. S. (1998), Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition. Berkeley : University of California Press. Jokiranta J. and P. B. Hartog (eds) (2017), Dead Sea Discoveries. Thematic Issue: The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Hellenistic Context. Nickelsburg, G. W. E. (2005), Jewish Literature between the Bible and the Mishnah. 2nd edn. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Ulrich, E. (2000), ‘Septuagint,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 863–8.
13
Scrolls and Non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature Jutta Leonhardt-Balzer
Non-Jewish Greek literature has not been studied explicitly in its relationship with Qumran [→19 The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Study of the Ancient World; 20 Historiography]. There is not a single fragment of a Hellenistic (non-Jewish) author from Qumran. There are, however, a few instances, in which Greek literature can be relevant to the Scrolls. The Scrolls’ way of thinking and arguing is fundamentally different to that in Hellenistic literature, (on Hellenism, see Hartog, Jokiranta, 2017, pp. 340–3, 351–4), but based on the research of the last decades there are three potential areas of convergence between the two. Firstly, accounts of philosopher groups can be compared to the rules of Qumran. Secondly the dualism of the Two Spirits (1QS 3.13–4.26), which has frequently been linked with Zoroastrianism, can be compared to other accounts of Zoroastrianism in the Mediterranean world, especially that of Plutarch (De Iside et Osiride 46–47) [→74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. And thirdly there is the question whether texts from the Scrolls refer to certain Hellenistic philosophical terms or concepts.
Associations and Philosopher Communities Here is not the place to compare Philo’s or Josephus’ account of the Essenes with accounts in Hellenistic literature (this connection was made soon after the discovery of the Scrolls, cf. Dupont-Sommer, 1955, pp. 75–92) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus; 72 Forms of Community]. Neither is it the place to compare actual community structures (for such a group-society comparison regarding their attitudes to temples, see Eckhardt, 2017). In the present context only the community as described in the Scrolls will be compared to literary accounts of Hellenistic communities [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation]. In Hellenistic times there was a variety of voluntary associations, whose statutes resemble the rule books found in Qumran (esp. 1QS 5–7) [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad]: the members enter the community voluntarily (1QS 5. 5–11) [→73 Daily Life]. A difference to Hellenistic associations is that in the community of 1QS people from outside the community are to be avoided, neither food nor property is to be shared (1QS 5.11–20). In CD [→35 Damascus Document], however, there is the possibility of purchases from 156
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non-community members (CD 13.12–16), so that there were differences in the attitude towards outsiders, and the stricter attitude should probably be explained as a later development. There are many more similarities between the community of the Scrolls and Hellenistic associations in that they also test applicants (1QS 5.20–22), impose a certain mode of conduct (1QS 5.21–22; 6.13–16; CD 15.1–17), emphasize order in their communal life and meetings (1QS 5.22–6.13), and punish any transgressions (1QS 6.24–7.25); furthermore the act of handing over the property of the new entrants (1QS 6.16–22) can be compared to an entrance fee (Collins, 2010, pp. 79–81). The evidence for the Hellenistic associations is based either on associational statutes (Weinfeld, 1986, esp. pp. 51–4), which emphasize the payment of dues and lack the ‘religio-moralistic rhetoric of the Jewish sect’ (Collins, 2010, p. 81), or on comparison with Greco-Roman constitutional literature, the comparison with which presents the community behind the Scrolls as creating an alternative to the current civic ideologies (Gillihan, 2011). For CD, the relationship to other community structures has even been described as hostile (Walker-Ramisch, 1996, p. 142). Thus the comparison with Hellenistic associations may point to certain structural similarities, the ideology of the community of the Scrolls, however, stands in contrast to that of any of its Hellenistic counterparts. In terms of structure and ideology parallels have been drawn to accounts of philosopher communities (Baumgarten, 1998, pp. 93–111), where common property was an ideal, thus for Plato’s guardians of the state in Republic 3.416E, 5.449C, or in general in Laws 5.739C (Collins, 2010, p. 82). In particular there is literary evidence of a community of common goods in accounts of Pythagoras and his disciples. Although the most extensive evidence concerning their communal life comes from the third century ce (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth., 6.29–30), and there is doubt concerning the existence of genuine Pythagorean communities with their own rules in pre-Christian times (Philip, 1966, pp. 138–9). An argument for the continuing existence of small Pythagorean communities throughout Hellenistic and into Roman times has been made (Kingsley, 1995, pp. 317–34), which, however, is hard to substantiate. Still, it has long been known that Iamblichus uses older sources of the fourth century bce : the account of the Pythagorean progression in Vita Pyth. 71–81 uses (via the Pythagoras biography of Appolonios of Tyana) the work of the historian Timaios of Tauromenion (van der Waerden, 1979, pp. 171–5), and the account of their daily lives in Vita Pyth. 96–100 is based on the report of Aristoxenos (Boyancé, 1939, p. 36; van der Waerden, 1979, p. 164). On the other hand, the founding of the community in Vita Pyth. 37–57 seems to be modelled along missionary practices of the third and fourth centuries ce (Festugière, 1949, pp. 33–47). And even outside this passage the term koinobious for the Pythagorean community’s common property in Vita Pyth. 29 is the only occurrence of this word in connection with the Pythagoreans, everywhere else in Greek literature it and similar terms refer to Christians, especially monks (TLG). Among the older strata of Iamblichus’ narrative is the account of the young men who come to Pythagoras to join and who are placed under observation with regard to how they behave towards their families, when they are silent or talk or laugh, which desires or joys they have, and even their gait and movements, their physiognomy is scrutinized and conclusions are drawn as to their character (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 71). For three years these youths are subjected to humiliation to test their commitment and
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perseverance; then they have to be silent for five years to prove their self-control, at which time they have to hand over their worldly goods to people charged with specific functions within the community. Only after the end of their period of silence do they become full members of the community and listen and see Pythagoras teach, whom they could only hear before (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 72). If they are rejected they received their possessions back twofold, and the community erects a funeral mount for them as infertile (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 73). If someone who had been fully admitted proves unworthy, a stele and a funeral mound is erected and the person is sent away with gold and silver. If anyone meets them later they are treated as dead (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 74). By contrast those who have been admitted to the community are distributed in groups according to their worthiness and capability, some sharing their goods, some with private property (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 80–81). The Pythagoreans here are depicted as a monastic community with common goods (van der Waerden, 1979, p. 174). This could be the influence of Iamblichus’ Christian contemporaries. If, however, the source examination of Iamblichus is correct, the reference to common goods goes as far back as the Timaios (Philip, 1966, pp. 142–3). Even if it is not certain whether the Timaios knows actual Pythagorean practice (Philip, 1966, pp. 143–4), this reference indicates that at least since his time Pythagoreans were described as sharing property, and this provides a notable parallel to practices described in some of the texts from Qumran [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. Another part of Iamblichus based on older sources is the account of the Pythagoreans’ daily lives. They have a set routine in their daily lives and obey food rules. In the morning the Pythagoreans retreat individually to quiet places to teach and learn (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 96). Then they exercise, their midday meal consists of bread and honey, without wine during the day, and only after that they turn to their daily business. At the end of the day they go for walks in twos or threes to study (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 97–98). Then they bathe and have a meal which consists of moderate fare and must be ended before sundown, no more than ten people together, at the end of which they read (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 98–99). Their clothes are white, and their peaceful disposition is shown in that they do not hunt (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 100). Even attacks on the Pythagoreans (Iamblichus, Vita Pyth. 248–49) and their reverence for the sun (256) are reported. The parallels between Iamblichus and 1QS 5–7 concerning gradual admission, emphasis on conduct, regular life including learning, etc. have induced the first scholars of the Scrolls to conclude that Pythagoreanism influenced the Scrolls, especially their views on communal property (Dupont-Sommer, 1955, pp. 75–92; Hadas, 1959). In spite of these similarities, however, it is difficult to imagine how the literary portrayal of the Pythagoreans could have influenced the movement behind the Scrolls. Thus, recently the actual parallels have been seen to derive from influences of Hellenistic associations on both accounts rather than a direct influence of one on the other (Collins, 2010, pp. 81–5), but the fact remains that these parallels have been noted in ancient times already. Thus the literary depiction of the Essenes in Josephus explicitly links them to the Pythagoreans (Ant. 15.10.4 §371) and Philo implies the same (Dupont-Sommer 1955, pp. 78–80, 86–91). This shows that people made a connection between the Essenes and the Pythagoreans (Hengel, 1974, I: 243–7, II : 64–7). In any
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case it is more likely that any Pythagorean link with the Scrolls was literary rather than through actual communities (Murphy, 2002, p. 20).
The Hellenistic view of Zoroastrianism Another instance of scholarly interest in a comparison between the Scrolls and Hellenistic Literature is the question of whether there was Zoroastrian influence on texts such as the Treatise on the Two Spirits (1QS 3.13–4.24), in which there is a distinction between the spirit of light and the angel of darkness or spirit of deceit, the one leading the sons of light and the other inciting the sons of deceit as well as the sons of light to fall [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 74 Ethics and Dualism]. The text describes their constant hostility until the final destruction of the angel of darkness through the God of Israel and his angel of truth, which leads to the purification of all sons of light. It is outside the scope of this chapter to discuss whether there could have been direct influence of Zoroastrian thought on the concept of the two spirits. In the present context, it only needs to be discussed whether Western ideas of Zoroastrian thought could have shaped the Treatise. Of the main extant sources on the philosophy of the magi such as Ps.-Plato, Greater Alkibiades 1.121–122 (fourth century bce ), Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride 46–47 (first century ce ), Diogenes Laertius, Vitae Philosophorum 1.6–9.10 (third century ce ) (de Jong, 1997, pp. 157–228, 2010, p. 484) only Plutarch offers a more extensive exposition of the Zoroastrian myth and dualism and therefore provides a useful indication of what was known in the West about the magi (de Jong, 1997, p. 159). Plutarch argues for a good god, an evil god and middle nature. Zoroastrianism does not know of this middle nature, and Plutarch’s account of it is shaped by his own convictions (de Jong, 1997, pp. 161–2). In De Iside 46–47 Plutarch expounds on the Zoroastrian contrast and conflict between the originator of the good – called a god, Horomazes – and that of evil, i.e. a demon, Areimanios, constituting the contrast of light and darkness (Mithras functions as middle). For Plutarch there is one good god (Horomazes) and his rival, a demon (Areimanius), the former ‘born from the purest light’ and therefore related to light, the latter born from and related to darkness. ‘They are at war with each other.’ Horomazes creates other gods related to the stars and so does Areimanius, who mixes good and evil. Areimanius brings famine and plague and ultimately will be destroyed by them. Plutarch refers to Theopomp saying that each god will dominate the other for 3,000 years, and for 3,000 further years they will be at war with each other. ‘In the end Hades will perish and men shall be happy’ (trans. de Jong, 1997, p. 165). Plutarch bases his account on Theopompus, who was already known in ancient times to have written on Persian dualism (Diogenes Laertius 1.8) and who probably also included Eudoxus, another ancient author well known for his great respect for Zoroastrianism (Pliny, Natural History 30.4), so that his account is not merely his own but summarizes a number of authors interested in the topic (de Jong, 1997, p. 162). Thus the basic contrast of two opposing spirits related to light and darkness seems to be a concept well known in Hellenistic authors and linked to Zoroastrianism. In this
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context it is noteworthy that the ancient Zoroastrian sources do not associate the two opposing powers with light and darkness (Lichtenberger, 1980, pp. 198–200), yet the link to light and darkness is an important feature in both, Plutarch and the Treatise. It is clear that Zoroastrian thought did not enter the Mediterranean until it had been linked to the contrast of light and darkness, but it is impossible to say whether the Treatise on the Two Spirits was influenced by a general Mediterranean idea of two opposing spirits or directly by Zoroastrian influences (Collins, 1997, pp. 42–3). In view of the evidence of Jewish apocalyptic wisdom traditions (Aune, 2003, p. 295) it can be assumed that the origins of the Treatise are inner-Jewish and that there is no direct influence of Zoroastrianism on the Treatise of the Two Spirits. Still, it is noteworthy that some ancient authors link the Jews themselves with Zoroastrianism. Thus, near the end of his brief account of the magi and Zoroastrianism Diogenes Laertius adds that some people claim that the Jews derive from the magi as well (9.6). It is quite possible that Jewish sources contributed to the entry of Zoroastrian thought into the Mediterranean area, although the Scrolls themselves do not provide primary sources of this influence, but are themselves the result of this event.
Philosophy There is a very small number of incidences in which specific ideas in the Scrolls are attributed to an influence from Hellenistic literature. Thus the term the ‘mystery of being and/or becoming’ (rz nhyh) is an important term in wisdom texts found in Qumran [→63 Wisdom]. The term refers not merely to a ‘mystery,’ but a ‘secret purpose’ (Bockmuehl, 1990, pp. 53–4), the ‘sapiential order of being,’ a ‘blueprint for creation,’ it includes the Torah, but is ‘dualistic and eschatological in character’ (Lange, 2010, pp. 459, 464). It is the divine purpose behind everything that happens. According to the Qumran wisdom text 1Q/4QI nstruction (4Q416 2 ii 9, 14, 18; 7; 4Q417 1 10–11; 2 i 1–13, 18–21) this mystery can be studied and leads to knowledge [→38 Instruction]; in 4QMysteries (4Q300 3 3–4) it combines past, present and future elements and ‘includes the eschatological judgment of the wicked’ (Lange, 2010, p. 458) [→42 Mysteries; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic and Divination]. None of these texts are of sectarian origin but the number of manuscripts found in Qumran is proof of the esteem in which they were held. Lange (2010, p. 459) claims that the term rz nhyh sounds like a Greek philosophical term (mustērion tou einai). The problem with Lange’s theory is that the term mustērion tou einai does not exist in Greek literature except for one occurrence in Basilius Seleucensis, a Christian author of the fifth century AD (Scr. Eccl., Sermones xli. p. 445 ll. 30– 31, TLG search): ‘until today the mystery remains and the mystery of being never ends.’ In this passage the following line also contains a reference to creation. Thus, this late reference provides a similar concept and context of rz nhyh to the one preserved in the Scrolls. Yet in view of the non-sectarian origin of Instruction and 4QMysteries, far from indicating Hellenistic Greek influence on Jewish wisdom texts the Basilius passage is more likely evidence of Jewish wisdom influence on a Christian author. There is one case in which mustērion is combined with a form of ‘to be’ in a genitive construction in a Greek author of the first century ce : In Philo, Deus. 61–62 we find
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the use of the participle (ho ōn) instead of the infinitive (einai), ta peri tou ontos apseudē mustēria, referring to the initiation into the ‘true mysteries concerning the one who is,’ and contrasting God’s attributes to those of created beings. The term does not relate to the mystery of creation or of history but to that of the creator in contrast to creation. Thus it is a different concept to the wisdom texts in the Scrolls, inserting the philosophical idea of God as ho ōn, also found in the Septuagint, into the context of the mystery religions. Still, the creation context and the idea of a special mystery associated with God, which can be comprehended by those who have special wisdom, corresponds to the use of the term in the wisdom texts from Qumran. It is therefore possible that the two are still related. The question then arises which is the more original phrase. As Philo’s participle construction can be seen to have been influenced by his philosophical background and as the infinitive has the greater number of occurrences in the Hebrew and can even be found in a fifth-century Christian author, it is more likely that Philo changed the infinitive construction – always supposing they both are related. If they are, then the question arises whether Philo’s metaphor of Greek mystery initiation indicates a Sitz im Leben for the Greek term. Mystery religions are by definition not prone to leaving public literary evidence of their terminology, and yet there is a lot of indirect evidence of mystery religions in Greco-Roman literature (cf. Burkert, 1987, pp. 7–9, 66–88, esp. p. 69). There are no terminological parallels in the extant texts, but many mysteries involved the enactment of ideas of the cycle of life and death, e.g. in such ancient mysteries as Eleusis (Burkert, 1987, pp. 4–5), and the votive character of many mystery cults shows that people sought them in adversity (Burkert, 1987, pp. 12–29). Especially the Demeter mysteries in Eleusis promised a blessed life (Homeric Hymn to Demeter; Cicero, De legibus 2.36), before and after death (Burkert, 1987, pp. 20–1), a thought quite compatible with Jewish wisdom, especially the idea of the ‘mystery of being and/or becoming’ as the purpose behind the unfolding of history, the mystery which explains why everything, especially evil, happens. Barring the assumption that a whole range of literature has been lost to us which used the term, the mystery cults are among the few conceptual parallels which could provide the missing evidence for the term in Greek literature. Nevertheless the link between rz nhyh and any Greek term or concept must remain more than tentative, especially in view of the fact that the term rz itself is a Persian loan word and hints at another, completely different range of influences, which cannot be studied here. Yet the link between the Scrolls’ wisdom texts and Hellenistic literature is not as obscure as it appears: Instruction, the same text which uses the concept of the ‘mystery of being and/or becoming’, contains polemic against certain Jews (Lange, 2010, pp. 464–5): 4Q418 69 ii 4–5 calls them ‘foolish minded ones’/’foolish of heart’ (ʾwyly lb). These foolish people assume that they have not been created, and the text asks which ‘tranquillity’ (hšq·t) there could be for such a person, and what kind of righteousness they have to look forward to. Thus these ‘foolish ones’ claim that there is no creation and focus on tranquillity (Lange, 2010, p. 465). The idea that there is no creation can be found in the Letter of Epicurus to Herodotus (Diogenes Laertius 10.38–39), where it is emphasized that there is nothing which came from nothing and that the universe has always existed and never changes. Furthermore, the idea of ‘tranquillity’ (4Q418
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69 ii 4–9) corresponds to the Greek atapaxia, and both concepts together indicate that the opponents here are adherents of Epicurus (Lange, 2010, p. 465). Instruction declares an uncreated person as non-existent, therefore all their, i.e. the Epicurean, expectations are futile and they only have an eschatological destruction to look forward to. Thus, in Instruction there is undeniable evidence of quite specific polemic against a Greek philosophical tradition along with the use of a term which might possibly have links to the Greek mystery cults. The genre of wisdom literature is international by nature and provides much scope for such instances of interaction between the Scrolls’ wisdom texts and Hellenistic literature.
Conclusion So far it has been possible to demonstrate that there is a range of possible convergences between Hellenistic literature and the Scrolls, even if there are few cases of proven influence. In the cases where a certain influence of Hellenistic literature on the Scrolls is likely or even demonstrable the Hellenistic input is always treated with polemic (Hartog, Jokiranta, 2017, p. 339), and the texts take a very definite and critical stance towards it. This does not mean however, that a search for further instances of convergence would not help to increase our understanding of the Scrolls.
Bibliography Aune, D. E. (2003), ‘Dualism in the Fourth Gospel and the Dead Sea Scrolls. A reassessment of the problem,’ in D. E. Aune, T. Seland, and J. H. Ulrichsen (eds), Neotestamentica et Philonica: Studies in Honor of Peder Borgen. NovTS up 106. Leiden: Brill, pp. 281–303. Basilius Seleucensis (1857–1866), Sermones XLI, in J.-P. Migne, Patrologiae cursus completus (series Graeca). MPG 85. Paris: Migne, pp. 28–474. Baumgarten, A. (1998), ‘Graeco-Roman voluntary associations and ancient Jewish sects,’ in M. Goodman (ed.), Jews in a Greco-Roman World. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 93–111. Bockmuehl, M. N. A. (1990), Revelation and Mystery in Ancient Judaism and Pauline Christianity. WUNT II 36. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Boyancé, P (1939), ‘Sur la vie pythagoricienne,’ Revue des études grecques 52, 36–50. Brown, R. E. (1968), The Semitic Background of the Term ‘Mystery’ in the New Testament. Facet Books Biblical Series 21. Philadelphia: Fortress. Burkert, W. (1987), Ancient Mystery Cults. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press. Cicero (1951), De re Publica – de Legibus, trans. by C. W. Keyes, LCL . London: William Heinemann; Cambridge MA : Harvard University Press. Collins, J. J. (1997), Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: Routledge. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Diogenes Laertius (1999–2002), Diogenis Laertii vitae philosophorum, ed. M. Markovich and H. Gärtner, 3 vols. Stuttgart/Leipzig: Teubner (I-II ); Munich/Leipzig: Saur (III : Indices).
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Dupont-Sommer, A. (1955), ‘Le problème des influences étrangères sur la secte juive à Qoumrân,’ Revue d’Histoire et de Philosophies Religieuses 35, 75–94. Eckhardt, B. (2017), ‘Temple ideology and Hellenistic private associations,’ DSD 24 (2017), 407–23. Festugière, A. J. (1949), La révélation d’Hermès Trismégiste: Le dieu cosmique. Paris: Lecoffre, J. Gabalda et Cie. García Martínez, F. and E. Tigchelaar (eds) (1997–1998), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Gillihan, Y. M. (2011), Civic Ideology, Organization, and Law in the Rule Scrolls: A Comparative Study of the Covenanters’ Sect and Contemporary Voluntary Associations in Political Context. STDJ 97. Leiden: Brill. Hadas, M. (1959), Hellenistic Culture: Fusion and Diffusion. New York: Columbia University Press. Hartog, P. and Jokiranta, J. (2017), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Hellenistic context,’ DSD 24 (2017), 339–55. Hengel, M. (1974), Judaism and Hellenism: Studies in their Encounter in Palestine during the Early Hellenistic Period. 2 vols. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: Fortress. Homer (2003), Homeric Hymns: Homeric Apocrypha. Lives of Homer, ed. M. L. West, LCL 496. Cambridge, MA : Loeb Classical Library. Jamblich (2008), Pythagoras: Legende – Lehre – Lebensgestaltung, ed. M. von Albrecht et al. Sapere 4. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Jong, A. de (1997), Traditions of the Magi: Zoroastrianism in Greek and Latin Literature. Leiden: Brill. Jong, A. de (2010), ‘Iranian connections in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 479–500. Kingsley, P. (1995), Ancient Philosophy, Mystery and Magic: Empedocles and Pythagorean Tradition. Oxford: OUP. Lange, A. (2010), ‘Wisdom literature and thought in the Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 455–78. Lichtenberger (1980), Studien zum Menschenbild in Texten der Qumrangemeinde. SUNT 15. Göttingen: Vandenhoek & Ruprecht. Murphy, C. M. (2002), Wealth in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Qumran Community. STDJ 40. Leiden: Brill. Philip, J. A. (1966), Pythagoras and Early Pythagoreanism. Phoenix Supplementary Volume 7. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Waerden, B. L. van der (1979), Die Pythagoreer: Religiöse Bruderschaft und Schule der Wissenschaft. Zurich: Artemis Verlag. Walker-Ramisch, S. (1996), ‘Graeco-Roman voluntary associations and the Damascus Document,’ in J. S. Kloppenborg and S. G. Wilson (eds), Voluntary Associations in the Graeco-Roman World. London: Routledge, pp. 128–45. Weinfeld, M. (1986), The Organizational Pattern and the Penal Code of the Qumran Sect: A Comparison with the Guilds and Religious Associations of the Hellenistic Period. NTOA 2. Fribourg: Éditions Universitaires.
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Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture Ingo Kottsieper
Knowledge about the physicality of manuscripts and the technologies used in the production of manuscripts proves to be important in several ways: ●
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The different materials used by the scribes determine not only different techniques in preparing a scroll but may also affect its inscription. The types of damage affecting the scrolls having been stored over centuries in the caves and subsequently during treatment also depend on the material. Thus, knowledge of the physical features of the different materials used is helpful and sometimes crucial for reconstructing the original state of a fragment or scroll.
Materials The main materials on which most of our texts are written are a kind of parchment and papyri. Occasionally earthen sherds (ostraca), wood, stone or metal objects and probably also wax tablets (see Luke 1.63; for rabbinic references to wax tablets see Strack and Billerbeck, 1924, pp. 108–10) common throughout the Roman Empire could be used. In what follows we will focus on the two main writing materials, parchment and papyrus [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls].
Parchment In the scholarly literature, different terms are used to refer to the material of the Scrolls: hide, skin, leather, or parchment (see Reed and Poole, 1962a, 1962b, 1964; Murphy et al., 2010; Rabin, 2013, pp. 130–1; Rabin, 2016, pp. 63–7). For the sake of clarity, we will use ‘hide’ to designate the unprepared hide of an animal. A hide consists of three main layers: the outer epidermis, the hypodermis (or subcutaneous tissue) – the layer placed on the flesh – and the dermis in between, consisting mainly of collagen fibrils. Without treatment a hide is not suitable to be written on and would decay rapidly. To obtain a durable material suitable for writing one has to depilate the hide, remove the upper and lower layers, and stabilize the structure of the remaining dermis in order to make it resistant to external influences such as bacteria. 167
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The terms leather and parchment designate two different techniques for stabilizing the dermis. In the case of leather, this is achieved chemically by tanning which stabilizes the texture of the dermis by chemically binding its collagen proteins between the single fibrils. In contrast to this, parchment is produced by stretching the wet hide after depilating it. The chemical substances used for depilating also disintegrate the structure of the dermis’ fibrils. The mechanical stress of stretching forces the fibrils into a new texture in parallel layers. This new structure becomes fixed during the process of drying and is now compact enough to prevent the intrusion of bacteria or other harmful substances. No tanning is needed, but the use of chalk or flour during the process of stretching and afterwards while polishing the parchment results in a smooth, bright material well suited for inscription. The chemical substances for depilating may vary. For ‘classical’ European parchments lime-solutions are common while Mesopotamian and rabbinic sources also attest the use of organic ingredients like excrements. Rabbinic tradition recommended for parchments being used for holy texts an additional tanning for refining the surface of the parchment, thus creating a hybrid form of ‘tanned parchment’ (Haran, 1991). A further technique was to split the dermis into two layers. This produced an increase in the amount of writing material but also resulted in thinner and more flexible parchments that were more susceptible to damage. According to later rabbinic prescriptions, undivided parchments or the upper layer of a split parchment are to be inscribed on the hair-side while for the lower layer of a split parchment the flesh side should be used. Besides splitting, other techniques could be used to reduce the thickness of a (hybrid) parchment. In the course of depilating and removing the outer layers of the hide one can scratch off layers of the dermis which is also possible while the hide is in the process of stretching. In the final stages polishing materials such as pumice could be used to further reduce the thickness of the material (Nir-El and Broshi, 1996a, p. 166). A number of fragments from the Dead Sea Scrolls were submitted to material analysis, and the following main results can be presented: ●
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Most of the Scrolls are made from tanned parchments as described in rabbinic sources. Their fibril structure offers evidence for stretching and their overall character as parchments. Additionally, they reveal a superficial layer of tanning applied after stretching. Other traces of organic substances have been found but no significant residuum of lime suggesting organic material was used for depilating. The majority of parchments were not split and inscribed on the hair-side. Nevertheless, one of the most remarkable scrolls, the so-called Temple Scroll (11QTa) [→51 Temple Scroll], was originally made of sheets fabricated by tawing, that is soaking in an inorganic alum-based solution and applying a gypsum-paste and no tanning at the end. What is now the first sheet was added later as replacement of the original beginning and was manufactured in the common way (Rabin et al., 2010). Additionally, this scroll was made of split parchment and is inscribed on the flesh side.
Thus, though the material analysed so far corresponds to a number of later rabbinic prescriptions, the case of the authoritative Temple Scroll clearly argues against the
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assumption that the fabrication of parchment already followed fixed halakhic rules. However, it is noteworthy that the technologies on which the later rules are based were already established during the Second Temple period. The thickness of fragments found in the Dead Sea area varies between 0.04 mm and about 1.6 mm. As noted above extremely thin parchment was very hard to handle and easily damaged if in use. It is no surprise, therefore, that the dimensions of most thin fragments are small (27 × 40–44 mm) and commonly found with small items such as phylacteries not to be read again. Such thin pieces may have been remains scraped away from the parchments which might explain the irregular shape of most of them. The split parchment of the Temple Scroll (11QTa) measures only 0.1 mm in thickness. The fact that the first sheet of this scroll was added later to replace an earlier sheet illustrates that the original outer sheet suffered severe damage probably partly because of its thinness. The fragments of other scrolls measured by Reed and Poole range from 0.19–1.55 mm in thickness. Only scarce data is available about the kinds of animals the hides were taken from. Early attempts to determine the animals were based on comparisons of follicle structures with those found on animals today. This suggested the hides came mainly from (hairy) sheep and goats but also from a calf (Ryder, 1991, p. 29). Subsequent DNA analyses revealed that beside domestic goat (as is the case with the Temple Scroll) the hides of wild animals such as gazelle and an ibex-like species had also been used (Woodward et al., 1996; Kahila Bar-Gal et al., 2001 [→15 Scientific Technologies]). After the parchment was prepared the next step was cutting a sheet. A prepared hide is not rectangular and often uneven with holes caused, e.g., by scars. Given that hides were taken from relatively small and slim animals it was not possible to gain many spacious sheets from one hide. Accordingly, though the reconstruction of 4Q13 (Exodb) proposed by F. M. Cross (Cross, 1994, p. 80 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]) would allow a height above 50 cm, normally the height of sheets does not exceed 40 cm, and sheets as small as 3 cm in height were used (4Q444 [4QIncantation] [→61 Liturgical Texts]). Between these extremes nearly any height can be found (Tov, 2004, pp. 79–84). The length of sheets varies between ca. 5 and 90 cm (Tov, 2004, p. 75). Such a range suggests there were no strict rules about the size of sheets but the aim was to get as many suitable rectangular sheets from a single hide as possible. The original orientation of a sheet relative to the hide it was taken from can also vary (cf. Pfann, 1997, p. 2 and fig. 2 p. 4 regarding the sheets of 4Q298 [Words of the Maskil to All Sons of Dawn] [→65 Wisdom]). Given smaller sheets would be less wasteful and inexpensive, any decision about which sheets to use for a scroll was probably an economic one though it may also reflect the value of a particular text. That a scribe could use sheets of completely different width for one and the same scroll is illustrated by 4Q320 (4QCalendrical Document/Mishmarot A [→62 Calendars]), a scroll which ‘appears to be a compendium of discrete chronometrical lists’ (Talmon with Ben-Dov, 2001, p. 37): frag. 4 contains two nearly complete sheets of about 4.7 cm and 10 cm in width, while the height of both was probably about 15 cm. The problem of obtaining good quality larger sheets is illustrated by the fact many sheets attest unusable areas left blank by a scribe. This was probably caused by surface damage to the parchment (see, e.g. Yadin, 1962, p. 249 [→40 Milh.amah] or 4Q367 (Reworked Pentateuch) 3 5–14 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related;
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56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. Sometimes the problem was caused by holes in the sheet which could be repaired (e.g. 4Q266 [4QD a] 2 ii 9–12 [→35 Damascus Document]) or left open (cf. 4Q396 [MMTc] 9a [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]; 4Q416 (4QI nstructionb) 2 ii 19–21[→38 Instruction]). Parchment was smooth enough to allow scribes to indicate dry guiding lines. Normally the text would be written on single sheets which were easier to handle than big scrolls. Thus, the sheets would be sewn together to form the scroll after they were inscribed (for an analysis of different styles of stitching see Gorski, 2006). Since all sewing threads analysed thus far were made of flax there is no reason to assume that leather threads prescribed by later rabbinic rules were common at this period (pace Tov, 2011, p. 13). However, some scrolls do accord with later halakhic prescriptions by not extending the sewing to top and bottom margins. Scrolls could also be damaged while in use. In this case, as already mentioned above with reference to the Temple Scroll, one could easily replace a damaged sheet. A different technique is found with 4Q22 (paleoExodm). In col. VIII there is a patch sewn onto the original sheet to fill a hole. Since it is inscribed by a different hand we may assume that it replaces a part of the column damaged during its later use. To stabilize a parchment, one could also glue papyrus sheets to its back (cf. 4Q51 [4QS ama]). To prevent damage to the heavily used beginning of a scroll scribes either left a bigger margin at the beginning of the scroll or a narrow un-inscribed sheet was added, the socalled handle sheet. By this uninscribed wide space at the beginning of a scroll also a kind of envelope could be provided to protect the inscribed part of the scroll. It also gives space for the application of a leather patch holding a string to tie the scroll when it was rolled up. The last sheet is often also smaller because only a small amount of text remained to be written suggesting some scribes cut such narrow sheets from bigger ones. If this was the case, we may expect that any remaining strips were used for another scroll, suggesting that even parts of the same sheet could belong to different scrolls. The material particularities of parchments cause two main problems for reading and reconstructing fragments: ●
As already mentioned, stretching forces the fibrils into a structure of parallel layers, which even allows splitting the material into thinner sheets. On the other hand, the connection between such layers and the inner structure of the fibrils can subsequently deteriorate (cf. Dik, 2010, p.25, who analyses the structure of a fragment by applying the non-destructive method of micro-tomography: ‘Both the edges [= surfaces, IK ] show a fairly solid, homogeneous consistency, which also applies to the area directly below the primer. . . . The most degraded volume occurs towards the centre of the parchment, where we observe disentanglement of string-like structures.’ See also Kennedy and Wess, 2006 and Rabin and Franzka, 2006.) This may result in flaking of small surface patches which destroys any information about what may have been written. Since most black and white images of our texts are infrared and optimized to broaden the contrast between ink and parchment, such flaked areas are sometimes very hard to detect on the images and can be misinterpreted as originally un-inscribed areas.
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Moreover, distortion of fragments can be the result of different changes to the inner coherence of the material. By nature, a hide and consequently the parchment made from it is not materially homogenous material and thus different fragments and even parts of one fragment may react differently to later external influences. External influences affect different parts of a manuscript differently, e.g. some fragments may have been exposed to the surface while others were buried in the ground or (partially) covered by other fragments. Consequently, different areas of a scroll or fragment may react differently, and secondary shrinking or widening of a fragment need not appear homogenously across the entire fragment. This causes not only distortions in shape but also differences in line height or letter size which can mislead scholars trying to reconstruct a sheet. For example, the main fragment of 1QHa 20.32–34 [→37 Hodayot] shows a small flap which shrank dramatically still connected to the main fragment; it can no longer be connected to its original place. The line heights depicted on this flap are lower than the rest of the fragment. If one imagines that this flap had lost its connection at the bottom and was found as a separate fragment, it would have taken a great deal of ingenuity to locate it correctly. Some images represent a stage of reconstruction where scholars tried to force damaged material into its original state. Since this is often not possible without destroying the fragments it can lead to overlapping which can arouse the suspicion that the reconstruction is wrong or lead to faulty readings. Thus, 4Q403 (4QS hirShabbd) 1 ii 6 [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice] is torn partially apart. The remains of the last word on both parts give the clear reading of an otherwise unattested gwh.ly, as can be seen on PAM 42.182 (January 1956) and recorded in the card concordance used by the original editorial team [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. Later, the two parts were forced to fit which led to an overlap in the area of this word. This ‘reconstruction’ can be seen on PAM 42.807 (October 1958) which served as the source for all editions of the text. The overlapping concealed part of the writing leading to the common but faulty reading gh.ly (‘coals of [fire]’). Today it is possible to use image processing software [→15 Scientific Technologies] to reconstruct the original image without destroying the fragments but one should use this with care because of the risk of a scholar creating a phantom text from wrongly connected fragments.
Many fragments suffered additional damage after they were found (Boyd-Alkalay and Libman, 1998). Thus, probably as a result of early treatment some parchments developed a layer of salt crystals on the surface – probably residues of salts in the collagen structure of the parchment – diminishing its legibility. Rabbinic regulations suggest that salt was used to conserve the fresh hide and possibly also as an ingredient after depilating the hide (Haran, 1991, p. 35). Early conservation treatments included humidification followed by freezing or applying Fuller’s earth to the parchment which caused the process of the crystallization of salt (see Wallert, 1996; Hahn et al., 2008, pp. 3–4; Rabin, 2013, pp. 137–8). The use of Fuller’s earth also caused dramatic changes to the structure and hardening of the surface of the parchment resulting in physical stress and probably further flaking and distortion (on the application of Fuller’s earth see Boyd-Alkalay and Libman, 1998, p. 541). To state these facts is not to blame earlier
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scholars for lack of experience and training, but to remind contemporary scholars that early images may provide information lost today. Thus, the use of the old PAM photographs (Tov, 1993) is mandatory for any serious scholar dealing with damaged manuscripts, and the decision of the IAA to publish those images electronically is most welcome (http://www.deadseascrolls.org.il/).
Papyrus Papyrus (see Lewis, 1974) was invented and produced in Egypt from the papyrus plant (Cyperus papyrus) which produces triangular stems up to a length of 3 m. These stems were cut into parts of up to 40 cm and stripped of their outer rind. The remaining tissue is cut vertically into thin strips which are placed side by side overlapping each other. A second layer of such strips is placed crosswise on the first. By pressing or beating the strips are connected to each other forming a solid sheet. After polishing, probably with pumice or some iron instruments which would explain the amount of iron to be found in papyrus, the sheet becomes smooth enough to write on. Since the structure of both layers of strips orientated crosswise is still visible such a sheet has two materially different sides. The main side on which one writes parallel to the strips is called recto, the other side on which the lines of writing cross the strips is called verso. Thus, recto and verso are not defined by the material but by the orientation of the writing relative to the strips. The manufactured sheets are glued together to form a scroll. The join of two sheets is normally smooth enough to write across. With very fine papyrus of high quality it is sometimes impossible to detect a join with the naked eye. Thus, in contrast to parchment, papyrus was normally sold in scroll form rather than as single sheets, and scribes would cut the necessary amount for a given text from such a scroll. The orientation of the text written on a scroll depends on its length. Long texts are written in columns similar to parchment scrolls. In this case, the recto is the side on which the strips run parallel to the direction the scroll is rolled in. Shorter texts such as letters or contracts are written in one long column with the beginning of the scroll on the top. In this case, the recto is the side with the strips running across the direction of the scroll. The sequence of papyrus strips is often helpful for placing fragments. If a specific pattern is found on different fragments the axis on which to place those fragments is known. If several fragments attest an overlapping sequence of strips in both dimensions provided by verso and recto, one may even reconstruct parts of a papyrus simply on the basis of material data. But two issues must be kept in mind. First, a papyrus of high quality is often made of strips of the same colour and width which minimize the differences in the sequence of strips and thus does not display discernible patterns. On the other hand, low quality papyrus is often made of strips of changing colour and width. Thus, they provide clear patterns which are very helpful in identifying direct or near joins, but those patterns are subject to change further along. Consequently, the reliability of placing fragments according to the pattern decreases in line with the width of the space lost between the fragments. And, of course, only fragments belonging to the same sheet can be placed by observations of those patterns. To my knowledge, we have no information about where the papyri found in the Dead Sea area were manufactured. Since Egypt was well known for exporting papyrus
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and we do not know about any place for papyrus production in Palestine this material was probably imported from Egypt.
Choosing Which Material to Use? There is a clear tendency in Palestine to use parchment for literary texts and papyrus for documentary ones (see Tov, 2002). But this was by no means a strict rule, since 30 per cent of the documentary texts were written on parchment. They are mostly short notes or lists, rather than letters or deeds. On the other hand, 145 nondocumentary texts are found written on papyrus including 38 cryptic and 19 Greek texts from Cave 7. Both copies of biblical texts like the Book of Isaiah (4Q69) [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related] and other important texts like the Book of Jubilees (4Q223–224 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]), the Rule of the Community (4Q255; 4Q257 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]), the Damascus Document (4Q273 [→35 Damascus Document]), or the Halakhic Letter MMT (4Q398[→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]) are attested on papyrus, and this material could be used for backing parchments containing a biblical text (4Q51 [4QS ama]). Clearly, papyrus was not considered as halakhically inappropriate for religious texts. Possible reasons for generally favouring papyrus for documentary and parchment for literary texts are to be sought elsewhere and were probably economic and practical. Normally, letters and contracts were not consulted repeatedly. In fact, a contract would only be opened in the event of a lawsuit and thus be rendered invalid for further use; a letter is often read only in the situation it addresses as is the case also with lists and short notes. Such texts would normally be kept in an archive for as long as they were needed. An analysis of archives from the Persian period shows they normally only contain documentary texts spanning two generations (Kottsieper, 2013), suggesting older manuscripts would have been reused or destroyed. Occasionally they were reused after washing away the writing. On the other hand, the fact that papyrus was traded in scroll form made it very suitable for letters, contracts or other documentary texts. The scribe could use exactly the amount needed for his text rather than searching for a sheet of parchment of the right size or subsequently sewing sheets together. In contrast to this, literary texts were written to be read and used repeatedly for as long as possible. Thus, parchment, a much more solid material, would be preferable. This does not exclude the use of parchment – especially leftovers – for other purposes such as short notes, lists or even letters. Though we do not have any information about the prices of the different materials in Palestine, the predominant use of papyrus in daily life, though probably imported from Egypt, favours the assumption that it was less expensive – or at least not more expensive – than the more durable parchment (see also Ryder, 1991, p. 25).
The Ink Normally, carbon-based black ink was used for writing (cf. esp. Nir-El and Broshi, 1996a, 1996b; Tov, 2004, pp. 53–5; Murphy et al., 2010; Tov, 2011, pp. 10–12). The pigment is provided mostly by charcoal or soot produced by burning organic material
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and mixing it with binding agents especially gum arabic, but may also include other materials (for possible ingredients of ancient inks used in Palestine or Jordan see further Rasmussen et al., 2012 and Rabin, 2013 [→15 Scientific Technologies]). In some manuscripts, red ink was used to mark the beginning of sections, as e.g. in 2Q14 1 1–2 (the opening verses of Ps. 103), or 4Q27 (Num. 11–36). This practice is found already in the first millennium bce in the plaster inscription from Deir ʿAlla in the Jordan valley and is well known from Egyptian scribal tradition where red ink is used for the socalled rubra. This red ink uses cinnabar, probably imported from Spain, as pigments. Before writing, ink was diluted with water. Other ingredients such as botanical gall may have been added (cf. Maimonides, Mishne Tora Ahava, Hilkhot Tefillin we Mezuzah we Sefer Tora I,4 [my ʿpsym]. For an analysis of 1QHa that suggests this could also have been the case for this manuscript see Rabin et al., 2009, pp. 101–2; Rabin, 2013, pp.139–40). If the scribe uses high quality parchment or papyrus with a smooth surface the ink is only glued to the surface and does not penetrate it, allowing scribes to correct errors by scratching off the surface of a parchment or washing off the ink. The latter technique is common with papyrus allowing its reuse. Further damage to the ink was often caused during the manuscripts’ centuries in the caves or during their handling after the discoveries sometimes without traces visible to the naked eye. In other cases, ink can become attached to the back of the parchment with which it comes into contact in a rolled-up scroll. This was facilitated by the rougher and more adhesive surface of the back of the parchment. Such cases can result in a text apparently written in mirror writing on the back of a parchment, cf. parts of 11QTa or 4Q377 (apocryphal Pentateuch B) 2 which is found in mirror writing on the back of fragment 1. If the surface of the parchment is not smooth the ink may sink into the material and can be detectable at the back. This is the case with 4Q417 (Instructionc) 2 i which displays some text on the back of the parchment in mirror writing [→38 Instruction]. Since this is only attested in some areas one may assume it is indicative of the poor quality of parts of the sheet. A connection to the quality of the parchment is also illustrated by 4Q414 (Ritual of Purification A [→70 Purity and Holiness]) which is written on the back of 4Q415 (Instructiona) – the side which was normally not used – with some letters preserved on the other side of the parchment, the original recto. It is likely that technical considerations prevented scribes from using both sides of a parchment. One would have to prepare both surfaces carefully for the ink to be absorbed without appearing on the other side. Moreover, ink on a parchment scroll inscribed on both sides would have been liable to stick together especially if not in frequent use. Later medieval codices inscribed on both sides reflect changes in technology in the preparation of parchment and ink. Thus it is not surprising that only a small number of parchment manuscripts inscribed on the verso have been preserved. Most of these attest a different composition and were probably never intended to be part of a regular scroll, but attest secondary use. This is obvious for 4Q355, an Aramaic or Hebrew account list written on the verso of 4Q324 (Mishmarot C [→62 Calendars]) with lines running crosswise to the direction of the original text, and 4Q350, a Greek account written on the verso of
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4Q460 (Narrative Work and Prayer) 9. Additionally, at least one sheet of 4Q201 (4QE nocha [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]) was used for a genealogical list (4Q338) probably as a kind of ‘school-exercise, as the surface of the verso is badly blotted with ink’ (Milik, 1976, p. 139). Similarly 4Q414 written on the verso of 4Q415 and mentioned above is found on a sheet that probably originally belonged to 4Q418 and was later replaced (Tigchelaar, 2001, pp. 29–30). This leaves 4Q343 which is a Nabatean letter written on both sides of a small patch of parchment and some pen strokes on the verso of XH.ev/Se 7 [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview], a deed of sale, preserving what appear to be remains of the witnesses’ signatures. Thus, there is no example of a literary parchment scroll with a single text on both sides. The interactions between the ink and the surface of a parchment can also damage the parchment itself. For instance, the flaking of some areas may have been increased by the physical stress exacted by the ink ‘glued’ onto the surface or sunken into it. Moreover, chemical deterioration of the parchment, leaving holes left by the ink, is visible in 1QapGen [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]. Such effects are well known from medieval parchments written with ink prepared with an iron vitriol base. Since no iron was detected in the ink of 1QapGen the damage was probably caused by copper attested especially in the damaged fragments which suggests either the scribe added ingredients containing copper to the ink or used an inkwell made of bronze as attested at Qumran (Nir-El and Broshi, 1996a, p. 164; Machiela, 2009, pp. 29–30). Even ordinary black ink or, to be precise, its binding agent may have caused deterioration of the parchment (Murphy et al., 2010).
Bibliography Boyd-Alkalay, E. and E. Libman (1998), ‘Preserving the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran artifacts,’ in Flint and VanderKam (eds) (1999), I:535–44. Cross, F. M. (1994), ‘4Q13. 4QE xodb,’ in F. M. Cross and E. Ulrich, Qumran Cave 4. VII: Genesis to Numbers. DJD 12. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 79–95. Dik, J. (2010), ‘A short note on the application of synchrotron-based micro-tomography on the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds) (2010), pp. 21–7. Eshel, H., M. Broshi, and T. A. J. Jull (2005), ‘Four Murabbaʿat papyri and the alleged capture of Jerusalem by Bar Kokhba,’ in R. Katzoff and D. Schaps (eds), Law in Documents of the Judaean Desert. JSJS up 96. Leiden: Brill, pp. 45–50. Flint, P. W. and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (1999), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Gorski, A. (2006), ‘Forensics Practices – Scribal Activities,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds) (2006), pp. 203–8. Gunneweg, J., C. Greenblatt, and A. Adriaens (eds) (2006), Bio- and material cultures at Qumran. Stuttgart: Fraunhofer IRB Verlag. Gunneweg, J., A. Adriaens, and J. Dik (2010), Holistic Qumran: Trans-Disciplinary Research of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 87. Leiden: Brill. Hahn, O. et al. (2008), ‘Non-destructive investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in 9th International Conference on NDT of Art, Jerusalem, Israel, 25–30 May 2008, http://www.ndt.net/search/docs.php3?MainSource=65
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Haran, M. (1985), ‘Bible scrolls in Eastern and Western Jewish communities from Qumran to High Middle Ages,’ HUCA 66, 21–63. Haran, H. (1991), ‘Technological heritage in the preparation of skin for biblical texts in medieval oriental Jewry,’ in Rück (ed.), 1991, pp. 35–43. Kahila Bar-Gal, G. et al. (2001), ‘The genetic signature of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in D. Goodblatt, A. Pinnick, and D. R. Schwartz (eds), Historical Perspective: From the Hasmoneans to Bar Kokhba in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 37, Leiden: Brill, pp. 165–72. Kennedy, C. J. and T. J. Wess (2006), ‘Parchment degradation analyzed by X-ray diffraction,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds) (2006), pp. 215–28. Kottsieper, I. (2013), ‘Aramäische Archive aus achämenidischer Zeit und ihre Funktion,’ in M. Faraguna (ed.), Archives and Archival Documents in Ancient Societies, Legal Documents in Ancient Societies 4, Trieste: Edizioni Università di Trieste, pp. 175–98. Lange, A., E. Tov and M. Weigold (eds) (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures I. VTS up 140/2. Leiden: Brill. Lewis, N. (1974), Papyrus in Classical Antiquity, Oxford, Clarendon Press. Lewis, N. (1989), Papyrus in Classical Antiquity: A Supplement. Papyrologica Bruxellensia 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Lewis, N. (1992), ‘Papyrus in classical antiquity: An update,’ Chronique d’Egypte 67, 308–18. Lönnqvist M. and K. Lönnqvist (2011), ‘Parallels to be seen: Manuscripts in jars from Qumran and Egypt,’ in A. Lange, E. Tov, and M. Weigold (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures I, VTS up 140/2. Leiden: Brill, pp. 427–87. Machiela, D. A. (2009), The Dead Sea Genesis Apocryphon. STDJ 79. Leiden: Brill. Milik, J. T. (1976), The Books of Enoch. Oxford, Clarendon Press. Murphy, B. M. et al. (2010), ‘Degradation of parchment and ink of the Dead Sea Scrolls investigated using synchroton-based X-Ray and infrared microscopy,’ in Gunneweg, et al. (eds) (2010), pp. 77–97. Nir-El, Y. and M. Broshi (1996a), ‘The black ink of the Qumran Scrolls,’ DSD 3, 157–67. Nir-El, Y. and M. Broshi (1996b), ‘The red ink of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Archaeometry 38, 97–102. Pfann S., ‘4Q298. 4QcryptA Words of the Maskil to All Sons of Dawn,’ in T. Elgvin et al., Qumran Cave 4. XV: Sapiential Texts, Part I. DJD 20. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 1–30 Rabin, I. (2013), ‘Archaeometry of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 20, 124–42. Rabin, I. (2016), ‘Material analysis of the fragments,’ in T. Elgvin, K. Davis, and M. Langlois (eds), Gleanings from the Caves: Dead Sea Scrolls and Artefacts from the Schøyen Collection, London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, pp. 61–77. Rabin I. and S. Franzka (2006), ‘Microscopy and parchment degradation: A comparative study,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds), pp. 269–76. Rabin I. and O. Hahn (2013), ‘Characterization of the Dead Sea Scrolls by advanced analytical techniques,’ Analytical Methods 5, 4648–54. Rabin, I. et al. (2009), ‘On the origin of the ink of the Thanksgiving Scroll (1QHodayota),’ DSD 16, 97–106. Rabin, I. et al. (2010), ‘Analysis of an antique alum tawed parchment,’ Paper presented at the ICOM-CC Joint Interim Meeting, Rome, http://www.icom-cc.org/54/document/ analysis-of-an%20antique-alum-tawed-parchment/?id=795#.WcbAU bKGPX 4 Rasmussen, K. L. et al. (2012), ‘The constituents of the ink from a Qumran inkwell: New
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prospects for provenancing the ink on the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Journal of Archaeological Science 39, 2956–68. Reed, R. and J. B. Poole (1962a), ‘A study of some Dead Sea Scroll and leather fragments from Cave 4 at Qumran. Part I—Physical examination,’ in Proceedings of the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society (Scientific Section), 9/1, 1–13. Reed, R. and J. B. Poole (1962b), ‘The preparation of leather and parchment by the Dead Sea Scrolls community,’ Technology and Culture 3/1, 1–26. Reed, R. and J. B. Poole, (1964), ‘A study of some Dead Sea Scroll and leather fragments from Cave 4 at Qumran. Part II —Chemical examination,’ in Proceedings of the Leeds Philosophical and Literary Society (Scientific Section) IX.4, Leeds, 1964, pp. 171–82. Rück, P. (ed.) (1991), Pergament: Geschichte – Struktur – Restaurierung – Herstellung. Sigmaringen: Jan Thorbecke Verlag. Ryder, M. L. (1991), ‘The biology and history of parchment,’ in Rück, (1991), pp. 25–33. Strack, H. and P. Billerbeck (1924), Kommentar zum Neuen Testament aus Talmud und Midrasch II. München: C. H. Beck. Talmon, S. with J. Ben-Dov (2001), ‘4Q320. 4QC alendrical Document/Mishmarot A,’ in S. Talmon, J. Ben-Dov, and U. Glessmer, Qumran Cave 4. XVI: Calendrical Texts. DJD 21. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 37–63. Tigchelaar, E. (2001), To Increase Learning for the Understanding Ones. Reading and Reconstructing the Fragmentary Early Jewish Sapiential Text 4QInstruction. STDJ 44. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (ed.) (1993), The Dead Sea Scrolls on Microfiche: A Comprehensive Facsimile Edition of the Texts from the Judean Desert, Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (2002), ‘Lists of Specific Groups of Texts from the Judaean Desert,’ in E. Tov et al. (eds), The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 203–28. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (2011), ‘The sciences and the reconstruction of the ancient scrolls: Possibilities and impossibilities,’ in Lange et al. (eds) (2011), pp. 3–25. Wallert, A. (1996), ‘Deliquescence and recrystallization of salts in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in A. Roy and P. Smith (eds), Archaeological Conservation and its Consequences. London: International Institute for Conservation, pp. 198–201. Wise, M. et al. (eds) (1994), ‘Report and discussion concerning radiocarbon dating of fourteen Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site, Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 722. New York: The New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 441–53. Woodward, S. R. et al. (1996), ‘Analysis of parchment fragments from the Judean Desert using DNA techniques,’ in D. W. Parry and S. D. Ricks (eds), Current Research and Technological Developments on the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 20. Leiden: Brill, pp. 215–38. Yadin, Y. (1962), The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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Scientific Technologies Ingo Kottsieper
Technologies Different scientific methods allow us to date and localize a given manuscript and often provide hints for the reconstruction of a scroll. However, it is crucial to be clear about the significance of scientific data for the reconstruction and dating of damaged manuscripts. Often, they are only decisive in a negative way excluding some possibilities but still allowing several others. To give an example: If scientific analysis of two fragments were to show they were not fabricated from the same hide one may exclude the possibility that they belong to the same sheet – unless one of the fragments had been part of a later patch added in the course of repairing the sheet. However, it would still be possible that both fragments come from the same scroll using sheets from several animals. On the other hand, if one could prove that both fragments originated from one and the same animal this would render the assumption that they belong to the same sheet or even scroll only possible since it could not be excluded that they belong to different sheets which could have been used for different scrolls even (pace Tov, 2011, pp. 8–9). In addition, some of the data – and especially those for dating a fragment – based on scientific analysis result in probabilities and are not simple measurements. To use such data one has to understand what they really mean.
Chemical Analysis During the last decade it has become possible to analyse the chemical profile of very precise areas of fragments (Hahn et al., 2008; Rabin et al., 2010; Rabin, 2013; Rabin and Hahn, 2013). Technologies such as X-ray fluorescence and infrared spectroscopy employ electromagnetic waves to detect the presence and relative amount of elements without destroying the material. It is even possible to distinguish the chemical profiles of different areas of a fragment and to differentiate between the chemical composition of the writing material, the ink and even the residues which affected the fragments during the time they were hidden in the caves. Thus, those new technologies permit analyses of the ink and the ingredients used in preparing the parchment but also offer insights about the locality where either the parchment or the ink was prepared or 178
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stored. Thus water has its own chemical fingerprint which can be detected in substances prepared with water. As seen above, this is the case with both parchments and ink. Since traces of the water of the Dead Sea have been identified in at least some fragments, one may assume that either the parchment or the ink of those texts was prepared in this area (cf. the analysis of 1QHa [→37 Hodayot] by Rabin et al., 2009; also Wolff et al., 2012). It remains to be seen whether this technology will in due course allow a firm identification of the chemical makeup of individual fragments that will permit us to distinguish them from different sheets and offer a firm material basis for the reconstruction of fragmentary scrolls [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts].
Analysis of DNA At first glance we might hope that an analysis of the preserved DNA (cf. esp. Woodward et al., 1996; Parry et al., 1999, pp. 497–507; Kahila Bar-Gal et al., 2001; VanderKam and Flint, 2002, pp. 55–9; Tov, 2011, pp. 9–10) could be used to identify fragments originating from the same sheet. However, two major problems beset such attempts: a) As yet no technology to analyse DNA has been developed that does not destroy the material making it suitable only for large fragments with enough empty space to be sacrificed for this method. b) Recent analysis (Campana, 2010) has shown that parchments tend to contain DNA from different sources obtained in the course of preparation when wet hides were in direct contact with each other or treated in the same solutions. Thus, on the one hand, different spots of one and the same sheet may provide different DNA-fingerprints while, on the other, DNA-fingerprints even from different hides may show a misleading agreement caused by contamination shared by them.
Radiocarbon Dating Alongside palaeographic observations, the use of radiocarbon analysis contributes significantly to the debate about the date of the Scrolls (Doudna, 1998; VanderKam and Flint, 2002, pp. 27–33; Broshi, 2004, pp. 133–6; Plicht, 2007; Plicht and Rasmussen, 2010; Tov, 2011, pp. 6–8). This method is based on the fact that organic material absorbs carbon during its lifetime. The absorbed carbon consists of different isotopes, especially 12 C and 13C which are stable, and 14C which is an unstable radioactive isotope and decays with a half-life time of about 5,730 years. Thus, in comparison with the stable 12 13 / C isotopes 14C starts to decrease continually from the moment of an organism’s death. By comparing the original relation of these isotopes and the current ratio one can calculate the timespan between the ‘death’ of the material and today quite exactly. Based on this idea Willard Libby started to date organic material in the 1940s, and Libby himself applied this method to some linen fragments from Qumran (Libby, 1951). Since at that time up to 200g of material was needed for this procedure it was impossible to apply it to manuscripts without destroying inscribed portions. In
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the 1980s the new technology Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS ) was developed and was able to produce data from samples measuring milligrams allowing small uninscribed areas of manuscripts to be tested. With texts from the Dead Sea area AMS analyses were performed in laboratories in Zurich (Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule [ETH ]; Bonani et al., 1991) and Tucson (NSF Arizona Accelerator Mass Spectrometer Facility; Jull et al., 1995). To interpret the results of AMS investigations correctly two considerations have to be borne in mind:
a) For any given sample it is not possible to measure the exact amount of 14C isotope. Instead scientists depend on the number of sub-atomic particles emitted by nuclear decay. Thus different measurements recorded in the same lab for the same sample give different results. To address this variation scientists use the mean score of several runs together with the standard deviation based on the actual deviation provided by the measurements. To simplify the comparability of the results the data are given as years of age in relation to 1950. Thus, a so-called CBP value of 2289 +/– 55 simply means that the real value is to be expected somewhere around the year 1950–2289 = 339 bce with a probability described by a Gaussian distribution centred on this year and a standard deviation of 55 years. For 1QI saa, for instance, the Zurich lab measured readings of 2128 +/–38 (using four runs) while the Tucson lab calculated 2141 +/–32 (using three runs; all raw data cited here are taken from Doudna, 1998, pp. 468–71). b) These raw data are calculated on the oversimplifying basis that the ratio between the stable 12/13C and the unstable 14C in living organisms is constant. The actual ratio of 12/13C and 14C depends, however, on several variables such as the intensity of solar activity and the presence of particular sources of carbon in the biosphere, either constantly by the sea or temporarily stimulated by a volcanic eruption. Thus, the raw data need to be calibrated by taking geographical and historical contexts into account. Such calibrations are based on data derived from radiocarbon analysis of otherwise dated material. Different regions of the world require different sets of data to calibrate, and there are different sets available for the Northern and Southern hemispheres and for marine versus non-marine areas. These data sets are constantly refined, and data provided by labs should always be recalibrated according to the most up-to-date set. A number of institutes offer programs or internet applications to recalibrate raw data (cf. http://calib.qub.ac. uk/calib/calib.html which forms the basis for the data quoted here). For Qumran the data set is currently IntCal13 for the Northern hemisphere. However, this set is based predominantly on material from Northern Europe (Ireland) and North America providing data for periods of only 10–20 years each. The implications of applying such a calibration to material found in Palestine and to organisms from an extreme environment such as the Dead Sea region are still unknown. By applying a calibration set to the raw data the results no longer follow a simple Gaussian distribution but the probabilities for each year form a graph with several peaks. To facilitate the interpretation of such complex probabilities one normally presents two or three different sets of periods which include the most probable periods
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and taken together are equivalent to a given overall probability. Thus a set of time spans with the probability of 68.3 per cent represents all most probable periods and in which the actual value would be found by a probability of 68.3 per cent. A set with the probability of 95.4 per cent would contain longer and/or more periods which increases the probability that the actual value would be included. One should keep in mind that one deals mostly with a set of discrete time ranges located around several peaks of the calibrated probability curve and that the probability is not equally distributed throughout these sets. Thus, to get the probability of a certain sub-range of dates one has to calculate it by using the complex probability curve at this area. To prevent misunderstandings modern calculations add the percentage each single area contributes to the overall probability. To illustrate the accuracy of data for sources found in Palestine the following table displays the results of radiocarbon calculations for internally dated documentary texts based on the new calibration set IntCal13 with two sets of periods. 1σ designates the periods the material could belong to by a probability of 68.3 per cent and 2σ those with a probability of 95.4 per cent. Text1
Actual Date Lab Runs CBP 2
WDSP 2
352/1 bce
Z
3
Mur 30
69 or 134 ce
Z
3
5/6H.ev 19
128 ce
T
4
XH.ev/Se 125 131 ce
Z
3
5/6H.ev 21
130 ce
T
3
XH.ev/Se 8a
135 ce
T
4
1σ (= 68.3%)
2σ (= 95.4%) 3
2289 +/− 55 404–354 (0.553) bce 292–231 (0.447) bce (= 59 years) 1892 +/− 32 65–135 ce (1.0) (= 70 years) 1827 +/− 36 135–22 ce (1.0) (= 92 years) 1917 +/− 42 29–38 ce (0.069) 50–130 ce (0.931) (= 89 years) 1799 +/− 57 134–257 ce (0.831) 285–286 ce (0.011) 295–321 ce (0.158) (= 190 years) 1758 +/− 36 239–332 ce (1.0) (= 93 years)
481–440 bce (0.029) 434–199 bce (0.971)4 (= 281 years) 53–219 ce (1.0) (= 166 years) 84–256 ce (0.964) 298–319 ce (0.036) (= 193 years) 15–17 ce (0.001) 0–217 ce (0.999) (= 219 years) 84–352 ce (0.986) 367–379 ce (0.014) (= 280 years) 143–155 ce (0.015) 167–195 ce (0.039) 210–385 ce (0.947) (= 210 years)
WDSP = Wadi Daliyeh Samaria Papyri; Mur = Murabaʿat; H.ev = Nah.al H.ever [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. 2 The uncalibrated age (relative to 1950) and the standard deviation. 3 Portion of probability provided by this period. 4 Periods which include the actual date of the manuscript are in bold. 5 The designation ‘XH.ev/Se 11’ given by Doudna, 1998, p. 469, and reprinted in Webster, 2002, p. 364, is wrong. Though both papyri, XH.ev/Se 11 and 12, bear the museum number ROC 736 the identification above is supported by the data given in Bonani et. al., 1991, p. 29, as ‘a business document dated to the twenty-fifth year of the Provincia Arabia,’ cf. ll. 11–12 and Cotton and Yardeni (1997), pp. 10, 60. 1
The (probable) actual date of a manuscript falls into the narrower range of 1σ only in one instance (Mur 30). However, the date of this document is contested, and scholars
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disagree on whether it is to be dated to the First or Second Revolt. Radiocarbon dating does not solve this question but renders both dates possible. With the exception of the final example all dates coincide with the long periods given by the 2σ probability. This may be taken to indicate that periods with 2σ probability normally cover the actual date of a manuscript. But since these periods cover time spans between 166 and 281 years these values by no means prove a date proposed on palaeographical grounds in a range of only 50 or even 25 years. Thus, the assertion sometimes expressed in the literature that radiocarbon dating generally supports the dates arrived at on palaeographical grounds is to misuse the data. It is more accurate to argue that radiocarbon dating does not contradict the palaeographical dates but allows also for other dates even if one uses the narrow range of 1σ. Thus, 1QI saa is dated palaeographically to the end of the second century bce , but the radiocarbon analyses performed in Zurich and Tucson allow several periods included in the 1σ probability (333–330 [Z] or 346–321 [T], 203–91 [Z] or 206–149 and 140– 112 [T], and 67–65 [Z]). These data would also ‘prove’ a palaeographic dating at the beginning of the second or even at the end of the fourth century bce ! In some cases the palaeographic assumptions do not even correspond to the data provided by radiocarbon analysis based on the broader periods given by the 2σ-probability. Thus, 4Q208 (Astronomical Enocha [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other]) has been dated by radiocarbon analysis to the period 175–51 bce despite a palaeographical date of 225–175 bce ; 4Q266 (Da [→35 Damascus Document]) dated palaeographically to 100–50 bce has been dated by radiocarbon analysis to 39 bce –125 ce ; and 4Q213 (Aramaic Levia [→24 Aramaic Levi] has produced radiocarbon dates in the periods 324–326 bce , 204–87 bce and 78–56 ce but has been dated palaeographically to 50–25 bce . The final sample in the table above was affected by the additional problem of possible contamination of the material with older or younger organic material. It is easy to see why XH.ev/Se 8a is older than even the earliest period of 2σ probability (143–155 ce ) which itself covers only 1.5 per cent of the probability of this range. The probabilities in such an area are not equally distributed, and in this case 94.6 per cent of the probability falls into the area of 210–385 ce . This documentary text had been studied by the pioneering scholar J. T. Milik (Milik, 1954), and it is well known that scholars at that time did not hesitate about smoking while working on the fragments. Residues of cigarette smoke originating from recently harvested plants would have increased the amount of 14C isotopes making ancient material appear younger. Scientists do their best to remove any secondary sources of carbon. Yet, sometimes a common scientific procedure for cleaning contaminated samples may not be sufficient as was the case with 4Q258 (Sd [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] which was tested in the lab in Tucson (cf. Jull et al., 1995, pp. 12–13) initially resulting in dates that were clearly too young (second to third century ce !). A second sample from the same manuscript which looked cleaner and was subsequently treated by all available procedures revealed reasonable data. This begs the question what data other samples would have produced, had they also had been treated in this special way. Nevertheless, the fact that two different labs which tested 1QI saa produced very approximate raw data shows that the error rate created by different procedures in the labs is small enough to be neglected.
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Recent investigations nevertheless demonstrate, for instance, that standard cleaning processes do not remove all residue of castor oil, often used in the 1950s for cleaning and enhancing the legibility of fragments. Samples contaminated with this oil commonly appeared younger (Plicht and Rasmussen, 2010; cf. also Doudna, 1999, pp. 62–70, Rasmussen et al., 2006). Contamination caused by old carbon found in products made with fossil oil can also lead to older 14C calibrations. Since many manuscripts were treated with substances the ingredients of which are unknown a certain degree of uncertainty inevitably remains. Thus, radiocarbon analysis offers valuable data on probabilities allowing us to estimate the periods when a scroll was produced and – assuming it was not stored first – also the date of its inscription. One should use the data cautiously and not misuse them to date manuscripts into a timeframe of only a few decades (see also Van de Water, 2000, pp. 423–30). Where there is a fit to a hypothesis about the date of a scroll, this only tells us that the measured data do not contradict the theory – with the proviso that the measured data are not distorted by contaminations. Often the data would allow also contradicting hypotheses, especially if timeframes of only a few decades are proposed which also overlap with the broader timeframe provided by radiocarbon dating. If the results do not fit a certain hypothesis, the reason could be that either the measurement or the hypothesis or both are wrong – a scenario which cannot be totally excluded even if all the data fit!
Digital Imaging The legibility of manuscripts decreased dramatically during the centuries in the caves, and this was compounded by external influences after their discovery. This frequently resulted in a dark surface on parchments diminishing the visible contrast between ink and parchment almost completely. While ink which had flaked secondarily often leaves traces on the surface, these traces are not always detectable by the naked eye because of the small visible contrast and size. From the outset, scholars used a number of techniques to improve the legibility of the Scrolls, including now disregarded conservation methods such as the application of castor oil. From the beginning the most successful technology was infrared photography. This technology is able to exploit the contrast – invisible to the human eye – between ink and writing surface at the wavelengths of infrared or near infrared light. This method uses photographic material sensitive to (near) infrared light and employs filters that cut off other light. The image provided by the narrow bandwidth of (near) infrared light is then projected on to a medium which displays a broader bandwidth of visible light. Comparable results can also be reached by other technologies such as using different exposures of normal photographic material with the help of modern image processing software like GIMP. However, these technologies always lead to the loss of information in other areas. Thus, in many (near) infrared images the contrast between ink and surface is enhanced at the expense of the contrast between different areas of the surface making it difficult to distinguish flaked areas of a fragment from the rest of its background. Thus, different old photographs frequently offer complementary information and should be used side by side with more recent digital images.
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The development of high resolution digital spectral imaging over recent decades provides a powerful tool to preserve and reveal as much information about the manuscripts as possible (cf. esp. Zuckerman, 1997; Bearman et al., 1996; Zuckerman and Zuckerman, 2000; VanderKam and Flint, 2002, pp. 67–75). This technology is based on several high resolution digital images using different wavelengths of light being captured simultaneously. The digital information gained by this procedure far outweighs information accessible to the human eye or via older technologies such as ‘analogue’ photography (normally using the three wavelengths blue, red and green). Digital storage further permits broad accessibility through a variety of media without exposing the fragments to further damage. The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Library Project of the Israel Antiquities Authority uses this technology to secure data of all fragments. The IAA digitization work produces digital images with twelve different wavelengths, five of which are invisible near infrared light. Besides useful scans of the (mostly infrared) photographs taken earlier under the auspices of the Palestine Archaeological Museum (PAM ), the webpage of the project (accessible since 2012, http://www.deadseascrolls. org.il) provides the scholarly world with access to pictures in different forms (primarily as full colour spectrum and infrared images) with excellent magnification features that regularly reveal new readings. As yet not all fragments have been processed though the amount of digitized texts is constantly increasing. This technology and the Project based on it will continue to provide the scholarly world with invaluable new insights.
Bibliography Bearman, G., S. Pfann, and S. I. Spiro (1998), ‘Imaging the Scrolls: Photographic and direct digital acquisition,’ in Flint and VanderKam (eds), 1999, I:472–95. Bonani, G. et al. (1991), ‘Radiocarbon dating of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ ʿAtiqot 20, 27–32 Bonani, G. et al. (1992), ‘Radiocarbon dating of fourteen Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Radiocarbon 34/3, 843–9. Broshi, M. (2004), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls, the sciences and new technologies,’ DSD 11, 133–42. Burton, D., R. Reed and J. B. Poole (1959), ‘A new approach to the dating of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Nature 184/4685, 533–4. Campana, M. G. et al. (2010), ‘A flock of sheep, goats and cattle: Ancient DNA analysis reveals complexities of historical parchment manufacture,’ Journal of Archaeological Science 37,1317–25. Cotton, H. M. and A. Yardeni (1997), Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek Documentary Texts from Nah.al H.ever and Other Sites, with an Appendix Containing Alleged Qumran Texts (The Seiyâl Collection II). DJD 27. Oxford: Clarendon. Doudna, G. L. (1998), ‘Dating the Scrolls on the basis of radiocarbon analysis,’ in Flint and VanderKam (eds), 1999, II :430–71. Doudna, G. L. (1999), ‘Redating the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran: The case for 63 bce ,’ QC 8/4, 1–96. Flint, P. W. and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (1999), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Gunneweg, J., C. Greenblatt, and A. Adriaens (eds) (2006), Bio- and material cultures at Qumran. Stuttgart: Fraunhofer IRB Verlag.
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Gunneweg, J., A. Adriaens, and J. Dik (eds) (2010), Holistic Qumran: Trans-Disciplinary Research of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 87. Leiden: Brill. Hahn, O. et al. (2008), ‘Non-destructive investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in 9th International Conference on NDT of Art, Jerusalem, Israel, 25–30 May 2008, http://www.ndt.net/search/docs.php3?MainSource=65 Jull, A. J. T. et al. (1995), ‘Radiocarbon dating of scrolls and linen fragments from the Judean Desert,’ Radiocarbon 37/1, 11–19 Kahila Bar-Gal, G. et al. (2001), ‘The genetic signature of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in D. Goodblatt, A. Pinnick, and D. R. Schwartz (eds), Historical Perspective: From the Hasmoneans to Bar Kokhba in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 37, Leiden: Brill, 165–72. Knox, K., R. Johnston, and R. L. Easton, Jr. (1997), ‘Imaging the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Optics & Photonics News 8/8, 30–4. Libby, W. F. (1951), ‘Radiocarbon dates, II ,’ Nature 114/2960, 291–6. Milik, J. T. (1954), ‘Un contrat juif de l’an 134 après Jésus-Christ,’ RB 61, 182–90. Parry, D. W. et al. (1999), ‘New technological advances: DNA , databases, imaging radar,’ in Flint and VanderKam (eds) (1999), II :496–515. Plicht, J. van der (2007), ‘Radiocarbon dating and the Dead Sea Scrolls: A comment on “redating”,’ DSD 14, 77–89. Plicht, J. van der and K. L. Rasmussen (2010), ‘Radiocarbon dating and Qumran,’ in Gunneweg, Adriaens, and Dik (eds) (2010), pp. 99–121. Rabin, I. (2013), ‘Archaeometry of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 20, 124–42. Rabin, I. and O. Hahn (2013), ‘Characterization of the Dead Sea Scrolls by advanced analytical techniques,’ Analytical Methods 5, 4648–54. Rabin, I. et al. (2009), ‘On the origin of the ink of the Thanksgiving Scroll (1QHodayota),’ DSD 16, 97–106. Rabin, I. et al. (2010), ‘Characterization of the writing media of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds) (2010), pp. 123–34. Rasmussen, K. L. et al. (2006), ‘Cleaning and radiocarbon dating of material from Khirbet Qumran,’ in Gunneweg et al. (eds) (2006), pp. 139–63. Tov E. (2011), ‘The sciences and the reconstruction of the ancient scrolls: Possibilities and impossibilities,’ in Lange et al. (eds) (2011), pp. 3–25. Van de Water, R. (2000), ‘Reconsidering paleographic and radiocarbon dating of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ RB 19, 423–39. VanderKam J. and P. Flint (2002), The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Significance For Understanding the Bible, Judaism, Jesus, and Christianity. San Francisco: Harper. Webster, B. (2002), ‘Chronological index of the texts from the Judaean Desert,’ in E. Tov (ed.), The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 351–446. Wolff, T. et al. (2012), ‘Provenance studies on Dead Sea Scrolls parchment by means of quantitative micro-XRF,’ Analytical and Bioanalytical Chemistry 402, 1493–1503. Woodward, S. R. et al. (1996), ‘Analysis of parchment fragments from the Judean Desert using DNA techniques,’ in D. W. Parry and S. D. Ricks (eds), Current Research and Technological Developments on the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 20. Leiden: Brill, pp. 215–38. Zuckerman, B. (1996), ‘Bringing the Dead Sea Scrolls back to life,’ DSD 3, 178–207. Zuckerman B. and K. Zuckerman (2000), ‘Photography and computer imaging,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 66–75.
16
Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts Annette Steudel
The process of cleaning, sorting and beginning to decipher tens of thousands of Qumran fragments lasted until the beginning of the 1960s [→1 Discoveries]. Many texts were preliminarily published before the majority of manuscripts were edited in the official publication series Discoveries in the Judaean Desert (DJD ) [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. Editions were usually accompanied by palaeographical analysis (based on Cross, 1998 and his earlier publications; see also Yardeni, 2007 [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]). Some manuscripts were re-edited after initial publication, sometimes several times. The process of improving readings in the Scrolls is still continuing. More recently major tools have become available on the internet such as ‘The Digital Dead Sea Scrolls’ (http://dss.collections.imj.org.il/) for manuscripts of the Shrine of the Book and the rapidly growing number of images of the Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library for the rest of the collection (http://www.deadseascrolls. org.il/). Technology also facilitated deciphering the Copper Scroll (Brizemeure, Lacoudre, and Puech, 2006 [→15 Scientific Technologies; 34 Copper Scroll]. It also plays a major role in the decipherment of often difficult to read textual remains with the help of image processing programs. Nevertheless, the epigrapher’s eye for forms and ways of writing a letter is still required to achieve a reliable reading. It is important to consult not only the most recent images, but also older sets of photographs either on microfiche (Tov and Pfann, 1993; Brooke, 1996) or as part of the Leon Levy Digital Library which also includes fragments in a more complete state, and of course the originals in the Museum. Electronic and printed concordances (Abegg, 2003; Abegg, Bowley and Cook, 2010) as well as retrograde dictionaries (Kuhn, 1958; Sander and Mayerhofer, 2010) help in identifying the text of manuscripts. The Göttingen Qumran Dictionary Project is collecting all available variant readings in the different editions of the manuscripts (Kratz, Steudel, and Kottsieper, 2017). Following the seminal early work by Malachi Martin (Martin, 1958), recent years have witnessed a growing interest in scribal features and physical aspects of the Scrolls (see esp. Tov, 2004 and, e.g. Brooke, 2010). Among the over nine hundred manuscripts found at Qumran only nine are more or less well preserved scrolls: Isaiaha (1QI saa); Isab (1Q8) [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]; Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen) [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]; Rule of the Community (1QS ) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] with Rule of the Congregation (1Q28a) [→46 Rule of Congregation], and 186
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Rule of Blessings (1Q28b) [→45 Rule of Blessings]; War Scroll (1QM ) [→40 Milh.amah]; Hodayota (1QH a) [→37 Hodayot]; Pesher Habakkuk (1QpHab) [→44 Pesharim]; 11QPsalmsa (11Q5) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]; and Temple Scroll (11Q19) [→51 Temple Scroll]. Note also the completely preserved Copper Scroll (3Q15) [→34 Copper Scroll], and, from Nah.al H·ever [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview], the Greek Twelve Prophets Scroll (8H·evXIIgr). A few compositions seem to have been written on single sheets of leather, see e.g. Testimonia (4Q175) [→52 Testimonia]. All other so-called Scrolls exist only in fragmentary form, often in tiny pieces. The aim of the material reconstruction of scrolls is to learn more about a once-complete work that remains and was handed down in a fragmentary state. The aim is to gain more insight into a manuscript’s text, its content and its genre. The advantage of a material reconstruction is that it is based on the physical evidence of the fragments rather than speculation about its missing text. Such a method enables scholars to calculate the width of gaps between fragments as well as their sequence in the former scroll. Already in 1955, J. T. Milik had undertaken a material reconstruction of the Words of Moses (Apocryphon of Mosesa?, 1Q22) and Rule of Blessings. The actual method of material reconstruction of scrolls from scattered fragments, also known as the Stegemann method, was developed by Hartmut Stegemann in 1963 in the course of his reconstruction of the Hodayot from Cave 1 at Qumran. Émile Puech independently reconstructed the same manuscript arriving at almost the same conclusions as Stegemann. The work of both scholars has since been confirmed by additional Hodayot manuscripts from Cave 4. The method was outlined in detail by Stegemann (Stegemann, 1990; cf., e.g., Steudel, 1998, and Stoll, 1996). Outside the field of Qumran research Ingo Kottsieper successfully undertook a material reconstruction of the Aramaic Ah.ikar Papyrus Scroll from Elephantine (Porten and Yardeni, 1993; Kottsieper, 1991). Stegemann’s reconstruction of the Hodayot, alongside the additional fragments placed by Puech, was published by Eileen Schuller (Schuller et al., 2009). The application of the method took place almost exclusively in the Qumran Institute in Göttingen, and in the hands of Emile Puech at the Ē´cole Biblique in Jerusalem. However, in the past few years it has begun to spread internationally, especially to Helsinki, but also to the United States and recently to Israel. Reconstructions of entire manuscripts by Göttingen scholars are found in Steudel (1994), Vielhauer (2001), Jain (2002, 2014); those by scholars from abroad, who took advice in Göttingen, are Metso (1997), Pajunen (2013), Angel (2015) and Uusimäki (2016). A number of studies have dealt with the use of material reconstruction to solve specific questions (see, e.g. Steudel,1999; Norton, 2003; and Klein, 2014). The method of reconstructing Dead Sea Scrolls manuscripts from scattered fragments is grounded in the fact that they were scrolls, that is, that they were rolled up when the natural process of decay started. The basic principle of the Stegemann method is to find corresponding shapes of fragments and corresponding points of damage. This is based on the insight that those fragments or points of damage within a fragment that look very similar to each other come from successive layers of the former scroll. The distance between corresponding shapes equals the circumference of the original scroll, and the smaller the distance between corresponding traces of damage,
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the closer to the end of the scroll we are. A good example is the progress of distances in which the damage caused by a worm occurs in 11Q5 (11QPsa) between col. 14 and the end of the scroll. Usually, scrolls were stored rolled up correctly with the beginning of the text on the outside. In those cases the distances decrease from the beginning of the text, the right part of the scroll, to the end of the text, the left as, for example, with the imprints of the sewing seams in 11Q19 (11QTa 25, 48, and 66 [→51 Temple Scroll]). Some scrolls had not been rolled back after usage: The beginning of their text is found in the innermost layers, instead of the outermost, of the former scroll. Here we have small distances between corresponding points of damage at the beginning of the text that grow larger the further one moves toward the end of the text. This is the case several times with scrolls from Qumran Cave 1 (see, e.g. 1QM [→40 Milh.amah]; 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; but see also 4Q174 [Florilegium]). The increase or decrease from one layer to the next depends on the thickness of the leather and how tightly a scroll was wrapped. It usually measures about 0.1–0.5 cm, and can vary from one sheet of the scroll to another (Steudel, 1999, on 11Q19). In general, scrolls that are rolled in the wrong direction are more loosely wrapped than those scrolls that are rolled in the right direction. Finally, a few things should be mentioned on the technical process of reconstruction. In order to find corresponding shapes of fragments it is necessary to compare all the fragments of a manuscript with one another and also to check whether there are corresponding points of damage within a fragment (which is the case when a fragment is larger than the circumference of the former scroll at that point). For this purpose one traditionally has to prepare two sets of Xeroxes of all the fragments of a manuscript, to mark the edges of the shapes of the fragments and to mark evidence like top and bottom margins, column dividers, sewing seams, empty spaces in lines, etc. With the help of a strong light (artificial or sunlight through a window) one shifts the photocopies against each other until corresponding traces of decay are found. In addition, the distance of corresponding drylines drawn with ink or a sharp instrument have to correspond to each other if fragments belong to the same sheet of skin. Alternatively, one might use one set of Xeroxes and one set of transparencies; no extra light is needed in this case. Fortunately nowadays these steps of reconstruction can be done with a computer and electronic images, which facilitates a clear presentation of the results (see the presentation of Stegemann’s 1QHa-reconstruction prepared by Ingo Kottsieper in Schuller, Newsom and Stegemann, 2009). Fragments that correspond to each other necessarily have to be arranged on the same horizontal level. It is imperative to check such a reconstruction against the originals in the museum. Frequently many important physical details are not mentioned in the editions and cannot be seen in the photographs; for example, imprints of a fragment or a sewing seam on the back of another fragment. Images of the backs of the fragments such as are available in The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Library Project are extremely helpful for material reconstructions. The thickness and the colour of the leather might indicate that fragments come from the same area of the former scroll, but this is not necessarily so, because the thickness within one sheet can vary. Similarly, the colour of a fragment, especially its darkening, depends also on its history after the scroll has fallen apart. The colours of fragments may have changed after treatment with oil [→15 Scientific Technologies] in the Museum for the
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purposes of preservation (see, e.g. 4Q174 1). Another scenario we have evidence for is fragments having been used by rats to build their nests (Benoit et al., 1961, Plate 2). In the following cases it is worth trying a material reconstruction: a) For the text of a fragmentarily preserved manuscript that is not, or only partly, known through a parallel text; b) When other manuscripts of the text represent versions rather than exact copies of a composition; c) In the case of biblical texts material reconstructions facilitate efforts by scholars to determine the former scope of the manuscript, i.e. to confirm whether a manuscript is a biblical scroll rather than an excerpted text or a scroll containing a biblical text which differs significantly from previously known textual versions; d) It is possible to address specific questions such as whether a certain fragment comes from the end or the beginning of a former scroll; e) The final test, though not the starting point, for any material reconstruction is to see whether the text that results from it makes sense.
Bibliography Abegg, M. G. with J. E. Bowley and E. M. Cook (2003), The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance. Volume One: The Non-Biblical Texts from Qumran. Parts 1 and 2. Leiden: Brill. Abegg, M. G., J. E. Bowley, and E. M. Cook (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance. Volume Three: The Biblical Texts from the Judaean Desert. Parts 1 and 2. Leiden: Brill. Angel, J. (2015), ‘The material reconstruction of 4QS ongs of the Sageb (4Q511),’ RevQ 27, 25–82. Barthélemy, D. and J. T. Milik (eds) (1955), Qumran Cave 1. DJD 1. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Benoit, P., J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux (eds) (1961), Les Grottes de Murabbaʿât: Planches. DJD 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Brooke, G. J. (2010), ‘Aspects of the physical and scribal features of some Cave 4 “Continuous” Pesharim,’ in S. Metso, H. Najman, and E. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts. STDJ 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 133–50. Brooke, G. J. with H. K. Bond (eds) (1996), The Allegro Qumran Photograph Collection: Supplement to The Dead Sea Scrolls on Microfiche. Leiden: Brill. Brizemeure, D., N. Lacoudre, and E. Puech (2006), Le Rouleau de cuivre de la grotte 3 de Qumrân (3Q15): Expertise, restauration, épigraphie. 2 vols. STDJ 55. Leiden: Brill. Cross, F. M., (1998), ‘Palaeography and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. Flint and J. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, pp. 379–402. Jain, E. (2002), ‘Die materielle Rekonstruktion von 1QJ esb (1Q18) und einige bisher nicht edierte Fragmente dieser Handschrift,’ RevQ 20, 389–409. Jain, E. (2014), Psalmen oder Psalter? Materielle Rekonstruktion und inhaltliche Untersuchung der Psalmenhandschriften aus der Wüste Juda. STDJ 109, Leiden: Brill. Klein, A. (2014), ‘Resurrection as reward for the righteous: The Vision of the Dry Bones in Pseudo-Ezekiel as external continuation of the biblical vision in Ezek 37:1–14,’ in
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E. R. Hayes and L.-S. Tiemeyer (eds), ‘I Lifted My Eyes and Saw’: Reading Dream and Vision Reports in the Hebrew Bible. London: T&T Clark, pp. 196–220. Kottsieper, I. (1991), Die Geschichte und die Sprüche des weisen Achiqar, in O. Kaiser et al. (eds), Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments 3.2. Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus, pp. 320–47. Kratz, R. G., A. Steudel, and I. Kottsieper (eds) (2017), Hebräisches und Aramäisches Wörterbuch zun den Texten vom Toten Meer ב–א. HATTM 1. Berlin: De Gruyter. Kuhn, K. G. (ed.) (1958), Rückläufiges Hebräisches Wörterbuch. Unter Mitarbeit von H. Stegmann und G. Klinzing. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Martin, M. (1958), The Scribal Character of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Bibliothèque du Muséon 44–45. Louvain: Publications universitaires. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Norton, J. (2003), ‘Observations on the official material reconstructions of Sefer haMilh.amah (11Q14 and 4Q285),’ RevQ 21, 3–27. Pajunen, M. (2013), The Land to the Elect and Justice for All: Reading Psalms in the Dead Sea Scrolls in Light of 4Q381. JAJS up 14. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Porten, B. and A. Yardeni (1993), Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt. Vol. 3: Literature, Accounts, Lists. Jerusalem: Hebrew University. Sander, R. and K. Mayerhofer (2010), Retrograde Hebrew and Aramaic Dictionary. JAJS up 1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Schuller, E., C. Newsom and H. Stegemann (eds) (2009), Qumran Cave 1.III. 1QHodayota with Incorporation of 1QHodayotb and 4QHodayota-f. DJD 40. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Stegemann, H. (1990), ‘Methods for the reconstruction of scrolls from scattered fragments,’ in L. H. Schiffman (ed.), Archaeology and History in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The New York University Conference in Memory of Yigael Yadin. JSOT /ASOR Monograph Series 2. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 189–220. Steudel, A. (1998), ‘Assembling and reconstructing manuscripts,’ in P. Flint and J. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, I: 516–34. Steudel, A. (1994), Der Midrasch zur Eschatologie aus der Qumrangemeinde (4QMidrEschat a.b). Materielle Rekonstruktion, Textbestand, Gattung und traditionsgeschichtliche Einordnung des durch 4Q174 (‘Florilegium’) und 4Q177 (‘Catena A’) repräsentierten Werkes aus den Qumranfunden. STDJ 13. Leiden: Brill. Steudel, A. (1999), ‘There are no further columns in the Temple Scroll,’ RevQ 19, 131–6. Stoll, D. (1996), ‘Die Schriftrollen vom Toten Meer—mathematisch oder Wie kann man einer Rekonstruktion Gestalt verleihen?,’ in H. J. Fabry, A. Lange, and H. Lichtenberger (eds), Qumranstudien. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 205–21. Strugnell, J. and H. Stegemann (eds) (1988), A Preliminary Concordance to the Hebrew and Aramaic Fragments from Qumran Caves II–X Including Especially the Unpublished Material from Cave IV. Printed from a Card Index prepared by R. E. Brown et al., Prepared and arranged for printing by H.-P. Richter. Vols 1–5. Göttingen: Privately Published. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. and S. Pfann (1993), The Dead Sea Scrolls on Microfiche. Leiden: Brill. Uusimäki, E. (2016), Turning Proverbs Towards Torah: An Analysis of 4Q525. STDJ 117. Leiden: Brill.
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Vielhauer, R. (2001), ‘Materielle Rekonstruktion und historische Einordnung der beiden Pescharim zum Hoseabuch (4QpHos a und 4QpHos b),’ RevQ 20, 39–91. Yardeni, A. (2007), ‘A note on a Qumran scribe,’ in M. Lubetski (ed.), New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean, and Cuneiform. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, pp. 287–98.
17
Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek Holger Gzella
Background and Language Situation The Dead Sea Scrolls as a whole contain, in descending order of frequency, texts in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek and thus form a cornerstone for any assessment of the language situation in Palestine during the Second Temple Period. It is unlikely that the distribution in the corpus faithfully represents the relative prominence of these three idioms in society at large. Nonetheless, the Scrolls show not only that literary production in Hebrew continued after the final redaction of the Book of Daniel (ca. 165 bce [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]), but also that other varieties of Hebrew were current at that time, at least in circles that promoted a religiously motivated nationalism. Some of these varieties seem to anticipate traits of Mishnaic Hebrew and occur in letters and contracts from other places in the Dead Sea region [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. The Aramaic material, again a blend of theological compositions discovered at Qumran [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] and nonliterary sources from adjacent sites, reflects a similar diversity of standard and vernacular features. It indicates that Aramaic was widely known but far from unified in Hellenistic and Roman Palestine. Outside hundreds of funerary inscriptions and some contracts, Greek occurs surprisingly rarely, whereas the absence of Latin from Jewish sources confirms the hypothesis that this idiom, being the language of the Roman administration (at least its inner circles) and the army (as evidenced by the Latin Masada papyri), did not gain ground among the local population. Gzella (2015, pp. 190–3; 221–38; 285–96) gives an assessment of the language situation and the shifts that occurred over time.
Hebrew With numerous fragments (ca. 25 per cent of the texts) of most biblical books excepting Esther [→55 Bible], original compositions whose remains are said to correspond to ca. 11 per cent of the Hebrew Bible in size, and further documentary material from other sites of the Judean Desert, Hebrew is the language of the lion’s share of the Dead Sea Scrolls. According to a rough estimate, the number of different Hebrew Scrolls amounts to about seven-eighths of the total. Most of them were written in the Jewish 192
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alphabet, but some manuscripts in Paleo-Hebrew and other, cryptic, scripts (presumably for esoteric purposes) are also attested [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls; Mystical Texts, Magic and Divination]. Contrary to the Aramaic texts, however, at least a major part of the non-biblical writings unearthed at Qumran proper are generally supposed to have been created by the Qumran community itself; yet the value of the distinction between ‘sectarian’ compositions (e.g. 1QM [→40 Milh.amah] and 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules]), marked off by the use of specific terminology for the community and its enemies, and ‘non-sectarian’ ones remains debated. According to palaeographical and radiocarbon dating, the earliest manuscripts were written around 200 bce and the latest some time before the destruction of the site in 68 ce [→15 Scientific Technologies], but the moment of composition of a text may antedate an individual copy. The importance of this material for filling in gaps in the previous knowledge of how the language evolved during the Second Temple Period has been recognized soon after its discovery. Previous research had to concentrate on Biblical Hebrew in its Tiberian garb, rabbinic Hebrew, and, to a lesser extent, variant traditions of Hebrew as reflected in early transcriptions and other vocalization systems. Growing attention to different developmental stages (Early Poetry, Classical pre-Exilic prose, Late or post-Exilic Biblical Hebrew), regional dialects (‘Northern/Israelian Hebrew’ vs standard ‘Southern/ Judaean’), and register-based variation could fine-tune the picture in the meantime (Gzella, 2017b). Epigraphy and Comparative Semitics also contribute to a partial reconstruction of pre-Tiberian Hebrew (Gzella, 2011c). Yet the place of the Dead Sea discoveries within a more rigorous diachronic framework of the language still has to be determined in light of advances in historical and contact linguistics. Even the non-biblical texts exhibit such a considerable amount of diversity among themselves that the generic concept ‘Qumran Hebrew’ cannot meaningfully refer to any unified linguistic stage. Attempts to imitate biblical literary prose, embryonic stages of later developments, and parallels in other varieties of Hebrew, especially the Samaritan reading tradition (Ben-H·ayyim, 1958), add up to a rather complex picture that defies an explanation in linear chronological terms. For the time being, Qimron (1986) can serve as a compact synchronic description of the grammatical facts but should be supplemented by Fassberg (2013); the lexicon features in some modern dictionaries of Biblical Hebrew, most significant words receive an indepth treatment in Fabry and Dahmen (2011–16), and a complete philological dictionary is currently being prepared by Kratz, Steudel, and Kottsieper (2017–). Nebe (2004) has a useful survey of the status quaestionis. The most obvious linguistic peculiarities reflected in this corpus concern a formerly unknown amount of the, nonetheless somewhat inconsistent, use of vowel letters for rendering vocalic phonemes (at times even two in a row, as in kyʾ/kī/ ‘that,’ presumably on analogy with older historical spellings like bry’ ‘fat’ or nbyʾ ‘prophet,’ where an original word-final glottal stop has disappeared in pronunciation), including some instances of short /u,o/ and /i/; phonetic (e.g. zwt ‘this;’ rwš ‘head’) or hybrid etymological and phonetic spellings (zʾwt/zwʾt; rʾwš/rwʾš); an increasing reduction of laryngeals and pharyngeals, as shown by interchanges of the letters {ʾ}, {h}, {h.}, and {ʿ} or their absence in spelling (e.g. wʾth ‘and now’; wyś h ‘and he shall do’); the frequent occurrence of what seem to be pausal ‘imperfect’ forms in context such as ysgwdw ‘they
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bow down’ as opposed to Tiberian ysgdw, vocalized yisgd- ū (alternatively, the {w} could simply represent a reflex of the short /o/ still preserved in pre-Tiberian ancestor forms before its loss in an open syllable, i.e. /yasgodū/ > /yisgodū/ > yisgd- ū, but the much higher frequency of such spellings than for other instances of short /o/ might point to a long /ō/ that was lengthened under the stress); longer variants expanded by /-ā/ of certain personal pronouns (3m.sg. hwʾh, 3f.sg. hyʾh, 2m.pl. ʾtmh) and pronominal suffixes (2m.pl. -kmh; 3pl. -(h)mh after /e/ and /a/ vowels; 2m. pl. ‘perfect’ afformative -tmh), most of them unattested in the Masoretic Text; cohortative endings in the ‘imperfect consecutive’; and various lexical loans as well as other, at times debatable, influences from Aramaic, some of which occur already in Late Biblical Hebrew, including semantic shifts like the passive participle rʾwy ‘worthy’ from rʾī ‘to see’ after Aramaic h.zh from the root h.zī with a similar meaning. A few Aramaisms occur as occasional by-forms: e.g. the third-person suffix -why ‘his’ attached to a plural base instead of -yhw (generally -yw in the Masoretic Text) or the shift of intervocalic /y/ to /ʾ/; perhaps also the masculine plural unbound ending -yn, as often in Mishnaic Hebrew, instead of usual -ym, which may nonetheless mirror an internal development rather than a borrowing (i.e. nasalization of the final long vowel), and 2f. sg. forms in -y, both of which have rare parallels in the Masoretic Text. Some distinctive features of Classical Hebrew prose style, on the other hand, like the ‘imperfect consecutive’ for past-tense narration and the relative particle ʾšr, continued to be used in several literary compositions among the Scrolls but have disappeared in the Mishna. Yet the occasional use of non-consecutive forms and the appearance of the ‘long imperfect’ instead of the ‘short’ one betrays a gradual breakdown of the Classical Hebrew verbal system, and the participle was much advanced on its way to becoming a present-tense form. The language of the Hebrew Qumran texts has thus been characterized as essentially a classicizing idiom patterned after Late Biblical Hebrew but, due to imperfect learning, affected by vernacular forms also current in Palestine toward the end of the Second Temple Period (Kutscher, 1974 [1959]; Blau, 2000). This view chiefly rests on 1QI saa [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], 1QpHab [→44 Pesharim], and 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], published in 1950 and 1951, but has gained much ground in later scholarship. Others attach greater weight to the non-classical features for determining the Scrolls’ proper linguistic profile and conclude that they altogether reflect a different, previously unknown, dialect of Hebrew (e.g. Ben-H·ayyim, 1958; Qimron, 1986). The higher presence of allegedly later hallmarks in the Copper Scroll (3Q15 [→34 Copper Scroll]) and Hebrew documentary texts from Wadi Murabbaʿāt composed during the two Jewish revolts against Rome, letters sent from Bar Kosiba and his associates as well as some contracts, further complicated the situation when they were published in the 1960s. These hallmarks include the relative marker š-, the unbound masculine plural ending -n, and the absence of the ‘consecutive’ conjugations. 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah], finally, whose official edition appeared in 1994, seems to fall into yet another category, because it betrays certain affinities with both (Late) Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew. Hence, one can distinguish between a language form basically resembling Biblical Hebrew with some non-standard elements, which underlies most Scrolls, and varieties closer to Mishnaic Hebrew, as in 3Q15, 4QMMT,
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and the texts from Wadi Murabbaʿāt (Morag, 1988; Nebe, 2004, pp. 531–47). The difficult, unprovenanced, ‘Hazon Gabriel’ inscription, which, if authentic, may come from the same period and region, has yet another distribution of linguistic features. However, it would be naïve, and at odds with the remaining evidence on the language situation, to attribute all non-standard traits in this material indiscriminately to the impact of a Hebrew vernacular that continued to be spoken in every-day life and eventually evolved into Mishnaic Hebrew. One may rather imagine that competing pronunciation traditions coexisted and that several technical registers of Hebrew were used predominantly in oral discourse on exegetical, legal and other specialized matters, without there necessarily being ‘native speakers’ of Hebrew at that time. (Even today, Latin, Ancient Greek, Sanskrit and Classical Syriac are all spoken by small groups of enthusiasts, though presumably none of them natively.) Adherents of religiously motivated nationalism like Bar Kosiba and his followers purposefully, and perhaps exceptionally (Beyer, 2004, p. 201), employed such a non-standard variant in writing. At any rate, certain function words and syntactic use patterns that, according to widespread principles of contact linguistics, belong to the pragmatically dominant language, derive from Aramaic (Gzella, 2007b). The weakening of gutturals and the extension of pausal forms to context articulation can also be explained as substrate pronunciation of speakers of regional Aramaic varieties. Likewise, it is possible that the disappearance of short unstressed vowels in open syllables so characteristic of Aramaic, where it was completed in the third century ce , had already begun. Untypical spellings like yqw·tlnw, alternating with yq·twlnw, could thus easily echo the metathesis of an erstwhile full vowel that was on its way to becoming a non-systemic helping vowel merely facilitating pronunciation (i.e. /yiqot·elénnū/, from older /yiqt·olénnū/; a vowel preceding the stress can easily disappear), although such quasi-auxiliary vowels rarely surface in writing and seem to have parallels in other reflexes of the ‘imperfect’ base as q·twl- and qw·tl- in suffixed forms. The relative marker š-, by contrast, may be an archaic trait eclipsed by ʾšr in Classical Hebrew but surviving beneath the surface in other registers: it occurs already in Judg. 5.7, arguably one of the oldest passages of the Hebrew Bible, and has close parallels in other Canaanite languages; its growing frequency in post-Exilic times could also result from a replication of the Aramaic equivalent d(y)-, yet with native morphological matter. Evidence for the personal pronouns is similarly inconclusive as far as an allegedly widespread use of Hebrew as a spoken language is concerned. A second-person masculine plural ʾtmh besides usual ʾtm seems to have been patterned after the corresponding feminine ʾtnh. The consistent spelling of the third-person masculine singular suffix as -hw when attached to a base ending in a long vowel even in biblical manuscripts (e.g. ʾbyhw ‘his father’ instead of Tiberian ʾbyw with loss of intervocalic /h/) can also be seen as an analogical extension of a variant form (cf. pyhw ‘his mouth’ besides pyw in the Masoretic Text). Despite parallels in the Samaritan reading tradition, these features do not necessarily derive from a vernacular, but could result from an older variant pronunciation or parallel development due to analogy. As Samaritan and Qumran Hebrew are both rooted in a matrix of older Palestinian traditions, no synchronic dialectal unity between them can be established. Similar considerations might apply to the peculiar third-person singular by-forms hwʾh (masc.) and hyʾh (fem.) besides the
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slightly more frequent standard variants hwʾ and hyʾ. Because of the striking similarity to their older West Semitic counterparts */hu’a/ or */huwa/ and */hi’a/ or */hiya/ (compare Ugaritic and Arabic), it is in theory possible to explain them as archaisms that survived in an otherwise unknown sub-standard variety of Hebrew or perhaps even as traces of an older oblique pronoun */huwat-/ (with */-at/ becoming /-ā/, as in the feminine ending). This similarity may be purely coincidental, however: again, the additional /-ā/ could easily result from paradigm pressure triggered by the very many second-person masculine singular and plural and third-person masculine and feminine plural pronouns and suffixes ending in /-ā/ in Hebrew, just as the singular and plural first-person pronouns in Aramaic, which may have reinforced the levelling process, as bilingualism leads to the reduction of internal variation in high-frequency forms. The emergence of likewise non-etymological by-forms of certain adverbs like mʾwdh/mwʾdh ‘much’ (presumably secondary and not an old adverbial accusative) and the ‘pseudo-cohortatives’ also point to a more general stylistic preference for lengthened variants. The oscillation in the reflexes of old */qut·l/ nouns (qw·tl in the st.abs. and cstr. vis-à-vis q·twl and qw·twl, which only occur in the st.cstr.) has not yet been explained satisfactorily. As for the verbal system, neither Aramaic nor, presumably, other varieties of Hebrew systematically developed consecutive verbal forms as formal (Judean) Hebrew prose did. Their erosion may also partly underlie a growing tendency from VS to SV word order. Conversely, the increasing verbalization of the participle, which was already further advanced in Aramaic, could indicate that an existing, though marginal, use pattern in Hebrew was expanded under the influence of language contact (Gzella, 2007a). This is how convergence through pattern replication normally works. PostExilic stages of Hebrew thus seem to have been shaped by a complex interplay of internal developments, the growing impact of formerly non-literary dialects (that continued to be used in oral religious discourse) on written forms of the language, and an increasing influence of Aramaic.
Aramaic About 120 to 130 literary texts written in Aramaic feature among the Qumran Scrolls. It is usually assumed that they originate from elsewhere and thus represent a broader production of religious literature in Post-Achaemenid Palestine and perhaps in the Diaspora as well. They were imported because they match the community’s interests in scriptural exegesis [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation] and in visions about the end of time [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The surviving manuscripts are dated between the second century bce and 70 ce on grounds of palaeography; at least several of the actual texts may have been composed significantly earlier, although this is difficult to ascertain because of the non-linear development of the language and the amount of linguistic variation in the material (Gzella, 2009). Some alleged archaisms might thus only be veneer. Like other forms of Aramaic from the Roman Near East chiefly attested in hundreds of honorific, dedicatory and funerary inscriptions (Gzella, 2006, 2015, pp. 212–80), they witness to the interaction of Official Aramaic and its
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literary tradition, the chancery idiom of the Achaemenid Empire to which Palestine belonged (Gzella, 2011a, 2015, pp. 157–211), with partly older regional dialects of Aramaic. The latter were eclipsed by the Achaemenid standard language in an earlier period but subsequently turned into new written varieties (Gzella, 2011b, 2015, pp. 212–21). Aramaic was increasingly used for commercial and administrative purposes in the Near East from the eighth century bce on, had grown roots in Judaea even before the advent of the Persians (its spread as a vernacular was presumably accelerated by demographic changes that had taken place in the Babylonian period), and gradually became the dominant medium of communication in daily life in Syria Palestina during the latter half of the first millennium bce (Gzella, 2017a). ‘Qumran Aramaic,’ better termed ‘Hasmonean’ (Beyer, 1984–2004) or ‘Standard Jewish Literary Aramaic’ (Fassberg, 2010), since, whatever its original distribution may have been, it did not emerge at Qumran, considerably enriches this body of evidence. Compared to Official Aramaic, it is less conservative than Nabatean, which was used throughout the northern part of the Arabian Peninsula (and is also attested in a number of contracts, dating from 60–122 ce , discovered in caves near the Dead Sea), but not as innovative as some idioms from Eastern Syria and Mesopotamia like Edessan (the direct forerunner of Classical Syriac) and Hatran Aramaic. An unsystematic mixture of enduring Official Aramaic heritage, subsequent developments and regional features of an older Judean dialect that may antedate the Persian administration in Palestine, determines the transitory character of this material between the Achaemenid standard language and later Palestinian Aramaic. The Aramaic of Ezra and Daniel is also part of this ongoing evolution of a local literary language (Gzella, 2017c). As the Aramaic varieties of the Near East formed a continuum of dialects connected along the axes of international trade, innovations, just like themes and literary conventions, could spread quickly from centre to periphery. The Qumran texts and other corpora from Palestine thus replicate several common post-Achaemenid developments of Aramaic in phonology, morphology and syntax, such as resolution of word-final consonant clusters, monophthongization of diphthongs, simplification of word-final long consonants, gradual weakening of gutturals in pronunciation, loss of the internal passive (except for the participle), and full integration of the participle into the verbal system, which then reduced the functional range of the ‘imperfect.’ Beyer (1984–2004) has a comprehensive treatment of phonology, morphology and lexicon yet unsurpassed in its historical-comparative depth; Muraoka (2011) provides a synchronic description; many Aramaic lexemes are also included in Fabry and Dahmen (2011–16), with a focus on the Qumran corpus, and in Gzella (2016), against their wider background in the Aramaic scribal tradition. The Göttingen dictionary (Kratz, Steudel, and Kottsieper, 2017–) will include complete basic philological evidence. Owing to the heterogeneous origin of the texts, the distribution of these features (cf. Gzella, 2011b, pp. 599–600) varies in the individual manuscripts, and sometimes even between different manuscripts of the same text. Sub-standard phenomena include the pronouns dn ‘this one’ (masc.), ʾl(y)n or hlyn ‘these’, and ʾnwn ‘they’ (masc.) instead of their standard counterparts dnh, ʾlh, and hmwn; the rare third masculine singular suffix -wy instead of -why on plural nouns; a few infinitives of the D and C stems with an m-prefix besides the usual forms; and the reappearance of the ancient Western
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Aramaic object marker yt. Orthography, by contrast, could more easily change in the process of copying. Besides the growing use of vowel letters, the spelling of the relative particle oscillates between more traditional dy and later d, with some instances of archaic zy and, likewise, the masc. sg. demonstrative pronoun znh with historical orthography {z} for /d/ < */ð/ in some high-frequency forms; etymological /n/ which would be expected to assimilate in pronunciation is, by and large, less frequently represented in writing than in Official Aramaic, as is the etymological /h/ in certain forms of the C-stem (i.e. the peculiar historical spelling characteristic of Official Aramaic gave way to a phonetic one); and the increasing merger of etymological */ś/ with */s/ led to inconsistencies in the distribution of the graphemes {š} and {s}. The almost consistent use of the preformative l- instead of y- for the 3masc. sg. and, by way of analogy, masc. and fem. pl. of the root hwī ‘to be’ already occurs in Biblical Aramaic and presumably results from disambiguation with the tetragrammaton in earlier forms of Jewish Aramaic. Most of these traits have parallels in contemporaneous varieties of Aramaic. The distinctive hallmarks of Aramaic texts from Qumran, however, consist in the new masculine singular demonstrative dn ‘this one’ (either a by-form of older */ðenā/ > /denā/ or, less plausibly, a defective writing), the pervasive spelling of the secondperson masculine singular suffix -kh instead of rare -k (perhaps a Hebrew influence in orthography) and the still productive ‘short imperfect’ for deontic modality, together with ʾl in vetitive utterances, which had otherwise disappeared in Aramaic by then. However, besides some spellings like the third-person singular independent pronouns hwʾ and hyʾ instead of Old Aramaic hʾ or Official Aramaic hw and hy, the masculine absolute plural ending -ym, and perhaps t-stem forms with initial /h-/, Hebraisms generally are confined to lexical loans, mostly in the area of religious terminology (Stadel, 2008). 4Q339 1 (List of False Prophets ar) even features a brief list of Hebrew names and titles after an Aramaic heading, but patronyms and epithets may have been conceived as parts of a proper name. After the end of the Hasmonean dynasty in 37 bce , Greek was promoted to the official idiom excepting local law, and the spoken Judean Aramaic increasingly replaced the Official Aramaic layer (Beyer, 1984, pp. 34–5; Gzella, 2015, pp. 226–38). Apart from some loanwords, especially in the documentary texts, Greek influence on Aramaic is nonetheless hard to pinpoint. This development also emerges from the wider Palestinian historical-linguistic context of the Aramaic attested by the Qumran corpus (Yardeni, 2000; Yadin et al., 2002; Beyer, 1984–2004). Several earlier texts among the first- and second-century ce legal documents from the Dead Sea region seem particularly close to Official Aramaic (including archaizing spellings like z instead of then usual d for /d/ < */ð/, only rarely surviving in Qumran Aramaic) and continue its legal tradition. Yet later contracts like XH·ev/Se 8a and 50 [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview] exhibit an increasing use of the object marker yt, a growing tendency to replace the ‘short imperfect’ by the ‘long’ one, and the frequent occurrence of the vowel letter h for the ‘emphatic state’ /-ā/ instead of the older, historical, spelling with ʾ. Such features also occur in the brief inscriptions from Jerusalem and its surroundings (generally post-dating 37 bce ) as well as in the few Aramaic letters from Bar Kosiba and his subordinates during the Second Jewish Revolt. Their linguistic garb, often
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subsumed to the generic term ‘Judean Aramaic,’ continues into later Jewish Palestinian Aramaic compositions, after it had advanced to a more widely-used code following the consolidation of rabbinic textual scholarship, and also surfaces in the few words and phrases in Greek transcription in Josephus and the New Testament. The Aramaic Qumran Scrolls thus mirror a rather dynamic situation in which the use of a local variety gradually came to dominate the textual record at the expense of an older literary standard idiom, which was nonetheless preserved as an inherited layer in later compositions like the Targumim. That mixture resulted in the evolution of a new Jewish Aramaic literary language (Fassberg, 2010, pp. 76–8; Gzella, 2015, pp. 296–310).
Greek About 3 per cent of the Qumran Scrolls are written in Greek and contain texts from Hebrew Scriptures, especially the Pentateuch, that generally seem to correspond to the Septuagint tradition (Tov, 2001; cf. Fabry, 2001[→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]). The same applies to the revised, more literal, translation of the Minor Prophets from Nah.al H·ever Cave 8. However, the exact textual type of a scriptural passage is often difficult to identify in light of the fragmentary evidence. Additionally, 4Q350 refers to a Greek account written on the verso of 4Q460 (Narrative Work and Prayer) 9, yet its connection with Qumran remains a matter of debate (Cotton and Larson, 2003). The language of all these witnesses reflects the Greek koiné, based on a de-regionalized form of Attic, which gradually absorbed and replaced the local dialects from the fourth century bce on. Willi (2011) provides an up-to-date sketch with extensive bibliography. At least some knowledge of Greek must have been reasonably widespread in many areas of Roman Palestine, especially in urban centres, or among particular groups: the koiné was not only a prestige language for those with affinity for Hellenistic culture throughout the Roman Near East, but also the idiom of daily life of all sorts of immigrants from the Mediterranean Diaspora. Indeed, the social and intellectual connections between Alexandrian and Palestinian Judaism should not be underestimated [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. Specifically the Septuagint, part of which may have been translated or revised in Palestine, could serve as a bridge connecting both worlds. In accordance with Roman bureaucratic practice in the Near East, Greek was also established as the official language when the Herodian dynasty rose to power in 37 bce . Hundreds of funerary inscriptions throughout Palestine on the one hand (Cotton et al., 2010–; van der Horst, 2001) and more than twenty documentary texts from Masada, Wadi Murabbaʿāt, Nah.al H·ever, Nah.al S.eʾelim, Nah.al Mishmar and Ketef Jerih.o on the other (Cotton, 1999) illustrate the different uses of Greek among Jews during the period in question. Although they point to varying levels of proficiency, are not necessarily representative of the population as a whole (given the relative paucity of Greek inscriptions from Upper Galilee), and only contain at best indirect information on the medium of day-to-day communication, Greek is the language of about or even more than half of these witnesses. In addition, rabbinic Hebrew and later Jewish forms of Aramaic contain, especially in passages about non-Jewish life, a number of Greek
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lexical borrowings pertaining to administration and law (Krauss, 1898; Sperber, 1984). Merely tiny fragments of what appear to be Greek literary texts have been discovered in the Judean Desert, but a few metrical funerary inscriptions from Palestine follow Hellenistic poetic conventions, including certain traditional topoi. The coexistence of Greek, Aramaic, and sometimes Hebrew within the family archives of Babatha and Salome Komaïse as well as among the Bar Kosiba letters shows that the very same parts of Jewish society could produce texts in these three distinct idioms, even if the reasons differ. Greek may have been the preferred option for ensuring the legal acceptability of documents in provincial courts (as opposed to forms of Jewish jurisdiction to which rabbinic sources allude). Yet especially the numerous Aramaisms as well as Aramaic signatures and subscriptions in the Greek documentary texts from Jewish collections (Lewis, 1989, pp. 13–16) suggest that the language of the inherited legal tradition and the idiom preferred by witnesses was Aramaic. As a Greek Bar Kosiba letter carelessly written by an unskilled hand might indicate, Greek could also serve as a fallback when no scribe who could write Aramaic or Hebrew was available (Papyrus Yadin 52; Gzella, 2007b, p. 106). Evidence for this practice is, however, extremely scarce. The surprising lack of Greek loanwords and other obvious traces of linguistic impact on the Hebrew and Aramaic texts from Qumran is thus often attributed to a deliberate avoidance of such foreign features. Attempts to ‘downgrade’ Greek influence can be observed in other parts of the Roman Near East as well; they replicate a more widespread form of resistance to Hellenistic civilization and the assertion of a new cultural self-awareness (Gzella, 2006; 2015, pp. 212–80). Yet not all instances of the use of Greek are ideologically laden, as its occurrence in documents pertaining to the nationalist followers of Bar Kosiba shows. Knowledge of an idiom does not necessarily imply sympathy for it, and a couple of written words in a language on a tombstone do not reveal any advanced active command of it. Even if more than half of the Jewish funerary inscriptions from Palestine are in Greek, they would usually have been executed by professional masons and therefore cannot act as proof for the widespread hypothesis that the persons to whom they refer could actually express themselves adequately in Greek. Especially mere names written in Greek, which constitute the major part of the evidence, may simply betray the attempt of lower social strata to imitate certain cultural codes.
Conclusion Bilingualism is a complex phenomenon, since people often use different languages complementarily for different purposes or in different communicative situations. The topic of an utterance itself may trigger a shift (Grosjean, 2010, pp. 51–62). Hence, the actual distribution of Aramaic, Greek and Hebrew in Hellenistic and Roman Palestine across regions, social strata and domains of life remains a mystery. In a scribal milieu like Qumran [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls], a better knowledge of these languages would be of little surprise. Yet it is impossible to say to what extent this multilingualism surfaced in daily life [→73 Daily Life], and which part of the population consisted of true Aramaic-Greek bilinguals, let alone Aramaic-Hebrew-Greek trilinguals, who
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could effortlessly switch between these different idioms independent of the speech situation. The quantitative majority of Greek texts belong to the specialized genre of funerary inscriptions with often little content or, in the case of legal documents, may result from practical reasons. The Aramaic material, by contrast, represents a much broader selection of literary compositions, inscriptions, contracts and letters; additionally, the Aramaic texts from Qumran appear to originate from different places and exhibit much linguistic variation. Due to its religious prestige, Hebrew, finally, was employed for theological and liturgical works in scribal circles, presumably for (oral) legal and exegetical discussions, and for a few every-day purposes among nationalists, but its distribution outside such small groups is hard to assess due to the lack of information. Its active use may thus have been a statement (Weitzman, 1999). Judging from the high statistical relevance of this diversity, then, it seems most likely that the pragmatically dominant language of most Jews in Hellenistic and Roman Palestine was Aramaic. There is no hard evidence that people grew up speaking Hebrew at that time anymore. As a literary language, Hebrew was more strongly associated with the indigenous scriptural, legal and liturgical traditions of Israel, whereas Aramaic had the allure of a supra-regional means of administration and written communication.
Bibliography Ben-H·ayyim, Z. (1958), ‘Traditions in the Hebrew language, with special reference to the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ Scripta Hierosolymitana, 4, 200–14. Beyer, K. (1984–2004), Die aramäischen Texte vom Toten Meer. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Blau, J. (2000), ‘A conservative view of the language of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. Muraoka and J. F. Elwolde (eds), Diggers at the Well: Proceedings of a Third International Symposium on the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Ben Sira. Leiden: Brill, pp. 20–5. Cotton, H. M. (1999), ‘The languages of the legal and administrative documents from the Judaean Desert,’ Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, 125, 219–31. Cotton, H. M. and Larson, E. (2003), ‘4Q360/4Q350 and tampering with Qumran texts in Antiquity?,’ in S. M. Paul et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. Leiden: Brill, pp. 113–25. Cotton, H. M. et al. (eds, 2010–), Corpus Inscriptionum Iudaeae/Palaestinae. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. Fabry, H.–J. (2001), ‘Die griechischen Handschriften vom Toten Meer,’ in H.–J. Fabry and U. Offerhaus (eds), Im Brennpunkt: Die Septuaginta. Studien zur Entstehung und Bedeutung der Griechischen Bibel. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, pp. 131–53. Fabry, H.–J. and Dahmen, U. (eds, 2011–16), Theologisches Wörterbuch zu den Qumrantexten. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Fassberg, S. E. (2010), ‘Salient features of the verbal system in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in K. Berthelot and D. Stökl Ben Ezra (eds), Aramaica Qumranica: Proceedings of the Conference on the Aramaic Texts from Qumran in Aix-en-Provence 30 June–2 July 2008. Leiden: Brill, pp. 65–78. Fassberg, S. E. (2013), ‘Dead Sea Scrolls: Linguistic features,’ in G. Khan et al. (eds), Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics. Leiden: Brill, I: 663–9.
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Grosjean, F. (2010), Bilingual: Life and Reality. Cambridge MA : Harvard University Press. Gzella, H. (2006), ‘Das Aramäische in den römischen Ostprovinzen: Sprachsituationen in Arabien, Syrien und Mesopotamien zur Kaiserzeit,’ Bibliotheca Orientalis 63, 15–39. Gzella, H. (2007a), ‘The use of the participle in the Hebrew Bar Kosiba letters in the light of Aramaic,’ DSD, 14, 90–8. Gzella, H. (2007b), ‘Elemente systemischen Sprachkontaktes in den hebräischen BarKosiba-Briefen,’ in J. Luchsinger, H.–P. Mathys and M. Saur (eds), “. . . der seine Lust hat am Wort des Herrn!” Festschrift für Ernst Jenni zum 80. Geburtstag. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag, pp. 93–107. Gzella, H. (2009), ‘Dating the Aramaic texts from Qumran: Possibilities and limits’. RevQ 24, 61–78. Gzella, H. (2011a), ‘Imperial Aramaic,’ in S. Weninger et al. (eds), The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 574–86. Gzella, H. (2011b), ‘Late Imperial Aramaic,’ in S. Weninger et al. (eds), The Semitic Languages: An International Handbook. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 598–609. Gzella, H. (2011c), ‘Ancient Hebrew,’ in H. Gzella (ed.), Languages from the World of the Bible. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, pp. 76–110. Gzella, H. (2015), A Cultural History of Aramaic: From the Beginnings to the Advent of Islam. Leiden: Brill. Gzella, H. (ed.) (2016), Aramäisches Wörterbuch. Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Alten Testament, vol. 9. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer (Eng. edition, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2018). Gzella, H. (2017a), ‘Verbreitung, Entwicklung und Gebrauch aramäischer Dialekte in Palästina in der ersten Hälfte des 1. Jahrtausends v.Chr.,’ U. Hübner and H. Niehr (eds), Sprachen Palästinas im 2. und 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr.: Kolloquium des Deutschen Vereins zur Erforschung Palästinas, 02.–04.11.2012, Mainz. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, pp. 231–64. Gzella, H. (2017b), ‘Das Hebräische als Sprache Israels und Judas,’ U. Hübner and H. Niehr (eds), Sprachen Palästinas im 2. und 1. Jahrtausend v. Chr.: Kolloquium des Deutschen Vereins zur Erforschung Palästinas, 02.–04.11.2012, Mainz. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, pp. 265–99. Gzella, H. (2017c), ‘Von der Kanzlei- zur Kultursprache. Die Anfänge der aramäischen Weltliteratur,’ ThQ 197, 107–32. Horst, P. van der (2001), ‘Greek in Jewish Palestine in the light of Jewish epigraphy,’ in J. J. Collins and G. E. Sterling (eds), Hellenism in the Land of Israel. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, pp. 154–74. Kratz, R. G., A. Steudel, and I. Kottsieper (eds, 2017), Hebräisches und Aramäisches Wörterbuch zu den Texten vom Toten Meer א–ב. HATTM 1. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. Krauss, S. (1898), Griechische und lateinische Lehnwörter im Talmud, Midrasch und Targum. Berlin: Calvary (reprint Hildesheim 1987: Olms). Kutscher, E. Y. (1974), The Language and Linguistic Background of the Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa). Leiden: Brill (originally published in Hebrew in 1959). Lewis, N. (1989), The Documents from the Bar-Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters: Greek Papyri. Jerusalem: IES . Morag, S. (1988), ‘Qumran Hebrew: Some typological observations,’ Vetus Testamentum, 38, 148–64. Muraoka, T. (2011), A Grammar of Qumran Aramaic. Louvain: Peeters.
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Nebe, G. W. (2004), ‘Zu Stand und Aufgaben der philologischen Arbeit an den hebräischen Handschriften vom Toten Meer,’ in A. Drost-Abgarjan and J. Tubach (eds), Sprache, Mythen, Mythizismen: Festschrift für Walter Beltz zum 65. Geburtstag am 25. April 2000. Halle: Institut für Orientalistik, pp. 519–82. Qimron, E. (1986), The Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Sperber, D. (1984), A Dictionary of Greek and Latin Legal Terms in Rabbinic Literature. Jerusalem: Bar-Ilan University Press. Stadel, Chr. (2008), Hebraismen in den aramäischen Texten vom Toten Meer. Heidelberg: Winter. Tov, E. (2001), ‘The nature of the Greek texts from the Judean Desert,’ Novum Testamentum, 43, 1–11. Weitzman, S. (1999), ‘Why did the Qumran community write in Hebrew?,’ Journal of the American Oriental Society, 119, 35–45. Willi, A. (2011), ‘Greek,’ in H. Gzella (ed.), Languages from the World of the Bible. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter, pp. 209–41. Yadin, Y. et al. (2002), The Documents from the Bar-Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters. Jerusalem: IES . Yardeni, A. (2000), Textbook of Aramaic, Hebrew and Nabataean Documentary Texts from the Judaean Desert and Related Material. Jerusalem: IES .
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Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies Reinhard G. Kratz
Introduction The following offers methodological reflections on the relationship between biblical scholarship and Qumran studies. In particular, we will address the question whether critical methods developed ca. 250 years ago in biblical scholarship and practiced to this day can fruitfully be applied to the texts found at Qumran. Beyond purely methodological concerns we will ask whether the results of modern biblical criticism are able to shed fresh light on the Scrolls and to what extent the new material unearthed at Qumran can enrich the field of biblical studies. The critical study of the Hebrew Bible draws on a well-established canon of exegetical methods. These include the study of the transmission of the biblical text (textual criticism or Textkritik), the compositional and redactional history of individual compositions (literary and redaction criticism or Literar- and Redaktionskritik), the oral pre-history and constituent traditions of the texts as we have them (Überlieferungsand Traditionskritik), the texts’ linguistic features and literary genre(s) (form criticism or Formkritik) as well as the historical context behind their formation (Steck, 1998; Becker, 2011). As far as the application of these methods to the Dead Sea Scrolls is concerned textual criticism (Tov, 2012) and the historical (perhaps even historicist) interpretation (Stegemann, 1971) have been particularly prominent [→20 Historiography]. By contrast, an earlier wave of interest in the compositional and redactional history of selected Scrolls (Davies, 1983, 1992; Metso, 1997; Hempel, 1998; 2006) has recently declined (Schofield 2008; 2009). In analogy with current research in biblical studies Qumran studies has witnessed a growing interest in the application of new methods such as rhetorical criticism, anthropological and sociological approaches, and new historicism [→21 Social Scientific Approaches; 22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies]. The latter are often presented as alternatives to classical biblical criticism. By contrast, both traditional and newer methods are complementary rather than mutually exclusive. With the exception of textual criticism, the results of critical biblical scholarship have played a relatively minor role in Qumran scholarship. The composition history of individual biblical books is often ignored since this process was largely complete by the time of the Scrolls. Consequently, the Bible [→55 Bible] is frequently presupposed to 204
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be a fixed entity and studied exclusively as the object of biblical reception history. Too little attention is paid to the fact that biblical reception history begins already within the biblical texts themselves. The complex development of a biblical text from its earliest beginnings to the final form is best understood as a dynamic process of reception and (so to speak inner-biblical) interpretation (Kratz, 2006, pp. 126–56 [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]). The understanding of the dynamics behind the biblical tradition just outlined invites the question how such a process can be related to the reception and (extra-biblical) interpretation of the biblical texts in the Dead Sea Scrolls. This question will inform the remainder of our investigation of the relevance of the methods and results developed in biblical scholarship to the study of the Scrolls.
The Biblical Text As noted above, the relationship between biblical scholarship and Qumran studies is closest in the field of textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible. In this area the Scrolls have enlarged our knowledge enormously (Tov, 2012, pp, 93–111 and passim). Various hypotheses on the history of the biblical text previously based on the Masoretic Text, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the Versions (especially the Septuagint) could now be confirmed, falsified or modified on the basis of a wealth of new material. New insights gained in matters of scribal praxis [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls], morphology [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], and the classification of the textual tradition (in terms of stemmata) further enriched our understanding. The text-critical tools developed on the basis of the Masoretic Text and the Versions could be applied also to the new material. The methodological repertoire of textual criticism proved fruitful not only for the now enlarged corpus of biblical manuscripts but can also be applied to non-biblical texts (both sectarian and non-sectarian) that are preserved in multiple copies. The manuscripts of the Community Rule (Serekh haYahad), for instance, attest many significant variants [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules]. Scribal errors, corrections as well as orthographical, morphological and semantic variants can frequently be observed between different manuscripts and at times even within one and the same manuscript. Of particular interest are cases where questions of a text-critical nature intersect with the history of composition of a text (Tov, 2012, pp. 283–326). One such case is the well-known plus in 1 Sam. 11 found in 4QS ama X 6–19 (Cross, 1983; with new but erroneous readings Cross et al., 2005, pp. 65–7 [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]). Immediately before the beginning of 1 Sam. (10.27b and) 11.1 this manuscript records an initial campaign by King Nahash prior to his attack against Jabesh Gilead. In the course of this campaign against the Gadites and Reubenites he gouges their right eyes out, a fate he would threaten the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead with subsequently. This episode was already known from Josephus (Antiquities 6.5.1 §§ 68–70 [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]) prior to the discovery of 4QS ama. The Qumran manuscript confirmed that Josephus’ account is based on a Hebrew original. Scholars disagree whether the evidence is best accounted for with a text-critical or a literary-critical explanation. Many argue for the priority of the longer text of 4QS ama
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and suppose a mechanical scribal error behind the shorter text (Cross, 1983; Cross et al., 2005, p. 66; similarly Lange, 2009, pp. 219–20; Tov, 2012, pp. 311–13). However, this hypothesis is unlikely since it presupposes an original text that has not survived in any of our preserved witnesses. A textual omission cannot be proven on such a basis. On the other hand, there is a great deal of evidence supporting the alternative explanation that the plus in 4QS ama is best explained in literary-critical and redactioncritical terms as a secondary addition (Rofé, 1982; Kallai, 1996). The addition begins in 1 Sam. 11.1 with an introduction typical of the books of Samuel introducing ‘Nahash the king of the Ammonites’ instead of the simple ‘Nahash the Ammonite’. Rather than pointing towards originality this feature is best explained as a secondary alignment with the wider literary context (cf. 1 Sam. 12.12). At the end of the plus the phrase ‘and they came to Jabesh Gilead’ capably sets the scene for the original opening ‘About a month later, Nahash the Ammonite went up and besieged Jabesh [Gilead].’ In each case Jabesh is spelled defectively provoking in 4QS ama a scribal error and subsequent supralinear correction. The eyes of the scribe appear to have jumped from the first ‘to Jabesh’ (ʾl ybš) to the second ‘against Jabesh’ (ʿl ybš). The terminology as well as the content of the passage draw on the immediate and wider context (cf. 1 Sam. 11.2, 11 and Judg. 4.3; Num. 32.2–38; 1 Kgs. 19.18). Alongside the technique of recounting events for a second time (Rofé, 1982) this points strongly towards a secondary, midrashic addition. In addition to considerations of form, several aspects concerning the content of the passage further indicate that we are dealing with a later addition. The repetition of events serves the purpose of preparing for Nahash’s surprising hostility. This by no means suggests the episode is part of the original text. The additional passage was, however, not inserted in order to diminish the surprise since the attacks on Gad and Reuben in 4QS ama occur just as suddenly as the attack on Jabesh in the MT. Rather, an attentive reader of 1 Sam. 11 appears to have recollected the last reference to Jabesh Gilead in Judg. 21.8–14. According to the latter passage Jabesh Gilead was uninhabited at the time of Saul. It was thus necessary to repopulate the city to set the scene for Nahash’s attack recorded in 1 Sam. 11. This is why according to the secondary addition in 4QS ama refugees from the tribes of Gad and Reuben (Num. 32; Josh. 22) had arrived in Jabesh Gilead prior to Nahash’s attack on the city and the subsequent appeal to Saul for assistance on the part of its inhabitants (Goldstein 2013; Kratz 2016a, 2017a). Finally, the literary history of 1 Sam. 11 itself further bolsters the case for the secondary character of the addition in 4QS ama. An analysis of 1 Sam. 11 indicates that a gradual supplementation of the original text began even earlier. Verses 6–8 which include a reference to Saul as ‘judge’ as well as verses 12–14 linking 1 Sam. 11 to 1 Sam. 10 are secondary (Kratz, 2005, pp. 172–3). The plus in 4QS ama can be associated with these additions and is particularly compatible to verses 6–8. Whereas in 1 Sam. 11:6–8 it is the ‘spirit of God’ which descends upon Saul as it did upon the judges of Israel, it is the ‘grievous oppression’ of 4QS ama that is reminiscent of the period of the judges (so only in Judg. 4.6; cf. Judg. 1.34; 2.18; 6.9; 10.11–12 as well as 1 Sam. 10.18). Moreover, 1 Sam. 1:6–9 further includes a message to the ‘territory of Israel’ (v. 7) that is reminiscent of Judg. 19.29 which may have alerted the author of the plus in 4QS ama to Judg. 19–21 and the issue of the compatibility of the statements about Jabesh Gilead in Judg. 21 and 1 Sam. 11.
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If all this is correct, then we are able to observe a literary development in 1 Sam. 11 that begins within the biblical Text and continues seamlessly in 4QS ama. The textual history and the literary growth of the biblical book and the Qumran manuscript lead to comparable results and are mutually illuminating.
Rewritten Bible A close relationship can also be established between biblical scholarship and Qumran studies regarding the phenomenon of ‘rewritten bible’ (Segal 2005; Zahn 2011; Kratz 2013 [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]). This phenomenon occurs as much within the Hebrew Bible as in the Scrolls. Chronicles is the classic example of the genre of rewritten bible in the Hebrew Bible. Moreover, we may also categorize either the relationship between priestly and non-priestly material in the Pentateuch or that of Deuteronomy to the earlier text of Genesis to Numbers as a rewriting of this kind. Among the Scrolls the best-known representatives of this type of literature are Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll], Reworked Pentateuch and the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]. Rewritten bible texts are of interest from a variety of methodological perspectives. Firstly, this literature offers valuable text-critical material in those places where biblical texts are cited more or less comprehensively. Thus, Chronicles repeatedly attests a text for Samuel that corresponds to the Septuagint and the Qumran manuscripts rather than the Masoretic Text. This situation is compatible when we consider Reworked Pentateuch, a composition that still divides scholarly opinion as to whether we are dealing with rewritten bible or with a biblical manuscript (Kratz 2016b). In addition, close attention to minuses and pluses in rewritten bible texts sheds valuable light on the processes and techniques that lie behind the growth of the biblical text regardless of whether the latter are copies of pre-existing Vorlage or developed creatively as part of the rewriting process. We need to allow both omissions and especially additions also in the course of the literary growth of the biblical base texts. Thus, the process of rewriting is nothing more than a continuation of literary processes that have their roots already in the biblical tradition underlying the rewriting in the Scrolls. Rewritten bible texts are finally also significant from the perspectives of redactionand reception history. They offer insights into the mechanism of a kind of intertextuality that is based on a clearly defined direction of literary dependency that becomes historically tangible. This kind of intertextuality reveals textual development and continuous textual reworking, a process of redaction and interpretation that we have elsewhere labelled inner- or extra-biblical reception history (Kratz, 2006, pp. 135–44, 157–80). A particularly beautiful example which illustrates this process of redaction- and reception history first within and then beyond the Hebrew Bible is the motif of the patriarchal wife who is introduced by her husband as his sister in order to protect himself in a distant land (cf. Kratz 2009, 87–93). This motif recurs three times in Genesis, twice in the context of Abraham and Sarah (Gen. 12 and Gen. 20) and once
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linked to Isaac and Rebekah (Gen. 26). The idea probably developed from Isaac’s name (who ‘caressed’ Rebekah) with Gen. 26:7–14 representing not only the shortest but probably also the earliest version of the story. Based on Gen. 26 the motif was subsequently transferred also to Abraham and Sarah in Gen. 12.10–20 which in turn gave rise to the account in Gen. 20:1–18 (Kratz, 2005, pp. 260, 267, 271). The transfer of the motif from Isaac to Abraham is rooted in an earlier phase of the development of the patriarchal narratives but already presupposes the placement of Abraham as Isaac’s and Jacob’s ancestral father. Against this background Gen. 12.10–20 was added secondarily for the sake of parity between father and son (Gen. 26) and to point forward to the exodus. The repetition of the motif in Gen. 20 – this time in the territory of Abimelech of Gerar as in Gen. 26 – presupposes the version in Gen. 12 and is integrated into the larger narrative by means of Gen. 20.13. The repetition goes back to a later author who was keen to align the two accounts in Gen. 12 and Gen. 26 while also offering distinctive aspects. Gen. 20 portrays Abraham as an example of cosmopolitan Judaism in a diaspora context (Köckert, 2006, pp. 152–61). All three biblical versions illustrate how different shades of meaning became attached to the same literary motif in the course of the redaction history of Genesis. Post-biblical literature approached the multiple transmission of this tradition in a variety of ways. Jubilees refers only briefly to Gen. 12 and passes over Gen. 20 and 26 entirely. A different course is followed by the author of the Genesis Apocryphon who offers a harmonized and expanded version of Gen. 12 and 20 (as well as 26) in the course of his account of Gen. 12 (1QapGen 19–20; Machiela, 2009, pp. 69–77 [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]). In terms of literary technique, the author of the Apocryphon takes up individual verses from Gen. 12.10–20 verse by verse and inserts additional material, some of it is taken from Gen. 20 and 26 and some of it is original composition. In this manner any questions raised by the differences between various versions of the story are resolved and allusive motifs are elaborated more fully. As far as the author’s Tendenz is concerned the Apocryphon clearly presupposes the account of Gen. 20. Gen. 20 already emphasizes that it was God who prevented Abimelech from laying hands on Sarah (vv. 4, 6) and notes she is indeed Abraham’s sister on her father’s side. Developing such apologetic tendencies further, the author of the Apocryphon is emphatically concerned with exonerating Abraham and Sarah from any suspicion of having acted in a morally questionable or inappropriate manner. In his distinctive portrayal of Abraham as possessing the ability to receive and interpret dreams, contesting and ultimately prevailing over Egyptian specialists in magic, the author of the Apocryphon is able to build on the attribution to Abraham of the honorific title of ‘prophet’ attested in Gen. 20.7. As is the case also in Jubilees (Jub. 12.27) the Apocryphon portrays Abraham as one versed in the writings of Enoch, a learning with which he – just like Sarah and her wisdom – is able to impress the wise of Egypt. The friendly tone adopted towards the foreign ruler who alleviates Abraham’s concerns by means of his actions and proves himself to be a man of piety familiar from Gen. 20 (cf. v. 11) has not been retained by the author of the Apocryphon. In this case the Apocryphon adopts (again) a harsher tone and emphasizes the foreign ruler’s violent tendencies. We are thus able to observe the development of inner-biblical interpretation in Gen. 26 via Gen. 12 and culminating in Gen. 20. In each case the issues of Israel’s survival
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under foreign rule call for renewed reflection and response. The extra-biblical interpretation attested in the Genesis Apocryphon seamlessly connects with Gen. 12 on a literary level and with Gen. 20 on a theological level. Moreover, the Apocryphon ‘rewrites’ the biblical account against a background of even graver threats by offering its own answers. The author of the Apocryphon was, of course, entirely unaware of the literary and redactional development of the three biblical accounts. He chose Gen. 20, the most recent version, intuitively because its content and ideological outlook reflected his own concerns most closely. One suspects that the accounts in Gen. 20 and in the Apocryphon are historically not far removed from one another either.
Biblical Law and Sectarian Rules Biblical law is another object of rewriting both within the Hebrew Bible (Covenant Code, Deuteronomy, Holiness Code) and outside the Bible in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll]). To this we may add the numerous examples of explicit interpretation of individual laws in the Scrolls, halakhah which is concerned with the concrete application of the law (4QMMT ) [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah; 58 Halakhah]. Finally, Qumran revealed sectarian communal rules written in the style and at times also the garb of torah and halakhic rules for the life of the community (Serekh ha-Yahad, Damascus Document) [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 35 Damascus Document]. As far as such texts can be classified as rewritten law the same methodological principles apply as for other rewritten Bible texts. A fruitful area of investigation is, therefore, a study of the Temple Scroll that goes beyond the issue of exploring the rewriting of the biblical text but also investigates those areas where the reception and the literary history of biblical law overlap (Kratz 2015a). Here the methodological approaches of form- and tradition criticism are particularly promising alongside textual- and literary criticism (Text- and Literarkritik), since in the area of law (contrary to other areas of biblical literature) these approaches can be demonstrated in phenomena we witness in the texts and are therefore particularly significant. The relationship between the literary- and redaction history of biblical law and the process of its rewriting in the Scrolls can be elucidated with the aid of the following example (Kratz 2013). Thus, the Covenant Code embedded in the Sinai periscope of Exod. 19–24 developed from a collection of impersonal (casuistic) stipulations in Exod. 21–23. This original collection was subsequently elaborated through the addition of a framework of cultic laws (altar, festivals) and integrated into the context of the larger biblical narrative. In the course of this redaction-historical process the impersonal stipulations were transformed into a first-person address by the deity directed towards a second-person singular addressee (Moses or the people) as well as occasionally a second-person plural addressee (the people). This is the rhetorical scenario presupposed in the book of Deuteronomy which was composed as an address to Moses in the secondperson singular and includes later additions that attest a second-person plural addressee. According to the fictional perspective of the narrative Moses proclaimed the law which he had received from God on Mount Sinai (Exod. 19–24) to the people in the land of Moab immediately before the entrance into the promised land (cf. Num. 25.1;
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Josh. 2.1; 3.1). Against the rhetorical background of this fictional framework Deuteronomy emerges as a repetition of the Covenant Code which to a certain degree it is. Deuteronomy is nothing other than a type of rewritten Bible: a reformulation of the Covenant Code, especially the cultic laws with particular stress on the centralization of the cult (cf. Exod. 20.24 with Deut. 12.13ff.; Exod. 23.14–17 with Deut. 16.16–17 etc.; see Kratz, 2005, pp. 114–33). This literary process is taken a step further in the rewriting process attested by the Temple Scroll which presents the already developed, interpreted and elaborated text of Deuteronomy as first-person divine speech as revealed to Moses himself on Sinai (cf., e.g. the rules on the centralization of the cult in cols. 51–53.). Both stylistically and in terms of content the Holiness Code (Lev. 17–26) commanding Moses’ speech to the people (Lev. 17.1–2) and itself the product of a rewriting of the Covenant Code and Deuteronomy, represents a likely intermediate stage in this development. Biblical law is equally significant for the scholarly study of the Qumran Community Rules even though the latter are – like halakhic texts – more removed from the biblical text and constitute independent compositions (Kratz, 2011b). Thus, our understanding of the processes that gave rise to biblical law as reconstructed by means of redaction-, form- and tradition critical methods may serve as a model to illuminate the literary development of legal texts from Qumran (Metso, 1997; Hempel, 1998). In addition, the literary historical relationship between different collections of biblical law (esp. the Covenant Code, Deuteronomy and the Holiness Code) can serve to illuminate the relationship between 1QS and 1QS a [→46 Rule of Congregation] or the Serekh ha-Yah.ad and the Damascus Document. Like the various corpora of biblical law, the latter compositions testify to a comparably rich network of inter-textual relationships. Finally, a remaining question is the place of Qumran Rule texts and halakhah vis-à-vis the literary- and redaction history of biblical law. A connection doubtless exists both literarily and in matters of content as demonstrated by the heading of the Penal Code in 1QS 6.24 which draws on Exod. 21.1. In sum, the relationship between biblical scholarship and Qumran studies is fruitful beyond the application of historical-critical methodologies in reading the Scrolls also in respect of biblical law and sectarian rules. An area that deserves much more attention is the integration of the results of critical biblical scholarship with Qumran research. Such an approach may reveal the historical preconditions and perhaps even the precedents of phenomena and developments reflected in the Scrolls.
Biblical Commentaries Further removed from the biblical text are biblical commentaries such as the thematic and continuous pesharim [→44 Pesharim]. Like halakhic texts such as 4QMMT these works differentiate clearly between the biblical text (or Vorlage) and its interpretation. However, the results of critical biblical scholarship nevertheless play an important role in the study of this particular new genre from Qumran. Of particular interest here are the scholarly insights gained in the study of biblical prophecy (Kratz, 2011a, esp. pp. 99–108).
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As in all scholarly work with the biblical text, text-critical methodologies play a primary role. Biblical quotations attested in the pesharim occasionally testify to readings that diverge from the Masoretic Text. Occasionally they are in agreement with an ancient version indicating that the pesher drew on a different Hebrew Vorlage. Where this is not evident, we cannot be sure whether a distinctive reading is based on a different Vorlage or should be attributed to the author of the pesher in question in order to serve his particular interpretive aims (Brooke, 1987). Whatever the case may be the pesharim are doubtless important witnesses in our quest to establish the history of the biblical text. The pesharim are, furthermore, an important historical source for the study of the history of the Qumran community and ancient Judaism in the Hellenistic-Roman period [→20 Historiography]. The study of biblical history draws on biblical and extrabiblical sources, both archaeological and epigraphic remains as well as literary sources, in its quest to reconstruct a history of Israel. Similarly, Qumran scholars have offered a synthesis of the allusions to contemporary events derived from the pesharim with the accounts of ancient historians about the Essenes [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature] alongside pertinent statements drawn from the Damascus Documents and the archaeological remains discovered at Khirbet Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. This medley of sources gave rise to the classic account of the history of the Qumran Essenes under the leadership of the ‘Teacher of Righteousness’ (Stegemann, 1971). This reconstruction is not without validity today even though recent scholarship has issued a growing number of challenges both in terms of methodological approach and in terms of the substance of the historical reconstruction offered by earlier generations (Davies, 2010; Grossman, 2002, 2010; Metso, 2004, 2010; Kratz 2017b). Mirroring debates among biblical scholars, concerns have been raised in Qumran research about the use of different types of evidence, the combination of different sources, the use of literary witnesses for direct historical reconstructions as well as the amalgamation of historical and literary phenomena. Controversy further continues to characterize the interpretation of the archaeological remains at Khirbet Qumran. The approach gaining favour both in biblical research and in Qumran studies is an insistence on undertaking independent analyses of archaeological and literary bodies of evidence respectively. Hand in hand with the call for an initial separation of different kinds of evidence we observe an increased stress on the need to approach literary witnesses with sensitivity about their literary qualities in exploring provenance and Tendenz. Overall the earlier quest for insights about historical events and details has given way to a consideration of complex historical scenarios which can be evaluated by means of sociological and historiographical analogies. In this area Qumran studies can draw on the work of biblical scholars in matters of historical reconstruction. Biblical scholars, likewise, benefit from Qumran by gaining access to the ancient historical and sociological context of the biblical scrolls. Such a richly illustrated example from Israel’s history was previously not available with the exception of Elephantine (Kratz 2015b). In light of increased scepticism towards what now appear to be rather naïve historical readings recent scholarship has focused on the elucidation of literary features in the pesharim. Careful attention to the relationship between text and commentary offers insights into a variety of subtle exegetical and hermeneutical techniques that
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inform the reception of the biblical text in the pesharim. The hermeneutical approach and some of the techniques are evident already in the emerging inner-biblical interpretation (Kratz, 2006, pp. 128–35) as well as in later rabbinic exegesis (Brooke 1985). The distinct presentation of lemma and commentary so characteristic of the pesharim allows us to observe these exegetical and hermeneutical approaches particularly clearly. These insights can inform biblical scholars about the hermeneutical presuppositions and techniques that underlie the redaction-historical processes attested within the Bible; all of these phenomena have much in common with rewritten bible texts (Kratz, 2006, pp. 157–80). Conversely, the pesher genre – already highly significant from the perspectives of form criticism, literary history and historical reconstruction (Steudel, 2009; Kratz, 2014) – can be illuminated by considering this literature against the background of the history of inner-biblical redaction and interpretation; the prophetic books offer particularly valuable material in this regard. The complex interplay between inner-prophetic biblical interpretation and exegesis of the prophets in the pesharim is particularly evident in the Pesher Nahum (Kratz, 2011a, pp. 99–145). The curious interpretation of the ‘city of blood’ Nineveh in Nah. 3.1–7 as a reference to ‘the city of Ephraim, the seekers after smooth things’ makes good sense against the background of the redaction history of the book Nahum. This demonstrates the inadequacies of simply identifying ciphers employed in the pesharim with contemporary historical entities, such as the Pharisees in this case, as if they were simply inserted into a randomly selected prophetic text. Rather, the redaction history of the biblical book Nahum already paved the way for the reinterpretation of Nineveh as a reference to Judah or her internal enemies. The ciphers employed in the book Nahum – as well as their predecessors in the interpretation of Isaiah (in CD ), Hosea and Micah – testify to an appropriation of an inner-biblical discourse about internal conflicts within biblical ‘Israel.’ This discourse was then continued and updated in the reception and transmission of the biblical tradition as understood by the Qumran community. The reading proposed here by no means excludes the customary identification of the biblical ciphers (Judah, Ephraim, Manasseh, etc.) with groups attested in the second and first centuries bce but is able to shed fresh hermeneutical light on the material. Comparable phenomena can be witnessed also in the reception of Isaiah in the book of Daniel (Kratz, 2011a, pp. 183–6 and 243–71; Teeter, 2012) and in Hosea and Amos (Kratz, 2011a, pp. 359–79). In each case the interpretation attested in the Scrolls picks up on tendencies that have their starting point already in the history of innerprophetic and inner-biblical redaction and interpretation. The authors of the pesharim consistently pursue a dual purpose: to interpret the biblical text as such and in light of the contemporary situation of the Qumran community.
Conclusion Constraints of space force me to draw these observations to a close even though numerous further examples such as psalms, prayers or wisdom could be added to illustrate further the fruitful, and indeed necessary, dialogue between biblical
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scholarship and Qumran studies. The examples above amply illustrate that such dialogue must go much further than the application of methods developed in critical bible scholarship to the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls. While the latter approach is certainly necessary we should by no means stop there. Instead, careful consideration of and mutual illumination between the results of critical biblical scholarship and the study of the Scrolls promises fruitful results, and both areas of scholarly endeavour stand to make considerable gains from such an approach. The Scrolls cease to be an isolated corpus of texts and become part of the well-established, dynamic process of the emergence of the Hebrew Bible, a process that lasted at least until the completion of the book of Daniel in the second century bce . The Hebrew Bible, likewise, ceases to be a fixed canonical entity which lacks a historical context. Instead, the Scrolls shed new light on the literary history as well as the historical and sociological background from which the biblical literature emerged. Biblical scholarship and Qumran studies share not only a historical-critical methodology, but are very much interdependent in the quest for our understanding the relationship of the Hebrew Bible to the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Bibliography Becker, U. (2011), Exegese des Alten Testaments. 3rd edn. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Brooke, G. J. (1985), Exegesis at Qumran: 4QFlorilegium in its Jewish Context. JSOTS up 29. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Brooke, G. J. (1987), ‘The biblical texts in the Qumran commentaries: Scribal errors or exegetical variants?,’ in C. A. Evans and W. F. Stinespring (eds), Early Jewish and Christian Exegesis: Studies in Memory of W. H. Brownlee. Atlanta: Scholars Press, pp. 85–100. Cross, F. M. (1983), ‘The Ammonite oppression of the tribes of Gad and Reuben: Missing verses from 1 Samuel 11 found in 4QS amuela,’ in T. Tadmor and M. Weinfeld (eds), History, Historiography, and Interpretation: Studies in Biblical and Cuneiform Literatures. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, pp. 148–58. Cross, F. M. et al. (2005), Qumran Cave 4.XII: 1–2 Samuel. DJD 17. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Davies, P. R. (1983), The Damascus Covenant: An Interpretation of the Damascus Document. SOTS up 25. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Davies, P. R. (1992), ‘Redaction and sectarianism in the Qumran Scrolls,’ in F. García Martínez et al. (eds), The Scriptures and the Scrolls: Studies in Honour of A. S. van der Woude on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday. Leiden: Brill, pp. 152–63. Davies, P. R. (2010), ‘What history can we get from the Scrolls, and how?,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 31–46. Goldstein, R. (2013), ‘More on the story about Nahash in 4QS ama: Its purpose and diffusion,’ Shnaton 22, 17–26 (Hebrew). Goodman, M. (2010), ‘Constructing ancient Judaism from the Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 81–91. Grossman, M. L. (2002), Reading for History in the Damascus Document: A Methodological Study. STDJ 45. Leiden: Brill.
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Grossman, M. L. (ed.) (2010), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill [reprinted SBL pb. 2006]. Hempel, C. (2006), ‘The literary development of the S tradition: A new paradigm’, RevQ, 22, 389–401. Kallai, Z. (1996), ‘Samuel in Qumrân: expansion of a historiographical pattern (4QS ama),’, RB , 103, 581–91. Köckert, M. (2006), ‘Abraham: Ahnvater, Fremdling, Weiser: Lesarten der Bibel in Gen 12, Gen 20 und Qumran,’ in S. Martus and A. Polaschegg (eds), Das Buch der Bücher – gelesen: Lesarten der Bibel in den Wissenschaften und Künsten. Publikationen zur Zeitschrift für Germanistik NF 13. Bern: Peter Lang, pp. 139–69. Kratz, R. G. (2005), The Composition of the Narrative Books of the Old Testament. Trans. J. Bowden. London: T&T Clark. (German original Die Komposition der erzählenden Bücher des Alten Testaments, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000). Kratz, R. G. (2006), Das Judentum im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels. FAT 42. 2nd edn. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Kratz, R. G. (2009), ‘Friend of God, brother of Sarah, and father of Isaac: Abraham in the Hebrew Bible and in Qumran,’ in D. Dimant and R. G. Kratz (eds), The Dynamics of Language and Exegesis at Qumran. FAT II .35. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 79–105. Kratz, R. G. (2011a), Prophetenstudien: Kleine Schriften II. FAT 74. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. (English edition, The Prophets of Israel. Critical Studies in Hebrew Bible. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2014.) Kratz, R. G. (2011b), ‘Der “Penal Code” und das Verhältnis von Serekh ha-Yachad (S) und Damaskusschrift (D),’ RevQ, 25, 199–227. Kratz, R. G. (2013), ‘Rewriting Torah in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in B. U. Schipper, D. A. Teeter (eds), Wisdom and Torah: The Reception of ‘Torah’ in the Wisdom Literature of the Second Temple Period. JSJS up 163. Leiden: Brill, pp. 273–92. Kratz, R. G. (2014), ‘Text and Commentary: The pesharim of Qumran in the context of Hellenistic scholarship,’ in T. L. Thompson and P. Wajdenbaum (eds), The Bible and Hellenism: Greek Influence on Jewish and Early Christian Literature, Durham: Acumen, pp. 212–29 (German original, ‘Text und Kommentar: Die Pescharim im Kontext der hellenistischen Schultradition,’ in P. Gemeinhardt and S. Günther (eds), Von Rom nach Bagdad: Bildung und Religion von der römischen Kaiserzeit bis zum klassischen Islam, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013, pp. 51–80.) Kratz, R. G. (2015a), ‘Law and narrative in Deuteronomy and the Temple Scroll,’ in C. Berner, H. Samuel (eds), The Reception of Biblical War Legislation in Narrative Contexts: Studies in Law and Narrative. BZAW 460. Berlin: de Gruyter, pp. 109–22. Kratz, R. G. (2015b), Historical & Biblical Israel: The History, Tradition, and Archives of Israel and Judah, translated by Paul Michael Kurtz, Oxford: Oxford University Press (German original version: Historisches und biblisches Israel: Drei Überblicke zum Alten Testament, Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2nd ed. 2017). Kratz, R. G. (2016a), ‘Bibelhandschrift oder Midrasch? Zum Verhältnis von Text- und Literargeschichte in den Samuelbüchern im Licht der Handschrift 4Q51 (4QSama),’ in W. Dietrich in cooperation with Cynthia Edenburg and Philippe Hugo (eds), The Books of Samuel: Stories – History – Reception History. BETL 274. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 153–80. Kratz, R. G. (2016b), ‘Reworked Pentateuch and Pentateuchal Theory,’ in J. C. Gertz, B. M. Levinson, D. Rom-Shiloni, K. Schmid (eds), The Formation of the Pentateuch. FAT 111. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 501–24.
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Kratz, R. G. (2017a), ‘Nahash, King of the Ammonites, in the Deuteronomistic History,’ in R. Müller, J. Pakkala (eds), Insights into Editing in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East: What does documented evidence tell us about the transmission of authoritative texts? Leuven: Peeters, pp. 163–88. Kratz, R. G. (2017b), ‘The Teacher of Righteousness and his Enemies,’ in A. Feldman, M. Cioata, C. Hempel (eds), Is There a Text in this Cave? Studies in the Textuality of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of George J. Brooke. Leiden: Brill, 515–32. Lange, A. (2009), Handbuch der Textfunde vom Toten Meer. Band 1: Die Handschriften biblischer Bücher von Qumran und anderen Fundorten. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Machiela, D. A. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls Genesis Apocryphon: A New Text and Translation with Introduction and Special Treatment of Columns 13–17. STDJ 79. Leiden: Brill. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Metso, S. (2004), ‘Methodological problems in reconstructing history from rule texts found at Qumran,’ DSD, 11, 315–5. Metso, S. (2010), ‘When the evidence does not fit: Method, theory, and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 11–25. Rofé, A. (1982), ‘The acts of Nahash according to 4QS ama,’ IEJ , 32, 129–33. Schofield, A. (2008), ‘Rereading S: a new model of textual development in light of the Cave 4 Serekh copies,’ DSD , 15, 96–120. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yahad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 72. Leiden: Brill. Segal, M. (2005), ‘Between Bible and Rewritten Bible,’ in M. Henze (ed), Biblical Interpretation at Qumran. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 10–28. Steck, O. H. (1998), Old Testament Exegesis: A Guide to the Methodology. Resources for Biblical Study 39. Trans. J. D. Nogalski. 2nd edn. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Stegemann, H. (1971), ‘Die Entstehung der Qumrangemeinde.’ PhD diss., Bonn. Steudel, A. (2009), ‘Dating exegetical texts from Qumran,’ in D. Dimant and R. G. Kratz (eds), The Dynamics of Language and Exegesis at Qumran. FAT II .35. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 39–53. Teeter, A. (2012), ‘Isaiah and the king of As/Syria in Daniel’s final vision: On the rhetoric of inner-scriptural allusion and the hermeneutics of “mantological exegesis,” ’ in E. F. Mason et al. (eds), A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam. JSJS up 153. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (2012), Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. 3rd edn. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Zahn, M. (2011) ‘Talking about Rewritten Texts: Some Reflections on Terminology,’ in H. von Weissenberg, J. Pakkala, M. Marttila (eds), Changes in Scripture. BZAW 419. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 93–119.
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The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Study of the Ancient World Benjamin G. Wright III
In 1997 scholars celebrated the golden anniversary of Mohammed edh-Dhib’s serendipitous entry into Cave 1 at Qumran with numerous conferences and celebratory volumes that took stock of Scrolls scholarship up to that point and attempted to set the agenda for future study [→1 Discoveries]. These celebrations came close on the heels of a watershed moment in the history of the Scrolls, the complete publication of all the scrolls from the eleven Qumran caves. These two events formed a turning point in the history of scholarship on the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the scholarly study of the Scrolls has changed dramatically since that fiftieth anniversary.
Scrolls Study since the mid-1990s The coincidence of reconsidering the first fifty years of Scrolls study and completing the publication of all the Scrolls marked the close of an initial phase of Scrolls scholarship. Much of the early work was dominated by philological and technical concerns, as might be expected, given the large number of manuscripts and the very fragmentary state of many [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. With the publication of the major editions in the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert series [→4 Acquisition and Publication], scholars had at their disposal a staggering amount of new data, and they began to ask new questions and to take new methodological approaches to this evidence. Moreover, the first generation of Scrolls scholars had worked out comprehensive theories about the group who lived at Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] and their connections to other Jews. Those theories, built primarily on the foundation of the wellpreserved scrolls from Cave 1, persisted as the major frames for understanding Qumran and the Scrolls well into the 1980s, when scholars became aware of Cave 4 texts like 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah ] that provided evidence to challenge and to force revisions to those early theories (Nickelsburg, 1999; Collins, 1999 [→72 Forms of Community; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]). This burst of new content that accompanied the increasing amount of scrolls material available, especially from Cave 4, forced a reconsideration of the interpretative hegemony of the Cave 1 scrolls [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. 216
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A number of publications marking the fiftieth anniversary identified that moment as a time when Qumran scholarship should move ‘to look outward and to build bridges not only to biblical and rabbinic scholarship but also to the broader study of religion’ (Collins, 1999, pp. 105–6 [→6 Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context of the Scrolls]). As this turn has gradually come about in many areas of Scrolls scholarship, the ongoing construction of these bridges makes the study of Qumran and the Scrolls more broadly applicable to the study of the ancient world. Earlier concerns of theology, philology and historical criticism [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies; 20 Historiography] continue to be practiced within a more diverse methodological environment [→21 Social Scientific Approaches; 22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies] that includes the areas that John Collins identified in 1999. The relative newness (about sixty-five years now) and compact nature of the field (the study of the site and the scrolls connected with it) enable the combination of earlier methods and newer approaches to happen in very interesting ways. Indeed, it is instructive to look at the importance of particular methodologies in Scrolls scholarship in the late 1990s compared to more than a decade later. So, in 1999, George Nickelsburg wrote, Social scientific methodology made a quick appearance in Qumran studies in Isenberg’s 1974 article on millennialism. Yet despite the development and refinement of these methods in the study of the canonical scriptures, and despite the material evidence from Khirbet Qumran and the scrolls, many references to purity, law, ritual, and community organization and institutions, Qumran scholarship continues to be dominated by the methods and approaches that typified biblical studies prior to the 1970s. Nickelsburg, 1999, p. 94
Compare this statement to Maxine Grossman’s remarks a decade later, Sociological approaches to the Dead Sea Scrolls are well established in the field; for decades they have provided scholars with tools for rethinking basic historical questions about the social structure and ideology of the communities associated with the scrolls. Grossman, 2010, p. 498
In the accompanying footnote, however, Grossman cites literature since 1994, a time when Scrolls scholars were beginning to look in the directions that Collins advocated. Working along these lines has invigorated Scrolls research with new insights into the texts and site and broadened its relevance to scholarly fields beyond the Scrolls.
The Concept of ‘Antiquity’ In the same year as Qumran’s anniversary, the president of the Society of Biblical Literature, Hans Dieter Betz, gave his presidential address entitled, ‘Antiquity and Christianity.’ His assessment of the relationship between Christianity and Antiquity
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(with a capital ‘A’) revealed some central assumptions about the ancient world that affect how we might situate the Qumran Scrolls in their larger context. Betz wrote, [W]hat became Christianity had its origins indirectly in the confrontation between Judaism and Hellenism, first in Hellenistic Judaism, and then through Paul directly in the confrontation with pagan polytheism. Thus, the earliest version of ‘antiquity and Christianity’ occurs as part of the Jewish conflict with Hellenism and its imposition of Greek standards of culture and religion. Betz, 1998, p. 7
Betz goes on to argue that over the course of the last two thousand years ‘Antiquity’ and ‘Christianity’ have had both a confrontational and an integrative relationship (Betz, 1998, pp. 6–7). By framing the matter in this way, Betz reified the idea of ‘Antiquity’ as a particular set of Greek (and later Roman) cultural and religious norms, and he implicitly set Judaism, and later Christianity, as standing by definition outside of and in contrast to Hellenocentric ‘Antiquity.’ For Betz, Christianity owes its origins, if only indirectly, to a confrontational relationship between Judaism and Hellenistic Antiquity, since ‘Jesus himself was opposed to Hellenistic culture and its influences,’ although the gospels, as products of Hellenism, soften this opposition and shift the confrontation to one between Jesus and Jewish authorities (Betz, 1998, p. 8 [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]). Indeed, the relationship between Judaism and Hellenism (however this term might be defined) has been a major concern since the earliest modern scholarship on ancient Judaism. With respect to the categories Hellenic and Hebraic, Tessa Rajak has noted the ‘invention and exploitation of polarities in the nineteenth century,’ polarities that became so familiar they seemed ‘almost natural.’ She goes on to suggest that nineteenthcentury idealization of classical Greece played a crucial role in shaping a notion of ‘the other,’ and ‘[s]ince Philhellenism involved the creation of models for the present age as much as the invention of fictionalized cultural origins, any exalted valuation of the Greek inheritance produced tension over values’ (Rajak, 2001, p. 535). Without engaging in unnecessarily long explanation, the upshot of Rajak’s analysis demonstrates that at the heart of Betz’s reification of ‘Antiquity’ – that the centre of the ‘struggle’ between Antiquity and Christianity or between Judaism and Hellenism is a particular construction of Greek cultural values – lies a paradigm that has been deeply engrained in Western scholarship of the last two centuries and that has constituted a site of contestation over modern value systems. Of course, tensions within ancient Judaism over how to respond to Greek cultural values are inherent in our sources; the term ‘Hellenism,’ used to indicate these values, appears for the first time in a Jewish text written in Greek (2 Macc. 4.13). Yet, if we set aside the modern idealizations of Greece that Rajak identifies, we uncover a complex and dynamic ancient Mediterranean world. Certainly, Greek language, culture and politics exerted enormous influence in the period after Alexander, but as numerous scholars have pointed out, connections between the Near East and Greece flourished well before the military expansions of Macedon. Furthermore, Greece (joined later by Rome) was not the only actor on the stage. Civilizations further to the east, such as
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Persia and Parthia also had significant impacts on those to the west. Thus, whether they resided in Palestine or in the Diaspora and however they reacted to things Greek, Jews were thoroughly enmeshed in a more interconnected, even cosmopolitan, ancient world than the idealized term ‘Antiquity’ suggests (for recent further discussion see Jokiranta and Hartog, 2017). In this sense, then, I do not think that we can talk about antiquity with a capital ‘A,’ particularly if Jews (and later, Christians) are cast as outsiders in this construction (and I would prefer the phrase ‘ancient world’). Jews, along with any number of other ethnic groups, were fully peoples of the ancient world. They were not passive recipients (either willingly or unwillingly) of a culture that was imposed from the west but were active participants in a vibrant and dynamic interchange that included many voices calling out for attention, even if Greek was often the loudest. In short, we need to work with a more comprehensive notion of antiquity that does not set up Greece (and Rome) as the idealized norm or standard, but one that includes traditions such as Judaism or Christianity as an integral part of antiquity (for positive examples, see Gruen, 1998 and Schwartz, 2010). Moreover, in any construction of antiquity we cannot ignore the locales and cultures east of the Jordan River. When we think in this way, Qumran and the Scrolls stand out as a major laboratory for rethinking the category ‘Antiquity’ as a more comprehensive notion, one in which the societies and cultures of the entire Eastern Mediterranean and Near East are fully considered. Indeed, the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls has done much to explode the dichotomizing of ‘Judaism’ and ‘Hellenism’ or ‘Christianity’ and ‘Antiquity’ and to reorient our thinking about these categories.
The Scrolls and the Ancient World If Qumran and the Scrolls can serve as a major laboratory for thinking differently about a concept of antiquity, they also act as a laboratory for thinking programmatically about how we study the ancient world. At Qumran, we have an archaeological site that is compact and was occupied for a limited amount of time (approximately 150 years; Magness, 2002, p. 68 [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]) together with a large number of scrolls that constitute the literary remains of the people who lived at the site. It is clear that the inhabitants of Qumran did not compose or even copy all the manuscripts found in the caves and, despite the objections of some scholars, the best assessment of the proximity of the caves to the settlement is that the Scrolls are to be connected in some way with the people who lived there (Magness, 2002, pp. 43–4; Meyers, 2010; on the nature of the collection see Popović, 2012). This coalescence of material remains and such a large collection of texts is practically unprecedented, and scholars thus have an opportunity both to look at older issues through new methodological lenses and to raise an entire range of questions that heretofore have been difficult to answer. If the Jews of this period were integrated into ‘Antiquity,’ then what we learn from Qumran should be more broadly applicable to other areas of the ancient world. In the remainder of this essay I highlight a few exemplary areas of study that are illuminated by the Qumran finds.
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Relating Texts to Social Realities The large number of manuscripts found at Qumran enables scholars to think in nuanced ways about how texts related to social realities in the past and how we can do historiography in the present, particularly, but not exclusively, social history (Lapin, 2010). While I agree with Michael Stone, who has urged caution when trying to reconstruct unknown groups on the basis of ‘tendencies of thought’ in texts (Stone, 1989, pp. 65–6), the scrolls from Qumran, given their sheer number and connection to the people who lived at the site, offer unprecedented access to what a specific ancient group of people thought important to read (and in some cases to compose) and how what they read and wrote reflects their thinking. So, to take a single methodological example, scholars, such as Carol Newsom, have explored the language and rhetoric of the Qumran sectarian texts for what they can reveal about how the identities of community members were shaped and constructed vis-à-vis a broader set of ancient Jewish cultural and religious symbols (Newsom, 2004). The Qumran finds also allow for the additional possibility of thinking about how the Scrolls as artefacts might give us better (or different) purchase on the textual data. Moreover, the Scrolls illustrate both the methodological problems and the historiographical payoff of this approach. Though, as Hayim Lapin reminds us, in the production of historiographical knowledge no text or artefact is so transparent that it can communicate without interpretation, and scholars must constantly balance what they ‘read in’ against what they ‘read out’ (Lapin, 2010, p. 111). This is especially true in the piecing together of these texts [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts] and, at the ‘deeper level’ of scholarly reconstruction, where source and redactioncritical theories about these works are proposed (Lapin, 2010, p, 112 [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies]). One example will illustrate the point. From the earliest studies on the Scrolls, scholars have used them to reconstruct the origins both of the group who withdrew to Qumran and of the settlement of the site. Lapin has suggested that one avenue into these issues is to begin with the manuscript assemblage – that is, the Scrolls as artefacts. He observes that production of both ‘biblical’ and ‘non-biblical’ manuscripts shows ‘a decided peak in the second half of the first century B.C.E. (50–1 B.C.E.)’ (Lapin, 2010, p. 115). In addition, no scroll that reflects sectarian characteristics dates from before 100 bce . This peak in manuscript production coheres with dates established archaeologically for the initial occupation of the site. Using these data as a basis and starting point, Lapin argues that social-historical investigation of the people of Qumran points in the direction of ‘property ownership, literacy, and (at least at one phase) elite taste’ (Lapin, 2010, p. 121; see also the conclusions of Baumgarten, 1997, pp. 196–9). Lapin further proposes that these conclusions, when viewed in light of historical information derived from the study of the texts themselves, enable scholars to reintegrate the Scrolls into the study of ancient Judaism and push them to ‘take seriously the early first century as the context for sectarian activism, conflict, disappointment, and alienation’ (Lapin, 2010, p. 123; for some methodological caveats, see pp. 123–7). Social history done in this mode would have obvious comparanda in contemporary Greek and Roman voluntary associations and/or philosophical schools [→7 The Yahad
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in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation]. Yet, farther afield, what kinds of social-historical questions might we ask of Galilean archaeology of a few centuries later? Here I am thinking of a place like Beit She‘arim, whose rich range of symbols and inscriptions in various languages would seem to provide data for asking similar questions.
Employing the Social Sciences Although scholars have employed the social sciences in biblical and religious studies for some time now, the unusual situation at Qumran of having material remains and texts serves to place some controls on their use in historical reconstructions of the ancient world [→21 Social Scientific Approaches]. Two different disciplines that frequently draw on each other (so, for example, in social readings of archaeology such as spatial theory) illustrate the case at Qumran: archaeology (primarily concerned with material remains [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]) and sociology (primarily focused on textual sources [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism]). On the archaeology side, a number of challenges have been issued recently to the longstanding, general consensus that Qumran was a sectarian settlement – the alternatives being a fortress, a villa or a commercial establishment – and indeed, if one ignores the Scrolls altogether as those proposing these ideas must, then, as Jodi Magness, writes, ‘Without the scrolls, the archaeological remains are ambiguous enough to support any of a variety of possible interpretations of the site’ (Magness, 2010, p. 104). It is precisely the texts in combination with the archaeological data, however, that make all the difference in the interpretation of the site and that rule out interpretations that do not take them into account. They give the site what Magness calls a ‘social-religious-historical context’ (Magness, 2010, p. 104). The site’s anomalous features – the relatively large number of baths, the animal bone deposits, the cemetery – are best explained by the sectarian legal texts [→58 Halakhah] found at Qumran and indicate a sectarian community that maintained a high level of ritual purity [→70 Purity and Holiness; 73 Daily Life]. Precisely because scholars have the evidence of the texts found near the site, Magness can claim, ‘Rarely does archaeology so clearly reflect a system of religious beliefs and practices’ (Magness, 2010, p. 107). On the side of sociology, the major focus of sociological approaches to the Scrolls themselves has been on the issue of sect/group formation and the history of the Qumran group. Jutta Jokiranta has observed about this enterprise, [T]he study of the ‘sectarian texts’ has sometimes presumed too straightforward a relationship between the texts’ image of reality and the history of the movement associated with them. An understanding of the Qumran texts must aim at producing relevant information about their ‘text world’ as well as their ‘social world,’ understanding the two together, rather than in conflict with each other. Jokiranta, 2010a, p. 246
Jokiranta raises two issues that show how the Qumran texts illustrate the methodological problems at stake. First, as a way of speaking about sectarianism in a sociological sense
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and as a way of understanding the differences in the Qumran ‘sectarian’ documents, she urges scholars to think about different discourses rather than different social movements. ‘The move from texts to sects can put us in danger of creating movements out of nothing, or imagining wrong kinds of movements, or more or fewer movements than were actually present historically’ (Jokiranta, 2010a, p. 252). Second, she cautions that different sociological theories of sectarianism (e.g. Weberian, Troeltschian, Wilsonian) identify different aspects of the phenomenon. In her view, if definitions alone are compared for their applicability much gets lost in the analysis. More important is the cultivation of a ‘sociologically informed imagination’ that enables scholars to think and ‘to theorize, in an explicit and precise manner, about the social phenomena in the Qumran movement and Second Temple Judaism’ (Jokiranta, 2010b, p. 226). In addition, the large amount of material present at Qumran offers the kinds of data that permit scholars to engage fruitfully in comparative analyses – with the appropriate caveats – with movements from different times and places (Baumgarten, 1997; Regev, 2007). These insights, then, might also be applied in different ancient contexts. So, for example, how might these kinds of questions help to understand or rethink the archive/ collection found in the ‘Villa of the Papyri’ at Herculaneum, which contains several hundred rolls, mostly of Epicurean philosophy, that Philodemus of Gadara may have collected and which included much of his writing?
How We Read the Past It might seem a truism to say that our reading of the past depends on the vagaries of what has been preserved of that past, whether preservation is accidental or the result of intentional processes. Particular texts or artefacts may occupy a central position in historical reconstruction simply because they are what scholars have at their disposal, not because they played the same central role in antiquity. Furthermore, when it comes to texts, our reconstructions rely of necessity to a great extent on the products of social elites and their perceptions of the world in which they lived [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Reconstructing the social, cultural and religious lives of non-elites involves finding ways of working around, getting behind or bringing other methodologies to bear on our reading of the extant evidence. Sensitive readings of texts or of material culture (and when possible the two together) can throw light on social and religious dynamics that are not immediately obvious. One example that comes to mind is the number of synagogue floor mosaics discovered in Israel, whose decorations suggest more variety in Judaism of the rabbinic period than rabbinic texts alone would lead us to believe. Moreover, the texts that come to us are ‘filtered,’ to use Michael Stone’s term, in two different ways. First, within Second Temple Judaism choices were being made about what texts were preserved and transmitted and which ones were not. The technological constraints of text production and duplication probably played a role as well. Second, later Jewish and Christian orthodoxies preserved and transmitted only those works that they found acceptable for their own ideological reasons. (For a nuanced discussion, see Stone, 2011, pp. 4–16.) At Qumran we have a collection of texts deposited by the people who lived at the site (or by people connected with them). The Dead Sea Scrolls, then, give scholars
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better purchase on the degree to which our reading and knowledge of the past are controlled by the products and perceptions of ancient elites and, in the case of Judaism in this period, by subsequent Jewish and Christian orthodoxies that selected and transmitted ancient texts. Similar claims about the selectivity of later tradents could be made about Greek and Latin classical literature. One comparable situation from the Hellenistic world is the aforementioned Herculaneum archive, which is roughly contemporary with the Qumran Scrolls. The Scrolls reveal ‘a type of Judaism existing in the last pre-Christian centuries, at whose existence we would otherwise scarcely have guessed’ (Stone, 2011, p. 3), and they exponentially increase the sources at our disposal for reconstructing both the Qumran movement and Judaism more broadly in this period. Perhaps more significantly, however, the collection forces us to rethink how many aspects of Judaism (or other ancient groups) might be conceived. So, for example, in light of previously unknown texts such as 4QI nstruction and their impact on how we might read other Jewish and early Christian texts, scholars have recognized that the relationship between the categories of ‘wisdom’ and ‘apocalyptic’ is much more complex than had been thought by earlier generations of scholars.
Pluralism in the Ancient World When we think about the social composition of the group who lived at Qumran, it is tempting to see it as monolithic, but the extant evidence fits better with a more pluralistic understanding of the group. The Qumran movement was more ‘multicultural’ than we might think at first, both in its social makeup and in the influences that affected it. This evidence from Qumran suggests that other ancient groups may well have been similarly pluralistic. If the literature is anything to judge by, it is probable that people holding differing ideological views, some of whom represented different Jewish groups, made up the Qumran community. George Brooke identifies ‘overlapping and developing interests of four ideologies, each of which has a practical dimension to it,’ which are priestly, apocalyptic, scribal and mantological (Brooke, 2011, p. 57). He further identifies two different kinds of crises as motivations for like-minded Jews to band together and head to the desert (Brooke 2011, pp. 58–68): (1) crises external to the Qumran group, such as the political and religious crisis connected with the Hasmoneans, who would have formed a common opponent for people holding various ideologies and deriving from different social groups; and (2) crises internal to the group, especially over issues of leadership, as some of the sectarian texts indicate. At the very least, Brooke argues, these different ideologies should caution scholars about concerning themselves ‘with one social group to the exclusion of others’ (Brooke, 2011, p. 57). Even though the residents of Qumran settled in an out-of-the-way location, recent scholarship has emphasized that the movement we know from Qumran likely extended beyond the confines of that isolated settlement, and indeed those at the settlement might not have been so isolated themselves. In any event, in the literature that they used we find a wide variety of cultural influences. Although not given much attention in a collection dominated by Hebrew and Aramaic scrolls, Greek scrolls were discovered in Caves 7 and Cave 4 [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview], including
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fragments of the Greek Pentateuch [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Epistle of Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other] and the Letter of Jeremiah [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. Commenting on the implications of these finds, James VanderKam observes, ‘It [i.e., the Qumran situation] shows that even in a community like this . . . there were some members who read the scriptures in Greek, although the relative numbers of manuscripts written in the three languages of Qumran indicate that Greek was hardly the dominant one’ (VanderKam, 2001, p. 178 [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]). Additionally, the scrolls give evidence of the influence of Iranian ideas (de Jong, 2010 [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 74 Ethics and Dualism). All of the evidence, then, points to the community at Qumran having a more diverse makeup than might be expected. It is just as probable that other ancient groups had diverse social and ideological compositions as well.
Text Production and Transmission When we look at the texts that come from Qumran, scholars who study ancient text production and transmission can learn much from the Scrolls. The evidence from the Scrolls pushes us to realize that we need to set aside the anachronistic designation of biblical and non-biblical [→55 Bible; 56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture] and that ancient text production and transmission generally were characterized by creativity and fluidity. At Qumran we encounter ‘a learned group of Jews engaged in composing, shaping and collecting a very large amount of literature’ (Hempel, 2013, p. 289), and we confront the same processes at work in a number of the Qumran texts that scholars have identified in the development of what we now recognize as biblical books. In this environment, it is crucial to recognize that the process of the development of what became the Hebrew scriptures took place right alongside of and in almost identical ways to the process of development of Jewish works that would not become part of the canon. Two major implications come out of these observations: (1) since textual production and transmission took place among a small, literate elite in ancient Judaism (likewise elsewhere in the ancient world), its seems likely that the ‘same limited stratum of highly educated scribes is the pool responsible for the emerging Hebrew scriptures and the corpus of the Scrolls’ (Hempel, 2013, p. 289); and (2) the creation and transmission of texts in the ancient world generally was marked by the kind of fluidity and creativity that we see evident in the Scrolls from Qumran (Hempel, 2013, p. 289). A second, and perhaps overlooked, aspect of text production is writing material and what it might tell us about larger issues of trade and international contact in antiquity [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. A number of texts among the Qumran Scrolls were written on papyrus, which would of necessity have come from Egypt. Since there seems to be a connection between Qumran sectarian writings and papyrus (Tov, 2004, p. 49), the people who lived at Qumran must have been connected to systems of trade, despite their apparent desire to remove themselves to such a deserted place. At the least, this evidence suggests that even communities as physically isolated as the occupants of Qumran could be tied into sophisticated networks of international trade that supplied goods that they could not produce themselves.
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The Spread of Scientific Knowledge The covenanters who lived at Qumran are perhaps most well known for their use of a 364-day calendar [→62 Calendars]. Both astronomy and astrology were important sciences in antiquity, and we find a sophisticated use of calendrical knowledge in the scrolls [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. Jonathan Ben-Dov has shown how some of the Qumran texts evince Babylonian astronomical knowledge, and indeed, the presence of such astronomical texts suggests that there were people at Qumran who were versed in this knowledge. So, for example, the mishmarot texts 4Q320 and 4Q321, which regulate priestly courses, demonstrate a significant relationship to Babylonian traditions about the observation of lunar phases (Ben-Dov, 2008). Of course, among the Scrolls were copies of the Astronomical Book of Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], which, although not written at Qumran, occupied a place of importance for the movement. The sophistication of the Qumran texts and their clear relationship to Babylonian astronomical lore raises important questions about ancient learning and how it was transmitted not only within intellectual elites of one culture, but also how this knowledge spread to other cultures, where it would also play a crucial role. A second example of esoteric knowledge that raises questions for us about networks of knowledge in antiquity is physiognomy, the science of reading the human body for what it signifies about people [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Like the astronomical texts at Qumran, physiognomic texts, like 4Q186 and 4Q561, indicate an insight and active interest on the part of those who lived at Qumran in the use of contemporary scientific perceptions. At the very beginning of his study of these Qumran texts, Mladen Popović makes the significant observation that the Qumran physiognomic texts share important features with Babylonian and Greco-Roman traditions but that they also display their own unique features (Popović, 2007, p. 1). Thus, rather than uncritically taking over these materials, their Jewish users adapted them and applied their own intellectual acumen to them. The Qumran Scrolls reveal active Jewish intellectual interests that manipulate these other traditions for their own purposes. Like the astronomical material from Qumran, the physiognomic texts provide potential glimpses of the intellectual avenues by which these scientific traditions travelled, a path that Popović has recently begun to explore further (Popović, 2014).
Conclusion The scholarly study of the Dead Sea Scrolls has been transformed in the last two decades or so, and in ways that demonstrate their value for understanding the ancient world more generally. The unique connection of site and scrolls offers scholars a rare glimpse into the life, thinking and literature of one Jewish group. The opportunity to bring so many different methods and approaches to bear on this small but relatively well attested community allows us to think in new ways about the complexity of ancient Judaism and the ancient world at large. The scrolls represent something like two sides of a coin. On the one side, the scrolls show us the inadequacies of our
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categories and our theories about the past. They reveal to us how partial and incomplete our evidence always is and how incomplete our reconstructions are. On the other side, the scrolls force us to set aside categories that have long been in need of revision in favour of more complex and nuanced ways of looking at the ancient world. Categorization and theorizing are necessary, but to the extent that we forget that our categories are heuristic mechanisms for trying to understand an ancient world to which we do not have first-hand access ‘we fail to see that in the world from which they have come to us, they were related parts of an organic whole’ (Nickelsburg, 2005, p. 36). To confuse the two recalls the Zen Buddhist adage of fingers pointing at the moon; the finger points the viewer at the heavenly orb, but we must not confuse the finger with the moon. The scrolls and their neighbouring site remind us of the difference both in their immediate context and in that of the broader ancient world. [I am grateful to Maxine Grossman for her careful reading of and invaluable feedback on an early draft of this article. She is the epitome of both colleague and friend.]
Bibliography Baumgarten, A. (1997), The Flourishing of Jewish Sects in the Maccabean Era: An Interpretation. JSJS 55. Leiden: Brill. Ben-Dov, J. (2008), Head of All Years: Astronomy and Calendars at Qumran and in their Ancient Context. STDJ 78. Leiden: Brill. Betz, H. D. (1998), ‘Antiquity and Christianity,’ JBL , 117, 3–22. Brooke, G. J. (2011), ‘Crisis without, crisis within: Changes and developments within the Dead Sea Scrolls movement,’ in A. Lange, K. F. D. Römheld, and M. Weigold (eds), Judaism and Crisis. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 89–107. Collins, J. J. (1999), ‘Scrolls scholarship as intellectual history,’ in R. A. Kugler and E. M. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls at Fifty. EJL 15. Atlanta: Scholars Press, pp. 101–6. de Jong, A. (2010), ‘Iranian connections in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 479–500. Grossman, M. L. (2010), ‘Rethinking gender in the Community Rule: An experiment in sociology,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture. STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 497–512. Gruen, E. S. (1998), Heritage and Hellenism: The Reinvention of Jewish Tradition. Hellenistic Culture and Society 30. Berkeley: University of California Press. Hempel, C. (2013), Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Jokiranta, J. (2010a), ‘Social-scientific approaches to the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 246–63. Jokiranta, J. (2010b), ‘Sociological approaches to Qumran sectarianism,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 200–31. Jokiranta J. and P. B. Hartog (eds) (2017), Dead Sea Discoveries. Thematic Issue: The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Hellenistic Context.
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Lapin, H. (2010), ‘Dead Sea Scrolls and the historiography of ancient Judaism,’ in M. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 108–27. Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Magness, J. (2010), ‘Methods and theories in the archaeology of Qumran’, in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 89–107. Meyers, E. M. (2010), ‘Khirbet Qumran and its environs,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 21–45. Newsom, C. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Nickelsburg, G. W. E. (1999), ‘Currents in Qumran scholarship: The interplay of data, agendas, and methodology’, in R. A. Kugler and E. M. Schuller (eds), Dead Sea Scrolls at Fifty. EJL 15. Atlanta: Scholars Press, pp. 79–99. Nickelsburg, G. W. E. (2005), ‘Wisdom and apocalypticism in Early Judaism: Some points for discussion,’ in B. G. Wright III and L. M. Wills (eds), Conflicted Boundaries in Wisdom and Apocalypticism. SBLSS 35. Atlanta: SBL , pp. 17–37. Popović, M. (2007), Reading the Human Body: Physiognomics and Astrology in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Hellenistic-Early Roman Period Judaism. STDJ 67. Leiden: Brill. Popović, M. (2012), ‘Qumran as scroll storehouse in times of crisis? A comparative perspective on Judaean Desert manuscript collections,’ JSJ 43, 551–94. Popović, M. (2014), ‘Networks of scholars: The transmission of astronomical and astrological learning between Babylonians, Greeks and Jews,’ in J. Ben-Dov and S. Sanders (eds), Ancient Jewish Sciences and the History of Knowledge. New York: New York University Press, pp. 153–94. Rajak, T. (2001), ‘Jews and Greeks: The invention and exploitation of polarities in the nineteenth century,’ in T. Rajak (ed.), The Jewish Dialogue with Greece and Rome: Studies in Cultural and Social Interaction. Leiden: Brill, pp. 535–57. Regev, E. (2007), Sectarianism in Qumran: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. Religion and Society 45. Berlin: De Gruyter. Schwartz, S. (2010), Were the Jews a Mediterranean Society? Reciprocity and Solidarity in Ancient Judaism. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Stone, M. E. (1989), ‘The Book of Enoch and Judaism in the third century B.C.E.,’ in M. E. Stone and D. Satran (eds), Emerging Judaism. Minneapolis: Fortress, pp. 61–75. Stone, M. E. (2011), Ancient Judaism: New Visions and Views. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. Leiden: Brill. VanderKam, J. C. (2001), ‘Greek at Qumran,’ in J. J. Collins and G. E. Sterling (eds), Hellenism in the Land of Israel. Notre Dame, IN : University of Notre Dame Press, pp. 175–81.
20
Historiography Philip R. Davies†
History and Historiography According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, historiography is (a) ‘the writing of history; especially the writing of history based on the critical examination of sources, the selection of particulars from the authentic materials, and the synthesis of particulars into a narrative that will stand the test of critical methods;’ (b) ‘the principles, theory, and history of historical writing;’ and (c) ‘the product of historical writing: a body of historical literature.’ Only the last is relevant here. Ancient historiographers rarely had access to ‘authentic materials’ and could not exercise critical examination. They were reliant on stories they heard from others, or on previous historiographies, and while their work provided meaningful stories about the past, these are not ‘history’ in our modern sense. Before the modern conception of a recoverable past that ‘really happened,’ historiography rather represented the way things were simply remembered, or should be remembered, or the way things should have happened. Above all, it used the past to teach lessons and to affirm or even define national or cultural identity – for Herodotus the Greeks’, for Livy the Romans’, for the Bible, Israel’s. Indeed, the Bible is full of stories of this kind, mixing events and persons that we can now show to be ‘historical’ with others that we know or suspect to be distorted or invented, all under the control of an ideological message. We can see this character illustrated in the books of Kings and Chronicles, which tell very different and sometimes flatly contradictory versions of the same story. Or in the first two books of Maccabees, markedly different accounts, in both style, substance and message, of the same events. But even in the ancient sense just described, there is no historiographical text in the Qumran texts. There are, however, texts and passages that show an interest in the past. They are of limited use in our own search for history. But we can examine them in order to learn how their writers constructed the past, what knowledge their authors may have had of what had once happened, the lesson they are trying to illustrate, and, indeed, how they understand ‘history’ itself. This is not a study of historiography, but of what the Qumran writers wrote in its place; even their own ‘principles, theory, and history of historical writing.’ † Deceased.
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It is of course disappointing that in Qumran studies, furnished with so many texts and so much archaeology [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], we find ourselves with no clear or agreed history of either the authors of the Scrolls or the inhabitants of the Qumran site (not necessarily exactly the same groups). Had we sufficient knowledge, we could more easily assess the historical value of what the Scrolls tell us about the past. But the archaeology of the site correlates very little to the contents of the texts (though it does, of course, to the manuscripts as objects). The broad historical context of the Scrolls and the site are, within reasonable limits, determined, but given the uncertainty of the archaeological data at present, we remain largely dependent on external sources such as Josephus, Philo and Pliny the Elder [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature] – and only if the inhabitants can be identified as ‘Essene’! Statements or allusions to the past in the Scrolls can be divided into two categories: those referring to what we might call ‘public history’ – people and events in the world outside, which we might in principle be able to identify – and ‘private history’ – the otherwise hidden story of the groups from which the texts come [→72 Forms of Community]. Despite an enormous amount of scholarly conjecture, there is very little material within the Scrolls or elsewhere that allows us to bridge these domains and relate the two histories. The ‘private’ history of the Scrolls writers and their communities involves ‘public’ history only in a few allusions. On reflection, this is not really surprising: for the Scrolls, it is private history that really matters: here lies ‘real’ history in the sense that here the relationship between God and the true Israel is being worked out: what happened outside is just a backdrop of failure and divine exclusion.
Calendrical and Annalistic Texts The majority of allusions to ‘public’ history fall within this group of texts. This is not coincidental. It has been argued that ancient historiography in Greece grew out of ‘chronography,’ the chronologically ordered list of the names of (for instance) kings, magistrates, athletic victors or members of an aristocratic family. In the ancient Near East it grew out of lists of kings or of officials, starting with the distant and mythical past but developing over time into near-contemporary or contemporary records (Van Seters, 1983). These lists represented an attempt to provide a temporal framework for the many stories about the past that societies possessed, but they also developed as a by-product of a mantic culture that sought to divine the future by correlating events on earth with celestial phenomena that preceded or accompanied them [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Concerns with the periodization of the past, the prediction of the future, and with celestial phenomena are in fact all characteristic of what is called ‘apocalyptic’ literature, including Ages of Creation, 11QMelchizedek [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms], Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] and 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts], all found at Qumran. Of these, only Jubilees bears some resemblance to historiography, but – significantly – it represents a calendrical revision of the chronology of Genesis and Exodus. Calendrical calculations arose from the need to correlate the Qumran 364-day calendar with the 12-lunar-month calendar used in the Jerusalem temple [→62
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Calendars]. A group of such texts (4Q320–330) were first given the name Mishmarot (literally ‘watches’) because their correlations are based on the weekly priestly shifts of Temple service. According to the ‘lunar’ calendar there were twenty-four of these shifts, each serving twice a year and named after the serving priestly family (the list can be found in 1 Chron. 24.1–19). The Qumran calendar, however, required twenty-six courses. Hence the need for a ‘calendar’ that converted the real (but according to the Scrolls, incorrect) system of time-measurement into the ideal one. Mishmarot is an appropriate and useful designation for these texts, because it identifies a recognizable key feature. However, it has now given way to the classification 4QC alendrical Texts (A–H), some of which have been further re-designated and renumbered (4Q331–333) as ‘Historical Texts.’ The re-named texts have the additional feature of identifying some priestly courses as the time of year when a memorable event of ‘public’ history took place. A more appropriate description of them is ‘annalistic calendars’ (following Wise, 1994). These texts are not historiographical because they are essentially only a list of persons and datings with an occasional historical person or event inserted, and do not offer an extended narrative. Four other texts mentioning historical events and/or persons, but not calendrical/ mishmarot, have been added to the set now labelled in Historical Texts in the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. This set requires only a brief treatment here. (For a fuller evaluation see Brooke, 2010; for a maximal attempt to identify historical allusions from these works, see Eshel, 2008). 4Q248 (4QH istorical Text A, see Broshi and Eshel, 2000): According to the editors this is a ‘genuine historical composition which is part of an apocalyptic work.’ The text mentions ‘Egypt’ and ‘Greece’ (line 2), a siege (line 4), someone coming to Egypt to sell its land (line 6) and (line 7) the ‘city of the temple’ (= Jerusalem). 4Q248 then alludes to the overthrow of other nations, a return to Egypt, before describing what will happen after the ‘holy people’ lose their power, perhaps a return of Israel (lines 8–10). Most commentators identify the protagonist as Antiochus IV, and Eshel (2008) attempts a quite detailed reconstruction of events. However, this text is highly reminiscent of Daniel 11 – which contains retrospectively (and wrongly) ‘predicted’ events as well as real ones – and, as Brooke remarks (2010, p. 209), it would be better labelled as an ‘apocalypse associated with Daniel literature.’ Apocalypses and historiographies understand the past quite differently (see below) and should not be confused. 4Q578 (4QH istorical Text B, see Puech, 1998): The only historically relevant word in this text reads ptlmys (‘Ptolemy’ or ‘Ptolemais;’ twice only partially, plus the word ‘his son’). Although Puech describes this text as ‘of a historical type’ and suggests possible allusions, such speculation based on a very small piece of preserved text is hardly justifiable, and the label ‘historical’ is tendentious. 4Q331 (4QH istorical Text C, see Fitzmyer, 2000a): The largest fragment of this manuscript bears the names Yoh.anan and Shelamzion (Salome), both Hasmonean rulers. But if we can restore the name of a priestly course ([Yeh.ez]kel), then the text very probably belongs with the Mishmarot, and is better classified as an ‘annalistic calendar.’ 4Q332 (4QH istorical Text D, see Fitzmyer, 2000b): Here we find a number of historical allusions: possibly ‘head of the Kittim’ (frg. 3 4), Arabs (probably frg. 3 1), Salome Alexandra (frg. 3 4) and a rebellious ‘Hyrcanus’ (line 6) whom both Fitzmyer
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(2000b, p. 285) and Wise (1994, pp. 210–11), identify with Hyrcanus II . But a priestly course is clearly mentioned, Jedaiah (frg.1 2 and frg. 3 3), and so this should also be classified as an ‘annalistic calendar’. 4Q333 (4QH istorical Text E, see Fitzmyer, 2000c): This text twice includes the phrase ‘Aemilius killed.’ He is generally understood as M. Aemilius Scaurus, quaestor under Pompey; from 65–61 bce and put in charge of Syria and Judea by Pompey, where he dealt with the struggle between the brothers Aristobulus and Hyrcanus, rival claimants to the throne. But yet again we find priestly courses, Yehezkel and Gamul, and so we are dealing with an ‘annalistic calendar.’ 4Q468e (4QH istorical Text F, see Broshi, 2000): The item of historical interest here is the phrase in line 3: ]pwtlʾys whnpš ʾšr, ‘Ptls and the people who . . .’ Who is this person? There is a Ptollas in Josephus’ Ant. 17.219, who was a courtier and companion of the tetrarch Archelaus; and also a Peitholaus (Josephus, War 1.162–63, 172, 180; Ant. 14.84–85, 93–95, 120), who was a Jewish general [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]. But there is no indication of a historical narrative, and it seems more likely that we have another annalistic composition, though without the mention of a priestly course this is conjectural. 4Q468f (4QH istorical Text G, see Lange, 2000): The extant phrases of this final ‘historical’ fragment include ‘the sons of Gilead,’ ‘the land,’ ‘Edom’ (or ‘Adam’), and ‘seven,’ from which it is impossible to deduce any historical reference at all; as with others in this set, the classification ‘Historical Text’ is inappropriate and misleading. Can we learn anything from these texts? None gives us even the briefest of narratives, but only allusions to persons and events. But they do betray an interest in events of the outside world, in which we can perceive two motives. One (already mentioned) is the correlation between two calendrical systems, using the weekly shift of priests rather than days and months. But another interest may be to correlate these occasional historical references with what we can loosely call some kind of ‘apocalyptic scheme’ in which (pseudo-)predictions of occurrences preceding the end-times, expected soon, are identified with actual events, in the manner, as remarked earlier, of Dan. 11. Such allusions would tend to confirm that the predicted end was indeed about to occur (and with it the final vindication and restoration of the writers and their communities). We shall see presently how the notion of a divine plan forms an essential component of the understanding of what we would call ‘history’ at Qumran, especially when applied more explicitly and fully to the history of the communities themselves. But incidental references to the world beyond these communities show by their very infrequency how much the authors of the texts from Qumran are disengaged from that world, a world which in their view has no future and little relevance to the divine purpose that is the key to ‘history.’
Historical Reviews in the Damascus Document While we cannot apply the genre of historiography to the first part of the Damascus Document (the Admonition, CD 1–8; B 1–2) [→35 Damascus Document], it contains passages that come closest to historiography (see also Grossman, 2002). The writing exhibits a strong interest in the past, both as a story of the origins of its own community
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and also as a record of the failings of the old ‘Israel’ that this community now replaces. These are the themes of two of the three opening discourses, which combine features of rewritten scriptural historiography, periodization of the past and calendrical calculations of the end. Like all ancient historiography, the historical surveys in CD are intended to teach a lesson, which is that it is time for the addressee to decide whether to join the true ‘Israel’ or come to judgement and destruction with the ‘old’ Israel. The decision is to be made by first of all ‘considering the doings of God’ (1.1), an invitation that leads straight into the rehearsal of those deeds. The first historical review (CD 1–2.1) opens with the destruction of Israel under Nebuchadnezzar and the foundation of a new ‘Israel’ from its remnant (390 years later, a hint of periodization). The origins of that ‘remnant’ are then described, culminating (after 20 years) in the ‘Teacher of Righteousness’ who reveals what will come upon the ‘final generation’ of the ‘faithless’ – in language that may be intended to include not only those outside the community, but also disloyal members of the community itself (CD 1.1–12). This ‘historical’ account, however, is followed – perhaps deliberately balanced – by a markedly non-historical one (CD 2.1– 13), in which the language is predestinarian: God has from the beginning chosen the righteous and the wicked: he knows what will happen throughout history (CD 2.10) and has appointed his chosen people, by name, in each era. The authors therefore do not understand the origin of their community in an exclusively ‘historical’ sense. History is no more than the unfolding of an eternal divine scheme: rehearsal of the past is meant to disclose God’s plan and pattern of behaviour. Thus, previous events can act as an object lesson, prefiguring what is happening now and in the near future. Once (or even more often) Israel disobeyed and was punished: that will recur. A few were saved: they can and will be saved now and in the coming final judgement. A third review, again historical in form, focuses on the pattern of human rebellion and divine retribution (CD 2.14–4.12b) beginning with the ‘Watchers,’ the angelic beings who came to earth, misled and misleading others [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. They, and the humans they misled, all perished in the Flood. But Noah survived, as, later, did Abraham. Israel rebelled in the wilderness, and later, finally was ‘given to the sword.’ Yet a remnant was preserved, and a list of their names is announced (though it is not given, perhaps once it was included). Here history and predestination meet: the elect are known (by name). Until the judgement comes, these will follow the law in complete obedience to the divine commandments, while in the world outside Belial is at work, continuing to corrupt those of ‘Israel’ who have been rejected, as proved by their disobedience of the law. In another flashback (CD 5.16) readers are reminded that Moses and Aaron were opposed by Jannes and his brother. This particular allusion is again typological: then Israel opposed the law and the true lawgiver and paid the price. Now it is again time to choose the true law and lawgiver, the ‘new Moses’ who is now identified as the ‘Staff,’ the ‘Interpreter of the Law,’ who laid down the laws (or rather, determined their true meaning) for the remnant Israel. At this point, the past is now left behind and the writers move on to the laws and the punishments to come upon backsliders. Although still a matter of disagreement, it seems most likely that the Admonition of the Damascus Document addresses outsiders as much as insiders. Its use – cleverly
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slanted – of scriptural history exploits the common story about ‘Israel.’ But it also points beyond history to a divine plan that will shortly climax in the great judgement. Although the Damascus Document focuses, especially in the second half, on the laws of the community [→59 Rules], the appeal to scriptural history is important not just in helping the would-be convert to make up his mind to join, but in reinforcing among existing members the reasons why they must not backslide, reinforcing what we would now call the ‘cultural memory’ of the community as the true Israel, continuing the story of divine election already told in the scriptures. This is not ‘history’ or ‘historiography’ in our modern sense, but these discourses come close to the function of much if not all ancient historiography: teaching important lessons from the past and reinforcing the identity of the group through the rehearsing of a shared story that locates it firmly within that history, projects its future, and separates it from others who do not belong in that history. What separates this use of the past from most other ancient historiographies is the belief that behind (or within) ‘history’ lies a divine plan. The tension in the Damascus Document between predestination and the freedom to choose is perhaps logically unresolvable, but it is found even in modern reflections on the past: some historians see in history nothing but the outcome of discrete individual and corporate choices; others detect laws, forces and movements that ultimately reduce choices to mere waves on the surface of a deep ocean.
Historiography and the ‘Teacher’ Our attention finally moves to the genre known as pesharim [→44 Pesharim], commentaries on biblical books that demonstrate the fulfilment of ancient predictions in the history of the Yahad [→72 Forms of Community]. Not every pesher deals with the past: some apply biblical texts to the future, while some are too fragmentary to comment upon; here we shall consider only those that do treat the past, and in particular those focusing on the ‘Teacher’ and his contemporaries. We should note to begin with the same integration of discrete event and predetermined plan that the Damascus Document displays; but here the plan is one that the scriptures have encoded in the form of prophecies that need deciphering (pesher denotes such esoteric interpretation) [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; Revelation]. The pesharim might not have attracted as much attention in a chapter on historiography were it not for the enormous amount of historical reconstruction that scholars have tried to extract from them. Despite such scholarly reconstructions, it is difficult to establish whether any reliable historical information may be found in these pesharim. No external sources apparently narrate the inner history of this movement, and all of the main characters or groups are alluded to by sobriquets rather than real names. It is thus virtually impossible to verify any personage or event. There is a reference to ‘Demetrios king of Yawan [Greece]’ in 4QpNah 3+4 i 1–3’ and one figure, whose sobriquet is ‘Furious Lion Cub’ is widely thought to point to Alexander Janneus, one of the Hasmonean rulers (4QpNah [4Q169 3+4 i 5]). But we cannot be sure that the writers or readers of these texts could make this identification, nor even that it mattered to them. The purpose of the pesharim was not to relate factual history but to make it plain that the foundation
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of the Yahad had been foretold and that its members therefore belonged within the divine plan. The treatment of the past in the pesharim differs from that in the Damascus Document in several respects. Quite apart from the fact that the pesharim are not couched in the form of a continuous narrative, but in disconnected episodes or allusions linked to each consecutive biblical verse, they also serve to establish and sustain a different kind of identity: the story they are telling belongs to a different group, whose identity is not tied up so much with being the true remnant of Israel as being true followers of the ‘Teacher.’ According to CD 1.11 this ‘Teacher’ can be identified as a secondary founder, who comes to a group already in existence and who also meets with opposition from a ‘man of scoffing’ who ‘drips lies’ (1.14). The pesharim certainly reflect such opposition (and use similar terminology), but they do not, as does D, probe beyond the ‘Teacher’ to earlier periods of the community’s life: from their perspective, it all seems to begin with him. If we cannot verify anything of the content of the pesharim, we can nevertheless see something of how they constructed what their authors believed to have happened. Whether or not these utilized any of the material in D is not clear, since D itself shows signs of revision within the Yahad (see Davies, 1983 for detailed analysis; Hempel, 2000, pp. 44–53). But they appear to have drawn on the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot], which they must have read as autobiographical reflections of the ‘Teacher.’ For in these hymns we find mention of opposition, using the same sobriquets as in the pesharim, though always in such a way that they do not seem to designate specific groups, let alone individuals. By exploiting these references to construct such groups (and to invent individuals), the pesharim undertake a kind of ‘historical research’ that is nevertheless highly inventive (see Davies, 1987 for analysis). Yet what is said about each of these in the pesharim is often contradictory. While it remains possible to reconstruct a single ‘Teacher’ from all the allusions, many scholars think there may be more than one. The ‘Man of the Lie’ or ‘Scoffer’ may or may not be the same character as the Wicked Priest, and he may be a figure within the community or an external one. The ‘Wicked Priest,’ whose identity also seems to shift, but upon whom most scholarly constructions depend, is unmentioned in any other Qumran text. The profile of all these characters is far from sharp, and in a detailed study of the use of sobriquets, Matthew Collins (2009) has concluded that the apparent instability of their reference allowed a degree of indeterminacy so that the ‘perceived history within the group’ as he puts it could develop [→Collins 2009, p. 209]. While it would be overstating the case to suggest that these figures are purely stereotypical, there is clearly such an element: the ‘Teacher’ ‘teaches’ (the Hebrew can also mean ‘rains’) while the ‘Liar’ ‘drips’ or ‘spouts;’ the ‘Teacher’ is sometimes portrayed as the (true, righteous) priest; the ‘Wicked Priest’ is his adversary. This is emphatically not the arena of history.
History and Memory A study of references to the past in the Qumran literature shows that rather than focus on retrieving concrete events and persons, we need to understand the way in which
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communal, collective memory works: the past is configured and reconfigured to reflect the nature of the here and now (for a fuller discussion of this see Davies, 2010). The past teaches lessons, offers prototypes (see Jokiranta, 2006) and is sometimes quasimythical in displaying the interplay of forces and values that are eternal. It always serves the formation and reformation of group identity. Thus within the Scrolls we find a balance between historical definitions of the group, which provide one kind of foundation of identity, and mythical ones, which provide another: in CD the three opening discourses (discussed earlier) balance these two perspectives. In the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] the ‘two spirits discourse’ [→74 Ethics and Dualism] tips the balance against history, while the figures in the pesharim waver between the concrete and the archetypal. There is neither historiography nor history in the Scrolls, but something more complex and more profound: an ongoing search for the meaning of existence (as the Qumran wisdom texts put it, the raz nihyeh [→65 Wisdom]), as expressed in the actions and plans both of God and of those who believe they are his chosen ones.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2010), ‘What makes a text historical?: Assumptions behind the classification of some Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. R. Davies and D. V. Edelman (eds), The Historian and the Bible: Essays in Honour of Lester L. Grabbe. London: T&T Clark, pp. 207–25. Broshi, M. (2000), ‘468e. 4QH istorical Text F’, in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds.) Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 406–11. Broshi, M. and E. Eshel (2000), ‘248. 4QH istorical Text A,’ in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 192–200. Collins, M. A. (2009), The Use of Sobriquets in the Qumran Dead Sea Scrolls. LSTS 67. London: T&T Clark. Davies, P. R. (1983), The Damascus Covenant: An Interpretation of the Damascus Document. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Davies, P. R. (1987), ‘History and Hagiography,’ in idem, Behind the Essenes: History and Ideology in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Atlanta: Scholars Press, pp. 87–105. Davies, P. R. (2010), ‘What history can we get from the Scrolls, and how?,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Contexts. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 31–46. Eshel, H. (2008), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hasmonean State. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans/ Jerusalem Ben-Zvi Press. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2000a), ‘331. 4QpapHistorical Text C,’ in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 275–80. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2000b), ‘332. 4QH istorical Text D,’ in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 281–6. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2000c), ‘333. 4QH istorical Text E,’ in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 287–9.
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Grossman, M. L. (2002), Reading for History in the Damascus Document: A Methodological Study. STDJ 45. Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2000), The Damascus Texts. CQS . Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Jokiranta, J. (2006), ‘Qumran–The prototypical teacher in the Qumran Pesharim: A social-identity approach,’ in in P. F. Esler (ed.), Ancient Israel: The Old Testament in Its Social Context. Minneapolis: Fortress, pp. 254–63 Lange, A. (2000), ‘4Q468f Historical Text G,’ in S. J. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 412–13. Puech, É. (1998), ‘578. 4QC omposition historique B,’ in É. Puech (ed.), Qumrân Grotte 4. XVIII: Textes hébreux (4Q521–4Q528, 4Q576–4Q579). DJD 25. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 205–8. Van Seters, J. (1983), In Search of History: Historiography in the Ancient World and the Origins of Biblical History. New Haven: Yale University Press. Wise, M. O. (1994), Thunder in Gemini and Other Essays on the History, Language and Literature of Second Temple Palestine. JSPS up 15. Sheffield: JSOT Press.
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Social Scientific Approaches a. Sectarianism David Chalcraft
It is an empirical question as to when and why sectarianism in society leads to the formation of an actual exclusive group, and it is not always the case that collective drives to exclusivity will crystallize into formal institutions or that the central feature of membership will revolve around religious values, practices and behaviours. When a social movement does institutionalize and utilizes religious values as gate-keeping devices, we are dealing with what sociologists call a sect. A sect can produce literature that has a sectarian worldview but not all literature produced is ‘sectually explicit’ (Newsom, 2004); equally, writings produced outside of a formal sect can express sectarian ideology and these need not lead to the formation of an exclusive religious community. What constitutes a sectarian worldview will of course depend upon the sociological ideas being deployed by the researcher. When sectarianism and sect are employed in Second Temple studies today the social sciences are consciously drawn upon. It is no longer sufficient to use such labels loosely or to presume that merely common-sense assumptions are adequate. It is very useful indeed to turn to the sociological tradition for further guidance on how to conceptualize sects and analyse the social factors that contribute to the emergence of sectarian tendencies, the consolidation of movements into sects, and the impact of those organizations on individual members and on the wider society. Using the label sect in Qumran studies is probably a reflection of the fact that many scholars see this description as being the most relevant (Collins, 2010). However, this does not mean that all alternatives (types of sect) have been explored or that each scholar using the label sect or sectarianism means the same things by it. There is still a place for viewing the data through the lens of other ideal types of social movements such as communes, monasteries and even ‘total institutions,’ a technical term utilized in the social sciences to apply to a prison or a mental institution but also to a monastery or a leprosarium (Goffman, 1961). The point to grasp in these sociological experiments is that the issue is not to ‘get the label correct’ but to find a way of appreciating the full variety and complexity of the social phenomena being explored: in this case the Qumran movement and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Exploring the disconnections between various ideal types and the data at hand is precisely where explanatory attention can be focused (Chalcraft, 237
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2010). A fit between minority religious movements in the present and ancient sects should not be expected. It is perhaps more helpful to consider social movements and institutions as evidencing degrees of sect-like-ness or of total-institution-likeness and to use our sociological imaginations to access the warp and woof of dynamic systems of social relations and belief. In order for discussion to advance it is essential to use concepts that are based on sound research and conscious and critical use of sociological ideas. Further, what is now realized in the field is that using the concept sect without locating the source and explaining the use, and moreover without following through the consequences of the use of that sociological idea for the reading of the texts and the history of the movement, can hardly be satisfactory (Jokiranta, 2010).
The Weberian Sociological Tradition By far the most exciting classical theorist who can guide us is Max Weber (1864–1920). Yet it is only recently that the full import of Weber’s writing on sects and sectarianism has begun to be entirely appreciated (Chalcraft, 2007b, 2007c, 2007d, 2008, 2011; Kim, 2004). A thorough examination of Weber’s writing realizes that his contribution is not to be dismissed as a simple binary of Church–Sect. Rather, Weber places sectarianism within the wider contrast between compulsory (e.g. a universal Church) and voluntary (e.g. a sect, club) forms of association. In this way he is able to draw out the significant sociological point that a sect, on the basis of its principles of admission and ongoing discipline of the sect member, radically impacts on the formation of personality and is thereby transformative of culture and society (Weber, 1948). For Weber a sect is a religious community founded on voluntary membership achieved through qualification (Chalcraft, 2007b, 2011). In order to join a sect and to remain a member the individual needs to demonstrate in front of their peers those very qualities deemed to be of upmost importance to members and which indicate that the member has the requisite degree of charisma or virtuosity required. The individual member then needs to develop those qualities for admission and maintain those qualities whilst within the organization on pain of expulsion if they fail. For Weber this social process is of great importance and cultivates what he labels ‘self-assertion’ alongside, of course, the very qualities felt to be at a premium by the group. For Weber, there can be no better way of people getting together to further their values and visions for the world and seek social change. It was this quality of self-assertion (Selbstbehauptung) and the development of particular traits valued by the sects that played a large role in the rise of individualism which was central to modernity, and hence – for Weber – for the development of modern capitalistic culture. In a similar vein, those working with early Jewish materials will approach the data with questions about the manner in which a movement’s values and organization impacted on individual personality and indeed whether a strict hierarchical priestly leadership, for example, would tend to restrict these kinds of developments (Chalcraft, 2007d). For Weber, Judaism itself was a sectarian world religion (he used the questionable concept of a pariah people) and so any sects within the sect, so to speak, would have had less external impact in the course of Western history (Weber, 1952). In terms of the formation of sectarian movements Weber’s
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approach is also highly suggestive since he breaks away from definitions of sects which rely on their size, their dualistic and world abnegating ideologies, and, in particular, views which only posit a sect in a situation of a reaction to and withdrawal from orthodoxy in belief and practice. From a Weberian point of view there need not be orthodoxy against which to protest for sects to exist. Rather, in his view, all movements have sectarian tendencies, and the more the members feel themselves to be an aristocracy or to hold abilities that are rare the more likely exclusive practices will develop. Weber applies these ideas to all forms of voluntary associations, all of which can develop exclusive practices and when they do, the values and behaviours which they esteem will be utilized by gate keepers. The values need not be religious values. So for Weber we can say that sectarianism is an aspect of group life, and exclusive social action is not restricted to sects but is operative in all spheres of cultural life. Bryan R. Wilson (1926–2004) is the other sociologist who has most often been made use of in biblical studies in relation to sects and sectarianism. Wilson felt himself to be working in the Weberian tradition and this is most evident in his commitment to value-freedom and to treating sects as voluntary movements. Wilson’s ideas also appealed because he sought to distance the sociology of sects from the apparent Western or Christian bias in Church–Sect typologies that were associated with Ernst Troeltsch and Weber. It is true that Weber’s sociology was always enquiry-driven and that he was seeking to answer cultural problems that were of relevance to his location as an European sociologist. He did, nevertheless, seek to apply his conception of sects to non-Western societies and religious traditions (Chalcraft, 2011). However, Wilson’s work has largely been misunderstood in biblical studies, and this is chiefly on account of failing to recognize that Wilson, like Weber and sociology in general, sharply distinguishes between modernity and previous social formations (but see Craffert, 2001). Wilson developed a seven-fold typology of sectarian responses to the world in order to broaden the analysis of sectarian religion to include new religious movements which flourished in various parts of the globe. He lists the following types of sectarian response: introversionist, thaumaturgical, revolutionary/millennial, manipulationist, conversionist, reformist and utopianist (Wilson, 1973). What is often forgotten by biblical scholars is that the description of the ideology is not all that Wilson offers by way of differentiation and explanation. Alongside these points are observations about the typical social conditions that provide the needful context for these responses, and some of those responses are reactions to conditions of modernity, including high levels of structural differentiation and also, disenchantment. Many biblical scholars have applied Wilson’s so-called seven-fold typology of sectarian ‘responses to the world,’ to ancient social contexts, without realizing that the majority of responses were typical of the world of modernity and in contexts where there was no religious orthodoxy for sects to protest against (e.g. Esler, 1994; Regev, 2011). For Wilson, sects were a sub-set of minority religious movements, and sects in the pure sociological sense of the term were not emergent in a context of secularization. In other words, because of major sociological differences between past and present and between ancient and modern societies, Wilson would not expect to find manifestations of many of the types of minority religious movements that New Testament and Qumran scholars thought they could identify when looking at their materials with Wilson in mind
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(Chalcraft, 2010). Wilson’s work therefore, for Qumran scholars, needs to be utilized with a sense of caution, even though there are very many ethnographic and conceptual insights in Wilson’s writings that we ignore at our peril. Wilson’s list of generic attributes of sects applies, as did most of Weber’s ideas, to the classic sects of Western sixteenth- and seventeenth-century history. For Wilson (1959) the following attributes are generic: a sect operates exclusivity and believes itself to have a monopoly of truth in religion and in all areas of social, political and natural life; it is a lay organization which denies any special religious virtuosity within its membership; it operates voluntarism, admitting potential members through marks of merit; it has expectations of high standards which are monitored and operates expulsion for the wayward; it demands total allegiance, so that sect membership becomes a master status; and, finally, it is a protest group. When studying new religious movements in the developing world, Wilson felt that these generic attributes did not apply to the phenomena and that the approach needed to be refined to study religious movements in these contexts (Wilson, 1973, 1990). He would have sought a similar solution to the problem posed by non-Western and non-modern sectarian movements in the ancient and classical worlds.
Way Forward For scholars now wishing to work on sects and sectarianism in the Weberian tradition – building on the best of Weber and the best of Wilson (Chalcraft, 2011) – one next step is to engage in dialogue with other studies of the Qumran material that concentrate, for example, on identity-formation of self and community (Jokiranta, 2010; Newsom, 2004); a further next step is most probably to design an ideal type of sects in the ancient world (as opposed to the Western seventeenth century or the new religious movements of Postcolonialism), and one that places sectarianism within a history and sociology of group formation that recognizes experiences and traditions of exclusivity in many different spheres of life which, from time to time, tend to crystallize into social figurations that radically exclude others on the basis of ethnicity, gender, stigma or religious belief and practice (cf. Piovanelli, 2007; Hempel, 2011). What is striking is less that sects form than that they do not form more often.
Bibliography Chalcraft, D. J. (ed.) (2007a), Sectarianism in Early Judaism: Sociological Advances. London: Equinox. Chalcraft, D. J. (2007b), ‘The development of Weber’s sociology of sects: Encouraging a new fascination,’ in Chalcraft (ed.) (2007a), pp. 26–51. Chalcraft, D. J. (2007c), ‘Weber’s treatment of sects in Ancient Judaism: The Pharisees and the Essenes,’ in Chalcraft (ed.) (2007a), pp. 52–73. Chalcraft, D. J. (2007d), ‘Towards a Weberian sociology of the Qumran sects,’ in Chalcraft (ed.) (2007a), pp. 74–105. Chalcraft, D. J. (2008), ‘Why hermeneutics, the text (s) and the biography of the work matter in Max Weber studies,’ in D. J. Chalcraft, F. Howell, and M. Lopez-Menendez
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(eds), Max Weber Matters: Interweaving Past and Present. Basingstoke: Ashgate, pp. 17–40. Chalcraft, D. J. (2010), ‘Is sociology also among the social sciences? Some personal reflections on sociological approaches in Biblical Studies,’ in E. Pfoh (ed.), Anthropology and the Bible: Critical Perspectives. Piscataway, NJ : Gorgias Press, pp. 35–71. Chalcraft, D. J. (2011), ‘Is a comparative historical sociology of ancient Jewish sects possible?,’ in S Stern (ed.), Sects and Sectarianism in Jewish History. Leiden: Brill, pp. 235–86. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Craffert, P. F. (2001), ‘An exercise in the critical use of models: The “goodness of fit” of Wilson’s sect model,’ in J. J. Pilch (ed.), Social Scientific Models for Interpreting the Bible. Atlanta: SBL , pp. 21–46. Esler, P. F. (1994), The First Christians in their Social Worlds. London: Routledge. Goffman, E. (1961), Asylums: Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates. Harmondsworth: Pelican. Hempel, C., (2011), ‘1QS 6:2c–4a—satellites or precursors of the yahad?,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture. STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 31–40. Jokiranta, J. (2010), ‘Social scientific approaches to the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Kim, S. H. (2004), Max Weber’s Politics of Civil Society. Cambridge: CUP. Newsom, C. A. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. Leiden: Brill. Piovanelli, P. (2007), ‘Was there sectarian behaviour before the flourishing of Jewish sects? A long term approach to the history and sociology of Second Temple Judaism,’ in Chalcraft (ed.) (2007a), pp. 156–79. Regev, E. (2011), ‘What kind of a sect was the yahad? A comparative approach,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture. STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 41–58. Wilson, B. R. (1959), ‘An analysis of sect development,’ American Sociological Review, 24, 3–15 Wilson, B. R. (1973), Magic and the Millennium. London: Heinemann. Wilson, B. R. (1990), The Social Dimensions of Sectarianism: Sects and New Religious Movements in Contemporary Society. Oxford: OUP. Weber, M. (1948), ‘The Protestant sects and the spirit of capitalism,’ in H. Gerth and C. W. Mills (eds), From Max Weber. London: Routledge, pp. 302–22. Weber, M. (1952), Ancient Judaism. Glencoe: The Free Press.
b. Sociolinguistics Trine Bjørnung Hasselbalch Sociolinguistic approaches to the Dead Sea Scrolls are of three types. First, as a reaction to early formalistic and descriptive works on Qumran Hebrew [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], Rabin and others after him tie linguistic developments to social change. They see the historical development of the Hebrew language, and its
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particular use in Qumran literature, as influenced by ideological motives and the need to mark social boundaries. This applies whether one thinks the Hebrew language in the Second Temple Period was still a natural linguistic choice in a multilingual society (Rabin, 1973; Weitzman, 1999; Schniedewind, 1999; Joosten, 2010), or holds that it was a dying language of mere symbolic importance, available only to privileged Jews responsible for the management of law and cult issues (Schwartz, 1995). Weitzman points to elements of a linguistic ideology in Jubilees and 4Q464 (Exposition on the Patriarchs) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] that nurtures the idea of Hebrew as the ideal language, prevailing before the Babel incident and before the multilingualism of Hellenic-Roman times. This ideology envisaged the destruction of competing languages – and speech communities – in the end of days. Schniedewind designates a number of well-known linguistic surface features peculiar to Qumran Hebrew an ‘anti-language’ (a term coined by M. A. K. Halliday). They result from conscious, ideological efforts to distinguish the Qumran community from the outside world. Such features are the peculiar orthographic practice; the avoidance of Aramaisms, colloquial language and lexical items otherwise seen as standard in the larger, Jewish society; attempts at classicizing language, as seen, e.g. in the awkward use of inverted verbal forms, which were standard in Biblical Hebrew, but otherwise not in use. Second, a growing interest in how texts are shaped in order to support identityformation in the Dead Sea community has led to attention to rhetoric and other sociolinguistic aspects, such as the social meaning conveyed by intertextuality (especially vis-à-vis biblical literature) and the choice of genre. Even if references to cross-linguistic theories tend to be few and implicit, the sociolinguistic perspectives are still appreciable. Newsom’s investigation of identity-formation in 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] and 1QHa [→37 Hodayot] is socio-linguistically and rhetorically explicit and shows how genres reveal aspects of social structures, rhetorical situations and goals. In her reading, the instructions of 1QS [→59 Rules] and the poetic genre of the Hodayot leader hymns [→60 Poetry and Hymns] fulfil complementary functions. The former realizes an institutionalized leadership’s authoritative demands on community members, thus indexicalizing hierarchic social structures, whereas the latter urges their continued loyalty in the appealing voice of a self-sacrificing leader, thus indexicalizing the voluntary character of the community. Her analysis illustrates the important theoretical point that there are various ways in which texts can bespeak or symbolize social and personal subjects appropriately, i.e. by successfully accentuating central concepts in a speech community in ways that its members perceive as convincing and acceptable (Newsom, 2004). Third, in addition to ideological and rhetorical aspects, attention is called to how writers’ potentially unconscious linguistic choices materialize in linguistic deep structures, such as syntax (compare Polak, 2010 on biblical material). Linguistic innovation is not fully explained by the identification of social changes on the national or regional level; based on a socio-cognitive theory of language it can be seen as reflecting writers’ mental models of their social situation and of the discourse in which they are participating. This includes the authors’ perception of other discourse participants’ overt and covert motives. Also, depending on their calculation of how much relevant
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knowledge is shared by other participants, writers leave some information out while accentuating other points, thus impeding modern interpreters’ access to the complete picture of the communication. Taking the theoretical existence of mental contexts and implicit knowledge into consideration, Hasselbalch argues that 1QHa as a collection of prayers does not oscillate between presentations of leadership and ordinary community members’ perspectives, but nurtures one membership identity, entailing an elitist ethos that includes both leadership responsibilities and the experience of being subject to God’s agency (Hasselbalch, 2015). Not every aspect of this social identity is brought to the surface in every composition. Nevertheless, transitivity analysis of verbs (according to the principles of Systemic Functional Linguistics) suggests that the speaker’s sense of having leadership responsibility manifests itself semantically on a deeper, linguistic level, also in compositions generally seen as spoken by ordinary community members (see, e.g. 1QHa 6.19–33). In this the Hodayot deviate from the patterns of biblical Psalms [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related], presumably because their social context included different social roles and functions. The above perspectives could show themselves useful in analyses of other large, complex compositions felt to be central to the Dead Sea community and revealing important points about its social structure (e.g. 1QS , 1QM [→40 Milh.amah]). Texts originating in different contexts and brought together to constitute new compositions carry vestiges of original denotations, but the new literary and social context takes priority and involves connotative meanings, which were not in the original and do not always surface as, e.g. lexical or orthographic variants. Insofar as the social meaning of such works is carried also between the lines, in syntax, and in patterns of transitivity, a sociolinguistic approach may complement the prevailing redaction-historical interpretations [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies] with its focus on extant, identifiable text.
Bibliography Hasselbalch, T. B. (2015), Meaning and Context in the Thanksgiving Hymns: Linguistic and Rhetorical Perspectives on a Collection of Prayers from Qumran. EJL 42. Atlanta: SBL Press. Joosten, J. (2010), ‘Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek in the Qumran Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 351–74. Newsom, C. A. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space. Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill Polak, F. (2010), ‘The Book of Samuel and the Deuteronomist—A syntactic-stylistic analysis,’ in C. Schäfer-Lichtenberger (ed.), Die Samuelbücher und die Deuteronomisten. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer, pp. 34–73. Rabin, C. (1973), A Short History of the Hebrew Language. Jerusalem: Department of the Jewish Agency. Schniedewind, W. M. (1999), ‘Qumran Hebrew as antilanguage,’ JBL 118, 235–52. Schwartz, S. (1995), ‘Language, power, and identity in ancient Palestine,’ Past and Present 148, 3–47 Weitzman, S. (1999), ‘Why did the Qumran Community write in Hebrew?,’ JAOS 119, 35–45.
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c. Identity Theory Lloyd K. Pietersen Social identity theory (SIT ) is generally associated with Tajfel (Tajfel, 1978) and Tajfel’s student, John Turner (Tajfel and Turner, 1986). The use of SIT has been fruitfully explored in biblical studies by Philip Esler (Esler, 1998, 2003). Social identity ‘is that part of an individual’s self-concept which derives from his knowledge of his membership of a social group together with the value and emotional significance attached to that membership’ (Tajfel, 1978, p. 63). It thus consists of three components: identification (belonging), the evaluative dimension (positive or negative connotations of belonging) and emotional attachment (attitudes held towards insiders and outsiders) (Esler, 1998, p. 42). Being concerned with an individual’s self-conception in relation to group membership, SIT has been developed within the discipline of social psychology. An individual’s membership of a group affects both identity and behaviour. Group membership invites social comparisons with other groups in the process of selfevaluation. In this process intra-group similarities and inter-group differences are exaggerated. The evaluative dimension of social identity thus results in both positive and negative stereotyping. Inter-group comparison becomes problematic for identity when the group with which one identifies has a status lower than other groups. In this situation two options are open: social mobility and social change. If exit from the lower status group is possible then social mobility occurs, and the individual simply defects. To combat this, groups will often exert pressure on members to prevent them from leaving. The second option involves promoting a more positive group identity either through social creativity or social competition. If there are no means of changing the actual social relations with the out-group, social creativity is employed which involves altering the terms of comparison with the dominant out-group by focusing on a different dimension of the in-group’s experience (e.g. ‘they may have power but we have the Spirit’), by redefining the comparison so that what was previously seen as a weakness is now perceived as a strength, or by comparing the in-group with a different out-group. If, however, a change in social relations is possible then the group will engage in social competition by seeking to change the status quo resulting in possible conflict. SIT has been usefully employed in relation to Qumran by Louise Lawrence (Lawrence, 2005) and Jutta Jokiranta (Jokiranta, 2005). Lawrence redefines the three core components of SIT as: categorization, identification and social comparison. She tabulates a number of terms used as self-categorization in 1QS [→47 Serekh haYahad] under the labels of covenant, holiness and perfection. The community thus defines itself in covenantal terms and, as a community seeking to embody the new covenant, strives for spiritual perfection and to be ‘a most holy community’ (1QS 9.6) [→70 Purity and Holiness]. Identification is achieved through group submission to purity rules and the pooling of possessions [→73 Daily Life]. Finally, social comparison occurs frequently in which the community is seen as the true Israel in contrast to ‘the iniquities of the children of Israel’ (1.23). The community thus compares itself favourably to the rest of Israel. Combining SIT with notions of religious virtuosity, Lawrence concludes that ‘The Rule of the Community certainly constructs an elite social
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identity that at base at least believes in the transformation of people into the covenant of God, perfect and holy’ (Lawrence, 2005, p. 97). Jokiranta focuses on self-categorization as an aspect of SIT. As stated above, SIT emphasizes the exaggeration of intra-group similarities; given that individuals do not all share a given set of defining features this is achieved by means of a group prototype. Leadership within a group depends on proximity to this group prototype. Jokiranta argues that the Teacher of Righteousness functions as such a prototype in the Pesharim [→44 Pesharim; 20 Historiography; Revelation]. The Teacher is both persecuted and privileged. The former emphasizes the conflict with the ‘Wicked Priest’ whilst the latter emphasizes his role as chosen by God to teach what is right. This prototypical role suggests that the community perceives itself as persecuted by the dominant out-group (unfaithful Israel), represented prototypically by the Wicked Priest, precisely because it is the bearer of right teaching and is the group chosen by God. Jokiranta’s analysis demonstrates how the community engages in the process of social creativity by the use of a group prototype to compare itself favourably with the wider society. SIT, with its analysis of group identification and group differentiation, serves as a more fruitful social-scientific tool for analysing the Qumran community than the sociology of deviance. The latter usefully draws attention to the social construction of deviance and the use of labels in that process. However, the Qumran community clearly does not perceive itself as deviant but rather as the true, righteous, holy, covenantal community. The labelling of the out-groups that frequently occurs within the literature from Qumran can best be seen, therefore, as examples of social creativity as described by SIT. Further analysis of self-categorization, in-group and out-group prototypes, and how group behavioural norms are generated and inculcated should prove useful avenues of enquiry for future Qumran research using identity theory as an heuristic tool.
Bibliography Esler, P. F. (1998), Galatians. London: Routledge. Esler, P. F. (2003), Conflict and Identity in Romans: The Social Setting of Paul’s Letter. Minneapolis: Fortress. Jokiranta, J. (2005), ‘Qumran – The prototypical teacher in the Qumran Pesharim: A social-identity approach,’ in P. F. Esler (ed), Ancient Israel: The Old Testament in its Social Context. London: SCM , pp. 254–63. Lawrence, L. (2005), ‘ “Men of Perfect Holiness” (1QS 7.20): Social-scientific thoughts on group identity, asceticism and ethical development in the Rule of the Community,’ in J. G. Campbell, W. J. Lyons and L. K. Pietersen (eds), New Directions in Qumran Studies: Proceedings of the Bristol Colloquium on the Dead Sea Scrolls, 8–10 September 2003. London: T&T Clark, pp. 83–100. Tajfel, H. (1978), Differentiation between Social Groups: Studies in the Social Psychology of Intergroup Relations. London: Academic Press. Tajfel, H. and J. C. Turner, (1986), ‘The social identity theory of intergroup conflict,’ in S. Worchel and W. G. Austin (eds), Psychology of Intergroup Relations. Chicago: Nelson-Hall, pp. 7–24.
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Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies Maxine L. Grossman
In his now-classic, if not unproblematic, definition of religion as a cultural system, Clifford Geertz makes the important observation that such a system constructs and shapes culture by ‘formulating conceptions of a general order of existence’ that are given ‘such an aura of factuality’ that the feelings and intentions they generate come to seem ‘uniquely realistic’ (Geertz, 1973, p. 90). Although he has been critiqued for treating religion too much as a conceptual system, Geertz is definitely on to something here. It is precisely in creating a sense of reality – and furthermore, a sense of unique reality – that a religious tradition, a scriptural canon, or even an academic discipline convinces its audience of its – again, unique – legitimacy as bearer, respectively, of truth, doctrine or objective fact. Working at around the same time but in a different intellectual frame, Michel Foucault took this insight one step further, by linking truth explicitly to power. Thus, he argues, ‘the production of discourse is at once controlled, selected, organized and redistributed according to a certain number of procedures’ responsible for containing and constraining the statements that the discourse makes possible (Foucault, 1972, p. 216). One implication of this claim is that any given discourse will have boundaries on truth, such that a particular statement is not merely false within the discourse but is actually outside ‘the true’ entirely (Foucault, 1972, p. 224). Statements that are outside the true are incapable of being asserted in light of the grammar, vocabulary and communicative assumptions of a given discourse, and thus they contribute silently to the maintenance of boundaries on that discourse. We need only consider a man’s use of ‘my husband,’ or a woman’s of ‘my wife’ – which until recently might be understood as either nonsensical, transgressive, or, within certain communities, a statement of insider identity – to understand both how discourses discipline action and thought and also how discourses may change over time on precisely that account. Challenges to the assumptions of a given discourse may come from a variety of sources. The presence of new evidence is the most common stimulant of new views within a given field of study. But new methods, new thought processes and new understandings of familiar evidence (what Kuhn, 1962, might label ‘paradigm shifts’), too, contribute to transformations in a given discipline or its discourse. The evidence of the Dead Sea Scrolls has contributed to profound changes in scholarly understanding, for example, of the text of the Hebrew Bible [→55 Bible]. The primacy of the Masoretic 246
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Text, the fixity of scriptural forms, indeed the shape of the biblical canon itself have all been challenged at the level of definition and primary assumption by the manuscripts of the Scrolls [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies; 25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related; 27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. In this contribution I explore another set of discursive challenges: those provided by scholarly treatments that take into account theoretical approaches sometimes deemed ‘postmodern’ or ‘poststructuralist’ (see especially the groundbreaking work of Newsom, 1990, 1992, 2004; see also, e.g. Campbell, 1995; Grossman, 2002, 2011). A poststructuralist approach inspired in part by Foucault’s understanding of discourse reminds us that Scrolls studies itself is a constructed realm, with its own assumptions and implicit boundaries. From here we may ask, what has the discipline of Dead Sea Scrolls scholarship rendered invisible? How might our academic tools, assumptions and commitments have contributed to a discursive structure that leaves whole areas of study unexplored, because they are unrecognized as areas in the first place? And what might we find in exploring those subjects ‘outside the true’ of contemporary Scrolls scholarship? Foucault’s insights with regard to discourse and dynamics of power fall within the interconnected web of academic approaches to cultural studies that is generally labelled ‘postmodern’. Postmodernism itself is a loose catch-all term, with relevance in art, literature and architecture, but in the context of cultural studies it implies a critique of Enlightenment assumptions about meaning-construction. Postmodern approaches tend to question the possibility of scholarly objectivity and to emphasize dynamics of power at all stages of cultural formation. They further question the notion of a fixed, bounded text (‘the work’), whose meaning lies in its author’s intentions, and may look instead for a more dynamic understanding of textual meaning, unfixed by original intent and capable of endless permutations, in light of audience interpretations and new contextualizations (see Grossman, 2011). Postmodern approaches to scholarship have been faulted as leading down a slippery slope to relativism, the view that all arguments are equally valid, such that no standard of critique or exclusion is permissible. But this is not the case. Even from a postmodern perspective, it is possible to critique an argument as poorly-conceptualized, poorlyarticulated or based on faulty data and problematic assumptions. The problem, from a postmodern perspective, is that even well-thought-out and carefully-stated arguments, grounded in good data and reasonable assumptions, remain implicated in dynamics of power that constrain their capacity to make authoritative or objective claims of whatever sort. Thus, we, as readers and composers of texts, as critics and scholars, find ourselves implicated in an uncomfortable set of realizations: that even objective scholarship retains hidden biases and assumptions; that our personal histories and expectations (including those connected to our experiences of race, religion, gender, sexuality, gender-identity, and ability) have significant impact on our view of the world; and perhaps most uncomfortably, that power – among people, within discursive frames and with respect to claims about universal realities – implicates the things we read, write, think and say.
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Sex, Gender, and Boundaries on Scrolls Discourse A grounded discussion will serve to clarify this treatment of discursive frames. Particularly useful here is the example of how women and men – and the intersecting categories of gender, sex, sexuality and embodiment – have been treated through the history of Scrolls scholarship. Several important studies have traced this history (Schuller, 1999; Crawford, 2003; Ilan, 2011), noting the relative absence of women as a subject of study before the late 1990s (‘That the two components “Women” and “Dead Sea Scrolls” can be discussed together in any meaningful or productive way has not always been as obvious as the title of this essay might suggest.’ [Schuller, 1999, p. 117]) [→73 Daily Life]. Some of the discussions that do pay attention to women or gender have included treatments of sectarian texts that refer to marriage and families, such as the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] and the Rule of the Congregation [→Rule of the Congregation] (Schiffman, 1989, 1994; and esp. Wassen, 2005), as well as studies of female characters and constructions of gender in literary texts, such as Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon; 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] and the ‘Wiles of the Wicked Woman’ (4Q184) [→53 Wiles of the Wicked Woman]. By and large, however, the focus of attention has been on the related questions of marriage versus celibacy and the presence or absence of women at Qumran itself [→72 Forms of Community]. These questions are framed in terms of the evidence of the sectarian rule scrolls [→59 Rules], as well as the classical descriptions of the Essenes [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature] and the archaeology of Qumran and its cemeteries [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. Taken together, this scholarly work has generated a discourse around gender and the Scrolls sectarians – not a ‘consensus view’ of the correct relationship of all this evidence, but rather an understanding of what the questions are, combined with a wide range of views on how those questions should be answered. Like any discourse, this treatment of the evidence privileges certain data points and certain readings of that data; changes in the dominant perspective may happen suddenly or gradually. Thus, a long-dominant view – for example, the argument that the Community Rule reflects evidence for a celibate yahad, whose geographic centre is at Qumran, while the Damascus Document reflects evidence for a network of ‘camps’ of marrying sectarians – may be subject to small tweaks or major challenges, as both evidence and perspectives change (on this, see Collins, 2010). In what follows, I would like to consider a few possibilities for expansion of the margins on this discourse, especially in light of the contributions of a postmodern or poststructuralist feminist critique (Nicholson, 1990). Examples of existing scholarship in this mould include studies of the Scrolls in light of postmodern performance theory (Harkins, 2012), gender constructions (e.g. Aubin, 2001; Wright and Edwards, 2015) and androcentric language (Grossman, 2010). The focus of attention in the present discussion will be on individual identity-formation in light of sectarian group norms (again, see Newsom, 2004), but with a particular emphasis on dynamics of interpersonal connection, intimacy and uniformity in the homosocial settings imagined in the penal code of the Community Rule and the rules of exclusion in the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah].
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The War Scroll and the Community Rule generally assume a homosocial milieu – a single-gender social setting – with particular concerns about norms of order and respect for hierarchies and stability (although on women as potential sectarians, see Grossman, 2010). Sectarian roles are sharply delineated, with an eye to such categories as age, social rank and purity status; acknowledgements of individuality (in behaviour, personality, and the like) appear only occasionally and are subject to rigorous discipline. Underlying this discipline, in ways that normative Scrolls studies have tended to ignore, are anxieties (and social realities?) deserving of further study.
Intimacy and Group Stability in the 1QS Penal Code The penal code of the Community Rule offers a good starting point. This rule text [→59 Rules] envisions a group of individuals who have volunteered to come together as a community – sharing property, knowledge and abilities, and agreeing to function in a closely ordered hierarchical fashion [→73 Daily Life]. In regulating individual behaviour, the text puts a premium on uniformity and consistency; at the same time, it must acknowledge the fact that the sectarians are not robots, and that individuals have frailties that will need to be addressed. The highly specific rules for disciplinary action in the text’s penal code thus create an atmosphere that is mindful of addressing transgression, but of doing so with fairness and according to proper procedure. The text of 1QS differs in sometimes significant ways from the other penal codes to which it is obviously related (see 1QS 6.24–7.25; par. 4Q258 5; 4Q259 1, 2; 4Q261 3, 4a–b, 5a–c, 6a–e; notable differences are visible in the otherwise quite similar penal code in CD 14.20–21; par. 4Q266 10; 4Q269 11; 4Q270 7; see also the parallel penal code in 4Q265 4), and a primary difference lies in the types and degrees of punishment associated with individual transgressions. For this reason, it would be inappropriate to make hard-and-fast generalizations about specific transgressions and punishments. It is possible, however, at least experimentally, to cluster the transgressions found in 1QS by general degrees of severity. The result is provocative in several ways. We may identify roughly four clusters within the penal code: the most serious transgressions, which lead to permanent removal from the group; a second tier of transgressions that result in a state of long-term penance (six months to a year, and in one case a two-year ban that returns the transgressor, effectively, to novice status); less severe infractions with mid-range penalties of a month or a few months; and ‘nuisance’ infractions with punishments in the ten-day range. Each of these clusters has a character of its own. The most dire transgressions, leading to permanent banishment, stand as challenges to the basic authorizing structures of the group, either on the cosmic plane or in the human realm. Thus, speaking the divine name aloud is cause for expulsion, as is any defamation of ‘the Many’ or ‘the foundation of the Yahad’ (1QS 6.27–7.2; 7.16–17). Rebellion against communal rules by a participant of ten years’ standing or more, as well as fraternization with such an apostate, also leads to a permanent ban (1QS 7.22–25; within this category of extreme transgression, parallel texts from the Damascus Document material also include unacceptable sexual behaviour with one’s wife and
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murmuring against the ‘fathers’ – but not the ‘mothers’ – of the congregation, see 4Q267 9 vi 4–5; 4Q270 7 i 12–15; such characters as wives, ‘fathers,’ and ‘mothers’ are notably lacking in the text of the Community Rule). What is remarkable here is the strictness of the standard, which draws firm lines between insiders – those who treat the community and its values with unwavering respect – and outsiders, including not only critics of the group but those who would retain ties to them after their transgression is revealed. The concern about relationship dynamics here is interesting. For a long-term member of the group to transgress its norms suggests a failure of doctrinal orientation; a sectarian who cannot follow the rules after that much practice is clearly no sectarian at all. But I think there is more at work in this statement. ‘Transgression’ of major rules in this case might just as easily imply disagreement with the group’s standards and an attempt to establish an alternate norm on a particular issue. Such transgression by a long-term member is a threat to the stability of the social organization: senior-ranking members have authoritative status over their juniors, which might give them personal moral standing over them as well; at the same time, apostates of a senior rank may have long-lived relationship ties within the group. Thus, rules against fraternization with apostates may reflect awareness of dangers of schism within the group as a whole. To the extent that individuals might conceivably put private relationships above the authority of the group as a whole, this offers a first example of personal connection (intimacy) as a threat to communal stability. Transgressions that lead to long-term penance (six months or a year, with some textual variance and possible ambiguity) appear also to concern threats to group stability and internal relationship bonds: personality clashes, grudge-holding and interpersonal conflicts of the sort that can throw off a group’s equilibrium if allowed to fester. Some of these rules address interpersonal tension (insulting a fellow member knowingly and unjustifiably, 1QS 7.4–5; walking around defaming one’s fellow, 7.15– 16), while others relate specifically to group stability: lying with regard to possessions (of significant concern in a collective setting, 6.24–25), speaking rudely to someone of a higher rank (which creates an atmosphere of disrespect for the established hierarchies, 6.25–27), and defaming anyone ranked as a priest (a threat to hierarchy but also to norms of order framed in cosmic terms, 7.2–3). Again, it is possible to see an emphasis here both on authorizing group structures and on the formation of balanced and nonpreferential relationships between and among individuals. A middle-range category of transgressions includes rules related to negligence (with regard to people and property), as well as transgressions that reflect disrespect while leading to disruption. A one-month penalty is levied, for example, on sectarians who lie down and sleep in the meeting (7.10) or who spit in that setting (7.12–13). Control of seemingly minor behaviours (e.g. interrupting when others are speaking, 7.9–10; gesturing with the left hand, 7.15) with ten-day penalties may also be understood as efforts to maintain order among sectarians and prevent the formation of potentially destabilizing patterns of tension among them. Several of the rules in the penal code are particularly relevant to a discussion of order and intimacy among sectarians. Consider, for example, the rule against audible ‘foolish’ laughter (7.14), which receives a thirty-day punishment. This rule may refer to
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disruptive behaviour within a meeting of the group or merely to a rejection of frivolity in general. In either case, laughter is interesting for its destabilizing quality. ‘Inside jokes’ draw some individuals together while alienating others; even when it does not intend to exclude, laughter in general contributes to irreverence in ways that may challenge hierarchy and authority. Another thirty-day transgression concerns the case of indecent exposure. The text is repetitive here in a way that permits two distinct readings. It may refer to an accidental exposure, a sort of ‘wardrobe malfunction,’ on the part of a sectarian whose clothing is ragged enough that his genitals are accidentally revealed when he gestures with his hand (1QS 7.13–14). However, it also may be read as referring to two separate categories of transgression, one intentional (taking out his ‘hand’ from within his garment) and one inadvertent (related to his wearing ragged clothing that accidentally exposes his genitals; for this rendering, cf., García Martínez and Tigchelaar, 2000, p. 87). Alexander and Vermes argue that the minimal penalty in this case must reflect an inadvertent exposure, since much more severe punishment would be expected for a purposeful exposure of this sort (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, p. 138 n. L. 12). However, the repetitive nature of the passage does permit either reading. A related rule identifies a transgression marked by a much stricter penalty. In 1QS 7.12, the text asserts that anyone who ‘walks around naked in front of his fellow when he is not compelled (to do so)’ will be punished for six months. We should note that this penalty is otherwise associated with transgressions that threaten the most fundamental function and stability of the group (lying to other sectarians, or bearing unjustified animosity toward them, for example). Here again, Alexander and Vermes make an interesting observation, that the term ‘ אנוסcompelled’ ‘expresses strong, even violent physical compulsion. It is hard to envisage a situation where, within the community ( )לפני רעהוa member would be forced to disrobe’ (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, p. 138). The strength of this language (‘compelled’ to be naked) and the severity of its penalty suggest some interesting assumptions about bodily presence in the group, as well as some interesting anxieties about it. Both rules assume the possibility of physical exposure within the group, and the latter ruling even assumes a category of ‘necessary nakedness’ (perhaps connected with changing clothing or immersion for ritual or ordinary washing purposes), and it assumes that men in the group will on occasion be naked in front of one another. However, it attempts to limit such nakedness and to prevent the development of casual attitudes toward bodily exposure. I suspect that what is at stake here is some combination of being, seeing, and doing: participants in the group should not develop a casual attitude toward their own bodily nakedness, but rather should discipline themselves (again, toward a state of uniformity); nor should they be distracted by the presence of other naked people (disrupting their mental focus from attention to matters of communal importance). Nakedness should be for reasons of unavoidable necessity, as Alexander and Vermes indicate, and not merely a sign of casual comfort among friends. And just as nakedness should not be reflective of personal intimacy, so should it not be an excuse or setting for sexual behaviour between sectarians. If laughter is somewhat disruptive in a tightly-knit, disciplined community, then sexuality is infinitely more so. Dynamics of attention, attraction and erotic desire can
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generate a sense of intimacy within small groups (which are often said to be run by the power of unresolved sexual tension), but such dynamics can also lead to frustration, anger, anxiety and conflict, on the part of those who offer or receive undesired attention. Homosocial groups display remarkable diversity in their degree of willingness (or unwillingness) to acknowledge or accept same-sex intimacy. In some social groups, casual sexual interaction may be considered acceptable or may be treated as problematic but easy to overlook. In other settings, particular physical behaviours may be deemed harmless or beneficial (exercising together, for example, or roughhousing playfully), while actions of a more explicitly sexual nature may be treated as unacceptable. In still other settings – and the community envisioned in this penal code seems to fall into this category – the limits on physical interactions may be particularly strict, addressing not only intentional behaviours, but even inadvertent ones. A general truism argues that the presence of laws indicates the presence of the behaviours those laws control. Here I would expand this statement, to suggest that the presence of these particular laws indicates not only behaviour, but even the anxiety about it. Occasional cases of public nakedness and indecent exposure are going to be impossible to prevent in the context of a group of people who live, sleep, and bathe within sight of one another. What the text seeks to constrain, I think, is the potential for destabilization that may result from such incidents, whether in the form of desired and reciprocated erotic interaction, in the form of more ambiguous behaviour (including expressions of desire, ranging from flirtation to harassment), or even in the very minimal form of variety in the personal relationships shared by individual sectarians within the larger group. The Community Rule’s catalogue of transgressions and punishments reflects concern about behaviours that threaten the authority and stability of the group, challenge the atmosphere of respectful decorum, or contribute to imbalance in the relationships of members and the group as a whole. Imbalance, in this context, should be understood as any dynamic that pushes members of the group away from one another – hostility, gossip, expressions of rudeness – but also as any behaviour that inappropriately pushes group members toward one another, by inviting intimacies that go beyond the accepted social norm. The ideal is a balanced state of relationship in which group members treat one another with respect and kindness, while reserving their highest commitment to the group as a whole.
Inclusions and Exclusions A second brief example considers rules of inclusion and exclusion, culminating in a discussion of one such reference in the War Scroll. A number of particular rules of inclusion can be identified in the sectarian scrolls and related literature, and the rationales behind them may vary widely, providing us with another opportunity to think in terms of sectarians as gendered, sexed and embodied actors in a larger social world. A first standard of distinction is grounded in social status. The consumption of the Passover offering is identified in a number of texts as including only adult men, over
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the age of twenty (Jub. 49.17 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]; 11QTa 17.8–9 [→51 Temple Scroll]; 4Q265 3 [→73 Daily Life]). This distinction seems to be a general one, focusing not on personal qualities or ability, but rather on a limited set of objective categories: gender and age. An element of ritual purity is assumed here (in that the offering must be consumed in a state of purity), but there is no indication that women or minors (‘underage youths’) are left out because of an explicitly-identified purity issue [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. Rather, they are simply not ‘adult men.’ A more complicated standard is in place in several of the rule texts, which ban sectarians with visible physical defects from certain public gatherings. The Rule of the Congregation uses language of impurity in the context of banning certain members of the congregation from participation in the assembly: those physically unable to keep upright in the meeting (because of age or illness), those with other bodily injuries or blemishes, the blind, the deaf, the mute (1QS a 2.3–10) [→Rule of the Congregation]. The Damascus Document has a slightly different list for its own prohibition, including the mentally disabled or mentally ill, anyone who is blind, deaf or physically handicapped, and underage youths (CD 15.16, 4Q266 8 i 6–9) [→35 Damascus Document]. Ritual purity (literal, metaphorical, or both) may lie behind these statements, but Aharon Shemesh (Shemesh, 1997) has demonstrated that the logic behind these rules goes beyond purity alone. It concerns physical perfection and wholeness, in ways that expand on scriptural laws related to qualifications for priestly service (Lev. 21.18–23). A physically imperfect priest is an insult to God, according to Lev. 21.23, and his presence profanes the sacred space (Shemesh, 1997, pp. 188–9). Similarly, a physically imperfect sectarian is an insult to the ‘holy angels’ in the midst of the congregation (1QS a 2.8–9; 4Q266 8 i 9). Exclusions in these two rule texts thus operate on several levels at once. Primary imperfection, as an insult to the divine, renders a member of the congregation ineligible for participation in public assembly. Incapacity is also at issue here, framed primarily in physical terms in the Rule of the Congregation (inability to sit upright, etc.), and in mental terms (related to both intelligence and mental health) in the Damascus Document. In this context, the Damascus Document’s exclusion of the ‘underage youth’ (who is not mentioned in the relevant passage of the Rule of the Congregation) is interesting. The Damascus Document passage may reflect the specific view that minors lack the capacity to participate in the group, or it may reflect a more generic exclusion related to age-status; in either case, it is interesting to see that women are not explicitly excluded in this context where minors are. The absence of women and minors from the Rule of the Congregation passage may reflect that passage’s immediate interest in perfection and not participation, or it too may have larger implications (Schuller, 1999, pp. 133–4). One final set of texts makes mention of exclusions, and it is here that I want to push again on the boundaries of Scrolls studies discourse, because I think they reflect an additional sort of logic that has not yet been articulated. In the War Scroll, discussions of categories of participants include extensive references to age-role behaviour (including listings for men aged forty to fifty years old, aged fifty to sixty, and aged twenty-five to thirty; 1QM 7.1–3). We also find the familiar statement excluding
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certain men from participation; among these are the physically handicapped, the blind and those with a permanent blemish of the flesh (7.4–5). The participants in the war are explicitly said to be ‘perfect in spirit and in body’ (7.5), and explicit references to purity are found here. Three short but significant statements also appear in this text. The first is that ‘no underage youth or woman shall come into the (war) camps’ (7.3). The second is that on the day of battle, no man who has not cleansed himself of his ‘fount’ or ‘spring’ (mqwr) may go out in battle, on account of the presence of the angels (7.5–6) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. And the third is that there will be a significant distance (2,000 cubits) between the camps and the latrine (‘place of the hand’) so that no ‘immodest nakedness’ (ʿrwt dbr rʿ) will be seen around the camps (7.6–7). Unlike the other exclusion texts, whose primary logic seems to reflect either categories of social status (age, gender) or categories of imperfection, with only underlying (but certainly not absent) concerns about purity, this War Scroll passage seems concerned about purity in a central way. True, the passage under discussion begins with attention to status markers (the age ranges for the particular tasks of war), but after the reference to women and boys, the focus of the text shifts directly to the interwoven topics of imperfection and impurity. As in the penal code of the Community Rule, discussed above, this passage assumes particular social/physical realities: all men will have need of a latrine; some men might experience a seminal emission. The text also puts into place as many controls as possible: the latrine will be located at the periphery of occupied space. Men who have experienced seminal emissions will not be permitted to participate in battle. And women and underage youths are not permitted in the camp. What social realities – and what social anxieties – might these passages imply? The reference to the latrine is specific in its treatment: it seems to express concern not so much about questions of hygiene or disgust with regard to bodily elimination, but rather about nakedness and immodesty, very much on par with our examples from the Community Rule. Here again we see dual concerns about being naked within sight of others and about seeing others in a naked state. The exclusion of men who are ritually impure due to a seminal emission makes obvious sense in terms of ritual purity, although the explanation of the text – that angels are present – adds onto this by reintroducing the element of offence and imperfection in the face of (emissaries of) the divine. Lastly, how should we understand the ban on women and youths? A general concern about categories of age and gender may be in place here (as in the case of the Passover sacrifice). But the text’s statements with regard to nakedness, immodesty and seminal emissions suggest that the most important problems here concern sexuality. The dangers of viewing nakedness, being seen naked, or potentially being exposed to some ‘immodest nakedness’ (ʿrwt dbr rʿ ) relate directly to the possibility that the men of the camp, having seen these women and youths, will either have sex with them or be stimulated by their mere presence to impurifying sexual emissions. As in the case of the penal codes, then, this passage expresses an awareness of the power of homoerotic desire and same-sex intimacy, but here joined by a parallel anxiety about men’s desire for and sexual intimacy with potential female partners, as well. Exclusion of both
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women and youths in this context is not only a matter of ‘category’ exclusion or a generalized concern about ritual purity, but more importantly a concern about the destabilizing power of sexual desire in its varied manifestations.
Conclusions Much of the analysis offered above addresses familiar textual evidence, which already plays a significant role within the discourse of Qumran studies. Neither the penal codes nor the texts of exclusion are new data points within a discussion of the Scrolls sectarians. But focused attention to the binary distinction between marriage and celibacy – both understood in largely heteronormative terms – has made it difficult to see, and draw attention to, other contexts for understanding sexuality and sexual desire in these texts. By shifting attention away from those standard questions and by introducing other categories of analysis, including what might be labelled an ‘erotics of sectarian identity’, I hope simultaneously to expand certain fields of discussion within scrolls studies and to point toward what have been certain gaps in the field. Further attention to these questions, in light of such approaches as masculinity studies, attention to androcentric language, queer theory, performance studies and the like, ideally will contribute to future expansions of ‘the true’ as it relates to the study of ancient Jewish sectarianism [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism] and the Dead Sea Scrolls.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. and G. Vermes (1998), Qumran Cave 4, XIX: Serekh Ha-Yah.ad and Two Related Texts. DJD 26. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Aubin, M. (2001), ‘ “She is the beginning of all the ways of perversity:” Femininity and metaphor in 4Q184,’ Women in Judaism: A Multidisciplinary e-Journal 2:2, 1–23 Campbell, J. G. (1995), The Use of Scripture in the Damascus Document 1–8, 19–20. Berlin: de Gruyter. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Crawford, S. W. (2003), ‘Not according to rule: Women, the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran,’ in S. M. Paul, et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. Leiden: Brill, pp. 127–50. Foucault, M. (1972), ‘Appendix: The discourse on language,’ in idem, The Archaeology of Knowledge and the Discourse on Language. New York: Pantheon Books, pp. 215–37. García Martínez, F. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (2000), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 Vols. Leiden: Brill. Geertz, C. (1973), ‘Religion as a cultural system,’ in idem, The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books, pp. 87–125. Grossman, M. L. (2002), Reading for History in the Damascus Document: A Methodological Study. STDJ 45. Leiden: Brill. Grossman, M. L. (2010), ‘Rethinking gender in the Community Rule: An experiment in sociology,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture. STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 497–512.
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Grossman, M. L. (2011), ‘Roland Barthes and the Teacher of Righteousness: The death of the author of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. J. Collins and T. Lim (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 709–22. Harkins, A. K. (2012), Reading with an ‘I’ to the Heavens: Looking at the Qumran Hodayot through the Lens of Visionary Traditions. Ekstasis 3. Berlin: de Gruyter. Ilan, T. (2011), ‘Reading for Women in 1QS a (Serekh ha-Edah),’ in Armin Lange, Emanuel Tov, and Matthias Weigold (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures. VTS up 140. Leiden: Brill, 61–76. Kuhn, T. (1962), The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Newsom, C. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Newsom, C. (1990), ‘Apocalyptic and the discourse of the Qumran community,’ JNES , 49, 135–44. Newsom, C. (1992), ‘The case of the blinking I: Discourse of the self at Qumran,’ in V. L. Wimbush (ed.), Semeia 57: Discursive Formations, Ascetic Piety and the Interpretation of Early Christian Literature. Atlanta: SBL , pp. 13–23. Nicholson, L. J. (ed.) (1990), Feminism/Postmodernism. London: Routledge. Schiffman, L. H. (1989), The Eschatological Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls: A Study of the Rule of the Congregation. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Schiffman, L. H. (1994), Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of Judaism, the Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society. Schuller, E. (1999), ‘Women in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. Flint and J. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, II : 117–44. Shemesh, Aharon (1997), ‘ “The Holy Angels Are in Their Council”: The Exclusion of Deformed Persons from Holy Places in Qumranic and Rabbinic Literature,’ DSD 4, 179–206. Wassen, C. (2005), Women in the Damascus Document. AcBib 21. Atlanta: SBL . Wright, B. G. and S. M. Edwards (2015), ‘ “She undid him with the beauty of her face” (Jdt. 16.6): Reading women’s bodies in Early Jewish literature,’ in G. Xeravits (ed.), Religion and the Female Body in the Ancient East Mediterranean. DCLS 28. Berlin: de Gruyter, pp. 73–108.
Part Four
Key Texts
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Aramaic Job David Shepherd
Aramaic Job is represented by two fragmentary manuscripts from Qumran: 4Q157 and 11Q10. While the fragments of 4Q157 contain only a few verses of Job 3–5 (Milik et al., 1977), 11Q10 preserves a translation of much of the dialogues of Job 17.14–36.3 on a collection of over thirty leather fragments, and the better part of Job 37.10–42.11 on a single roll (García Martínez, Tigchelaar and van der Woude, 1998) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. The latter’s omission of a translation of 42.3 and the appearance of 40.5 in its place (11Q10 38.5–6) may be the result of a fragmentary Vorlage. It is unclear whether the final verses found in the Hebrew (42.12–17) and perhaps even the longer epilogue contained in the LXX Job (and attributed by it to a ‘Syriac’ tradition) were omitted by 11Q10, missing from its Vorlage, or belonged to a part of the manuscripts which has now perished. Given their respective provenances in Caves 4 and 11 and differences of orthography (see Vasholz, 1982), 4Q157 and 11Q10 likely reflect two distinct Aramaic versions of Job, though the orthography of 4Q157 is similar to that of Aramaic version of Leviticus from Cave 4 (4Q156) (Milik et al., 1977). The Aramaic of 11Q10 is commonly agreed to be older than the Aramaic of the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon], but less archaic than that of the biblical book of Daniel [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. While 11Q10 may thus have been produced as early as the third century bce , paleographic analysis (Zuckerman, 1987) and a selection of later linguistic traits (Kaufman, 1973) may indicate an origin nearer to the turn of the era when the extant manuscript appears to have been copied in a Herodian hand. Apart from furnishing a probable terminus ad quem of 70 ce , the Qumran provenance of the fragments points toward their Palestinian origin. The Cave 11 translator’s occasional willingness to depart from his Hebrew source may be seen in his prosaic preference for ‘the morning stars’ of Job 38.7 (11Q10 30.4–5) to ‘shine’ (Aram.) rather than ‘sing’ (Heb.) and in his theological preference for ‘all the angels of God’ (Aram.) rather than ‘all the sons of God’ (Heb.) to shout for joy – a notion which seems also to have discomfited both the Aramaic translators of Peshitta Job and the Targum of Job. In general, however, the bulk of the translator’s divergences from his source may be safely attributed to the demands of an idiomatic Aramaic on the one hand and Job’s notoriously difficult Hebrew text on the other (Shepherd, 2004). There can be little doubt that the Qumran texts’ language, provenance and occasional deviations from the Hebrew have contributed to their classification as ‘targum’. Indeed, 259
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the Cave 11 text does employ memra (‘word’), a term often associated with the targums, but its use in translating Job 36.32 and 39.27 is quite unlike that found in the Aramaic version of Job from Qumran Cave 11 (11Q10). Moreover, the absence of expansions typical of the rabbinic targums and the apparent omission and transposition of elements of the Hebrew source text in 11Q10’s translation, suggest that in terms of translation approach, the Qumran Aramaic version of Job’s primary affinity lies with Peshitta Job from the Syriac tradition (Shepherd, 2004). Because the Cave 4 and Cave 11 fragments do not translate the same portion of the Hebrew text of Job, synoptic comparison is not possible. However, the supplying of the Aramaic consecutive conjunction on two occasions in 4Q157’s meagre fragments where it is not attested in the MT finds a clear correspondence in 11Q10, where the same conjunction is regularly supplied for linguistic/stylistic purposes even when unprompted by the Hebrew (Shepherd, 2008). Such a practice offers a marked contrast to the targums of the rabbinic tradition which are typically scrupulous in their reproduction of the minutiae of their Hebrew source. Given their date, provenance and distinctive character vis-à-vis the targums, it seems clear that 11Q10 (11QarJob) and 4Q157 (4QarJob) circulated independently from the targums and, on the basis of datable manuscripts, probably considerably earlier. While the Qumran Aramaic versions stand outside (and thus do not belong to) the history of the classical targum tradition per se, such a conclusion invites speculation that these Qumran Aramaic versions of Job are to be identified with certain ‘translations of Job’ remembered by the Rabbis (t. Šabb. 13.2; cf. b. Šabb. 115a; y. Šabb. 16.1) in connection with Rabban Gamaliel and his grandson of the same name, who gave orders to remove one or more translations of Job from circulation. While the reasons for this removal are not given, it is not impossible that these translations of Job were rejected by successive generations of Rabbis who objected to Aramaic translations which, like those found at Qumran, lacked both the targum’s interpretative expansions, but also its highly literal representation of the Hebrew text.
Bibliography García Martínez, F., E. J. C. Tigchelaar, and A. S. van der Woude (1998), Qumran Cave 11, DJD 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Kaufman, S. (1973), ‘The Job targum from Qumran,’ JAOS 93, 317–27. Milik, J. T. et al. (1977), Qumran Grotte 4, II: Tefillin, Mezuzot et Targums (4Q128–157). DJD 6. Oxford: Clarendon. Shepherd, D. J. (2004), Targum and Translation: A Reconsideration of the Qumran Aramaic Version of Job. Assen: Van Gorcum. Shepherd, D. J. (2008), ‘What’s in a name? Targum and taxonomy in Cave 4 at Qumran,’ JSP 17, 189–206. Vasholz, R. I. (1982), ‘4Q Targum Job vs. 11Q Targum Job,’ RevQ 11, 109. Zuckerman, B. (1987), ‘The date of 11Q Targum Job: A paleographic consideration of its Vorlage,’ JSP 1, 57–78.
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Aramaic Levi Vered Hillel
‘. . . he who learns wisdom will (attain) glory through it’ (ALD 13.5)
Aramaic Levi Document (ALD ) exalts Levi as the ideal priest, ruler and sage, who teaches his children, and exhorts them to pass on the priestly and sapiential knowledge transmitted to him from Isaac (ALD 5.8) through Abraham (ALD 10.3, 10) and ultimately from the antediluvian Book of Noah (ALD 10.10) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. ALD is a first-person, didactic narrative that recounts the life and activities of Levi drawn exegetically from Genesis chapters 34, 35 and 37 and from extrabiblical material, as well as from wisdom principles and scribal instruction pertinent to Levitical training. ALD can be separated into three major structural segments that resemble the macro structure of a testament in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs: (1) past – Levi’s life story; (2) present – cultic and ethical education of Levi and his descendants; and (3) future – prediction of the future destiny of the Levitical priesthood. ALD is a Jewish pseudepigraphon [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other] belonging to Second Temple Period literature that has been dated from the early Hellenistic period (Drawnel, 2004, pp. 63–75) and the late third/early second century bce (Greenfield, Stone and Eshel, 2004, pp. 19–20), to the mid-second century ce (Kugel, 2007, p. 312). ALD is written in good literary Aramaic and contains Hebraisms and other loan words [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. The extant manuscript evidence of ALD is quite fragmentary; no single manuscript preserves the entire text. Beyond of the ancient fragments found at Qumran the earliest manuscripts are from the Cairo Geniza, now in Cambridge (T.S. 16, fol. 94), Oxford (Bodleian Heb. C. 27, fol. 56), and Manchester (P1185). Fragments of seven manuscripts were found among the Qumran writings (1QL evi [1Q21]; 4QL evia-f [4Q213–214b]) and one possible citation of ALD 6.3 is found in the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document]. One small fragment covering ALD 12.6–9 is preserved in Syriac, and extracts from a Greek translation of the Aramaic Levi Document are preserved in Athos, Koutloumous, cod. 39 (catalogue #3108). Two additional citations attributed to Levi are preserved in the writings of Ammonas, a fourth-century ce monk. The fragmentary state of the document, and particularly the missing beginning and ending of the composition, preclude definitive decisions about its organization and 261
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genre. Reconstruction of the beginning of the composition has been advanced by the discovery that Manchester P1185 belongs to the same folio as the broken columns a and b of the Cambridge fragment, thereby providing the contextual narration of the destruction of Shechem by Levi and Simon in revenge for the rape of Dinah. This identification coupled with further internal evidence (Greenfield, Stone and Eshel, 2004, pp. 11–17) and comparison with the Greek Testament of Levi (TL evi) occasions a reconstructed sequence as follows: the Shechem incident, the prayer of Levi, his travels and vision(s). The order of the main body of the text is confirmed by overlapping sequential texts from the Geniza and the Athos manuscript. This material covers Levi’s priesthood, blessing and instruction, his priestly teaching on purity and sacrifices, including the weights and measures of wood, salt, fine flour, oil, wine and frankincense, midrashim of the names of his offspring, and a wisdom poem. However, the fragments comprising the beginning of the composition are riddled with lacunae and contain very little overlapping material. Traditionally, the Greek Testament of Levi in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs has been heavily relied upon to reconstruct the fragmented text and establish the order of events. The provenance of ALD remains unknown; the document contains no direct indications of its origin. Nevertheless, characteristics of the author or group that produced the composition can be teased out from the document. The centrality of the Levitical priesthood, the emphasis on the purity of the Levitical line and its descent, as well as on the proper transmission of priestly instruction indicate that the composer(s) belonged to a priestly group. ALD employs a solar calendar [→62 Calendars] similar to that of 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], Jubilees and Qumran writings, but without the polemics. The document also declares definite ideas about the two spirits, demonology and apotropaic prayers [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination; 61 Liturgical Texts]. Further special features of ALD are the paradigmatic role assigned to Joseph as the wise scribe who taught wisdom and scribal practices and who was exalted to royal status [→63 Wisdom]. The metrological knowledge (ALD 7.1–9.8) resembles methods attested in Babylonian scribal education (Drawnel, 2004, pp. 93–6) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. The presence of these themes, together with the missing beginning and ending of the composition, also obfuscate the assessment of the genre of ALD. Though ALD resembles wisdom and testamentary literature, it cannot be classified as such. The document’s name migration from ‘Aramaic Testament of Levi,’ to ‘Aramaic Levi’ to its generally accepted name ‘Aramaic Levi Document’ demonstrates this ambiguity. Nonetheless, ALD was influential in contemporary Jewish and in some Christian circles.
Bibliography Bohak, G. (2013), ‘A new Geniza fragment of the Aramaic Levi Document,’ in P. S. Alexander and R. Smithuis (eds), From Cairo to Manchester: Studies in the Rylands Genizah Fragments. Oxford: OUP, pp. 101–14. Drawnel, H. (2004). An Aramaic Wisdom Text from Qumran: A New Interpretation of the Levi Document. JSJS up 86. Leiden: Brill.
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Greenfield, J., M. E. Stone, and E. Eshel (2004), The Aramaic Levi Document: Edition, Translation, Commentary. SVTP 19. Leiden: Brill. Kugel, J. (2007), ‘How old is the Aramaic Levi Document?,’ DSD 14, 291–312. Kugler, R. (1996). From Patriarch to Priest: The Levi-Priestly Tradition From Aramaic Levi to Testament of Levi. SBLEJL 9. Atlanta: Scholars Press.
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Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related Texts Katell Berthelot
Writings are only ever authoritative for a particular community or society. Here we shall deal with the authoritativeness of the Torah (and related texts) within the Yahad and the wider movement of which it was a part, keeping in mind that the only evidence we have is the collection of scrolls found at Qumran, the great majority of which did not originate within a single community [→72 Forms of Community]. Still, even those scrolls that were not composed by members of the communities reflected in the texts were probably valued by them in one way or another. The issue of authority is much wider than that of canon, which shall not concern us here. Some of the writings which were authoritative within the circles behind the Dead Sea Scrolls did not make their way into the canon of the Hebrew Bible [→55 Bible], whereas several books that belong to the canon do not seem to have been particularly popular or authoritative at Qumran. The two issues, though interrelated, are nevertheless distinct. The criteria relevant to assess a text’s ‘authoritativeness’ are as follows: (1) Divine revelation [→66 Revelation]. At Qumran we are dealing nearly exclusively with religious compositions, whose most obvious source of authoritativeness lay in the connection they could claim to a divine revelation, not only at Sinai but at different times and places. The patriarchs [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] had been granted divine revelations too, and so had prophetic figures later on. As far as the Dead Sea Scrolls are concerned, antiquity – the claim that a tradition is ancient or ancestral – seems to tally with the idea of divine revelation to a great extent (thus differing from the way Greeks valued antiquity), even if a renewed revelation could still be received through an inspired intermediary in the Second Temple Period. (2) Inspired author(s). This point logically follows from the preceding one. God’s revelation at Sinai, for instance, had to be mediated through Moses, who became an authoritative voice himself – hence the notion of pseudepigraphy which connects an author’s own theological or halakhic views to an authoritative figure of the past. In the Qumran texts, the Teacher [→20 Historiography], who may have seen himself as an heir to Moses, was certainly considered an inspired character, whether as an author (of the Hodayot for instance) or as an interpreter (Brooke, 2010, p. 48) [→37 Hodayot; 44 Pesharim; 66 Revelation]. In all cases, the authority of an inspired figure comes from the ability to receive, grasp or interpret divine revelation(s). 264
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(3) Sponsorship by groups or individuals in positions of authority (e.g. priests, scribes). Texts, especially legal ones, become authoritative only insofar as a group of people have the power to promote their study and, in some cases, put them into practice. (4) Influence on other works. A text’s authoritativeness generally results in the text being quoted, paraphrased, alluded to, rewritten, translated or commented upon [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. The new compositions gain authority through their relationship to a more ancient, authoritative work. Simultaneously, the older text gains authority precisely through this process of literary expansion in other works (Brooke, 2005). (5) Number of copies. Although partly hazardous and problematic to interpret, the number of copies found at Qumran nevertheless represents an interesting clue concerning the popularity a given book may have enjoyed within the communities reflected in the Qumran literature. Not all of these criteria are applicable in every case, and taken separately they do not all represent conclusive proof of authoritativeness. However, all of them may shed light on a text’s authoritativeness. Let us examine how they apply to the Torah and related works. First, the following question must be addressed: When we speak about Torah at Qumran, what are we talking about: the Pentateuch as we know it, or a different, possibly wider collection of writings? At Qumran there is evidence pointing to the circulation of the Pentateuch already in the second to first century bce , although we cannot exclude the possibility that other books were included in the entity called ‘Torah.’ The expression ‘the book of the Law’ may refer to the Pentateuch as a whole rather than just to Deuteronomy (see for instance CD 5.2 or 11QTa 56.4), but it remains imprecise. The reference in CD 7.15 to ‘the books of the Law’ is vague too. The expression ‘the five books’ found in 1QL iturgical Text A (1Q30) 1 4 provides an interesting piece of evidence and should probably be related to the Torah, but the context is unclear [→61 Liturgical Texts]. Finally, the existence of manuscripts containing two books one after the other (at least 4QG en–Exoda, 4QpaleoGen–Exodl, 4QE xodb [with Gen], 4QE xod–Levf and 4QL ev–Numa) is a valuable clue to the emergence of a collection including Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy [→55 Bible]. We shall assume here that the Torah consisted of the five books of the Pentateuch, from Genesis to Deuteronomy. Whereas Jubilees, the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] and other works participating in the ‘Sinai discourse’ probably enjoyed some kind of authority as well, they were not considered books of the Torah, but rather related works complementing the Torah (see Najman, 2003, pp. 41–69; Lim, 2010). That the five books of the Pentateuch enjoyed great authority in the Qumran collection is beyond doubt. This authoritativeness obviously had to do with the attribution of these five books to Moses and with the connection to the revelation at Sinai, which also implied that they represented very ancient, ancestral traditions. Moreover, many copies of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy have been found at Qumran, and these books are frequently quoted, paraphrased or
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rewritten in other compositions. The legal sections of the Torah, in particular, are referred to and interpreted in several compositions produced by the Qumran movement or the priestly milieu from which it emerged. The book of Genesis was very popular too; although no quotations have been identified (VanderKam, 1998, p. 395). The great number of works found at Qumran that refer to Genesis in one way or another is striking and shows that it enjoyed an authoritative status. The list of works related to the collection Gen.–Deut. is sizeable. With reference to Genesis in particular, one may list the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]; 1QNoah (1Q19– 19bis); apocryphal David? (2Q22 olim Narrative and Poetic Composition?); 3QTJudah (3Q7); Ages of Creation A–B (4Q180–181); 4QNaphtali (4Q215); 4QE xercitium Calami A (4Q234); Commentary on Genesis (4Q252–254a) [→33 Commentaries on Genesis]; Meditation on Creation (4Q303–305); Prayer of Enosh (4Q369); Admonition on the Flood (4Q370); Narrative and Poetic Composition (4Q371–373); Exposition on the Patriarchs (4Q464); Text Concerning Rachel and Joseph (4Q474); Words of Michael (4Q529); Birth of Noah (4Q534–536); TJacob? (4Q537); TJudah (4Q538); TJ oseph (4Q539); Levi Apocryphon (4Q540–541); TQ ahat (4Q542); Text Mentioning the Flood (4Q577), as well as the Enochic literature [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], the Book of Giants and Aramaic Levi [→24 Aramaic Levi], even if several of these compositions are only loosely based on Genesis. Other works are sometimes quoted or referred to in these writings, but most of them are primarily connected with Genesis and its authority conferring figures (such as the patriarchs) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. Among the compositions that are related to Gen.–Deut., some works gained an authoritative status too. Let us look at three compositions frequently discussed in that respect, the ‘Reworked Pentateuch’ manuscripts, Jubilees and the Temple Scroll (1 Enoch has its starting point in Genesis, but it represents a wholly different composition, not dependent upon Genesis, and the issue of its authority shall therefore be addressed separately). As far as the ‘Reworked Pentateuch’ manuscripts are concerned, the question is both complicated and simple: if these manuscripts, which should be treated not as a single composition but rather as representing five similar but distinct works, are not biblical manuscripts but rather interpretative works, then we have no evidence that they enjoyed a particularly authoritative status at Qumran. If, however, they are to be perceived as biblical manuscripts, as most scholars now agree, then they were probably as authoritative as the Torah itself, since authoritativeness was not related to the type of text (proto-Masoretic, proto-Samaritan, etc.) but to the book itself. Jubilees undoubtedly represents the best example of a composition related to the Torah and enjoying an authoritative status at Qumran. First, its authority derives from the way it presents itself: a divine revelation to Moses at Sinai through the mediation of an angel [→66 Revelation]. Second, CD 16.1–3 refers to Jubilees in a way that implies its authoritativeness (cf. also Text with a Citation of Jubilees [4Q228] 1 i 9 though there the full title is missing). Jubilees also inspired new compositions, such as the texts entitled Pseudo-Jubilees (4Q225–228), as well as Miscellaneous Rules (4Q265) and some sections of 1QS (so Shemesh, 2009) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. Moreover, Jubilees’ halakhic views [→58 Halakhah], particularly in matters of calendar [→62 Calendars], were influential and even binding within the movement behind the Scrolls. Finally, at
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least fifteen copies of the work have been found, which comes close to the number of copies of Exodus for instance (seventeen). The case of the Temple Scroll is different. The book itself lays claim to an authoritative status, since it presents itself as the very words of God to Moses on Sinai, and refers to itself as ‘this Torah’ (11QTa 50.5–9, 17; 56.20–21) in a way that is reminiscent of Deuteronomy. The fact that we have a few copies of it at Qumran, including the carefully copied manuscript from Cave 11, probably indicates that the work was valued by the members of the communities associated with the texts. There are similarities between ‘Reworked Pentateuchc’ (4Q365) 23 and 11QTa, as well as between the latter and 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah], but they do not necessarily indicate that the Temple Scroll influenced the other works; the similarities may rather be explained by common traditions. We therefore lack clear examples of works that would quote or rewrite the Temple Scroll. Nevertheless, the book may have been considered an authoritative supplement to the Torah, deriving its authority mainly from its close connection with the books of Moses and from its own claim to consist of the revealed words of God (VanderKam, 1998, p. 388). Other writings, such as 4QMMT and the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document], can be considered related to the Torah insofar as they contain halakhic sections which may themselves represent earlier compositions integrated into these works at a later stage (see Hempel, 1998). They must have been seen as authoritative at Qumran, even if the degree of their authority was perhaps inferior to that ascribed to the Torah. Their halakhic teachings were certainly binding on the members of the community and the wider movement from which it emerged, and the authors of this material were in all probability seen as inspired teachers and interpreters who produced a kind of revelatory exegesis of the Torah. 4QMMT has been found in six, seven or even eight copies (depending on the identification of certain fragments and of the tentatively identified copy of MMT in cryptic script 4QcryptA MMT g? [4Q313]) and was in any case extensively copied, as was the Damascus Document (with ten copies attested at Qumran). Other halakhic compositions at Qumran, such as Halakha A (4Q251) [→58 Halakhah], may also have been considered authoritative as inspired or revelatory exegesis of the Torah, although the fragmentary state of the manuscripts does not permit definitive conclusions. An exegetical work that clearly distinguished between the ‘biblical’ passage and its commentary such as the Pesharim could also claim to be authoritative [→44 Pesharim], even if its authority conferring strategy differed substantially from that of the Temple Scroll or other works that wove the ‘biblical’ texts and their interpretations into an indistinct whole. Within the communities reflected in the texts several compositions related to the Torah enjoyed different levels of authoritativeness, mainly because of their proclaimed connections with the revelation at Sinai and because they were the result of the exegetical activity of the priests associated with the foundation and leadership of the movement [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Not long after Qumran was destroyed [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], a different Torah-related work, the Mishnah, would become authoritative within rabbinic Judaism. Unlike 4QMMT or CD, which never became ‘Scripture’ or ‘Bible,’ the Mishnah, however, would eventually become ‘Scripture,’ not as part of the written Torah but as oral Law.
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Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘Between authority and canon: The significance of reworking the Bible for understanding the canonical process,’ in E. G. Chazon (ed.), Reworking the Bible. Apocryphal and Related Texts at Qumran. Leiden: Brill, pp. 85–104. Brooke, George J. (2010), ‘The “apocalyptic” community, the matrix of the Teacher and rewriting scripture,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, 37–53. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition, and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill. Lim, T. H. (2010), ‘Authoritative scriptures and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 303–22. Najman, H. (2003), Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism. Leiden: Brill. Popović, M. (ed.) (2010), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. Leiden: Brill. Shemesh, A. (2009), ‘4Q265 and the authoritative status of Jubilees at Qumran,’ in G. Boccaccini and G. Ibba (eds), Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 247–60. Shemesh, A. and C. Werman (2003), ‘Halakhah at Qumran: Genre and authority,’ DSD 10, 104–29. Ulrich, E. C. (2000), ‘The Qumran biblical scrolls: The Scriptures of Late Second Temple Judaism,’ in T. H. Lim (ed), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Their Historical Context. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, pp. 67–87. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), ‘Authoritative literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 5, 382–402.
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Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related Texts Roman Vielhauer
Prophets and the books that were transmitted in their names derive their authority from their claim to transmit the word of God. It is against this background that – alongside the Torah [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] – ‘the books of the prophets’ were also regarded as authoritative by the communities behind the Dead Sea Scrolls and the wider movement of which they were a part (cf. CD 7.17–18 [→35 Damascus Document]; 4QMMT C 10 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]). However, the Scrolls do not identify exactly which books belong to this category of authoritative prophetic works. It is, moreover, anachronistic to retroject the later category of ‘prophets’ to the Second Temple Period. Given that the authoritative status of a given book can vary at different times and in different communities, it is necessary to begin by identifying pointers in the Dead Sea Scrolls that suggest a group of authoritative prophetic works. An initial, if rather vague, clue is the number of copies of a given book that have survived. A more solid foundation are instances where the scrolls refer more or less explicitly to particular books as authoritative by way of citations, commentaries (such as pesharim [→44 Pesharim]) or a process of rewriting (cf. VanderKam, 1998; Brooke, 2005; Lim, 2010 [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]). On that basis Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and the Twelve emerge as authoritative works in the first place. The number of preserved copies for the book of Isaiah is particularly remarkable (twenty-one copies from Qumran plus MurIsa from Muraba‘at [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview] and a further copy of unknown provenance XI sa). Jeremiah and Ezekiel (six copies from Qumran respectively, an unprovenanced copy XJ er and a Masada manuscript, MasEzek) and the Twelve (eight to nine Qumran copies as well as MurXII und 8H·evXII gr [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]) are also well represented even if we cannot be sure as to their authoritative status. More telling are cases where a prophetic book is cited as an authoritative text, the subject of commentary or the object of rewriting. Here the following picture emerges: explicit scriptural quotations are attested for Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and, among the Twelve, for Hosea, Joel, Amos, Micah, Nahum, Zechariah and Malachi (cf. the list provided in VanderKam, 1998, further citations are found in the Damascus Document for Joel [4Q266 11 4–5 par. 4Q269 16 2 par. 4Q270 7 i 18–19] and Nahum [CD 9.5]). Pesher-type commentaries are preserved for Isaiah (3Q4, 4Q161–165), 269
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Hosea (4Q166–167), Micah (1Q14, 4Q168), Nahum (4Q169), Habakkuk (1QpHab), Zephaniah (1Q15, 4Q170) and, possibly, Malachi (4Q253a, 5Q10) [→44 Pesharim]. We come across rewritten compositions relating to Jeremiah (4QApocryphon of Jeremiah A–C, 7QpapEpistle of Jeremiah gr) and Ezekiel (4QPseudo-Ezekiela-e). The resulting picture sketched above indicates that the preserved Scrolls do not preserve citations, commentary or rewritten literature relating to Obadiah, Jonah or Haggai. This lack of evidence should not tempt us to raise doubts about the authoritative status of these works. Thus, Obadiah is identified in Non-Canonical Psalms A (4Q380) 1 ii 8 [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 60 Poetry and Hymns] as the author of a psalm although it remains unclear whether the reference is to the prophet or the Obadiah who according to 1 Kings 18 served as head of Ahab’s royal household or, indeed, both. A decisive body of evidence are several manuscripts transmitting the twelve minor prophets as a collection among the Dead Sea Scrolls (4QXIIc.g, MurXII , possible also 4QXII b.d.e, 8H·evXII gr). If they were not already considered a unity (cf. Sir 49.10) the books would have enjoyed authoritative status by virtue of forming part of such a scroll of the Twelve[→55 Bible]. Alongside the traditional prophetic books dealt with above Daniel appears to have been considered as another authoritative prophetic book by the movement associated with the scrolls from Qumran. Thus, 4QF lorilegium (4Q174) 1–3 ii 3 contains an explicit reference to Daniel the prophet in the introduction to a quotation. Moreover, the eight copies of Daniel from Qumran (plus XpaleoDan?, XD an, and XpapDan) demonstrate that Daniel is more amply attested than either Jeremiah or Ezekiel [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 55 Bible]. However, the Scrolls have not revealed any Daniel pesharim. It is uncertain, moreover, whether the additional Aramaic Daniel literature known only from Qumran (4Q242–246; 4Q552–553) presupposed the canonical book [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. In addition, the Psalter was clearly considered a prophetically inspired collection by the tradents of the Qumran Scrolls [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. This is suggested by the reference in 11QPsa 27.11 to David’s prophetic gifts and the fact the Scrolls revealed three pesharim on the Psalms (1Q16, 4Q171, 4Q173) – a form of commentary reserved for prophetic works [→44 Pesharim; 66 Revelation; 20 Historiography]. With thirty-six copies the Psalter is the most numerously attested composition from Qumran (cf. 5/6H·evPs, MasPsa-b in addition) whose authoritative status is further consolidated by a large number of quotations. It is disputed, however, whether a prophetically inspired Psalter would have been considered a third component of authoritative writings. Much depends on how we interpret the difficult passage ‘in the book of Moses [and] the book[s of the pr]ophets and in Davi[d’ in 4QMMT C 10 (for discussion see Lim. 2010, pp. 311–14; Puech, 2010, pp. 119–26) [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah; 55 Bible]. There are indications that the works later referred to as the Former Prophets – Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings – belonged to the body of authoritative prophetic works in the movement behind the collection [→55 Bible]. This is suggested first and foremost by the reference to the [the pr]ophets in 4QMMT C. It is noteworthy that the historical examples referred to in the Epilogue of MMT are all derived from the books Samuel to Kings. This indicates that the phrase ‘[the pr]ophets’ does not refer exclusively to the prophetic books
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mentioned above but also includes at least Samuel–Kings if not also the larger framework represented by the Former Prophets Joshua–Kings (cf. Kratz, 2006, pp. 171–2; Lim, 2010, pp. 309–10). The comparatively modest number of preserved copies of Joshua to Kings does not offer evidence of their authoritative status (Joshua: two copies + XJosh; Judges: three copies + XJudga-d; Samuel: four copies; Kings: three copies). Nor have any pesharim devoted to the Former Prophets emerged. However, it is clearly significant that the books Joshua to Kings emerge among the portfolio of authoritative works by virtue of being cited (cf. Josh. 6.26 in 4QTestimonia [4Q175] 21–30 [→52 Testimonia] attesting a text known from 4QApocryphon of Joshuab 22 ii 7–14; 1 Sam. 25.26 in CD 9.9 [→35 Damascus Document]; and 2 Sam. 7 in 4QF lorilegium [4Q174] 1–2 i) as well as the object of rewriting in a substantial number of compositions from the corpus of the Dead Sea Scrolls (4QApocryphon of Joshuaa-b [4Q378–379], 4QApocryphon of Joshuac? [4Q522], 5QApocryphon of Joshua? [5Q9], 4QpaleoParaJosh [4Q123], 4QB iblical Chronology ar [4Q559], 4QVisions of Samuel [4Q160], 4QpapParaphrase of Kings [4Q382], 4QApocryphon of Elisha [4Q481a] and 6QpapApocryphon of Samuel–Kings [6Q9]) [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. It is possible that several of the rewritings of prophetic books above obtained authoritative status in their own right. This has been proposed in particular for rewritings of Joshua, Jeremiah and Ezekiel. We noted already, for instance, that 4QApocryphon of Joshuab is cited in 4Q175 (Testimonia). Moreover, 4QApocryphon of Jeremiah Ce (4Q390) may well be a rewriting of an earlier version of 4QApocryphon of Jeremiah (cf. Berner, 2006, pp. 393–430). The Epistle of Jeremiah (cf. 7QpapEpistle of Jeremiah gr) later found its way into the Greek Canon, and 4QPseudo-Ezekiel presents itself as the genuine message of the prophet and may have been accepted as such (cf. Popović, 2010). Nevertheless, the fact that of all the rewritings to emerge from Qumran only 4QApocryphon of Joshuab is cited as an authority suggests an element of caution. Let us, finally, address the issue of the pesharim [→44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. On the basis of 1QpHab 7.4–5 (cf. 1QpHab 2.8–10, 11QMelch 2.17–20 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]) it is clear that the Teacher of Righteousness had access to divinely inspired insights into the meaning of the words of the prophets [→20 Historiography]. The Pesharim are, thus, presented as divinely inspired, authoritative literature (VanderKam, 1998, pp. 386–7; Lim, 2010, pp. 305–6). This takes us beyond the category of authoritative prophetic writings, however. With their explicit distinction between the received text (the lemma) and its inspired interpretation the Pesharim belong to the category of exegetical literature. The dominant authoritative tradition remains here the prophetic text that forms the basis of the interpretation. In sum, the following works can be assigned to the category of authoritative prophetic literature from Qumran: (1) the books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings (the Former Prophets); (2) the books of the Latter Prophets Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Hosea–Malachi; (3) the book of Daniel; as well as possibly also a prophetically conceived Psalter. It is hardly surprising that Joshua–Kings and Isaiah–Malachi were considered authoritative prophetic works by the communities behind the Dead Sea Scrolls and the wider movement of which they were a part. Indeed, there is evidence to suggest the existence of a collection of ‘prophets’ from Joshua to Malachi alongside the Torah already around the end of the third century bce (Steck, 1991, pp. 127–44, who
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refers to the intentional inclusio of Josh. 1 and Mal. 3.22–24 as well as to the external evidence of Sir 44–49). However, such a conclusion does not exclude the possibility that further writings such as Daniel and the Psalter were subesquently considered as prophetically inspired by particular groups including the movement associated with the Qumran Dead Sea Scrolls. These developments preceded the emergence of the Writings as the third part of the emerging Hebrew Bible [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related].
Bibliography Berner, C. (2006), Jahre, Jahrwochen und Jubiläen: Heptadische Geschichtskonzeptionen im Antiken Judentum. Berlin: de Gruyter. Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘Between authority and canon: The significance of reworking the Bible for understanding the canonical process,’ in E. G. Chazon (ed.), Reworking the Bible: Apocryphal and Related Texts at Qumran. Leiden: Brill, pp. 85–104. Kratz, R. G. (2006), ‘Mose und die Propheten: Zur Interpretation von 4QMMT C,’ in F. García Martínez et al. (eds), From 4QMMT to Resurrection: Mélanges qumraniens en hommage à Émile Puech. Leiden: Brill, pp. 151–76. Lange, A. (2009), Handbuch der Textfunde vom Toten Meer: Die Handschriften biblischer Bücher von Qumran und den anderen Fundorten. Vol. 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lim, T. H. (2010), ‘Authoritative scriptures and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 303–22. Popović, M. (2010), ‘Prophet, books and texts: Ezekiel, pseudo-Ezekiel and the authoritativeness of Ezekiel traditions in Early Judaism,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. Leiden: Brill, pp. 227–51. Puech, É. (2010), ‘Quelques observations sur le “canon” des “Écrits”,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJ Sup 141. Leiden: Brill, pp.117–41. Steck, O. H. (1991), Der Abschluß der Prophetie im Alten Testament: Ein Versuch zur Frage der Vorgeschichte des Kanons. Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), ‘Authoritative literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 5, 382–402.
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Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related Texts Ulrich Dahmen
The notion of the the Writings (ketuvim) as a third part of the Hebrew Bible goes back to the work of the Masoretes at the end of the first millenium ce and their early medieval manuscripts. While the Torah is already an important point of reference even in ancient Jewish collections, the Masoretes’ Torah-centric arrangement of the Bible is not attested in antiquity [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. The masoretic scheme is rather a development that emerged in response to the Septuagint (LXX ) and emerging Christian interpretations of the Hebrew Bible. The Masoretes designed a system with a clear interpretative goal. We can refer to several ancient witnesses such as Melito of Sardis, Josephus, and the Talmud (e.g. b. B. Bat. 14b) that suggest an arrangement of the order of the books of the Hebrew Bible that differs substantially from that found in the Masoretic Aleppo Codex (MA) and Codex Leningradensis (B19A). The ancient references point, rather, to a wide-ranging correspondence with Codex Vaticanus (see Fabry, 2012, p. 594). The book of Ruth, for instance, originally belonged to the first section, and enjoyed a notably constant place with respect to the order of books (Gen.–Ruth). This was followed by a second block of historical books (1–2 Sam.; 1–2 Kings; 1–2 Chron.; Ezra/Neh.). Thus, originally Chron. and Ezra/Neh. did not form part of the Writings. Only a third group made up of Psalms, wisdom literature [→63 Wisdom] and Esther comprises the earliest collection of writings as such. Even Daniel, a book that was transmitted as part of the prophets in the large Septuagint codices (Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, Sinaiticus) as well as in Pap. 967 was probably considered a prophetic text in ancient Judaism (in 4Q174 1–3 ii 3 [4QM idrEschata olim Florilegium (Steudel, 1993)] Daniel is explictly referred to as a ‘prophet;’ cf. also 11QMelchizedek [11Q13] 2 18 [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]). To a certain extent, therefore, to speak of the third part of the Hebrew Bible as we have it today as the Writings is anachronistic. These observeration have important implications also for the notion of a tri-partite canon (Torah, Prophets and David) which is unlikely to have existed in this form in ancient Judaism [→55 Bible]. The point of reference of passages such as the Prologue to Ben Sira; 2 Macc. 2.13–15; MMT C 10 [4Q397 14–21 10 par. 4Q398 14–17 i 2–3]; also Lk. 24.27 is restricted most probably to the Pentateuch, the Latter Prophets (incl. Daniel), and Psalms (the latter conceivably including Proverbs and Job, see Puech, 2010, 273
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pp. 128–34). There are no clear indications at all to suggest the inclusion of the remaining historical books (see Brandt, 2001, pp. 63–4). As for the Writings, there is no evidence for a third division of the Hebrew Bible at Qumran. To be sure, some of the books that eventually ended up in the kethubim were cited as authoritative (e.g. Prov 15:8 in CD 9:20–21), but there is no evidence of a collection, apart from the Psalms. Lim, 2010, p. 310
If we take as our basis the Hebrew Bible of the tenth-century ce Masoretes then we can confirm that with the exception of Esther every one of the works that were considered Writings in the tenth century ce is attested in at least a single copy amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls: Psalms 40 (1QPsa-c; 2QPs; 4QPsa-w; 4Q236 [now 4QPsx]; 5QPs; 6QpapPs; 8QPs; 11QPsa-e; MasPsa-b [MasPsc = 11QPsd frgm. 3]; 5/6H·ev 1b [XH·ev/Se 4 = 5/6H·ev 1b frgm. 4]) Job 4 (2QJ ob; 4QJ oba-b; 4QpaleoJobc) Proverbs 3–4 (4QP rova-c; 6QProv? [see Lange, 2009, p. 468]) Ruth 4 (2QR utha-b; 4QR utha-b) Song of Songs 4 (4QC anta-c; 6QC ant) Qohelet 2 (4QQ oha-b) Lamentations 4 (3QL am; 4QL am; 5QL ama-b) Daniel 8 (1QD ana-b; 4QD ana-e; 6QpapDan) Ezra/Neh. 2 (4QE zra; XN eh [see Lange 2009: 523–24]) Chronicles 1 (4QC hron)
The absence of Esther may well be accidental and a direct result of the fragmentary state of preservation of the Scrolls. The centrality of Purim in Esther, a festival not referred to in the Scrolls, and evidence for calendrical disputes allows also for the possibility of a conscious avoidance (see VanderKam, 1998, p. 385; Lange, 2009, p. 497) [→62 Calendars]. Of the works that are today known as deutero-canonical the Dead Sea Scrolls have revealed two copies of the Book of Ben Sira (2Q18; Mas1h [Sir]; cf. also Sir 51:13–30 in 11QPsa 21:11–22:1) to complement six medieval genizah manuscipts of the work [→55 Bible; 63 Wisdom]. The Book of Tobit is attested once in Hebrew (4QTobe) alongside four Aramaic copies (4QToba-d ar) and was clearly highly valued at Qumran. The text of Tobit corresponds largely to the Greek of the LXX (Codex Sinaiticus). The list of documents related to the Writings is sizeable [→56 Parabibical Texts/ Rewritten Scripture]: Psalms: Non-Canonical Psalms (4Q380–381); Apocryphal Psalm and Prayer (4Q448); Prophecy of Joshua (4Q522) [→26 Authoritative Writings: Prophets and Related]; Apocryphal Psalms (11Q11) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]; approximately ten apocryphal Psalms collected in 4QPsf and 11QPsa.b (Apostrophe to Judah; Apostrophe to Zion; Eschatological Hymn; Hymn to the Creator; Plea for Deliverance; and the so-called ‘Syriac Psalmsʾ Ps 151[A; B]; Ps 154; Ps 155) [→60 Poetry and Hymns].
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4Q380–381 are non-sectarian collections of non-canonical psalm-like compositions attributed to biblical figures (e.g. Obadiah, 4Q380 1 ii 8; Manasseh, 4Q381 33 8; a king of Judah, 4Q381 31 4) from the Persian or Early Hellenistic period. All of them are thematically more or less closely related to the biblical Psalms (e.g. Ps. 9; 69; 76; 18; 86; 89; 106), and 4Q380–381 are best considered an imitation of biblical Psalms. There are no indications that suggest their authoritative status. In the great Psalms Scroll 11QPsa the sequence of psalms differs from that known in the MT. As a consequence, this scroll also presents a distinctive theological message. This is evident, for instance, by the position of Pss. 120–132 before Ps. 119: such a conclusion of the Pilgrim Psalms redirects the original perspective of the Pilgrim Psalms towards the Temple (Pss. 133–134) to a climax that stresses the Torah as a replacement Temple (Ps. 119, cf. Dahmen, 2003, p. 291) [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. A number of so-called apocryphal psalms were collected alongside authoritative psalms in the scrolls 4QPsf and 11QPsa and apparently enjoyed an authoritative status for the Qumran movement. The former comprise a sapiential hymn in praise of Zion (11QPsa 22.1–15 par. 4QPsf 7 14–8 16) [→60 Poetry and Hymns], an eschatological hymn addressed to the people of Judah (4QPsf 10 4–15) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms], a hymn of praise of creation and its Creator (11QPsa 26.9–16), an eschatological hymn in praise of the lord (4QPsf 9 1–15) and a Plea for Deliverance that is in places reminiscent of the self-depricating terminology of the Hodayot (11QPsa 18.25–19.18) [→37 Hodayot]. Along with Ps. 155 (11QPsa 24.3–20) all of these Psalms are akin to biblical Psalms in terms of imagery, metaphors, motifs and phrasing which are largely drawing on biblical precedents [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation] that occasionally depart from the biblical paradigms or go beyond what is familiar from the Hebrew Bible and thus offer distinctive and new theological emphases (see Reymond, 2011, p. 168) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The latter sit easily within the framework of a theology advocating ‘that it is through language and thought (especially in blessing and praise) that Zion survives’ (Reymond, 2011, p. 152). They are likely to date from the third or early second centuries bce . Ps. 154, preserved both in 4Q448 (Apocryphal Psalm and Prayer) and in the great Psalms Scroll 11QPsa (17.24–18.18), is an apocryphal psalm that displays particular affinity with sectarian thought, motifs and vocabulary. It is composed of different units that are only tenuously related to one another (4Q448 comprises the units ll. 1–3* and ll. 17–20*). Rather than supposing a text that was composed in the community this is most likely a composition that was inherited by the Qumran community from presectarian precursors of the second century bce . Ps. 151 preserved in 11QPsa 28.3–14 represents since it is transmitted in the form of two separate psalms (Ps. 151A: ll. 3–12; Ps. 151B: ll. 13–14, and only the beginning of the psalm is preserved). This is in contrast to our other ancient textual witnesses (LXX ; Syriac). It is a text sui generis, which takes the reader back to the early life of David and coincidentally to the point where he stands in Ps. 101 at the beginning of his kingly rule (if 11QPsa began with Ps. 101 as is often thought; see Dahmen, 2003, p. 307). As such a fixed composition 11QPsa was authoritative for the Qumran community. 11Q11 contains a collection of exorcistic psalms including an abbreviated version of Ps. 91. We find a clear reference to such a collection in 11QPsa 27.9–10 (David’s
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Compositions). 11Q11 is a non-sectarian collection, and nothing can be said about its authoritative status. However, it was no doubt considered effective by those who used it for protection [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination; 60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts]. Job: (4Q157; 11Q10) [→63 Wisdom]. A special case is the paleo-Hebrew manuscript 4QpaleoJob. This ancient script is restricted to Pentateuch manuscripts with the exception of writing the name of God or divine epithets in paleo-Hebrew letters (cf. 1QPsb; 2QE xodb; 4QE xodj; 4QL evg; 4QI sac; 11QL evb; 11QPsa; 1QpHab; 1QpMic; 1QH [x3]; 4Q180; 4Q183; 4QD b; 4Q406; 6Q15; 6Q18; 8H·evXII gr) [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. 4QpaleoJob might suggest a particularly authoritative status for the book of Job that is comparable to the Pentateuch. In this context it is worth noting that some scholars have identified a five-part structure analogous to the Pentateuch in the book of Job. The Aramaic Job texts (4Q157; 11Q10) [→23 Aramaic Job] dating from the second century bce offer a fairly literal Aramaic rendering of the Hebrew text of Job alongside a small number of interpretative translations, omissions and additions. Noteworthy are their demythologising tendencies as well as a striving for an accessible translation at the expense of its poetical quality (see Lange, 2009, p. 456). Proverbs: Instruction (1Q26; 4Q415–418a, 4Q423); Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184); and Beatitudes (4Q525) [→63 Wisdom; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. 4Q184 and 4Q525 are closely related to ‘Lady Folly’ of Prov. 7 or Prov. 1–9 more broadly. Both texts also contain sapiential instructions (in the second-person singular) as well as beatitudes. The two works were written in the same style, share comparable topics, use the same key terms and are inspired by the biblical book of Proverbs. They seem to be secondary re–readings and may not have had any authoritative status in Qumran. The sapiential work 4QI nstruction (4QS ap A or Musar le-Mevin) [→38 Instruction] is in its main parts clearly a non-sectarian or pre-sectarian text. However, it also contains parts that are closely related to sectarian texts in terms of vocabulary, thoughts and theology (e.g. 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 1QH [→37 Hodayot] etc.). The semantic analysis of the vocabulary used in 4QI nstruction shows that this originally pre-sectarian work was redactionally reworked by the Qumran community and adopted by them. It contains sapiential admonitions and instructions of a type familiar from biblical wisdom texts such as Proverbs (and Ben Sira) alongside cosmological and eschatological reflections. Its importance for the movement represented by the Qumran community is suggested by the presence of eight manuscripts. The large number of copies suggests a high regard for this work among the Qumranites indicating that it enjoyed an authoritative status. Lamentations: Apocryphal Lamentations (4Q179). The undoubtedly pre-sectarian poetic lament over the city of Jerusalem 4Q179 refers to the attacks on Jerusalem at the hands of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (169/68 and 168/67 bce ) and to the extensive destruction of the city led by Apollonius (see Horgan, 1973, p. 222) [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple; 20 Historiography]. There are some parallels with the accounts contained in 1 Macc. 1.16–40, but in general this lament is a secondary re-reading of prophetic lament motifs (frg. 1 i) and of the biblical book of Lamentations (frg. 1 ii and frg. 2; see in detail Horgan, 1973, pp. 226–34; Pabst, 1978, pp. 141–47). There are no
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indications to suggest that this text was considered authoritative by the sectarians who collected the manuscripts together at Qumran. Daniel: Prayer of Nabonidus (4Q242); Pseudo-Daniel (4Q243–246); DanielSusanna? (4Q551); Four Kingdoms (4Q552–553). As noted above, several ancient Jewish witnesses demonstrate that Daniel was ranked among the Prophets in this period [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. Several Aramaic texts are associated with traditions about Daniel (4Q242–246; 4Q552–553a) and seem to be comparable to some apocryphal compositions containing traditions about Jeremiah (e.g. 4Q383; 4Q385a; 4Q387) and Ezekiel (e.g. 4Q385; 4Q386; 4Q388). It is likely that some apocryphal Daniel traditions emerged parallel to or even pre-dating the final composition of the biblical book of Daniel. The person of Daniel and the traditions about him clearly provoked a great deal of interest in Early Judaism. The pseudo-Daniel scrolls (4Q243–245) belong to the genre of court tales that allot a central role to Daniel who is portrayed as Belshazzar’s interpreter of visions depicting events from primordial times to the Hellenistic period (the author’s own time) and eventually the eschaton. In contrast to Dan. 7–12 these visions are not cryptic, do not refer to a four-kingdom scheme, and display particular interest in pre-exilic history and a deuteronomistic theological approach. The Prayer of Nabonidus (4Q242) and the famous ‘Son of God’Text (4Q246) [→49 Son of God Text] attest no direct or literary relationship to the canonical book of Daniel; at the very least they share tradition-historical features. 4QF ourKingdoms (4Q552–553) may be a parabiblical work that elaborates on Danielic themes, including interpreting the four kingdoms. Its connection to the final form of the biblical book of Daniel should be conceived of in terms of Daniel as prophecy, and so ‘evinces a different picture of authoritativeness’ (Hogeterp, 2010, p. 191). We do not observe any evidence of a relationship between the pseudo-Daniel texts from Qumran and later Daniel apocrypha dating from the first to third centuries ce . The suggestion that 4Q551 represents an Aramaic version or Vorlage of the DanielSusanna narrative known only from the additions in the LXX (Dan. 13) is not substantiated by the evidence. The deutero-canonical additions to Daniel in the LXX are not attested at Qumran and appear not to have enjoyed authoritative status there. Esther: Jews at the Persian Court (4Q550). Several quotations and allusions to the book of Esther in authoritative texts indicate that Esther was known and read at Qumran (1QS 2.4 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 1QS a 1.26–27 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; 4QD b 9 i 1 [→35 Damascus Document]; 4QpHosa 2.16–17 [→44 Pesharim]; see Lange, 2009, pp. 499–501; Lange and Weigold, 2011, p. 186), though we cannot be certain that the book enjoyed authoritative status at Qumran. It has also been suggested that 4Q550 represents an Aramaic Vorlage of Esther. This hypothesis has not been accepted. Even if a number of similarities can be noted the differences in significant matters of detail as well regarding the setting of Esther (MT and LXX ) outweigh any resemblances (see Lange, 2009, p. 498). Rather, 4Q550 comprises narratives about Jews at the Persian court known also from the stories about Daniel and Joseph. ‘The conclusion that must be drawn concerning Tales of the Persian Court, therefore, is that it is not directly related to the Esther corpus as it has been preserved (Crawford, 2000, pp. 269–70).
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To what extent these documents also held authoritative status is unclear, though this is probably unlikely except in the case of the Psalms Scroll 11QPsa (and 4QPsf ) and probably 4QI nstruction. Ben Sira: Considering its size, the book of Ben Sira is scarcely represented in the DSS . However, we do find quotations, e.g. in 4QB eatitudes (4Q525 25 4 [Sir 18.33]) [→31 Beatitudes]. It is therefore far from clear whether Ben Sira was regarded as authoritative at Qumran. Only two tiny fragments have survived in 2Q18; a further scroll containing Sir 39.27–44.17 emerged from Masada (Mas1h [Sir]). The acrostic wisdom canticle Sir 51.13–30, now part of the great Psalms Scroll 11QPsa (21.11–22.1), was copied as an independent unit (see Flint, 2001, p. 92), and it is not clear whether it was an integral part of the original Sira scroll (see Reymond, 2011, p. 50) or came into existence independently around the end of the third century bce and was subsequently incorporated by Ben Sira into his work (see Dahmen, 2003, p. 243). The canticle’s autobiographical character is suggestive of Ps. 151 (David) or another wisdom teacher. This survey has indicated the enormous breadth of texts akin to what eventually became part of the writings. Which works were deemed authoritative by at least some Jews in the late Second Temple Period remains an open question.
Bibliography Brandt, P. (2001), Endgestalten des Kanons: Das Arrangement der Schriften Israels in der jüdischen und christlichen Bibel. BBB 131. Berlin: Philo. Crawford, S. W. (2000), ‘Esther, book of,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I: 269–70. Dahmen, U. (2003), Psalmen- und Psalter–Rezeption im Frühjudentum. STDJ 49. Leiden: Brill. Fabry, H.-J. (2012), ‘Der Beitrag der Septuaginta – Codizes zur Kanonfrage: Kanon– theologische Überlegungen zu Einheit und Vielfalt biblischer Theologie,’ in S. Kreuzer, M. Meiser and M. Sigismund (eds), Die Septuaginta: Entstehung, Sprache, Geschichte. WUNT 286. Tübingen: Mohr, pp. 582–99. Flint, P. W. (2001), ‘Noncanonical writings in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Apocrypha, other previously known writings, Pseudepigrapha,’ in P. W. Flint (ed.), The Bible at Qumran: Text, Shape, and Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 80–126. Hogeterp, A. L. A. (2010), ‘Daniel and the Qumran Daniel cycle: Observations on 4QF our Kingdomsa–b (4Q552–553),’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 173–91. Horgan, M. P. (1973), ‘A lament over Jerusalem (4Q179),’ JSS 18, 222–34. Jain, E. (2014), Psalmen oder Psalter? Materielle Rekonstruktion und inhaltliche Untersuchung der Psalmenhandschriften aus der Wüste Juda. STDJ 109. Leiden: Brill. Lange, A. (2009), Handbuch der Textfunde vom Toten Meer. Band 1: Die Handschriften biblischer Bücher von Qumran und den anderen Fundorten. Tübingen: Mohr. Lange, A. and Weigold M. (2011), Biblical Quotations and Allusions in Second Temple Jewish Literature. JAJS up 5. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Lim, T. H. (2010), ‘Authoritative scriptures and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 303–22.
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Pabst, H. (1978), ‘Eine Sammlung von Klagen in den Qumranfunden (4Q179),’ in M. Delcor (ed.), Qumrân: Sa piété, sa théologie et son milieu. BETL 46. Paris: Éditions Duculot, pp. 137–49. Puech, É. (2010), ‘Quelques observations sur le “canon” des “Écrits”,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJ Sup 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 117–41. Reymond, E. D. (2011), New Idioms within Old: Poetry and Parallelism in the Non-Masoretic Psalms of 11Q5 (= 11QPsa). EJL 31. Atlanta: SBL . Steinberg, J. (2006), Die Ketuvim: Ihr Aufbau und ihre Botschaft. BBB 152. Hamburg: Philo. Steudel, A. (1993), Der Midrasch zur Eschatologie aus der Qumrangemeinde (4QMidrEschata.b): Materielle Rekonstruktion, Textbestand, Gattung und traditionsgeschichtliche Einordnung des durch 4Q174 (“Florilegium”) und 4Q177 (“Catena A”) repräsentierten Werkes aus den Qumranfunden. STDJ 13. Leiden: Brill. VanderKam, J.C. (1998), ‘Authoritative literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 5, 382–402.
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Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts Kelley Coblentz Bautch and Jack Weinbender
The status of texts in antiquity is not easily identified, especially if one is to decide whether the works in question served as authoritative Scriptures. An initial task is to determine or name those for whom texts would be authoritative. The Dead Sea Scrolls are typically associated with a particular movement; the collective, though, is to be understood in a nuanced manner, taking into consideration questions of origin and development. Further, the dynamic nature of the movement complicates how one assigns texts to (or determines the value of texts for) a community. While modifiers such as ‘biblical’ or ‘canonical’ might be useful for contemporary readers, it is difficult to determine what ‘authoritative Scriptures’ could mean in antiquity [→55 Bible]. Textual ‘authority’ expresses the idea that certain writings possessed a distinctive status for a community; further, the contents of such texts could present obligatory practices, codes of conduct and sanctioned views. Complexities arise when evaluating Second Temple texts deemed ‘Scripture’ (an emerging status itself) inasmuch as these writings seem to have been complemented (sometimes perfected; cf. 1QpHab 7 1–2 [→44 Pesharim]) by their interpretations [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 66 Revelation]. Thus, there is growing acknowledgement of the dynamic relationship of authoritative texts and interpretative traditions which flourish alongside of them and sometimes were capable of influencing or bolstering the credentials of the former (one thinks, for example, of Deuteronomy and Chronicles). Moreover, diverse texts that appear to have been accepted and deemed normative in some manner may have had varying degrees of authority. It is important to note as well that the notion of a set collection of sacred writings is a matter of debate; even while some scholars stress the significance of references to a bipartite collection of authoritative texts consisting of the Torah and prophetic literature (Lim, 2013, pp. 128– 31; Ulrich, 2003, pp. 65–77), most acknowledge fluidity (or an open-ended nature) in the case of the latter section that is proposed [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related, 26 Prophets and Related, 27 Writings and Related]. Determining which texts were considered authoritative Scripture in the late Second Temple Period poses a unique set of problems as well. The following criteria provide a point of departure for a discussion of authoritative Scriptures. None of the factors articulated are diagnostic on their own and all require careful caveat. Likewise, given the fluidity of textual traditions, as suggested by the Scrolls, scholars must approach notions of authoritative texts with restrained expectations around the fixed nature of texts. 280
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First, external factors have been cited in assessing which texts were considered authoritative. These include: (1) the number of extant copies; (2) the presence of ancient translations; and (3) the continued use and authority of texts in other religious communities. The number of surviving manuscripts of a given text is instructive because it seems plausible that plentiful texts were likely to have been important or frequently used. This metric assumes that the surviving manuscripts offer a representative sample of texts and that the relative abundance of a text roughly corresponds to its status. The fragmentary nature of the Scrolls merits, however, circumspection with regard to assessing the number of manuscripts. The presence of ancient translations also advocates for a text’s status based on the assumption that significant, valued texts were more likely to have been translated, e.g. to reach a wider audience or to preserve a tradition in a different linguistic context. Similarly, it seems plausible that those texts present among the Dead Sea Scrolls that were also authoritative or influential for other Jewish and Christian communities have a higher probability of being considered authoritative by the movement associated with the Scrolls. A second set of factors – here termed ‘intertextual’ – offer additional insights into how the various writings were understood. These intertexual clues include: (1) explicit appeals or citation in other texts; (2) less explicit or indirect textual references to other texts; and (3) influence on or relationship to practices endorsed in the Scrolls. The most obvious manifestation of intertextual evidence is the direct citation of texts as an appeal to authority. These references often include citation formulae appealing to authoritative figures like prophets, patriarchs [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] and other figures associated with the cited text (e.g. Moses, Enoch, David, et al.; see below); a text appealing to the authority of another is, therefore, indicative of the cited text’s authoritative status. Additionally, less explicit references and allusions (e.g. ‘rewritten’ texts – to the extent that this is a helpful term [→Parabiblical Texts / Rewritten Scripture], Targums, commentaries [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 44 Pesharim]) buttress the status of a given text. Finally, if a text can be tied to a particular practice (e.g. use of a preferred calendar [→62 Calendars]), it seems plausible that the text could have been authoritative. A third, more subjective but no less useful, set of criteria is provided by the texts themselves. The claims to authority made by a particular text – for example the assertion that a work is the result of a revelatory experience or is connected to a patriarch – offers some insight into how the text may have been understood by its readers. These so-called ‘authority conferring strategies’ (Najman, 2010, pp. 39–41, 49) require scholars to be sensitive to the literary form and function of a given text. For example, the pseudepigraphical works attributed to Enoch assert authority by framing these as divinely revealed and associated with the enigmatic patriarch of Genesis 5 [→66 Revelation]. With these considerations in mind, works typically explored by scholars as authoritative from the corpus of the Scrolls include the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll], the Book of Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Aramaic Levi Document [→24 Aramaic Levi], the Enochic booklets (1 Enoch, as an anthology preserved in Geʿez, is not attested at Qumran), the Book of Tobit, the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules], and the Book of Meditations or
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Book of Hagu (cf. 1QS a 1.7 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; CD 10.6; 13.2 [→35 Damascus Document]; Lim, 2010, p. 319). While each composition merits concentrated study in discussions of authoritative literature at Qumran, this essay restricts itself to examination of the test cases of Enochic compositions and the Book of Tobit.
Case Study: Enochic Booklets Writings associated with Enoch, the patriarch familiar also from Gen. 5.21–24, are typically presented as possible candidates for authoritative Scriptures among the Scrolls. Many of these fragmentary texts, primarily found in Cave 4 and in Aramaic [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], correspond to booklets attributed to the patriarch that are extant outside of Qumran. The latter are available also partially or in fragmentary form in Greek but in their most complete form the booklets are found in 1 Enoch, an anthology preserved in Geʿez. There is much overlap between the Enochic literature extant among the Scrolls and 1 Enoch, though one of the booklets, the Similitudes (or Parables) of Enoch (= 1 Enoch 37–71), is lacking, as is 1 Enoch 108. The codicological evidence at Qumran does not attest a developed anthology like 1 Enoch, though some booklets (for instance, the Book of the Watchers and the Book of Dreams) may have been copied on the same scroll. In addition to the manuscript evidence from Cave 4, some assert that fragments written in Greek and on papyrus are from the Epistle of Enoch (1 Enoch 92–105, cf. 7Q2; 7Q4 1, 2; 7Q8; 7Q11; 7Q12 and 7Q13; see Puech, 1997, pp. 313–23). Multiple manuscripts (twelve) and related traditions attest to the popularity of Enochic literature at Qumran. The extant booklets among the Scrolls are designated the Astronomical Book (1 Enoch 72–82), the Book of the Watchers (1 Enoch 1–36), the Book of Dreams (1 Enoch 83–91) and the Epistle of Enoch (1 Enoch 92–105). Each has its own history of composition and distinct provenience. Still, the varied writings have in common visionary experiences of Enoch, robust angelologies [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons], and God’s arrangement of space (heavenly, liminal and sacred space) and time (especially primordial and eschatological periods) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. These booklets also concern God’s judgement of creation (human or otherwise) along with the recompense of deeds. Watchers traditions that concern rebellious angels and their punishment are also prominent in the majority of these writings as is the leitfmotif of revealed wisdom that passes from Enoch to audience [→66 Revelation; 63 Wisdom]. While Enoch is identified with the antediluvian patriarch of Genesis, the seer is also presented in these writings as a scribe, as well as a sort of priest and prophet. Literature related to (though not necessarily dependent upon) other Enochic booklets found at Qumran includes the Book of the Giants. Represented by nine manuscripts in Aramaic, the Book of Giants deals with the offspring of the Watchers and their visit to the seer [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The work is known to have circulated outside of Qumran as it was preserved in Manichean literature. Authoritative status is often assessed by citations or interpretations within other texts, and with regard to the Enochic booklets, an argument (not one widely accepted)
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has been put forth by the editor that 4Q247 is best identified as a Pesher of the Apocalypse of Weeks, a component of the Book of Dreams (Broshi, 2000, pp. 187–91) [→44 Pesharim]. Notable, though, and suggestive of the status of Enoch and/or of these booklets are the numerous references to the seer among the Scrolls (for example, in the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon], Pseudo-Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], and Chronology of Patriarchs (4Q559) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]; four references to Enoch also occur in Hebrew (including in Jubilees and Pseudo-Jubilees [4Q227]). The theme of rebellious angels, or watchers, who mate with women is frequently attested among the writings of the Scrolls (for example, Jubilees [Jub. 4:15, 22; 5:1–10; 7:20–25; 8:3–4; 10:1–11]; Genesis Apocryphon [2.1, 16; 7.2]; the Damascus Document [CD 2.18–21] [→35 Damascus Document]; Ages of Creation [4Q180–181; 4Q180 1 7–10]; and the socalled Birth of Noah [4Q534–36; e.g. 4Q534 1 ii+2 15–17]). The antediluvian patriarch and literature associated with him appear to have been well known, likely inspiring other traditions (e.g. 4Q559 [Biblical Chronology ar]). The proliferation of Enochic texts and texts presenting Enoch as an authority speak to the status of the seer. Moreover, the distinctive calendar in Enochic literature (i.e. the solar-lunar calendar of the Astronomical Book) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East] promoted in some calendrical texts discovered at Qumran [→62 Calendars] is sometimes cited as evidence of the booklets’ value; such a shared tradition as a calendar, it is thought, could demonstrate a special link between the Enochic texts and the movement’s praxis. Many writings to emerge from Qumran concern eschatology, dualism [→74 Ethics and Dualism] and otherworldly beings – topics of interest to Enochic writings and the Book of Giants, for example. However, there is good reason for thinking that literature associated with Enoch had its origins outside of the movement associated with the Scrolls in a narrower sense. Moreover, the Enoch literature would continue to flourish much more widely especially in Christian communities as some would consider early Enoch texts Scripture (cf. the Epistle of Barnabas) and authoritative (Jude 14). The Enochic booklets’ ongoing translation from Aramaic into Greek, Coptic and Geʿez, for example, also testifies to an appreciation of this work in antiquity. Returning to the criteria outlined in the introduction, the number of copies of Enochic booklets, comparable ideology, potential citations of or references to the writings, use and authoritative status outside of Qumran, and translation into other languages all point to the significance of Enochic works at Qumran and beyond. Moreover, several works attested at Qumran present Enoch as an authoritative figure, associated with special revelation (Jub. 4.17–22; Knibb, 2010, p. 147).
Case Study: Tobit The Book of Tobit poses an interesting case study for thinking about the status of writings attested in the Scrolls. If subjected to the aforementioned criteria, Tobit yields a complex picture. The surviving fragments from Qumran have been reconstructed [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts] to represent five manuscript copies, all found in Cave 4 (4Q196–200 [4QToba–e]). Four of the copies
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were written in Aramaic while only one copy has survived in Hebrew [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Although the original language of composition (either Hebrew or Aramaic) has not been definitively determined, it is clear that the text’s value warranted translation from one language to the other. Tobit is not found in the Masoretic text that forms the basis of the Tanakh and the Protestant Old Testament; various recensions of Tobit were preserved, however, by Jews in both Hebrew and Aramaic as suggested by medieval fragments from the Cairo Genizah. It is clear that the book had a long afterlife, one that transcended the fate of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Tobit was, at some early point, also translated into Greek and survived in several textual traditions – the two major forms represented are, on the one hand, the shorter tradition of Codex Vaticanus (B) and Alexandrinus (A) and, on the other hand, the longer tradition of Codex Sinaiticus ( )אfrom which the Old Latin was derived. The Book of Tobit was included in the Septuagint and Latin Vulgate and remains part of both the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Old Testament. There are no known citations or allusions to the Book of Tobit among the Dead Sea Scrolls, nor is there clear evidence that the work directly influenced the praxis of the movement. That said, Tobit shares a rich angelology and demonology with other writings from Qumran and recent scholarship has attempted to identify halakhic practices shared by legal texts attested in the Scrolls and the Book of Tobit that differ from those of the Rabbis (Dimant, 2009). The text itself makes no claims to divine inspiration per se, although Tob 12.20 includes a command by Raphael to ‘write down all these things that have happened to you,’ which was presumably meant as a reference to the Book of Tobit itself. That the command came from an angel of God surely bolstered the perceived reliability of the text coupled with the fact that the work is written – at least partially – in the first person like Daniel, Ezra and the Enochic books. If judged by the aforementioned criteria, Tobit may have enjoyed some sort of authoritative status at Qumran. It is not, however, clear that it enjoyed the same kind of status as, for example, the Enochic books and certainly not that of the Torah. Tobit must have been widely read among various Jewish and Christian communities in antiquity to have merited translation between Hebrew and Aramaic and then to Greek and Latin. Moreover, that the longer text reflects halakhic practices endorsed in legal texts from Qumran leaves open the possibility that it was not simply read as an entertaining novella. Instead, one must allow for the possibility that the notion of ‘authoritative Scripture’ to emerge from the evidence of the Dead Sea Scrolls was not normatively categorical but variable and graduated.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘Between authority and canon: The significance of reworking the Bible for understanding the canonical process,’ in E. G. Chazon (ed.), Reworking the Bible. Apocryphal and Related Texts at Qumran. STDJ 58. Leiden: Brill, pp. 85–104. Broshi, M. (2000), ‘247. 4QPesher on the Apocalypse of Weeks,’ in S. J. Pfann et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 187–91.
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Coblentz Bautch, K. (2018), ‘Introduction’, Textual History of the Bible. Vol. 2. Leiden, Brill. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Dimant, D. (2009), ‘The book of Tobit and the Qumran halakhah,’ in D. Dimant and R. G. Kratz (eds), The Dynamics of Language and Exegesis at Qumran. FAT 2. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 121–43. Fitzmyer, J. A. (1995), ‘The Aramaic and Hebrew fragments of Tobit from Qumran Cave 4,’ CBQ 57, 655–75. Knibb, M. A. (2010), ‘Reflections on the status of the early Enochic writings,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 143–54. Lange, A. and Weigold M. (2011), Biblical Quotations and Allusions in Second Temple Jewish Literature. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Lim, T. H. (2010), ‘Authoritative scriptures and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 303–22. Lim, T. H. (2013), The Formation of the Jewish Canon. New Haven: Yale. Milik, J. T. (1976), The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4. Oxford: OUP. Mroczek, E. (2016), The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity. Oxford: OUP. Najman, H. (2010), Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation, and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. JSJS up 53. Leiden: Brill. Puech, É. (1997), ‘Sept fragments grecs de la lettre d‘Hénoch (1 Hén 100, 103 et 105) dans la grotte 7 de Qumrân (= 7QHéngr),’ RevQ 18, 313–23. Popović, M. (2010), ‘Introducing authoritative scriptures in ancient Judaism,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 1–17. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for The Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Segal, M. (2012), ‘Biblical Interpretation-Yes and No,’ in K. Finsterbusch and A. Lange (eds), What is Bible? Leuven: Peeters, pp. 63–80. Shemesh, A. (2009), ‘4Q265 and the authoritative status of Jubilees at Qumran,’ in G. Boccaccini and G. Ibba (eds), Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 247–60. Stuckenbruck, L. T. (1997), The Book of Giants from Qumran. TSAJ 63. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Tigchelaar, E. (ed.) (2014), Old Testament Pseudepigrapha and the Scriptures. Leuven: Peeters. Ulrich, E. C. (2000), ‘The Qumran biblical scrolls: The scriptures of Late Second Temple Judaism,’ in T. H. Lim (ed), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Their Historical Context. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, pp. 67–87. Ulrich, E. C. (2003), ‘Qumran and the canon of the Old Testament,’ in J.-M. Auwers and H. J. de Jonge (eds), The Biblical Canons. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 57–80. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), ‘Authoritative literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 5, 382–402. VanderKam, J. C. (2010), ‘The Book of Enoch and the Qumran scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 254–77. Weeks, S., S. Gathercole and L. Stuckenbruck (eds) (2004), The Book of Tobit: Texts from the Principal Ancient and Medieval Traditions. With Synopsis, Concordances, and Annotated Texts in Aramaic, Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and Syriac. Berlin: De Gruyter.
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Barkhi Nafshi Daniel K. Falk
The work designated ‘Barkhi Nafshi’ is a collection of Hebrew poetic hymns of praise to God, extant in five fragmentary copies (4Q434–438) found in Qumran Cave 4 [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts]. On the basis of paleography, the composition would date no later than about the middle of the first century bce. The best preserved copy (4Q434) has fifteen fragments from at least five columns on two sheets of skin. If all copies contain the same hymns – as suggested by patterns of overlaps [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts] – then the large amount of content of 4Q436 1 i–ii and 4Q437 2 i–ii must also fit between 4Q434 1 ii and 2. Hence the first sheet of 4Q434 must have contained four or even five columns. Not a single hymn survives in its entirety, but the opening hymn must be between 14–18 lines, and three other wellpreserved hymns are at least 16, 13 and 10 lines respectively. One could estimate around ten hymns in the scroll. The opening hymn of the collection (4Q434 1 i 1–13; cf. 4Q435 1 i 1–8; 4Q437 1 1–2) begins with the summons ‘Bless, O my soul, the Lord, for all of his wonders forever. And blessed be his name, for he has saved the life of the poor . . .’ This seems to be in imitation of the formula at the beginning and end of Pss. 103 and 104 (‘Barkhi nafshi’, ‘bless, o my soul’; see Pajunen, 2012). The editors have named the collection after this formula on the assumption that each of the hymns began with the summons ‘Bless, O my soul, the Lord.’ Indeed, the only other surviving opening probably does attest this formula (4Q434 2 11), but there is no evidence that all of the hymns did. This first hymn offers indirect praise of God (3rd p. sg.) for his help in the past toward a group described as poor and helpless. In response to their cry, God delivered them from physical threat by violent enemies/gentiles, and in his mercy he enabled them to be spiritually responsive to him. Only four lines are preserved of the second hymn (4Q434 1 ii 1–4), which praises God directly (2nd p.) for delivering from distress a group that has atoned for past sins and observes God’s laws. Following this must come two largely intact hymns of highly personal diction, in which the speaker praises God directly for help toward himself. In the former (4Q436 1 i–ii, at least 14 lines; cf. 4Q435 2 i), the emphasis is on spiritual assistance: God has purified him and equipped him to keep Torah and to teach and assist others (the repentant, helpless, fallen, wise, upright). In the latter (4Q437 2 i 1–16; cf. 4Q434 4; 4Q435 5), the speaker praises God for delivering
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him from enemies/gentiles, which is dramatically portrayed as a rescue from death to life. He is opposed by a ‘congregation of seekers of . . .’ and comforted by a community of friends. The style and content of the former hymn has similarities to the responsibilities of the Maskil in 1QS 1.1–15 and 9.12–21 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], and the latter hymn to the so-called ‘Teacher Hymns’ of the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot; 20 Historiography]. The four lines of 4Q437 2 ii may belong to the next hymn but a similar diction continues, with reference to a group for whom the speaker seems responsible. The hymn in 4Q434 2 1–10 returns to indirect praise of God, expressing hope (or petition) for help toward a group in the future, both physical deliverance and spiritual strengthening. It ends with the sole surviving concluding formula, ‘I will bless the [. . .]. Blessed be the name of the Most Hi[gh . . .].’ The next hymn (4Q434 2 11–13) seems to begin with a barkhi nafshi formula, and contains direct praise to God for his mercies toward the speaker in the past, including establishing Torah. Later in the work is another hymn (4Q437 4; cf. 4Q438 4) that praises God directly for strengthening the speaker spiritually and removing evil from him, and a subsequent hymn (4Q434 7b) offers indirect praise to God for delivering a group from enemies. As typical of early Jewish prayers, the hymns are steeped in the language and imagery of sacred writings, especially Psalms, Isaiah and Jeremiah. Particularly prominent are body images used as metaphors for spiritual responsiveness: eyes, ears, tongue, lips, neck, heart, hands, foreskin, feet. There is a deterministic emphasis in that God has removed the condition of sinfulness (Brand, 2013, 42–8) and implanted these spiritual qualities in the elect (Seely, 2000a). In a general way, the theology is compatible with the sectarian Scrolls from Qumran, and the language and style resonate with them, leading the editors to suggest a sectarian provenance. There are, however, no distinctively sectarian characteristics (Brooke, 2000, 79–90, 93–4): the predominant threat is from gentiles and the evil inclination, not a cosmic dualism with Belial and sons of darkness [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. As G. Brooke has shown, however, these hymns would have natural appeal to the sectarians: especially the association of spiritual qualities with the body would resonate with the practice of physiognomy used in discernment and initiation (Brooke, 2000) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. In reciting these hymns, a sectarian would reinforce one’s conviction of belonging to the elect in the eschatological community [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. There is no explicit evidence for a specific liturgical occasion for these hymns [→61 Liturgical Texts]. M. Weinfeld argued that 4Q434 2 represents a grace after meals in the house of a mourner, based on parallels to all four benedictions of the rabbinic grace after meals (provision of food, land, Jerusalem and messiah, and God’s goodness), and the citation of Isa. 66.13 (consolation of Jerusalem as a mother comforts her child) used in the mourner’s house (Weinfeld, 1992). A. Shmidman argues 4Q434 2 refers to daily grace after meals. In the end the third-person diction of the hymn makes it unlikely as a grace at meals, but it does show an impressive collocation of prayer themes that found a home in grace at meals (Shmidman, 2008). Alternative explanations of the function of these psalms include instruction (Gordley, 2011, 247–52) and prophecy (Pajunen, 2017).
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Bibliography Brand, M. T. (2013), Evil Within and Without: The Source of Sin and Its Nature as Portrayed in Second Temple Literature. JAJSup 9. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Brooke, G. J. (2000), ‘Body parts in Barkhi Nafshi and the qualifications for membership of the worshipping community,’ in D. K. Falk, F. García Martínez, and E. Schuller (eds), Sapiential, Liturgical and Poetical Texts from Qumran: Proceedings of the Third Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Oslo 1998. STDJ 35. Leiden: Brill, pp. 79–94. Gordley, M. E. (2011), ‘Didactic hymns in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in Teaching Through Song in Antiquity: Didactic Hymnody among Greeks, Romans, Jews, and Christians. WUNT 2.302. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Pajunen, M. S. (2012), ‘From poetic structure to historical setting: Exploring the background of the Barkhi Nafshi hymns,’ in J. Penner, K. M. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds), Prayer and Poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honor of Eileen Schuller on the Occasion of Her 65th Birthday. STDJ 98. Leiden: Brill, pp. 355–76. Pajunen, M. S. (2017), ‘Exodus and exile as prototypes of justice: Prophecies in the Psalms of Solomon and Barkhi Nafshi hymns,’ in M. S. Pajunen and J. Penner (eds), Functions of Psalms and Prayers in the Late Second Temple Period. BZAW 486. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, pp. 252–76. Seely, D. R. (2000a), ‘Implanting pious qualities as a theme in the Barki Nafshi hymns,’ in L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov, J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years after Their Discovery. Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20–25, 1997. Jerusalem: IES in cooperation with the Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, pp. 321–33. Seely, D. R. (2000b), ‘Barkhi Nafshi,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I: 76–7. Shmidman, A. (2008), ‘On the liturgical function of DSS document 4Q434a,’ Zutot: Perspectives on Jewish Culture 5, 15–22. Weinfeld, M. (1992), ‘Grace after meals in Qumran,’ JBL 111, 427–40. Weinfeld, M. and D. Seely (1999), ‘Barkhi Nafshi,’ in E. G. Chazon et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4. XX: Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 255–334.
30
Bar Kokhba Letters Lutz Doering
The Bar Kokhba Letters are a collection of at least twenty-three and perhaps as many as twenty-eight letters in Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek] that were written in connection with Bar Kokhba’s administration during his leadership of the Jewish Revolt against Rome from 132–5 ce . The collection comprises letters both to and from various persons within the administration, frequently involving Bar Kokhba himself. They have been preserved largely in two archival contexts. The first one is the archive of the commander of ‘the camp’ at Herodium, Yeshua ben Galgula; it had been hidden in a cave in Wadi Murabbaʿat [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview] and was discovered during excavations led by R. de Vaux in 1952. The archive comprises at least five letters in Hebrew, and possibly four more in very fragmentary condition (abbreviated ‘Mur’; two further letters with this siglum [Mur 47–48] are of unconfirmed provenance; Benoit, Milik and de Vaux, 1961). The second one is the archive of Jonathan ben Baʿyan, one of the military commanders of Ein Gedi, which had been hidden in the so-called Cave of Letters in Nah.al H·ever [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview] and was discovered by Y. Yadin in 1960. It comprises four letters in Hebrew, eight in Aramaic and two in Greek (abbreviated either ‘5/6H·ev’ or ‘P.Yadin’); there is a further, fragmentary letter in either Aramaic or Hebrew, as well as another very fragmentary text apparently in Greek. A critical edition of the Hebrew and Aramaic texts from this site, based on Yadin’s work, was finally published by A. Yardeni and B. A. Levine (Yadin et al., 2002), replacing the preliminary publications through which these materials had been available for decades. The two Greek letters had already been published by B. Lifshitz (1962); both were republished by H. Cotton (Yadin et al., 2002, pp. 351–66), one of them (P.Yadin 52) with new readings (see also Cotton, 2003). A further Hebrew letter, addressed to Bar Kokhba, was amongst manuscripts that were sold by Bedouin between August 1952 and July 1953 and initially labelled as coming from Wadi Seiyâl (Nah.al S.eʿelim), although there is reason to believe that some of them were in fact from Nah.al H·ever. A. Yardeni published this letter as XH·ev/Se 30 (in Cotton and Yardeni, 1997, pp. 103–4). The following tables provide an overview of the letters according to languages (see tables 30.1–30.3). The letters show that Bar Kokhba’s original name was Shimʿon ben/bar Kosiba(h) (variously spelt); the letter chireq (–i–) is suggested by the Greek form Chōsiba written 289
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Table 30.1 Hebrew Siglum
Addressor(s) and addressee(s)
Contents
Mur 42
From the administrators of Beit Mashikho (Yeshua & Eleazar) to Yeshua b. Galgula
Ownership of a cow by Jacob b. Judah at Beit Mashikho
Mur 43
From Shimʿon ben Kosibah to Yeshua b. Galgula and the men of the KRK /BRK
Proper treatment of ‘Galileans’ staying with Yeshua
Mur 44
From Shimʿon to Yeshua ben Galgula
Delivery of wheat after Sabbath
Mur 45
No extant prescript
Shortage of grain; mention of Mes.ad H · asidim; war casualties
Mur 46
From Jonathan ben M[ (= M[ah.anaim, as in P.Yadin 44:6; 45:11?) to Yoseh
Fair treatment of Euphronius (?) the son of Eliezer
Mur 47
No extant prescript; very fragmentary
Something related to Teqoa
Mur 48
To the son of (?) Yoh.ani fr[om Shimʿ]on [ben ]ry (?)
Unclear; mention of the war?
Mur 49–52 Letters? – very fragmentary
Unclear
P.Yadin 49 [olim 12]
From Shimʿon bar Kosiba to the men of Ein Gedi; to Masabala and Jonathan bar Baʿyan
Reproach for idleness, request to bale fruit from a boat
P.Yadin 51 [olim 5]
From Shimʿon to Jonathan Ba’yan and Ein-Gedites (+ ?)
Some delivery; ‘children;’ fruit (?), formerly of ‘the Gentiles’
P.Yadin 60 [olim 9]
(From Shimʿon?) to Jonathan; very fragmentary
Unclear
P.Yadin 61 [olim 7]
From Shimʿon bar Kosibah to the men of Teqoa
Unclear; mention of a payment?
XH·ev/Se 30
To Shimʿon ben Kosiba, Premier of Israel, from Shim’on ben Mtnym / Mtnyh
Unclear; relates an incident of a group, among whom ‘we have not been’ (so DJD 27)
Table 30.2 Aramaic Siglum
Addressor(s) and addressee(s)
Contents
P.Yadin 50 [olim 8]
Shimʿon bar Kosibah to Jonathan bar Baʿyan & Masabalah bar Shimʿon
Sending of Eleazar b. H·it·t·ah ‘before Sabbath;’ punishment of clamour; cattle not to destroy trees
P.Yadin 53 [olim 4]
Letter of Shimʿon bar Kosibah
‘To’ or ‘regarding’ (?) Jonathan b. Baʿaya(n); follow Elisha’s instruction
P.Yadin 54 [olim 1] wood
Shimʿon bar Kosibah, the Premier over Israel, to Jonathan and Masabalah
Confiscation of wheat from H·anun; burning of Teqoans’ houses; guarded transfer of Yeshua son of the Palmyrene
P.Yadin 55 [olim 14] palimpsest
Shimʿon bar Kosibah to Jonathan and Masabalah – a letter (no salutation)
Sending of any person from Teqoa or other place; threat of destruction (?) of houses
P.Yadin 56 [olim 11]
Shimʿon bar Kosibah to Jonathan bar Baʿyan, Masabalah, and Bar H·it·t·ah / H·ayyat·ah
Packing goods for transport; mention of ‘Romans;’ Thyrsus (?) b. Theodorus to come; transport of salt
Bar Kokhba Letters
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Siglum
Addressor(s) and addressee(s)
Contents
P.Yadin 57 [olim 15]
Shimʿon to Judah bar Menasheh, to Qiryat ʿArabayyah; no salutation
Organizing transport of palm fronds and citrons from Ein Gedi to the camp; gathering / preparing myrtle and willows
P.Yadin 58 [olim 10]
From Shimʿon to Jonathan and Masabalah
Sending of salt to the camp; greeting to the men of Qiryat ʿArabayyah
P.Yadin 62 [olim 13]
Very fragmentary, but found with the other letters
Unclear. Language?
P.Yadin 63 [olim 2]
From Shimʿon bar Kosiba to ? and Masaba]lah?
Unclear; mentions ‘weighing out’ and a ‘letter’ sent through Shimʿon b. Ishmael
Table 30.3 Greek Siglum
Addressor(s) and addressee(s)
Contents
P.Yadin 52 [olim 3]
Soumaios to Jonathes son of Beianos and Masabala
Sending wands and citrons by Agrippa, due to the festival; writing in Greek explained
P.Yadin 59 [olim 6]
[A]nnanos (?) to Jonathes (Yadin: Aelianus)
Reference to letter by Simon son of Khosiba(s); ‘to send . . . for the need of our brothers’
P.Yadin 64
Fragmentary – only plate: JDS 3, Plate 91 (?)
Unclear
above the line in P.Yadin 59.2. Most of the letters concern communication between Bar Kokhba and his military commanders. In addition, there are letters sent by civil administrators (Mur 42) or persons whose function remains uncertain (Mur 46). The letters are important for the study of epistolary features and formulae. Thus, the prescript of most of the Aramaic letters reads, ‘A to B šlm (‘peace,’ ‘well–being’)’. This is very different from the prescript of the older Imperial Aramaic letters, e.g. from Elephantine, an island in the Nile where a collection of fifth-century bce Aramaic documents going back to a Jewish colony serving the Persian administration were discovered. Arguably, the new prescript has been influenced by the usual Greek prescript, ‘A to B χαίρειν (‘be joyous,’ ‘greeting’).’ A minority of Aramaic letters shows the prescript, ‘From A to B šlm,’ which is also the form of the majority of Hebrew prescripts (the salutation there being šlwm). In contrast, the two Greek letters follow the standard Greek prescript as quoted. While the Aramaic and Hebrew letters often have a final salutation featuring šl(w)m (e.g. hwʾ šl(w)m ‘Be [in a state of] peace / well– being’), the two Greek letters deploy the usual errōso ‘be strong,’ ‘farewell,’ albeit with slight modifications: in P.Yadin 52 the author writes his name together with the salutation in his own hand, and in P.Yadin 59, the salutation is extended by the word ‘brother,’ as becomes widespread in the second century. The letters were evidently written down by scribes, the Hebrew and Aramaic ones showing mostly variations of the ‘Jewish’ cursive or semi-cursive script. The usual writing material was papyrus [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]; however, P.Yadin 54 is written
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on a slice of wood. In five letters we find the note ‘[name] ktbh’ at the end of the letter, written in a different script. Most likely, this designates the issuer of the letter, that is, a person in the administration who saw to the production of the letter on behalf of the sender (Doering, 2012, pp. 76–8; cf. similar notes in the receipt XH·ev/Se 60 and the deed of gift XH·ev/Se 64). The letters are important for the assessment of multilingualism in Palestine in the 130s ce [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. While the camp commander Yeshua b. Galgula receives (to our knowledge) only letters in Hebrew, Jonathan b. Baʿyan, a military commander from Ein Gedi, gets letters in either Hebrew or Aramaic (even from the same addressor, Bar Kokhba), as well as in Greek. What informed the choice of language is not entirely clear. Hebrew may have been the ideologically preferred language, apt for a letter to Bar Kokhba (XH·ev/Se 30) or from village administrators to a commander (Mur 42). Some features of the Hebrew letters point to the use of Hebrew as vernacular, while the degree of Aramaic influence on the language is debated among scholars [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. However, it is likely that letter writing in Hebrew was informed by Aramaic letter writing, for which we have clear evidence in the preceding period (Masada ostraca from the First Revolt [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]). As to Greek, P.Yadin 52 states that the letter ‘was written in Greek because of our inability (to write in Hebrew).’ According to Cotton (2003), this refers to the Jewish script, which the addressor Soumaios, probably a Nabataean, and his scribe would not have been able to write; hence the use of Greek. The addressor of the second Greek letter, P.Yadin 59, is likely a Judean (‘[A]nnanos,’ pace Yadin’s initial reading ‘[Aelia]nos’). The letters ought to be read in the context of the legal and administrative papyri (in Greek, Hebrew, [Jewish-] Aramaic and Nabataean-Aramaic) from the caves of Wadi Murabbaʿat and Nah.al H·ever: sale and purchase contracts, gift deeds, marriage contracts, receipts and other documents; notable subsets are the archives of Babatha (P.Yadin 1–36; see Esler, 2017, in particular for nos. 1–4) and of Salome Komaïse, likely from Nah.al H·ever (XH·ev/Se 2, 12, 60–65 [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]; for both archives see also Czajkowski, 2017). Together with the coinage of the rebels and archaeological evidence, the letters and other documents complement the literary testimony about the Bar Kokhba war, although much remains sketchy. The revolt probably started sometime in the summer of 132 and lasted until the end of 135, with ‘[m]opping-up operations’ probably continuing into early 136 (Horbury, 2014, p. 285); it is only then that Hadrian was acclaimed as imperator II (Eck, 2014, pp. 215–20). There is some debate about its geographical extent. While control of areas in Judea south of Jerusalem is certain, it is likely that the revolt also reached a small part of Perea; in addition, hideouts with Bar Kohkba coins were found in the Judean Shephelah as well as in Benjamin and Ephraim. In contrast, recent research tends to assume that the rebels did not hold Jerusalem (Horbury, 2014, pp. 339–52). One letter (P.Yadin 43) mentions ‘Galileans,’ probably pointing to some Galilean participation in the revolt. Archaeological finds in Galilee might suggest some preparation for war and even military action, but this area, in which Bar Kokhba coins have not been found so far, was not under rebel control. Dated documents seem to point to a process of economic deterioration in Bar Kokhba’s realm as the revolt continued:
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While P.Yadin 42 (May 133 ce ) records the exceptionally high annual sum of 650 denarii for a four-year lease granted by Bar Kokhba’s administrators, XH·ev/Se 8a (February 135 ce ) gives the purchase price of a house with merely eight denarii, which may suggest a preference for cash to real estate in strained conditions (Eshel, 2006, pp. 112, 121). The Bar Kokhba letters, none of which carries a date, appear to belong to later phases of the revolt. Some letters authored by Bar Kokhba display a harsh tone, which might point to the precarious state of the revolt. Thus, in P.Yadin 49 he rebukes the military commanders of Ein Gedi, Masabala and Jonathan b. Baʿyan, for ‘dwelling in good (conditions), eating and drinking of the property of the House of Israel, and not caring for your brethren in any way,’ he threatens that ‘your case is with me (for consideration).’ In another of his letters (P. Yadin 54) he commands the two to seize and deliver under guard a consignment of wheat and to see to it that the houses of any Teqoans who might be found would be burnt with failure to do so threatened with punishment. Both a Greek and an Aramaic letter request delivery of the four species for the festival of Sukkot to ‘the camp,’ probably at Herodium (P.Yadin 52, 57). Two letters show a concern for Sabbath observance. An Aramaic letter from Bar Kokhba to Jonathan and Masabala (P.Yadin 50) requests that they ‘send me Eleazar bar H·it·t·ah immediately, before the Sabbath.’ A Hebrew letter from Shimʿon (Mur 44) instructs Yeshuʿa b. Galgula to function as middleman for a consignment of wheat; he is to ‘prepare a vacant place’ for some other rebels where ‘they will be with you (on) the Sabbath’ while they are to take up the wheat ‘after the Sabbath.’ In sum, the letters afford first-hand glimpses of Bar Kokhba’s administration and communication, providing details of linguistic, social, economic, military and religious interest.
Bibliography Benoit, P., J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux (1961), Les grottes de Murabbaʿât. 2 vols. DJD 2. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Cotton, H. M. (2003), ‘The Bar Kokhba Revolt and the documents from the Judaean Desert: Nabataean participation in the revolt (P. Yadin 52),’ in P. Schäfer (ed.), The Bar Kokhba War Reconsidered: New Perspectives on the Second Jewish Revolt against Rome. TSAJ 100. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 133–52. Cotton, H. M. and A. Yardeni (1997), Aramaic, Hebrew and Greek Documentary Texts from Nah.al H · ever and Other Sites, with an Appendix Containing Alleged Qumran Texts (The Seiyâl Collection II). DJD 27. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Czajkowski, K. (2017), Localized Law: The Babatha and Salome Komaise Archives. Oxford: OUP. Doering, L. (2012), Ancient Jewish Letters and the Beginnings of Christian Epistolography. WUNT 298. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Eck, W. (2014), ‘Hadrian, the Bar Kokhba Revolt, and the epigraphic transmission,’ in idem, Judäa – Syria Palästina: Die Auseinandersetzung einer Provinz mit römischer Politik und Kultur. TSAJ 157. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 212–28. Eshel, H. (2006), ‘The Bar Kokhba Revolt, 132–135,’ in S. T. Katz (ed.), The Cambridge History of Judaism, Vol. IV: The Late Roman Period. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 105–27.
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Esler, P. (2017), Babatha’s Orchard: The Yadin Papyri and an Ancient Jewish Family Tale Retold. Oxford: OUP. Horbury, W. (2014), Jewish War under Trajan and Hadrian. Cambridge: CUP. Lifshitz, B. (1962), ‘Papyrus grecs du desert de Juda,’ Aegyptus 42, 240–58. Pardee, D. et al. (1982), Handbook of Ancient Hebrew Letters. SBLSBS 15. Chico: Scholars Press. Yadin, Y. et al. (2002), The Documents from the Bar Kokhba Period in the Cave of Letters, Vol. 2: Hebrew, Aramaic and Nabatean–Aramaic Papyri. JDS 3. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society/Hebrew University.
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Beatitudes Dorothy M. Peters
Also termed ‘wisdom blessings’ or macarisms, the beatitudes from the Second Temple Period appear either singly or in clusters, with or without corresponding woes or negatively phrased counterparts, and with varying degrees of eschatological and apocalyptic overlays on the sapiential genre [→63 Wisdom; 68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The language of ‘Happy is’ or ‘Happy are’ (ʾšry) introduces the promise of a present ‘happy’ and/or future ‘blessed’ state for the communities identified by the beatitudes, language distinct from that of priestly blessings (brk) and curses found in the more explicitly sectarian scrolls (e.g. 1QS 2.1–5) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules]). Scholarly discussions have focused on identifying and reconstructing the various beatitudes in the Dead Sea Scrolls, examining their genres and structures, locating them in their diachronic and synchronic contexts (e.g. Hebrew Bible [→55 Bible], Second Temple literature [→10 Scrolls and Early Judaism], and New Testament [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]), and discerning their function with the communities that produced them. While in the Hebrew Bible beatitudes appear only singly or in pairs, a broader range of structures is evident in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. For example, a single ‘happy’ describing the state of those who accept and understand wisdom (1 En. 99.10) is found in the midst of woes in 1 Enoch 94–100 (cf. blessings interspersed with antithetical ‘curses’ in 2 En. 52.1–15). No woes accompany the cluster of blessings in Sir 25.7–11 while multiple sub–points define the ‘happy’ person who meditates on wisdom (Sir 14.20–27). The latter example, especially, justifies the restoration of ‘Happy are’ to the multiple descriptors of the ‘men of truth’ (e.g. ‘poor in spirit’) in the Hodayot (1QH a 6.13–18) [→37 Hodayot]. Likely composed in the first half of the second century bce , 4QB eatitudes preserves four blessings with four corresponding antithetical negative phrases (e.g. ‘Ble[ssed] are those who rejoice in it, and do not exult in paths of folly’) followed by an expanded, summarizing description of those who attain Wisdom and walk in the Torah (4Q525 2–3 ii 1–6) (Uusimäki, 2016). Matthew’s beatitudes also follow a structure of eight elements plus one expanded element but without the negative phrasing in 4Q525 (Matt. 5.3–12). This diversity of structuring beatitudes in early Jewish literature makes it unnecessary to insist on the dependency of Matthew, for example, upon Luke 6.20–26. Eschatological overtones are sometimes more subtle in the Scrolls than the explicit ‘your reward is great in heaven’ in Matthew 5.12 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. 295
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‘How happy are all who wait for him’ (Isa. 30.18b) is cited and interpreted in 4QpIsaiahc as a passage for the ‘Last Days’ (4Q163 23 ii 9–10) [→44 Pesharim], thus contemporizing and explicating the prophetic eschatological promise. The negative ‘Happy is the man to whom [Wisdom] is given’ precedes a line about the wicked to whom it is not given (4Q185 [Sapiential Work] 1–2 ii 8–10; cf. 13–14). The eschatological or apocalyptic nature of the beatitudes in 4Q525 is debated. In contrast to the Community Rule which contains instructions for hating the ‘Children of Darkness’ cursing those ‘foreordained to Belial’ to ‘eternal fire’ (1QS 1.10; 2.4–10) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons], explicit woes and curses are absent in 4Q525. Yet, within the larger context of the scroll, mention of curses, wrath, together with images of flames and brimstone do envision the unpleasant end for the notblessed (4Q525 15 4–6; 21 2–8). That kind of language suggests a closer affinity to priestly blessings and curses than the beatitudes found in the Gospels. A block of woes follows the macarisms in Luke; however, the exhortation to love one’s enemies and bless those who curse that follows immediately afterwards (Luke 6.27–36) effectively silences any suggestion that those to whom the woes were addressed were meant to be hated and cursed. Various collections of beatitudes in early Jewish writings and in the New Testament, however structured, appear to be affirmations of the identities of the various movements that produced them, at times adapting and re-accentuating terms drawn from their scriptures. Thus, the ‘happy’ ones in 4Q525 are identified as the ‘pure in heart,’ the ones who attain wisdom by ‘walking in the Torah of the Most High’ (cf. Ps. 15.3; Matt. 5.8). In the Hodayot, the ‘happy’ are the ‘poor in spirit’ (1QH a 6.14; 1QM 14.7 [→40 Milh.amah]; cf. Isa. 66.2; Matt. 5.3). Metaphorical and literal interpretations of ‘poverty’ permeate the pre-sectarian and sectarian texts, and the sectarians elsewhere identify themselves as the ‘poor’ (1QHa 10.36; cf. 4Q434 1 I 1–2 [→Barkhi Nafshi]). Wealth illegitimately obtained was condemned (CD 6.16–17 [→35 Damascus Document]); instead, the sectarians brought their wealth and property into the community (1QS 1.12). Entering voluntary ‘poverty’ may have functioned to re-literalize the ‘poor in spirit’ metaphor, validating and affirming this aspect of identity. Similarly, the terminology ‘poor’ over against the ‘rich’ in the Lukan beatitudes (Luke 6.20, 24) may have encompassed also the ‘poor in spirit.’
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘The wisdom of Matthew’s beatitudes,’ in idem, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress, pp. 217–34. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2000), ‘A Palestinian Jewish collection of beatitudes,’ in idem, The Dead Sea Scrolls and Christian Origins. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 111–18. Lichtenberger, H. (2003), ‘Makarismen in den Qumrantexten und im Neuen Testament,’ in F. García Martínez (ed.), Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition. BETL 168. Leuven: Leuven University Press/Peeters, pp. 395–411.
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Puech, É. (1993), ‘The collection of Beatitudes in Hebrew and Greek (4Q525 1–4 and Mt 5, 1–3),’ in F. Manns and E. Alliata (eds), Early Christianity in Context: Monuments and Documents. Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, pp. 353–68. Uusimäki, E. (2016), Turning Proverbs towards Torah: An Analysis of 4Q525. STDJ 117. Leiden: Brill.
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Berakhot Daniel K. Falk
Berakhot is a collection of liturgical blessings and curses that appears to survive in five fragmentary Hebrew manuscripts from Qumran Cave 4 (4Q286–290 [4QB era–e]) [→61 Liturgical Texts]. These date paleographically to the first half of the first century ce . Neither the beginning nor the end of the work is preserved, and there are only a few minor overlaps among three of the manuscripts. There is, therefore, uncertainty about the overall nature of the work, its overall length, and whether these five manuscripts are all copies or versions of the same work [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. Following a suggestion by J. T. Milik (1972), Bilhah Nitzan (2000a, 2000b) proposes that 4QB erakhot contains liturgical rituals for an annual covenant ceremony at Pentecost related to that outlined in 1QS 1.16–3.12 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] and 5Q13 (Rule), and partly in the expulsion liturgy at the end of the Damascus Document (4QD a 11 5–17; 4QD d 11 ii+15; 4QD e 7 i–ii) [→35 Damascus Document]. Nitzan tentatively proposes the following structure: (1) communal confession; (2) blessings of God; (3) curses on Belial and his lot; (4) laws of reproof; (5) liturgy of expulsion; (6) concluding expression of eschatological hope [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. No manuscript attests all of these elements, however. The best preserved manuscript is 4QB era (4Q286), comprising three large and seventeen small fragment units, spanning at least two sheets of parchment, each with about four columns of thirteen lines. Two parts are well attested: a series of liturgical blessings to God followed by a series of curses on Belial, and the evil angels and humans allied with him [→67 God(s), Angels, and Demons]. Various opening and concluding formulas indicate that these are liturgical recitals by the community. The basic form is similar for both blessings and curses, roughly: ‘They shall bless (curse) . . . they shall answer and say, Blessed be (cursed be) . . . Amen Amen.’ The blessings (4Q286 1 ii–6; 7 i; 12) praise God concerning his glory in the heavenly sanctuary, the celestial bodies and appointed times, and the various classes of angels that serve him, as well as his creation and renewal of the earth and its creatures. This is followed by a threefold sequence of curses (4Q286 7 ii): of ‘[B]elial’ and ‘all the spir[its] of his [lo]t’; the ‘Wick[ed One]’ and ‘all the sons of Beli[al]’; ‘you [Ange]l of the Pit and Spir[it of Aba]ddon’ and ‘[a]ll who execute their [wicked schemes] and commit their evil intrigue.’ A few small fragments seem to contain parts of laws about reproof and perhaps tithes: 4Q286 20, 13–15, 17. That it is a product of the Yahad is attested by the mention of ‘council of the Yahad’ and ‘[me]n of the Yahad’ 298
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(4Q286 7a ii 1; 20 a, b 4) and verbal and thematic connections with distinctive sectarian rituals of the Yahad (e.g. covenant ceremony) [→72 Forms of Community; 73 Daily Life). 4QB erb (4Q287), with ten fragment units, represents similar content: blessings of God (1–5), with a possible slight overlap with 4QB era (4Q286 12 1–3, cf. 4Q287 2 11–13); curses on Belial and his lot (6–7), with extensive overlap with 4QB era (4Q286 7 ii 1–12, cf. 4Q287 6 1–11); and a few fragments that might possibly contain legal material but could equally belong to curses against the wicked (8, 9, 10). 4QB erc (4Q288), with three small fragments, overlaps slightly with the laws of reproof in 4QB era (4Q288 1 1–7, cf. 4Q286 20 4–10). Nitzan reconstructed this material schematically according to the laws of reproof in the Community Rule (1QS 6.26–27; 7.5–8) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] and the Damascus Document (CD 9.16–22) [→35 Damascus Document]. The remaining two manuscripts have no specific overlapping content with the others, but some language and formulas seem compatible. In the tiny remains of 4QB erd (4Q289, three small fragments) are references to ‘etern[al] curses . . . of destruction,’ the blessing of God’s name, some action by ‘the priest [who is ap]pointed at the head[ of the Many],’ a corporate blessing, praise of God concerning creation, ‘[the pri]ests who enter[ the covenant],’ and a prayer response ‘Amen, Amen.’ Nitzan suggests that this belongs to a liturgy of expulsion, comparable to that at the end of the Damascus Document (4Q266 11; 4Q269 16; 4Q270 7 i–ii). The single small fragment of 4QB ere (4Q290) contains a prayer response ‘Amen,’ a reference to the cessation of something, and a mention of wrath. Nitzan suggests that this may be a conclusion to the liturgy, expressing hope for the end of the rule of Belial and the age of wrath. All that is certainly attested in 4QB er, then, is blessing of God in various facets, a cursing of Belial and his lot, and – possibly – laws of reproof. There is no certain evidence for elements 1, 5 and 6 or that 4Q289 and 4Q290 are copies of the same work. The hypothesis that these manuscripts belong to a covenant ceremony has the distinct advantage of explaining the combination of blessings, curses and laws in a known liturgical setting of the Yahad. Nevertheless, the hypothesis remains speculative and faces significant difficulties. As Nitzan notes, there is no evidence – nor seeming place for – a blessing on those entering the covenant, the central component of the covenant ceremony in the Serekh ha-Yahad (cf. 1QS 2.1b–4a). Also, the extended blessings on the holiness of the heavenly sanctuary [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple] are fundamentally different than the blessings of God in 1QS 1.18b–22a, which focus on salvation history. Nitzan suggests that Berakhot shows a variant version of the covenant ceremony, focusing on cosmological rather than national dimensions of covenant, and based on merkabah traditions rather than priestly blessing (cf. Pajunen 2015, p. 485) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. The curses, directed at Belial, reflect the distinctive cosmic dualism ideology of the Yahad (Metso, 2008, pp. 507–8, 511–12). On the other hand, although 4QB er has no direct verbal overlaps with the covenant ceremony in the Serekh ha-Yahad, it has the same curse on Belial and his spirits as in the eschatological curses of the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah] (1QM 13.1–6, cf. 4Q286 7a ii 1–5). It also has extensive overlaps with the curse on those who carry out wicked schemes in 4Q280 (4QC urses, cf. 4Q286 7a ii 11–12 and 4Q280 2 5–7), in a context where 4Q280 has significant overlaps with 1QS 2.4–9 (Brand, 2013). 4Q280, however,
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curses Melchiresha not Belial. This points to a complicated pattern of reuse of ritual blessings and curses in different liturgical contexts. Occasions for ritual blessing and cursing in the Dead Sea Scrolls include not only the covenant ceremony (1QS ; 4Q275; 5Q13; 4Q280) and expulsion ritual (4QD ), but also apotropaic rituals (4Q510, 511 [Songs of the Sage]) and eschatological rituals (1QM 13; 4Q285 8; 11Q14 1 ii [→40 Milh.amah]; 1QS b [→45 Rule of Blessings]). Jokiranta draws on speech-act theory, ritual theory, and cognitive theories of magic in comparing the Berakhot with other blessing rituals in terms of the effective agents (Jokiranta, 2017a). The language and semi-poetic style of the hymnic blessings of God resemble the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and later merkabah hymns [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]. One hymn takes the form of a list of terse phrases describing features of God’s heavenly throne, based on the chariot vision of Ezek. 1, 3, 10. God as king is the central image, a key motif in the later synagogue liturgy (for discussion see Jokiranta, 2017b). Praise of God’s attributes is based on Exod. 34.6–7, interpreted as numinous qualities; the expressions ‘foundation of wisdom / holiness / truth’ have no biblical precedent, but are distinctive to the sectarian writings, especially the Hodayot. Similar to other sectarian works (esp. Hodayot and Milh.amah), 4QB er emphasizes the motif of united human and angelic worship (Chazon, 2003).
Bibliography Brand, M. T. (2013), Evil Within and Without: The Source of Sin and Its Nature as Portrayed in Second Temple Literature. JAJSup 9. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Chazon, E. G. (2003), ‘Human and angelic prayer in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon, R. Clements, and A. Pinnick (eds), Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19–23 January, 2000. STDJ 48. Leiden: Brill, pp. 35–47. Jokiranta, J. (2017a), ‘Towards a cognitive theory of blessing: Dead Sea Scrolls as test case,’ in M. S. Pajunen and J. Penner (eds), Functions of Psalms and Prayers in the Late Second Temple Period. BZAW 486. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 25–47. Jokiranta, J. (2017b), ‘Ritualization and the power of listing in 4QB erakhota (4Q286),’ in A. Feldman, M. Cioată, and C. Hempel (eds), Is There a Text in this Cave? Studies in the Textuality of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of George J. Brooke. STDJ 119. Leiden: Brill, p. 438–58. Kobelski, P. J. (1981), Melchizedek and Melchirešaʿ. CBQMS 10. Washington: Catholic Biblical Association. Metso, S. (2008 ), ‘Shifts in covenantal discourse in Second Temple Judaism,’ in A. Voitila and J. Jokiranta (eds), Scripture in Transition: Essays on Septuagint, Hebrew Bible, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of Raija Sollamo. JSJSup 126. Leiden: Brill, pp. 497–512. Milik, J. T. (1972), ‘Milkî–S. edeq et Milkî–Rešaʿ dans les anciens écrits Juifs et Chrétiens,’ JJS 23, 95–144. Nitzan, B. (1997), ‘The laws of reproof in 4QB erakhot (4Q286–290) in light of their parallels in the Damascus Covenant and other texts from Qumran,’ in M. J. Bernstein, J. Kampen, and F. García Martínez (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the
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Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995. Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten, STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 149–65. Nitzan, B. (1998), ‘Berakhot,’ in E. Eshel et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4: VI. Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 1. DJD 11. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 1–74. Nitzan, B. (2000a), ‘Berakhot,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, New York: OUP, I: 93–4. Nitzan, B. (2000b), ‘The Benedictions from Qumran for the annual covenant ceremony,’ in L. H. Schiffman et al. (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls Fifty Years After Their Discovery: Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20–25, 1997. Jerusalem: IES /The Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, pp. 263–71. Pajunen, M. S. (2015), ‘The praise of God and his name as the core of the Second Temple liturgy,’ ZAW 127, 475–88.
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Commentaries on Genesis (4Q252–254) George J. Brooke
A small group of manuscripts have been associated with one another as Commentaries on Genesis. Though they have a few characteristics in common, there is not much overlap between them and should probably be thought of as three or four different works, rather than all as copies of the same work. They indicate the widespread interest in Genesis, or parts of it at least, in the late Second Temple Period [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. The best preserved of these fragmentary Genesis commentaries is Commentary on Genesis A (4Q252; last half of first century bce ); it is written on a single piece of thin skin in six columns. The extant fragments of 4Q252 contain, in the order of Genesis itself, interpretations of the flood narrative, the curse of Canaan, the entry of Abram into the land, the covenant of the pieces, the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah, the binding of Isaac, the blessing of Isaac, the defeat of the Amalekites, and the blessings of Jacob [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. There might have been coverage of other matters, but there was no interpretation of topics before Noah and the flood. The composition is notable because it is compiled with several different kinds of exegesis [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation ]; it was probably put together from excerpts from other interpretative works. The best-preserved section abbreviates and rewrites parts of Genesis 6–8 with particular attention to various matters of chronology and calendar [→62 Calendars]: the text explicitly gives the duration of the flood as exactly 364 days, and it distinctively identifies the various dates in the year both as days of the month and days of the week. The demise of Sodom and Gomorrah is reworked with reference to the Deuteronomic laws of war (Deut. 20), implying that those cities fell under the sacrificial ban. Some of the blessings of Jacob are interpreted as unfulfilled prophecies, like in the sectarian pesharim [→44 Pesharim]; explicit sectarian vocabulary (‘men of the community’) is only to be found in this final section. Reflecting its composition from different sources in a variety of styles, Commentary on Genesis A has no overall unifying theme, though its sections seem to have some common concerns. Some sections appear to be clarifications of the plain meaning of the text of Genesis, especially in matters of chronology. Other thematic links between sections involve the inheritance and exclusive occupation of the land, election and rejection, blessings and curses, and inappropriate sexual behaviour. The apparent lack of any mention of Joseph in what survives might reflect a negative attitude to those associated with his name. 302
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Three fragments are assigned to Commentary on Genesis B (4Q253; last half of first century bce ). In the first there is mention in turn of Israel, the ark, and a statute made known to Noah; this combination of subjects is not unlike Jubilees 6 which talks of the children of Israel together with the covenant that Noah makes before God. In the other two fragments there is not much to go on: some cultic terminology and a mention of Belial, a sectarian name for Satan [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Commentary on Genesis C (4Q254; last quarter of first century bce ) is extant in seventeen fragments that variously mention the ark, the curse of Canaan, Hagar, the binding of Isaac, the Joseph narrative with Joseph as interpreter, and the blessings of Jacob. Apart from Joseph the content is like 4Q252, though there is almost no similar phraseology. The phrase ‘two sons of oil’ (Zech. 4.14) occurs; it might have been part of a messianic interpretation of Gen. 49.8–12, though that is unclear [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. As in 4Q252 the common sectarian tag, ‘men of the community,’ occurs (in frag. 4; cf. 1QS 5.1 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]). Three small fragments are assigned to Commentary on Genesis D (4Q254a; turn of the era). Noah and the flood are the sole subject mentioned, including the measurements of the ark, the date of exit from the ark, and, somewhat mysteriously, what the raven makes known to the latter generations.
Bibliography Bernstein, M. J. (1994), ‘4Q252: From re-written Bible to biblical commentary, JJS 45, 1–27 Bernstein, M. J. (1994), ‘4Q252: Method and context, genre and sources,’ JQR 85, 61–79. Brooke, G. J. (1994), ‘The genre of 4Q252: From poetry to pesher,’ DSD 1, 160–79. Brooke, G. J. (1994), ‘The thematic content of 4Q252,’ JQR 85, 33–59. Brooke, G. J. (1996), ‘Commentaries on Genesis,’ in G. J. Brooke et al., Qumran Cave 4. XVII: Parabiblical Texts Part 3. DJD 22. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 185–212, 217–36. Saukkonen, J. (2005), ‘The Story behind the Text: Scriptural Interpretation in 4Q252’ (PhD diss., University of Helsinki). Trafton, J. (2002), ‘Commentary on Genesis A (4Q252=4QC ommGen A=4QPB less),’ in J. H. Charlesworth (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations: Pesharim, Other Commentaries, and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 6B. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck; Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, pp. 203–19.
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Copper Scroll Jesper Høgenhaven
The Copper Scroll (3Q15), henceforth CS , was discovered in Cave 3 in 1952 by a team of archaeologists lead by Roland de Vaux [→1 Discoveries]. The text is a catalogue of hidden treasures, originally engraved on three metal sheets riveted together. One of the sheets was at some point detached, and the sheets were rolled up in the form of two scrolls. The material is copper with one per cent tin. Due to the unusual material of the document and its state of preservation, the opening of the scroll proved particularly challenging until 1955–6 when it was opened at the Manchester College of Science and Technology. The original scroll is kept at the Archaeological Museum in Amman, Jordan. The editio princeps is that of J. T. Milik (Milik et al., 1962). An alternative edition was published by John M. Allegro (Allegro, 1960), who assisted at the opening of the scroll. Extensive restoration and preservation work was carried out by the laboratories of Electricité de France in the years 1994–6, and a new edition was published by Émile Puech in 2006 (see now Puech, 2015). The script of the CS is datable to the first century ce . The engraving process seems to have caused considerable difficulty, and scribal errors and peculiarities are relatively numerous. The language of the CS has been described as akin to Mishnaic Hebrew rather than the Hebrew of most Qumran texts [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. A peculiar feature of the scroll is the occurrence of Greek letters at the end of the first seven sections. The letters have been interpreted variously, e.g. as abbreviated personal names, but no consensus has been reached as to their significance. The text consists of twelve well-preserved columns of text containing some sixtyfour sections (the count varies slightly according to the analysis and division of the text), each describing treasures hidden at a named location. The geographical outlook of the Copper Scroll seems to focus primarily on the area in and near Jerusalem, and localities near Qumran and Jericho, but locations in Northern Palestine (e.g. Garizim) are also mentioned. A significant number of place-names are biblical, or in some way connected with biblical texts or traditions. There is no consensus as to the identification of the most commonly used place-name in the CS (‘Kohlit’). The literary genre of the CS has been a much-debated issue. Several scholars have pointed to the similarities between the CS text and a list or a catalogue, and to the lack of any narrative framework in the document. From a formal point of view, however, the text is addressed to a second-person singular addressee, as is evident from the repeated 304
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imperatives instructing the addressee to measure out a certain distance between named localities, or dig a certain amount of cubits at a specific place, e.g. ‘dig three cubits!’ The verb forms, however, are read by some scholars not as imperatives but as passive participles to be translated ‘is buried at three cubits.’ The text would seem to envisage a situation in which hidden treasures are to be reclaimed and recovered by this ‘you’-figure. The addressee, however, remains anonymous in the text. It is also unclear who is to be understood as the ‘voice’ behind the instructions given to the addressee. As far as genre is concerned, then, the CS could be interpreted as a form of ‘manual’ containing instructions for the day when the treasures now hidden are to be uncovered. Related to the question of literary genre is the broader issue of the historical setting and context of the CS . Milik held that the text reflects a literary fiction drawing on folklore traditions and cognate to later legendary material concerned with the lost treasures of the Jerusalem Temple. Allegro and more recently Puech have argued that an actual historical treasure is described in the CS , and pointed to the possibility that the Qumran community (identified by many scholars as the Essenes [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature; 72 Forms of Community) could have held considerable possessions based on the gifts and contributions of members accumulated over time [→73 Daily Life]. An argument in favour of understanding the treasures as legendary is supported by the enormous amounts of gold and silver referred to in the text. There are several references to sacred objects (e.g. tithe vessels, priestly garments), and these could be associated with the temple [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. Some scholars regard the treasures as a part of the temple treasury possibly hidden as a consequence of the Jewish War (66–73 ce ). Others have pointed to Jewish legends concerning objects and treasures belonging to Solomon’s temple (2 Macc. 2.1–8; 2 Bar. 6.5–9) as the most plausible background. It cannot be determined whether the CS was written before or after the fall of the Second Temple. It is also disputed whether or not the CS belongs to the Qumran library. Some scholars think that the manuscript was deposited in Cave 3 independently of the remaining scrolls. At any rate, the contents show no direct traces of the theology of the Qumran community.
Bibliography Allegro, J. M. (1960), The Treasure of the Copper Scroll. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Milik, J. T. et al. (1962), ‘Le rouleau de cuivre provenant de la grotte 3Q (3Q15),’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik and R. de Vaux, Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumrân. DJDJ 3. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 198–302. Puech, E. (2015), The Copper Scroll Revisited. STDJ 112. Leiden: Brill. Wolters, A. (1996) The Copper Scroll: Overview, Text and Translation. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
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Damascus Document (D) Liora Goldman
As witnessed by the fact that ten copies of the work were discovered in the caves near Qumran, the Damascus Document (D ) was clearly considered an important composition in the movement associated with Khirbet Qumran. The document describes how a group was formed as the elect remnant in the wake of the destruction of the First Temple, its establishment as a separatist community, and the events of its early history – the most significant of these being an exile in Damascus, where its members entered into a New Covenant with God [→20 Historiography]. The manuscripts also depict the beliefs and tenets regarding the Day of Judgement and the eschaton [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms] as well as polemics against opponents. These details are given in admonitions interlaced with explicit biblical quotations and implicit allusions that are interpreted via various methods, including the pesher interpretation [→44 Pesharim]. The admonitions constitute a polemical preface to the main body of the text – a distinctive interpretation of pentateuchal laws [→58 Halakhah] and the communal precepts [→59 Rules] imposed on members of a movement which claims to have withdrawn from the House of Israel during the present period in order to ensure preservation until the eschaton and redemption. Twelve manuscripts of the composition are extant. Two copies (CD A and CD B) dating to the tenth and twelfth centuries ce were discovered in the Cairo Genizah and published by Solomon Schechter (Schechter, 1910). CD A contains sixteen pages (1–16), B consisting of two long pages (19–20). The other ten copies were discovered in the Qumran caves, eight in Cave 4 (4Q266–273). The latter were edited by Milik and Baumgarten and published in DJD 18 (Baumgarten, 1996). The earliest of these (4Q266) is dated to the Hasmonean Period, the latest (4Q270) to the first century ce , and the remainder being ascribed to the Herodian Period. Two small, fragmentary copies (5Q12 and 6Q15) were published by Milik and Baillet in DJD 3 (Baillet, 1962; Milik, 1962). The Qumran manuscripts contain a preface, a conclusion as well as legal ordinances not preserved in the Genizah version – thereby substantially augmenting our understanding of the composition and its structure as a whole. On the basis of the texts found in Cave 4, Milik proposed that the pages from the Genizah be ordered so that the admonitions open the document (pages 1–8, 19–20), followed by the laws and other injunctions (pages 15–16, 9–14) (Milik, 1963, pp. 151–2). The legal material in 4QD that is not attested in CD A – laws relating to skin-diseases, agriculture (offerings, 306
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tithes, first-fruit, burnt-offerings, gleanings and edges), jubilees, the adulterous wife, the family, the priest captured by gentiles, and purification rites [→70 Purity and Holiness] – belongs to the text before pages of CD 15–16. The legal material in CD that is paralleled in the texts from Cave 4 includes laws relating to vows, oaths, witnesses, reproof and trial, purification by water, the Sabbath, trading and association with gentiles, and purity/impurity – together with regulations [→59 Rules] concerning the Maskil, the Overseer, the arrangement in camps and the penal code (only the initial part of the latter is preserved at the end of CD 14, the bulk appearing in 4QD, see Hempel, 2000, pp. 53–4) [→22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies]. The admonitions can be divided into ten discourses, constructed according to a careful chiastic patterns (Goldman, 2007, pp. 288–92): the opening (4Q266 1a–b i 1–5; 4Q268 1–7), which lays out the purpose of the document, and the conclusion linking the admonitions with the laws (4Q266 5 i; 4Q267 5 ii); the preface to the discourses (CD 1.1–2.1) that details the community’s origins; and the summation (CD 19.33– 20.34), which describes the community’s present existence, following the death of the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography]. Six further discourses are inserted between these two sections, relating to two principal issues: (1) the movement’s election from the House of Israel; (2) legal polemics with its opponents. The fact that these alternate with one another – three in each group – indicates they are clearly interlinked. The six discourses are: a) the sins of the earlier generations (CD 2.2–3.12); b) the election of the community (CD 3.12–4.12); c) the sins of the present generation (CD 4.12–5.19); d) the revelation of the interpretation of the pentateuchal laws (CD 5.20–6.11) [→66 Revelation]; e) the ordinances the movement must observe in the present (CD 6.12–7.9); and f) the community’s deliverance and its opponents’ punishment in the eschaton (CD 19.5–26) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The final discourse has been preserved in two versions – CD A 7.9–8.13 and CD B 19.5–26 (Goldman, 2007, pp. 288–92). The question of the composition’s redaction is a complex issue. In contrast to the Community Rule (S) manuscripts [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the proposals regarding the editorial process undergone by D are based mainly on considerations regarding the nature, date and origin of the fully-preserved sections of the text – rather than various recensions. Murphy-O’Connor (1970, 1971, 1972) has propounded that the discourses reflect at least two editorial stages – one pre-sectarian and the other sectarian (see also Davies, 1983); Hempel (1998) contending the same for the Laws. Following Murphy-O’Connor, Hultgren (2007, pp. 535–39) argues that the group described in CD developed into the Qumran community, positing that the New Covenant entered into in Damascus was made with the parent-movement of the Qumran sect and thus long preceding the end of the third century bce . Hempel (1998, pp. 25–6) distinguishes between the laws with an explicit basis in pentateuchal laws to be observed by all the House of Israel – which she assigns to an earlier period probably of priestly provenance – and the communal rules (Hempel, 1998, pp. 70, 72). She also suggests that the communal rules in D were edited and updated by the group responsible for the S texts (1998, p. 191). Schofield (2009, pp. 165–7) similarly contends that the influence of S is clearly visible in the latest redactional stages of D. While these alleged editorial processes are adduced on the basis of the nature and spirit of the texts, it must be noted that the sole evidence for different versions lies in
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the disparity between CD A 7–8 and CD B 19. The original text appears to have been preserved in CD B. The reasons for the differences between both medieval manuscripts appearing to derive either from a variant linguistic interpretation of the root mlt (Kister, 2007, pp. 69–72) or an ideologically-motivated endeavour to substitute one cluster of pesharim for another (Goldman, 2006, pp. 185–9). The strong consistency between the various copies of the document and the deliberate chiastic arrangement of the admonitions indicate a strong editorial hand that shaped several manuscripts of this composition (Goldman, 2007, pp. 291–2). A further thorny issue relates to the development of the Essene/sectarian movement, as suggested by the relationship between the Community Rule and the Damascus Document (Murphy-O’Connor, 1970, 1971, 1972; Davies, 1983; Hempel, 2013, pp. 121– 50; Hultgren, 2007) While Schofield (2009) and Collins (2010, pp. 78–9) concur that the early history of the movement is reflected in CD, they maintain that we cannot assume any diachronic development but should rather think in terms of the parallel emergence and existence of a number of groups. Textual-exegetical analysis of the admonitions in CD reveals that the explicit and implicit pesharim embedded here play a more significant role than has traditionally been acknowledged, constituting a series constructed around the theme of the community’s election and the controversy over the proper interpretation of the Pentateuch [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 58 Halakhah]. This matrix of pesharim comprises an exegetical-philosophical preface to the collection of laws that follow it (Goldman, 2007, pp. 292–3). The admonitions and laws establish the importance of CD within the corpus of scrolls from Qumran. The value of the composition for understanding ancient Jewish halakhah and the hermeneutical methods whereby it was determined – especially the pesher and its refinement – contribute to the document’s great significance as do the descriptions of the movement’s early history which are unparalleled.
Bibliography Baillet, M. (1962), ‘Document de Damas,’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik and R. de Vaux (eds), Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumran. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 128–31. Baumgarten, J. M. (1996), Qumran Cave 4: Damascus Document (4Q266–4Q273). DJD 18. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Davies, P. R. (1983), The Damascus Covenant: An Interpretation of the “Damascus Document.” JSOTS up 25. Sheffield: JSOT Press. Goldman, L. (2006), ‘A comparison of Genizah manuscripts A and B of the Damascus Document in light of their pesher units,’ Meghillot 4, 169–89 [Hebrew]. Goldman, L. (2007), ‘Biblical exegesis and pesher interpretation in the Damascus Document’ (PhD. diss., University of Haifa) [Hebrew]. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2000), The Damascus Texts. CQS 1. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
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Hempel, C. (2013), Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hultgren, S. (2007), From the Damascus Covenant to the Covenant of the Community. STDJ 66. Leiden: Brill. Kister, M. (2007), ‘The development of the early recensions of the Damascus Document,’ DSD 14, 61–76. Milik, J. T. (1962), ‘Document de Damas,’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik and R. de Vaux (eds), Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumran. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. 181. Milik, J. T. (1963), Ten Years of Discovery in the Wilderness of Judaea. London: SCM . Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1970), ‘An Essene missionary document? CD II , 14–VI , 1,’ RB 77, 201–29. Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1971), ‘The original texts of CD 7:9–8:24, 19:5–14,’ HTR 64, 379–86. Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1972), ‘The critique of the Princes of Judah (CD VIII , 3–19),’ RB 79, 200–16. Schechter, S. (1910), Documents of Jewish Sectarians. Vol. 1: Fragments of a Zadokite Work. Cambridge: CUP. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill.
36
Genesis Apocryphon Daniel A. Machiela
Jews of the early Roman period inherited much Aramaic religious literature [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Some of this legacy was eventually part of the Jewish and Christian scriptural canons (parts of Daniel and Ezra-Nehemiah), while other items were apparently handed down in various Christian circles only, typically in translation and occasionally reworked (e.g. 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], Tobit [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related], and some of the patriarchal testamentary literature [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions). Over 200 Aramaic manuscripts amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls have opened new vistas onto this heritage. Of these, the Genesis Apocryphon from Qumran Cave 1 (1Q20) was the first to be discovered in the initial, seven-scroll cache of 1947 [→1 Discoveries; 4 Acquisition and Publication]. The leather scroll now exists in twenty-three columns (ca. 13 cm wide and 25 cm high); all of these are damaged, some so badly that virtually nothing can now be read (e.g. col. 18). The margins of the manuscript are large, the scribal hand is meticulous, and the leather preparation of top quality, all indicating that this was a scroll of great expense and, presumably, importance to the group or individual who commissioned it [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture; 71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. In its broad framework, the Genesis Apocryphon is a retold version of the Hebrew book of Genesis (from approximately Gen. 5.28 to 15.4 in what is extant). In the process of reworking, the scribal circles that composed the Apocryphon wove many specific traditions and religious elements known from the Aramaic literary heritage into the Genesis story [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. Consequently, it is helpful to view the Genesis Apocryphon as a rapprochement of these two distinct but related streams of Israelite tradition. While Hebrew Genesis occupied the more prominent place as the basic narrative structure, it was dramatically altered by the traditions and religious worldview of the Aramaic literature. A striking departure from Hebrew Genesis is the Apocryphon’s use of first-person voices (or pseudepigraphy) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 66 Revelation]. In the scroll we find ‘serial pseudepigraphy,’ with first-person narration by various characters as the story progresses: the Watchers, Lamech, Enoch, Noah and Abram. Complicating this is the ‘layering’ of first-person voices (e.g. Lamech relating first-person accounts of both Methuselah and Enoch in a first-person voice). The 310
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switch to a third-person voice near the end of the preserved text suggests that the entire composition had a third-person frame. Use of first-person narration was very popular in Persian and Hellenistic period Aramaic writings, both non-Jewish (e.g. the fifth century bce copy of the Words of Ahiqar from Elephantine) and Jewish (e.g. portions of Tobit, Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah, 1 Enoch, EnGiants, Visions of Amram, Testament of Qahat, Words of Michael and Prayer of Nabonidus [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. The originally Hebrew Book of Jubilees, which resembles the Genesis Apocryphon in multiple respects, also employs the first-person voice, though in a distinctive way. The reason for employing pseudepigraphy remains unclear; perhaps it was an authorizing technique to imbue the writing with a certain historical gravitas (Najman, 2010) [→66 Revelation]. The Genesis Apocryphon tries to integrate the content of the Aramaic Enochic literature (i.e. various parts of 1 Enoch and EnGiants) into the patriarchal narratives of Genesis. This is most obvious in cols 0–5, in which the sins of the fallen Watchers figure prominently and Enoch plays a significant role in deciphering the astounding birth of Noah, whom Lamech fears has been fathered by one of the Watchers (cf. 1 En. 106– 107). Enoch is also an important source of heavenly wisdom for subsequent patriarchs through the books that he had written and left with his son Methuselah. Furthermore, Abram taught the Egyptian nobles wisdom from ‘the book of the words of Enoch’ (1QapGen 19.25) [→63 Wisdom]. Like other Jewish Aramaic works (e.g. Aramaic Levi [→24 Aramaic Levi], Testament of Qahat and 1 Enoch), the Apocryphon advocates a single line of transmission for divinely revealed wisdom during the patriarchal period, from father to son through written and spoken testimonies. In the Genesis Apocryphon, these men are depicted as ultra-righteous, paradigmatic individuals. Many early Jewish Aramaic writings have a decidedly apocalyptic character (e.g. Daniel [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], Words of Michael, Four Kingdoms [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] and Visions of Amram [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]). The symbolic dream-visions of Noah in 1QapGen 6–15 most palpably attest to this. These visions often concern historical circumstances and God’s mysterious, otherwise inscrutable plan for human history. Like many apocalyptically-oriented works, the Apocryphon prominently features good and evil divine beings, and advocates a dualistic choice between the paths of truth and deceit (cf. 1QapGen 6.1–6; 4QL evia ar 4.5–7; 4QTJacob? ar 5.3) [→ 67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 74 Ethics and Dualism]. The Apocryphon also shows familiarity with wider Hellenistic and Egyptian cultures [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature; 13 Scrolls and non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature]. 1QapGen 16–17 (cf. Jub. 8–9) portray Noah dividing the world according to a well-known Greek scheme (the so-called ‘Ionian Map’), while the personal and geographic names added to the story of Abram and Sarai’s stay in Egypt appear to reflect impressive local knowledge. These details speak to the remarkable, international knowledge behind this literary creation. Some other distinctive traits and concerns of the scroll are: the resolution of exegetical difficulties [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]; dramatic elaboration of characters and their emotions (with more focus on names, places, and female characters) [→ 56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten
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Scripture]; proper sacrificial observance of the patriarchs; endogamous marriage; chronology of the events in Genesis [→33 Commentaries on Genesis; 62 Calendars]; and the legitimacy of Israelite claims to the ancestral inheritance of Arpachshad (i.e. the land of Israel). The change of voice to third-person narration near the end of the extant scroll (around 1QapGen 21.23) is indicative of a more general change of character at this point. The retelling snaps much more firmly into line with the Hebrew text of Genesis, at times coming very close to literal translation. This change, along with other factors (e.g. the distribution of divine names and epithets throughout the scroll) has led scholars to consider the various sources that may lie behind the Apocryphon, and the extent to which they were redacted by whoever composed its final version. While it seems very likely that written sources other than Genesis were used, the strong links forged between characters such as Noah and Abram (not present in Genesis) attest to a comprehensive reworking of all such sources to make a coherent, compelling whole. Much effort has gone into determining where the Genesis Apocryphon should be placed in Second Temple Judaism. Though discovered at Qumran there is near unanimous agreement that, like all other Aramaic compositions found in the caves, this scroll is not a product of the group that wrote the distinctive ‘sectarian’ literature (even if it contained themes they would have embraced [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions; 72 Forms of Community]). The Aramaic dialect, content and religious worldview of the Apocryphon place it squarely with the other Aramaic works [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], almost all of which have been dated from the fourth to second centuries bce . The scholarly assumption has always been that the scroll was composed in Greco-Roman Palestine, a hypothesis that is plausible but not assured. The many contacts with Jubilees (mid-second century bce ) provide a particularly helpful point of comparison, though the two works differ in a number of important respects; some scholars have argued that the Apocryphon is later, and others that it is earlier. At present, then, we may say that the Genesis Apocryphon is a creative fusion of the Hebrew Genesis narrative and the Geist of the Aramaic Jewish literature, composed for a popular audience in highly learned scribal circles in or around Palestine during the third or second centuries bce .
Bibliography Alexander, P. (1988), ‘Retelling the Old Testament,’ in D. A. Carson and H. G. M. Williamson (eds), It is Written: Scripture Citing Scripture. Essays in Honor of Barnabas Lindars. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 99–121. Bernstein, M. J. (1996), ‘Re–arrangment, anticipation and harmonization as exegetical features in the Genesis Apocryphon,’ DSD 3, 37–57. Falk, D. K. (2007), The Parabiblical Texts: Strategies for Extending the Scriptures among the Dead Sea Scrolls. CQS . London: T&T Clark. Fitzmyer, J. A. (2004), The Genesis Apocryphon from Qumran Cave 1 (1Q20): A Commentary. Third revised edition. Biblica et Orientalia 18B. Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute.
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Machiela, Daniel A. (2009), The Dead Sea Genesis Apocryphon: A New Text and Translation with Introduction and Special Treatment of Columns 13–17. STDJ 79. Leiden: Brill. Najman, H. (2010), Past Renewals: Interpretative Authority, Renewed Revelation, and the Quest for Perfection in Jewish Antiquity. JSJS up 53. Leiden: Brill. White Crawford, S. (2008), Rewriting Scripture in Second Temple Times. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 105–29
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Hodayot (H) Angela Kim Harkins
The Qumran Hodayot are a collection of prayer texts [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns] attested in as many as eight copies (1QHa–b; 4Q427–432) alongside three copies of related ‘Hodayot–like’ texts (4Q433, 4Q433a and 4Q440). The largest copy of these prayers from Cave 1, known as 1QHa, was one of the first Dead Sea Scrolls introduced to the scholarly world by Eliezar Sukenik. In an effort to make these texts available quickly, Sukenik published the critical edition of 1QH a without reconstructing the scroll (Sukenik, 1955). The scroll was simply arranged in order from the largest and most complete manuscript sheets to sizeable fragments and concluding with the smaller fragments. This publication decision led to a popular ordering of the Hodayot that has since been superseded by the reconstructed scroll in DJD 40 almost sixty years later, an edition based largely on the work of Hartmut Stegemann and brought to completion by Eileen M. Schuller after Stegemann’s untimely death in 2009 (Stegemann, Schuller and Newsom, 2009) [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. The more correctly reconstructed order of 1QHa in DJD 40 varies by approximately nine columns and a few lines from the Sukenik edition (see also Puech, 1988). Since a reconstructed Hodayot scroll was not available to scholars until recently, the early publication history of 1QHa focused on particular compositions or specific clusters of compositions. One group known popularly as the Teacher Hymns begins in what is reconstructed as the third manuscript sheet. This collection is found in the best-preserved manuscript sheets of the entire scroll. The scribal hand is elegant in this part of the scroll and continues until column 19 where there is a shift to a second scribal hand that finishes the scroll. Early on, the compositions in 1QHa were classified as two distinct types: the thanksgiving hymns in columns 10–17, and the hymns found in the rest of the scroll. The first category known as the thanksgiving hymns was thought to have a more sophisticated literary style. It also corresponded with the beautifully preserved sections from the Cave 1 scroll, allowing them to be read easily without the need for technical reconstruction. The thanksgiving hymns came to be closely associated with the scroll, often serving as an early alias for the scroll as a whole (‘the Thanksgiving Hymns Scroll’). The vivid compositions known as the thanksgiving hymns came to receive particular attention during the early years of scrolls research. In the 1960s, what later became a longstanding theory known as the ‘Teacher Hymns Hypothesis’ was formulated. This 314
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was a theory that the author of certain hymns, those known as the thanksgiving hymns in columns 10–17, were authored by the leader mentioned in the pesharim [→44 Pesharim] and the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] and known by the moniker ‘the Teacher of Righteousness’ [→20 Historiography]. This theory of authorship was a refinement of an initial proposal by Sukenik, who first attributed the entire scroll to this figure and identified the Hodayot as autobiographical meditations. The Teacher Hymns Hypothesis experienced some resurgence in the 1990s (Douglas, 1999). Some have even identified the author of the Teacher Hymns with specific historical individuals (Wise, 1999 and Knohl, 2000). The Hodayot’s association with the Teacher of Righteousness has been a longstanding theory, but the identification of an historical author on the basis of literary style and details is controversial and influenced by historical-Jesus methodology [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. Unlike NT studies that seek to authenticate Jesus sayings, no ancient attributions of the Teacher Hymns to the figure known as the Teacher of Righteousness exist. The assumption that the sophisticated literary style of the Teacher Hymns was a marker of a singularly remarkable leader and creative genius derives from a Romantic model of authorship that assumes a resemblance between the author and the composition (Harkins, 2012a). A question that has not been adequately treated in Hodayot studies is the role that these texts played in generating religious experience. Prior to the 1990s when the Cave 4 Hodayot were published, the majority of studies on the Hodayot were textual, historical or literary. The publication of the Cave 4 texts brought to light an exceedingly remarkable composition known as the ‘Self-Glorification Hymn’ (SGH). While many have written about the mystical aspects [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination] of the SGH in light of other Qumran texts like the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifices [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice], it is ironic that very few studies have paid sustained attention to the relationship between the SGH and the Hodayot, the material and literary context of SGH (Alexander, 2010). This is certainly a topic that is in need of further investigation. Other questions remain outstanding in the scholarly treatment of the Cave 1 scroll. The authorial assumptions underlying the Teacher Hymns Hypothesis are anachronistic for Jewish texts of the Second Temple Period, many of which seek to efface authorial markers and rely upon pseudonymous attribution [→66 Revelation]. Orthographic variations found throughout the Cave 1 scroll indicate that the collection, like many others, emerged over time and goes back to multiple authors. The diachronic development of the scroll as it appears in 1QH a has not received wide treatment in scholarship. Harkins has proposed that certain orthographic features and literary themes suggest that 1QHa is a later version of the collection that appears in 4Q428, a scroll that she proposes contained only Teacher Hymns and the second group of Community Hymns (Harkins, 2010). Questions of the redaction of various Hodayot collections from Caves 1 and 4 and their impact on how the Hodayot were experienced have not been studied exhaustively. In her monograph, Harkins offers the proposal that 4Q428 is organized purposefully to move from places of punishment to paradise, culminating in the remarkable hymn known popularly as SGH (Harkins, 2012b). Harkins’ rhetorical study of the Hodayot and critical spatiality proposes that the ultimate goal of the detailed constructed spaces,
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when read synchronically, is to bring the reader into the space of the heavens and the presence of the deity. In the reading and re-enactment of these prayer texts, the firstperson voice, the elaborate spatial details in the text, and the language of the body functioned to assist an ancient reader in re-enacting the emotions and phenomenal experiences of transformation described in these texts. Repeated affective reenactments could have created within the reader a predisposition to having the kinds of religious experiences described in the Hodayot. A reader is carried from the places of punishment, through the gardens of paradise, and brought into the celestial realm of the angels [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. When the Hodayot are considered from a diachronic perspective, the instrumental role of emotions can be understood within a model of reading which led to the generation of new visions and experiences of these constructed spaces (Harkins, 2011, 2012b). According to Harkins, the extraordinary kinds of emotional and other experiences described in the Hodayot (physical manifestations of emotions, communion with angels, entry into the heavens) were not intended for everyone, but rather for the religious virtuoso (Harkins, 2012b). This proposal of the role that the emotions play in the reading and re-enactment of the Hodayot stands in contrast to the one offered by Carol Newsom who understands the Hodayot as participating in a general system of inculturation into the community (Newsom, 2004). The earliest form of the Hodayot known as 4Q428 was not written by a single authorial hand and the question remains: how were these compositions generated and what purpose did they serve? The Hodayot were meant to be read, re-read and experienced through the re-enactment of emotions. Emotions may also have played a role in how these texts were generated over time and authenticated in the absence of an attributed author. Unlike other contemporary texts that are pseudonymously attributed to Moses, Levi or Enoch [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other; 65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] the Hodayot are not attributed to any single named figure, although reference is made throughout to a figure known as the Maskil [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 45 Rule of Blessings; 48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice].
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (2010), ‘Qumran and the genealogy of Western mysticism,’ in E. G. Chazon and Betsy Halpern-Amaru (eds), New Perspectives on Old Texts: Proceedings of the Tenth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 9–11 January, 2005. STDJ 88. Leiden: Brill, pp. 215–35. Douglas, M. (1999), ‘The Teacher Hymn hypothesis revisited: New data for an old crux,’ DSD 6, 239–66. Harkins, A. K. (2010), ‘A new proposal for thinking about 1QH a sixty years after its discovery,’ in D. K. Falk et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 1 Revisited: Texts from Cave 1 Sixty Years after Their Discovery. Proceedings of the Sixth Meeting of the IOQS in Ljubljana. STDJ 91. Leiden: Brill, pp. 101–34. Harkins, A. K. (2011), ‘The performative reading of the Hodayot: The arousal of emotions and the exegetical generation of texts,’ JSP 21, 55–71.
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Harkins, A. K. (2012a), ‘Who is the teacher of the Teacher Hymns? Re–examining the Teacher Hymns hypothesis fifty years later’ in E. F. Mason et al. (eds), A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam, Volume 1. JSJS up 153. Leiden: Brill, pp. 449–67. Harkins, A. K. (2012b), Reading with an “I” to the Heavens: Looking at the Qumran Hodayot through the Lens of Visionary Traditions. Ekstasis 3. Berlin: de Gruyter. Knohl, I. (2000), The Messiah Before Jesus: The Suffering Servant of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Berkeley: University of California Press. Newsom, C. A. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Puech, E. (1988), ‘Quelques aspects de la restauration du rouleau des Hymnes (1QH ),’ JJS 39, 38–55. Schuller, E. M. (2011), ‘Recent scholarship on the Hodayot 1993–2010,’ CBR 10, 1–44. Schuller, E. M. and C. A. Newsom (2012), The Hodayot (Thanksgiving Psalms): A Study Edition of 1QHa. SBLEJL 36. Atlanta: SBL . Stegemann, H., E. M. Schuller, and C. Newsom (2009), Qumran Cave 1. III: 1QHodayota, with Incorporation of 4QHodayota-f and 1QHodayotb. DJD 40. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Sukenik, E. L. (1955), The Dead Sea Scrolls of the Hebrew University. Jerusalem: Magnes. Wise, M. O. (1999), The First Messiah: Investigating the Savior Before Jesus. San Francisco: Harper.
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Instruction Benjamin Wold
1Q/4QInstruction (Hebrew title: Musar le-Mevin ‘Instruction for an Understanding One’) is a previously unknown Hebrew document preserved in at least eight manuscripts (1Q26, 4Q415, 4Q416, 4Q417, 4Q418, 4Q418a, 4Q418*, 4Q423) and discovered in two caves. The largest surviving manuscripts are 4Q416, 4Q417 and 4Q418. Based upon the reconstruction of Steudel and Lucassen the original length of the document may be thirty columns (Strugnell, Harrington, and Elgvin, 1999, pp. 17–18), with only about 30 per cent of the total document surviving [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. While the precise date of Instruction cannot be established there are several clues about its provenance. The handwriting of the surviving manuscripts dates to the late first century bce or early first century ce . Based upon comparison with the so-called ‘sectarian’ literature, the opinio communis is that Instruction lacks the necessary terminological and theological similarities to locate it among them [→72 Forms of Community; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Furthermore, one leitmotif of the document is instruction about marriage (see esp. 4Q416 2 iii–iv), which also raises questions about how this composition may have been read by those at Qumran who are thought by some to have been celibate [→73 Daily Life]. Perceived similarities between Instruction, the Treatise on the Two Spirits (1QS 3.13–4.26 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 74 Ethics and Dualism]) and the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] have permitted speculation about a second-century bce date. However, for some scholars the presence of apocalypticism in the document may suggest that Instruction was written earlier, based on Enochic tradition [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. Overall, most scholars would view Instruction as a nonsectarian document that may be tentatively dated to the mid-second century bce or perhaps even as early as the late third century bce . Instruction provides sapiential instruction that are at times practical; sometimes these are polyvalent and/or motivated by an apocalyptic worldview [→63 Wisdom]. For instance, when issues of wealth and poverty arise they may be related to real life economic circumstances, such as borrowing money, but on other occasions are metaphorical and relate to lacking wisdom or being humble. One manuscript (4Q423) includes several occurrences of agricultural imagery, which at times may relate to practical advice about farming, but also allude to Eden as a way of construing the acquisition of wisdom (4Q423 1–2 i). 318
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Of utmost concern to the author is urging the addressees to seek the ‘mystery of existence,’ (rz nhyh) which has frequently been interpreted as revealed wisdom that spans all of creation: past, present and future [→13 Scrolls and non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature]. References to angels are not uncommon and they seem to serve as a model that the addressees are to follow [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Motivation to behave properly is not justified solely by the promise of rewards in this life, but also by judgement in the hereafter: the wicked to destruction and the elect righteous to everlasting life [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. In light of those features and others Instruction has challenged scholars to reappraise the relationship of wisdom to apocalyptic. The beginning of the document, preserved in 4Q416 1, describes the ordering and establishment of the cosmos and envisages a time when judgement will be visited upon the wicked. Elsewhere (e.g. 4Q417 1 i 15–18) humanity is understood in some translations as divided into two categories: the Spirit of Flesh and the Spiritual People [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. However, this translation, which results in a dualistic anthropology, has been challenged in recent studies (Wold, 2018, pp. 104–8). On the one hand each has an inheritance and allotment; on the other hand, we find a pressing concern to exhort the addressee to gain wisdom lest consequences ensue. Tension may exist in Instruction between determinism and an element of freewill that is as complex as the relationship between wisdom and apocalyptic. The intended recipients of this composition may have come from a variety of social circumstances. Instruction is written primarily as a work addressed to a single individual, the mevin (‘understanding one’). On occasion the address is to a group (e.g. 4Q417 1 i 27). There is one rare instance of a second-person singular feminine address (4Q415 2 ii), although some speculate, perhaps problematically, that the mevin is instructed at this point about how to speak with a female about a matter related to marriage. Although there is indication that some of the addressees may be priests (e.g. 4Q418 81), and perhaps the mevin himself, much of the instruction appears to be directed at individuals from a broad spectrum of society.
Bibliography Goff, M. J. (2013), 4QInstruction. WLAW 2. Atlanta: SBL . Kampen, J. (2011), Wisdom Literature. Eerdmans Commentaries on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Grand Rapids: Michigan. Rey, J.–S. (2009), 4QInstruction: sagesse et eschatologie. STDJ 81. Leiden: Brill. Strugnell, J., D. J. Harrington, and T. Elgvin (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XXIV Sapiential Texts, Part 2: 4QInstruction (Mûsār lĕ-Mēvîn): 4Q415ff. DJD 34. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2001), To Increase Learning for the Understanding Ones: Reading and Reconstructing the Fragmentary Early Jewish Sapiential Text 4QInstruction. STDJ 44. Leiden, Brill. Wold, B. G. (2018), 4QInstruction: Divisions and Hierarchies. STDJ 123. Leiden: Brill.
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Messianic Apocalypse Eric F. Mason
Seventeen fragments of the poorly-preserved Hebrew manuscript Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521) were discovered in Qumran Cave 4. Its common title may be a misnomer, as the extant contents have an eschatological theme but probably lack the visionary or revelatory features of an apocalypse [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Some instead identify the genre as an ‘eschatological psalm.’ The presence of corrections implies that this manuscript was a copy of an earlier document, and several scribal practices (including use of the word ’dny in place of the Tetragrammaton) correspond to those of manuscripts copied at Qumran [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. The script is Hasmonean and dates to the early first century bce . Most scholars concur that the text was composed in the second century bce , but there is disagreement about whether it stems from a group like the Essenes (perhaps even the Teacher of Righteousness himself) or Hasidim or else is a non-sectarian work [→20 Historiography; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus; 72 Forms of Community]. Most of the fragments preserve very little text, and the only essentially complete column is the second one of fragment 2. The first two lines read, ‘heaven and earth will obey his anointed one, [and all th]at is in them will not turn from the commandments of holy ones’ (adapted from Collins, 2010, p. 131). Later in lines 5–8 one reads of the lord ’s beneficence for the faithful, concluding with three actions ascribed to the lord in Ps. 146.7–8 (releasing captives, opening the eyes of the blind, and raising those bowed down). Another list of the lord ’s actions appears in lines 12–13. Here he is said to heal the wounded, revive the dead, proclaim good news to the poor (cf. Isa 61.1), satisfy the weak, lead the uprooted, and enrich the hungry. Scholarly discussion of this text has focused on issues present in this column. Interpreters debate how to understand ‘his anointed one’ in 4Q521 2 ii 1, including the role of the anointed figure and whether he is messianic. The term may also be read as plural, especially if it parallels ‘the holy ones’ in line 2, though in the Scrolls the latter normally are angels [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Priestly language appears elsewhere in the text (fragments 8 and 11), including the phrase ‘all his anointed ones’ just after a mention of ‘his holy vessels’ (4Q521 8 8–9; cf. the ambiguous mention of an ‘anointed one’ in the very fragmentary 4Q521 9 3), though in the Scrolls ‘anointed ones’ elsewhere refers to the prophets. The words of Isa. 61.1 were voiced by an anointed prophet in their original context, and the eschatological Elijah seems to be in mind 320
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when the author alludes to Mal. 3.24 (ET 4.6) in 4Q521 2 iii 2 (‘the fathers will return to the sons,’ something to be prompted by the Elijah discussed in Malachi). Émile Puech understands the scroll’s Elijah as the eschatological contemporary of a royal messiah (cf. ‘scepter’ in 4Q521 2 iii 6) but finds a messianic priest (or, if the term is plural, a priest and king) in 4Q521 2 ii 1 (Puech, 1998). John J. Collins argues that the text presents only one messianic figure throughout, an eschatological prophet identified as or modelled on Elijah (Collins, 2010). This discussion is closely tied to another issue in 4Q521 2 ii 12 and elsewhere in the text (4Q521 7 + 5 ii 6, 8), that of raising the dead. This is one of the several functions of God noted above and a rare reference to resurrection in the Qumran corpus. This divine activity is followed in the list, however, by that of proclaiming good news to the poor, a function of an anointed prophet in Isa. 61.1. Collins notes numerous motifs in biblical, Second Temple, and rabbinic texts that relate Elijah and resurrection. He proposes that the eschatological Elijah performs the deeds listed here as God’s messianic agent, but others insist that God acts directly. Numerous scholars have noted similarities between the two lists of God’s functions in 4Q521 2 ii 8, 12–13 and the Q material in Luke 7.22 / Matt. 11.5 (cf. also Matt. 10.8). There Jesus responds to the inquiry of John the Baptist with a list of his activities derived chiefly from Isa. 35.5–6 and Isa. 61.1 (the blind see, the lame walk, lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised and the poor have good news preached to them), and Elijah traditions figure prominently in the context in both gospels [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. The most striking correspondence between the lists is the pairing of giving life to the dead and preaching good news to the poor. For Collins this demands literary dependence on 4Q521 or at least a shared tradition. George J. Brooke instead emphasizes a number of divergences in the lists as evidence for independent collation from Isaiah and Psalms of ‘scriptural passages to be associated with the activity of God (and his anointed agent) in the last days’ because ‘the scriptural texts suggest each other’ (Brooke, 2005, p. 82).
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. Minneapolis: Fortress. Collins, J. J. (2010), The Scepter and the Star: Messianism in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Puech, É. (1998), ‘521. 4QApocalypse messianique,’ in idem, Qumrân Grotte 4. 18: Texts Hébreux (4Q521–4Q528, 4Q576–4Q579). DJD 25. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 1–38.
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Milh.amah (M) Brian Schultz
The ‘Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness’ was among the first seven scrolls retrieved from Qumran Cave 1 (Sukenik, 1948, p. 17). This lengthy name has since been shortened to the ‘War Scroll’ in English, but also Milh.amah meaning ‘war’ in Hebrew, which lies behind the siglum 1QM . An alternative name is Serekh ha–Milh.amah, the ‘Rule of the War,’ since much of the content provides directives for going to war [→59 Rules]. The war in question is eschatological and culminates in an end to evil [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The scroll is some 2.9 m long and an average of 16 cm high with a total of 19 columns (Sukenik, 1955, p. 44) and was composed in Hebrew. It is also one of the best-preserved scrolls although the bottom lines of all columns and the ending of the composition are no longer extant. More texts relating to the eschatological war were found in Caves 4 and 11 (4Q285, 4Q471, 4Q491–497, 11Q14), all of them fragmentary. Scholars have attempted to piece the fragments together in order to reconstruct portions of the text from which they emanated [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts] These fragmentary manuscripts have been divided into two groups. The first group comprises copies or different recensions (or versions) of the War Scroll (4Q471, 4Q491–497) and are also labelled 4QM (Duhaime, 2004, pp. 20–31). A second group of texts is made up of 4Q285 and 11Q14, two copies of a separate composition called Sefer ha–Milh.amah or the ‘the Book of the War’ (Alexander, 2003, pp. 17–32; Schultz, 2012, pp. 197–212). The War Scroll (1QM ; 4QM ) is a kind of ‘manual’ for priests (Duhaime, 1988, pp. 133–51; Schultz, 2009, pp. 348–52) while the preserved portions of Sefer ha–Milh.amah focus more on the role of the Prince of the Congregation and the last stages of the war. Since the War Scroll constitutes the longest and best-preserved composition, it is the foundation for our understanding of the sectarians’ expectations of an anticipated eschatological war. The War Scroll begins in column 1 with a kind of historical introduction based on a reworking of Dan. 11.40–12.3, a portion of the Danielic prophecy in chapters 11–12 that did not come to fruition as anticipated with the death of Antiochus IV Epiphanes (Flusser, 2007, pp. 140–58). This and other details point to an initial composition in the middle of the second century bce (Segal, 1965, pp. 140–41). Column 1 includes an account of the war against the Kittim, a sobriquet for the eschatological foe, that takes place in Judea. In what is labelled the ‘war against the Kittim,’ the latter and their 322
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allies are pitted against the three tribes of Levi, Judah and Benjamin. The opening column 1QM 1 also introduces the idea of the ‘War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness.’ The latter are aided by an evil angelic being named Belial and his forces but will ultimately be defeated after divine intervention by ‘the mighty hand of God’ [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Such dualistic language is undoubtedly the result of a later editorial hand (Davies, 1977, pp. 113–21; 2010, pp. 8–19) [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. 1QM 3–8 describe the military’s organization and tactics, such as the number, kinds, uses of – and even inscriptions to be found on – the trumpets, descriptions of the military’s various formations and battle tactics, and more. 1QM 9–14 list a series of prayers to be used on the battlefield. These two sections have parallels in contemporary War Manuals (Duhaime, 1988). Finally, 1QM 15–19 merge the themes of cols 3–8 with those of 9–14 in a detailed description of the confrontation against the Kittim, the topic of 1QM 1. Further details about this battle can be found in Sefer ha–Milh.amah, where we learn that the King of the Kittim will be captured and eventually put to death by the Prince of the Congregation. Some ambiguity remains about 1QM 2. It talks about a forty-year-long ‘War of the Divisions’ that amounts to a conquest of the entire world by an army comprised of soldiers from all of Israel’s tribes. It is not clear how this account relates to the ‘War against the Kittim.’ There have been two primary approaches to resolving that question. One draws on source- and text criticism to explain the incongruities of the composition before drawing possible historical conclusions (Davies, 1977, 2010). The other takes the reworking of Dan. 11–12 in 1QM 1 as pointing to a historical context behind the initial composition of the document shortly after Antiochus IV ’s death and seeks to discern how that might inform the internal cohesion of the rest of the text, before appealing to source- and text criticism (Flusser, 2007; Schultz, 2009, 2011). Naturally, this has led to different understandings of the war. Thus, on the former view the ‘War against the Kittim’ is national and takes place after the return of Israel’s exiled tribes (Davies, 2010, p. 13). On the latter interpretation only the three tribes explicitly mentioned, Levi, Judah and Benjamin (Schultz, 2009, pp. 123–4) fight in the ‘War against the Kittim’ where victory brings about the end of the exile (Flusser, 2007, p. 153; see also Licht, 1961). Yet the overarching conclusions reached by both approaches converge significantly. Both concur that the eschatological war is a two-stage process, first a ‘War against the Kittim’ followed by a ‘War of the Divisions.’ Both suggest that most of the dualistic language relates to the ‘War against the Kittim.’ One advantage of the latter approach is that it suggests a historical impetus for updating an earlier version of the War Scroll into the form preserved in 1QM , as well as explaining why the dualistic reworkings were principally applied to the ‘War against the Kittim’ and not the ‘War of the Divisions.’ In particular, the proposed context that gave rise to an updating of existing war traditions was Pompey’s conquest of Judea in 63 bce which led to an identification of the eschatological Kittim, previously associated with the Seleucids, with the mighty Romans (Schultz, 2009, pp. 385–90, 2011).
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Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (2003), ‘The evil empire: The Qumran eschatological war cycle and the origins of the Jewish opposition to Rome,’ in S. M. Paul et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. Leiden: Brill, pp. 17–32. Davies, P. R. (1977), 1QM, the War Scroll from Qumran: Its Structure and History. Biblica et orientalia 32. Rome: Biblical Institute Press. Davies, P. R. (2010), ‘Dualism in the Qumran war texts,’ in G. G. Xeravits (ed.), Dualism in Qumran. London: T&T Clark, pp. 8–19. Duhaime, J. (1988), ‘The War Scroll from Qumran and the Greco-Roman tactical treatises,’ RevQ 13, 133–51. Duhaime, J. (2004), The War Texts: 1QM and Related Manuscripts. Companion to the Qumran Scrolls 6. London: T&T Clark. Flusser, D. (2007), ‘Apocalyptic elements in the War Scroll,’ in Judaism of the Second Temple Period: Vol. 1. Qumran and Apocalypticism. Trans. A. Yadin. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 140–58. Licht, J. (1961), ‘Eternal plant and the people of divine deliverance,’ in C. Rabin and Y. Yadin (eds), Essays on the Dead Sea Scrolls: In Memory of E. L. Sukenik (Jerusalem: Shrine of the Book), 49–74 [Hebrew]. Schultz, B. (2009), Conquering the World: The War Scroll (1QM) Reconsidered. STDJ 76. Leiden: Brill. Schultz, B. (2011), ‘Not Greeks but Romans: Changing expectations for the eschatological war in the War Texts from Qumran,’ in M. Popović (ed.), The Jewish Revolt Against Rome: Interdisciplinary Perspectives. JSJS up 154. Leiden: Brill, pp. 107–27. Schultz, B. (2012), ‘Re–imagining the eschatological war—4Q285/11Q14,’ in A. M. Maeir, J. Magness, and L. H. Schiffman (eds), ‘Go Out and Study the Land’ (Judges 18:2): Archaeological, Historical and Textual Studies in Honor of Hanan Eshel. JSJS up 148. Leiden: Brill, pp. 197–212. Segal, M. H. (1965), ‘The Qumran War Scroll and the date of its composition,’ in C. Rabin (ed.), Aspects of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Scripta Hierosolymitana 4. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, pp. 138–43. Sukenik, E. L. (1948), Megillot Genuzot: Scrolls Stored in an Ancient Geniza Found in the Judean Desert, First Survey. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute [Hebrew]. Sukenik, E. L. (1955), The Dead Sea Scrolls of the Hebrew University. Trans. D. A. Fineman. Jerusalem: Magnes.
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Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah (MMT) Hanne von Weissenberg
The designation 4QMMT was given to this composition by the editors Elisha Qimron and John Strugnell and derives from the words ‘Some of the Works of the Torah’ (line C 26 of the composite text, Qimron and Strugnell, 1994). The manuscripts of this document, 4Q394–399, were found in Cave 4 at Qumran. The oldest preserved manuscript is not likely to be the original composition, and the editors dated the document to around 150 bce . 4QMMT is generally considered either one of the earliest writings of the Qumran movement or, alternatively, pre-Qumranic. The number of copies attests the importance of this document to the movement associated with the Qumran library. Therefore, even though 4QMMT could originally have been composed either at Qumran or elsewhere, it was certainly of considerable significance for the Qumran movement. 4QMMT was published in the Discoveries of the Judean Desert series (DJD 10) in 1994. This edition presents both transcriptions of the individual manuscripts and a composite text based on all of the available manuscripts. The editors divided the composite text into three literary divisions: Section A) the calendar section representing a 364-day solar calendar [→62 Calendars]; Section B) the halakhot [→58 Halakhah]; and Section C) an epilogue. In presenting 4QMMT in DJD 10 the editors could not agree on the arrangement of some fragments of the epilogue, namely fragments 4Q398 11–13 [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. Thus, while the composite text is arranged according to the views of Qimron, Strugnell (Qimron and Strugnell, 1994, pp. 201–2) and Hartmut Stegemann proposed an alternative placement for these fragments (Strugnell, 1994). After the publication of the edition, it was discovered that the calendar fragments 4Q394 1–2 = 4Q327, published in DJD 10, do not belong to the same manuscript as the rest of 4Q394 (García Martínez, 1993; VanderKam, 1997). Nevertheless, the first extant passage of 4Q394 3a–4 1–3 is a calendrical phrase, probably a concluding section of a longer calendrical section. Therefore, at least one of the manuscripts of 4QMMT contained a calendar of some kind before the halakhic section. When first announced, 4QMMT was understood to be a letter written by the founder of the Qumran community, the Teacher of Righteousness, to the Wicked Priest, the leader of his opponents and a high priest in Jerusalem, in order to explain the reasons for the Qumran community’s existence (see also 4QpPsalmsa) [→20 Historiography; 44 Pesharim]. The initial interpretation has been somewhat modified 325
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in recent years, and most scholars have abandoned the identification the Teacher of Righteousness as the author of 4QMMT. Furthermore, both its genre as a letter, and its Qumranic origin, have been questioned by scholars (Hempel, 2010). Some still refer to the document as the ‘halakhic letter,’ although 4QMMT lacks the formal features typical of a personal letter (Doering, 2012, pp. 194–214). It comprises, rather, a mixture of genres such as legal texts and literary epistles. In the halakhic section, the document presents what the authors consider to be the correct interpretation of some disputed cultic and purity laws (see Qimron and Strugnell, 1994, pp. 123–200; Hempel, 2013, pp. 173–92) [→70 Purity and Holiness]. In the epilogue, the authors offer the justification for the legal interpretations put forward and an admonition for the implementation of the laws. The laws of the halakhic section deal with matters of cult and ritual purity: sacrifice, profane slaughter, various purity regulations, individuals forbidden to enter the Temple or the congregation, priestly gifts and illegal marriages – issues that are clearly of priestly interest – and the authors of 4QMMT express their own interpretation over matters that appear to be disputed. Often, the interpretation advocated appears to be more stringent than the view of the assumed opponents. In the epilogue, scriptural source texts, mainly Deuteronomy, are cited or alluded to (Kratz, 2006; von Weissenberg, 2009). 4QMMT is modelled on an imitation of the covenantal pattern of biblical laws and Deuteronomy in particular. In the epilogue, the blessings and curses, the guarantee for the covenantal obligation, are woven together with paraenetic material. The epilogue is exhortatory in tone: in order to avoid the curses the addressees are encouraged to repent and return to the law, which means following the legal interpretation presented in the halakhic section. Even though the structure of 4QMMT had scriptural predecessors, the genre of this text is an innovative combination of elements from several previously known genres. In 4QMMT, the authors skilfully created a text in which both the structure and the scriptural subtext(s) are used to argue in favour of the legal interpretations of the authors. The purity of the Temple cult and covenantal faithfulness are linked in 4QMMT. It is generally concluded that 4QMMT was authored by members of the Qumran movement or its predecessors. However, neither the halakhic section nor the epilogue display any sectarian characteristics. Apart from the strictness of the interpretation of cultic laws, which is often considered to be typical of the movement associated for a time with Khirbet Qumran, the focus of the halakhah is not necessarily sectarian, governing the life of a particular group, but rather it is addressed to Israel as a whole (Hempel, 2010; von Weissenberg, 2009). Furthermore, the document lacks the technical terminology and expressions that are found in the documents associated with the movement behind such texts as the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] and the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. The covenantal understanding of the epilogue of 4QMMT differs from the particularistic idea of the covenant presented in the former texts. The calendar attached to one of the manuscripts apparently represents the 364–day solar calendar known from other Qumran texts; however, it is now clear that more than one calendar is attested at Qumran [→62 Calendars]. It is noteworthy that the combination of concerns for ritual purity prominent in the
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halakhic section and the emphasis on repentance in the epilogue is reminiscent of the parity of ritual and moral impurity in texts like the Community Rule [→70 Purity and Holiness]. A common interpretation of 4QMMT assumes that the document was addressed to a group of outsiders, probably the Temple establishment. After a break with this group, the relationship with opponents remained hostile and defensive, and no more efforts were made toward reconciliation or reformation of the situation in the Jerusalem Temple [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. However, this assumption does not explain the rather large number of late copies of the text, and alternative explanations have since been offered. 4QMMT could have been composed as a document listing principal opinions of the author(s) or their community where their halakhic interpretation differed from those of other groups. Alternatively, it could have been understood as such by its readers. In both cases, the document could have served a pedagogical function, used for instruction and strengthening the identity of new members (Fraade, 2000; Grossman, 2001). The strong interest in cultic matters could also have functioned as a substitute for the actual participation in the Temple cult. On the other hand, the manuscripts could reflect the hope that the Temple cult would one day be purified, especially as the separation from the rest of the people is not the main emphasis of the epilogue (Hempel, 2010; von Weissenberg, 2010). The focus is rather on repentance and the reformation of the Jerusalem cult, which could not be achieved by separation alone.
Bibliography Doering, L. (2012), Ancient Jewish Letters and the Beginnings of Christian Epistolography. WUNT I. 298. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Fraade, S. (2000), ‘To whom it may concern: Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah and its addressee(s),’ RevQ 19, 507–26. García Martínez, F. (1993), ‘Dos notas sobre 4QMMT,’ RevQ 16, 293–7. Grossman, M. (2001), ‘Reading 4QMMT: Genre and history,’ RevQ 20, 3–22. Hempel, C. (2010), ‘The context of 4QMMT and comfortable theories,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 275–92 Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Kampen, J. and M. J. Bernstein (eds) (1996), Reading 4QMMT: New Perspectives on Qumran Law and History. SBLS ymS 2. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Kratz, R. G. (2006), ‘Mose und die Prophetie: Zur Interpretation von 4QMMT C,’ in F. García Martínez, A. Steudel, and E. Tigchelaar (eds), From 4QMMT to Resurrection: Mélanges qumraniens en hommage à Émile. STDJ 61. Leiden: Brill, pp. 151–76. Qimron, E. and J. Strugnell (1994), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Maʿaśeh Ha-Torah. In Consultation with Y. Sussmann and with contributions by Y. Sussmann and A. Yardeni. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Strugnell, J. (1994), ‘MMT: Second thoughts on a forthcoming edition,’ in E. Ulrich and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Community of the Renewed Covenant: The Notre Dame Symposium on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Christianity and Judaism in Antiquity 10. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, pp. 53–73.
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VanderKam, J. C. (1997), ‘The calendar, 4Q327, and 4Q394,’ in M. Bernstein, F. García Martínez, and J. Kampen (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten. STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 179–94. Weissenberg, H., von (2009). 4QMMT: Reevaluating the Text, the Function, and the Meaning of the Epilogue. STDJ 82. Leiden: Brill. Weissenberg, H., von (2010), ‘The centrality of the temple in 4QMMT,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 293–305.
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Mysteries Samuel I. Thomas
The work now known as Mysteries came to light in 1949 during the first official excavation of Qumran Cave 1. J. T. Milik dubbed the manuscript 1Q27 ‘Livre des Mystères’ because of its frequent use of the word raz, often translated as ‘mystery.’ Later discoveries in Cave 4 unearthed two additional copies of the same work (4Q299–300 [4QMysta–b]) that displayed significant overlaps with 1Q27 and with one another. The precise nature of the relationship between these manuscripts and 4Q301 (4QMystc?) continues to be debated; the latter also has some intriguing thematic parallels with later Hekhalot literature, a topic that merits further inquiry [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. It is possible that 4Q301 is a copy or a variant recension of Mysteries, in which case it may preserve the opening section of the work. All of the manuscripts of Mysteries are fragmentary, making it difficult to know the full length of the original composition [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. Scholars have proposed several theories regarding the composition of Mysteries based upon observations about its themes, genre(s) and use of earlier texts and traditions. One theory holds that Mysteries is the product of a group of sage-scribes who are in some kind of continuity with the circles responsible for the production of Ben Sira, the book of Daniel [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related], and/or Instruction [→38 Instruction]. The important verbal similarities between Mysteries and 4QI nstruction, for example, have been well researched [→63 Wisdom]. Another possibility is that Mysteries originated in the Jerusalem Temple and reflects a debate among priestly-scribal practitioners about who has proper interpretive authority [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. In any case, it is clear that Mysteries mixes elements of sapiential, prophetic and priestly perspectives, and these together make up a text whose date and provenance are difficult to determine. It is likely that Mysteries was composed some time during the second century bce in the vicinity of Jerusalem. This proposition fits the textual evidence well, and accords with a general situation that fostered esotericism and Jewish polemical literature aimed at other Jewish and/or non-Jewish groups. It is probable that Mysteries preceded the formation of the Yahad (i.e. it is not sectarian in a narrow sense) and it was possibly a source for compositions such as the Treatise on the Two Spirits and perhaps Pesher Habakkuk, among other texts [→72 Forms of Community; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 44 Pesharim]. Its genre does not correspond 329
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clearly to any other extant early Jewish text. Rather, it is a blend of genres that weaves together elements of prophecy and both ‘biblical’ and early Jewish wisdom [→63 Wisdom]. The primary themes of Mysteries include: insider-outsider language; statements about interpretive authority that include references to proper access to the ‘root of wisdom’ (šwrš h.wkmh), ‘the vision’ (hh.zwn), and ‘the mystery of what is to be’ (rz nhyh); an apparent interest in astrological concepts; and references to priestly ritual and instruction [→66 Revelation; 62 Calendars]. Throughout the composition we find evidence of a deterministic, eschatological outlook that presupposes an impending judgement [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The use of insider-outsider language is prominent in Mysteries. The protagonists are contrasted with their opponents throughout the composition. Such language serves not only to define the status of these opponents but – perhaps more importantly – to establish the identity of the in-group by a series of binary oppositions that have both cosmic and eschatological significance [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. These oppositions are cast mostly in terms of knowledge, displaying a ‘cognitive taxonomy’ that orders the social, temporal and cosmic dimensions (Petersen, 2002, p. 419). The principal epistemological concern of Mysteries seems to be that of interpretive authority [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Who has the right kind of knowledge and wisdom to be able to derive a proper understanding of the universe and of history? Here again the contrast is between those who have access to the ‘root of wisdom’ (4Q300 1 ii 3; 4Q301 1 2, 2 1), the ‘vision’ (4Q300 1a ii–b 3, 6) and ‘the mystery of what is to be’ (1Q27 1 i 3, 4 [=4Q300 3 4]), and those who know only the ‘mysteries of transgression’ (1Q27 1 i 2 [4Q300 3 2]). This latter group consists of ‘magicians’ (h.r·tmym) – wayward diviners – who lack interpretive authority and therefore true knowledge remains hidden from them in riddles and parables (4Q300 1a ii–b 1–6). Mysteries also employs the language of early Jewish astrology to present the distinction between the group and its opponents. Members of the opposition group are associated with the ‘birth times of iniquity’ (mwldy ‘wlh, cf. 1Q27 1 i 5; cf. 4Q417 2 i 11), whereas those who know ‘the mystery of what is to be’ are able to investigate the ‘horoscope’ (mwldym or byt mwldym) and thereby gain insight into the fate of individuals and the unfolding of historical time (4Q299 3a ii–b 9–16; 4Q299 5 5) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. While priestly concerns are not a primary focus of Mysteries, there are fragmentary passages that employ priestly language and refer to priestly practices. These include references to Aaron and priests (1Q27 3 2); atonement (1Q27 6 2–3); service in the sanctuary (4Q299 52 5); impurity (4Q299 3a ii–b 3 [=4Q300 5 4]) [→ 70 Purity and Holiness]; and the Urim and Thummim (4Q299 69 1–2). This may be due to familiarity with the Jerusalem Temple itself or, given the frequency of scriptural references in Mysteries, with scriptural traditions about the temple and priesthood.
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Bibliography Elgvin, T. (2010), ‘The use of scripture in 1Q/4QMysteries,’ in E. Chazon, B. Halpern-Amaru with R. Clements (eds), New Perspectives on Old Texts: Proceedings of the Tenth Annual International Orion Symposium, January 9–11, 2005. STDJ 88. Leiden: Brill, pp. 117–31. Goff, M. J. (2007), Discerning Wisdom: The Sapiential Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. VTS up 116. Leiden: Brill, pp. 69–103. Petersen, A. K. (2002), ‘Wisdom as cognition: Creating the others in the Book of Mysteries and 1 Cor 1–2,’ in C. Hempel, A. Lange, and H. Lichtenberger (eds), The Wisdom Texts from Qumran and the Development of Sapiential Thought. BETL 159. Leuven: Peeters / Leuven University Press, pp. 405–32. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2003), ‘Your wisdom and your folly: The case of 1–4QMysteries,’ in F. García Martínez (ed.), Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition. BETL 168. Leuven: Peeters/Leuven University Press, pp. 69–88.
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New Jerusalem Michael Langlois
New Jerusalem (hereafter NJ ) is the title given to a work preserved in seven fragmentary Aramaic manuscripts (1Q32, 2Q24, 4Q554–554a–555, 5Q15, and 11Q18) which describe a city and its temple as they are shown to the narrator.
Genre NJ is an apocalypse or ‘revelation’ of special knowledge otherwise inaccessible to human beings [→66 Revelation]. The present revelation is not merely auricular, but ocular or visionary, as the narrator gives an account of what he ‘saw’ or ‘was shown’ (using the verb h.zy ‘to see’). Apocalypses often focus on past and future events, or spiritual realms; the city described here is not an actual, contemporary one, but an ideal, perhaps – but not necessarily – future, city. Similar apocalyptic visions and descriptions of an ideal city were known in ancient Jewish literature prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, notably in the Book of Ezekiel (Ezek. 40–48) and the Revelation of John (Rev. 21–22). The city par excellence is of course Jerusalem, or the ‘New Jerusalem’ as reflected in the title given to this work, although the city described here is not explicitly identified. This anonymity may be due to the fragmentary state of the manuscripts (the beginning of the text, for instance, is lost), but it is not uncommon that apocalypses omit such details (cf. Ezek. 40.1). Several fragments of NJ seem to describe – or rather prescribe – priestly duties in the temple also dealt within halakhic and liturgical texts from Qumran [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple; 58 Halakhah; 61 Liturgical Texts]. This shows that, as is often the case, NJ is not limited to a single literary genre.
Narrator As is the case with the city, the names of the narrator and his guide are not attested in the extant fragments. Given the numerous affinities between NJ and Ezek. 40–48 the prophet Ezekiel is a strong candidate. His guide there – and perhaps also here – is an unnamed man of special appearance (Ezek. 40.3), most likely a divine being or angel [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. 332
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However, other candidates may be suggested. Daniel, for instance, is known for his interactions with divine beings (Dan. 8–10), and a number of Dead Sea Scrolls may be linked to Danielic traditions (see, e.g. 4Q242, 4Q243–245, 4Q246, 4Q552–553a) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related). Enoch is another serious candidate: not only are Enochic traditions well attested at Qumran [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other], but the books of Enoch feature a first-person account of visionary journeys (1 En. 17–36) led by angels, e.g. Uriel (1 En. 19.1), Raphael (1 En. 22.3,6), Raguel (1 En. 23.4) or Michael (1 En. 24.6). These journeys include a description of the divine mountain, the tree of life and the topography of Jerusalem (1 En. 24–26). Moreover, their language is Aramaic, as in NJ, and not Hebrew, as in Ezek. 40–48 or Dan. 8–10. For these reasons, Enoch seems to be the likeliest candidate as NJ narrator; his guide, then, may be one of the angels mentioned above or appearing elsewhere in the books of Enoch (e.g. Gabriel or Sariel). He may also be anonymous, as in the Book of Ezekiel.
Language and Manuscript Evidence Seven manuscripts from five Qumran caves have been identified as copies of NJ. On the basis of paleographical analysis and textual overlap, one of the fragments of 4Q554 was re-labelled 4Q554a (Puech, 2009, pp. 91, 139ff.); on the other hand, the identification of a possible NJ Hebrew fragment referred to by Milik (1976, p. 59) – the editor of 1Q32 and 5Q15 – was not subsequently upheld (it may have been a fragment of the Temple Scroll, Reworked Pentateuch [→51 Temple Scroll; 56 Parabiblical Texts/ Rewritten Scripture] or related manuscripts – if not lost). To our present knowledge, therefore, NJ is attested by seven manuscripts, all of them in Aramaic. The language itself is a Western dialect exhibiting orthographic features slightly posterior to the Aramaic sections of the Book of Daniel [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]; the dates of the copies range from the first half of the first century bce (4Q554a) to the first half of the first century ce (2Q24).
Significance Notwithstanding its language, the Aramaic NJ differs in several aspects from the Book of Ezekiel, the Temple Scroll or Revelation. Unlike John’s New Jerusalem, the city does have a temple which is described in great detail. Whereas Ezekiel’s visit begins with the temple, the direction of NJ ’s description seems to start from the outside walls into the city with its streets and, finally, the temple (e.g. DiTommaso, 2005, pp. 96ff .). The city gates are, as elsewhere, named after the twelve tribes of Israel, but appear in a unique order (Puech, 2009, p. 93). Unlike the square basis of Ezekiel’s and John’s cities (4,500 cubits and 12,000 stadia respectively), the city plan of NJ is rectangular (100 × 140 stadia). Moreover, its streets follow an orthogonal pattern similar to the well-known Hippodamian plan. This and other architectural features suggest a composition in the Hellenistic period.
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Finally, the presence of a fragment mentioning foreign kingdoms such as Babylon, the Kittim, Edom, Moab and the sons of Ammon (4Q554 13), is reminiscent of the four kingdoms at Qumran (4Q552–553a) and the Book of Daniel (Dan. 7). Such texts allude to the political crisis in Judea during the first half of the second century bce , which may also underlie the redaction of NJ.
Bibliography Baillet, M. (1962) ‘2Q24: Description de la Jérusalem Nouvelle,’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux, Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumran. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 84–9. DiTommaso, L. (2005), The Dead Sea New Jerusalem Text: Contents and Contexts. TSAJ 110. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. García Martínez, F. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (1998), ‘11Q18,’ in García Martínez, Tigchelaar, and A. S. van der Woude, Qumran Cave 11. DJD 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 305–55. Milik, J. T. (1955), ‘1Q32: Description de la Jérusalem Nouvelle,’ in D. Barthélemy and J. T. Milik, Qumran Cave 1. DJD 1. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 134–5. Milik, J. T. (1962), ‘5Q15: Description de la Jérusalem Nouvelle,’ in M. Baillet, J. T. Milik and R. de Vaux, Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumran. DJD 3. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 184–93. Milik, J. T. (1976), The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4. Oxford: OUP. Puech, É. (2009), ‘4Q554–554a–555: Jérusalem Nouvelle,’ in idem, Qumrân Grotte 4. 27: Textes Araméens Deuxiéme Partie. DJD 37. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 91–152
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Pesharim Shani Tzoref
The dozen or so ‘continuous’ pesharim found in the Qumran corpus are the earliest extant systematic commentaries on biblical texts. In these compositions, poetic/ prophetic texts of the Hebrew Bible are applied to the Community’s own experience [→60 Poetry and Hymns], which was understood as taking place at the end-time [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Related works known as thematic pesharim offer similar sorts of exegesis, but select their biblical texts thematically rather than offering consecutive commentary on a single work. As contemporizing theological commentaries on biblical prophecy, the pesharim offer valuable insight into the world of the movement affiliated for a time with the site of Qumran. In particular, the continuous pesharim have been mined for historical information and viewed as a potential key to the identification of the movement. This has most commonly been directed towards support of the Essene hypothesis, for example in the identification of ‘Ephraim’ and ‘Manasseh’ – the political/ideological opponents singled out by the author of Pesher Nahum – as the Sadducees and Pharisees respectively [→20 Historiography; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus]. The pesharim have also been analysed in terms of their contribution to our understanding of the reception of the Hebrew Bible at Qumran. The systematic commentary form of continuous pesharim (sequential citation of scriptural lemmas followed by interpretation) and the understanding of the biblical base-texts as authoritative sources of revelation point to the centrality of the emerging biblical corpus for the Qumran community [→55 Bible; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. At the same time, the attestation of textual variants and the use of creative exegetical techniques point to the textual fluidity discernible in the Qumran scriptural corpus and a view of biblical texts as living interactive media rather than static relics to be preserved untouched. This approach to scripture may be associated with the movement’s selfunderstanding as representatives of an elect group selected as recipients for ongoing divine revelation [→66 Revelation]. The distinctive sectarian language and motifs in the pesharim offer significant information about theology and community identity [→72 Forms of Community; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The pesharim share certain key terminology with the other classic sectarian works such as the Damascus Document (D) [→35 Damascus Document], the Community Rule (S) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the War Scroll (M) [→ Milh.amah], 335
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and the Hodayot (H) [→37 Hodayot] as isolated and discussed by Devorah Dimant (Dimant, 2014, pp. 57–100). The distribution of the terms in the pesharim is distinctive, however, and there is also some variation in the clustering of specific terms in the continuous pesharim as compared to the thematic pesharim. Examination of the sectarian terms that appear in the pesharim shows a marriage of form and function – they revolve around group identity vis-à-vis outsiders, contemporizing exegesis and a deterministic dualistic worldview [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. Dimant organized her discussion of sectarian terminology into three categories, which I adopt below.
Structure and Organization Terminology of community is characteristic of the foundational documents of the Yahad, especially the Rule texts [→59 Rules]. In M, D and S the community is frequently designated simply as haʿedah with the definite article. In the pesharim, collocations are more common: ‘congregation of his Elect,’ ‘congregation of the poor.’ Ten such collocations occur in continuous pesharim, of which six are found in 4QpPsa (4Q171), and two more occur in thematic pesharim. The only instance of the specific form haʿedah in the pesharim is found in 4Q161 (pIsaa) where it is the nomen rectum in a genitive construct, the epithet for the messianic figure, the ‘Prince of the Congregation.’ In 4Q163 (pIsac) and 1QpHab, as in D, H and one occurrence in M, ʿedah is used also in designations of the author’s opponents – in 4QpIsac, in a genitive construct with a negative term: ‘the congregation of the Seekers-After-Smooth-Things;’ in1QpHab, as an indefinite noun referring to the congregation built by the ‘Dripper of Lies.’ Similarly, ʿes.ah is used in the pesharim for both the community and their opponents. Most commonly, ʿes.ah appears in collocation, as the ‘council of the Yahad.’ The expression ‘men of the Yahad’ also appears, but there are no occurrences of the string ‘men of the council of the Yahad’ which is found in CD and S. The term ‘Elect’ appears in the pesharim with a possessive suffix referring to God (‘his Elect’), as it does in S, M and H, but it tends to be paired with a qualifier indicating that these Elect are set aside from non-Elect Israel: ‘the Elect of Israel,’ or ‘the congregation of the Elect.’ This collocation ‘Elect of Israel’ also appears in CD, but it is an exception that proves the rule, as the occurrence is found in a pesher identification embedded in CD : ‘the sons of Zadok [in Ezek. 44.15] are the Elect of Israel.’ Terms for members, institutions and offices (serekh ‘rule’, tikun ‘rank’, mebaqqer ‘overseer,’ [the] many) that are common in D and S are rare in the pesharim. The term rabbim (‘many’), for example, is used non-technically, or perhaps to refer to the masses at large, rather than to a segment of the community as in the foundational texts [→73 Daily Life]. Thus, the use of community terminology in the pesharim differs from that in the Rules where it tends to be inwardly focused, reflecting the concern with internal structure and regulations. In these works, such terms call attention to individuals within the group, and mark a boundary between ‘the congregation’ and all outsiders. Community terminology in the pesharim presents the community as an entity set apart from other named groups on the historical stage and in interaction with them.
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History and Polemic The terms in this category – including most significantly the word pesher itself – are those that are found especially in the pesharim and the Damascus texts, and have been discussed extensively with respect to the history of the community. A noteworthy feature of pesharim is that they tend to name contemporary figures via sobriquets. Dimant points out, significantly, that the epithets ‘Teacher of Righteousness,’ ‘Wicked Priest,’ ‘Spouter of Lies,’ and ‘Smooth Things,’ which are used to encode the actualizing revelations in the pesharim, are all themselves derived from pesher-like exegesis of biblical verses (e.g. ‘Teacher of Righteousness’ as rooted in Joel 2.23, Hosea 10.12) [→20 Historiography].
Theology and Worldview The specific sectarian concepts discussed by Dimant pertain to dualism, fate and the conduct of the members of the community. Philologically, dualism is reflected in the sectarian texts in word pairs: light/darkness; iniquity/righteousness; truth/falsehood [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. Somewhat unexpectedly, the characteristic sectarian idiom ‘sons of light’ does not appear in the extant texts of the continuous pesharim (and only once partially preserved in one manuscript of D [4Q266 1a–b 1]). It is found in the thematic pesher 4QC atena (4Q177 and probably also Florilegium [4Q174]) especially in the context of susceptibility to Belial’s falsehood [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Belial occurs numerous times in 4Q177 and 4Q174, but is not mentioned in the continuous pesharim. I would venture that this is because the pesharim are more concerned with earthly expressions of dualism than with metaphysics. Thus, the word ‘truth’ and terms for falsehood appear frequently, with sectarian connotation: e.g. ‘men of truth,’ ‘Spouter of Lies,’ the ‘false tongue’ of the Seekers-after-Smooth-Things. This does not account, however, for the absence of the term ʿwl ‘falsehood’ in the pesharim and D. The one occurrence in D, as with ‘sons of Light,’ is in 4Q266 (4QD a). As for the terms indicating determinism, ‘period’ recurs with great frequency in all of the classic sectarian texts, including the pesharim, whereas grl ‘lot’, typical of the other compositions, occurs in D, 4Q174 and 4Q177, but only once in 4Q164 (pIsad) in the continuous pesharim (other than a citation of Nahum in a lemma in 4Q169 [pNah] which is not taken up in the pesher interpretation.) Again, this seems to reflect the interest of pesharim in earthly fulfilment rather than cosmic and theosophical concerns. Most of the representative sectarian terms found in pesher pertain to the history of the Community, and to its founders and spiritual leaders, rather than to communal functionaries or metaphysical concepts. The language of community in the pesharim is boundary-marking, of a particular sort. It generally conveys the distinctiveness of the group vis-à-vis other opposing groups. The theological language relates especially to the fulfilment of predestined periods, and to the dualism that divides the Elect true community from competing groups falsely posing as righteous. The sectarian terms found in the pesharim are especially tied to the biblical text, particularly the epithets
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in the continuous pesharim, which are rooted in contemporizing interpretations of biblical prophecy.
Bibliography Berrin [Tzoref], S. L. (2005), ‘Qumran Pesharim,’ in M. Henze (ed.), Biblical Interpretation at Qumran. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 110–33. Dimant, D. (2014), History, Ideology and Bible Interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Collected Studies. FAT 90. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Horgan, M.P. (1979), Pesharim: Qumran Interpretations of Biblical Books. CBQMS 8. Washington: Catholic Biblical Association of America. Lim, T. (2002), Pesharim. Companion to the Qumran Scrolls 3. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press.
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Rule of Blessings (Sb) Judith H. Newman
The Rule of Blessings (1QS b) is a fragmentary composition appearing in the last five columns at the end of the scroll containing the Community Rule (1QS ) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] and the Rule of the Congregation (1QS a) [→46 Rule of the Congregation]. The entire scroll is written in the same scribal hand and dated paleographically to the Hasmonean period (100–75 bce ). The customary title is misleading because nowhere does the term ‘rule’ (serekh) appear [→59 Rules]. Attribution to the (or a) Maskil (1.1; 3.22; 5.20) links this composition to the Community Rule (cf. 1QS 3.13, 9.12, 9.21), the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice], the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah] and the Songs of the Sage (4Q510–511) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination] which have similar assignations. They can also be compared to the Berakhot [→32 Berakhot] from Caves 4 and 11. It is not clear whether the ascription was understood to indicate authorship or to designate a Maskil as the performer of the text, or both. The office of Maskil served didactic, apotropaic, and especially liturgical functions [→61 Liturgical Texts]. Blessings were one of the forms of potent speech pronounced by this ‘spiritual maestro’ of the Yahad (cf. 1QS 9.26). The document begins with a formula, ‘Words of blessing for the Maskil to bless those who fear God, do his will, and observe his commandments.’ The extant portions give an indication of its content: a series of five to eight blessings written with a second-person singular addressee. These blessings are distinguished formally from such blessings as found in the Hodayot, in which in reciprocal fashion, humans are called on to bless God. Though it may have been used independently, the Rule of Blessings can be understood in connection with the Community Rule and the Rule of the Congregation. The Community Rule describes an entry ceremony into the Yahad covenant (1QS 1.18–2.10) which includes a recitation of divine mercy and Israelite recalcitrance, a communal confession, and concludes with the blessing the priests should pronounce over those entering the covenant (1QS 2.2–4) and a much longer series of curses that the Levites would pronounce over those of Belial’s lot (1QS 2.5–18) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons). Because 1QS b contains no curses like those in the covenant ceremony, the setting may envision a time in which evil has been expunged so there is no need to curse the sons of Belial. 1QS b has been understood as an eschatological blessing for the end of days in part because it follows 1QS a which is written ‘for the congregation of Israel in the last days.’ 339
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Blessings are to be pronounced over different people according to ascending rank. The initial blessing in column one is the broadest, addressed to members of an eternal covenant (1QS b 1.1–2.21). Because of the broken text, it is unclear whether one or more parties are addressed in the next block of text (1QS b 2.22–3.21). ‘The sons of Zadok the priests’ are mentioned (3.22) as those chosen to strengthen the covenant by teaching the law. The middle of the blessing in 3.22–4.21 is lost or highly fragmentary. The end of column 4 describes one who should be ‘like an Angel of the Presence in the Abode of Holiness,’ thus suggesting the Zadokite High Priest. This is supported by the blessing expressing the wish that he be dedicated to the Holy of Holies, the place reserved exclusively for the entrance of the High Priest. This figure is also expected to ‘illuminate the face of the Many’ (4.27). The ‘Many’ (rabbim) is one term by which the Yahad movement identified themselves. The glowing glorified faces are seemingly a result of visionary knowledge conveyed by the High Priest and suggest a special revelatory character resulting in an angelic status. The motif of an illuminated face occurs in the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] as well. In the so-called ‘Teacher Hymns,’ the hymnist thanks God for illuminating his face for the divine covenant (1QHa 11.4; 12.6) through which he in turn reveals mysteries which illumine the faces of the Many (1QHa 12.28). A significant feature of the composition is its interpretive engagement with scripture [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation], most notably the threefold priestly blessing of Num. 6.24–26. The passage is not cited verbatim, but its six verbs are repeated throughout all the blessings except for the final blessing over the Prince of the Congregation. This amplification of the priestly blessing is similar to the covenant ceremony (1QS 2.1–4) and offers a distinctively sectarian reinterpretation. Both the interpretative process by which such prayers are composed and the resultant offering of the blessing should be understood as a priestly-prophetic activity; which is part of the central communal activity of interpretation of the Torah of Moses.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2015), ‘Reading, searching and blessing: A functional approach to the genres of scriptural interpretation in the Yahad,’ in R. T. McClay (ed.), Temple in Text and Tradition: A Festschrift in Honour of Robert Hayward. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, pp. 140–56. Charlesworth, J. H. and L. T. Stuckenbruck (1995), ‘Blessings (1QS b),’ in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations. Rule of the Community and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck; Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox, pp. 119–31. Nitzan, B. (1994), Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry. Trans. J. Chipman. STDJ 12. Leiden: Brill. Schuller, E. (1990), ‘Some observations on blessings of God in texts from Qumran,’ in H. Attridge, J. J. Collins, and T. Tobin (eds), Of Scribes and Scrolls: Studies on the Hebrew Bible, Intertestamental Judaism, and Christian Origins. Lanham: University Press of America, pp. 133–43. Talmon, S. (1960), ‘The “Manual of Benedictions” of the sect of the Judaean Desert,’ RevQ 2, 475–500.
46
Rule of the Congregation (Sa) Corrado Martone
The Rule of the Congregation (1QS a) (see Figure 46.1 below) is found in the same manuscript from Qumran Cave 1 as the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] and the Rule of Blessings [→45 Rule of Blessings], and along with these two texts it was among the very first Dead Sea Scrolls to be published and studied [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. The script, the same as the other works in the same scroll, may be dated to the early first century bce . The title usually given to the work is found at the very beginning (1QS a 1.1): ‘This is the rule for all the congregation of Israel in the Last Days.’ More recently a group of tiny fragments in cryptic script from Qumran Cave 4 have been identified by Stephen Pfann as further witnesses of the Rule of the Congregation. Pfann’s identification, though, is far from widely accepted, and his conclusions have been challenged (Gayer, Stökl Ben Ezra and Ben-Dov, 2016). The text is rather brief (two columns) but treats a number of fascinating topics. It may be summarized as follows: a general introduction stating that the members of the congregation of Israel will join the Yahad in the last days to be instructed in the statutes of the covenant (1.1–5) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Joining the Yahad requires living ‘by the law of the Sons of Zadok’ (1QS a 1.1–2). 1QS a next enumerates a list of rules regarding the life of the members of the Yahad, from youth through old age (1.6–19) [→73 Daily Life]. A further set of rules concerns members unable to serve and the functions of the Levites (1.20–27). A major section is devoted to the men appointed to the council of the Yahad and those who are excluded due to physical impairments or impurity (1.27–2.10) [→70 Purity and Holiness]. The work concludes with the description of a messianic banquet to be held in the last days, ‘when [God] sends the Messiah to be with them’ (2.11–12). Contrary to 1QS women and children, as well as a number of rules concerning family life, appear in 1QS a. The relationship between the two works is still a matter of debate, though the alleged celibacy of the members of the Qumran group is an argument from silence based on 1QS [→72 Forms of Community]. A common interpretation takes the Rule of the Congregation as a collection of ordinances for the eschatological era when the sect will be at the head of the nation (Schiffman, 1989). A number of scholars have questioned this interpretation, stating that the community described in 1QS a resembles other Rule texts devoted to describing the conduct of communities in the present. On this perspective, even the ‘last days’ mentioned in 1QS a 1.1 would not represent the messianic era, but the present time of 341
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Figure 46.1 The Rule of the Congregation (1QS a). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan. the community, to be fulfilled by God’s visitation (Stegemann, 1996). Likewise, the meal described in the closing lines would not be held in the presence of the messiah, but rather refer to priests officiating in communities. More nuanced views suggest an interpretation based on the non-eschatological character of a good part of the work as well as on the many rules concerning family life, similar to those found in the Damascus Document (Hempel, 1996) [→ 35 Damascus Document]. Besides, a further hint at the close relationship between the Damascus Document and the Rule of the Congregation is the striking analogy of the categories of people to be excluded from the community according to both works (see 1QS a 2.5–9 and CD 15.15ff.). From this point of view, the present form of the Rule of the Congregation is the result of progressive development of eschatological concepts from a core of rules reflecting pre-eschatological rules. In any case, the Rule of the Congregation ascribes the greatest importance to the Zadokite element, seen as the elite of the community. This at least makes plausible an identification of the community’s elite with a group which no longer acknowledges the Jerusalem priesthood as the legitimate one after the end of its Zadokite lineage
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[→69 Jerusalem and the Temple; 20 Historiography]. After the death of the last Zadokite High Priest Onias III in 175 bce , Zadokite descent was removed from the historical scene and only eschatological expectation may offer hope to see the legitimate priesthood re-established in office [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. For this reason the Rule of the Congregation sees the Zadokite priesthood raised to an eschatological level and gives it a central role in the social structure of the community of the last days. Although intriguing, the translation ‘when [God] has fathered the Messiah among them’ (1QS a 2.11–12) is likely to originate from an erroneous reading of the original text. As early as 1965, Jacob Licht made a partial list of eight different readings of the passage put forward by as many scholars back then, and further proposals have been added over the years. In any case, in the priestly perspective of the Rule of the Congregation, the Zadokite priest may be conceived of as a priestly messiah even though he is not explicitly given a messianic title. In fact, this Zadokite priest precedes the ‘messiah of Israel’ in the strictly hierarchical course of the banquet described in the closing lines of the work.
Bibliography Gayer, A., D. Stökl Ben Ezra and J. Ben-Dov (2016), ‘A new join of two fragments of 4QcryptA Serekh haEdah and its implications,’ DSD 23, 139–54. Hempel, C. (1996), ‘The earthly Essene nucleus of 1QS a,’ DSD 3, 253–69. Licht, J. (1965), The Rule Scroll: A Scroll from the Wilderness of Judaea (1QS, 1QSa, 1QSb). Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik [Hebrew]. Pfann, S. J. (2000), Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Schiffman, L. (1989), The Eschatological Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Stegemann, H. (1996), ‘Some remarks to 1QS a, to 1QS b, and to Qumran messianism,’ RevQ 17, 479–505.
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Serekh ha-Yahad (S) Stephen Hultgren
Serekh ha-Yahad (The Rule of the Community, also known as the Manual of Discipline) is one of the most significant documents among the Scrolls, containing material relating to the origins of the Yahad, rules for admission, organization and discipline [→73 Daily Life], as well as liturgy [→61 Liturgical Texts], doctrine and hymns [→60 Poetry and Hymns]. The best-preserved exemplar of the Rule is the Cave 1 copy 1QS . Among the first of the Scrolls to be found in 1947 [→1 Discoveries], 1QS was first published in 1951 (Burrows, 1951) [→4 Acquisition and Publication]. Various parts of the Rule exist in at least ten further manuscripts from Cave 4 (4Q255–264) (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, p. 1). These manuscripts indicate that the Rule existed in multiple recensions, that the contents of the Rule varied in the course of its textual transmission, and that the Rule is composite. The variations, the composite nature, and the dating of the manuscripts, which indicate that various recensions continued to be copied even after 1QS was complete, give one pause before speaking of the Rule as a fixed text [→59 Rules]. Yet the appearance of Serekh ha-Yahad as a title on the handle sheet of 1QS and the words ‘the book of the Rule of the Community’ in 1QS 1.1 (supported by 4Q255 1 1, the oldest of the 4QS copies) suggest that one or more recensions of the Rule received recognition as a community rule book fairly early. Although some recensions contained material that does not appear in 1QS , the evidence suggests that 1QS preserves the Rule in a basically complete form. Since 1QS was found and published first, and is the most complete exemplar in the ‘S’ tradition, it is understandable that it has controlled the discussion and has served as the basic framework for studying that tradition. More recent scholarship, however, has challenged this approach (Jokiranta, 2016). The manuscript containing 1QS is dated to 100–75 bce . 1QS seems not to be an autograph, however, and parts of it must have been first composed at an earlier time. It is likely that the Rule came into the relatively complete form such as we have in 1QS towards the end of the second century bce . The oldest 4QS manuscripts have been dated towards the end of the second century bce (4Q255) and to 100–75 bce (4Q257). The remaining 4QS manuscripts date from 50 bce to 50 ce . The most important evidence for multiple recensions is twofold. First, some 4QS manuscripts agree significantly with each other and against 1QS . For example, although 4Q256 seems basically to support 1QS in order, content and length (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, pp. 39–44), it has strong agreements with 4Q258 against 1QS , particularly 344
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in column 5 of 1QS , but also elsewhere. 4Q258 appears to have begun at 1QS 5.1, so that it probably represents a recension of the Rule that lacked a parallel to 1QS 1–4 and that had a section similar to but not identical with 1QS 5. 4Q256 has material parallel to parts of 1QS 1–4, so that it has been suggested that 4Q256 and 4Q258 represent related but not identical recensions (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, pp. 11–12). Second, the 4QS manuscripts contain material that either does not appear in 1QS or that appears in a different form. 4Q259 contains a calendrical text (4QO tot) [→62 Calendars] in place of the hymn of the Maskil (1QS 9.26–11.22) [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts]. 4Q255 appears to have included a section similar to but not identical with the Treatise on the Two Spirits in 1QS 3.13–4.26 [→74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. It has been proposed that one or more recensions contained material beyond 1QS 11 (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, pp. 11, 63, 202), but it is not clear what that material may have been. The patterns of agreement and disagreement between recensions are complex, including instances where otherwise divergent manuscripts converge. Accordingly, the evidence has been interpreted in various ways, with both relatively sequential and more complex recensional histories proposed (Hempel, 2006). It has been almost universally recognized that the Rule is composite. Literary analysis of the Rule is aided by section headings, vacats, indentations and marginal markings in the manuscripts, by the varying contents of the manuscripts, and by parallels between sections of the Rule and other Scrolls [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls; 18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies]. On the basis of these indicators, one can divide the best preserved Cave 1 manuscript of the Rule into the following sections: 1QS 1.1–15 (introduction); 1.16–3.12 (covenant ceremony); 3.13–4.26 (treatise on the two spirits); 5.1–13 (rules for joining the community); 5.14–6.8 (various rules for life in the community); 6.8–23 (rules for the session of the Many); 6.24–7.27 (community discipline); 8.1–16 (a charter for the community); 8.16–9.2 (more discipline); 9.3–11 (another charter for the community); 9.12–25 (regulations for the instructor); 9.26– 11.22 (hymn of the Maskil). Parallels with other scrolls also help in identifying the genre of certain sections of the Rule, such as the covenant ceremonies in 4Q266 11 5–19 [→35 Damascus Document] and 4Q275 (Communal Ceremony; compare with 1QS 2–3) [→61 Liturgical Texts]; and the hymns in 1QHa (compare with 1QS 11) [→37 Hodayot; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. Scholars have attempted to correlate the textual development of the Rule with the history of the Qumran community [→20 Historiography]. Perhaps the best known attempt is that of Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, who proposed that the Rule developed in the following stages: 1QS 8.1–16a and 9.3–10.8a, constituting a ‘manifesto’ for a community in the desert, written before the foundation at Qumran (Stage 1); 8.16b–19 and 8.20–9.2, two different penal codes for a period after the community had been established (Stage 2); 5.1–13a and 5.15b–7.25, representing a later, more institutionalized and democratized period of the community perhaps coinciding with an influx of Pharisees into the community under John Hyrcanus (Stage 3); additions of columns 1–4 and 10.9–11.22 and interpolations in 5.13b–15a and 10.4b and 6a, intended to revive the fervour of the community (Stage 4, see Murphy-O’Connor, 1969). Other scholars have prioritized 1QS 8–9 (see Metso, 1997, p. 9 and further literature cited
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there). But the 4QS manuscripts put these questions in a new light, and it is possible that columns 5–7 have chronological priority over columns 8–9 (Metso, 1997, pp. 108– 10, 143; Hultgren, 2007, pp. 311–13, 509–12, 541–2; see also Hempel, 2015). In general, the recensional evidence, as well as the relationship between the various forms of the Rule of the Community, the Damascus Document and 4Q265 (Miscellaneous Rules), points to a complex history (both literary and communal) [→59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community]. Moreover, scholars have recently questioned the presumed, tight relationship between the Rule and a yahad narrowly identified with the Qumran site [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] and have moved away from attempts to correlate the textual development of the Rule with the history of a single community in a linear way (e.g. Schofield, 2009). Some would go even further and question whether the Rule refers to an actual community at all (Davies, 1996, pp. 151–61). The present state of research encourages a differentiated view of the relationship between various sections and recensions of the Rule and the communities they may have served.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. and G. Vermes (1998), Qumran Cave 4. XIX: Serekh Ha–Yah.ad and Two Related Texts. DJD 26. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Burrows, M., with J. C. Trever, and W. H. Brownlee (1951), The Dead Sea Scrolls of St. Mark’s Monastery Volume 2 Fascicle 2: Plates and Transcription of the Manual of Discipline. New Haven: ASOR . Davies, P. R. (1996), Sects and Scrolls: Essays on Qumran and Related Topics. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Hempel, C. (2006), ‘The literary development of the S–tradition: A new paradigm,’ RevQ 22, 389–401. Hempel, C. (2015), ‘The long text of the Serekh as crisis literature,’ RevQ 27, 3–24. Hultgren, S. (2007), From the Damascus Covenant to the Covenant of the Community: Literary, Historical, and Theological Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 66. Leiden: Brill. Jokiranta, J. (2016), ‘What is “Serekh ha-Yahad (S)”? Thinking about ancient manuscripts as information processing,’ in J. Baden, H. Najman, and E. Tigchelaar (eds), Sibyls, Scriptures, and Scrolls: John Collins at Seventy. JSJS up 175. Leiden: Brill, II: 611–35. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1969), ‘La genèse littéraire de la Règle de la Communauté,’ RB 76, 528–49. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill.
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Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice Judith H. Newman
The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (also sometimes referred to by the short Hebrew title Shirot ‘Songs’) (4Q400–407, 11Q17, Mas 1k) are a liturgical compilation of thirteen songs probably composed for each of the first thirteen sabbaths of the year. The work is preserved in ten copies, eight from Cave 4, one from Cave 11 and one from Masada. The number of copies found in the caves in proximity to the Qumran settlement likely attests to its importance to the Yahad movement. The title is derived from the superscription of each song though the composition is also known as the Angelic Liturgy because it contains descriptions of angelic praises of the divine king as creator whose arrival and immanent glory transforms the temple [→61 Liturgical Texts; 69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. The highly fragmentary texts are dated on palaeographic grounds between 75–50 bce (4Q400) and ca. 50 ce (Masada manuscript) [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. No single manuscript contains the entire collection, but together they seem to contain remains of all thirteen songs. 4Q405, which overlaps with other manuscripts, is the most complete. The Songs contain no overtly sectarian language, except possibly the mention of the Maskil in each heading. Moreover, their use of ͗elohim for God distinguishes them from most compositions thought to be composed by the Yahad with the exception of the Songs of the Sage (4Q510–511) [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Songs of the Sabbaths Sacrifice 1, 6–8, and 12–13 are the best preserved and give a sense both of the content and progression of the series. Five songs preserve a full formulaic heading containing three elements: le-maskil, which indicates either authorship or the performative assignation to the (or a) Maskil; a phrase indicating the genre: Shir ʿolat ha-shabbat (a song of the Sabbath sacrifice) and third, a date formula indicating on which sabbath it was assigned. Following the formulaic incipit is an exhortative second-person plural imperative, such as hallelu, ‘praise.’ The Songs can be divided into three groups on thematic and linguistic grounds: 1–5, 6–8 and 9–13. Songs 1–5 describe the establishment of the angelic priesthood and its responsibilities [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The first-person voice is used only in the second song of the extant material when the human priests compare themselves to the angelic beings: ‘How shall we be accounted among them? And how shall our priesthood be accounted in their dwellings . . . the offering of our tongue of 347
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dust with the knowledge of the angels?’ (4Q400 2 6–7). Songs 6–8 have a formulaic and repetitious literary structure which stresses the number seven (or oath) ševaʿ. They evoke the temple throne vision of Isaiah 6 with its commissioning of the prophet. While Isa. 6.3 is never cited, songs 6 and 8 have multiple repetitions of the root q–d–š ‘holy.’ The psalms and thanksgivings on the tongues of the seven angelic princes are uniquely described as ‘tongue offerings’ (terumot lashon). Song 7 standing at the centre represents a high point and a transition in the sequence. It contains a three-stage cosmogony in which the ‘king of kings’ creates the exalted gods, the eternal spirits and creatures, respectively, through his mouth, lips, and will. This represents an interpretation of the divine creation through speech in Gen. 1. The second half of the song contains the description of a vivified temple structure and from that point throughout the remainder of the extant liturgical cycle, the language for ‘spirits’ recurs. As the sequence unfolds, the language is increasingly difficult to comprehend because of its loosening syntax. While 1–5 offer a clearer syntax with more finite verbs and poetic parallelism, the final songs lack clear syntactic structure comprising mainly long construct chains. Songs 9–12 offer a progressive description of the temple, from the entrance to the nave to a description of the innermost sanctum of the tabernacle, the debir, with its chariot throne, concluding with the vesting of the high priestly figures. While it is clear that the structure and verbal content of the songs were carefully laid out, less clear is their socio-rhetorical function. Some scholars have characterized the language as ‘numinous’ perhaps reflecting the practice of communal mysticism which draws a line of continuity with the medieval Jewish Merkabah. The liturgical texts may have been used to induce a transformation on the part of those who participate. While many scholars describe the texts as ‘mystical,’ ‘escstatic’ or ‘pneumatic’ might be more fitting to describe the intended result of recitation given the density of spirit and tongue language in Songs 7–13. On the other hand, though less likely, these esoteric Songs may only have been studied. If the songs were indeed recited on the Sabbath, it is likely that they were supplemented by other liturgical material, whether more spontaneously produced utterances or pre-formulated praises, thanksgivings and blessings. Other texts of Yahad authorship with similar language include the Berakhot (4Q286–287) [→32 Berakhot; 61 Liturgical Texts] and the Songs of the Sage (4Q510– 511) which may be derivative of the Shirot. If the Shirot pre-date the community, they may reflect the same connection as Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] and Instruction (4Q415–4Q418) [→38 Instruction; 63 Wisdom] to a later instantiation of the Yahad and its sectarian literature. Petitions on the sabbath seem to have been proscribed by the Yahad movement. In connection with the early Jesus movement, the Shirot share interpretive traditions with the visionary apocalypse of John, the book of Revelation [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. The throne vision and opening of the heavens in Rev. 4–5 draw on Ezekiel 1 and 10 and the developing Sanctus/Qedushah of Isa. 6. The question of who was able to join in the angelic songs before the divine throne in heaven or in heavenrealized-on-earth is a key one and among the many disputed issues in Early Judaism [→10 Scrolls and Early Judaism]. The distinctive poetic language, paronomasia, and scriptural allusion of the Songs connects them to the later liturgical poetry of the synagogue, liturgical poems known as piyyutim and Hekhalot hymns.
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Bibliography Alexander, P. (2006), The Mystical Texts: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Related Manuscripts. London: T & T Clark. Angel, J. L. (2010), Otherworldly and Eschatological Priesthood in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Leiden: Brill. Baumgarten, J. M. (1988), ‘The Qumran sabbath Shirot and rabbinic Merkabah traditions,’ RevQ 49–52, 199–214. Charlesworth, J. H. and C. Newsom (1999), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations. Angelic Liturgy: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. PTSDSSP 4B. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Mizrahi, N. (2015), ‘The cycle of summons: A hymn from the seventh Song of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q403 1 i 31–40),’ DSD 22, 43–67. Newman, J. H. (2008), ‘Priestly prophets at Qumran: Summoning Sinai through the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice,’ in G. J. Brooke, H. Najman, and L. Stuckenbruck (eds), The Significance of Sinai: Traditions about Sinai and Divine Revelation in Judaism and Christianity. Themes in Biblical Narrative 12. Leiden: Brill, pp. 29–72.
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Son of God Text Eric F. Mason
Also called the ‘Aramaic Apocalypse’ (4Q246, 4QapocrDan ar), this is one of several texts known only from Qumran Cave 4 that may be related to the book of Daniel [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. Daniel’s name is not preserved here, but there are verbal parallels with the book, and the text’s apocalyptic vision is reminiscent of scenes in Daniel. The text is found in one parchment fragment measuring 14.1 × 8.8 cm. The extant material includes two columns of nine lines each; while the first column preserves the second half of each line, the second column is almost completely intact. The amount of material that preceded and followed the surviving text is unknown, but at a minimum the text included one subsequent column and likely at least one earlier column. The manuscript is written in a Herodian script and dates to the last third of the first century bce , but its date of composition could be earlier, perhaps mid-second century bce , and thus roughly contemporary with the final redaction of Daniel. If so, 4Q246 may be a non-sectarian text that predates the emergence of the Qumran community. The extant text opens with a throne room scene (1.1). An unidentified figure, perhaps an inspired visionary, falls before the throne (1.1). He then reports a prophecy (or interprets a vision) presumably to a king (1.3). The content of the prophecy is coming wrath, tribulation, and slaughter (1.2–7). The kings of Asshur (Assyria) and Egypt are (perhaps symbolically) evoked (1.6), likely as enemies participating in the envisaged destruction. The last line of column 1 introduces someone called ‘great’ (1.9), and this figure is later ascribed as the ‘son of God’ and ‘son of the Most High’ (2.1). The text then resumes discussion of the oppressors, whose reign of terror will continue for a certain time (2.1–3). Finally the ‘people of God’ arise or are raised (2.4, after a vacat in the manuscript that may mark a transition or climax). God will strengthen and defend the people (or the ‘son’), and the result of all this (for the people and/or the ‘son’) will be an eternal kingdom with peace, justice, and dominion over the nations (2.5–9). At this point the second column ends with a noun in construct, indicating that this description of God’s (or the son’s) rule continued into the next column. Proposals for the identity of the ‘son of God’ vary significantly. Some have viewed him as a negative figure who claims this title with arrogance. Jósef Milik, the original editor of this text, argued for the Seleucid king Alexander Balas, reading the honorific designation of 1.9 as the latter’s self-proclaimed attempt to link himself to Antiochus 350
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IV Epiphanes (whom others have also understood as the ‘son,’ cf. Milik, 1976, p. 60). Similar proposals have been offered by David Flusser (a pre-Christian ‘antichrist’) and Israel Knohl (a figure worshipped as divine like Caesar Augustus). Such approaches hinge on the assumption that figures mentioned before the vacat that begins 2.4 must be opposed to God’s people. Most interpreters reject this idea and understand the ‘son’ as a positive agent sent by God, but even here suggestions vary. Florentino García Martínez considers the son to be an otherworldly messianic figure, correlated with the envoy identified as Melchizedek, Michael, or the ‘Prince of Light’ in 11QMelchizedek [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms] and the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah]. Also positive are collective interpretations of the ‘son’ as a representative of the Jewish people, suggested by Martin Hengel and Annette Steudel. The most convincing interpretation, espoused by several scholars including Frank Moore Cross, John J. Collins, George J. Brooke, and Émile Puech (in his later publications on this text), identifies the ‘son’ as the Davidic messiah. Joseph A. Fitzmyer takes a similar approach, identifying the ‘son’ as a future Davidic or perhaps Hasmonean king, but he rejects a messianic identification because the term ‘messiah’ does not appear. This text has been of special interest to New Testament scholars because of several striking correspondences with Luke 1.32–35 (the ‘Annunciation’) [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. There the angel tells Mary that she will bear a son named Jesus, who will ‘be great’ (Luke 1.32; cf. 4Q246 1.9), will be called ‘Son of the Most High’ (Luke 1.32; cf. 4Q246 2.1) and ‘Son of God’ (Luke 1.35; cf. 4Q246 2.1), and his kingdom will last forever (Luke 1.33; cf. 4Q246 2.5). Collins states that ‘it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that Luke is dependent in some way, whether directly or indirectly, on this long lost text from Qumran’ (Collins, 2010, p. 173). Others are more restrained but agree that 4Q246 provides evidence that ‘son of God’ and ‘son of the Most High’ were titles used in Palestinian Judaism before the Christian era.
Bibliography Collins, J. J. (2010), The Scepter and the Star: Messianism in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Fitzmyer, J. A. (1993), ‘4Q246: The “Son of God” document from Qumran.’ Biblica 74, 153–74. Milik, J. T. with the collaboration of M. Black (1976), The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (1996), ‘246. 4QApocryphe de Daniel ar,’ in G. J. Brooke et al., Qumran Cave 4. XVII: Parabiblical Texts, Part 3. DJD 22. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 165–84.
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Tanh.umim Jesper Høgenhaven
Tanh.umim (4QTanh., 4Q176) derives its name from the Hebrew for ‘consolations,’ a term occurring twice in the text. The manuscript was discovered in Qumran Cave 4 and published by John M. Allegro in 1968 (Allegro, 1968). The scroll consists of fiftyfour fragments varying greatly in size; the identification of some fragments remains uncertain. Two different scribal hands are represented in the fragments, both late Hasmonean ‘semiformal’ scripts (with some ‘semi-cursive’ elements), datable to the early first century bce [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture; 71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Large portions of the surviving text are passages known from the book of Isaiah: Text from Isa. 40; 41; 43; 44; 49; 51; 52; 54 is quoted, and there seems to be a quotation from (or allusion to) Zech. 13.9 as well. However, 4Q176 also contains extensive non-scriptural passages speaking of God’ s creation of the world and of his ordering of human destiny in a style seemingly akin to theological treatises or wisdom texts [→63 Wisdom]. Finally, the scroll includes poetic or liturgical passages in which God is directly addressed, and a collective ‘we’ speaks in a lament-like style [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts]. The original beginning of the document is lost. The first preserved section (1 12–15) is a prayer text, calling for divine intervention on behalf of the speaker’s people and the temple, and describing the present disastrous situation. The prayer/lament is followed by Isaiah citations, ‘consolations from the book of Isaiah’ (1 15). A long chain of quotations continues through two columns (2–3). In the non-scriptural sections that follow we have God speaking in the first person, as well as a collective ‘we’ addressing God, continuing the lament style of the initial column. An extensive non-biblical section (partly reconstructed) follows, speaking of God’s creation of the eternal generations, his governing and ordering of human destiny, his just dealings with those who love him and obey his commandments, and the ultimate destruction of those hated by God (5 1–8). Even in this section, a collective speaks in the first-person plural, and addresses God directly. The literary structure and genre of 4Q176 is not easily assessed. The greater part of cols 1–3, when viewed in isolation, gives the impression of belonging to an Isaiah manuscript. 4Q176 is not ‘exegetical’ in the sense that any direct interpretation of scriptural passages is carried out [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. There are no interpretative additions, comments or explanations. The text is perhaps best described 352
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as a liturgical composition. The scriptural passages quoted are clearly marked as something different from the surrounding (non-scriptural) text. The author, when quoting scripture, is obviously conscious of importing text from a particular source into his own work. The non-scriptural parts of the document are held together by their liturgical language, which gives expression to the lamenting and appealing voice of God’s people or congregation. The ‘treatise–like’ elements of 4Q176, while showing remarkable similarities to passages from Qumran wisdom literature, may be naturally interpreted as parts of the liturgical whole, the discourse taking on, occasionally, a more ‘doctrinal’ style, drawing, in all probability, on well-established traditional expressions. At crucial points of transition from scriptural quotations to other liturgical material, passages similar to rubrics occur with an implied speaker that is clearly different from the voice of the congregation heard in the liturgical passages. In the majority of scriptural passages God is the speaker, addressing Israel, or Zion/ Jerusalem [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. This double form of address to God’s people/Zion corresponds with the occurrence in the non-scriptural passages in 4Q176 of a ‘we’ representing God’s people and a third-person feminine (‘she’) representing Zion. In these passages the people’s address to God takes up most of the space, and they may be said to function, in relation to the quotations, as the ‘other’ part of a liturgical dialogue. Thematically, the selected Isaiah-passages emphasize the love and faithfulness of God, and contain divine promises of a future restoration. The selection of passages from Isaiah was probably governed by a similar notion of a ‘salvation history’ (transition from a period of punishment and affliction to a new glorious state for Israel) to that dominating the non-scriptural sections of 4Q176. Whether the text was actually intended for liturgical use cannot be determined, but the implied readers would seem to be a ‘congregation’ expected to perform liturgical acts of recitation and listening. 4Q176 shows no clear evidence of specifically sectarian terminology, and there is no proof that the text originated within the Qumran movement. There are points of contact with sectarian documents but also with nonsectarian wisdom texts and liturgical compositions.
Bibliography Allegro, J. M. (1968), ‘4Q176. Tanh.ûmîm,’ in J. M. Allegro with A. A. Anderson, Qumrân Cave 4. I: 4Q158–4Q186. DJD 5. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 60–7. Maier, J. (2000), ‘Tanh.umin and Apocryphal Lamentations,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 915.
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Temple Scroll Joseph L. Angel
The Temple Scroll draws heavily upon pentateuchal and other scriptural material to present a vision of an ideal Jewish polity with a gargantuan temple complex at its centre [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. The work is comprised of instructions for the building of this temple complex, as well as numerous regulations pertaining to festivals, sacrifices, purity, government and other matters [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. In broad outline, the text follows the order of the Pentateuch from Exodus 34 to Deuteronomy 23. At the same time, the author/redactor systematically reworks his base text, employing a number of techniques, such as conflation, harmonization, supplementation, omission and the insertion of pre-existing materials, in order to produce a completely novel work [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. The composition presents itself as the words of God spoken in the first person to Moses at the renewal of the Sinaitic covenant described in Exodus 34. This claim of divine origins intends to bestow upon the legislation and social programme of the Temple Scroll a measure of authority equal to that of the Torah [→66 Revelation]. Scholarly discussion of the Temple Scroll is governed by the best-preserved exemplar, 11QTemplea (11Q19), which is, in fact, the longest preserved scroll from the caves of Qumran. Unrolled, it surpasses eight metres in length and is made up of sixty-five extant columns. The manuscript was copied by two different scribes [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. The hand responsible for the majority of the text (cols 6–65) dates to 25 bce –25 ce , while that of the first extant columns (2–5) appears to date slightly later. It seems that the first sheet of the document (containing the younger script) was added in order to repair the beginning of the scroll, which had become damaged [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture; 16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. The editio princeps was published by Yigael Yadin in 1977 in Hebrew (see Figure 51.1). An English translation with numerous corrections and improved readings appeared in 1983 (Yadin, 1983). More recent editions include those of Elisha Qimron (1996) and Lawrence Schiffman, Andrew Gross and M. C. Rand (2011). Four other Temple Scroll-related manuscripts exhibiting a spectrum of relationships with 11QTemplea have been discovered at Qumran. Two of these come from Cave 11 and may be dated to 20–50 ce . 11QTempleb (11Q20) is comprised of forty-three fragments, the majority of which parallel a broad distribution of material from 354
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Figure 51.1 Professor Yigael Yadin at work on the Temple Scroll (Zev Radovan Image 2529).
11QTemplea (García Martínez, Tigchelaar, and van der Woude, 1998, pp. 357–410). Since there are only minor textual variants, scholars regard it as a text closely related to 11QTemplea. 11QTemplec? (11Q21) consists of just three fragments addressing topics and attesting phraseology similar to those of 11QTemplea and 11QTempleb (García Martínez, Tigchelaar and van der Woude, 1998, pp. 411–14). However, only fragment 1 appears to overlap with 11QTemplea. Too little of the text has been preserved to positively identify it as another copy of the Temple Scroll. The other two witnesses, both from Cave 4, were copied decades earlier than 11QTemplea and provide concrete evidence of the Temple Scroll’s long history of development. 4QTempleb (4Q524 or 4QR ouleau du Temple; 150–100 bce ) consists of thirty-nine small fragments, most of which overlap with 11QTemplea (Puech, 1998, pp. 85–114). There are, however, some significant textual differences. Most notably, the ending of 4QTempleb extends beyond that of 11QTemplea. Moreover, there is no overlap with large segments of 11QTemplea (cols 2–34 and 36–48). Such details indicate that this manuscript likely represents an early edition or source of the Temple Scroll as represented by 11Q19 and 11Q20. 4QTemple? (4Q365a; 125–75 bce ) is comprised of five fragments written in the same hand and probably deriving from the same manuscript as 4QR eworked Pentateuchc (4Q365) [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. On the grounds of content alone, these fragments were removed from 4Q365 by the final editors and
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classified instead as Temple Scroll-related material (White, 1994, pp. 319–20). Since only fragment 2 partially overlaps with 11QTemplea, and since it is unclear how the remaining four fragments relate to 11QTemplea, it has been proposed that 4Q365a constitutes a source or divergent edition of the Temple Scroll. It is also possible that 4Q365a and 11QTemplea represent independent iterations of an unknown common source. Since the publication of 11QTemplea scholars have recognized the Temple Scroll’s composite nature (Wilson and Wills, 1982). In addition to the author/redactor’s dependence on some form of the Torah (the precise nature of his Vorlage remains undetermined) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 55 Bible], he has incorporated a number of pre-existing sources into his work. These sources, which have been determined on the basis of linguistic and form-critical criteria [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies], may be divided into four blocks of material: First, the Temple Source (cols 3–13; 30–47) describes the plans for the temple building and its surrounding courtyards. It is unclear whether this material existed as a separate composition prior to the redaction of the Temple Scroll or goes back to the author/ redactor who made use of existing sources. Second, inserted within the Temple Source is the Festival Calendar (cols 14–29), which specifies the festivals and associated temple rituals and sacrifices [→62 Calendars]. This material likely circulated as a separate composition prior to the redaction of the Temple Scroll. Third, the purity regulations of columns 48–51 as well as those interwoven into the end of the Temple Source (cols 45–47) likely reflect the author/redactor’s reliance on one or more pre-existing collections of purity laws (Wise, 1990, pp. 133–4) [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. Fourth, and finally, the Deuteronomic Paraphrase (cols 51–66), which has been categorized by some scholars as part of a pre-existing source, is in fact most likely a rewriting of the laws of Deuteronomy 12–23 produced by the author/redactor himself (Schiffman, 1992) [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Inserted within this section is the expansive Law of the King (cols 57–59), which clearly derives from an independent source. The vast knowledge of the Torah, the intense interest in the temple, its architecture and cult, as well as the numerous legal polemics pertaining to details of ritual purity and the sacrificial system exhibited in the Temple Scroll suggest origins within a priestly setting. If 4QTempleb is considered an early edition and not a source of the Temple Scroll, then the date of composition would be no later than the middle of the second century bce , prior to the settlement of a community at Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. Many other qualities of the composition, such as its orientation as an address to all of Israel and the absence of sectarian terminology, indicate origins in a broader Second Temple milieu. The numerous affinities of the Temple Scroll to sectarian literature, such as acceptance of a 364-day solar calendar or prohibition of uncle-niece marriages, thus do not constitute evidence of sectarian provenance. Rather, they are to be seen as markers of a broader traditional heritage, represented also in such compositions as Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other] and Aramaic Levi [→24 Aramaic Levi] that were cherished and preserved by the group(s) who deposited the Scrolls.
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Bibliography García Martínez, F., E. J. C. Tigchelaar and A. S. van der Woude, (1998), Qumran Cave 11. II :11Q2–19, 11Q20–31. DJD 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (1998), ‘4QR ouleau du Temple,’ in idem, Qumrân Grotte 4. XVIII: Textes hébreux (4Q521–4Q528, 4Q576–4Q579). DJD 25. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 85–114. Qimron, E. (1996), The Temple Scroll: A Critical Edition with Extensive Reconstructions. Beersheva/Jerusalem: Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Press/IES . Schiffman, L. (1992), ‘The Deuteronomic paraphrase of the Temple Scroll,’ RevQ 15, 543–67. [Reprinted in L. H. Schiffman (2008), The Courtyards of the House of the Lord:] Studies on the Temple Scroll. ed. F. García Martínez. STDJ 75. Leiden: Brill, pp. 443–69. Schiffman, L., A. Gross and M. C. Rand (2011), ‘Temple Scroll defining edition (11Q19),’ in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations: Temple Scroll and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 7. Tübingen/Louisville: Mohr Siebeck/Westminster John Knox, pp. 1–174. White, S. (1994), ‘4QTemple?,’ in H. Attridge et al., Qumran Cave 4. VIII: Parabiblical Texts Part 1. DJD 13. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 319–34. Wilson, A. and L. Wills (1982), ‘Literary sources of the Temple Scroll,’ HTR 75, 275–88. Wise, M. (1990), A Critical Study of the Temple Scroll from Qumran Cave11. SAOC 49. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Yadin, Y. (1983), The Temple Scroll (revised edn; 3 vols and supplement). Jerusalem: IES .
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Testimonia Eva Mroczek
4QTestimonia (4Q175), a compilation of four quotations from proto-Samaritan Exod., Deut., Num., and Psalms of Joshua (4Q379), has typically been read as an anthology of passages about eschatological figures [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The text sheds light on two issues: textual practices of quotation and compilation on the one hand, and messianic expectations on the other. These questions of form and content converge when we consider that in the early study (and the very naming) of 4QTestimonia, the text was linked to the hypothesis of Burkitt, Rendel Harris and others that NT authors used testimonia – collections of OT proof-texts – to compose their writings. 4Q175 was generically classified as a collection of messianic proof-texts and considered as evidence for the existence of such compilations in Second Temple Judaism. However, without any direct references to the messiah or the end times, and without the kind of interpretive commentary found in 4QF lorilegium and the pesharim [→44 Pesharim], the intended emphasis and uses of this compilation are ambiguous, and other themes and selection principles also emerge. 4QTestimonia is written on a single sheet in a careless but clear early-first century bce Hasmonean hand, by the same scribe who copied 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 71 The Scribes of the Scrolls; 14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture] (see Figure 52.1 below). The scribe has separated the quotations with line breaks and hookshaped marginal marks, and represented the tetragrammaton by four dots. Only the bottom right corner is missing from an otherwise complete text. The contents are as follows: Passage 1 is often presented as Deut. 5.28–29 plus Deut. 18.18–19, but this combination is found in Samaritan Exod. 20.21 (reflected in 4QR eworked Pentateuch and 4QP aleoExod [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]), where the introductory formula ‘And **** spoke to Moses saying’ is identical to 4QTestimonia (no such formula exists in Deuteronomy). The text emphasizes the fear of God and promises a prophet like Moses who will have divine words in his mouth and warns of punishment for those who do not heed him. Passage 2 cites Num. 24.15–17, Balaam’s oracle about hearing and seeing the vision of God and about ‘the sceptre and the star,’ who will crush the enemies of Israel. This text is also cited in the War Scroll (1QM 11.6–7) [→40 Milh.amah] and the Damascus Document (CD 7.19–20) [→35 Damascus Document]. 358
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Passage 3 contains Deut. 33.8–11, Moses’ blessing of Levi and the priests, who ‘observed your word and kept your covenant’ and who made God’s law ‘shine,’ complete with the curse on their opponents. Passage 4 cites Joshua’s curse upon the rebuilder of Jericho with additional curses on an ‘accursed man, one of Belial’ who will rebuild the ‘fortress of wickedness’ [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Passage 4 is customarily represented as a citation of Josh. 6.26 followed by interpretive supplement from Psalms of Joshua (4Q379 22 ii). This is misleading, however, since 4Q379 itself contains Josh. 6.26 with the same introductory note as 4Q175: ‘At the moment when Joshua finished praising and giving thanks with his psalms, he said . . . .’ The entire fourth passage, then, is taken from a text like 4Q379, a ‘rewritten’ Joshua tradition that blends older and newer material. Separating the ‘biblical quotation’ from the ‘apocryphal embellishment’ misrepresents our scribe’s compositional process and gives misleading information about the distinction between scriptural and interpretive materials. Besides the proto-canonical Joshua, a variety of Joshua traditions are attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls and at Masada (4Q378, 4Q379, 4Q522, perhaps 5Q9, 4QpaleoParaJosh and MasParaJosh [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]). 4Q175 illustrates that 4Q379’s Joshua text was worthy of citation on a par with Num. and Deut. When the sources are considered without anachronistic canonical bias, 4QTestimonia emerges as a balanced compilation, containing four quotations from four authoritative sources – (proto-Samaritan) Exod., Num., Deut. and 4Q379’s Joshua tradition. The text, then, presents further evidence for the use of a variety of scriptural traditions. The first three quotations seem to refer to a messianic prophet, king and priest [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The expectation of three eschatological personalities is also found in 1QS 9.11, copied by the same scribe, which anticipates a time when ‘the prophet comes, and the Messiahs of Aaron and Israel.’ F. García Martínez argues that the prophet of 4Q175 is a messianic figure to be identified with the eschatological Interpreter of the Law (4Q174 1 11–12 and CD 7.18), rather than merely a precursor to the two messiahs, royal and priestly. The fourth passage veers away from this messianic interest, although the man of Belial may be an anti-messiah [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons], and D. Mitchell has argued that here Joshua represents a Josephite war messiah. The cursed rebuilder of Jericho has been identified with Hasmonean rulers [→20 Historiography], especially Alexander Jannaeus or John Hyrcanus. According to Josephus (Ant. 13.299–300) Hyrcanus claimed the triple office of prophet, king and priest, and (if Josephus preserves an early tradition) perhaps appears here as a pretender and antagonist of the legitimate prophet, king and priest described in the text [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]. J. Lübbe suggests that the text is not concerned with eschatology, but with condemning the sect’s current enemies. The traditional messianic reading, however, remains the consensus. Given the early formal association between 4Q175 and NT testimonia, it is not surprising that a messianic reading of its contents has dominated the scholarly debate to date. While intertextual evidence makes it fairly certain that it has eschatological resonance, references to end times or messiahs are not explicit, and this focus is not exclusive or unequivocal. In compiling the text, the scribe may have
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Figure 52.1 Testimonia (4Q175). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan.
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been guided by a different set of interests than merely to collect quotations about messiahs. Warnings of destruction unify all four passages, and the first three texts share general exhortations about obedience to sanctioned authority. A major concern is the communication of authoritative instruction: in the first passage, through listening to the prophetic word; in the second, a voice and vision leading to divine knowledge; and in the third, the priestly task of making law and instruction ‘shine.’ The classification of 4QTestimonia as an anthology of messianic proof-texts along the lines of NT testimonia hypotheses, then, is unsatisfactory; the selection of passages seems constrained and specific, so that the text becomes a self-contained and logical instructional composition in its own right (coherent shaping is especially evident if we read a condemnation of a Hasmonean prophet, king and priest in the culminating passage). More than a reference collection of proof-texts, 4Q175 is also about knowing and heeding divine instruction, and the dire consequences of ignoring or opposing its legitimate prophetic, royal and priestly tradents. A focus away from the early interest in 4QTestimonia’s relevance for the NT testimonia hypothesis may lead to a reconsideration of its genre and open new questions about how Jewish scribes constructed new literature from old building blocks.
Bibliography Allegro, J. M. (1968), ‘4Q175. Testimonia,’ in J. M. Allegro with A. A. Anderson, Qumrân Cave 4. I: 4Q158–4Q186. DJD 5. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 57–60, pl. 21. García Martínez, F. (2007), ‘Two messianic figures in the Qumran texts,’ in E. J. C. Tigchelaar (ed), Qumranica Minora II: Thematic Studies on the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 64. Leiden: Brill, pp. 13–32. Lübbe, J. (1986), ‘A reinterpretation of 4QTestimonia,’ RevQ 12, 187–97. Mitchell, D. C. (2005), ‘The fourth deliverer: a Josephite messiah in 4Q175,’ Biblica 86, 545–53.
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Wiles of the Wicked Woman Michael Lesley
Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184) consists of a main fragment of seventeen lines (frag.1) and likely up to three more, very small fragments, on which little has been written. Fragment 1 contains a poetic description of an evil female character who dwells in the underworld and causes men to sin [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Scholarship has focused on two major aspects of this character: her identity and her gender. For reasons that will become clear, I will focus on the former, and return to the latter at the end. The character is composed almost entirely of allusions to Proverbs 1–9, especially the characters of the Strange Woman and Folly [→63 Wisdom; 27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. In Proverbs these characters are seductive women who lead naïve men astray, causing them to lose wealth and even their lives. Their opposite, Wisdom, is a supernatural female who protects men from wickedness. The protection Wisdom offers against Folly is arguably the central message of Proverbs. In 4Q184 the character is quite different from her wicked counterparts in Proverbs, less sexualized and more otherworldly. Most importantly, insofar as she possesses power over the righteous and the good, she contradicts the belief, found in Proverbs, that Wisdom is all-powerful. Yet this rejection of the confidence in wisdom is not a simple repudiation of Proverbs. Rather, 4Q184 attempts to reconcile its optimism with the pessimism found in another text, Isa. 59. Here, in contrast with Proverbs, goodness offers no protection from evil: ‘righteousness does not reach us,’ and ‘truth is tripped up in the public square’ (Isa. 59.9). This is echoed in 4Q184, where the character overtakes the righteous and trips up the perfect in the public squares (12–14). To accomplish this reconciliation, the author harmonizes ideas from both Proverbs and Isaiah, culminating in the character that emerges from 4Q184. This character is no longer the sexualized human who is weaker than Wisdom, but an evil otherworldly creature, the exact equal and opposite of Wisdom. The transformation is epitomized in one of the central passages of 4Q184, which alludes to a well-known reference to Wisdom in Proverbs and inverts it (see Table 53.1 below). To understand the implications of this interpretation requires moving from scripture to Scrolls. A central feature of the eschatology found in core sectarian documents (such as 362
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Table 53.1 She is a tree of life to those who possess her, and all who hold her are happy.
. . . Alas! ruin shall be to all who inherit her, and desolation to a[ll] who hold her.
Her paths are paths of goodness, and all her ways are peace.
For her paths are paths of death . . . and her ways are the guilt of transgression.
(Prov 3.18, 17)
(4Q184 1 8–10)
the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah] and the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot]) is the dualistic opposition between good and evil, which is embodied in supernatural spirits [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. In this eschatological narrative, angelic spirits of light and demonic spirits of darkness are locked in struggle. The world is currently under the rule of demons and their allies, until the time when God ultimately gives victory to the spirit of light [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. The Scrolls contain references to a variety of demons and spirits. In the eschatological texts, however, they are generally spirits who dwell in darkness and eternal fire and cause the righteous to sin. Exactly these features are found in the description of the character in 4Q184 and this, coupled with her dualistic opposition with supernatural Wisdom, make it plausible to assume that this is a description of one of these demonic spirits. This would resolve the potential conflict between Proverbs and Isaiah, by showing that they are both part of a single eschatological narrative: the spirit of light is ultimately stronger, but at present her power is opposed by her antithesis, the spirit of darkness. Uncovering the scriptural interpretation in 4Q184 adds a great deal to our understanding of this text and its significance [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. The text can be seen as a reconciliation of two scriptural texts that appear to contradict one another on the power of good versus evil. The eschatological interpretation is worked out exclusively by means of the two conflicting texts, Proverbs and Isaiah, demonstrating that the eschatology was already present in scripture: the antithetical spirits in Qumran eschatology are the same antithetical spirits in Proverbs, the female characters of Wisdom and Folly. This last point may have important implications for the other major area of scholarship on this text, the character’s gender. If the Strange Woman from Proverbs was the basis for this character because of her opposition to the character of Wisdom in Proverbs, her gender may be at least somewhat incidental, and may not offer significant information on attitudes toward women in Qumran or the meaning of this text. Fifty years after its first publication there is still much study to be done. Further examination is required of the relationship of the character to the scriptural texts, to other fragments of 4Q184, and to the wider Scrolls corpus if this enigmatic character is to be more clearly understood.
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Bibliography Baumgarten, J. M. (1991), ‘On the nature of the seductress in 4Q184,’ RevQ 57–58, 133–43. Goff, M. (2007) Discerning Wisdom: The Sapiential Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. VTS up 116. Leiden: Brill. Lesley, M. (2012) ‘Exegetical wiles: 4Q184 as scriptural interpretation,’ in G. J. Brooke et al. (eds), The Scrolls and Biblical Traditions: Proceedings of the Seventh Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, August 2–4 2010, Helsinki. STDJ 103. Leiden: Brill, pp. 107–42.
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Words of the Luminaries Judith H. Newman
The Words of the Luminaries (4Q504–506) is the name given to a liturgical collection of prayers found in three papyrus copies [→61 Liturgical Texts]. The title is inscribed on the back of 4Q504, the most intact manuscript of forty-nine fragments representing about half of the original scroll, which is dated paleographically to ca. 150 bce . 4Q506, dating somewhat later in the Hasmonean period, also comprises forty-nine small fragments some of which overlap with 4Q504. It appears on the front of a manuscript along with a copy of the Festival Prayers (4Q509). The ten fragments of 4Q505 are written in Herodian script on the back of 4Q509 after a copy of the War Scroll (4Q496) [→40 Milh.amah]. 4Q505 dates to the first century ce and contains only minimal overlaps with 4Q504. Some have doubted that it is actually a third copy. The title of the collection may indicate the ‘words’ or prayers to be recited at the time of the change of the celestial light-givers, the sun and the moon. Two days are mentioned among the extant fragments, the fourth day (4Q504 3 ii; Wednesday) and the seventh day (4Q504 1–2 vii 4; the Sabbath). As they have been reconstructed [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts], the prayers are a collection of supplications and a thanksgiving for daily recitation over a period of a week. They provide some of the earliest evidence of daily prayers in Early Judaism (cf. Dan. 6.11; Ps. 55.18). Whether they were to be said daily throughout the year, or perhaps as a special preparation for a feast is unclear. The series of six communal supplications contains an overview of Israel’s corporate autobiography from the creation of Adam to the post-exilic era and serve as a confession for a continuing pattern of sin. Unlike the prayers found in Neh. 9, Dan. 9 or Pss. 105 and 106, which review parts of this metanarrative in a single prayer, the Words of the Luminaries traces this ‘history’ in prayers over six sequential days. Aside from the indications about when the prayers were to be recited, there is no evidence as to who was reciting them or the occasion of their performance. There is no clear use of language linking the prayers to the Yahad with its distinctive lexicon. This has led Chazon to suggest that the cycle originated outside the movement (Chazon, 1994). The supplications share a similar structure (cf. 1Q34–34bis, 4Q507–509), beginning with a title with a date formula followed by an imperative to ‘remember,’ a historical review, a petition (whether a plea for physical deliverance [Tues., Wed., Fri] or for spiritual strengthening and observance of law [Sun., Thurs.]). This is followed by a blessing of God and a liturgical response, ‘Amen, amen.’ 365
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These learned prayers, like most long prayers written in the Second Temple era, are woven through with scriptural wording and interpretation. Sunday, the first day, offers a prayer that recalls the creation: ‘Adam our father you formed in the image of glory’ (4Q504 viii 4). Although this is not overtly sectarian language, it accords with the perspective of the movement which anticipates that members will receive the glory of Adam as an inheritance (CD 4.20; 1QS 4.23; 1QH 17.14 [→35 Damascus Document; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 37 Hodayot). Wednesday is devoted to remembering the revelation at Sinai [→66 Revelation] and draws on associated language such as eagle imagery (Exod. 19.4; Deut. 32.11). It contains an interpretation of the covenant renewal of Exod. 32–34 when God had threatened to kill the people, drawing on language from the divine attribute formula found in Num. 14.18. God was merciful as a result of Moses’ atoning intercession and made a covenant (4Q504 1 ii 8–9; cf. LAB 19.8–11). The prayer for Thursday recalls the twofold promise to David, here mentioning the divine presence in the Jerusalem Temple as a dwelling place, and for David to be Israel’s ‘shepherd, a prince,’ rather than king. The prayer on Friday recalls the exile and the return using marked allusions, inter alia, to Lev. 26 and Second Isaiah. Notable is the rhetorical reversal of direction. Whereas many of the verses alluded to appear in scripture as first-person divine speech about the fate of sinful and repentant Israel, in the confession, the wording appears in the first common plural: ‘For indeed we have wearied God with our iniquity. We have burdened the Rock with our sin.’ (4Q504 2 v 17–18; cf. Isa 43.24). In effect, the petitioners respond to God by offering Torah inscribed on their circumcised hearts. The prayer for the Sabbath is formally and thematically different from the other days. It is doxological and hymnic with no petition or historical remembrance [→60 Poetry and Hymns]. The Sabbath reflects a suspension of time, thus also permitting God to cease the ‘work’ of answering petitions. The Sabbath thanksgiving refers to the new creation, thus forming the appropriate climax to the week and making a circle to the mention of Adam on day one. The similar themes and sequence of knowledge, forgiveness, and repentance in the Words of the Luminaries, as well as the marked distinction between weekday and Sabbath prayers are also themes in the later synagogue liturgy, and so offer a relatively rare instance of continuity between the content of the Scrolls from the Qumran caves and later rabbinic traditions.
Bibliography Chazon, E. G. (1992), ‘4QD ibHam: Liturgy or literature,’ RevQ 15, 447–55. Chazon, E. G. (1994), ‘Prayers from Qumran and their historical implications,’ DSD 1, 265–84. Falk, D. K. (1998), Daily, Sabbath, and Festival Prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 27. Leiden: Brill. Olson, D. T. (1995), ‘Words of the lights (4Q504–506 = 4QD ibHama–c),’ in J. H. Charlesworth et al. (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations. Pseudepigraphic and Non–Masoretic Psalms and Prayers. PTSDSSP 4A. Tübingen/Louisville: Mohr Siebeck/Westminster John Knox, pp. 46–105. Penner, J. (2012), Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Period Judaism. STDJ 104. Leiden: Brill.
Part Five
Types of Literature
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It is generally acknowledged that the term ‘biblical’ is anachronistic in the Second Temple Period. It depends on the idea of a definable set of authoritative writings usually denoted by another problematic term ‘canon’ (cf. Talmon, 2002, pp. 7–9; Najman, 2012, pp. 497–518), which is then used as a demarcation line to divide writings into biblical and non-biblical/non-canonical. Such a definable list of writings set apart from other compositions does not exist in sources deriving from the Second Temple Period, and it appears that at that time there was no impetus to making lists, counting books, or defining explicitly what is to be included in and excluded from the widely adopted general categories of authoritative writings: the Law and the Prophets (Schuller, 2012, p. 310). In order to circumvent such problems and to allow for the inclusion of some books, not included in the later biblical canons, that apparently were authoritative for certain groups in the Judaism(s) of the late Second Temple Period, many scholars have switched to using the term ‘scriptural’ instead of ‘biblical’ [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. This is a slightly more neutral term, but it still requires a division of compositions into scriptural and non-scriptural for it to be meaningful. This is not easily done, as the divisions would vary depending on the particular group and the specific period of time (see, e.g. Lim, 2013, pp. 54–177). The use of such terminology encourages static boundaries to be drawn between compositions, whereas it has been amply demonstrated that the emergence of canon(s) is most of all a multifaceted process. Instead of concentrating on the terminology, much more attention needs to be devoted to studying the mechanics of the overall development including such aspects as the canonical (Ulrich, 2011, pp. 47–64; 2015, pp. 265–308) and the historical process (Brooke, 2011, pp. 16–18). Regardless of the terminology used, the canonical division has and continues to influence studies either explicitly or more often implicitly. Terminology such as ‘scriptural’ is a useful way to denote a later collection of literature if it is used with the understanding that it is an arbitrary way of dividing Second Temple Period material, although one might legitimately question the need to impose such categories at all. However, on the whole, the label ‘biblical’ is more a hindrance than a help. It frequently clouds the overall evidence and leads to hypotheses where the end result, the canon, is known and as such influences the perception of the path that leads to it (cf. Mroczek, 2016). In an ideal situation it would be far better to approach the entire corpus of material without any foreknowledge of the canon and let the material speak for itself. 369
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Perhaps the most obvious examples of how theories of canonization have influenced the field are the collections of psalms from Qumran that sometimes include only a single Psalm now in the MT Psalter and the manuscripts containing some of the books now in the collection of the twelve Minor Prophets that are frequently all still seen as copies or evidence of the entire collection.
Authoritative Writings among the Dead Sea Scrolls While there was no fixed canon in the Judaism(s) of the late Second Temple Period, there nevertheless were compositions whose authority was recognized widely (see, e.g. Lim, 2013). Scholars have proposed a series of indicators to identify authoritative compositions among the scrolls found at Qumran, for instance by listing explicit references to a specific authoritative book or a collection, counting the number of extant manuscript copies, and analysing the use of these compositions in other works (quotations, allusions, etc.). The DSS mostly exhibit references to authoritative works broadly divisible into two categories that are also explicitly referred to, viz., the Law and the Prophets. There are many references to the books of Moses/Law [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], cf. CD 15.12 [→35 Damascus Document]; 1QM 10.6 [→40 Milh.amah]; 4QMMTe (4Q398) 11–17 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh haTorah]. We also find frequent references to individual prophets [26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], e.g. Isaiah in CD 4.13; Ezekiel in CD 3.20–4.2; Daniel in 4QF lorilegium (4Q174) 2 3; and 11QMelchizedek (11Q13) 1–4 ii 18 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms], and the prophetic writings as a collective category, for instance 1QS 1.1–3 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. Contrary to the present canon of the Hebrew Bible, Daniel was probably included among the prophetic writings at this point and so were the Psalms, at least from some point in the first century bce onwards (e.g. 11QPsa 27.11; 11Q13 1–4 ii 10–12, and the pesharim on the Psalms) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 44 Pesharim]. Thus, a bipartite division where at least the category of prophetic writings was broader than in current biblical canons fits the evidence of the Scrolls best (cf. Lim, 2013, pp. 128–31). However, there is a famous passage in 4QMMT (4Q397 14–21 9–11) that has to be mentioned at this point because some scholars (e.g. Flint, 2003, pp. 269–304) take it as an early reference to a tripartite canon. The editors’ composite text of the passage reads: ‘We have [written] to you so that you may study the book of Moses and the books of the prophets and Davi[d . . .]’ (Qimron and Strugnell, 1994). The text of the passage and its interpretation are highly contested. The reading of the letters, the proper reconstruction of the sequence of the fragments [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts], and the reconstruction of the end of the sentence have all been questioned, and it has been suggested that instead of a tripartite reference the text might refer to the deeds of David, books about David or the example of David (cf. Brooke, 2011, pp. 19–20; Lim, 2013, pp. 127–8; Schuller, 2012, p. 302; von Weissenberg, 2009, pp. 204–5). Therefore, the passage is much too ambiguous to constitute a secure reference to a tripartite canon, and its significance lies in its appeal to the generally recognized authority of several categories of writings. In order to
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grasp the meaning of ‘David’ in the passage more accurately it would be beneficial to analyse what exactly David embodied at the time 4QMMT was written. Were, for instance, the psalms on the whole already thought of as Davidic, or as prophecy? Probably not, and if not, then what was the significance of David in such compositions (and in other parts of MMT itself)? While it can be said that the DSS show evidence of a bipartite set of authoritative earlier traditions, there are no lists of the compositions included in these categories. The apparently more open-ended nature of the prophetic collection is not at all unexpected, but the Law as the five books of the Pentateuch is usually taken as a fixed collection at this point because of the existence, for instance, of the Septuagint translation of the Pentateuch and the Samaritan Pentateuch [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. There is no reason to question the inclusion of these five books in the category of Law in the DSS (Lim, 2010, p. 308). Furthermore, several of these books were also sometimes written on the same manuscript (cf. 4Gen–Exoda [4Q1], 4QpaleoGen–Exodl [4Q11], 4QE xod–Levf [4Q17], and 4QL ev–Numa [4Q23]), thus demonstrating the use of several of these books together as a collection, although Deuteronomy seems to be freestanding in the surviving manuscripts (Brooke, 2011, pp. 15–16). Nevertheless, Lim (2013, pp. 54–94) has shown that in different writings in the Second Temple Period the Law seems to have been understood varyingly as a tetrateuch (Exodus–Deuteronomy), pentateuch or even a hexateuch (Genesis–Joshua). While it is plausible that at least the five books of the Pentateuch are seen as part of the Law in the DSS , the collection may at some point have included other books as well (VanderKam, 2011). To sum up, beyond a proliferation of references to bipartite collections of authoritative writings the precise nature of what the Law and the Prophets contained remains somewhat obscure.
Problematic Manuscript Statistics The number of preserved manuscripts of particular books in the DSS is often used as evidence for what books were considered authoritative and what may have constituted the core of these books for a community, a so-called canon within a canon. It is quite typical to argue that based on these numbers Deuteronomy, Isaiah and Psalms were the most important books for the community that collected the DSS (e.g. Brooke, 1997, pp. 242–66). But there are severe problems with such use of the manuscript statistics. First, the argument is usually limited to biblical books or at least to books that have been explicitly quoted in other compositions. However, should it then be assumed that for instance liturgical works, apart from the MT Psalms, held no authority for the community? Additionally, why do current biblical books with low numbers of manuscripts get treated as part of these statistics whereas sectarian works such as the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] or the Community Rule [→47 Serek ha-Yahad] with more extant manuscripts are categorically excluded from most of the discussion? Another, more important, point is that manuscript numbers cannot be treated simply as units of equal value because each manuscript is different and should be treated as such, especially in the case of collections such as the so-called Psalms manuscripts.
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There is a difference between a more or less unified book, which is typically a single composition, and a collection of compositions. This dissimilarity has probably not been adequately recognized partly because in modern bibles the collections have come to be seen as specific books, such as the Book of Psalms. The manuscript statistics can be fairly reliably used when dealing with individual books but they are very problematic as evidence for particular collections. The individual books were transmitted simultaneously in different literary editions, each of which apparently enjoyed equal status (Ulrich, 2011, p. 49), but these are still recognizable as different versions of the same general composition. Such plurality was apparently not a problem before the turn of the era, and it has to be noted that the same kind of textual plurality is encountered within the DSS in the Rule texts (Hempel, 2013, pp. 271–84) and in other ancient Jewish literature as well (Lange, 2007, p. 108). A noteworthy feature in terms of the textual history is that when scriptural scrolls are arranged in chronological order the proto-Masoretic text-type is proportionally more dominant in the later period (Brooke, 2011, pp. 18–19). But it is the book and not the textual form that is relevant in the DSS and therefore most of the manuscripts of individual books can be counted as evidence for a certain composition even if they are attested in slightly different forms. However, caution must still be exercised because some of the manuscripts may have held only a part of the book (e.g. 4QD eutq), and cannot thus automatically be taken as evidence for the entire book. Collections of compositions should be excluded from such discussions entirely, or only used where they offer clear evidence for a specific arrangement. There is ample evidence that collections of compositions included different numbers of compositions, in various orders, and were not restricted to compositions now in the biblical collections. Some compositions attested in collections were also sometimes used alone, as seems frequently to have been the case with, for example, Psalm 119 (4QPsg, 4QPsh, 5Q5). Thus, partially preserved remains of such collections are not indisputable evidence for any particular form of a collection, such as the MT Book of Psalms or the Book of the Twelve. Such fluidity is widely attested and can be described as a characteristic feature of collections. Similar variety is found, for instance, in the canon lists all the way to the present day and in the books of the earliest available medieval manuscripts. It is demonstrated by the pentateuchal manuscripts of the DSS that hold some of the books but not all five, and in differences between psalm collections (cf. the large collections of psalms in the MT, Septuagint, Peshitta and 11QPsa). The psalm manuscripts from Qumran are not representatives of a particular book of Psalms, but independent compositions that are arranged in collections of different sizes with quite varied purposes (cf. Lange, 2010, pp. 90–3) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. It is a distinct possibility that none of the so-called Qumran Psalm manuscripts actually contained as many Psalms as are now found in the MT Psalter, viz., 150. Rather most of them were probably more limited collections containing a small number of Psalms or even just one Psalm. Moreover, several of these Psalm manuscripts actually represent compositions that include a Psalm or parts of it alongside other compositions, not Psalm collections at all (see 4QPs122 and possibly 4QPsx). Furthermore, enough variance is shown in the Psalms manuscripts to demonstrate that no single order of psalms was adhered to in all manuscripts, and
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many of the manuscripts directly contradict the order found in known larger collections, such as the MT Psalter. Similarly, most of the manuscripts containing some of the books of the Twelve Minor Prophets did not include all twelve compositions. Rather, most manuscripts probably contained only some of the books. While a collection of twelve prophetic books was probably already extant during the late Second Temple Period, this did not mean that all subsequent manuscripts of these prophetic books necessarily contained all twelve books. Rather, the individual books could be copied and used individually or combined in variant orders and in collections of different sizes. To give an example, it is materially practically certain that manuscript 4Q76 (= 4QXII a) did not contain all the books of the twelve but rather only three or four of the shortest books among them (Malachi, Jonah and one or two texts of similar size). 4Q76 has by far the narrowest attested column width among the manuscripts commonly considered to be copies of the Twelve (only 4QXII b comes close to it), and with 18–20 lines it is also among those with the fewest lines per column. The Hebrew manuscripts with most attested books of the Twelve are 4QXIIg and MurXII [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. Manuscript 4QXIIg contains fragmentary remains of ten books. The format of this scroll differs markedly from 4Q76, and it has almost twice as many characters (letter spaces) in an average line as 4Q76, and thirty or more lines per column. Manuscript MurXII has a third more letters on an average line than 4Q76 and thirty-six lines per column. These are manuscripts that may have included all or most of the books of the Twelve, and their material format attests to this [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. But most of the Qumran manuscripts containing at least some of these prophetic compositions are much smaller in size and hence they probably did not hold all twelve books. Other examples of collections in the DSS are the pentateuchal traditions and 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. As already indicated, some of the pentateuchal books are collected together in several manuscripts, but rather than being evidence for a fixed Pentateuch that was always copied together, they are probably collections of several of the books for different functions, such as the narratives of Genesis and Exodus or the Laws. This partial use of pentateuchal traditions is also demonstrated by the works rewriting parts of these books. Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] and some Reworked Pentateuch (RP ) manuscripts (e.g. 4Q364) are more concerned with modifying the narrative frame [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture] whereas the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] and some other RP manuscripts focus more on the laws (cf. 4Q366–367). 1 Enoch should probably be counted as a collection of compositions as well because the manuscripts represent different parts of the book with various combinations evident. Quite often individual compositions are also attested alone, such as the Astronomical Book (1 Enoch 72–82; see 4Q208–211). To conclude this part, each manuscript needs to be studied individually and in its context before it is used as statistical evidence for the importance of a particular composition. Parts of a collection cannot be used as evidence for the collection in its entirety or a specific form of it. But neither can the evidence be used the other way around. A different sequence among some books found in the collection of twelve prophets or among psalms is not evidence for the non-existence of an otherwise known arrangement
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nor is it necessarily more original than the other arrangement. Such differences merely demonstrate that there was no single normative collection of those compositions.
Influence of Traditions Another important criterion for arguing that a particular book was authoritative to a community is its direct use in compositions authored by that group. Most weight has thus far been placed on direct quotations from a book, it being the subject of rewriting (e.g. pentateuchal books, Ezekiel, Jeremiah), or commented on in the pesharim (e.g. Isaiah, Micah, Zephaniah, Psalms) [→44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 66 Revelation]. Together with the number of manuscripts, this kind of usage of traditions has been used to demonstrate that from books outside the mainstream biblical canons at least Jubilees and Enoch were considered authoritative writings at Qumran (e.g. Brooke, 2011, pp. 19–22). By combining the different criteria other scrolls, such as the Temple Scroll, the book of Hagu, and the Psalms of Joshua (4Q378–379) have been brought into the discussion as well. There is still a considerable amount of evidence to be had of more indirect use of compositions by exploring the influence of traditions stemming from them, and this may help in the assessment of whether some of these books were authoritative or not. For instance, the influence of Enoch literature is much broader than its more direct usage in 4Q180 (Ages of Creation) and 4Q247 (Pesher on the Apocalypse of Weeks) as is shown by the use of the myth about the origin of evil spirits found in the Book of Watchers (1 Enoch 1–36; e.g. 11Q11 [Apocryphal Psalms] v 6 [→61 Liturgical Texts; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination; 60 Poetry and Hymns]). Similarly, the Book of Jubilees was sometimes used together with traditions from Genesis, which it develops, as seems to be the case in the creation imagery of 4QB erakhot [→32 Berakhot; 61 Liturgical Texts]. Together the explicit references to specific books, the number of manuscript copies and the use of compositions in later works form a firm basis to evaluate what was authoritative for a community. Perhaps the most problematic area is the sectarian scrolls and their authority. They are not usually part of the discussion, probably mostly because they are not seen as part of the Law and the Prophets. Their authority is typically considered to be of a different nature from the earlier works. Yet Lim (2010, pp. 305–6) has argued strongly that in the pesharim both scripture and comment were authoritative, and it seems certain that the Rule texts were also considered authoritative. Is it a mere coincidence that these apparently most important texts of the group itself were its laws and its prophetically inspired interpretations of earlier traditions? While their own writings were probably seen as different from the earlier traditions, would the group still have included them in their canon of authoritative works? The question should at least merit a more thorough discussion before being discarded.
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Changes in Societal Discourse Lim (2013, p. 186) has remarked that once Jewish sectarianism disappeared, so did the variety of collections (of authoritative Scriptures). A perspective that has been lacking in the discussion concerning the development of such collections could be summarized by revising Lim’s statement slightly: once Jewish sectarianism appeared, so did the variety of collections. Looking at the broader developments at the societal level, there seems to be a movement from a widely achieved unity on the level of discourse to great diversity and gradually back to unity again. Much of the process of canonization of scripture in the late Second Temple Period seems to be dependent on the heritage of a previous more unified period, on the one hand, and the social mechanisms of the time of diversity, on the other hand. Most of the surviving discourse from the Persian and Hellenistic periods is meant to unify the people, and they typically discuss issues on the level of the nation, focusing particularly on its past and where the Jewish people as a collective are headed. Perhaps the last ‘pure’ example of such a discourse is the book of Ben Sira [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Other Literature; 63 Wisdom] which is still very much oriented to the whole people of Israel. The segmentation of Jewish society in the wake of the Maccabean revolt then led to an eventual change in the societal discourse and gradually also in the aims of authors and editors. Most of the literature written in the first centuries bce and ce is oriented towards particular groups as God’s chosen element of the nation, not on the entire people. The common ‘all Israel’ heritage was probably nurtured by most groups, although it frequently needed adaptation into new situations in order to be meaningful for the specific groups. The compositions that spoke to the nation as a whole and were attributed to famous figures were probably most likely to succeed in gaining wider authority. But it is not a division into ‘canonical’ and ‘non-canonical’ material, but rather compositions intended for different discourses. The Qumran movement’s own writings were meant for the movement, not those outside it (cf. Brooke, 2002, pp. 90–1). They did not seek recognition as authorities for a larger audience, but were a means to promulgate the identity of the group that produced them. Many other compositions from this period are similar, and the evidence suggests a fragmentation of the society where fewer people were trying to extend their influence to the whole nation and focused instead on nurturing the special character of their own group. Many writings from the beginning of this period of diversity, such as the Temple Scroll, Jubilees and 4QMMT, represent voices of dialogue also aimed at other groups. But they too already include contested issues, such as the proper calendar [→62 Calendars] and the correct understanding of specific laws [→58 Halakhah; 70 Purity and Holiness]. They try to persuade others to join the in-group by accepting the group’s position on these issues. Other writings focus only on the in-groups. They describe the special portion of such groups, their own foundation myths, and may have been written in the name of the movements’ mythical leaders, such as the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography], instead of a pseudepigraphic attribution to a figure more commonly accepted as an authority. In this time period any new claims to general authority surely met resistance from other groups as is well demonstrated slightly later by the debates over different topics and accepted authorities in the New Testament
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[→12 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. Therefore, it is not surprising that it was the probably widely accepted common heritage that achieved eventual canonicity whereas literature from the late Second Temple Period was almost entirely left outside the canons. This awareness of the change in society is only one small facet of the issue of canon formation, but it may help in answering some persisting questions. One such problem is the frequently raised question about the status of Chronicles in the first centuries bce and ce [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. The influence of Chronicles is rather well represented in second-century bce sources (e.g. Ben Sira, Eupolemus, Daniel, Greek Prayer of Manasseh, Temple Scroll, 4QS apiential Work [4Q185], 4QNon-Canonical Psalms B [4Q381], Words of the Luminaries [4Q504] and 4QP rophecy of Joshua [4Q522]), but hardly figures in later works among the DSS or the New Testament. In addition, attention is frequently drawn to there being only one possible manuscript copy of Chronicles among the DSS (4Q118). Reasons for this have been identified in the temple-centricity of Chronicles [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple] and in Chronicles being connected with the Hasmoneans and their policies (e.g. Brooke, 2011, pp. 25–8). However, Chronicles should not be singled out. Rather, the question is why all the ‘historical’ writings as we know them today were neglected during the late Second Temple Period. If the manuscripts of the books of Samuel, Kings, Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah are counted together, they still make up less than 1 per cent of the entire corpus of over 900 manuscripts. There are more copies of the Community Rule alone. Nor are the other ‘historical’ books quoted or otherwise used in any markedly different way from Chronicles. The situation is the same in other Jewish writings of this time which pay little direct attention to the period from the beginning of the monarchy to the Maccabean revolt. At least one plausible reason for this loss of interest is that each group had its own history and foundation myths that were of central importance to them. This is true not only of the groups who collected the DSS , but also of the Hasmoneans whose own stories are preserved in 1–2 Maccabees. The Psalms of Solomon describe the experiences of a particular group, and the later gospels of the New Testament also represent a comparable viewpoint. To some extent group history replaces national history just as the in-group perspective supersedes the national point of view.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (1997), ‘The canon within the canon at Qumran and in the New Testament,’ in S. E. Porter and C. A. Evans (eds), The Scrolls and the Scriptures: Qumran Fifty Years After. JSPS up 26. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 242–66. Brooke, G. J. (2002), ‘Between authority and canon: The significance of reworking the Bible for understanding the canonical process,’ in E. G. Chazon, D. Dimant and R. A. Clements (eds), Reworking the Bible: Apocryphal and Related Texts at Qumran: Proceedings of a Joint Symposium by the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature and the Hebrew University Institute for Advanced Studies Research Group on Qumran. STDJ 58. Leiden: Brill, pp. 85–104. Brooke, G. J. (2011), ‘Canonisation processes of the Jewish Bible in the light of the Qumran scrolls,’ in J. Dochhorn (ed.), ‘For it is Written’: Essays on the Function of Scripture in
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Early Judaism and Christianity. Early Christianity in the Context of Antiquity 12. Aarhus: Peter Lang, pp. 13–36. Flint, P. (2003), ‘Scriptures in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The evidence from Qumran,’ in S. M. Paul et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and the Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. VTS up 94. Leiden: Brill, 269–304. Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lange, A. (2007), ‘ “Nobody dared to add to them, to take from them, or to make changes” (Josephus, Ag. Ap. 1.42): The textual standardization of Jewish scriptures in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in A. Hilhorst, E. Puech, and E. Tigchelaar (eds), Flores Florentino: Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Early Jewish Studies in Honour of Florentino García Martínez. JSJS up 122. Leiden: Brill, pp. 105–26. Lange, A. (2010), ‘The textual plurality of Jewish scriptures in the Second Temple period in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in N. Dávid and A. Lange (eds), Qumran and the Bible: Studying the Jewish and Christian Scriptures in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Contributions to Biblical Exegesis and Theology 57. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 43–96. Lim, T. (2010), ‘Authoritative scriptures and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. Lim and J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 303–22. Lim, T. (2013), Formation of the Jewish Canon. The Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library. New Haven: Yale University Press. Mroczek, E. (2016), The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity. New York: OUP. Najman, H. (2012), ‘The vitality of scripture within and beyond the canon.’ JSJ, 43, 497–518. Qimron, E. and J. Strugnell (1994), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Maʿaśeh Ha-Torah. In Consultation with Y. Sussmann and with contributions by Y. Sussmann and A. Yardeni. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Schuller, E. (2012), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls and canon and canonization,’ in E.-M. Becker and S. Scholz (eds), Kanon in Konstruktion und Dekonstruktion: Kanonisierungsprozesse religiöser Texte von der Antike bis zur Gegenwart. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 293–314. Talmon, S. (2002), ‘The crystallization of the “canon of the Hebrew scriptures” in the light of biblical scrolls from Qumran,’ in E. Herbert and E. Tov (eds), The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries. New Castle: Oak Knoll Press, pp. 5–20. Ulrich, E. (2011), ‘The evolutionary production and transmission of the scriptural books,’ in H. von Weissenberg, J. Pakkala and M. Marttila (eds), Changes in Scripture: Rewriting and Interpreting Authoritative Traditions in the Second Temple Period. BZAW 419. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 47–64. Ulrich, E. (2015), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible. VTSup 169. Leiden: Brill. VanderKam, J. (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Weissenberg, H. von (2009), 4QMMT: Reevaluating the Text, the Function and the Meaning of the Epilogue. STDJ 82. Leiden: Brill.
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Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture Molly M. Zahn
One of the more notable aspects of the Qumran finds is the number of works with some sort of connection to the texts of the Hebrew Bible [→55 Bible]. Most of these texts (some known prior to the Qumran discoveries, some previously unknown) are not commentaries, but rather independent literary works that present topics and characters known from the Bible in a new light. They constitute a range of literary genres: narrative, law [→58 Halakhah], apocalypse, poetry [→60 Poetry and Hymns]. They also range in their degree of connection to texts now found in the Hebrew Bible. Some take a character known from a biblical book as the protagonist of an entirely new work that has little direct connection to any specific biblical text (e.g. 1 Enoch [→ 28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]; Apocryphon of Jeremiah C). Others ‘rewrite’ scripture by extensively reproducing the text of a given book or books, adding, amending or deleting material in accordance with the authors’ point of view (e.g. Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll], the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]; see Zahn, 2010). Despite the diversity of form, content and relationship to known scriptural texts, these texts have often been grouped together under the label ‘parabiblical’ or, more recently, ‘parascriptural’ texts. For reasons described below, ‘parabiblical,’ though problematic, should be preferred. Another label, ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ is usually used more restrictively for those texts that show an especially close relationship to prior scripture, such as Jubilees and the Temple Scroll. In recent years, different perspectives have emerged among researchers as to how the texts belonging to this diverse group should be understood (including issues of classification and terminology, see Najman and Tigchelaar, 2014) and how they change our picture of the literature and religion of the Second Temple Period. This entry will focus on the question of how the relationship between ‘parabiblical’ texts and the betterknown works that ended up in the Hebrew Bible should be construed, and how that understanding can meaningfully be reflected in the labels we use for texts of this type.
A New Understanding of ‘Scripture’ Prior to the discovery of the Qumran scrolls, it was assumed that ‘scripture’ in the Second Temple Period meant the books of the Hebrew Bible, most if not all of which 378
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would have already been regarded as ‘canonical.’ The current picture is much more complicated. There is no evidence that a ‘canon’ of scripture existed in the Second Temple Period, in the sense of a fixed and closed list of specific books in specific forms (Barton, 2007 [1986], p. 91; VanderKam, 2002). On the contrary, the Qumran evidence shows definitively that many scriptural books circulated in a variety of forms simultaneously, and that, at least for the community at Qumran, some books that did not make it into the Hebrew Bible, such as Jubilees and 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts] must have been regarded as scriptural (Ulrich, 2002; VanderKam, 1998, 2002; Lange, 2002). These findings have important implications for the study of ‘parabiblical’ texts. It has often been assumed, implicitly or explicitly (see, e.g. Tov, 1994b, p. 114), that these texts were intended or perceived to have a secondary status vis-à-vis the books that later came to comprise Hebrew Scripture. The same assumption is reflected in terms used to name individual compositions such as ‘pseudo-X’ or ‘Apocryphon of Y.’ This assumption, however, does not stand up to scrutiny (Zahn, 2011). The question of authoritative or scriptural status can be very difficult to determine, but many ‘parabiblical’ texts make a strong claim to authority by presenting themselves as the words of revered ancient figures (e.g. Enoch, Noah, Levi [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions; 24 Aramaic Levi]) or even as containing divine revelation (e.g. Jubilees, the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll], Apocryphon of Jeremiah C). Given the concrete evidence that Jubilees and 1 Enoch were viewed as scriptural, we must presume that these authority claims were intended to be believed, and in many cases may indeed have been believed. In other words, whatever these texts are called (individually and as a group), it appears that many of them may have been just as authoritative as the more familiar books they are related to. The collection of ‘parabiblical’ texts thus provides grounds for a new understanding of what might have been thought of as ‘scripture’ by various Second Temple Jewish groups.
Dependence on Earlier Scripture If ‘parabiblical’ texts have often been assumed by modern scholars to be secondary in status to the works that were later included in the Hebrew Bible, this seems to be due in part to another assumption, that these works were secondary to biblical texts in a literary sense; that is, their authors knew and drew upon the texts of biblical books in something very like the form in which they now appear in the Masoretic Text (MT ). This issue too requires nuance. It can no longer be assumed that every ‘parabiblical’ text is posterior to and derives from the book of the Hebrew Bible that it resembles, especially not in the form that we know that book now. The most obvious reason for this, mentioned above, is the fluid state of the text of the books of Hebrew Scripture (see Ulrich, 2015). Since we know that the text was still in flux in the Second Temple Period, it is very difficult to know precisely what form(s) of a given book would have been known to the authors of a given ‘parabiblical’ text. The possibility is always present that previously unknown readings originated in the course of the transmission of the book itself, rather than with the authors of the new work. What is more, we should not necessarily assume that a given ‘parabiblical’ text is dependent upon a book found in
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the Hebrew Bible at all. In at least one case, the Prayer of Nabonidus (4QP rNab ar), it seems clear that a previously unknown Qumran text actually represents an earlier form or source of a biblical text (in this case, Daniel 4 [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]), rather than a revision of it (see Eshel, 2001). In other cases, ‘parabiblical’ texts may have influenced the ongoing development of the biblical books to which they are related (Popović, 2010). On the other hand, while caution is clearly in order, many ‘parabiblical’ texts demonstrably derive from reflection on an existing textual tradition similar to the one that has come down to us. That is, their parallels to known versions of scriptural texts are most persuasively explained as the result of deliberate reuse of the scriptural text by the authors of the ‘parabiblical’ text. This is particularly true of texts that have commonly been labelled ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ where the exegetical concerns that prompt a given distinctive re-presentation of earlier scriptural material are often easily detected. The nature of the rewriting, in other words, often allows us to determine with a high degree of probability the specific textual feature that provides the basis for the interpretation (for many examples, see Kugel, 1998). There is, of course, a problem latent here. How can one accurately describe a rewritten or ‘parabiblical’ text’s manipulation of prior scripture if that prior scriptural text was fluid and not yet fixed? We cannot, after all, assume that the scribes responsible for Jubilees, the Temple Scroll or any other Second Temple composition would have known a given biblical book in its familiar Masoretic form. Yet at the same time it often seems quite clear, as mentioned, that a particular feature of the text of a biblical book, a feature that is still known to us, prompted a given rewriting. Although there is a real need to promote models of textual development that do not assume the primacy of the MT (Kraft, 2007; Ulrich, 2010; and especially Mroczek, 2016), detailed examination of the ways in which rewritten texts appear to engage earlier works – based on what we know of the variety of text forms available at the time – is equally necessary for a proper understanding of these texts. Thus, attention must be paid to both issues: scholars should engage in detailed analysis of how rewritten texts rewrite, but must also constantly be aware of the limited nature of the evidence and, as a result, the preliminary nature of their conclusions. We should never lose sight of the possibility that certain variants stem not from the composer of a new, ‘parabiblical,’ work but from the composer’s source, or that the transmission history of a particular reading is much more complicated and involved many more stages than the few manuscripts preserved for us might suggest.
Terminology Although I have thus far referred to the loose group of texts under consideration here as ‘parabiblical’ or as ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ there has been considerable debate in recent years as to the suitability of these and other, related terms (see e.g. Bernstein, 1999; Campbell, 2005, 2014; Kraft, 2007; Zahn, 2011). Discussions about how best to refer to the texts under discussion may seem like unnecessary nit-picking – it is the texts themselves that are key, rather than what we call them. Current debates about terminology, however, have a critical role to play in that they reflect the degree to which
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scholars are still coming to terms with the new vision of the Second Temple Period that is emerging from the Qumran scrolls. We are recognizing that older labels are often inaccurate or anachronistic, sometimes to the extent that they actually impede understanding (Ulrich, 2010, pp. 151–2). No consensus has emerged, however, on which replacement terms would be most suitable.
Parabiblical/Parascriptural At root, the Greek-derived prefix ‘para-’ carries the general sense of ‘alongside, analogous to but beyond or outside of ’ the word it modifies. It implies that, if a given object or phenomenon can be described as ‘para-X,’ that thing is in some way similar to, but is also different from or not identical to, X (see OED s.v.; Kraft, 2007, p. 8). Thus, in the process of the publication of the Qumran scrolls, ‘parabiblical’ became a sort of catch-all term to describe a wide range of texts that ‘are closely related to texts or themes of the Hebrew Bible’ (as E. Tov expressed it in the Foreword to DJD 13; Tov, 1994a, p. ix). As Kraft has pointed out (2007), the ‘para-’ prefix can encompass various types of textual relationships: a ‘parabiblical’ text could thus be a rewriting of a biblical text, or an elaboration of a biblical theme or character, or a source for the biblical text, or a tradition that developed parallel to that found in the Bible from a common source. Thus, ‘parabiblical’ functions quite effectively to denote texts with some sort of relationship to biblical books, while leaving open the precise nature of that relationship. Despite the apparent attractiveness of ‘parabiblical,’ it suffers from what most scholars see as a serious anachronism: labelling Second Temple texts ‘parabiblical’ seems to imply that there was such a thing as a ‘Bible’ in this period. Yet as we have seen, the Bible in the sense of a fixed list of specific forms of specific books did not exist in the Second Temple Period. If we want to accurately reflect this fact in our terminology, ‘parabiblical’ would seem inadmissible (Campbell, 2005, p. 51). To get around this problem, some – notably Kraft (2007) – have suggested the term ‘parascriptural’ as a replacement. There may not have been a Bible in the Second Temple Period, but there certainly was scripture, and so perhaps it is better to speak of these new texts with some relation to the scriptural texts that later ended up in the Bible as ‘parascriptural.’ This substitution, however, is not as straightforward as it might appear at first glance. While the Bible is a specific list of books (though this list depends on one’s perspective) and ‘biblical’ most obviously denotes something pertaining to that list of books, ‘scripture,’ unless it is simply functioning as a synonym for Bible, means something different – and it is precisely because of this difference that scholars prefer to talk about ‘scripture’ rather than ‘Bible’ for the Second Temple Period. Put simply, ‘scripture’ is a broader designation: works other than those currently preserved in the Hebrew Bible seem to have been viewed as scripture by at least some people in the Second Temple Period. Furthermore, ‘scripture’ is a label or category defined by authoritative status: what makes something ‘scriptural,’ in the Second Temple Period or at any other cultural moment, is the recognition by some community of people that the work in question has a particular authority and sanctity (see, e.g. Graham, 2005). Thus, the move from ‘parabiblical’ to ‘parascriptural’ involves a subtle but important shift: from denoting works having something to do with the books of the Bible (granted the
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non-existence of ‘the Bible’ as a canon at this point), to denoting (remembering our definition of ‘para-’) things that resembled or paralleled, but were not themselves, scripture. As Campbell notes (2005, pp. 51–3), this means that numerous texts that fell under the ‘parabiblical’ umbrella, like Jubilees, would not fit under an umbrella labelled ‘parascriptural,’ precisely because it appears that these works were considered scripture by at least some Second Temple Jews. A further implication of the switch is that, in order to determine that a Second Temple composition could be considered ‘parascriptural,’ one would have to determine that it was not in fact considered to be scriptural. This is a tall order, considering the fragmentary state of many Qumran manuscripts, and is much more difficult than identifying in those documents contents or themes that parallel those found in books that ended up in the Bible (Campbell, 2005, p. 56). Thus, although it does avoid anachronism, the term ‘parascriptural’ appears to involve even more difficulties than ‘parabiblical,’ not least of which is its lack of accuracy as a label for that broad group of texts with some sort of relation to texts of the Hebrew Bible that has previously been labelled ‘parabiblical.’
Rewritten Scripture The more specific term that has frequently been used to denote works that show a sustained relationship to a particular scriptural text, ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ has also occasioned much debate (see Zahn, 2010). Among those who regard the term as a label for a genre or category of texts, some would view the boundaries of the category as quite broad, encompassing texts like 1 Enoch and the Life of Adam and Eve (e.g. Harrington, 1986), while others would define it more narrowly as requiring sustained, detailed reproduction of scriptural texts such as that found in Jubilees, the books of Chronicles, Josephus’s Antiquities, and others (Alexander, 1987; Bernstein, 2005). Other positions hold that ‘Rewritten Scripture’ should not be regarded as a category or genre but rather as a scribal technique (‘rewriting scripture’; e.g. Brooke, 2000, p. 780; Falk, 2007, p. 17; ‘textual strategy,’ Petersen, 2014, p. 29), or that ‘Rewritten Scripture’ is a sort of ‘meta-genre’ (Brooke, 2007, pp. 41, 47; 2010, pp. 375–79) or ‘umbrella term’ (Brooke, 2000, p. 780; Collins, 2010, p. 428) that functions at a higher level of abstraction than other genre labels (e.g. law, narrative, apocalypse, etc.). Regarding Rewritten Scripture as a clearly-defined literary genre risks totalizing or essentializing the category and overlooking key points of connection with other types of works. The techniques by which earlier texts are reconfigured in works labelled Rewritten Scripture (that is, the actual techniques of ‘rewriting’) are often no different from those found in texts usually placed in other categories, such as expanded editions of scriptural books, paraphrastic translations such as the targums, and ‘parabiblical’ texts more broadly. Furthermore, labelling a text Rewritten Scripture tells one nothing about that text’s contents or literary form; only that the text is closely related to some scriptural text. The genre of the Rewritten Scripture text in formal terms varies according to the genre of the text it rewrites (Brooke, 2000, p. 780). From the perspective of a traditional view of genre as tied primarily to formal textual features (content, structure, style, etc.), it seems clear that regarding Rewritten Scripture as a genre causes problems. On the other hand, recent work in genre studies
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has stressed that genres can also be distinguished according to their functions and goals (not just their formal features), that texts can partake of multiple genres simultaneously, and that texts can participate in a single genre to a greater or lesser degree. These insights help us to understand how Rewritten Scripture might function as a genre or category of text, despite the diversity in form and contents of its members. Rewriting is indeed a technique that, it appears, was deployed in a wide variety of textual settings in the Second Temple Period. However, within this broad spectrum of contexts for rewriting, a core group of texts does appear to use the technique, in combination with other elements, for a specific purpose. Jubilees, the Temple Scroll, the books of Chronicles, and the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon] – in slightly varying degrees – all combine rewriting with authoritative forms of presentation (pseudepigraphy; setting in ancient times) to produce new interpretations of Israel’s scriptural tradition that locate themselves within that same tradition. As such, they constitute a subset of ‘parabiblical’ texts that evince a common purpose and strategy, and thus can fairly be demarcated from other texts in this broad group. Perhaps a better label could be found for this group than ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ since many other types of texts also employ rewriting. In any case, study from the perspective of genre – broadly understood – helps us articulate key questions about the nature and function of rewritten texts (see further Brooke, 2010; Zahn, 2012).
Future Directions As the full corpus of texts from the Judean Desert has been published over the last several decades, a wealth of new information has come to light that is gradually shaping a new understanding of how texts were composed and received in Second Temple Judaism. Older ideas about ‘scripture’ and ‘interpretation’ are being challenged as scholars reconsider the dynamics by which traditions were reconfigured, texts were reworked, and new compositions claimed or were granted authority. Further progress in refining our understanding of these phenomena and in finding appropriate terminology to discuss them requires continued detailed and comparative study of ‘parabiblical’ texts themselves as well as related materials. While a great amount of work has been done already, many texts remain to be investigated specifically from the perspective of their relations to or reuse of existing traditions [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Where detailed studies exist, they have so far only rarely been brought into conversation with one another. We still lack a broad but reasonably comprehensive ‘map’ of the range of Early Jewish texts that draw upon or show points of contact with scripture. Such a map would not only track parallels in content, but would chart techniques of reworking, authorization strategies (Najman, 2003) and exegetical concerns; and would ultimately take account of translations, variant copies and the representation of scripture in Qumran sectarian literature and other interpretive texts, in addition to ‘parabiblical’ texts. This data will allow us to more accurately describe the role played by rewriting and reuse of earlier traditions in Second Temple Judaism, and to contextualize such rewriting in the intellectual history of the ancient Near East.
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Bibliography Alexander, P. (1987), ‘Retelling the Old Testament,’ in D. Carson and H. G. M. Williamson (eds), It is Written: Scripture Citing Scripture. Essays in Honour of Barnabas Lindars, SSF. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 99–121. Barton, J. (2007 [1986]), Oracles of God: Perceptions of Ancient Prophecy in Israel after the Exile. Rev. ed. Oxford: OUP. Bernstein, M. J. (1999), ‘Pseudepigraphy in the Qumran scrolls: Categories and perspectives,’ in E. G. Chazon and M. E. Stone (eds), Pseudepigraphic Perspectives: The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 31. Leiden: Brill, pp. 1–26. Bernstein, M. J. (2005), ‘ “Rewritten Bible:” A generic category which has outlived its usefulness?,’ Textus 22, 169–96. Brooke, G. J. (2000), ‘Rewritten Bible,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 2 vols. New York: OUP, II : 777–81. Brooke, G. J. (2007), ‘The Books of Chronicles and the scrolls from Qumran,’ in R. Rezetko et al. (eds), Reflection and Refraction: Studies in Biblical Historiography in Honour of A. Graeme Auld. VTS up 113. Leiden: Brill, pp. 35–48. Brooke, G. J. (2010), ‘Genre theory, rewritten bible and pesher,’ DSD 17, 361–86. Campbell, J. G. (2005), ‘ “Rewritten Bible” and “Parabiblical Texts”: A terminological and methodological critique,’ in W. J. Lyons, J. G. Campbell, and L. Pietersen (eds), New Directions in Qumran Studies. LSTS 52. London: T & T Clark, pp. 43–68. Campbell, J. G. (2014), ‘Rewritten Bible: A terminological reassessment,’ in J. Zsengellér (ed.), Rewritten Bible after Fifty Years: Texts, Terms, or Techniques? JSJSup 166. Leiden: Brill, pp. 49–81. Collins, J. J. (2010), ‘Epilogue: Genre analysis and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 17, 418–30. Eshel, E. (2001), ‘Possible sources of the Book of Daniel,’ in J. J. Collins and P. W. Flint (eds), The Book of Daniel: Composition and Reception. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill, II : 387–94. Falk, D. K. (2007), The Parabiblical Texts: Strategies for Extending the Scriptures in the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: T&T Clark. Graham, W. A. (2005), ‘Scripture,’ in L. Jones et al. (eds), Encyclopedia of Religion. 2nd edn. Detroit: Macmillan, pp. 8194–205. Harrington, D. J. (1986), ‘The Bible Rewritten (narratives),’ in R. Kraft and G. Nickelsburg (eds), Early Judaism and Its Modern Interpreters. Philadelphia: Fortress, pp. 239–47. Kraft, R. A. (2007), ‘Para-mania: Beside, before and beyond Bible studies,’ JBL 126, 5–27. Kugel, J. L. (1998), Traditions of the Bible. Cambridge MA : Harvard University Press. Lange, A. (2002), ‘The status of the biblical texts in the Qumran corpus and the canonical process,’ in E. D. Herbert and E. Tov (eds), The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judean Desert Discoveries. London: British Library, pp. 21–30. Mroczek, E. (2016), The Literary Imagination in Jewish Antiquity. New York: OUP. Najman, H. (2003), Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Najman H. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (2014), ‘A preparatory study of nomenclature and text designation in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ RevQ 26, 305–25. Petersen, A. K. (2014), ‘Textual fidelity, elaboration, supersession or encroachment? Typological reflections on the phenomenon of Rewritten Scripture,’ in J. Zsengellér (ed.), Rewritten Bible after Fifty Years: Texts, Terms, or Techniques? JSJSup 166. Leiden: Brill, pp. 13–48.
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Popović, M. (2010), ‘Prophet, books and texts: Ezekiel, Pseudo-Ezekiel and the authoritativeness of Ezekiel traditions in early Judaism,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 227–51. Tov, E. (1994a), ‘Foreword,’ in H. Attridge et al., Qumran Cave 4. VIII: Parabiblical Texts Part I. DJD 13. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. ix–x. Tov, E. (1994b), ‘Biblical texts as reworked in some Qumran manuscripts with special attention to 4QRP and 4QP araGen-Exod,’ in E. Ulrich and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Community of the Renewed Covenant: The Notre Dame Symposium on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Notre Dame, IN : University of Notre Dame Press, pp. 111–34. Ulrich, E. (2002), ‘The text of the Hebrew scriptures at the time of Hillel and Jesus,’ in A. Lemaire (ed.), Congress Volume Basel 2001. VTS up 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 85–108. Ulrich, E. (2010), ‘Methodological reflections on determining scriptural status in first century Judaism,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 145–61. Ulrich, E. (2015), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Developmental Composition of the Bible. VTSup 169. Leiden: Brill. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), ‘Authoritative literature in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 5, 382–402. VanderKam, J. C. (2002), ‘Questions of canon in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in L. M. McDonald and J. A. Sanders (eds), The Canon Debate. Peabody, MA .: Hendrickson, pp. 91–109. Zahn, M. M. (2010), ‘Rewritten Scripture,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 323–36. Zahn, M. M. (2011), ‘Talking about rewritten texts: Some reflections on terminology,’ in H. von Weissenberg et al. (eds), Changes in Scripture: Rewriting and Interpreting Authoritative Traditions in the Second Temple Period. BZAW 419. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 93–119. Zahn, M. M. (2012), ‘Genre and rewritten scripture: A reassessment,’ JBL 131, 271–88.
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Exegesis and Interpretation Michael Segal
A significant number of the Dead Sea Scrolls preserve compositions that fall under the broad rubric of biblical exegesis and interpretation, and their discovery and publication has led to a greater appreciation of the methods and modes by which Jews in antiquity read and interpreted the Bible. The current entry is intended to briefly survey and assess the contributions of the Scrolls as a whole to the rich body of exegetical literature from this period, and will not be limited only to the unique interpretive methods reflected in the sectarian scrolls (such as the pesharim [→44 Pesharim]). Some of these genres and aspects were already accessible to scholars prior to the Qumran discoveries on the basis of contemporaneous Jewish compositions. However, it is only in hindsight, and with the complete publication of the DSS , that we can properly appreciate their contribution to this crucial area of study.
Reuse of Biblical Idioms and Expressions Almost every single literary composition preserved in the Dead Sea Scrolls reflects biblical interpretation to some degree. The religious, cultural and ideational heritage of the Jewish people traces its roots to the Bible, and any new composition written by Jews in antiquity is suffused with rich biblical language. Thus, for example, the authors of the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] employed language based upon biblical expressions and imagery when composing new poetry (Licht, 1957; Holm-Nielsen, 1960; Hughes, 2006). Similarly, the language of early prayers such as Words of the Luminaries [→54 Words of the Luminaries] can sometimes be characterized as a pastiche of biblical vocabulary and allusions (Chazon, 2006) [→61 Liturgical Texts]. Some of this use was perhaps unconscious adoption of ‘standard’ idiom, but in other instances, these ancient authors employed terminology which alluded to specific biblical passages of particular import in order to support their worldview. By framing their compositions within the context of earlier, authoritative passages, these authors implicitly interpreted the biblical text, demonstrating the ideas they wanted to promote, and at the same time lending an imprimatur of authority and antiquity, which could now be traced directly to the most authoritative of compositions, the Bible itself [→55 Bible]. 386
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An interesting example of the intentional usage of a specific biblical expression is the divine epithet ‘God of knowledge/wisdom,’ which is used within the Qumran sectarian scrolls in line with the deterministic worldview of the authors (1QS 3.15 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 1QH 12.10–11 [20.13–14]; 4 15 [21.34] [→37 Hodayot]) [→74 Ethics and Dualism; 63 Wisdom]. The phrase originally appeared in the Song of Hannah (1 Sam. 2.3) in a different theological and ideological framework, but was appropriated and infused with a new, unique meaning in the sectarian scrolls. Most interpreters of 1 Samuel understand this phrase to refer to God’s awareness of men’s actions after they had performed them (for a different interpretation as an anti-Wisdom polemic see Segal, 2002). The meaning of the expression in the sectarian compositions reflects a secondary development. The borrowing from the Bible is further underscored in these instances by the combination with the verb hkyn ‘prepared,’ which is probably a reflection of 1 Sam. 2.3 according to the reconstructed Vorlage of the Septuagint (‘Because the Lord is God of knowledge and God prepares his ways.’ See the data presented in Segal, 2002, p. 92, n. 27). The combination of the epithet ‘God of knowledge’ and the verb together generate a new concept, yet at the same time, these authors cloak this idea in biblical garb.
Classification of Biblical Interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls Relationship to the Biblical Text The modes and methods of biblical interpretation from the Dead Sea Scrolls can be classified according to a number of different criteria. One way to evaluate them is according to their form, examining the literary genre of the interpretive composition and placing it along a spectrum of closeness to the biblical text. This spectrum ranges across compositions closest to the text, such as textual witnesses to the biblical text which express interpretation by means of secondary readings inserted into the text itself; works that rewrite the Bible by closely approximating its contours and contents, yet differ enough from previously known textual witnesses both quantitatively and qualitatively in order to be considered non-biblical [→56 Parabiblical Text/Rewritten Scripture]; compositions that use the Bible, including its stories, laws, poetry and prophecies as a springboard for completely new literary creations; and finally, works that explicitly distinguish between the biblical text and its interpretation by means of the formal usage of lemma-citation formula. Each of these genres is well represented in the Qumran corpus. Many of the biblical scrolls [→55 Bible] reflect a relatively free approach to the process of transmission, often including secondary readings that can be described as exegetical in nature. Individual scrolls such as 4QS ama (4Q51) reflect extensive interpretive tendencies and new readings (Rofé, 1989). The group of scrolls generally known as ‘pre-Samaritan’ manuscripts, including 4QpaleoExodm, 4QNumb and 4QD eutn, contains extensive secondary readings that serve an interpretive purpose, primarily to provide a ‘source’ for various ‘quotations’ elsewhere in Pentateuch (Segal, 2007) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. The group of 4QR eworked Pentateuch scrolls, although further afield than previously known Torah manuscripts, is typologically similar in its textual and scribal phenomena to other biblical manuscripts known from antiquity.
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Other scrolls reflect compositions that are directly related to the biblical text, yet reflect significant differences, such as the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] or Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] (although the latter was not necessarily Qumranic in origin, it was clearly of significance for the sect, as some fifteen copies were preserved in the Qumran caves) which both reflect extensive exegetical activity by its authors, still along the contours and within the confines of the pentateuchal text which they rewrote. Further along the spectrum are, for example, copies of 1 Enoch, which uses the short, enigmatic passage in Gen. 6.1–4 (the ‘Watchers’ story) as its starting point for much broader expositions than what is included in the Bible itself [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. Finally, the pesher texts formally distinguish between the quotation of the biblical text in a lemma, and the unique pesher interpretation that follows [→44 Pesharim]. The pesharim are the only compositions among the current list that can be characterized as specifically sectarian. They provide an important counterweight to the suggestion of the Qumran covenanters’ self-conception as belonging to the biblical world and the textual fluidity in biblical texts referred to above. The authors, who were unquestionably members of this social group, clearly did distinguish between the biblical text (whichever version that they adopted as their Vorlage) and their interpretation. One must keep in mind that these different literary distinctions reflect a certain degree of subjectivity, and therefore caution must be exercised in assuming that these modern distinctions in fact reflect the status and function of these works in antiquity.
Genre of Biblical Composition An alternative division of the exegetical texts can perhaps be accomplished by isolating the literary genre of the biblical text being interpreted. The Scrolls contain interpretation of essentially every biblical genre, including narrative, law, prophecy [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], poetry [→60 Poetry and Hymns] and wisdom [→63 Wisdom]. Narrative interpretation includes works such as the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon], Jubilees, 4QR eworked Pentateucha (4Q158), Commentary on Genesis A (4Q252) [→33 Commentaries on Genesis], 4QAdmonition on the Flood (4Q370), and 4QP araphrase of Genesis and Exodus (4Q422). This representative selection of interpretive compositions demonstrates that these authors were predominantly interested in narrative exegesis of the Pentateuch, and much less frequently in other narrative books of the Bible [→55 Bible]. In fact, one can further argue that their interest lay predominantly in narratives prior to the Sinai theophany in the book of Exodus. Of course, there are exceptions to both of these claims, and one finds works such as 4QVisions of Samuel (4Q160) and 4Qpap paraKings et al. (4Q382), but these are the minority. Moreover, 4Q382 is highly fragmentary and contains passages that apparently rework Elijah and Elisha traditions alongside psalmic material (reflected in the ‘et al.’ of the title) and is therefore not a categorical example of non-pentateuchal narrative exegesis. Legal exegesis is predominant in a number of Qumran texts, including works such as the Temple Scroll, the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document], 4QMMT (4Q394–4Q399) [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśe ha-Torah], and 4QO rdinances (4Q159). The halakhah [→58
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Halakhah] propounded in these works emerges from a specific sectarian social context, and the halakhic positions expressed therein reflect these views. Most significantly for the description here, the legal positions adopted by these sectarians reflect assumptions about how to read and interpret the biblical text, sometimes explicitly expounded, but frequently only implied (Bernstein and Koyfman, 2005). The distinction between the categories of law and narrative corresponds to the classic division between midrash aggadah and midrash halakhah found in rabbinic literature, although the division between these genres often breaks down (Fraade, 2011). Thus, for example, Jubilees presents numerous legal additions in the narrative sections of Genesis and Exodus, blurring the distinction between law and narrative (cf. also 4QM iscellaneous Rules [4Q265] 7 [→72 Forms of Community]). These additions are the result of both midrash aggadah and midrash halakhah, in terms of the hermeneutical methods underlying each one and are fundamentally intertwined. Prophecies form the basis for interpretation in most of the continuous pesher texts (in addition to Psalms and Gen. 49, which were perhaps naturally perceived as prophecy by early readers) [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. Biblical prophecies were construed as mysterious divine communications, the true meaning of which was unknown even to the prophets themselves (1QpHab 7) [→44 Pesharim], and which could only be revealed by an interpreter divinely endowed with this ability, namely the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography]. This notion is phenomenologically similar to the situation in Daniel 2; 4; 5 (based also on the story of Joseph) according to which the Babylonian king received a divine message but was unable to interpret its contents. In each instance only Daniel, in contrast to the foreign wise men, was able to do so, due to his having been blessed with divine knowledge and wisdom. In the pesharim the prophecies ultimately relate to the era of the later author(s), referring to the eschatological period at which time the righteous sectarians will emerge vindicated vis-à-vis their enemies [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Many scholars refer to the interpretation in the pesher texts as actualization, since the words of the prophets are interpreted with reference to actual historical events contemporaneous with the interpreter. However, it is in fact the eschatological time period following the composition of the pesher which is of particular significance for these authors. The accuracy of the divinely inspired interpretation regarding the events that already occurred in the author’s lifetime validates the interpretation regarding the impending transition to the eschatological period. In this sense, pesher texts are a variation of historical apocalypses, a common literary genre in the Second Temple Period. These apocalypses were retrojected by their authors into the past, and presented as a prophecy to a visionary (e.g. Daniel), through a divine intermediary who served as an interpreter of the prophecy. The apocalypses refer to events that already took place in order to validate the predictions of what is to come in the future. Anchoring the legitimacy of prognostication of future events to the ‘prediction’ of what already took place lends an air of determinism to these apocalypses. The pesher texts reflect this same apocalyptic worldview, and share a basic deterministic outlook. The prophets themselves already spoke of future times, but their words were not understood without the mediation of the divinely inspired Teacher. By means of the pesher hermeneutic, in which each element of the biblical text is carefully transformed into a reference to a
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future event, the author successfully transforms prophecy into apocalyptic (Collins, 1998, pp. 151–2). Other Qumran compositions rewrite prophetic books, including 4QApocryphon of Jeremiah (4Q383, 385a, 387, 387a, 388a, 389, [390]) and 4QPseudo-Ezekiel (4Q385, 385b, 386, 388). These works use terminology, themes and occasionally entire prophecies from the biblical prophetic books. Thus, for example, the Vision of the Dry Bones (Ezek. 37) plays a prominent role in 4QPseudo-Ezekiel, and its reformulation is partially preserved in three scrolls. In that sense these works can be classified as Rewritten Bible [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. Both of these compositions stray further from the biblical books to which they are related than the narrative or legal compositions mentioned above. However, this might simply be a function of the literary genre of prophecy which lends itself less easily to a close reworking due to its less structured nature in general. The Scrolls also preserve evidence of biblical interpretation within the context of the literary development of the prophetic books. Chief among the examples of this phenomenon are the multiple copies of Jeremiah found in Cave 4. Two of the copies (4QJ eremiahb,d) reflect the shorter edition of Jeremiah also found in the Septuagint of Jeremiah, while the other three texts (4QJ eremiaha,c,e) present the longer edition attested in the Masoretic Text. It is most likely, as has been argued by a number of scholars, that the shorter version reflects an earlier edition that has subsequently been expanded into the longer edition (e.g. Tov, 1985). This is of relevance for the discussion here since some of the changes reflect interpretation in its broader sense, and prophecies that did not come to fruition were expanded and updated to reflect a later reality. This too is not fundamentally different from the updating of prophecy that exists to a certain degree in the pesher texts, although there are no apocalyptic overtones to the revised prophecies within the framework of the transmission process of the book of Jeremiah. It is perhaps this preservation of the general framework and outlook of the book that led to their reception as copies of the same work, as opposed to the ‘rewritten’ compositions described above.
The Nature and Character of the Interpretation A third way of classifying early biblical interpretation in general and in the Dead Sea Scrolls in particular is according to the nature of the interpretive issue being addressed, and of the solution offered by the interpreter. The pair of terms ‘pure’ and ‘tendentious’ exegesis is useful heuristically in order to assess the nature of the interpretation. Pure interpretation refers to those instances in which an ‘actual’ interpretive issue can be identified within the text itself which demands interpretation, including issues of language, style and content. Tensions or queries within the immediate context of a verse or a passage, or within the broader biblical corpus, often created due to the different compositional processes of the various books, necessitate that any reader act as an interpreter. Some of the earliest readers of biblical literature, authors and scribes from the Second Temple Period, were active participants in this process. At the opposite end of the spectrum are those interpretive ‘issues’ which do not really present a problem per se, but rather are an excuse which an author/interpreter capitalizes upon in order
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to insert a new idea into the composition that he is explicating. Many instances of interpretation are somewhere along this spectrum, and one must keep in mind that no two readers approach a particular text from precisely the same perspective. It is therefore possible that one interpreter will perceive a ‘pure’ interpretive issue in the text, while another reader will not be bothered in any way by the same passage. This difference in viewpoint can be the result of linguistic [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], cultural or historical differences, and perhaps the proclivities of individual interpreters. The same distinction between the ‘pure’ and ‘tendentious’ nature of interpretive problems in the text can be applied to the content of the interpretation itself. Here too we can define the two polar extremes, often referred to as exegesis and eisegesis – the former referring to the attempt to interpret the text within its own framework and according to its general tone and tenor, without intentionally attempting to incorporate new material or ideas. At the other extreme an interpreter purposefully modified a source in order to promote a new idea or notion that was not previously expressed in the interpreted work. The latter approach is taken to further the agenda of the author, who wishes to bolster a particular point of view by attributing its origins to an earlier composition, and in particular to the biblical text. Here too, the theoretical distinction between these two extremes is not as clear in the practical realm, since an author’s own point of view prejudiced how they read the Bible; interpreters perhaps did not perceive of their ‘tendentious’ interpretation as an active attempt to promote a particular agenda. Another complication of using these two categories is the confusion between the nature of the interpretative issues and solutions. A ‘pure’ interpretive issue can be solved with a ‘tendentious’ solution, whether or not it is an intentional attempt to insert a foreign idea into the text. While the borders between the issues raised in the texts and interpretative solutions cannot be defined precisely, they are still of value in assessing the nature of individual examples of biblical interpretation and of more extensive compositions as a whole. The following two examples taken from the Book of Jubilees demonstrate the distinctions expressed in this categorization. Although scholars disagree as to whether Jubilees is sectarian in origin, its importance for the movement associated for a time with the site of Qumran is demonstrated by the high number of copies of this composition at Qumran as well as a reference to it in the Damascus Document (CD 16.3–4). The first example relates to the creation of the first woman in history. In the Pentateuch, this is described in two separate accounts each offering different details, and both found in the opening chapters of Genesis. According to Gen. 1.27 both male and female were created simultaneously on the sixth day of Creation: ‘male and female he created them.’ In contrast, the order of events in the story in Gen. 2 is remarkably different. Man was fashioned first in v. 7; God then noticed that he was alone and formed the various animals, presumably as potential mates for man, but none was a successful match (vv. 18–20). Only then did God decide to take one of man’s ribs, from which he fashioned the first woman, who proved to be an appropriate match for man (vv. 21–23). This passage raises an interesting theological question regarding God’s lack of foreknowledge regarding the unsuitability of the animals as appropriate partners for
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man. This question could be construed as a ‘pure’ interpretive issue, but at the same time, it reflects certain fundamental a priori theological assumptions, which are not necessarily problematic within the immediate context of the narrative. Similarly, if one reads Genesis 1 or 2 on their own, each presents a coherent story, without any problematic sequential issues. However, when read in concert with one another, these alternate descriptions are immediately drawn into stark contrast. Modern critical scholars read the two stories as the product of separate authors or sources, using examples such as this as proof of this division [→18 Biblical Scholarship and Qumran Studies]. However, traditional readers in antiquity who read the juxtaposed texts as a homogeneous literary unit could not have conceived of such a solution to this inherent tension. Instead, various interpretive solutions were proposed to solve this problem, generally reinterpreting one of the passages to conform to the other. Such an approach is found in Jubilees 3.8: In the first week Adam and his wife – the rib – were created, and in the second week he showed her to him.
According to this verse, Gen. 1 describes the first week in history, while Gen. 2 follows with the next week. During the first week, the woman was created in potential, as the man’s rib, and in that sense they were created simultaneously. This interpretation also offers an explanation for the transition from singular to plural objects in Gen. 1.27: ‘in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.’ Perhaps this suggested that there was only one body created in the first week (Gen. 1), while at the same time referring to them already as both male and female in the plural. In the second week (Gen. 2) according to the reading of Jubilees 3.8, God removed the already extant female rib from the man’s body and showed it to him, transforming the female from potential to reality (Kugel, 1998, pp. 85–6). This case can be described as ‘pure’ exegesis since the problem emerges clearly from the text in its current form, and the solution given does not promote any specific ideological agenda or approach of the author of Jubilees 3.8. Another example from Jubilees presents the opposite extreme in the nature of its interpretation. According to Gen. 1.16, the sun and the moon, the two great luminaries, were created on the fourth day, following which the verse distinguishes between the two, referring to the sun as the ‘greater’ luminary, and the moon as the ‘lesser’ one. The distinction between them does not present an actual interpretive problem, although the vacillation between referring to the moon first as ‘great’ and then as the ‘lesser’ luminary in the same context has engendered interpretive discussion. It is eminently reasonable in light of natural observations to refer to the sun as the greater of the two. However, at this juncture, Jubilees takes advantage of the slight distinction in the biblical text in order to make a fundamental claim about the authority of the solar calendar, a central belief promoted in this composition, and the subject of major polemics in the Second Temple Period [→62 Calendars]. The first sign of this interpretation is found in a direct rewriting of Gen. 1.14–19. The following table shows which elements in Jubilees have been adopted directly from Gen. 1, and which are completely new to the context here (see Table 57.1).
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Table 57.1 Jubilees 2.8–10
Gen. 1.14–19 (JPS )
2.8 On the fourth day
19
the Lord made the sun, the moon, and the stars.
16
He placed them in the heavenly firmament to shine on the whole earth, to rule over day and night, and to separate between light and darkness.
15
And there was evening and there was morning, a fourth day. God made the two great lights . . . and the stars.
and they serve as lights in the expanse of the sky to shine upon the earth.’ And it was so. (cf. v. 17)
16
. . . the greater light to dominate the day and the lesser light to dominate the night . . . (cf. v. 18)
14a
God said, ‘Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky to separate day from night;
2.9 The Lord appointed the sun as a great sign above the earth for days, sabbaths, months, festivals, years, sabbaths of years, jubilees, and all times of the years.
14b they shall serve as signs for the set times – the days and the years; (see ‘the greater light’ in v. 16)
2.10 It separates between light and darkness
18
to dominate the day and the night, and to separate light from darkness . . .
and (serves) for wellbeing so that everything that sprouts and grows on the earth may prosper . . .
In the Genesis description the sun and moon are placed on an equal footing with reference to the various aspects of the calendar, including the demarcation of days and years (1.14). In contrast, Jubilees assigns this role exclusively to the sun, and greatly expands the aspects of the calendar which it controls. A tell-tale corroboration of tendentious interpretation is the identification of the same idea elsewhere in the same composition. In this example, the interpretive Tendenz is confirmed by a long excursus on the authority of the solar calendar and the invalidity of lunar calculations, appended to the rewritten Flood story in Jubilees 6.32–38 (cf. also Commentary on Genesis A [4Q252 1–2] [→33 Commentaries on Genesis]; Van Ruiten, 2000, pp. 35–40).
Conclusion These three attempts at classification – according to the relationship to the biblical text, by the biblical genre under interpretation, or by the hermeneutical nature of individual exegetical passages – demonstrate the richness and complexity of biblical interpretation as witnessed in the Dead Sea Scrolls. While each of these categories is insufficient on its own to describe the phenomenon of biblical interpretation in this ancient collection, their combination allows us to assess the exegetical character of this corpus in a more nuanced fashion. The texts now at our disposal offer a window onto the rich world of
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early exegesis amongst readers in the Second Temple Period, and have contributed immeasurably towards our understanding of this area in antiquity, attesting new genres and modes of interpretation. While further work is necessary to understand the nature and character of these compositions more precisely, the current state of research allows us to analyse and reconstruct the contours of how the earliest readers interpreted and reinterpreted the Bible.
Bibliography Bernstein, M. J. and S. A. Koyfman (2005), ‘The interpretation of Biblical law in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Forms and methods,’ in M. Henze (ed.), Biblical Interpretation at Qumran. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 61–87. Chazon, E. G. (2006), ‘Scripture and prayer in “The Words of the Luminaries,” ’ in J. Kugel (ed.), Prayers That Cite Scripture. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Center for Jewish Studies, pp. 25–41. Collins, J. J. (1998), The Apocalyptic Imagination: An Introduction to Jewish Apocalyptic Literature. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Fraade, S. (2011), Legal Fictions: Studies of Law and Narrative in the Discursive Worlds of Ancient Jewish Sectarians and Sages. JSJS up 147. Leiden: Brill. Holm-Nielsen, S. (1960), Hodayot: Psalms from Qumran. Aarhus: Universitetsforlaget. Hughes, J. (2006), Scriptural Allusions and Exegesis in the Hodayot. STDJ 59. Leiden: Brill. Kugel, J. L. (1998), Traditions of the Bible: A Guide to the Bible as it was at the Start of the Common Era. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press. Licht, J. (1957), The Thanksgiving Scroll: A Scroll from the Wilderness of Judea. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute [Hebrew]. Rofé, A. (1989), ‘The nomistic correction in biblical manuscripts and its occurrence in 4QS ama’, RevQ 14, 247–54. Van Ruiten, J. T. A. G. M. (2000), Primaeval History Interpreted: The Rewriting of Genesis 1–11 in the Book of Jubilees. JSJS up 66. Leiden: Brill. Segal, M. (2002), ‘1 Samuel 2:3: Text, exegesis and theology,’ Shnaton 13, 83–96 [Hebrew]. Segal, M. (2007), ‘The text of the Hebrew Bible in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls’, Materia Giudaica 12, 5–20. Tov, E. (1985), ‘The literary history of the book of Jeremiah in light of its textual history,’ in J. H. Tigay (ed.), Empirical Models for Biblical Criticism. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, pp. 211–37.
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Halakhah Vered Noam
Governing the life of the communities reflected in the sectarian scrolls was an elaborate system of religious law, here referred to as ‘halakhah.’ Although this word nowhere appears in Qumran literature (Meier, 2003) and originates in its later rabbinic counterpart, ‘halakhah’ is nevertheless the most convenient term for the complex edifice that encompasses not just pentateuchal law [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] and its exegesis but also traditions, practices and regulations not found in the Bible [→55 Bible] (Jassen, 2014; but see Amihay, 2016). In essence, halakhah epitomizes the broad spectrum of behavioural norms viewed as binding by Jewish groups throughout the ages. The sectarian versions of halakhah, including communal rules [→59 Rules; 47 Serekh ha-Yahad], traditions and exegeses [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation], not only regulated the various forms of sectarian daily life [→73 Daily Life] but also constituted a significant part of its literature.
Halakhic Works Found at Qumran Texts treating various aspects of religious law are scattered in works found at Qumran. Comprehensive, organized collections of rules appear, however, in a restricted number of compositions (for a compilation, see Parry and Tov, 2004). Three of these halakhic works are described briefly below. Notwithstanding their shared features, these works differ greatly in purpose, genre, literary style, legal terminology, structure and implicit source of authority [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. The Temple Scroll (11QT ) [→51 Temple Scroll] belongs to the genre of Rewritten Bible [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. Beginning with Exodus 34–35 and following the order of the Pentateuch for the remainder of Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers, it first articulates the sanctuary-related injunctions [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple] and the sacrificial rites in these three pentateuchal books, before turning to Deuteronomic topics. As its name indicates, this work focuses on the laws of the Temple, its structure and furnishings, but also incorporates sacrificial, festival and purity laws [→70 Purity and Holiness], the prohibition against idolatry, the statute of the king, and priestly and levitical gifts, among other religious themes. The biblical laws are edited by rephrasing verses, inserting additional rulings (and even entire sections), 395
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compiling all the relevant material at a legislative issue’s first appearance, and harmonizing contradictory laws. Stylistically, the composition deliberately imitates scriptural language, even in the interpolated passages. In addition, in order to create the impression that all its directives were delivered by God, unmediated, its author alters the third-person references to God in the Deuteronomic commandments to first-person speech. These literary formulations manifest a desire to ground the halakhic content of this work, and its authority, in Sinaitic revelation [→66 Revelation]. Some scholars maintain that the Temple Scroll was not authored by a sect whose members settled at Qumran, but rather originated in a related, probably earlier group (Schiffman, 2008, pp. xviii–xx). However, the affinity between the halakhah of the Temple Scroll and other legal texts found at Qumran implies that this work is nonetheless representative of a legal system accepted, adopted or created by the Qumran sect [→72 Forms of Community]. Another prominent halakhic work found at Qumran and in the form of medieval manuscripts also in the Cairo Genizah is the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document]. Its legislative units address a variety of topics. Many passages are devoted to Temple-related matters, such as ritual impurity and consecrated food; others discuss the laws of the Sabbath, marriage and divorce, oaths and vows, and judicial regulations. These laws differ stylistically and structurally from their counterparts in the Temple Scroll, since the Damascus Document distinguishes clearly between the biblical text and its regulations, presenting the latter as autonomous units, independent of their biblical foundation. Frequently organized topically, they are on occasion preceded by captions; for example: ‘Concerning one who purifies himself in water’ (CD 10.10); ‘Concerning the Sabbath to guard it according to its law’ (CD 10.14); ‘[Con]cerning a woman’s oath’ (CD 16.1). Although these units sometimes open or close with a biblical citation that touches on the general theme, CD’s laws are never interwoven into the pentateuchal text, or phrased imitatively as Scripture. In this case, as in other similar works and fragments found at Qumran, the Damascus Document’s halakhic authority stems from divinely inspired human activity rather than from Sinaitic revelation (Shemesh and Werman, 2003). The third composition, Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah (4QMMT ) [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah], is a major source not only for sectarian halakhah, but also for the views of opponents. Apparently a letter aimed at convincing a political leader of the veracity of the sectarian halakhic stance, it is comprised of a sequence of polemically formulated legal statements framed as a group declaration and worded in the first-person plural. The formula ‘and concerning X: we are of the opinion’ introduces some of these statements. The legal controversies at the heart of the dispute in 4QMMT enable recovery of many of the issues fuelling the inter-sectarian controversy of the day. These controversies revolved around such topics as the sacrificial offerings, the Red Heifer, the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Temple and its halakhic consequences, purity laws, priestly gifts and the prohibition against incest, among others. The practices criticized by the author of the scroll are the ones attested in rabbinic literature as the later rabbinic consensus, and sometimes as the Pharisaic view, whereas the views espoused by 4QMMT represent the stance commonly found in the DSS , which is, in certain cases, identical to the Sadducean or Boethusian position as described in rabbinic literature.
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Sectarian Halakhah and the Bible In contrast to later Tannaitic halakhah, legislation attested in the Scrolls found at Qumran does not reflect a new construct vis-à-vis Scripture. Although it deviates from, and develops, the scriptural text, these deviations are readily discernible in light of their solid scriptural foundation. They can be categorized as follows: (a) ancient presectarian traditions; (b) scriptural exegesis; and (c) innovation (see Doering, 2012).
(a) Ancient Pre-sectarian Traditions Some non-scripturally based halakhic traditions found in the Scrolls from Qumran are not sectarian innovations but rather appear to be grounded in an earlier legacy. Intriguingly, these traditions, or their vestiges, frequently appear in early strata of Tannaitic halakhah, either as a similarly worded injunction or in reworked or reduced form, which suggests that all Second Temple streams of Judaism had certain fundamental principles of praxis and exegesis in common. As reflected in the Scrolls found at Qumran, these principles mirror an early, shared, pre-sectarian Jewish heritage. This evidently applies to many features of the Sabbath regulations, also found in rabbinic halakhah (Schiffman, 1975; Noam and Qimron, 2009). The appearance of some of these concepts in Jubilees, including the prohibition against speaking about post-Sabbath tasks, the ban on drawing water, and the essence of the Sabbath as ‘to eat, drink, and bless the creator of all’ (Jub. 50.7–13, 2.21, cf. CD 10.17–23 [→35 Damascus Document; 4Q264a [Halakhah B] 1 i 5–8, 1 ii 1; 4Q421 [Ways of Righteousnessb] 11 3), suggests that they predate the sectarian rulings, and were probably inherited and adopted by the sect. Similarly, an ancient tradition lacking an actual scriptural basis concerns the ability of liquids to convey and intensify impurity (e.g. 1QS 6.20–21 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 4Q274 3 i 6–9, ii 4–12 [Tohorot A]; 4Q284a 1 1–4 [Harvesting]; 11QT 49.7–10 [→51 Temple Scroll]). This ability is very dominant in Tannaitic halakhah as well, from its earliest phases, albeit in a different and more developed form (e.g. m. Parah, 8.5–7; m. Kelim 8.4; t. Yom. 1.6). But, as opposed to the legislation of the sectarian communities, which holds that any liquid can become impure and render foodstuffs susceptible to impurity, rabbinic halakhah arbitrarily and secondarily limits this capacity to seven liquids (m. Makhshirin 6.4; Terumot, 11.2; Sifra, Shemini 8.1). The same is true for corpse-blood impurity. Underscored in the Temple Scroll (11QT 50.6), it is also found in the earliest strata of Tannaitic halakhah (m. ’Ohal. 2.2; t. Naz. 5.1; b. Naz. 53a), despite the fact it is not expounded in Scripture as we know it. External evidence for the antiquity of one sectarian ruling comes from the law of corpse-impurity. Where Numbers 19 has the ‘tent’ of the deceased, the Temple Scroll (49.5–50.19) substitutes ‘house.’ Yet this is not a sectarian innovation, as this concept already appears in the Septuagint (Num. 19.14, 18, see Yadin, 1983, II : 213). A different example concerns the 364-day calendar [→62 Calendars]. This concept is not common to the rabbinic system; on the contrary, it is emphatically rejected in rabbinic literature. Nonetheless, this is another ancient feature found in several Jewish sources from the Second Temple Period. Its appearance in the astronomical chapters of
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1 Enoch [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts], in the Aramaic Levi Document [→24 Aramaic Levi], and in Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] attests to its antiquity and pre-Qumranic provenance.
(b) Sectarian Scriptural Exegesis The halakhic expansions found at Qumran frequently clarify unclear scriptural injunctions by filling gaps in biblical passages [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Thus, if Scripture contains general prohibitions against work on the Sabbath and rarely specifies the prohibited labours (Exod. 16.23, 29; 34.21; 35.3), sectarian legislation enumerates many additional bans, such as drawing water, eating food not especially prepared for the Sabbath, carrying into and out of a house, raising an animal from a pit, discussing business or work to be done the following day (CD 10.14–23, 11.1–12 and parallels, Schiffman, 1975), and even playing musical instruments or reading secular documents (4Q264a [Halakhah B] I 1 1–2, 4–5, Noam and Qimron, 2009). In the literature found at Qumran halakhic additions are often based on internal exegesis of the biblical text or conflation with other scriptural passages. Thus, for example, although the Pentateuch [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 55 Bible] teaches that an unsealed vessel found in a tent with a corpse becomes impure (Num. 19.15), it does not explain the types and status of the different vessels, the fate of their contents, or of the food and liquids defiled by corpse-impurity. The Temple Scroll (49.7–10, 14–16; 50.16–19) [→51 Temple Scroll] supplements these laws based on two passages: one from Leviticus (ch. 11) that deals with impure ‘swarming creatures’ and another from Numbers (ch. 31) concerning the war with the Midianites. From them, it deduces what types of utensils become impure, the susceptibility of food and liquids to impurity, and the imperative that only food that has come in contact with liquid is susceptible to impurity (Yadin, 1983, 1:330–1).
(c) Sectarian Innovation In sectarian halakhah certain deductions based on biblical verses, as well as autonomous laws not grounded in Scripture, were apparently engendered by circumstances and situations not addressed by Scripture. A notable example is the necessity to adapt the biblical conditions of wilderness, camp and sanctuary to the circumstances of a people permanently settled in the Second Temple Period land of Israel (4QMMT B.27–34, 58–62 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]; 11QT 45.7–18, 46.9–18, 47.3–18, 48.14–17 [→51 Temple Scroll). The new designations – Temple, Jerusalem, other cities [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple] – that adapt the biblical tabernacle, ‘camp’ and ‘outside the camp’ to Second Temple reality determine the applications of various regulations including, inter alia, the exclusion of the impure, secular slaughter of animals, removing the ashes from the altar, and the burning of the purification offering. In a similar fashion, the Temple Scroll (50.10–19) extends the law of corpse-impurity to the case of a dead foetus, not expounded in Scripture. It also adds new tools – a grindstone and a mortar – to the scriptural list of vessels that contract impurity (49.14) [→70 Purity and Holiness].
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Other expansions reflect uniquely sectarian doctrines, among them a strong tendency to extend the holiness of the sacred sphere to everyday life or, in other instances, to combine disparate laws and avoid internal discrepancies, termed ‘homogenization’ by Jacob Milgrom (1990, p. 93). An example of the first category is the extension of the laws concerning the biblical sanctuary to the entire ‘Temple city’ (11QT 45.7–18; CD 12.1–2; 4QMMT B.29–31). Exemplifying the second is the extension of the biblical injunction that distances the zav – a male with a urethral discharge – from the Israelite camp (Num. 5.1–4) to encompass exclusion from the towns of all those with acute sexual impurities (the zavah – a woman with a vaginal discharge, a menstruant and a postpartum woman [11QT 49.14–17]). Another type of halakhic novelty is reflected primarily in the newly composed sections integrated into the rewritten Pentateuch of the Temple Scroll. These passages, namely the description of the Temple and its furnishings (11QT 3.1–13.7), and the Law of the King (11QT 56.12–60.21), reflect the author/redactor’s vision of the reorganization of the Temple and Temple worship and the restructuring of the political system (Schiffman, 2008, pp. 215–94, 487–504). Innovations are also reflected in the legislation deriving from the unique nature and worldview of the sectarian communities. The rules pertaining to the life and organization of the sect [→59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community; 73 Daily Life] are compiled mainly in the Rule of the Community (1QS ) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the War Scroll (1QM ) [→40 Milh.amah], and several sections of the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document].
Legal Exegesis at Qumran A hallmark of Qumran halakhah is the absence of any effort to justify its rulings through biblical exegesis. With the exception of the rationales offered in polemical contexts, mainly in 4QMMT, and in the opening admonition of CD (Shemesh and Werman, 2003, pp. 119–23), the halakhic works belonging to both genres – rewritten Pentateuch [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture] as well as the lists of apodictic rulings – provide no clues as to the derivation of the laws. The material discovered at Qumran lacks the fundamental infrastructure that we denote midrash: that is, a verse citation followed by variegated interpretations that explicitly relate to the verse and are characterized by a fixed, sophisticated terminology. Unlike Tannaitic midrash, the Qumran material contains no disputes, nor are its laws attributed to specific, named personae. It never proposes interpretive options only to reject them, as is usual in Tannaitic legal midrash (Fraade, 1998). Nonetheless, inductive halakhic processes do underlie the Qumran legal texts. These subtle, unvoiced exegetical derivations are frequently hinted at through allusions to biblical expressions, or through the combination of mutually instructive verses. Accordingly, the exposure of such hidden ‘midrashim’ requires a reconstructive approach. Notwithstanding profound differences between the DSS and Tannaitic literature, the Scrolls frequently disclose the tip of a legal midrash, the details of which can be supplemented through comparison to Tannaitic parallels. Moreover, the scholarly
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claim that the Qumran writings are totally devoid of midrashic terminology is only partially correct. The sectarian texts definitely feature a number of fixed linguistic formulae that attest to an interpretive-halakhic process. Thus, the expression ‘for X (a clarifying equivalent) is Y (a biblical word)’ is used to define rare biblical terms (Shemesh, 2005, pp. 292–4), and the comparative kaf, when appended to a scriptural term, establishes an analogy between a given scriptural law and a new derivation. This term actually embodies a midrashic technique of verbal analogy, which is similar to the rabbinic heqesh or gezerah shavah in a number of cases (Noam, 2011).
Qumran Halakhah and Rabbinic Halakhah Despite their shared foundation in pentateuchal law, Qumran halakhah is strikingly different from the later corpus of rabbinic legislation, both in terms of content and literary formation. Generally characterized as stringent, exclusive, based on elitist priestly tradition, and focused mainly on themes related to the sanctuary, like purity and impurity, Temple rites and sacrifices, the Qumran system of law attributes its legislation to divine revelation [→66 Revelation]. In contrast, the rabbinic system has a demonstrable proclivity toward leniency and inclusiveness, grants authority to the sage over the priest, and rejects the option of revelation as a source for religious rulings. With regard to the purportedly stringent positions of the Qumranites, this assessment is justified only in comparison to Pharisaic-rabbinic halakhah. Indeed, the berating of the author’s opponents for their lenient bent is a recurrent motif in all the polemical issues raised in 4QMMT, and the members of the sect note this distinction between them and their rivals by accusing them of ‘choosing the path of lenience’ (4Q 171 [4QpPsa] 1–10 i 27 [→44 Pesharim]). Closer examination, however, attests that the Yahad legislation actually reflects simple, necessary inferences from Scripture itself, whereas rabbinic leniency represents a surprisingly revolutionary divergence from its plain meaning. In other words, the stringency of Qumranic law is relative, not ‘objective.’ Furthermore, the unrefined, simple character of Qumranic halakhah, as compared to the conceptual sophistication of Tannaitic halakhah, on occasion leads to the opposite result, in which Tannaitic halakhah is strict, and sectarian law lenient (Noam, 2009; but see Heger, 2011; Doering, 2012; and Amihay, 2017). Daniel R. Schwartz suggests that the priestly approach be conceptualized as realistic, in contradistinction to the Pharisaic-rabbinic approach, which he defines as nominalistic (based on Silman, 1984–85). If the realistic approach anchors law in nature, in independently existing situations, and therefore ascribes legal implications to actual facts, the nominalist approach views the law as autonomous, resulting from divine will and not contingent on pre-existing circumstances. It therefore subordinates legislation to human logic and juristic decision-making mechanisms (Schwartz, 1992, but see Rubenstein, 1999; Noam, 2010; and Edrei, Last Stone, Lorberbaum, Rubenstein, 2015). As compared to the Qumran edifice, the rabbinic corpus is much broader in scope. It reflects a massive expansion of religious law, including the creation of extensive
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legislative corpora with no biblical basis and the invention of fresh categories. It has undergone far-reaching processes of abstraction, conceptualization and deliberate reworking of early traditions. This multifaceted yet cohesive, intricate system solidified over the course of hundreds of years into newly invented literary genres, namely, the Mishnah, the Tosefta, legal midrash and later the Talmuds. These genres have no real counterparts in the Qumran library, though the apodictically worded Damascus Document and related texts may be considered extremely primordial forerunners of the Mishnah, which is characterized by topical arrangement and the absence of biblical proofs. Some of the Qumran texts of rewritten Pentateuch [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture] remotely resemble rabbinic legal midrash, but only in terms of their juxtaposition of halakhah and the biblical text. A comparison of the two halakhic approaches to their scriptural foundation demonstrates that the Qumranic system derives more naturally from the plain meaning or spirit of the biblical text, whereas the rabbinic one is often unexpected and bold. Theoretically, this suggests that Qumranic legislation reflects the foundation upon which, at a later stage, the rabbinic evolution took place, an assumption consistent with the fact that the material embedded in Tannaitic literature mostly derives from a much later period and was also redacted centuries later. But a number of factors militate against this reconstruction of Qumranic and rabbinic halakhic corpora as a simple early–late continuum. First, both corpora have preserved a primary layer of basic praxis and exegesis which, although lacking an obvious, identifiable scriptural source, is deeply rooted in both halakhic cultures. The identical existence of these ‘ancestral traditions’ points to an ancient stratum of shared inherited material that predates the split between the sects. Second, as seen above, Qumran literature does not simply reflect a neutral foundation of Early Jewish tradition, on which later developments could take place. It also displays some deliberate departures from scriptural regulations in line with its specific religious orientation. Furthermore, Qumran literature engages in a polemic with laws similar to rabbinic ones. Manifested especially in 4QMMT, this is also recognizable in more subtle forms in other works. An example is the Temple Scroll’s (50.5) implicit polemic against the impurity of a limb-torn-from-a-living-body, a notion prominent in rabbinic literature (Yadin, 1983, 1: 335). In this sense, the halakhah espoused by the movement behind the Scrolls might express rejection and censure rather than an ancient, fundamental tradition. This polemic also demonstrates that many fully developed conceptions familiar to us from the Tannaitic world were already current during the era of the transmission of the Qumran materials. Tannaitic halakhah, too, testifies to a polemic with opposing halakhic views, many of which are identical to opinions expressed in the texts from Qumran. In certain cases the dissenting stance, known to us from the Qumran literature, is unambiguously ascribed to opponents like the Sadducees or Boethusians (e.g. m. Para 3.7; t. Para 3.6, 8; cf. 4QMMT B.13–17; Qimron, 1994, pp. 152–4; Sussmann, 1994, pp. 187–8). But generally rabbinic literature presents the opposing sectarian view as a theoretical conjecture, one that is later rejected (Sifre Num. 6; compare to 4QMMT B.62–63; 4Q251 10.7–9 [→58 Halakhah]; 4Q266 [→35 Damascus Document] 6 iv 1–5;
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4Q270 2 ii 6–7 and others). This may testify to the contemporaneity of the rabbinic and the opposing sectarian law. Finally, rabbinic literature contains some early materials – recognizable by literary characteristics, context and the names of the sages involved – which may be dated as early as the period of the DSS . Later halakhic clusters, as well, often developed from an early kernel. Thus, the lenient Tannaitic definitions of camp and sanctuary apparently preceded the writing of 4QMMT, which engages in a polemic with its opponents’ definition of ‘camp’ (B.27–33). The charged dispute over the impurity of liquids dates to the second century bce , to the time of the sage Yose ben Yoezer (m. ʿEduyot 8.4). Rabbinic leniency regarding the ability of a single bone to convey impurity under an overshadowing object was recognized as early as the time of Shammai the Elder (m. ʿEduyot 1.7) and engendered a counter-polemic in 4QMMT (B. 72–74). In sum, alongside the early traditions that served as the foundation for both halakhic systems as attested in the texts from Qumran and Tannaitic literature, these two edifices also display originality and innovation, and testify to the existence of a lively halakhic debate in the Second Temple Period. Nonetheless, Tannaitic halakhah clearly reflects a more far-reaching development and even a revolution. How can we reconcile these facts? Whereas many differences between the DSS and rabbinic halakhah are the result of the chronological gap that separates them, a considerable portion of their dissimilarity can be traced back into the Second Commonwealth period. In other words, the initial source of the deep transformation evident in the Tannaitic system probably lies in a Pharisaic revolution that took place during Second Temple times, and on that basis Qumran halakhah should not be identified only as reflecting the early foundation of the rabbinic eruption of creativity, but also, in many cases, as its counterpart. Conceivably, certain parts of Qumranic legislation may have come into being in response to this pre-rabbinic revolution. The sectarian protest manifested itself in a return to the pentateuchal source and ancient halakhic tradition, alongside the formulation of a new body of laws. Priestly/sectarian legislation, as well as pre-rabbinic halakhah, are essentially two paths of creativity and exegesis that shaped disparate religious outlooks and ways of life over the course of the last two centuries bce. Grounded in a common foundation of tradition and exegesis, the former expanded it to a relatively moderate degree, carefully following the plain meaning of Scripture, unifying separate categories wherever possible, and striving to make the holiness of the sacred sphere a part of human life. The latter used this common foundation as a jumping off point for developing a revolutionary culture that encroached upon the sacred sphere and its demands and strengthened the secular precinct. As part of its abstract, sophisticated, conceptualizing, approach it engaged in bold interpretation and far-reaching reworking of early traditions, developed new terminology, and ultimately created innovative, large-scale halakhic corpora (Noam, 2016). Whether we view Qumran religious law as a forerunner of rabbinic halakhah or as its early counterpart, the discovery of its texts discloses a crucial missing link between the biblical and rabbinic cultures, and helps to decipher the fascinating emergence of ‘halakhah’ – a central manifestation of Judaism – in one of its most formative stages.
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Bibliography Amihay, A. (2017), Theory and Practice in Essene Law. New York: OUP. Baumgarten, J. M. (1977), Studies in Qumran Law. SJLA 24. Leiden: Brill. Doering, L. (2012), ‘Jewish law in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Some issues for consideration,’ in N. Dávid et al. (eds), The Hebrew Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 449–62. Edrei, A., S. Last Stone, Y. Lorberbaum, J. L. Rubenstein (2015), Dine Israel 30 [Special Issue Nominalism and Realism in Halakha Revisited: Studies in the Philosophy of Halakha] Fraade, S. D. (1998), ‘Looking for legal midrash at Qumran,’ in M. E. Stone and E. G. Chazon (eds), Biblical Perspectives: Early Use and Interpretation of the Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the First International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 12–14 May, 1996. STDJ 28. Leiden: Brill, pp. 59–79. Ginzberg, L. (1976), An Unknown Jewish Sect. New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Heger, P. (2011), ‘Stringency in Qumran?,’ JSJ 42, 188–217. Jassen, A. P. (2014), Scripture and Law in the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: CUP. Meier, John P. (2003), ‘Is there halaka (the noun) at Qumran?,’ JBL 122, 150–55. Milgrom, J. (1990), ‘The scriptural foundations and deviations in the laws of purity of the Temple Scroll,’ in L. H. Schiffman (ed.), Archaeology and History in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Sheffield: JSOT Press, pp. 83–99. Noam, V. (2009), ‘Stringency in Qumran: a reassessment,’ JSJ 40, 1–14. Noam, V. (2010), ‘Ritual impurity in Tannaitic literature: Two opposing perspectives,’ JAJ 1, 65–103. Noam, V. (2011), ‘Embryonic legal midrash in the Qumran Scrolls,’ in N. Dávid et al. (eds), The Hebrew Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. FRLANT 239. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 237–62. Noam, V. (2016), ‘The emergence of rabbinic culture from the perspective of Qumran,’ JAJ 6, 253–74. Noam, V. and E. Qimron (2009), ‘A Qumran composition of Sabbath laws and its contribution to the study of early halakhah,’ DSD 16, 55–96. Parry, D. W. and Tov, E. (eds), (2004), The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader. Part 1: Texts Concerned with Religious Law. Leiden: Brill. Qimron, E. (1994), ‘The halakhah,’ in E. Qimron and J. Strugnell (eds), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Ma‘aśê ha-Torah. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 123–77. Rubenstein, J. L. (1999), ‘Nominalism and realism in Qumranic and rabbinic law: a reassessment,’ DSD 6, 157–83. Schechter, S. (1970, reprint of 1910), Fragments of a Zadokite Work (Documents of Jewish Sectaries, I). New York (reprint of Cambridge): Ktav. Schiffman, L. H. (1975), The Halakhah at Qumran. SJLA 16, Leiden: Brill. Schiffman, L. H. (1994), Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of Judaism, the Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran. Philadelphia & Jerusalem: JPS . Schiffman, L. H. (2008), The Courtyards of the House of the Lord: Studies on the Temple Scroll. STDJ 75. Leiden: Brill. Schwartz, D. R. (1992), ‘Law and truth: On Qumran-Sadducean and rabbinic views of law,’ in D. Dimant and U. Rappaport (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Forty Years of Research. STDJ 10. Leiden: Brill, pp. 229–40. Shemesh, A. (2005), ‘4Q251: “Midrash Mishpatim,” ’ DSD 12, 280–302.
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Shemesh, A. (2009), Halakhah in the Making: The Development of Jewish Law from Qumran to the Rabbis. Berkeley: University of California Press. Shemesh, A. and Werman, C. (2003), ‘Halakhah at Qumran: Genre and authority,’ DSD 10, 104–29. Silman, Y. (1984–5), ‘Halakhic determinations of a nominalistic and realistic nature: Legal and philosophical considerations,’ Dine Israel 12, 249–66 [Hebrew]. Sussmann, Y. (1994), ‘Appendix 1: The history of the halakha and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. Qimron and J. Strugnell (eds), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Ma‘aśê ha-Torah. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 179–200. Yadin, Y. (1983), The Temple Scroll, I–III. Jerusalem: IES , The Institute of Archaeology of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, The Shrine of the Book.
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Rules Charlotte Hempel
Introduction . . . unless we can read a text as something – unless we can assign it to some genre, however ill-defined and in need of subsequent refinement – we cannot really read it at all; we can only construe it sentence by sentence, like an ‘unseen’ translation in a foreign language examination. Barton, 1984, p. 24
Barton’s words can usefully help us reflect on the history and current state of the study of the Rule texts from Qumran. There is no doubt the well-preserved Cave 1 manuscript of the Rule of the Community published in 1951 (Burrows, 1951), was always ‘read as’ something [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. There is also little doubt that its genre was and remains ‘ill-defined.’ Whereas scholars have been at pains to define, re-define and describe the characteristic features of several literary genres unearthed at Qumran, such as the distinctive type of commentary known as the pesharim [→44 Pesharim], the same cannot be said of the Qumran Rule texts. Carol Newsom’s reference to the largely implicit approach to genre in Qumran studies applies to the Rule texts in particular (Newsom, 2010, p. 243). For decades the Community Rule manuscript from Qumran Cave 1 (1QS ) has tacitly been regarded as the archetypal Rule text from Qumran, and the Rule books are often identified as a new genre attested at Qumran (Newsom, 2010). This classification was determined to a large extent by the supposed practical application of its regulations in a real-life community based at Khirbet Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. The sense of having direct access to the Sitz im Leben of this text was a major determining factor in reading 1QS which in turn was used as a direct reference point to describe the organization and daily life of the Qumran community [→73 Daily Life; 72 Forms of Community]. The overwhelming confidence in the reliability of the Community Rule’s account of communal life received further support from the considerable number of correspondences between this text and the descriptions of the Essenes in the writings in Josephus and Philo of Alexandria [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo; Josephus]. Reliable insights into the social background of an author and her or his community are precious in the case of all historical texts and ancient writings in particular. In the 405
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case of the Qumran Rule texts scholars are in many ways in a fortunate position since these texts were found in close vicinity to the remains of the settlement of an ancient community. While we are no doubt in an extremely privileged position with respect to the sheer wealth of ancient data available to us – both in the form of non-literary archaeological artefacts and texts – recent scholarship has stressed the complexity of the pictures painted by our bountiful evidence. As far as the once unquestioned direct relationship of the Community Rule to the communal settlement at Khirbet Qumran is concerned the well-supported revised chronology of the communal occupation of the site (see Magness, 2002, pp. 47–72) substantially challenges the notion that an early copy of the Community Rule such as 1QS (100–75 bce ) was composed or even copied on the site with the intended purpose of regulating the life of its inhabitants soon after they came to the settlement (so, e.g. Schiffman, 1983, pp. 11–13). On the basis of the archaeological evidence currently available the site of Qumran began to be used by a community no earlier than the first century bce . Given the highly developed composition of the Community Rule from Cave 1 (1QS ) was copied around 100–75 bce it must have been drafted initially and possibly read and refined at a place other than Qumran (Elgvin, 2005; Brooke, 2011, p. 95). With the publication of ten further manuscripts of the Community Rule from Cave 4 the situation became a great deal more complex (Alexander and Vermes, 1998; see also Metso, 1997, 2007). Scholars were immediately struck by several significant differences in the accounts of communal life between some of the Cave 4 manuscripts of the Rule and the long-known copy from Cave 1 (for a concise overview see Knibb, 2000; further, Hempel, 2006 and Schofield, 2009). In particular, the Sons of Zadok who are assigned a central role in the hierarchy of the community according to 1QS 5 are not included in the corresponding part of 4Q256 and 4Q258 where a leading role is allocated instead to ‘the Many’ (ha-rabbim). These recent developments have severely diminished our confidence in the Rule manuscripts as channels of unmediated access to the life and organization of a single community resident in Qumran (Collins, 2010a; Hempel, 2013a; Schofield, 2009). The prominent place of 1QS in the history of scholarship on the Qumran Rule texts has resulted in other compositions being added to a largely undefined and apparently almost intuitive category of Rule texts on the basis of their resemblance to or relationship with the Community Rule (Hempel, 2013b). John Collins rightly stresses the preliminary nature of a range of ‘intuitive’ genre classifications in Qumran research to date (Collins, 2010b, p. 389), an observation particularly apt with reference to the Rule texts. It is noteworthy that while the Rules, in Hebrew serakhim, are occasionally listed alongside the pesharim [→44 Pesharim] as new genres first attested in the Scrolls (Newsom, 2010, p. 256), the genre classification of a text as a Rule (serekh) has not received much attention. Instead, other types of literature to have emerged from Qumran such as pesharim, midrash [→58 Halakhah] and new representatives of the wisdom genre [→63 Wisdom], have dominated the genre debate as evidenced in the 2010 thematic issue of Dead Sea Discoveries entitled Rethinking Genre: Essays in Honor of John J. Collins which contains only sporadic references to the Rules.
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The Scholarly Discourse on Rules On closer inspection scholars have applied the literary category of a Rule (serekh) in several different ways which it will be helpful to unpack before looking at the ways in which serekh terminology is employed to label particular sets of regulations in a variety of primary texts from Qumran. On the basis of shared features with respect to terminology, content and function Rules, Rule Texts, or Rule Books are customarily classed together as a category or genre of texts often with very little discussion of the rationale for such a classification (cf. Parry and Tov, 2004, pp. v–viii, xxi–xxii; Lange and Mittmann-Richert, 2002, pp. 119, 132; Alexander, 2000, p. 799; Collins, 2010b, p. 389).
Rule Texts as a Customary Label for Entire Compositions Most recently Ben Wright refers very confidently to ‘rulebooks’ as a type of text and genre (Wright, 2010, p. 272). Wright’s term ‘rulebooks’ is noteworthy since it clearly envisages entire compositions rather than components of larger texts which brings us to the scholarly convention of referring to individual compositions as ‘Rules’ in their entirety. The foremost representative of this category is the Community Rule (1QS /4QS ) and the two annexes to 1QS (1QS a and 1QS b [→46 Rule of the Congregation; 45 Rule of Blessings]). 1QS a begins with serekh in the title (‘This is the rule [serekh] for all the congregation of Israel in the last days’), though 1QS b in spite of its conventional title serekh ha-berakhot or Rule of Blessings does not (e.g. Licht, 1965, p. 3 and Qimron, 2010, pp. 212, 238–42). The latter begins instead with the heading ‘Words of blessin[g] for the Maskil to bless.’ Whereas 1QS /4Q255 include a reference to the ‘book of the rule of the community’ the document also includes several subsections designated as serakhim. The notion developed by Wright of a blending of genres in single texts (Wright, 2010, p. 278) applies to the Community Rule manuscripts also. The latter comprise a variety of genres including: ●
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Liturgical material: a covenant ceremony in 1QS 1.16–3.12 // 4Q255 2 1–9 // 4256 2 1–13; 3 1–4 // 4Q257 2 1–8; 3 1–14 // 4Q262 1 1–4 // 5Q11 1 i and a hymn in 1QS 9.26–11.22 // 4Q256 19 1–7; 20 1–7; 23 1–3 // 4Q258 8 10–10 8; 12 4; 13 1–3 // 4Q260 2 1–5; 3 1–3; 4 1–10; 5 1–7 // 4Q264 1 1–10 [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns]; Instruction: The Teaching on the Two Spirits in 1QS 3.13–4.26 // 4Q257 5 1–5, 7–8,12–14 [→63 Wisdom; 74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 12 Scrolls and Non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature]; as well as material we might refer to as rules proper which is largely represented by 1QS 5.1–9.25 // 4QS such as the penal codes in 1QS 6.24–7.25 // 4Q258 5 1 // 4Q259 1 4–15; 2 3–9 // 4Q261 3 2–4; 4a–b 1–6; 5a–c 1–9; 6a–e 1–5 [→73 Daily Life; 22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies].
It is clear, therefore, that communal legislation is found within larger documents that are in Newsom’s terminology ‘multigeneric’ (Newsom, 2005, pp. 448; see further Collins, 2010a, p. 53; Metso, 2007, p. 7 with reference to the Community Rule; Brooke,
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2010, p. 355 who refers to 4Q252 as a ‘multi-genre compilation;’ and the reflection on ‘The Genre[s] of the Genesis Apocryphon’ in Bernstein, 2013, pp. 217, 237–8).
Rules as Independent Compositions that Have Been Incorporated into a Larger Manuscript A helpful parallel can be drawn with the scholarly convention of labelling entire compositions and genres pesharim even where the term pesher (‘interpretation’) occurs only once in the title of a composition where its usage seems rather distinctive (cf. Ages of Creation, 1Q180 1 1). Almost every occurrence of pesher is found with reference to a very specific portion of text, usually a mode of interpretation. Devorah Dimant’s category of ‘isolated pesharim’ (Dimant, 1992) can usefully be adapted to speak of ‘isolated serakhim.’ In other words, although initially applied to whole texts, the term serekh is most frequently used as a rubric that applies to components of larger works (cf. 1QS 1.1; 5.1; 6.8; 1QS a 1.1, 6; CD 10.4; 13.7; 14.12 to name but a few examples). The multiple serakhim have been interpreted rather differently by leading scholars. Thus, Licht’s early commentary refers to the scroll that contains 1QS –1QS a–1QS b as comprising three great serakhim and assigns the following titles to each part: the Rule of the Yahad (beginning in 1QS 1.1); the Rule of the Congregation (beginning in 1QS a 1.1), and the Rule of Blessings (Licht, 1965, p. 3; see also Qimron, 2010, pp. 209–12). Curiously his terminology departs substantially from the terminology in the scroll. We noted already that the term serekh does not occur in 1QS b at all. Moreover, it occurs more than once in headings in 1QS . However, where serekh heading occur in 1QS 5.1; 6.8 Licht refers to the section starting in 1QS 5.1 as ‘statutes for the volunteers’ (h.uqot hamitnadevim) and refrains from indicating a new section at 1QS 6.8 which is introduced by the heading ‘This is the rule (serekh) for the meeting of the Many’ (Licht, 1965, p. 19). In his comments on 1QS 6.8 he refers to the similarity of the heading in 1QS 5.1 without referring to the comparable terminology in 1QS 1.1 (Licht, 1965, p. 143; see now also 4Q255 1 1 not available to Licht). In sum, Licht appears to play down the frequency of serekh headings in 1QS while playing up the consistency within the scroll by introducing serekh terminology with reference to 1QS b. Another early commentator on the Community Rule, William Brownlee, similarly compares 1QS 5.1 (translated as ‘This is the procedure (serekh) for a session of the Many’) and 1QS 6.8 (rendered ‘this is the practice (serekh) of the men of the Community’) without referring to 1QS 1.1 (Brownlee, 1951, pp. 19, 24). With reference to the opening of the Community Rule Brownlee follows Sukenik’s suggestion of serekh ha-yah.ad as the Hebrew title of 1QS based on the remains of 1QS 1.1 which he translates ‘[Or]der of the Community’ (Brownlee, 1951, p. 6). In an important article of 1996 Hartmut Stegemann drew attention to the multiple serekh headings within the Community Rule and proposed understanding the scroll 1QS –1QS a–1QS b as an anthology (‘Sammelhandschrift,’ Stegemann, 1996). Note also Devorah Dimant’s description of serekh as ‘rule’ and ‘collection of rules’ (Dimant, 1995, p. 27 n. 10). In fact, as we will see, in the primary texts serekh is used both to denote a collection of rules and other genres (e.g. 1QS ) and to denote particular components within a larger collection (e.g. 1QS 5.1).
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The genre classification adopted by Lange and Mittmann-Richert proposes only two serakhim comprising 1QS 1–4 and 1QS 5–11 and parallels represented by other Rule manuscripts (Lange and Mittmann-Richert, 2003, p.132). Finally, reference should be made to communal rules as components of larger compositions such as the Damascus Document which also includes legal material [→58 Halakhah] that lacks reference to a particular community alongside a substantial Admonition (Hempel, 1998, 2000). The scholarly debate which we have outlined needs to be related to the now enlarged corpus of primary sources.
Serekh Terminology in the Primary Sources When conceptualizing the Rule texts from Qumran most readers will inevitably think of the Community Rule as the rule/serekh par excellence. However, a glance at the occurrence of the term serekh quickly leads us to the War Scroll as the document where serekh occurs most frequently [→40 Milh.amah]. Intriguing and noteworthy is the clear preponderance of serekh in texts published early on – chiefly Qumran Cave 1 texts and CD [→35 Damascus Document; 4 Acquisition and Publication] – and therefore shaped the early decades of Qumran research. A much smaller number of references to serekh have emerged in the more recently published material from Cave 4. Thus, scholarly discussions of the literary characteristics of the Rules have thus far been hampered by the history of publication with a long hegemony of the contents of Cave 1, especially 1QS , as well as the once prevailing view presupposing a neat match between social reality, the site of Khirbet Qumran and the Community Rule. In the corpus of the Scrolls the noun serekh occasionally occurs to designate entire compositions (cf. 1QS 1.1 // 4Q255 1 1; 1QS a 1.1, cf. also the fragmentarily preserved description of the entire scroll on the back of the handle sheet preceding 1QS 1 ‘Rul]e (sere[kh]) of the Community and from[,’ (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, p. 32; Milik, 1955, p. 107, Pl. XXII ; and Metso, 2007, p. 2). More frequently serekh is found within larger compositions, particularly in the Community Rule, the Damascus Document and the War Scroll as a means of shaping sections of text. Here, serekh headings are often accompanied by paratextual features (Tov, 2001, p. 49) such as vacats, marginal signs and demonstrative pronouns [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Comparable to the function of serekh as a term to aid the mapping of large documents it is also frequently used to refer to the proper arrangement and positioning of groups of people and individuals in liturgical and military contexts (for a comprehensive overview of all occurrences see Hempel, 2013b). Features pointing to a close relationship between serekh terminology, the scribal craft and the final shaping of texts are: ●
●
The headings in 1QS , 1QS a, which presuppose a near-completion stage in the growth of the texts. Headings of subsections which suggest an effort at shaping distinct parts of a larger composition (cf. 1QS 5.1 [contrast 4Q256; 4Q258]; 1QS 6.8; 1QS a 1.6).
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The self-referential quality of many headings as evidenced by the predominance of demonstrative pronouns (e.g. 4Q266 5 ii 14; CD 10.4 // 4Q270 [→35 Damascus Document]).
Serekh terminology exudes a sense of hierarchy and order also with reference to the social sphere as witnessed by the prominence of the terminology in contexts referring to the grouping and ranking of people (cf., e.g. 1QS 1.16 // 4Q256; 1QS 2.20–21). A particularly noteworthy passage is 1QS 5.1 where the heading ‘And this is the rule (serekh) for the people of the community’ introduces a new major section in 1QS that is preceded by a vacat and accompanied by a major marginal sign (paleo-Hebrew waw, cf. Tov, 2004, p. 207). Two Cave 4 manuscripts of the Community Rule begin at this juncture with the heading ‘Midrash for the Maskil over the people of the law’ (4Q256 9 1 and 4Q258 1 1). The suggestion has been made that 1QS 5.1 should be considered as the title of an independent composition rather than a sub-heading (cf. Stegemann, 1996). The heading favoured in 4Q256/4Q258 introduces us to the use of a range of terms that appear to be used almost synonymously with serekh. Overall the evidence of the primary texts points to more complexity and fluidity than much of the scholarly discussion would lead us to believe. The term serekh occurs frequently to introduce a particular portion of a larger composition – most commonly in the War Scroll. Interestingly there is some fluidity even in the terminology: what is called a serekh here can be called perush or midrash elsewhere (see Brooke, 2009; Maier, 2011, p. 737; Kratz, 2011, pp. 212–13; see also Denis, 1967, pp. 95–8). Such fluidity is also attested in those manuscripts which are confidently called Rules 1QS /4QS . Rather than referring to Rules as a literary genre it is helpful to think in terms of a ‘family resemblance’ (Newsom, 2010, pp. 35–6; Hempel, 2013a, p. 1).
Conclusion On closer inspection, and despite a prevailing scholarly discourse that seems to imply otherwise, George Brooke’s observation applies also to the Rule texts, It is certainly the case that few authors in antiquity explicitly and consistently name the genres of their compositions in their compositions. Brooke, 2010, p. 354
Overall, the above discussion has revealed two trends. On the one hand, with few exceptions, most scholars refer to the Rules or Rule Books with reference to whole books. On the other hand, the primary texts reveal that serekh terminology is used in a variety of ways, one of them being to refer to blocks of texts and only occasionally whole compositions. In many instances alternative terms are applied to the same or comparable blocks of texts across manuscripts and compositions. While it is certainly still true to say that the Scrolls have revealed a very distinctive type of literature that deals with community organization and shares a penchant for the term serekh, the evidence emerges as more complex than customarily indicated. The notion of a genre of Rules is to a considerable extent heuristic with considerable scope for further refinement.
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Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (2000), ‘Rules,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 799–803. Alexander, P. S. and G. Vermes (1998), Qumran Cave 4. XIX: Serekh Ha-Yahad and Two Related Texts. DJD 26. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Barton, J. (1984), Reading the Old Testament: Method in Biblical Study. London: Darton, Longman, and Todd. Bernstein, M. J. (2013), Reading and Re-Reading Scripture at Qumran: Vol. 1 Genesis and Its Interpretation. STDJ 107. Leiden: Brill, 2013. Brooke, G. J. (2009), ‘Pesher and midrash in Qumran literature: Issues for lexicography,’ RevQ 24, 79–95. Brooke, G. J. (2010), ‘Genre theory, Rewritten Bible and pesher,’ DSD 17, 361–86. Brooke, G. J. (2011), ‘Crisis without, crisis within,’ in A. Lange, K. F. D. Römheld, and M. Weigold (eds), Judaism and Crisis: Crisis as a Catalyst in Jewish Cultural History. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 89–107. Brownlee, W. H. (1951), The Dead Sea Manual of Discipline. BASORS up 10–12. New Haven: ASOR . Burrows, M. with J. C. Trever and W. H. Brownlee (1951), The Dead Sea Scrolls of St. Mark’s Monastery. Volume II Fascicle 2: Plates and Transcription of the Manual of Discipline. New Haven, CT: ASOR . Collins, J. J. (2010a), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Collins, J. J. (2010b), ‘Epilogue: Genre analysis and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 17, 389–401. Denis, A.-M. (1967), Les thèmes de connaissance dans le Document de Damas. Studia Hellenistica 15. Louvain: Publications Universitaires. Dimant, D. (1992), ‘Pesharim, Qumran,’ in ABD 5: 244–51. Dimant, D. (1995), ‘The Qumran manuscripts: Contents and significance,’ in D. Dimant and L. H. Schiffman (eds), Time to Prepare the Way in the Wilderness: Papers on the Qumran Scrolls by Fellows of the Institute for Advanced Studies of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 1989–1990. STDJ 16. Leiden: Brill, pp. 23–58. Elgvin, T. (2005), ‘The Yah.ad is more than Qumran,’ in G. Boccaccini et al. (eds), Enoch and Qumran Origins: New Light on a Forgotten Connection. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 273–9. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Traditions, and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill. Pb. ed. Atlanta: SBL , 2006. Hempel, C. (2000), The Damascus Texts. CQS 1. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Hempel, C. (2006), ‘The literary development of the S-tradition: A new paradigm,’ RevQ 22, 389–401. Hempel, C. (2013a), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hempel, C. (2013b), ‘ ס ֶֶרךsæræk,’ in ThWQ II : 1111–17. Knibb, M. A. (2000), ‘Rule of the Community,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 793–7. Kratz, R. G. (2011), ‘Der Penal Code und das Verhältnis von Serekh ha-Yachad (S) und Damaskusschrift (D),’ RevQ 25, 199–227. Lange, A. and U. Mittmann-Richert (2002), ‘Annotated list of the texts from the Judaean Desert classified by content and genre,’ in E. Tov (ed.), The Texts from the Judaean
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Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 115–64. Licht, J. (1965), The Rule Scroll: A Scroll from the Wilderness of Judaea 1QS .1QSa .1QSb. Text, Introduction and Commentary. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute. [Hebrew]. Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Maier, J. (2011), ‘ ׇדּ ַרשׁdāraš,’ ThWQ I: 725–37. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Metso, S. (2007), The Serekh Texts. London: T & T Clark. Milik, J. T. (1955), ‘28 Annexes à la Règle de la Communauté (1QS ),’ in D. Barthélemy and J. T. Milik, Qumran Cave 1. DJD 1. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 107–30. Newsom, C. (2005), ‘Spying out the land: A report from genology,’ in R. L. Troxel, K. G. Friebel, and D. R. Magary (eds), Seeking Out the Wisdom of the Ancients: Essays Offered to Honour Michael V. Fox on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, pp. 437–50. Newsom, C. (2010), ‘Pairing research questions and theories of genre: A case study of the Hodayot,’ DSD 17, 241–59. Parry, D. W. and E. Tov (eds) (2004), The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader Part 1: Texts Concerned with Religious Law. Leiden: Brill. Qimron, E. (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls: The Hebrew Writings Volume 1. Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi. Schiffman, L. H. (1983), Sectarian Law in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Courts, Testimony and the Penal Code. BJS 33. Chico, CA : Scholars Press. Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Stegemann, H. (1996), ‘Some remarks to 1QSa, to 1QSb, and to Qumran messianism,’ RevQ 17, 479–505. Tov, E. (2001), Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible. 2nd edn. Minneapolis, MN : Fortress; Assen: van Gorcum. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill. Wright, B. G. III (2010), ‘Joining the club: A suggestion about genre in Early Jewish texts,’ DSD 17, 289–314.
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Poetry and Hymns Daniel Stökl Ben Ezra
Poetry is commonly defined over and against prose. Intriguingly, while Hebrew vocabulary includes a multitude of terms for different kinds of poetical genres (such as thylh, šyrh, tšbwh.h, zmrh, rynh, twdh, rwnn) many of them apparently used synonymously, ancient Hebrew (and Aramaic) has no unifying term for poetry (Kugel, 1981, p. 61) or for prose. It is therefore important to note the etic character of the concept of ‘poetry’ in relation to ancient Hebrew literature. In classical biblical Hebrew, poetry is distinguished from prose primarily by its dense parallelismus membrorum (Lowth, 1835; Pardee, 1988; Berlin, 2007), terseness, highly metaphorical language and more rarely also through other rhetoric devices such as rhyme, alliteration or acrostics (Watson, 1984). Hymns are usually defined on the basis either of their mode of performance (singing) or of their content and form, i.e. a poem in honour of a person (a divine being, a ruler or a beloved). While several of the terms mentioned above, e.g. šyrh, šyr, rynh, zmrh refer to singing or reciting, in most cases it is far from clear whether a specific text was indeed sung or not. In principle, we cannot exclude that hymns could also be composed in prose – as long as they were sung. Given our limited access to the ancient world behind the Qumran scrolls, therefore, the second definition, a poem in honour of an exalted figure, is by far the more accessible categorization, even if the ancient reality may have looked quite different. Before starting the discussion proper, we need to remind the reader of three fundamental problems: First, while the existence of poetry and hymns seems obvious, in many cases the decision whether a specific text is poetic or a hymn is very difficult. Without access to the actual performances, the only clear cases are texts with a title mentioning one of the key words noted above and texts written stichometrically. This, however, applies only to a very small selection of Dead Sea Scrolls containing poetry (Tov, 2003). Discerning parallelismus membrorum, the main criterion for distinguishing poetry from prose, is often much more difficult for non-biblical texts from Qumran than for biblical texts given our access to reading traditions in the latter case. The much greater variation in the length of hemistichs (Carmignac, 1960; Reymond, 2006) and the fragmentary state of many scrolls, that often do not convey even one complete verse, aggravate this problem. Furthermore, it is methodologically crucial to alert the reader that poetry is defined on fundamentally different grounds from all other genres in the present volume. It may 413
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in fact be less confusing to speak of poetry as a literary mode of expression rather than as a genre. Indeed, any text is written in either poetry or prose. Poetry is defined according to formal and linguistic aspects of style, while the other genres in this volume are based on status, purpose, content and/or Sitz im Leben. The overlap of poetry with other genres is therefore very substantial. All poetic texts also belong to other genres. Among the many biblical and parabiblical books or parts of books [→55 Bible; 56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture] we can mention, e.g. the numerous extensive poetic sections in the prophetic books; Psalms supplemented by several previously unknown Psalms 4Q88, 11Q5–6, 4Q380–381 [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]; Proverbs, the Song of the Sea in Exod. 15, Deuteronomy 32; the Song of Deborah in Judg. 5; Job 3.1–42.6; Ben Sira, the poetical sections in Aramaic Levi 83b– 89 [→24 Aramaic Levi] and the Genesis Apocryphon 6. 20 [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]) to give just some examples. Most of the sapiential literature is poetic, e.g. most of Job; Proverbs; Sapiential Hymn (4Q411), Sapiential-Hymnic Work A (4Q426) and Hymnic or Sapiential Work B (4Q528) [→63 Wisdom]. Many liturgical texts are poetic, such as Barkhi Nafshi [→29 Barkhi Nafshi] or the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice; 61 Liturgical Texts]. It is more difficult to find halakhic or calendrical poetry [→58 Halakhah; 62 Calendars]. Finally, García Martínez’s challenge to the guild of Qumran scholars of 2000 still holds true today: ‘a thorough study of these compositions not only as literature, but specifically as poetry is sorely missed’ (García Martínez, 2000, p. 10). A small number of studies (e.g. Reymond, 2006, 2011a, 2011b) are first steps to fill that gap. The corpus of Aramaic poetry from Qumran has been investigated only very recently (Lee, 2011) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions; 17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Being one of only two modes of expression for literary texts, poetic texts abound among the Scrolls from Qumran. Many, if not most, poetical texts are extant in several copies. The following list does not try to achieve completeness. The Psalter is the most frequently attested composition of all books attested at Qumran (ca. forty copies), though due to the length of the book, most scrolls will have contained only a part; some may have contained a very small number of Psalms [→55 Bible]. Copies of the other poetic books that later became part of the Hebrew Bible, most of them of sapiential character, are less numerous: Proverbs (3–4), Ecclesiastes/Qohelet (2), Lamentations (4), Job (4 + 2 Targums), Song of Songs (4), and cf. also Ben Sira (2) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Other Literature]. It is important to note that a great part of prophetic literature has been written in poetry. Many of the compositions associated with the Yahad and the wider movement of which it was a part are collections of poetry, again extant in several copies. The most well-known are the various Hodayot collections [→37 Hodayot] encompassing over thirty poetic compositions (1QH a, 1QH b, 4QH a–f [4Q427–432], and the cognate Hodayot-like texts 4Q433, 4Q433a, 4Q440, 4Q440a), the Rule of Blessings (1QS b) [→45 Rule of Blessings], and one could also mention Berakhot (4Q286–290) [→32 Berakhot] and the Songs of the Sage (4Q510–511 [→61 Liturgical Texts; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons].
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In addition, several texts which are not considered as particular to the movement associated with the Yahad [→72 Forms of Community], or whose authorship is under discussion, include numerous substantial compositions extant in several copies and therefore probably of importance for the movement, a section of which lived for a time at Qumran: the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q400–407, 11Q17, Mas 1k) [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice], Barkhi Nafshi (4Q434–438) [→29 Barkhi Nafshi], and sapiential texts such as 4QI nstruction [→38 Instruction]. Many ritual texts include among other forms also poetry or hymns, frequently embedded by rubrics such as 1QS 1.24–2.1; 2.2–4; 2.5–9 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 4QP urification Liturgy (4Q284); 4QR itual of Purification (4Q512) [→70 Purity and Holiness]. The prayers for the Sabbath at the end of Words of the Luminaries (4Q504– 506 [→54 Words of the Luminaries]) include doxological parts, probably poetic. Several central prose texts contain substantial poetical sections, whether authored by the Yahad, such as the Community Rule (e.g. 1QS 10–11 par) and the War Scroll (1QM 13, 14, 18 par. 4Q491 11 i [→40 Milh.amah]), or not, such as the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen 6.20) or Aramaic Levi 83b–89 [→24 Aramaic Levi]. In addition, many prose texts mention poetry: tšbwh.h, 1QM 4.8; 4QTobe (4Q200) 6 4; 4QO rdo (4Q334); rnh, 4QC atena A (4Q177) 14 4; Apocryphal Jeremiah Ca (4Q385a) 18a–b ii 4; Apocryphal Jeremiah Ca (4Q388a) D 1; thlh Vision of Samuel (4Q160) 3–4 ii 3; 4QTobite (4Q200) 6 4; and 4QJubg (4Q222) 1 5.
Poetical Genres There have been several attempts to categorize poetic genres more accurately. Usually they discuss poetic and liturgical texts as a genre together and then establish subgenres following the presumed Sitz im Leben of particular compositions. Most of these subgenres are impractical for our purposes as the liturgical setting is often unknown or controversial precisely for the poetic texts and since some important poetic texts such as the sapiential texts are not liturgical. If we discuss poetry as a mode of expression independent from its liturgical or nonliturgical setting, Nitzan’s classification based on contents and structure is more helpful as this information is accessible in the manuscripts: Nitzan (1994) divides poetic texts from Qumran into: (1) (2) (3) (4) (5)
blessings and curses eschatological poetry magical poetry mystical poetry songs of praise.
If we complement the list by adding laments, sapiential and narrative poetry, and understand eschatological poetry as prophetic poetry, most poetic texts found at Qumran can be classified in at least one of these seven categories. At this stage of research, however, the categories remain very tentative:
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1. Blessings, Curses and Adjurations Blessings and curses attested in the Scrolls employ the roots brkh, ʾrr, qll, or zʿm in the paul or pual vis-à-vis human beings, God, angelic or demonic forces, see 1QS 2.2–17 par.; 1QS b; 1QM 13, 14, 18 par.; 4QC urses (4Q280); Book of the War (4Q285) 1; 4Q286-4Q290 [→32 Berakhot]; 11Q14 (Book of the War). Although Lev. 26, Num. 6.24–26 and Deut. 28 have had a great impact on the wording employed in these texts the blessings and curses attested do not address one people but mark the boundaries between the children of light and the children of darkness. The very short forms of beatitudes and woes, not infrequent in the Bible, are quite rare in the texts from Qumran. These forms are characterized by the word opening the phrase: ʾšry (‘blessed is’) in the first case, see Beatitudes (4Q525) [→31 Beatitudes]; Hymnic or Sapiential Work B (4Q528); and ʾwy/hwy (‘woe’) in the second (e.g. Hab 2.5–6, 12–13, 15, 19–20; Apocryphal Lamentations [4Q179]; Birth of Noaha and c [4Q534 7 2–4 // 4Q536 2 ii 11–13]). Finally, the group defined by Nitzan as ‘magical poetry’ may be included among the curses. Songs of the Maskil (4Q510–511), Incantation (4Q444), Exorcism (4Q560) and Apocryphal Psalms (11Q11) contain adjurations addressed to evil spirits in order to frighten them and/or limit their harmful effectiveness [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination].
2. Hymns, Songs of Praise and Songs of Thanksgiving Traditional Psalms exegesis distinguishes between songs of praise (thylh, e.g. Ps. 8) and songs of thanksgiving (twdh, e.g. Ps. 18). This distinction does not make much sense for the Hodayot (1QHa, 1QH b, 4QHa–f [4Q427–432]) [→37 Hodayot], and the cognate Hodayot-like texts 4Q433, 4Q433a, 4Q440, 4Q440a that mix praise and thanksgiving. Each hymn in the Hodayot starts with an alliterative proclamation in the singular addressed to God ‘I thank you, O Lord’ (ʾwdkhh ʾdwny). This is followed by praises of God’s greatness, especially his wisdom and his creation vis-à-vis humanity’s deficiency (and not collective acts of salvation in Israel’s history). Structure and theme can vary greatly from one hymn to another. Differences in content, vocabulary and style have led scholars to distinguish two types of hymns in the Hodayot: Teacher Hymns (most hymns in cols 10–17 characterised by a single speaker, specific vocabulary and themes, more influenced by prophetic models of revelation [→66 Revelation]) and Community Hymns (in which the ‘I’ is collective and which are more influenced by sapiential traditions) (Tanzer, 1987; Berg, 2008). However, after the publication of all the fragments, it emerged that there are some psalms that share characteristics of both groups. Newsom has suggested that the readers of the Hodayot identify themselves with the ‘I’ of these hymns (Newsom, 2004, pp. 196–204). There are many other hymnic poems from Qumran that differ from the Hodayot such as the Apostrophe to Zion (11Q5 22 // 4Q88 7–8), the Apostrophe to Judah (4Q88 9 and 10) and most of Non-Canonical Psalms A–B (4Q380 and 4Q381) [→Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. The Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon] includes a poem on Sarah’s beauty (1QapGen 20.2–8, cf. Harkins, 2010; VanderKam, 1979). Other hymns could be called poetic pledges. Most of the poem in 1QS 10–11 consists of resolutions of the speaker to choose the right conduct.
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3. Laments Laments have been divided into individual and collective laments and include, besides a simple address, a complaint, a request for help, an affirmation of trust and a vow to praise God after the emergency will have passed. The five chapters of the book of Lamentations and many of the biblical Psalms are classified as laments. Among the new compositions discovered at Qumran Prayer of Nabonidus (4Q242) and Lament A (4Q445) can be identified as individual laments, and Apocryphal Lamentations A and B (4Q179; 4Q501) as collective laments.
4. Mystical Poetry [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination] The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q400–407, 11Q17, Mas 1k) [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice] begin with a call to praise and third-person descriptions of a tour through a heavenly sanctuary that is home to an angelic cult [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The Self-Glorification Hymn (4QHa [4Q427]; 4QHe [4Q431 1] = SelfGlorification Hymn [4Q471b] and 1QHa 25–26; 4QM a [4Q491c]) is a hymn addressed by the speaker to himself describing his transformation and enthronization among the heavenly beings (4Q491c=4Q491 11 i 12–18) (Alexander, 2006).
5. Sapiential Poetry Besides large parts of the biblical books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Job, many Psalms and Ben Sira this group includes many if not most sapiential texts including Instruction (1Q26, 4Q415–418, 4Q418a, 4Q418b, 4Q423) [→38 Instruction], Mysteries (1Q27, 4Q299–301) [→42 Mysteries], and other texts such as Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184) [→53 Wiles of the Wicked Woman], Sapiential Work (4Q185), SapientialDidactic Work A (4Q412), Beatitudes (4Q525) [→31 Beatitudes], cf. also NonCanonical Psalms B (4Q381). These compositions have been written in a mixture of prose and poetry addressing students in order to admonish them to conduct themselves properly and to teach them about the visible and invisible world. Not surprisingly, sapiential hymns contain few laments or praise.
6. Narrative Poetry This group refers to texts that are essentially poetic retellings in the past tense, such as Narrative and Poetic Composition (4Q371–4Q373; 4Q373a; 2Q22).
7. Prophetic Poetry Prophetic poetry is prophecy written in verse. This includes much of the prophecies in the biblical prophetic books such as, e.g. Isa. 12.4–6. Among the compositions newly discovered at Qumran that may be classified as prophetic poetry we include at least 1QM 19, the Aramaic Apocalypse (4Q246), Levi Apocryphon (4Q541) 9 i and the Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521).
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Most of these texts probably had a primary or secondary liturgical function (Schuller, 2003), including the Hodayot and the mystical poetry. Sapiential poetry has a didactic Sitz im Leben. It should be noted that the preliminary division into these seven categories is further complicated by the fact that some poems tend to mix genres (e.g. Non-Canonical Psalms B [4Q381]; cf. also Hughes, 2006 on to the Hodayot). Finally, a large number of texts are too fragmentary to be classified, e.g. Sapiential Hymn (4Q411), Lament by a Leader (4Q439), and 4Q469 (Narrative I).
Stylistic Devices Poetry can be distinguished from prose by either oral or written presentation (Watson, 1984, p. 45). With regard to the graphic aspect, poetic texts found at Qumran rarely attest a ‘stichographical’ layout (Tov, 2003). The only three certain examples of this kind consist of texts that did not become part of the Hebrew Bible: Sirach 6 (2QS ir) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Other Literature], Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521), Unclassified Fragments (5Q16, see Tigchelaar, 2008) and perhaps also Hymnic Composition? (1Q38) which is extremely fragmentary. All other scrolls contain texts that became part of the Hebrew Bible: Exodus 15 (4Q365); Deuteronomy 32 (1QD eutb, 4QD eutb, 4QD eutc, 4QD eutq, 4QpaleoDeutr); Psalm 119 (1QPsa, 11QPsa, 11QPsb – but not the other Psalms in these three scrolls; 4QPsg, 4QPsh, 5QPs); Psalms 16–53 (4QPsc); Psalms 17–18 (8QPs); Psalms 91–118 (4QPsb); Psalm 104 (4QPsd, 4QPsl); Psalm 112 (4QPsw); Job 31–37 (4QJ oba); Job 13–14 (4QpaleoJobc); Proverbs 1–2 (4QP rova); Proverbs 9,13–15 (4QP rovb); Lamentations 3 (3QL am); Lamentations 4 (5QL amb). Furthermore, it is important to note that other scrolls containing the same biblical texts are not written stichographically. Another graphical device used for poetry is the division into stanzas. This question demands much further research. The division of psalms in the Hodayot by vacat or, rarely, paragraphos can differ from manuscript to manuscript [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Modern scholars, too, are divided with regard to the division into stanzas (Schuller, 2011, p. 132). Division into verses or stanzas can also be achieved audibly by adding a refrain such as for Ps. 145 in 11Q5. In one case, red ink has been used to write the beginning of a Psalm (2Q14) pointing to liturgical use (Schuller, 2003, p. 185). Further paratextual indications occur in liturgical texts [→61 Liturgical Texts]. A device that is both visible and audible is the use of acrostics. Partial or complete alphabetic acrostics appear in numerous biblical poems of praise, lament and those of a sapiential character: Pss. 9–10, 25, 34, 37, 111–112, 119, 145; Lam. 1–4; Nah. 1; and Prov. 31.10–31. In poetry newly discovered at Qumran, this mnemonic device has been discerned only in three poems: Sir 51.13–30 (11QPsa 21), Apostrophe to Zion (4Q88 7; 11QPsa 22; 11QPsb 6) and Syriac Psalm 155 (11QPsa 24). The three most noted characteristics of Hebrew poetry are parallelismus membrorum, terseness and a heightened use of metaphors. Some scholars have developed a complex set of distinctions for different types of parallelisms (e.g. Pardee, 1988). The most noteworthy parallelisms are semantic, syntactic and phonological. In the first case, the
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meaning of two hemistichs corresponds. In the second case, the grammatical structure is analogous. In the third case, the sound of words is similar. Furthermore, poetry reduces the use of words and morphemes such as the relative pronoun, the nota accusativi and the article. The list of rhetorical devices that have been researched for biblical poetry is very long. It includes repetition of words or roots, envelope figure, keywords, refrains, allusion, ellipsis (for example of the article or the relative pronoun), irony, oxymoron, employing abstract for concrete terms, hyperbole, merismus, hendiadys, ‘break up,’ enjambment, delayed identification, rhetorical questions, ballast variant, expansion, lists and inversion (Watson, 1984). Some of these devises (e.g. allusion, repetition, ellipsis) have been the subject of scholarly attention in studies of Qumran poetry (Hughes, 2006; Miller, 2012, 2015), but much further research is needed on the use of these devices in the different poetic genres attested in the texts discovered at Qumran, especially in comparison to earlier and later poetry. Unlike piyyut and medieval Jewish poetry, the poetry found at Qumran does not employ particularly rare roots (van Bekkum, 2008) with the possible exception of Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184, see Tigchelaar, 2012). Occasionally, the quality of poetry associated with the Yahad has been evaluated in comparison with biblical poetry as if the latter sets the standard for (better) quality (see especially Carmignac, 1963). Judgements on the quality of poetry are, however, mostly a matter of personal taste.
Why Are Texts Written in Poetry? A fundamental question is the raison d’être of poetry, i.e. why are some texts written in poetry while others are not? The terse and often highly metaphorical and ambiguous language distinguishes poetry from everyday communication and demands special attention and focus by performer and audience alike. Poetry can evoke special authority. It has been suggested that the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek] displays a preference for grammatical forms more frequently attested in poetry perceived as God’s language (Schniedewind, 2000, p. 245). While the legal and narrative parts of the Torah are mostly written in prose, the liturgical texts from Qumran such as blessings and curses resemble the poetic sections [→61 Liturgical Texts], and the pesharim frequently scrutinize poetic passages in the prophets (including David’s Psalms) in order to gain access to God’s secrets [→44 Pesharim]. Clearly, poetic language also has mnemonic functions through rhetorical devices such as rhythm. In addition, poetic language ‘does’ something with the performer and/or the audience. Through its rhetorical devices, usually orally performed, poetic texts are regarded as especially beautiful with an elevated standing and the potential to cause specific emotions (sadness, joy, hate, solemnity, serenity, etc.). They evoke reverence and respect vis-à-vis the contents, context and/or speaker whether in a liturgical or a didactic setting. This can go as far as causing a mysterium tremendum (Nitzan, 1994, p. 144) or inducing a process leading to mystical experiences especially through rhythm, repetition and metaphors (Alexander, 2006). The Yahad and the wider
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movement of which it was a part saw itself as participating in angelic worship (Chazon, 2003; Arnold, 2006, p. 207). It may not be by chance that the language of Homer, the Psalms, biblical prophecy and the Qur’an was perceived by the ancients as having a divine aura.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (2006), Mystical Texts: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Related Manuscripts. London: T & T Clark. Arnold, R. (2006), The Social Role of Liturgy in the Religion of the Qumran Community. STDJ 60. Leiden: Brill. Bekkum, W. van (2008), ‘Qumran hymnology and Piyyut: Contrast and comparison,’ RevQ 23, 341–56. Berg, S. A. (2008), ‘Religious Epistemologies in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Heritage and Transformation of the Wisdom Tradition.’ PhD diss. Yale University. Berlin, A. (2007), The Dynamics of Biblical Parallelism. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Carmignac, J. (1960), ‘Étude sur les procédés poétiques des Hymnes,’ RevQ 2, 515–32. Carmignac, J. (1963), ‘La forme poétique du Psaume 151 de la grotte 11,’ RevQ 4, 371–8. Carmignac, J. (1964), ‘Règle des Chants pour l’Holocauste du Sabbat: Quelques details de lecture,’ RevQ 4, 563–66. Carmignac, J. (1965), ‘Précisions sur la forme poétique du Psaume 151,’ RevQ 5, 249–52. Chazon, E. G. (1998), ‘Hymns and prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, I: 244–70. Chazon, E. G. (2000), ‘Liturgical communion with the angels at Qumran,’ in D. Falk, F. García Martínez, and E. Schuller (eds) (2000), pp. 95–105. Chazon, E. G. (2003), ‘Human and angelic prayer in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. Chazon, R. A. Clements and A. Pinnick (eds), pp. 35–47. Chazon, E. G. (2010), ‘Liturgical function in the Cave 1 Hodayot collection,’ in D. Falk, F. García Martínez, and E. Schuller (eds) (2010), pp. 135–49. Chazon, E. G. (2012), ‘Tradition and innovation in sectarian religious poetry,’ in J. Penner, K. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds) (2012), pp. 55–67. Chazon, E. G., R. A. Clements and A. Pinnick (eds) (2003), Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 48. Leiden: Brill. Diewert, D., ‘Poetry,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (2000), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II: 679–81. Eshel, H. and J. Strugnell (2000), ‘Alphabetic acrostics in Pre-Tannaitic Hebrew,’ CBQ 62, 441–58. Falk, D. (1998), Daily, Sabbath, and Festival Prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 27. Leiden: Brill. Falk, D. (2010), ‘The contribution of the Qumran Scrolls to the study of ancient Jewish liturgy,’ in T. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 617–42. Falk, D., F. García Martínez, and E. Schuller (eds) (2000), Sapiential, Liturgical and Poetical Texts from Qumran. STDJ 35. Leiden: Brill. Flint, P. (1997), The Dead Sea Psalms Scrolls and the Book of Psalms. STDJ 17. Leiden: Brill.
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Flint, P. (2012), ‘Interpreting the poetry of Isaiah at Qumran: Theme and function in the sectarian scrolls,’ in J. Penner, K. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds) (2012), pp. 161–95. García Martínez, F. (2000), ‘Sapiential, liturgical and poetical texts from Qumran,’ in D. Falk, F. García Martínez, and E. Schuller (eds) (2000), pp. 1–11. Greenfield, J. C. (1979), ‘Early Aramaic poetry,’ JANES 11, 45–51. Harkins, A. K. (2008), ‘The Community Hymns classification: A proposal for further differentiation,’ DSD 15, 121–54. Harkins, A. K. (2010), ‘Hymns, prayers and psalms,’ in J. J. Collins and D. C. Harlow (eds), The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 753–7. Hughes, J. (2006), Scriptural Allusions and Exegesis in the Hodayot. STDJ 59. Leiden: Brill. Kittel, B. (1981), The Hymns of Qumran: Translation and Commentary. Chico, CA : Scholars Press. Kugel, J. (1981), The Idea of Biblical Poetry. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Lee, P. (2011), ‘Aramaic poetry in Qumran’ (PhD diss., Catholic University of America). Lowth, R. (1835), Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews. Third edn. Trans. from Latin G. Gregory. London: Thomas Tegg. Miller, S. (2012), ‘Innovation and convention: An analysis of parallelism in stichographic, hymnic and sapiential poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls’ (PhD diss., Florida State University). Miller, S. (2015), ‘The oral-written textuality of stichographic poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ DSD 22, 162–88. Newman, J. (2008), ‘Priestly prophets at Qumran: Summoning Sinai through the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice,’ in G. Brooke, H. Najman, and L. Stuckenbruck (eds), The Significance of Sinai: Traditions about Sinai and Divine Revelation in Judaism and Christianity. TBN 12. Leiden: Brill, pp. 29–72. Newsom, C. (2000), ‘Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 889. Newsom, C. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Nitzan, B. (1994), Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry. STDJ 12. Leiden: Brill. Pajunen, M. and J. Penner (eds) (2017), Functions of Psalms and Prayers in the Late Second Temple Period. BZAW 486. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter. Pardee, D. (1988), Ugaritic and Hebrew Poetic Parallelism. VTS up 39. Leiden: Brill. Penner, J., K. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds) (2012), Prayer and Poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honor of Eileen Schuller on the Occasion of Her 65th Birthday. STDJ 98. Leiden: Brill. Penner, J. (2012), Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Period Judaism. STDJ 104. Leiden: Brill. Reymond, E. (2004), Innovations in Hebrew Poetry: Parallelism and the Poems of Sirach. SBLS tBL 9. Atlanta: SBL . Reymond, E. (2006), ‘The poetry of 4Q416 2 III 15–19,’ DSD 13, 177–93. Reymond, E. (2011a), New Idioms within Old: Poetry and Parallelism in the Non-Masoretic Poems of 11Q5 (=11QPsa). SBLEJL 31. Atlanta: SBL . Reymond, E. (2011b), ‘Poetry of the heavenly other: Angelic praise in the “Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice”,’ in D. Harlow, M. Goff and K. Hogan (eds), The ‘Other’ in Second Temple Judaism: Essays in Honor of John J. Collins. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 368–80. Schniedewind, W. (2000), ‘Linguistic ideology in Qumran Hebrew,’ in T. Muraoka and J. Elwolde (eds), Diggers at the Well: Proceedings of a Third International Symposium on the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Ben Sira. STDJ 36. Leiden: Brill, pp. 245–55.
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Schuller, E. (1998), ‘The use of biblical terms as designations for non-biblical hymnic and prayer compositions,’ in M. E. Stone and E. G. Chazon (eds), Biblical Perspectives: Early Use and Interpretation of the Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 28. Leiden: Brill, pp. 207–22. Schuller, E. (2003), ‘Some reflections on the function and use of poetical texts among the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon, R. A. Clements and A. Pinnick (eds) (2003), pp. 173–89. Schuller, E. (2011), ‘Recent scholarship on the “Hodayot” 1993–2010,’ CBR 10, 119–62. Segert, S. (1988), ‘Observations on poetic structures in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice,’ RevQ 13, 215–24. Tanzer, S. (1987), ‘The Sages at Qumran: Wisdom in the Hodayot.’ PhD diss. Harvard University. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2008), ‘Lady Folly and her house in three Qumran manuscripts: On the relation between 4Q525 15, 5Q16, and 4Q184 1,’ RevQ 23, 271–81. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2012), ‘The Poetry of the Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184),’ RevQ 25, 621–33. Tov, E. (2003), ‘The background of the stichometric arrangements of poetry in the Judean Desert Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon, R. A. Clements, and A. Pinnick (eds) (2003), pp. 409–20. VanderKam, J. C. (1979), ‘The Poetry of 1 Q ap Gen XX , 2–8,’ RevQ 10, 57–66. Watson, G. E. (1984), Classical Hebrew Poetry: A Guide to its Techniques. Sheffield: JSOT Press.
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Liturgical Texts Daniel K. Falk
The Dead Sea Scrolls provide abundant primary evidence for Early Jewish liturgical texts, but it is difficult to describe the corpus in part because there is little agreement on what is meant by ‘liturgy’ and hence what constitutes a ‘liturgical text’ (Schuller, 2017, p. 18). It is helpful to define liturgy as a subset of religious ritual in a way that is consistent with its heritage from Greek leitourgia as ‘public service.’ Hence liturgy is any set of rituals performed as part of the community’s religious system of service to God (cf. Arnold, 2006, pp. 6–7). It is not restricted to just the verbal part: prayer as human communication with the divine should be seen as a subset of liturgy. This definition would exclude private, spontaneous prayers and rituals, as well as ritual behaviours governing personal and social life such as social interactions, food preparation and toilet practices. As a subset of ritual, the study of liturgy benefits from the insights of ritual studies, and in the last decade a few scholars have sought to apply these to the Dead Sea Scrolls (Kugler, 2002; Arnold, 2006; Stökl Ben Ezra, 2011; Collins, 2012). Very important is the recognition that liturgy is a performance, not a text. The verbal is only one part of the performance. More important than the words recited in a liturgy is what is said by the liturgy: that is, the fact that it is performed, and what it accomplishes as a ritual performance. Defining what a liturgical text is, then, involves some difficult questions that have hitherto received scant attention (see Brooke, 2012, pp. 38–9). First of all, we should distinguish liturgical texts from accounts of liturgical performance (such as in the Rule Books [59 →Rules]) and liturgical elements included in narrative or other genres (such as Levi’s prayer in Aramaic Levi [4QL evib 1 i–ii] [→24 Aramaic Levi]). In the case of the Scrolls from Qumran, we have knowledge of rituals for which we can identify no related liturgical texts, and conversely, fragments of probable liturgical texts for which we know nothing of the ritual. A literary account of a liturgy may be true to life, but to qualify as a liturgical text per se, its raison d’être must be directly related in some way to liturgical performance. This relationship can take several forms. The most obvious relationship is where the text serves as a ‘script’ for ritual performance. There are numerous clear examples among the Qumran scrolls, where the entire manuscript consists of prayers for specific occasions, each introduced with rubrics concerning performance. A second type of relationship is more distant, where the text could serve as a guide or resource to the liturgical performance. Possible examples include the descriptions of liturgies in the Rules – such as of the annual covenant ceremony in the Community Rule [→47 Serekh 423
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ha-Yahad] – that are not quite scripts for performance but could arguably be guides for a liturgical leader. Further removed are calendrical texts and diagnostic texts related to rituals, but generally we lack evidence for their use. A third type of relationship is a text as product of liturgical performance. Possibilities include the record of members inscribed during the annual covenant ceremony and exegetical texts produced in a liturgical context of study. Much remains theoretical, as too little is known of such rituals to assign specific texts. A fourth type of relationship is the use of scrolls as ritual objects. Here we should consider the ways a scroll is physically treated and regarded in the course of a ritual performance, beyond the words contained in it. The many Tefillin are an intriguing case, where the texts are sealed and not accessible during use. Scriptural scrolls, both as revered symbolic objects and as texts read liturgically also come to mind in this context. Scholars have proposed various criteria for identifying liturgical texts, and the following list by Eileen Schuller is somewhat representative: the individual prayers are relatively short; they contain set formulae, particularly at the opening and conclusion; they employ rubrics or titles specifying when the prayers are to be recited, and sometimes by whom; they utilize a dialogical element implying two or more voices; they are formulated in first person plural; their content is communal and/or cosmological (not individualistic and specific). Schuller, 2003, p. 174
It should be noted that such criteria are based on the characteristics of the most clearly liturgical prose prayers found at Qumran (e.g. Words of the Luminaries [→54 Words of the Luminaries] and Daily Prayers [4Q503]). There is hence a certain circularity in such criteria, and they are helpful primarily just in a positive sense (texts that display these features are more likely to be liturgical), but they cannot reliably serve to exclude texts that lack these features. For example, they do not apply well to the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice] or other liturgical poetry [→60 Poetry and Hymns]. Moreover, they only take account of liturgical texts in the first sense mentioned above (scripts for liturgical performance), and are irrelevant for other types of liturgical text (e.g. Tefillin, scriptural scrolls). For our purposes, it is also necessary to: (1) take into account physical features of manuscripts for evidence of special purposes; and (2) consider whether the text corresponds to ritual practices otherwise attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls, or known for Jewish communities in the Second Temple Period or more broadly for voluntary associations in the Greco-Roman world [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation]. In many cases, no certainty will be possible. There have been a number of attempts to classify the prayer, poetic and/or liturgical materials from Qumran, and these have mostly started with the extant texts and grouped them according to occasions and/or forms represented (see, e.g., Nitzan, 1994; Falk, 1998, 1999; Chazon, 2000; Davila, 2000; Lange and Mittmann-Richert, 2002, pp. 136–9; Schuller, 2004; Parry and Tov, 2005). In the last decade, a few scholars have attempted to catalogue ritual practices attested in the texts from Qumran according to the six categories of ritual defined by Catherine Bell (Bell, 1997, pp. 93–137): calendrical and commemorative rites; rituals of affliction; rites of passage; rites of feasting, fasting, and festivals; political rituals; and rites of exchange and communion (see Kugler, 2002;
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Arnold, 2006; Stökl Ben Ezra, 2011). The following survey will draw generously on previous catalogues; it differs from them by what it includes and excludes based on the definition of liturgy and liturgical texts outlined above. It will mostly avoid questions of provenance in favour of assembling potential evidence. Nevertheless, on the basis of dating, terminology, ideology and formal features, the liturgical texts from Qumran cannot all have originated within a singular sectarian movement, and must reflect at least in part some broader Jewish practices (Falk, 1998, pp. 253–5) [→12 Scrolls and Early Judaism; 72 Forms of Community].
Calendrical Rites The clearest cases of liturgical texts found at Qumran are scrolls containing collections of prayers for specific times of the calendar [→62 Calendars], where each prayer has rubrics indicating the occasion, ritual instructions for communal recital, and a systematic pattern of prayer formulas. Daily Prayers (4Q503) contains short blessings of praise to God at sunset and sunrise each day of a month, with a responding blessing over the congregation. In the ritual as a whole – both by utterance as well as repeated performance – the congregation enacts their distinctive calendar, which they understand as God’s time. Words of the Luminaries (4Q504, 4Q506 [some have identified the disputed 4Q505 as a further copy]) is a collection of supplications for days of the week with a poetic ‘song of praises’ for Sabbath. Festival Prayers (1Q34+34bis, 4Q507, 4Q508, 4Q509+505) is a collection of prayers for each of the festivals throughout the year. Ritual of Marriage (4Q502) is probably also a collection of festival prayers [→73 Daily Life]. Of these, only Daily Prayers (4Q503) is likely a sectarian composition. The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice] is a collection of thirteen songs designated for each Sabbath holocaust of the first quarter of the year according to a 364-day schematic calendar. Although much remains unclear about this intriguing text, it seems to be a script for a ritual of corporate mysticism [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination] performed on each Sabbath throughout the spring cycle of festivals in order to achieve union with the angels in worship (Alexander, 2006, pp. 93–118) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Whether or not the ritual was based on a priestly practice from the Temple [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple], it was an important liturgical text at Qumran, where nine copies were found (4Q400–407, 11Q17; a further copy was found at Masada [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]) and it fulfilled specifically sectarian functions: it was led by the sectarian ritual expert (Maskil, ‘Instructor’) and was adapted to a 364-day schematic calendar [→62 Calendars]. MosesApocryphonc (4Q408) also contains morning and evening blessings, but this is now understood to be part of a Moses Apocryphon and so is a literary rather than liturgical text. Two further very fragmentary scrolls seem to be liturgical calendars (Liturgical Work A [4Q409] and Ordo [4Q334]) but on closer reflection, they are unlikely to have a liturgical function. Scholars have noted a relative lack of commemorative liturgies: there is no anamnesis, no celebration of founding events (Brooke, 2012, pp. 42–3). The closest is the annual covenant ceremony, but we will consider that below as a rite of passage.
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At a further remove, the various calendar texts might be considered liturgical in that at least part of their purpose is to calculate appointed times that require liturgical actions, including priestly service at sabbaths and festivals. The fixed cycle of prayers ritually enacts the calendar (Collins, 2012, pp. 74–5).
Rituals for Alleviating Affliction Rituals for alleviating affliction ‘attempt to rectify a state of affairs that has been disturbed or disordered; they heal, exorcise, protect, and purify’ (Bell, 1997, p. 115). A large number of liturgical texts from Qumran are in various ways aimed at restoring and maintaining the order of the cosmos. First, there are various prayers and poems to fend off demons and protect against their activity [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Eshel (2003) distinguishes between incantations for specific ad hoc situations of healing individuals deemed to be stricken by demons (Apocryphal Psalms [11Q11], Exorcism [4Q560] and Hymn [8Q5]), and apotropaic hymns intended to frighten demons and provide general protection of the community from evil (Songs of the Sage [4Q510–511], Incantation [4Q444] and Hymn [6Q18]). All three incantation texts refer specifically to a patient. Two of the apotropaic texts are for use by a ritual expert who acts on behalf of the community (4Q510–511; 4Q444); 6Q18 seems to be a communal hymn of protection. Two of the incantations are also for use by a ritual expert, who adjures the demons by God’s name on behalf of the patient (4QExorcism [4Q560] and Hymn [8Q5]). A rubric before one of the psalms in 11Q11 (5 5) seems to instruct the patient to recite the psalm in times of distress, but the liturgical rubric at the end of Ps. 91 in this scroll suggests congregational participation (it might better be classified as apotropaic). The numerous phylacteries found at Qumran containing Torah passages likely functioned as long-life amulets (Cohn, 2008, pp. 55–102). Without evidence for the ritual context, it is difficult to determine if these should qualify as liturgical texts. A second subcategory includes various rites to remove impurities [→70 Purity and Holiness]. The clearest liturgical texts are three scrolls containing a collection of sectarian purification rituals (Ritual of Purification B [4Q512], Ritual of Purification A [4Q414] and Purification Liturgy [4Q284]). The purification rituals include not only ad hoc occasions of defilement (e.g. contact with corpse, skin disease, menstruation, semen) but also calendrical occasions (Sabbath, new moons, festivals [4Q512 33 iv 1–3; 4Q284 1 3–6]) and possibly also meals (4Q512 7–9 3; 4Q414 7 8). A third subcategory includes rites to address threat or breeches of boundaries. These are certainly liturgical and mostly consist of ritual cursing of human and/or supra-human enemies. This is a larger category of rites than often recognized, involving diverse ritual settings, not all of which can be identified. There is a complicated pattern of intertextual relationships among the various cursing texts, but it should not be assumed that this points to the same setting/purpose. Cursing and expulsion rituals against apostates serve the purpose of maintaining the integrity of the boundaries of the community with regard to errant members. These will be discussed under Rites of Passage below. Another sort of cursing ritual is directed primarily against supernatural
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threats to the community and God’s purposes, and is closer to apotropaic rituals. 4QB erakhot (4Q286–290) [→32 Berakhot] contains a series of blessings to God followed by a series of curses on Belial along with the evil angels and humans allied with him. Rubrics indicate that these are liturgical recitals by the congregation, the ‘council of the Yahad.’ 4QC urses (4Q280) is also a collection of ritual curses against Melchiresha, although it is unclear whether they are recited by an individual or the congregation, and whether the ritual also included blessings and other curses. The War Scroll (1QM 13 [→40 Milh.amah]) incorporates the same curse of Belial and the spirits of his lot as in Berakhot (4Q286 7 ii 1–5) into an eschatological war ritual [→75 War and Violence; 68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The function of the curse language in 5QC urses (5Q14) and 6QB enediction (6Q16) is uncertain. A fourth subcategory includes rites to address error and disruptions in the social order. Numerous texts attest formal and public procedures for reproof and discipline (e.g. CD 9.16–10.3 [→35 Damascus Document]; 1QS 5.23–6.1 [→47 Serekh haYahad]) involving an overseer who records the reproof. The record of reproof in 4Q477 was likely produced and used in public ritual settings, specifically for ranking, but the function is primarily diagnostic and not directly related to liturgical performance more narrowly. A fifth subcategory includes rites to atone for sin. Most obviously, the liturgical texts include various penitential prayers in collections of daily and festival prayers, and in purification rituals, as well as other unspecified contexts (e.g. Communal Confession [4Q393]).
Rites of Passage Rites of passage ‘culturally mark a person’s transition from one stage of social life to another’ (Bell, 1997, p. 94). The most prominently marked transition in the Yahad is the progression from initiate to full member. This involves a protracted sequence of rites (over at least two years, 1QS 6.13–23) described or alluded to in various passages of the Community Rule and the Damascus Document. These accounts are not liturgical texts in the narrowest sense, and it is likely that they attest different versions of the rituals. The first stage involves initial rites of discernment by the Maskil (or Mebaqqer, ‘Examiner’) to assess the postulant’s ‘spirit’ and his commitment to separate from others and turn to Torah (1QS 3.13–15; 5.1–2; 9.14–21; CD 15.5–16.2). The second stage is a lengthy liminal period of instruction and examination (1QS 6.13–23; CD 13.11–13; 5Q13 4) [→73 Daily Life]. It is likely that the physiognomic texts (4QHoroscope [4Q186] and 4QP hysiognomy/Horoscope [4Q561] [→ 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]) served a diagnostic purpose (Alexander, 1996), and the cryptic text Words of Maskil (4Q298) was plausibly for use in the instruction of candidates. Despite the rituals involved, and probably expressions of repentance and oaths on the part of the candidates, none of this should be regarded as liturgy per se: the function of the texts is diagnostic. If a candidate was successful, the third stage is incorporation as a full member, by means of the sect’s central liturgy, the annual covenant ceremony (see Arnold, 2006,
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pp. 52–81). This involves various rites of procession, confessions, oaths, blessing and cursing, purification and inscribing names (1QS 1.16–3.12; 5.7–24; 6.22; 5Q13; CD 14.3–6; 15.5–6). 1QS 1.16–3.12 (4Q255 // 4Q257 // 4Q262) describes the liturgy including some spoken parts; it might have served as a guide to the liturgy for the Maskil. As an opposing rite of passage, the sect also marked expulsion from the community liturgically. There is an account of the liturgy preserved at the end of the Damascus Document (4QD a 11 5–17 // 4QD d 11 ii+15 // 4QD e 7 i–ii), including a prayer and declaration by the Priest over the Many and dismissal of the apostate. Immediately following this is a mention that all the camps assemble in the third month to curse apostates. It is unlikely that this expulsion ritual was part of the annual covenant ceremony or that 4QB erakhot [→32 Berakhot] and 4QCurses (4Q280) are liturgical texts for different versions of the ceremony as argued by Nitzan (1995, following Milik). Although the annual covenant ceremony included a ritual cursing of apostates (1QS 2.11–18), it is likely that the expulsion ritual would have been held some days before, perhaps as part of a preparatory purification of the community as suggested by Baumgarten (1996). Two other fragmentary scrolls may be liturgical texts related to (or versions of) the covenant ceremony. 4QC ommunal Ceremony (4Q275) attests a communal ritual in the third month involving liturgical recitations, ritual curses, discipline, vows, a group entering by genealogy, and some actions by the Overseer, the Mebaqqer and the elders. 5QR ule (5Q13) contains prayer to God concerning election of ancestors, and the annual examination by the Mebaqqer and dismissal of those found unfit. Apart from these liturgies marking entrance and expulsion from the sectarian community, there are no other identifiable liturgical texts for rites of passage. There is no evidence of prescribed rituals for birth, circumcision, marriage, ages of service or death. The so-called Ritual of Marriage (4Q502) is not a marriage liturgy as Baillet suggested, but more likely a festival liturgy.
Feasts and Fasts Feasts and fasts overlap with calendrical rituals, and especially for the sectarian movement that tied all festivals to specific dates of the 364-day calendar [→62 Calendars]. Communal meals were a central religious activity of the Yahad along with prayer and study (1QS 6.1–8), and they were highly ritualized in terms of access, purity requirements, seating and speech [→73 Daily Life]. The members recited blessings before meals (1QS 10.14b–15a) in order of rank (judging from the eschatological banquet [1QS a 2.17–22] [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; and according to 1QS 6.4–5 priests bless before meals), but no liturgical text of grace before meals has been identified. There is no mention of blessing after meals, but two miniature scrolls (4QD eutj; 4QD eutn) with scriptural passages related to blessing after meals (from Deut. 8), the Decalogue and Shema are probably personal scrolls, and may have been intended for liturgical use. No other liturgical text of blessings after meals has been identified (although Moshe Weinfeld initially suggested that a fragment from Barkhi Nafshi [4Q434] is a liturgical text of Grace After Meals in a mourner’s house [→29 Barkhi Nafshi]). Apart from the Day of Atonement as ‘the Fast’ (e.g. 1QpHab 11.8 [→44
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Pesharim]; CD 6.18–19) there is no evidence for public fasts or liturgical texts for fasts. This is surprising, but it is important to keep in mind that the evidence is incomplete.
Political Rituals According to Bell political rituals, specifically construct, display and promote the power of political institutions . . . or the political interests of distinct constituencies and subgroups. [. . .] first, they use symbols and symbolic action to depict a group of people as a coherent and ordered community based on shared values and goals; second, they demonstrate the legitimacy of these values and goals by establishing their iconicity with the perceived values and orders of the cosmos. Bell, 1997, pp. 128–9
The most prominent example is the complex set of rituals associated with the annual covenant ceremony and the expulsion ritual, discussed above. The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice could also be considered political rituals [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]. By liturgical recitation of the order of heaven and the rankings of angels, the community reinforced its identity as a spiritual temple and its alignment with the cosmic order on a vertical axis (i.e. ‘on earth as it is in heaven’) [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. On the horizontal axis, the community emphasized that it was aligned with the order of creation that will be restored in the eschaton (i.e. ‘as it was in the beginning, is now, and shall be forever’). This would seem to be the point of the eschatological liturgies [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The Rule of Blessings (1QS b) contains a series of blessings for the Maskil to recite over the congregation, and various groups and leaders including the Sons of Zadok, the High Priest, and the Prince of the Congregation [→45 Rule of Blessings]. Although these blessings are specified for the Messianic age (cf. also 1QS a [→46 Rule of the Congregation]), it is likely that this liturgy was not merely reserved for the future, but used somehow in the present to reinforce the ideal community order. Some scholars have also speculated that the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah; 75 War and Violence] had a liturgical use in the present, and if so, it would have a similar function for the community: reinforcing a vision of the community, its identity, structure and goals as in line with God’s order.
Rites of Exchange and Communion Such rites have the primary function to ‘serve as a means for nurturing a connection with the divine realm, and indicating one’s devotion to God’ (Arnold, 2006, p. 207). The main texts to be considered here are religious poetry [→60 Poetry and Hymns] used in communal, liturgical settings, and these are of two main types: hymns (psalms of praise) and laments (psalms of complaint). There is a large corpus of religious poetry found at Qumran including: thirty-three ‘biblical’ Psalters; three collections of psalms
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that mostly occur with the ‘biblical’ Psalter, but also include a number of other psalms and with unique arrangements (4Q88, 11Q5, 11Q6) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 55 Bible]; three different collections of ‘non-biblical’ psalms in eight manuscripts (Non-Canonical Psalms A and B [4Q380–4Q381] [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]; Works of God [4Q392]; Communal Confession [4Q393]; and Barkhi Nafshi [4Q434–438] [→29 Barkhi Nafshi][); five collections of laments (Apocryphal Lamentation A and B [4Q179 and 4Q501]; Lament A [4Q445]; Lament by a Leader [4Q439]; and Narrative I [4Q469]); eight collections of thanksgiving hymns (1QHa, 1QH b, 4Q427–432) and five Hodayot-like texts (4Q433, 4Q433a, 4Q440, 4Q440a, and Self-Glorification Hymn [4Q471b]) [→37 Hodayot]; two other scrolls with religious poetry (Apocryphal Psalm and Prayer [4Q448] and Time of Righteousness [4Q215a]); and twenty-two further prayer or poetic texts too fragmentary to determine their genre. In contrast to the Hebrew Bible, praise overwhelmingly dominates in the Dead Sea Scrolls, and lament is relatively rare (Pajunen, 2015). Which, if any, of these scrolls should be considered liturgical texts? This is extremely difficult to answer because most of these texts lack features such as liturgical rubrics and indications of a specific setting. There can be little doubt that the Yahad used poetry liturgically. The clearest cases are songs associated with the Maskil. The song of the Maskil in 1QS 9.26–10.17 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] emphasizes commitment to praise at all occasions, using terminology of songs (1QS 10.9) and refers to a communal setting (10.14). By terminology, style and content, it shows close similarities with the Hodayot. Although the function of the Hodayot has long been debated, with many scholars arguing that they were for private devotional purposes, the evidence for a liturgical use is much stronger since the publication of the Cave 4 fragments (Chazon et al., 1999) and a critical edition of 1QH a (Stegemann, Schuller, and Newsom, 2009). The reconstruction of 1QH a reveals four introductory rubrics (1QH a 5.12–14; 7.21; 20.7–12; 25.34) that are comparable to those in liturgical prayers specifying the songs for the Maskil, and in two instances giving an indication of purpose: for prayer as well as instruction (5.12–14), and for praise and prayer at all appointed times (20.7–12). Although the language of most of the hymns is in the first-person singular, there are a few indications of a communal setting (Schuller, 2003, p. 179): a long series of plural imperatives summoning to praise God in the congregation (4QHa 7 i 13–18); firstperson plural speech ending with an imperative call to praise and a concluding benediction (4QH a 7 ii 14–22; cf. 1QHa 7.12–20). Thus, the case of the Hodayot suggests that worship and instruction are not incompatible functions for psalms (Falk, 1998, pp. 100–3), and ‘I’ language does not necessarily exclude a communal setting. The case is much more difficult with the other poetic texts, and at best one can say a liturgical use is possible. In a careful study of the problem, Eileen Schuller (2003) notes that most of the evidence for liturgical use of the poetic texts found at Qumran is ambiguous, and she cautiously allows that songs may have had a special liturgical role in the sectarian community based on their self-identity as an ‘angel-like priestly community,’ and the common use of music and choirs in voluntary associations generally in the Greco-Roman world (Schuller, 2003, p. 189 citing a phrase by Dimant, 1996, p. 95). It is particularly likely that the ‘biblical’ psalms were recited liturgically, and by extension, the various ‘mixed’ collections of psalms. Scholars continue to disagree whether these latter (4QPsf, 11QPsa, b) attest their distinctive order and contents as variant versions of
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‘scriptural’ Psalters or as liturgical collections of psalms [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 55 Bible]. To some degree, this is a moot distinction, since the indications are that reading and study of scripture was predominantly a communal, liturgical activity (e.g. 1QS 6.6–8); the two functions are not mutually exclusive. This raises the further question whether we should consider all scriptural texts as liturgical texts? According to 1QS 6.6–8, corporate reading of scripture was a daily liturgical activity of the community alongside study of law and prayer. It seems to me best to acknowledge the liturgical use, but to reserve the designation of liturgical text for manuscripts where there is an indication that they were prepared for a purpose related to liturgy. This is the case with certain miniature scrolls containing liturgically significant excerpts, such as 4QD eutj,n [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] which combine the scriptural passages related to the grace after meals, the Decalogue and Shema (cf. 4QD eutq, 4QE xode, 4QPsg). The miniature copies of Ruth, Canticles, Lamentations and Qohelet (2QRutha, 4QC anticlesa,b, 6QC anticles, 4QL amentations, 5QL amentations, 4QQ oheleta) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] are probably portable copies for public liturgical reading at festivals (see Figure 61.1).
Figure 61.1 Qoheleta (4Q109). Photograph by Bruce and Kenneth Zuckerman, West Semitic Research, in collaboration with the Princeton Theological Seminary. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Jordan.
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Features of Liturgical Texts Most study on liturgical texts from Qumran has focused on textual elements such as themes, vocabulary and forms. Scholars have highlighted, for example, a tendency toward the use of blessings to frame prayers and liturgical occasions; a trend toward stereotyped forms of blessing; the abundant use of scriptural language; and the importance of the motif of remembrance (Nitzan, 1994). They have also tried to situate these prayers in the broader context of early Judaism (Chazon, 2012; Penner, 2014). Little attention, however, has been devoted to the features of liturgical scrolls as physical artefacts, though this offers valuable insights (see Falk, 2014). For example, the collections of liturgical prose prayers stand out among all the other genres of texts found at Qumran as especially likely to be compact, personal copies. Features include a high proportion of copies on papyrus and opisthographs, including what seem to be intentional collections of similar prayer texts on a single scroll. Such observations provoke questions about how a scroll of prayers functioned in relation to the performance of a liturgy. Was it for studying in preparation or for reading in the course of performance? Was it for a prayer leader or individual members of a congregation? Was it a personal or official copy? Was it accorded any special treatment? As artefacts related to liturgy, all features of the physical presentation of a manuscript are important: the material, quality, size, layout, scribal practices of preparation and writing, as well as paratextual elements such as paragraphing and marginal marks. Additionally, J. Newman (2017) considers the liturgical context of the scribe in the formation of scripture. Future research will need to pay more attention to material aspects of liturgical texts found at Qumran in accounting for their possible ritual functions.
Significance of Liturgical Texts The corpus of texts surveyed here is remarkable in the first place simply because it provides, for the first time, liturgical manuscripts from Second Temple Judaism, with indications of repeated ritual performance. The use of liturgical texts is not unique in the ancient world: there are references to the use of books of prayers and hymns in Hellenistic voluntary associations and guilds as well as Greco-Roman mystery cults [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation; 12 Scrolls and NonJewish Hellenistic Literature]. Philo’s description of the sacred songs of the Therapeutae (Philo, Contempl. Life 29, 80) reflects similar practices of composing and writing hymns for communal use among a Jewish community in Alexandria (cf. the ancestral prayers of the Essenes, Josephus, War 2.128) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus]. Philo’s description also depicts such written hymns recited at a feast by a leader with congregational refrains and chanting by choirs. This is of uncertain relevance to the situation with the Qumran scrolls, but it highlights that what is unique about the corpus at Qumran is not so much the use of liturgical texts, but the survival of many examples to study. Also remarkable is the extent and nature of this corpus. In a study of ritual in the Qumran scrolls Robert Kugler found that ritual was ‘hegemonic, making every aspect
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of their experience religious’ (Kugler, 2002, p. 152), and that ‘many of their ritual practices also differed from those undertaken by their contemporaries’ (Kugler, 2002, p. 149). Focusing specifically on liturgical texts yields a similar result: a very large number of texts are related to liturgical performance, and these involve all areas of life. The rituals most densely represented by liturgical texts concern calendar, rites of passage dealing with entry and exit from the community, and affliction rituals having to do with spiritual threats to the community.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (1996), ‘Physiognomy, initiation, and rank in the Qumran community,’ in H. Cancik, H. Lichtenberger, and P. Schäfer (eds), Geschichte – Tradition – Reflexion: Festschrift für Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburtstag. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 385–94. Alexander, P. S. (2006), Mystical Texts. LSTS 61. London: T. & T. Clark (Continuum). Arnold, R. C. D. (2006), The Social Role of Liturgy in the Religion of the Qumran Community. STDJ 60. Leiden: Brill. Baumgarten, J. M. (1996), Qumran Cave 4. XIII: The Damascus Document (4Q266–273). DJD 18. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Bell, C. M. (1997), Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions. New York/Oxford: OUP. Brooke, G. J. (2012) ‘Aspects of the theological significance of prayer and worship in the Qumran scrolls,’ in J. Penner, K. M. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds), Prayer and Poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honor of Eileen Schuller on the Occasion of Her 65th Birthday. STDJ 98. Leiden: Brill, pp. 35–54. Chazon, E. G. (2000), ‘Psalms, hymns, and prayers,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 710–15. Chazon, E. G. (2012) ‘Liturgy before and after the Temple’s destruction: Change or continuity?,’ in D. R Schwartz, and Z. Weiss (eds), Was 70 CE a Watershed in Jewish History? On Jews and Judaism Before and After the Destruction of the Second Temple. AJEC 78. Leiden: Brill, pp. 371–92. Chazon, E. G. et al. (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XX: Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 2. DJD 29. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Cohn, Y. B. (2008), Tangled up in Text: Tefillin and the Ancient World. BJS 351. Providence, RI : Brown Judaic Studies. Collins, J. J. (2012), ‘Prayer and the Meaning of Ritual in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. Penner, K. M. Penner, and C. Wassen (eds), Prayer and Poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honor of Eileen Schuller on the Occasion of Her 65th Birthday. STDJ 98. Leiden: Brill, pp. 69–85. Davila, J. R. (2000), Liturgical Works. Eerdmans Commentaries on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Dimant, D. (1996), ‘Men as angels: The self-image of the Qumran community,’ in B. D. Cooperman (ed.), Religion and Politics in the Ancient Near East. Baltimore: University Press of Maryland, pp. 93–103. Eshel, E. (2003), ‘Genres of magical texts in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in A. Lange, H. Lichtenberger, and K. F. D. Römheld (eds), Demons: The Demonology of IsraeliteJewish and Early Christian Literature in Context of Their Environment. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 395–415.
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Falk, D. K. (1998), Daily, Sabbath, and Festival Prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 27. Leiden: Brill. Falk, D. K. (1999), ‘Prayer in the Qumran texts,’ in W. Horbury, W. D. Davies, and J. Sturdy (eds), The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume 3: The Early Roman Period. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 852–76. Falk, D. K. (2014), ‘Material aspects of prayer manuscripts at Qumran,’ in H. Löhr and C. Leonhard (eds), Literature or Liturgy? Early Christian Hymns and Prayers in their Literary and Liturgical Context in Antiquity. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 33–87. Lange, A. and U. Mittmann-Richert (2002), ‘Annotated list of the texts from the Judaean Desert classified by content and genre,’ in E. Tov (ed.), The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 136–9. Kugler, R. A. (2002), ‘Making all experience religious: The hegemony of ritual at Qumran,’ JSJ 33, 131–52. Newman, J. H. (2017), ‘Scribal bodies as liturgical bodies: The formation of scriptures in early Judaism,’ in A. Feldman, M. Cioată, and C. Hempel (eds), Is There a Text in this Cave? Studies in the Textuality of the Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of George J. Brooke. STDJ 119. Leiden: Brill, pp. 83–104. Nitzan, B. (1994), Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry. STDJ 12. Leiden: Brill. Nitzan, B. (1995), ‘4QB erakhot a–e (4Q286–290): A covenantal ceremony in the light of related texts,’ RevQ 16, 487–506. Parry, D. W. and E. Tov (eds) (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader. Part 5: Poetic and Liturgical Texts. Leiden: Brill. Pajunen, M. S. (2015), ‘The praise of God and his name as the core of the Second Temple liturgy,’ ZAW 127, 475–88. Penner, J. (2014), ‘Mapping fixed prayers from the Dead Sea Scrolls onto Second Temple Period Judaism,’ DSD 21, 39–63. Schuller, E. M. (2003), ‘Some reflections on the function and use of poetical texts among the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon, R. Clements, and A. Pinnick (eds), Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19–23 January, 2000. STDJ 48. Leiden: Brill, pp. 173–89. Schuller, E. M. (2004), ‘Prayer at Qumran,’ in R. Egger-Wenzel and J. Corley, Prayer From Tobit to Qumran: Inaugural Conference of the ISDCL at Salzburg, Austria, 5–9 July 2003. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter, pp. 411–28. Schuller, E. M. (2017), ‘Functions of psalms and prayers in the Late Second Temple Period,’ in M. S Pajunen, and J. Penner (eds), Functions of Psalms and Prayers in the Late Second Temple Period. BZAW 486. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 5–24. Stegemann, H., E. M. Schuller, and C. Newsom (2009), Qumran Cave 1. III: 1QHodayota, with Incorporation of 4QHodayota-f and 1QHodayotb. DJD 40. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Stökl Ben Ezra, D. (2011), ‘When the bell rings: The Qumran rituals of affliction in context,’ in A. Lange, E. Tov, and M. Weigold (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures. Leiden: Brill, II : 533–46.
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Calendars Helen R. Jacobus
Introduction When a Qumran scroll that retold passages from Genesis was first published in the mid– 1990s, it quietly revived a debate about the calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls that began some forty years earlier. The scroll was Commentary on Genesis A (4Q252) (Brooke, 1996; see also ibidem Commentary on Genesis D [4Q254a]) [→33 Commentaries on Genesis], one of a series of parascriptural texts that retell different parts of Genesis [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. A non-sectarian passage supplementing the scriptural account of the Flood contained an unexpected reconstruction of its calendar (Gen. 7.11–8.14), including an explicit reference to the 364-day year (4Q252 ii 2–3).
The Calendar Hypothesis of Annie Jaubert The newly published scroll apparently confirmed Annie Jaubert’s hypothesis that a 364-day-year schematic calendar attested in the Hebrew Scrolls corresponded to an ancient Jewish calendar described in Jubilees (Jub. 6.23–38; cf. Jaubert, 1953, drawing on Barthélemy, 1952, pp. 199–203). Although Jaubert did not live to see 4Q252, the flood calendar in this manuscript was very similar to her reconstruction of the dates of the events of Noah’s Flood in Gen. 7–9 according to the 364-days described in Jubilees (Jaubert, 1953, pp. 258, 260; 1965). On Jaubert’s reading of Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] there were two days between the end of the swelling waters and the ark coming to rest, and this corresponds to the chronology of the Flood according to 4Q252 i 3–ii 5 (Gen. 7.10–8.18). In her seminal book The Date of the Last Supper (Jaubert, 1965) Jaubert argued in favour of an ‘ancient Jewish Calendar’ consisting of a 364-day year divided exactly into 52 seven-day weeks. Each season comprises three months composed of 13 weeks over 91 days. The first two months of each season are 30 days long and the third consists of 31 days. Hence, months 1, 4, 7 and 10 and months 2, 5, 8 and 11 each have 30 days, and months 3, 6, 9 and 12, have 31 days (Jaubert, 1953, p. 264; 1965, pp. 20–1, 26–7). In agreement with Barthélemy, Jaubert found that the year began on the fourth day of the week, Wednesday, on month 1, day 1, and that the first day of months 1, 4, 7 and 435
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10, always fell on a Wednesday. This schematic 364-day calendar is characterized by being divisible by seven, and is designed as a weekly liturgical calendar whereby the dates of the sabbaths and festivals fall on the same days of the week every year. Jaubert maintained that activities recounted in Jubilees, such as travelling, would begin on a Sunday and be completed on a Friday, thereby keeping the seventh day holy. She further claimed that in Jubilees religious holidays mainly occurred on a Wednesday, Friday or Sunday (Jaubert 1965, pp. 25–8; see also Saulnier, 2012, pp. 20–30). Some modern scholars contend that these data would be no more than could be expected from mere probability. 4Q252 was published in 1996 shortly after the appearance of an article apparently repudiating Jaubert’s theory (Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995; see already Baumgarten, 1977, orig. Hebrew 1962). On closer inspection, however, it may be argued that the Wacholders’ article confirmed Jaubert’s data, leaving room for her theory of travelling and liturgical days in the Book of Jubilees. Their argumentation against her hypothesis evaluated her findings empirically without disputing them and was based on disagreements on the nature of this calendar itself (Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995). The Wacholders and others stressed that the days of the week in Jubilees are not listed (see, e.g. Baumgarten 1977, p. 112; Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995, pp. 4, 18). Although this criticism is often repeated by modern scholars, it was a factor Jaubert herself emphasised, pointing out that the days of the week were in the Scrolls (1965, p. 28). This is why she labelled the 364-day year calendar as the ‘JubileesQumran’ calendar (1953, pp. 257, 264; 1965, p. 38). She also referred to it as a ‘solar calendar’, because 364 days ‘is evidently the figure divisible by seven nearest to the solar year’ (1965, p. 21). However, she stated that since the Jewish festivals were celebrated according to the lunar calendar and that some of those coincided with the solstices and equinoxes, there must have been a system of intercalation used in the Scrolls, which was presently unknown (Jaubert, 1965, pp. 20–1, 38; and see Synchronistic Calendars below). Accordingly, Jaubert theorised that there were two liturgical calendars in the Scrolls: the ‘official calendar’ in which the festivals coincided with the lunar month and which had survived in the later rabbinical calendar, and a ‘Jubilees-Qumran type’ where the festivals fell on fixed days of the week. She also postulated that the latter existed in a modified form related to the ‘official’ calendar (Jaubert, 1965, p. 52).
Talmon’s Initial Hypothesis Competing theories first proposed by Talmon (1951, 1958) and revised by VanderKam and others subsequently rejected Jaubert’s hypothesis that there were travelling and liturgical days in the Book of Jubilees. According to Talmon there was a schism between the sectarian group who may have followed a schematic 364-day calendar and a priestly group who followed the luni-solar calendar. This division was caused, in major part, by each party’s adherence to their respective calendars. It is worth noting that Talmon and Jaubert used the term ‘solar’ of the 364-day calendar and the term is still used today, although many scholars (e.g. Herr, 1976, pp. 834–5) have repeatedly said that the term is misleading as the solar year is approximately 365.24 days. Glessmer preferred the term ‘364-Day Calendar
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Traditions’ (1999); however, today some scholars use the designation in a more qualified way in order to discuss luni-solar models in the Scrolls, such as the Synchronistic Calendars (see below). The schismatic theory hinged on Talmon’s interpretation of a section of the sectarian commentary on Habakkuk [→44 Pesharim] in which the Wicked Priest pursues the Teacher of Righteousness to his house of exile on the Day of Atonement ‘in order to make him reel and to trip them on the day of their fasting, the sabbath of their resting’ (1Q pHab 11.2–8). Talmon argued that the Wicked Priest forcibly prevented the Teacher and his followers from observing the Day of Atonement according to their calendar (Talmon, 1951, 1958, 1999, p. 116) [→20 Historiography]. Other scholars suggested the sectarians may have used calculation rather than a system of observation to reckon the beginning of the month (Beckwith, 1992, p. 459; Stern, 2010, p. 245 and see b. Rosh Hashanah 25a). VanderKam has variously proposed that the 364-day schematic calendar was an ancient Israelite calendar that had been preserved by a sectarian community who rejected the Hasmoneans (VanderKam, 1979, 1981, 1998, pp. 113–16). According to his interpretation of 2 Macc. 6.7a and 1 Macc. 1.59, VanderKam suggested that this ancient calendar had been banned by Antiochus IV Epiphanes, and furthermore, that Antiochus had introduced the Seleucid calendar to Judea under a programme of calendar reform. Davies has argued that the Scrolls show that different calendars were in use in the second century bce , but that there is no evidence of a dispute (Davies, 1983; see Ben-Dov and Saulnier, 2008, pp. 135–42 for summaries of other originating theories).
Overview of the Qumran Calendrical Texts Attempts have been made to categorise the subgenres of different 364-day schematic calendar texts by Lange and Mittman-Richert (2002, pp. 115–64) and Pfann (2009), who have each classified the texts differently (Jacobus, 2015). Critical editions of most of the Hebrew 364-day schematic calendars are published in one volume, DJD 21 (Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001). These are a mixture of different types of calendars, including some which include the rosters of the priestly courses, the mishmarot in various forms. Some of those also include festivals (with different feasts between texts), and some contain possible lunar data [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. Calendrical texts with ‘mishmarot’ in their titles include the priestly courses in one form or another; the others do not. (None of the calendrical documents in DJD 21 include texts in cryptic script or Aramaic.) They are: 4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot A (4Q320); 4QC alendrical Document/Mishmarot B (4Q321); 4QC alendrical Document/Mishmarot C (4Q321a); 4QM ishmarot A (4Q322); 4QM ishmarot B (4Q323); 4QM ishmarot C (4Q324); 4QM ishmarot D (4Q324a); 4QpapCalendrical Document A? (4Q324b); 4QM ishmarot E (4Q324c); 4QC alendrical Document/Mishmarot D (4Q325); 4QC alendrical Document C (4Q326); 4QM ishmarot F (4Q328); 4QM ishmarot G (4Q329); 4QM ishmarot H (4Q329a); 4QM ishmarot I (4Q330), 4QC alendrical Document E? (4Q337), 4QC alendrical
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Document D (4Q394 1–2 [olim Mish Eb {4Q327}, the former title is correct; the text is not connected with 4QMMTa {4Q394}, VanderKam, 1997]); 4QO tot (4Q319) and 4QO rdo (4Q334) (on its classification as a liturgical text, see below [→61 Liturgical Texts]). The evidence from the Qumran caves can most conveniently be organised under four main headings.
Hebrew 364-day Schematic Calendars Discussions of how the 364-day year schematic calendars were periodically adjusted to take into account their discrepancy with the 365.24-day solar year can never be conclusive as there is no textual evidence for any method of intercalation. If the 364day calendar was left without any regular adjustment, in just 60 years it would fall behind the solar year by about 75 days, which means that festivals could not take place in their correct season. Some scholars have suggested that the scheme is a utopian one (Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995, pp. 28–37); others assume a practical application and suggest possible intercalary solutions (Glessmer, 1999; summary: VanderKam, 1998, pp. 82–4).
The Integration of the Priestly Courses (mishmarot) A number of 364-day year calendrical texts refer to the names of twenty-four priestly families serving a week at a time in the Jerusalem Temple (cf. 1 Chron. 24.7–18). These weekly priestly courses (the mishmarot) occur in a different order in the Scrolls beginning with the priestly family of Gamul, rather than Jehoiarib. Over the course of six years (a ‘sexennial cycle’), the twenty-four priestly courses rotate thirteen times each, thereby taking six years for each priestly family to return to the same week of the year. This cycle was subdivided into two identical, consecutive three-year cycles, the ‘triennial cycles’ (Abegg, 2001, pp. 166–71; Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, pp. 10–14, 16–33). Related detailed Hebrew 364-day year calendrical texts that do not include the mishmarot and that are not in DJD 21 include 6QC alendrical Document (6Q17) (Baillet, 1962, pp. 132–3) and 4QMMTa (4Q394) 3–7 i 1 (Qimron and Strugnell, 1994, pp. 7–13).
The Integration of the Festivals Not all of the Calendrical Documents list the calendars of the cycles of the priestly courses in detail; some contain the dates of the priestly service associated with the sabbath and the festivals only (Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995, pp. 30–5; VanderKam, 1998, pp. 71–87; Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, pp. 1–36). A number of calendrical texts, both with or without the mishmarot, mention additional festivals known from the Temple Scroll (11Q19 13–29 and 11Q20 1–6) [→51 Temple Scroll] and 4QR eworked Pentateuchc (4Q365) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]: 4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot D (4Q325) 2 7; 4QC alendrical Document C (4Q326) 1 and 4QC alendrical Document D (4Q394 1–2 [olim 4Q327]). In addition, one of the fragmentary calendars
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written in Cryptic A script, 4Q324d, contains a ruling for the Festival of Wood Offering, known from the Temple Scroll (Ratzon and Ben-Dov, 2017). One of the Cave 4 copies of the Community Rule (4QS e) [→Serekh ha-Yahad] includes calendrical material which was published separately under the siglum 4QO tot (4Q319). The ‘otot (Heb.: ‘signs,’ cf. Gen. 1.14) are recorded every three years, throughout six Jubilee (49-year) cycles. In the basic mega-cycle of 294 years (6 x 49). The ‘otot occur in the priestly service of Gamul and Shecaniah only, beginning with Gamul in the first year of the 294-year cycle, completing with Shecaniah in the forty-ninth year of the final Jubilee. Some scholars have considered whether the recurring three-year ‘signs’ may be connected with intercalation, though the discourse is inconclusive (Glessmer, 1994, 1996; Wacholder and Wacholder, 1995, pp. 30–2; VanderKam, 1998, pp. 80–4; Abegg, 1996, 2005, pp. 389–93; Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, pp. 195–244). 4QS e preserves 4QO tot rather than the Hymn to the Maskil, which contains a calendrically-related prayer at the same point in the Community Rule (1QS 9.26 // 4Q259 4 8, see Alexander and Vermes 1998, pp. 150–2). The editors of the Cave 4 copies of Serekh ha-Yahad contend that 4QO tot is a later addition but that it was regarded by the scribe as an integral part of the Rule (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, pp. 9–15, 59–60, 114–24, 150–2, 158–62). However, Metso has argued that 4QS e is a later copy of an earlier text that had chronological priority over 1QS (Metso, 1997, pp. 48–51, 69–74; see also Falk 1998, pp. 103–23; Nitzan 1994, pp. 52–9, and further on the Maskil’s Hymn, below).
Synchronistic Calendars There are possibly at least two groups of ‘synchronistic calendars’ in Hebrew and Aramaic [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]: these involve the schematic lunar calendar of 354 days harmonised with so-called schematic ‘solar’ calendars to create various calendrical schemes. The Hebrew schematic ‘solar’ calendar comprises a 364day year as discussed above, and the Aramaic schematic ‘solar’ calendars consist of, in at least one case, a 360-day year. The term, ‘synchronistic calendar’ was coined by Milik, who produced the first critical edition of some of the Aramaic fragments, Astronomical Enocha-b (4Q208–4Q209) [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. He argued that the moon, sun and numbered ‘gates,’ through which the sun and moon rise and set, were harmonised into a single calendar. The lunar year comprising 354 days of six alternating 29-day and 30-day months, and the ‘solar’ year of 364 days work together to create a luni-solar triennial cycle. This cycle consists mathematically of three lunar years of 354 days with the addition of a 30-day month (three years of 364-day years is equivalent to three years of 354 days plus 30 days) (Milik, 1976, pp. 274–5). The problem is that Astronomical Enocha-b are poorly preserved and describe the days of the lunar month (of 29 or 30 days), without any trace of the days of the ‘solar’ month (which are 30 and 31 days). Others argue that a 360-day ‘solar’ year, rather than a 364-day year may be represented (Albani, 1994, pp. 82–3; Jacobus, 2014b, pp. 334–40) (see Aramaic Calendars, below). Two different, yet related Hebrew synchronistic calendars are here discussed: the ‘X’ and dwq schemes of 4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot A (4Q320) with 4QC alendrical Document/Mishmarot B (4Q321) and 4QC alendrical Document/
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Mishmarot C (4Q321a), in which lunar phases are apparently synchronised with the mishmarot; and the intriguing Hebrew calendar text of 4QcryptA LunisolarCalendar (4Q317) written in the Cryptic A script, which does not include the mishmarot [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Other calendrical texts written in Cryptic A script are: 4QC ryptA Calendrical Document B (4Q313c); 4QC ryptA Liturgical Calendara,b,c (4Q324d,e,f ), 4QC ryptA Liturgical Calendar F-G; (4Q324g,h); 4QC ryptA Mishmarot J 4Q324i (Gropp, Bernstein et al., 2001, plates only; Abegg, 2004). The connected fragment numbering and titles follow Pfann (Gropp, Bernstein et al., 2001). These differ with respect to 4Q324 from Abegg (2004). 4Q320 1 ii 2 contains an unknown and unnamed possible lunar phase (signified by Talmon as ‘X’) marked schematically each month on the day of the week upon which it falls. The unnamed phase establishes whether each lunar month is alternately either 29 or 30 days long. The fixed date on which it occurs has a corresponding date in the 364-day calendar and the week of priestly service concerned. The text opens with a proem alluding to the fourth day of Creation that connects with a similar preamble in 4Q319 (Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, pp. 37–63; Abegg, 2001; Ben-Dov, 2008, pp. 198–202). In 4Q321 iii-iv and 4Q321a two possible phases for a date in each month are given in the recurring formulaic pattern connecting the lunar months with the ‘solar’ months in the 364-day calendar and the priestly week of service. The phases are ‘X’ (i.e. unknown and unnamed, as in 4Q320) and dwq (spelled in different ways). The texts state the days of the week during which the phenomena occur in the sexennial cycle (Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, pp. 65–91; Ben-Dov, 2008, pp. 207–19). Interestingly, 4Q321, which is younger, contains ‘X’ and dwq as does 4Q321a, which is some 50–100 years older; cf. 4Q320, which is of a similar Hasmonean date to 4Q321a and contains the ‘X’ phenomenon only. The identification of ‘X’ and dwq has been the subject of much debate. The etymology of dwq, is ambiguous, as is any interpretation based on it. Dwq could mean ‘observe, examine’, and has been understood to refer to the schematic first crescent (Abegg, 1999), and ‘X’ as the schematic full moon, in contrast to Wise who allocates the terms the other way around (Wise, 1994b). For Talmon, the root was dqq, meaning ‘thin,’ which he suggested referred to the time that the moon began to wane (Talmon, Ben-Dov and Glessmer, 2001, p. 14). Ben-Dov and Horowitz have argued that ‘X’ and dwq correspond approximately to similar lunar phases known from Babylonian astronomy (2005). Jacobus questions their conclusions, arguing that Babylonian astronomical records were based on real, observed data, and that alternating 29- and 30-day months possibly reflect Hellenistic calendrical parallels (Jacobus, 2013a). Another important Hebrew synchronised calendar is CryptA Lunisolar Calendar (4Q317). Written in Cryptic A script this calendar synchronises the lunar calendar of alternating 29 and 30 months with a 364-day year calendar cycle. It does not include the priestly courses and, unusually, it contains many supralinear marks, overwriting and apparent corrections for a large number of dates. 4Q317 lists the moon’s daily phases in fractions of fourteenths with the days of the months, noting the full moon and the first crescent (Gropp, Bernstein et al., 2001, plates only; Abegg, 2004, pp. 58–72; Jacobus, 2013b). 4Q317 may be synchronised with other manuscripts: the largest
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fragment, 1+1a ii 1–33 arguably corresponds with the lunar phases of ‘X’ and dwq in the 4Q321a–4Q321 calendar (Abegg, 2001, pp. 167, 169; Jacobus, 2013b, pp. 81–3).
Aramaic Calendars The full calendar, or calendars, of Astronomical Enocha-b (4Q208–4Q209) – the two texts are not identical – do not exist in the classical Ethiopic (Ge‘ez) version of 1 Enoch (1 En. 72–82 – sometimes called the ‘Astronomical Book’ but better referred to as the ‘Book of Luminaries’ to avoid confusion with 4Q208–209; see VanderKam, 2012). The current registration numbers for these materials are problematic because some other fragments of 4Q209 that identifiably overlap with parts of 1 En. 72–82 are literary, whereas the calendar of 4QA stronomical Enochb may be an independent document. Furthermore, Astronomical Enochb is not simply a later copy of Astronomical Enocha as the designations may imply. The official critical edition of the corpus of the so-called Aramaic Astronomical Book of Enoch is incomplete (Milik, 1976; Tigchelaar and García Martínez, 2000, pp. 96–102, 165–6). Drawnel has produced an edition for all the Cave 4 fragments in the ‘astronomical’ corpus (2011). Duke and Goff, like Drawnel, do not regard these texts as calendrical (2014), and they all treat 4Q209 as a lunar table of risings and settings, rather than as a calendar. Drawnel argues that the texts reflect a distant relationship with the Babylonian astronomical text, Enūma Anu Enlil, tablet 14 Table B, which quantifies the daily lengthening time periods of the moon’s risings and settings in an ideal equinoctial month (for discussion, see Jacobus, 2014b, pp. 260–343) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. The discussion is ongoing (see Ratzon, 2015b; Duke and Goff, 2016; Ratzon, 2016). In Astronomical Enocha-b the moon’s waxing and waning phases are described in fractions of half-sevenths (one-fourteenths) for every day of a lunar month (cf. 4Q317, see Hebrew Synchronistic Calendars, above, and 4Q503 which, like 4Q317, uses fractions of fourteenths, see Hebrew Liturgical Texts, below). Drawnel has identified two ‘patterns’ from the fractions: where there is a 29-day lunar month the full moon falls on day 14; in a 30-day lunar month, the full moon occurs on day 15 (Drawnel, 2011, pp. 421–4). From these data and Drawnel’s textual reconstructions of the remaining fragments it is arguably possible to propose calendrical reconstructions. Milik proposed that Astronomical Enochb comprises one year of a luni-solar triennial cycle and that the scribe possibly summarised the second and third lunar years (Milik, 1976, pp. 254–5). Ratzon has argued that the fragments can be placed in a full luni-solar triennial cycle, and that the cycle is an early precursor of the ‘solar’ triennial cycle of the mishmarot (Ratzon, 2017). In contrast, Jacobus contends that the fragments can be placed within a single year of a 19-year luni-solar cycle, similar to the Babylonian and Greek Metonic cycles (Jacobus, forthcoming). Returning to 1 En. 72–82, in the nineteenth and early twentieth century scholars adduced that the ‘gates’ in the Book of Luminaries represented the zodiacal signs, a conclusion that was refuted by Neugebauer (1964, 1979). Neugebauer’s repudiation of the zodiacal hypothesis is still widely accepted by modern scholars. He argued that the ‘gates’ in the Book of Luminaries represented particular points where the sun and the moon rise and set on the horizon throughout the year, and not the zodiacal signs. However,
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it is also argued that these points on the horizon are determined by the sun’s position on the zodiacal circle (Jacobus, 2014a; Ratzon, 2015a). Accordingly, it is contended that if the ‘gates’ signify the zodiacal signs, 4QAstronomical Enocha-b can function technically as a lunar and solar ephemeris for possible astral divination (Jacobus, forthcoming). Structurally, the zodiacal calendar unit of text in Zodiac Calendar and Brontologion (4Q318) is a schematic 360-day year calendar that lists the signs of the zodiac that the moon travels through for every day of a year. The calendar, which uses Aramaic monthnames, is composed of 30 twelve-day months (Greenfield and Sokoloff, 2000; Albani, 1999; Wise, 1994a; Jacobus, 2010, 2014b). Its lacunose remains can also be easily reconstructed from the text’s arrangement of the moon changing zodiacal signs schematically every two days, two days, then three days in a recurring sequence. The pattern is similar to late Babylonian zodiacal calendar texts that use numbers to represent the moon’s position in zodiacal signs on dates in the Babylonian calendar. It is argued that the Aramaic calendar in 4Q318, like the Babylonian calendar, is also related to the Metonic cycle. One can correlate the position of the moon in the zodiac for the dates listed in 4Q318 (and, it is argued, 4QA stronomical Enocha-b) with the moon’s position on the zodiacal circle 2,000 years ago (cf. Jacobus, 2014b, pp. 122–32; 2018).
Annalistic Calendars An interesting calendar-conversion between a numerical calendar and a calendar with a Babylonian month name, Shebat, is found in the fragmentary annalistic text 4QH istorical Text D (4Q332) 2 2–3. This locates an event in Hasmonean history in a chronological framework (Fitzmyer, 2000, pp. 281–6; Wise, 1994a [with the siglum 4Q322]; Atkinson, 2007, pp. 134–8; Talmon and Ben-Dov, 2008; Collins, 2012; Jacobus, 2014b, pp. 150–7).
Hebrew Liturgical Texts Associated with the Calendar The 364-day year calendars are reflected in a number of liturgical scrolls from Qumran either as part of the structure, or, as a description within the text. Although not calendar texts in the strict sense, the prayer fragments are associated with the times for communal praise [→61 Liturgical texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. The first group includes: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q400–407; 11Q17; 1MasK [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]). Copied for more than one hundred years, the liturgy consists of thirteen songs associated with thirteen sabbaths of the year. Falk and others argue that this cycle was repeated throughout the year (Falk, 1998, pp. 126–54, esp. 137; Maier, 1992). Daily Prayers (4Q503) contains prayers to be recited in the evening and at sunrise and includes similar lunar data and terminology to 4Q317 and 4Q208–4Q209 (Baillet, 1982; Baumgarten, 1986; Schmidt, 2006; Ben-Dov, 2008, pp. 132–9; Penner, 2012, pp. 107–30; Jacobus, 2013b, pp. 72–5). 4QO rdo (4Q334) (‘Order of Divine Office’) is related to 4Q503 in its symbolic structure; there is a division among scholars as to its mathematical and calendrical interpretation (for background, see Penner, 2012, pp. 198–207).
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The second group comprises in the main: the Maskil’s Hymn – a doxology that includes a section specifying times of prayer within a longer composition in the Community Rule (1QS 9.26–10.17 // 4QS b [4Q256] 19, 20 // 4QS d [4Q258] 8, 10 // 4QS f [4Q260] 2–5; Alexander and Vermes, 1998; Falk, 1998, pp. 103–23) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. Both the Hymn and 4QO tot (see 4Q319 above) are concerned with units of time related to the calendar, albeit in different genres. The editors of the Cave 4 critical edition regard both works as possibly having different purposes, rather than one necessarily being a replacement for the other (Alexander and Vermes, 1998, p. 152). David’s Compositions (11QPsa 27) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] includes symbolic calendrical references to the 364-day year and also to the 360-day year (for evidence of the latter, see Aramaic Calendars above). It apparently omits the Temple Scroll festivals (Sanders, 1965; VanderKam, 1999; Maier, 1992; Wacholder, 1988; Falk, 1998, pp. 125–6; Ben-Dov, 2008, pp. 49–52). 11QApocryphal Psalms (11Q11) refers to the four cardinal days of the year, and begins at the autumn equinox (for background, see Pajunen, 2008; Fröhlich, 2013). Baillet also proposed that 4QFestival Prayers (4Q509) follows this quarterly structure although the evidence is fragmentary (Baillet, 1982, pp. 185, 177; Falk, 1998, pp. 157–73).
Conclusion The most striking feature of the calendrical corpus is the large amount of material and the variety of texts: documentary, liturgical and literary, many including intertextual elements. Within these very basic taxonomies the classification of the corpus is still undergoing refinement. The different purposes and questions of who used these texts and how remain ongoing research issues. Studies on the detailed technical structures of the Aramaic calendars, omitted from the standard hypotheses and editions on the Hebrew 364-Day Calendar Traditions (to reuse Glessmer’s terminology), is also continuing. The long-standing consensus theory that there was a theologically-driven calendrical schism dating from the early Hasmonean Period, is constantly being evaluated. One certain observation is that the diverse nature of this collection is unique in the ancient world. However it is defined, classified and understood by modern scholars, the corpus highlights the development of Early Jewish calendrical theology and the reception of calendars from the region. We learn that ancient Jews organised time around astronomical and liturgical demarcations, and the details of how they did this is the focus of our continuing attention.
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Duke, D. and Goff, M. (2016), ‘A Response to Eshbal Ratzon “Methodological Issues concerning the Astronomy of Qumran,” ’ DSD 23, 79–87. Falk, D. K. (1998), Daily, Sabbath and Festival Prayers in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 27. Leiden: Brill. Fitzmyer, J. (2000), ‘332. 4QH istorical Text D,’ in S. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al., Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 281–86. Fröhlich, I. (2013), ‘Magical healing at Qumran (11Q11) and the question of the calendar,’ in H. R. Jacobus, A-Katrine de Hemmer Gudme and P. Guillaume (eds), Studies on Magic and Divination in the Biblical World. Piscataway : Gorgias. García Martínez, F. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (1997 and 1998), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 Vols. Leiden: Brill. García Martínez, F., E. J. C Tigchelaar, and A. S. van der Woude (1998), Qumran Cave 11. II: 11Q2–18, 11Q20–31. DJD 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Glessmer, U. (1994), ‘Investigation of the Otot-text (4Q319) and questions about methodology,’ in M. Wise (ed.), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 722. New York: New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 429–40. Glessmer, U. (1996), ‘The Otot texts (4Q319) and the problem of intercalations in the context of the 364-day Calendar,’ in H.-J. Fabry, A. Lange, and H. Lichtenberger (eds), Qumranstudien: Vorträge und Beiträge der Teilnehmer des Qumranseminars auf dem internationalen Treffen der Society of Biblical Literature Münster, 25–26 Juli 1993. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 125–64. Glessmer, U. (1998–1999), ‘Calendars in the Qumran scrolls,’ in P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Comprehensive Assessment. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill, pp. 213–78. Glessmer, U. (2001), ‘4Q334. 4QO rdo,’ in S. Talmon, J. Ben-Dov, and U. Glessmer, Qumran Cave 4. XVI: Calendrical Texts. DJD 21. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 167–94. Greenfield, J., and M. Sokoloff (2000), ‘318. 4QZ odiology and Brontology ar’, in S. Pfann, P. Alexander et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4. XXVI : Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 259–74. Herr, M. D. (1976), ‘The Calendar,’ in S. Safrai and M. Stern (eds), The Jewish People in the First Century. CRINT II .1 Assen: Van Gorcum/Philadelphia: Fortress Press, pp. 834–64. Jacobus, H. R. (2010), ‘A Jewish zodiac calendar at Qumran 4Q318?,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90, Leiden: Brill, pp. 365–95. Jacobus, H. R. (2013a), ‘The Babylonian Lunar Three and the Qumran calendars of the priestly courses: A response.,’ RevQ 26, 21–51. Jacobus, H. R. (2013b), ‘Qumran calendars and the creation: A study of 4Q317 (4QcrypticA Lunisolar Calendar),’ JAJ 4, 48–104. Jacobus, H. R. (2014a), ‘Greco-Roman sundials and their links with a Qumran zodiac calendar (4Q208–4Q209),’ Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry 14, 67–81. Jacobus, H. R. (2014b), Zodiac Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls and their Reception: Ancient Astronomy and Astrology in Early Judaism. IJS 14. Leiden: Brill. Jacobus, H. R. (2015), ‘Calendars in the Qumran collection,’ in C. Wassen and S. White Crawford (eds), The Library of Qumran. STDJ 116; Leiden: Brill. Jacobus, H. R. (forthcoming), ‘Astral divination in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in A. C. Bowen and F. Rochberg (eds), Hellenistic Astronomy: The Science in Its Contexts. Leiden: Brill.
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Jaubert, A. (1953), ‘Le calendrier des Jubilés et de la secte de Qumran: Ses origines bibliques,’ VT 3, 250–64. Jaubert, A. (1957), ‘Le calendrier des Jubilés et les jours liturgiques de la semaine,’ VT 7, 35–61. Jaubert, A. (1965), The Date of the Last Supper. Trans. I. Rafferty. Staten Island, NY: Alba House. Lange, A and U. Mittman-Richert (2002), ‘Annotated list of the texts of the Judaean Desert classified by content and genre,’ in E. Tov et al. (eds), The Texts in the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon, pp. 115–64. Lichtenberger, H. (2003), ‘Ps 91 und die Exorzismen in 11QPsApa,’ in A. Lange, H. Lichtenberger, and K. F. Diethard (eds), Die Dämonen der israelitisch-jüdischen und frühchristlichen Literatur im Kontext ihrer Umwelt. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 416–21. Lim, T. (1992), ‘Chronology of the flood story in a Qumran text (4Q252),’ JJS 43, 288–98. Maier, J. (1992), ‘Shîrê ‘Ôlat hash-Shabbat: Some observations on their calendric implications and on their style,’ in J. Trebolle Barrera and L. Vegas Montaner (eds), The Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Madrid 18–21 March 1991. STDJ 11. Leiden: Brill, II : 543–60. Metso, S. (1997), The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule. STDJ 21. Leiden: Brill. Milik, J. T. (1976), The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Neugebauer, O. (1964), ‘Notes on Ethiopic astronomy,’ Orientalia NS 33, 49–71. Neugebauer, O. (1979), Ethiopic Astronomy and Computus. Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften philosophisch-historische Klasse 347. No. 22. Vienna: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Nickelsburg, G. W. and J. C. VanderKam (2004), 1 Enoch: A New Translation. Minneapolis: Fortress. Nitzan, B. (1994), Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry. Trans. J. Chipman. STDJ 12, Leiden: Brill. Olson, D. (1977), ‘4QD aily Prayers (4Q503=4QprQuot),’ in J. H. Charlesworth (ed.), Pseudepigraphic and Non-Masoretic Psalms and Prayers. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 235–85. Pajunen, M. S. (2008), ‘Qumranic Psalm 91: A structural analysis,’ in A. Voitila and J. Jokiranta (eds), Scripture in Transition: Essays on Septuagint, Hebrew Bible, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of Raija Sollamo. JSJS up 126. Leiden: Brill, pp. 591–606. Penner, J. (2012), Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Judaism. STDJ 104. Leiden: Brill. Pfann, S. J. (2001), ‘Cryptic A calendrical documents,’ in D. M. Gropp, M. Bernstein et al., Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh and Qumran Cave 4. XXVIII: Miscellanea, Part 2. DJD 28. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 52–62. Pfann, S. J. (2009), ‘A reassessment of Qumran’s calendars,’ Henoch 31, 104–10. Puech, É. (2000), ‘Les Psaumes davidiques du ritual d’exorcisme (11Q11),’ in D. K. Falk, F. García Martínez and E. M. Schuller (eds), Sapiential, Liturgical and Poetical Texts from Qumran: Proceedings of the International Organisation of Qumran Studies, Oslo, 1998. Published in Memory of Maurice Baillet. STDJ 35. Leiden: Brill, pp. 160–81. Qimron, E. and J. H. Charlesworth (1994), ‘Rule of the Community (1QS ; and 4QMSS A-J; 5Q11),’ in J. H. Charlesworth (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek Texts with English Translation. Rule of the Community and Related Texts. PTSDSSP 1. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 1–51.
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Qimron, E. and J. Strugnell (1994), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Maʿaśe ha-Torah. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ratzon, E. (2015a), ‘The gates cosmology of the Astronomical Book of Enoch,’ DSD 22, 93–112. Ratzon, E. (2015b), ‘Methodological issues concerning the astronomy of Qumran,’ DSD 22, 202–9. Ratzon, E. (2016), ‘Astronomy of Qumran: Further considerations,’ DSD 23, 88–95. Ratzon, E. (2017), ‘The first Jewish astronomers: Lunar theory and reconstruction of a Dead Sea Scroll,’ Science in Context 30, 113–39. Ratzon, E. and J. Ben-Dov (2017), ‘A newly constructed calendrical scroll from Qumran in cryptic script,’ JBL 136, 905–36. Sanders, J. A. (1965), The Psalms Scroll of Qumrân Cave 11 (11QPsa). DJD 4. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Saulnier, S. (2012), Calendrical Variations in Second Temple Judaism: New Perspectives on the Date of the Last Supper Debate. JSJS up 159. Leiden: Brill. Schmidt, F. (2006), ‘Le calendrier liturgique des prières quotidiennes (4Q503),’ in C. Grappe and J.-C. Ingelaere (eds), Le Temps et les Temps dans les littératures juives et chrétiennes au tourant de notre ère. JSJS up 112, Leiden: Brill, pp. 55–88. Stern, S. (2010), ‘Qumran calendars and sectarianism,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins (eds), Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, pp. 232–53. Talmon, S. (1951), ‘Yom hakkippurim in the Habakkuk Scroll,’ Biblica 32, 549–63. Talmon, S. (1958), ‘The calendar reckoning of the sect from the Judaean Desert,’ in C. Rabin and Y. Yadin (eds), Aspects of the Dead Sea Scrolls. ScrHier 4. Jerusalem: Magnes, pp. 162–99. Talmon, S. (1999), ‘The calendar controversy in Ancient Judaism: The case of the Community of the Renewed Covenant,’ in D. W. Parry and E. Ulrich (eds), The Provo International Conference on the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 30. Leiden: Brill, pp. 379–95. Talmon, S., J. Ben-Dov and U. Glessmer, (2001), Qumran Cave 4. XVI: Calendrical Texts. DJD 21. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Talmon, S., and J. Ben-Dov (2008), ‘Mišmarot lists (4Q322–324C) and “Historical Texts” (4Q4Q331–4Q333) in Qumran documents,’ in C. Cohen et al. (eds), Birkat Shalom: Studies in the Bible, Ancient Near Eastern Literature and Postbiblical Judaism Presented to Shalom M. Paul on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday. 2 vols. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, II : 927–42. Tigchelaar E. J. C. and F. García Martínez (2000), ‘4Q208–209. 4QA stronomical Enocha-b ar,’ in S. Pfann, P. S. Alexander et al., Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 95–171. Tov, E. (1994), ‘365. 4QR eworked Pentateuchc,’ in H. Attridge et al. (eds), Qumran Cave 4. VIII: Parabiblical Texts, Part 1. DJD 13. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 255–318. VanderKam, J. C. (1979), ‘The origin, character and early history of the 364-day solar calendar: A reassessment of Jaubert’s hypothesis,’ CBQ 41, 390–411. VanderKam, J. C. (1981), ‘2 Maccabees 6, 7a and calendrical change in Jerusalem,’ JJS 12, 52–74. VanderKam, J. C. (1997), ‘The calendar, 4Q327, and 4Q394,’ in M. Bernstein et al. (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organisation for Qumran Studies. Cambridge 1995. STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 179–94. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Measuring Time. London: Routledge.
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VanderKam, J. C. (1999), ‘Studies on David’s Compositions,’ Eretz-Israel 26, 212–20. VanderKam, J. C. (2012), ‘The Book of Luminaries,’ in G W. E. Nickelsburg and J. C. VanderKam (eds), 1 Enoch 2. Minneapolis: Fortress, pp. 334–575. Van der Ploeg, J. P. M. (1965), ‘Le psaume XCI dans une recension de Qumran,’ RevQ 72, 210–17. Wacholder, B.-Z. (1988), ‘David’s eschatological psalter (11QPsalms),’ HUCA 59, 23–72. Wacholder, B.-Z. and S. Wacholder (1995), ‘Patterns of biblical dates and Qumran’s calendar: The fallacy of Jaubert’s hypothesis,’ HUCA 66, 1–40. Wise, M. O. (1994a), Thunder in Gemini and Other Essays on the History, Language and Literature of Second Temple Palestine. JSPS up 15. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Wise, M. O. (1994b), ‘Second thoughts on dwq and the synchronistic calendar,’ in J. C. Reeves and J. Kampen (eds), Pursuing the Text: Festschrift in Honour of B. Z. Wacholder. JSOTS up 184. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 98–120.
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Wisdom Matthew Goff
The nature and characteristic of wisdom is a much debated and muddy topic. To provide clarity, it is important to distinguish between the term as a signifier of a text’s content and as a literary category. I address the first issue and then, in more depth, the second.
What Is Wisdom? Broadly speaking, wisdom (h.okmah) denotes what a good teacher has and what a good student wants – a desire to acquire knowledge and the ability to perceive the world accurately. The term ‘wisdom’ is used in manifold ways but is generally associated with life. A person with wisdom is able to predict outcomes and make good decisions, which leads to success, material stability and the ability to understand one’s place in the world. A wise individual is thus likely to lead a long, prosperous and fulfilling life. Proverbs envisions wisdom as both a woman and a tree of life, with long life in her right hand and wealth in the other (Prov. 3.16, 18). The book presupposes male student-addressees, for whom the conceptualization of wisdom as a woman would help foster a love and a desire for it. Wisdom can signify specific skills of a technical nature. The book of Exodus, for example, uses the term to assert that Bezalel and Oholiab are trained in various crafts, such as metalworking, wood carving and embroidery (Exod. 35.30–35; cf. 28.3; see Weeks, 2010, p. 2). Hiram of Tyre has ‘wisdom’ in working with bronze (1 Kgs 7.12). One of the major specific skills associated with wisdom is the ability to teach and impart knowledge. Ben Sira asserts that ‘the wisdom of the scribe increases wisdom’ (38.24). The office of scribe is understood not simply as a civil servant but more importantly as a teacher, who possesses the skill to teach and transmit wisdom. Woman wisdom in the book of Proverbs is likewise a teacher who conveys wisdom to her students (e.g. 8.1–2). ‘Wisdom’ can also denote specific types of knowledge. Solomon’s wisdom famously includes encyclopaedic knowledge of flora and fauna (1 Kgs 5.13 [Engl. 4.33]). The Hebrew of Sir. 38.2 indicates that the sage viewed the learning possessed by a medical doctor as God-given wisdom. The early rabbinic text Pirke Avot, which is in continuity with the sapiential tradition, affirms that ‘astronomy and geometry are like the savouries of wisdom’ (3.23). 449
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While wisdom is a human quality, God also possesses wisdom. This explains why the world is rational and that its patterns and regularity can be discerned by an intelligent person – the world was fashioned with wisdom when God created it. Prov. 3.19 famously asserts this point, as does 8.22–31, but the motif is not restricted to wisdom literature (see also Ps. 104.24; Jer. 10.12; 51.15). Compared to the Hebrew Bible, the Dead Sea Scrolls and other Early Jewish texts display continuity and departures with regard to the term ‘wisdom.’ The word can represent a pedagogical ideal, as in the Bible. In 4Q213 (4QA ramaic Levia) [→24 Aramaic Levi] Levi praises wisdom on his deathbed as something acquired through education that can help a person attain honour and long life, But now, reading and instruction and wisdom [teach them to your sons, and wisdom will be with you] for eternal honour [. . . Ev]ery . . . man who teaches wisdom, all [his days will be lengthened and multiplied will be his renown. 4Q213 1 i 9–10, 14–15; cf. 1 ii + 2 5–6, DSSSE
4QB eatitudes [→31 Beatitudes] begins, not unlike Proverbs, with a pedagogical prologue asserting that the goal of the composition is to help its intended audience ‘[to acqui]re wisdom and disci[pline,] to understand . . . to increase kn[owledge]’ (4Q525 1 1–3). The student-addressee is training to become a teacher. If he keeps at his studies he will eventually have his own students, who will mourn him when he dies (14 ii 14–16). Ben Sira [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Other] – attested in ancient Hebrew manuscripts from Qumran Cave 2 (2Q18], as part of the Qumran Psalms Scroll (11QPsalmsa) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] as well as more substantially from Masada (Mas1h) [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview] – includes several poems that praise wisdom (4.11–19; 6.18–37; 14.20– 15.10). The author understands it as something attained over time through study and discipline that will reward one with material success, knowledge and a fulfilling life, as in Proverbs. To a greater extent than the latter, Ben Sira associates wisdom with piety, using ‘the fear of the Lord’ and ‘wisdom’ as virtual synonyms (e.g. 1.14, 20; cf. 15.10; Prov. 1.7). As is well-known, he praises the Torah as a source of wisdom and hails biblical personages as models of virtue (chs 24, 44–9). In the Second Temple Period scripture and the national history of Israel enter into the wisdom tradition. 4QB eatitudes also attests this development, since the composition associates the Torah with wisdom (4Q525 2 ii + 3 3–4; see Uusimäki, 2016), as do Baruch (4.1) and Psalm 154 (11QPsa 18.3, 12). Several texts of the Dead Sea Scrolls, as in the Hebrew Bible, present wisdom as an attribute of God. The Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] states ‘God loves knowledge; he has established wisdom and counsel before him; prudence and knowledge are at his service’ (CD 2.3–4, DSSE ). The emphasis is not on ‘wisdom’ exclusively but rather on a group of roughly similar terms that all denote God’s intelligence and knowledge. The Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] frequently refer to God’s wisdom (e.g. 1QH 9.16, 21; 17.17). Second Temple Judaism attests numerous claims of access to divine knowledge through supernatural revelation [→66 Revelation]. Such disclosures can be signified by the term ‘wisdom.’ This usage is by no means limited to
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sapiential literature. It is a central idea, for example, in the apocalyptic text 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. The ‘Apocalypse of Weeks’ (1 En. 93.1–10 + 91.11–17) asserts that the elect shall receive an ‘eternal planting’ and ‘sevenfold wisdom and knowledge’ (4Q212 1 iv 13 [1 En. 93.10]). The precise meaning of these terms is obscure, but they denote the eschatological rewards of the elect [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The Treatise on the Two Spirits (1QS 3.13–4.26) [→47 Serek ha-Yahad; 74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East] likewise presents ‘wisdom’ as heavenly knowledge available to the elect. They can attain ‘knowledge of the Most High’ and, in parallelism, ‘wisdom of the sons of heaven,’ referring to the angels (1QS 4.22) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination].
What Is Wisdom Literature? Wisdom as a genre is conventionally defined as pedagogical literature, written by teachers for students that is eudemonistic, didactic and seeks to instil in them a love for learning and the acquisition of knowledge. Crenshaw’s definition remains influential: formally, wisdom consists of proverbial sentence, or instruction, debate, intellectual reflection; thematically, wisdom comprises self-evident intuitions about mastering life for human betterment, gropings after life’s secrets with regard to innocent suffering, grappling with finitude, and quest for truth concealed in the created order and manifested in a feminine persona. Crenshaw, 2010, p. 12
Typically, scholars begin with the presupposition that the Hebrew Bible contains wisdom texts – Proverbs, Job and Ecclesiastes – and then analyse these books to define the genre. The classification makes sense, in my view, as long as one acknowledges that the use of this category does not imply a rigid or highly formal conception of genre (Goff, 2010; Weeks, 2010, p. 305). The term ‘wisdom’ is prominent in these texts, but they do not use it to denote their genre. There is a possible exception in Ben Sira 51.30, where the phrase ‘the wisdom of Ben Sira’ may have ended this book, in what is probably a later addition. The coherence of wisdom as a literary category, despite the substantial differences in terms of theme and form among the texts so classified, lay in two basic factors: (1) reflecting a pedagogical context, they attempt to instil in students the intellectual capacity and desire to seek knowledge; and (2) they do so in a way that shows reliance upon and engagement with what one can call sapiential discourse, pedagogical traditions transmitted by teachers to students, as evident in literary forms, motifs and concepts that are preserved above all in the book of Proverbs, a repository of ancient Israelite pedagogical materials. Job and Ecclesiastes, for example, in different ways address and reflect upon specific passages and core themes of Proverbs. The specific literary forms mentioned above include the proverb, rhetorical questions and the beatitude. They are widely considered markers of the wisdom genre. These forms are not found exclusively in sapiential literature, but express the instructional intent prominent in wisdom texts.
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The coherence of wisdom as a genre in the biblical and Second Temple periods is at times sought by attributing the production of texts of this genre to the ‘sages’ (h.akāmim), learned men who were diplomats, advisors and teachers (Perdue, 2008; see also Lange, 2008). There was undoubtedly in ancient Israel a small learned class of individuals who could be classified as sages. But the education of such individuals was surely not restricted to what we call wisdom literature. They were likely familiar with and composed literature of multiple genres. The book of Daniel, for example, portrays Daniel as trained at the Babylonian court ‘in every branch of wisdom,’ emphasizing a range of subjects and literatures going beyond what we would designate as sapiential (Dan. 1.4). The Dead Sea Scrolls suggest that the coherence of wisdom literature should not be based upon composition within an upper-class scribal milieu. Of the texts unearthed at Qumran generally considered sapiential writings (see the list below), only 4QB eatitudes accords with the retainer class social setting of Ben Sira. 4QI nstruction-like Composition B (4Q424) is written to an individual of means but he is not in training to become a scribe (Goff, 2007, pp. 179–97). 4Q Instruction [→38 Instruction] emphasizes the poor and economically humble status of its addressee, suggesting that he is not an upper-class scribe. While wisdom literature is certainly a construct developed by modern readers, it is not completely an invention imposed upon the material. Ancient authors do attest an awareness of sapiential literature, although it is not one that is precise or rigid. Josephus, in his well-known summary of the Bible, states that after the law and the prophets are four additional books that contain hymns ‘and precepts for the conduct of human life’ (Ag. Ap. 1.40). He had some understanding, however vague, of a category of scripture that roughly approximates our designation ‘wisdom literature.’ The teachings and education of Ben Sira reflect extensive engagement with the book of Proverbs. His composition suggests that in the late Second Temple Period sapiential traditions that derive from Proverbs were transmitted which were important in the training of scribes and teachers. The study of sapiential literature in this era has traditionally been hampered by a lack of evidence. Until recently only one Hebrew wisdom text was available between the time of composition of the Bible and the Mishnah – Ben Sira [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. The Dead Sea Scrolls have contributed to – and complicated – the issue considerably. It is common to regard the following material as sapiential literature: 4QI nstruction (1Q26, 4Q415–418, 423); Mysteries (1Q27, 4Q299– 300, 301?) [→42 Mysteries], Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184) [→53 Wiles of the Wicked Woman], Wisdom Composition (4Q185), CryptA Words of the Maskil to All Sons of Dawn (4Q298), Sapiential-Didactic Work A (4Q412), Ways of Righteousness (4Q420–421), Instruction-like Composition B (4Q424) and Beatitudes (4Q525) [→31 Beatitudes]. This list follows the texts covered in John Kampen’s recent commentary on Qumran wisdom literature (Kampen, 2011). Scholars have been justly intrigued by these writings and there has been a copious amount of scholarship on them in recent years, in particular on 4QI nstruction (Goff, 2009). The emergence of these ‘new’ sapiential texts makes it possible to refer to the wisdom literature of Early Judaism, over against that of the Hebrew Bible [→12 Scrolls and Early Judaism]. But new opportunities lead to new problems. Before one can speculate on the nature of wisdom
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as a genre in the Scrolls, one faces a serious problem – which texts should be so classified? Which writings should be considered wisdom texts in order to assess the nature of wisdom literature discovered at Qumran? The agreement as to which books should be studied to approach the question in the Hebrew Bible is not replicated in the Scrolls. For example, the two volumes of the series Discoveries in the Judean Desert devoted to wisdom texts (vols 20 and 34) include most but not all texts enumerated above (Elgvin et al., 1997; Strugnell and Harrington, 1999). They do not contain, for example, 4Q184, 4Q185, 4Q424 and 4Q525 but also include several smaller texts that are not in Kampen’s survey (4Q302, 4Q303–5, 4Q411, 4Q413, 4Q425, 4Q426). The classification of sapiential texts in DJD 39 is somewhat different from that of vol. 20 (and Kampen), including the Treatise on the Two Spirits [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East] and omitting 4Q420–21 (Lange and Mittmann-Richert, 2002, p. 140). A universally agreed upon list of wisdom texts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls is not possible because of the subjective nature of the criteria used to make the identification. People can argue that this or that text should be considered sapiential. Drawnel has done so, for example, with regard to the Aramaic Levi Document (Drawnel, 2004) [→24 Aramaic Levi]. Since a comprehensive list of Qumran wisdom texts is not available, I will focus on the texts that are widely regarded as our best examples of the category. In this regard 4QI nstruction dominates, but there is also no dispute that, for example, 4QS apiential Work (4Q185), 4QI nstruction-like Composition B (4Q424) or 4QB eatitudes (4Q525) are sapiential texts. From this perspective the corpus offers two major contributions to our understanding of the Second Temple sapiential tradition. One, the wisdom texts discovered at Qumran confirm the view, long evident from Ben Sira and the Wisdom of Solomon, that in the Second Temple Period the sapiential tradition incorporated the Torah and the national traditions of Israel, whereas biblical wisdom shows relatively little interest in these topics (the attribution of Proverbs to Solomon being a significant exception). For example, 4Q185 urges one not to defy the words of God, a reference to Torah obedience, and holds up Jacob and Isaac as models to emulate (1–2 ii 3–4). Also, several of the Qumran wisdom texts reformulate and interpret biblical verses. This is the case in 4QI nstruction, which reflects extensive engagement with Genesis 1–3 (4Q416 2 iv; 4Q423 1). Two, the corpus demonstrates that the sapiential and apocalyptic traditions could become intertwined to an extent not heretofore realized. This is most evident in 4QI nstruction and the book of Mysteries. 4QI nstruction, a lengthy composition, is the best example available of a sapiential text with an apocalyptic view. In terms of literary form, the work is clearly a wisdom text. It contains didactic instructions addressed to a student, who is constantly referred to as a mebin (‘understanding one’). He is encouraged to study and acquire knowledge, as in Proverbs and Ben Sira, and the instruction often addresses practical topics such as marriage and debts, again in continuity with traditional wisdom. But, in a striking departure from Proverbs, 4QI nstruction repeatedly urges its addressee to study the raz nihyeh, an enigmatic phrase that occurs over twenty times in the composition which can be translated ‘the mystery that is to be’ [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. It is the means by which one obtains wisdom. 4Q417 1 i 6–7, for example, affirms ‘[day and night meditate upon the mystery that] is to be and
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study (it) constantly. And then you will know truth and iniquity, wisdom and folly.’ This constitutes an appeal to supernatural revelation that is alien to Proverbs but fully in keeping with the apocalyptic tradition. The term raz denotes revealed heavenly knowledge in Daniel and 1 Enoch (e.g. Dan. 2.27–30; 4QE nc 5 ii 26–27 [1 En. 106.19]) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. The theme of supernatural revelation in 4QI nstruction is somewhat different from what one finds in the apocalypses. In the apocalypses Daniel and 4 Ezra, for example, the reader in a sense peers over the shoulder of the seer as he observes a cryptic vision which is explained to him by an angel (e.g. Dan. 7.23–27; 4 Ezra 13.21–50). 4QI nstruction, by contrast, contains no accounts of visions and there is no angelus interpretus. The focus is not on the disclosure of the raz nihyeh but rather on the need to contemplate it. The mebin acquires wisdom not from the revelation itself but from studying it. This pedagogical imperative helps establish the composition’s classification as a wisdom text. The mystery that is to be remains, well, mysterious, but God created the world by it (4Q417 1 i 8–9; cf. Prov. 3.19). The raz nihyeh signifies God’s dominion and mastery over the world, presented to the addressee as a revealed truth. 4QI nstruction also urges one to be mindful of the eschatological judgement (4Q416 1; 4Q418 69 ii), a theme that resonates more with apocalypticism than traditional wisdom. The composition can be understood as the exemplar of a current or stream within the Early Jewish wisdom tradition that is characterized by extensive influence from the apocalyptic tradition [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The book of Mysteries and the Treatise on the Two Spirits can likewise be characterized as wisdom texts that have prominent themes that accord more with the apocalypses than biblical wisdom, such as revelation, eschatology and determinism [→66 Revelation]. Ben Sira can be understood as representative of another trajectory of the wisdom tradition that is characterized by extensive mingling of the sapiential and covenantal traditions. Mysteries and the Treatise, while they can be used to discern the influence of apocalypticism on the wisdom tradition, also illustrate some of the inherent problems in the study of the sapiential literature uncovered at Qumran. Each of these compositions can reasonably be designated as a wisdom composition, but the identification is not clear-cut in either case. The Treatise is clearly pedagogical, written by a teacher (the Maskil) to students (1QS 3.13). Utilizing the criteria for understanding wisdom literature discussed above, in terms of function and form the text can be understood as sapiential. But the Treatise never incorporates the practical advice of Proverbs or major themes of the book such as the personification of wisdom. It does not appear to be in conversation with sapiential discourse represented by Proverbs. Considering the Treatise a wisdom text requires acknowledgement that it has little to do with traditional wisdom. This is also the case with Mysteries, which contains a prominent scene of eschatological judgement but has relatively little in common with biblical wisdom literature. Both compositions can be understood as drawing from sapiential discourse not on the basis of their affinity with Proverbs but rather with 4QI nstruction and its extensive points of contact with both texts in terms of theme and terminology (Goff, 2007, pp. 74–82). Texts like Mysteries force us not simply to incorporate the ‘new’ information from the Dead Sea Scrolls into our existing knowledge of the wisdom tradition. The Scrolls
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require us to re-examine our categories of genre and how we use them. While the wisdom label has value for highlighting the pedagogical content, one should also acknowledge the limits of the sapiential designation and that our means of identifying such texts are inherently subjective and somewhat loose. The diversity of the wisdom corpus from Qumran is conspicuous, raising the question of whether the texts included in it should be classified together at all. The wisdom texts discovered at Qumran do not stem from a single scribal milieu, as mentioned above, but rather have a diversity of social settings. In terms of theme, while 4QI nstruction, Mysteries and the Treatise are highly eschatological, assertions of final judgement are surprisingly infrequent in the rest of the sapiential corpus from Qumran, as are appeals to supernatural revelation. In this regard 4QI nstruction is not particularly representative of the wisdom literature unearthed at Qumran. Moreover, traditional markers of sapiential literature are conspicuously absent or muted. Solomon makes virtually no appearance in the wisdom texts from Qumran, and this corpus contains no lengthy collection of proverbs. It is also striking that the material includes no vivid or prominent depiction of Woman Wisdom, in contrast to Proverbs, Ben Sira and the Wisdom of Solomon. The common thread among the Qumran wisdom texts, as John Collins has stressed, is that they are instructional (Collins, 1997, p. 281). Since many other writings are instructional (including the Torah itself), I have suggested that we slightly refine this claim. The wisdom texts are profitably designated as ‘noetic,’ meaning that they are not only devoted to instruction on particular topics but also endeavour to instil in their addressees a desire to seek and strive for understanding (Goff, 2010, p. 298). That, and discernment of a text’s substantial engagement with sapiential discourse, provide a valid basis for understanding wisdom literature as a literary category and provide some direction in terms of classifying a given text as sapiential. Current scholarship on genre emphasizes that literary classification is a construct of the reader intended to give meaning to a diverse body of texts (Newsom, 2005). It is certainly true that the classification of Qumran texts is a modern enterprise. But it would be rash to understand the placement of texts into generic categories solely as a product of the modern reader. Texts such as Ben Sira and 4QI nstruction are reasonably understood as written by authors who were steeped in a pedagogical tradition that is represented by the book of Proverbs. There is no evidence, however, that they understood their writings or their pedagogical heritage in terms of rigid definitions and exacting literary structures. The sapiential texts that emerged from the Dead Sea Scrolls teach us that our project, as students of wisdom, is not to develop a fixed definition of the wisdom genre but rather to engage in discussions on how to approach the topic and evaluate which texts should be classified in this way, all the while frankly admitting a basic fact: our means of identifying sapiential texts, and our assessment of what that means, are subjective and rather imprecise.
Bibliography Crenshaw, J. L. (2010), Old Testament Wisdom: An Introduction. 3rd ed. Louisville: Westminster John Knox.
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Collins, J. J. (1997), ‘Wisdom reconsidered, in light of the Scrolls,’ DSD 4, 265–81. Drawnel, H. (2004), An Aramaic Wisdom Text from Qumran: A New Interpretation of the Levi Document. JSJS up 86. Leiden: Brill. Elgvin, T., et al. (1997), Qumran Cave 4. XV: Sapiential Texts, Part 1. DJD 20. Oxford: Clarendon Press. García Martínez, F. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (1998), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Goff, M. J. (2003), The Worldly and Heavenly Wisdom of 4QInstruction. STDJ 50. Leiden: Brill. Goff, M. J. (2007), Discerning Wisdom: The Sapiential Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. VTS 116. Leiden: Brill. Goff, M. J. (2009), ‘Recent trends in the study of Early Jewish wisdom literature: The contribution of 4QI nstruction and other Qumran texts,’ CurBR 7, 376–416. Goff, M. J. (2010), ‘Qumran wisdom literature and the problem of genre,’ DSD 17, 286–306. Kampen, J. (2011), Wisdom Literature. Eerdmans Commentaries on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Lange, A. (2008), ‘Sages and scribes in the Qumran literature,’ in L. G. Perdue (ed.), Scribes, Sages, and Seers in the Eastern Mediterranean World. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 271–93. Lange, A. and U. Mittmann-Richert (2002), ‘Annotated list of the texts from the Judaean Desert classified by content and genre,’ in E. Tov (ed.), The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon Press, pp. 115–64. Newsom, C. A. (2005), ‘Spying out the land: A report from genology,’ in R. L. Troxel, K. G. Friebel and D. R. Magary (eds), Seeking Out the Wisdom of the Ancients: Essays Offered to Honor Michael V. Fox on the Occasion of His Sixty-Fifth Birthday. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, pp. 437–50. Perdue, L. G. (2008), The Sword and the Stylus: An Introduction to Wisdom in the Age of Empires. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Strugnell, J. and D. J. Harrington (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XXIV: Sapiential Texts, Part 2. 4QInstruction (Mûsār Lĕ Mēbîn): 4Q415ff. With a re-edition of 1Q26. DJD 34. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Uusimäki, E. (2016), Turning Proverbs towards Torah: An Analysis of 4Q525. STDJ 117. Leiden: Brill. Weeks, S. (2010), An Introduction to the Study of Wisdom Literature. London: T&T Clark.
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Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination Gideon Bohak
The people who wrote and collected the Qumran Dead Sea Scrolls were neither mystics nor magicians. They were a group of apocalyptically-minded Jews, who were convinced that they were witnessing the unfolding of the great drama that would soon culminate in God’s final intervention in history [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. In that climactic event a group designated as the Sons of Light would finally be vindicated, and the rest of humanity, who are called the sons of darkness, will be punished. This eschatological and dualistic mindset [→74 Ethics and Dualism; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East] is the main intellectual agendum behind their peculiar social structure and behind most of the texts they produced or collected, and it is a mindset that is not necessarily mystical, nor especially conducive to an interest in and practice of magic and divination. And yet, like most Jews of the Second Temple Period, the Dead Sea sectarians believed in the existence of angels, demons and a plethora of other invisible beings who resided both in heaven and on earth [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Like many other Jews, they were curious to know more about the world of angels and God’s heavenly realms, but for them this interest had a peculiar twist, since they were convinced that they had a certain affinity with God’s angels. And like many other Jews, they were afraid of malevolent demons, of ‘angels of destruction,’ and of other evil spirits, and sought to expel them, but from their perspective the war against these invisible forces was also a part of a wider war, that between the Sons of Light and their human and demonic opponents. In speaking of (good) angels versus (evil) demons, we should bear in mind the sectarian group’s own terminology was much more complex and included numerous types of good and evil angels and spirits, and several different types of demonic beings. Moreover, because they were convinced that many hidden secrets were revealed to them, or at least to their Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography], the Dead Sea sectarians assumed that both in their dealings with angels and in their dealings with demons and evil spirits they had access to secrets and to powers that were not readily available to other Jews. Our knowledge of the sectarians’ interest in angels, demons, celestial secrets and terrestrial divination comes mostly from the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philo, who describes the Essenes in some detail (see Vermes and Goodman, 1989, pp. 19–31) speaks of their communal worship, their exegesis of the ancestral laws, their mode of instruction by means of symbols, and many other issues, but not about their infatuation with angels, 457
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demons and secret revelations [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo]. Josephus, in his detailed descriptions of the Essenes and in his many references to them throughout his works (see Vermes and Goodman, 1989, pp. 34–57), has much to say about their prayer habits, their communal meals, their study of the ancestral writings, and so on, but relatively little to say about their interest in things relating to mysticism, magic and divination [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]. In one passage (War 2.136) he notes that the Essenes scrutinize the ancient texts in search of roots and stones that are useful for healing and for protection. In another passage (War 2.159), he says that because of their interest in the holy books and the words of the prophets some Essenes have become experts in accurately foretelling the future. This claim is further amplified by his stories of how in 104 bce Judas the Essene, who always accurately foretold the future, correctly predicted when and where Aristobolus I would die (War 1.78–80; Ant. 13.311–313), how in the late 60s bce Manaemus the Essene correctly foretold to Herod that he would one day be the king of the Jews and in the 30s bce correctly foretold that Herod would rule for many years (Ant. 15.373–378), and how in 6 ce Simon the Essene predicted King Archelaus’s future by correctly interpreting the king’s dream (War 2.113; Ant. 17.345–348). But other than these references, Josephus has little to say about those aspects of the Essenes’ worldview that interest us here, and we are left with the evidence that may be culled from the Dead Sea Scrolls themselves. In surveying this evidence, we shall look at three different topics, namely, the Qumranites’ dealings with mysticism, with magic and with divination. In each of these cases, we shall note that the search for relevant materials in the Qumran library is in part determined by how we define what we mean by the terms we use, which are in no way obvious. And in each case, we shall look for the most important and best preserved textual evidence, and mostly ignore the speculative reconstructions of badly-preserved fragments which were offered by some scholars. Finally, although the question of the relations between the Qumran materials and later Jewish mysticism, magic and divination will resurface in all three sections, this is a question that deserves a detailed study of its own, that shall not be attempted here (and cf. Swartz, 2001).
Mysticism If there is one thing that is clear from even a cursory reading of the Dead Sea Scrolls, it is that their authors, collectors and readers were infatuated with the notion of ‘mysteries.’ Most commonly, these were secrets which were revealed to the Qumranites themselves, but apparently were unknown to all those who did not belong to their exclusive sect (for a typical passage, see 1QS 8.10–14) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. This image is corroborated by Josephus’ frequent references to the secrecy shrouding the Essenes’ communal gatherings and special doctrines, which they may divulge to no one who is not a full member of their community (see, e.g. War 2.129, 138, 141–142). From a sociological point of view, we can easily see how the shared knowledge of profound secrets was one of the bonds uniting the sectarians to each other. We can also see why one major component of the secrets shared by them was the true knowledge about the world, about God’s plans for the End of Time (as divulged, for example, by the biblical
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prophets, but misunderstood by most of their readers), and about their own special role within that secret plan. Looking at the possible history of such a mindset, we may note the biblical notion of the prophet as having access to God’s secret plans, and especially the recurrence in Second Temple Period Jewish literature of a discourse of apocalyptic (literally, the ‘uncovering,’ i.e. of hidden secrets) revelations to Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts], to Noah [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] and to the pseudepigraphic ‘authors’ of many of the extant Jewish writings of the Second Temple Period. This discourse was frowned upon by some Jews (see, most famously, Ben Sira 3. 21–24 [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 63 Wisdom]), but celebrated by many others. And in the Qumran community, it surely reached its climax, when theological ideas and social realia were fused into a peculiar sectarian mix (see Thomas, 2009) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community; 73 Daily Life]. And yet, an infatuation with secrets, and a developed discourse of esotericism, are in no way tantamount to mysticism. Thus, the search for mysticism in Qumran has tended to focus on two distinct issues (Alexander, 2006, chapters 2 and 3, respectively; Davila, 2010). First, on the Qumranites’ frequent depictions of the heavenly realms and the angelic liturgy, especially in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice; 61 Liturgical Texts], and second, on the far less frequent references to what might be seen as human apotheosis or angelification, especially in the so-called Self-Glorification Hymn [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 37 Hodayot]. Let us briefly look at each of these texts, and then ask whether the evidence they provide suffices to speak of mysticism in Qumran. The first, and in many ways easier text is the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, found in nine scrolls from Qumran (4Q400–407, 11Q17), and one from Masada (Mas1k) [→3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. This text might be of sectarian origin, but even this is far from certain, since it hardly uses the typical sectarian terminology of the Yahad (see Newsom, 1985, pp. 1–4, 61– 72). The text is badly preserved, but its structure is clear. It consists of thirteen hymns, one for each of the Sabbaths of the first quarter of the 364-day solar calendar that is promoted in a number of texts from Qumran, but also by non-sectarian texts such as Jubilees [→60 Poetry and Hymns; 62 Calendars; 25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. Each hymn has a fairly standard opening formula, an appeal to bless God, and descriptions of the angels’ service in the heavenly temple, including detailed accounts of both the physical structure and the liturgical and cultic activities carried out inside it [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. And yet, while the Songs clearly display a great interest in the celestial temple, in angels, in the celestial liturgy and in a host of related themes, such an interest need not imply a mystical mindset, since it is paralleled, even if to a lesser degree, in some of the apocalyptic and related texts of the Second Temple Period (e.g. 1 En. 14.8– 25). Moreover, while there is no doubt that the Songs display a keen interest in issues that would be of great interest to the Hekhalot mystics several centuries later, the question of a direct continuity between the two corpora remains contested (see, for example, Mizrahi, 2009, and Schäfer, 2010), and is in any case not entirely relevant to the question at hand. After all, there is a clear trajectory leading from some Second Temple apocalyptic texts to the Hekhalot literature (see Gruenwald, 1980), but this
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trajectory does not imply that both corpora belong in the same literary genre, or reflect similar ritual activities, or go back to similar social circles. Thus, the interest in the celestial temple and its worship, which is of great importance in the Songs and of some importance in the Hekhalot literature, certainly does not suffice to use the obvious mystical nature of the latter texts as a peg on which to hang the former. A second issue that remains in doubt with regards to the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice concerns the function of these hymns. They are assigned to specific sabbaths, and presumably were supposed to be recited each on its specified sabbath, but they are also titled la-maskil, i.e. ‘of ’ or ‘for’ the sectarian leader known as the Maskil, or ‘instructor.’ This might imply his postulated authorship of the hymns, but is more likely to imply that they were to be recited by him. They may, of course, have been intended for communal recitation, as is assumed by some scholars, but this is nowhere stated in the Songs themselves, and other Qumran hymns with the same title (including Songs of the Maskil [4Q510–511], to be discussed below) certainly were not intended to serve as communal liturgy [→61 Liturgical Texts]. Regardless of how exactly the Songs functioned within the Qumran community, the large number of manuscripts of this work found at Qumran clearly demonstrate their importance for that community. Moreover, the great interest in the angelic liturgy should certainly be read in conjunction with the statements found in explicitly sectarian scrolls about the Sons of Light’s communion with the angels, with whom they join in the same yahad (e.g. 1QHa 11.22–24; 19.13–17 [→37 Hodayot]; 1QS 11.7–8 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 1QS b 4.24–26 [→45 Rule of Blessings]). Thus, we may certainly speak of a unio liturgica between men and angels in the Qumran community, but such a religious conceit should in no way be equated with a mystical experience. After all, a few centuries later the rabbis would insist that whenever ten persons, or even five, or three, or two or even one person sits and studies Torah, the Shekhinah is right there with them/him (m. Avot 3.6). Thus, if the Qumranites were merely praying with angels, the rabbis were studying Torah with the Divine Presence itself! The rabbis would also insist that the study of Torah is a blissful experience, which they even compare to the joy of sex (e.g. in b. Eruv. 54b). And yet, it would be extremely rash to speak of the rabbis as mystics, or of their study of Torah as a mystical activity. In the same manner, the Qumranites’ unio liturgica is worthy of our scholarly attention, but should not be equated with mysticism. If the contents of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice are clear enough, the same cannot be said of the Self-Glorification Hymn found at Qumran in four copies, which represent two different recensions (4Q491c, 4Q471b, 4Q427 7 i–9 and 1QH a 26.6–16). Here, we have the first-person account of someone who seems to be a human figure, but who also boasts that he is reckoned among the angels, dwells in their holy council, and is immune to the temptations to which human beings fall prey. The speaker seems to contrast his exalted status with his being despised before, and with the great sufferings he had to bear, apparently before being vindicated among the angels. Unfortunately, the hymn is too broken to allow for a full reconstruction of the identity of the first-person speaker who is supposed to be making these boasts, and this has enabled some scholars to turn it into the testimony of a Qumran mystic, who relates the results of his ascent to heaven (Alexander, 2006, pp. 85–90). This, however, is a very
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speculative reconstruction, and seems far less likely than the suggestion that the speaker is either the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography], or the Eschatological High Priest whose arrival the Qumranites were fervently expecting (and see Eshel, 1999) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. In such a case, the figure’s elevation to the angelic council has nothing to do with his hypothetical mystical experiences, and much to do with his role in the expected eschatological scenario. But even here, no certainty is possible, and other interpretations of the hymn’s ‘I’ are being offered all the time (e.g. Miller, 2009). One such interpretation, that it is the personification of Wisdom who is speaking here (Kister, forthcoming), could re-open the whole question of whether this text is even relevant for the study of mysticism at Qumran, and strengthen the possibility that it is not. What, then, should be our verdict with regard to the evidence of mysticism among the Dead Sea Scrolls? The answer, I believe, depends first and foremost on how we define ‘mysticism.’ If, for example, we begin from William James’ famous characterization of the mystical experience as ineffable, but at the same time noetic (i.e. it makes the mystic feel he ‘knows’ something he had not known before), transient and passive (James, 1902, pp. 380–1), we would soon be forced to claim that there is no real evidence of mystical experiences at Qumran. I am, of course, fully aware of the many critiques of James’ analysis of the mystical experience, and of the availability of many other definitions of Jewish mysticism (see, for example, Schäfer, 2009, pp. 1–26, 353–5 and Vârtejanu-Joubert, 2009, esp. pp. 26–7). But regardless of which definition we adopt, either we will not find much mysticism at Qumran, or we will find it in almost every corpus of ancient Jewish texts. The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice become virtually irrelevant here, since they describe heavenly realms, but are not said to be the product of mystical experiences, and the claim that their recitation could have led to mystical experiences flies in the face of their very rigid calendrical settings. Are we to imagine the Qumran community’s billboard carrying advertisements such as ‘Next Saturday, 7am and 5pm, communal prayers with the Maskil; be sure to come, mystical experiences guaranteed, angelification possible!’? In this respect, the Self-Glorification Hymn could be more relevant, if it indeed conveys the words of a member of the sect who has undergone a process of angelification. This, however, is not the most plausible reading of the Hymn, and even if we choose to accept it, there is no indication in the text itself that the process was the result of some ineffable, transient experience, which overpowered the narrator and at the end of which he realized that he now had a whole new status. From a Jamesian perspective, there is no evidence for mysticism at Qumran. But even if we adopt the model of mysticism offered by Philip Alexander, which lays stress on the centrality of experience, the desire for communion, or even union, with the divine, and the importance of the via mystica (see Alexander, 2006), we would be forced to admit that the interpretation of the Scrolls from Qumran as fitting that model is based on a very circular line of reasoning. This is evident both in the search for an experience, which is not really there in the texts from Qumran, and in the search for a via mystica, which necessitates a slanted reading of the Qumranites’ admittedly peculiar way of life. This via was not geared towards the generation of mystical experiences, but was intended to assure the playing out of the sectarians’ predestined role at the End of Time, whose
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unfolding they were seeing all around them. It is, of course, quite possible that the Qumranites’ physical isolation [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], frugal eating habits [→73 Daily Life], fear of impurity [→70 Purity and Holiness] and evil spirits, and peculiar liturgical cycles [→61 Liturgical Texts] all served as a breeding ground for individual mystical experiences. And yet, both the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Second Temple Period descriptions of the Essenes are completely silent on this score. Given the large quantity of texts clearly produced by the Qumran sectarians to which we now have access, the absence of any clearly mystical texts is yet another argument against thinking of the Yahad as a mystical society, given to bouts of ecstatic ascent on a weekly basis.
Magic Regardless of how we define ‘magic,’ we will find very few ‘magical’ texts at Qumran (for a fuller discussion of Jewish magic in the Second Temple Period, including the Dead Sea Scrolls, see Bohak, 2008, pp. 70–142). Whether we look for medicinal magic (which, as we saw, is mentioned by Josephus as an issue in which the Essenes were greatly interested), for erotic magic, for aggressive magic, for magic intended to assure rainfall, to increase agricultural productivity, or to find lost treasures, we will find almost no such interests in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Moreover, when we look for the most basic unit of the Jewish magical tradition of later periods, namely, the magical recipe, we will find none in the Dead Sea Scrolls (with a single possible exception, to be mentioned below). And yet, there was one type of magical activity in which the Qumranites did display their great interest, namely the warding off of demons and evil spirits. This is something which was of great interest to many Jews in the Second Temple Period, but which received a special twist within the Qumranites’ peculiar worldview (see Nitzan, 1994, pp. 227–72; Alexander, 1997; García Martínez, 2002; Eshel, 2003). To see how this is reflected in their library, we will look at three relevant texts. The first of these exorcistic manuals is 11QApocryphal Psalms (11Q11), a set of several exorcistic hymns, at least some of which are pseudepigraphically attributed to King David (see Bohak, 2013), and the last of which is a revised version of the biblical Psalm 91. In these hymns, which display none of the sectarian terminology typical of the Qumranites’ own compositions, we find long series of taunts and threats hurled against the demons, often in the second person singular. One of these taunts, ‘Who are you, born from the seed of man and from the seed of the holy ones; your face is the face of nothingness (?) and your horns are horns of a dream (?),’ re-emerges in a somewhat different version in several incantation bowls of late-antique Babylonia, and in a remarkably close version in a magical recipe book of the eleventh century from the Cairo Genizah (Bohak, 2012). This textual continuity lends further support to the assumption of a non-sectarian origin of this text, and demonstrates the wide circulation of such texts among Jewish exorcists from the Second Temple Period to the Middle Ages. A second exorcistic manual, found in two copies (Songs of the Maskil [4Q510– 511]), is far more sectarian in terminology and outlook. Its hymns are recited by the Maskil, and contain much praise of God, the aim of which is, among other things, to frighten and drive away all evil spirits, and especially those that seek to mislead the
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sect’s members into error. Here, in other words, the fight against demons is not just that of the ordinary Jew of the time, afraid of malevolent spirits who might harm his body, his family or his possessions, but that of the Sons of Light, ranged against their human and demonic opponents and doing whatever they can in order to ward them off. The third exorcistic text from Qumran (4QE xorcism [4Q560]) differs from the other two in that it is written in Aramaic, and not in Hebrew [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. It clearly refers to several different types of demons, and to the harm they cause to different parts of the human body, and seems to have been intended to serve as an exorcism against toothache. Given its poor state of preservation, it is impossible to say whether this was a single exorcistic spell, a collection of such spells, or a full-blown magical recipe book, as was suggested by Joseph Naveh (1998). If this last interpretation is correct, it would be the earliest evidence we have of Jewish magical recipe books, pre-dating all the other evidence by almost half a millennium. If it is not, 4Q560 would join 11Q11 as another set of non-sectarian exorcistic hymns and spells found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and proving the Qumranites’ great interest in this specific genre. Looking at all three examples, we may note that exorcism is a practice that most modern scholars would normally classify as ‘magic.’ However, it must be stressed that from the Qumranites’ own perspective exorcism clearly was not seen as a magical activity, since the practice of magic was forbidden by the Hebrew Bible (e.g. Exod. 22.17 and Deut. 18.10–11), and this prohibition was repeated in some of the texts used by the sectarians themselves (11QTa 60.16–21 [→51 Temple Scroll]; Lange, 1997, pp. 408–22; Brooke, 2003). What label the Qumranites would have given to their practice of exorcism we cannot really say, but if we choose to speak of this as a ‘magical’ activity, we must always recall that it is our modern conceptions of ‘magic’ that make us classify it as such (Lyons and Reimer, 1998).
Divination As we saw above, Josephus has little to say about the Essenes’ interest in things that we might classify as ‘mysticism’ or as ‘magic,’ but much more to say about their expertise in divination, and especially in accurately foretelling the future. Some of that expertise clearly was due to an accurate interpretation of the biblical prophecies, a practice that is well documented in the Scrolls (and especially in the pesharim [→44 Pesharim]), but falls outside the scope of what we would classify as ‘divination.’ But sifting through the Dead Sea Scrolls, we find several fragments that point to an interest in technical literature of divination, which is entirely unrelated to the biblical texts. One clear example is offered by 4QZ odiology and Brontology (4Q318), which contains two separate but related texts (Greenfield and Sokoloff, 1995; Jacobus, 2010). The first is a selendromion, i.e. an attempt to chart the passing of the moon through the twelve signs of the zodiac, by listing in which sign it is found on each day of the year [→62 Calendars]. The second is a brontologion, that is, a listing of what is foretold by a thunder that occurs (when the moon is?) in each of the zodiacal signs. Very little of the second text is preserved, but it is clear that both texts are not sectarian in origin, and
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are likely of a non-Jewish origin, ultimately going back to the Babylonian scientific tradition (see Pingree’s appendix in Greenfield and Sokoloff, 1995) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. In fact, this is one of the first examples of the entry of ‘secular’ Aramaic scientific texts into the Jewish world, a phenomenon that will recur in the Cairo Genizah (see Greenfield and Sokoloff, 1989; Bohak and Geller, 2013; Bohak, 2016), and one of the earliest pieces of evidence for the Jewish interest in astrology (Leicht, 2006). A second divinatory text from Qumran is 4QP hysiognomy (4Q561), an Aramaic text which lists the physiognomic features of different people, perhaps with an attempt to tell their spiritual qualities from their bodily signs, although the preserved fragments do not allow for any certainty on this issue (Popović, 2007, pp. 54–67). More instructive is a physiognomic/astrological text, 4QZ odiacal Physiognomy (4Q186), which is written in Hebrew in a variously encrypted script [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls], and lists the physiognomic features of different persons and their spirit in the house of light and in the house of darkness. This has been interpreted by some scholars as a sign of the text’s sectarian origins and purpose, namely, to test from a newcomer’s appearance whether he really belongs with the Sons of Light or not (Alexander, 1996), but by others as astrological technical terms, that have nothing to do with the sectarian terminology (Popović, 2007, pp. 132–71). No consensus seems to have been reached on this point, but the least we can say is that the Qumran library displays its owners’ interest in nonsectarian, and originally non-Jewish, technical-scientific literature, some of which they may have adapted to their own sectarian needs, but some of which was of interest to other Second Temple Jews as well (Ben-Dov, 2010).
Conclusion Looking at all three spheres of activity together, we may note that the Qumran sectarians clearly practiced some forms of divination, and perhaps even adapted some divinatory techniques to their specific sectarian needs. They also practiced exorcisms, which we may classify as a ‘magical’ activity but they certainly did not. Finally, and most controversially, the question of whether we may speak of ‘mysticism’ in Qumran is a hotly debated issue, and – barring some new textual finds that will change the evidentiary basis at our disposal – is one that is likely to remain debated in the foreseeable future.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (1996), ‘Physiognomy, initiation, and rank in the Qumran Community,’ in H. Cancik, H. Lichtenberger and P. Schäfer (eds), Geschichte-Tradition-Reflexion: Festschrift für Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburtstag. 3 vols. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, I: 385–94. Alexander, P. S. (1997), ‘ “Wrestling against wickedness in high places”: Magic in the worldview of the Qumran community,’ in S. E. Porter and C. A. Evans (eds), The Scrolls and the Scriptures: Qumran Fifty Years After. JSPS up 26. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 318–37.
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Alexander, P. S. (2006), The Mystical Texts: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Related Manuscripts. LSTS 61. London: T&T Clark. Ben-Dov, J. (2010), ‘Scientific writings in Aramaic and Hebrew at Qumran: Translation and concealment,’ in K. Berthelot and D. Stökl Ben Ezra (eds), Aramaica Qumranica: Proceedings of the Conference on the Aramaic Texts from Qumran in Aix-en-Provence, 30 June–2 July 2008. STDJ 94. Leiden: Brill, pp. 379–402. Bohak, G. (2008), Ancient Jewish Magic: A History. Cambridge: CUP. Bohak, G. (2012), ‘From Qumran to Cairo: The lives and times of a Jewish exorcistic formula (with an Appendix by S. Shaked),’ in I. Csepregi and C. Burnett (eds), Ritual Healing: Magic, Ritual and Medical Therapy from Antiquity until the Early Modern Period. Micrologus’ Library 48. Florence: SISMEL Edizioni del Galluzzo, pp. 31–52. Bohak, G. (2013), ‘Exorcistic Psalms of David and Solomon (an Introduction and Translation),’ in R. Bauckham, J. Davila and A. Panayotov (eds), Old Testament Pseudepigrapha: More Noncanonical Scriptures, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, I: 287–97. Bohak, G. (2016), ‘Manuals of mantic wisdom: From the Dead Sea Scrolls to the Cairo Genizah,’ in H. Najman, J.-S. Rey, and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (eds), Tracing Sapiential Traditions in Ancient Judaism. JSJSup 174. Leiden: Brill, pp. 191–216. Bohak, G. and M. Geller (2013), ‘Babylonian astrology in the Cairo Genizah,’ in R. S. Boustan et al. (eds), Envisioning Judaism: Studies in Honor of Peter Schäfer on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday. 2 vols. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, II : 607–22. Brooke, G. J. (2003), ‘Deuteronomy 18.9–14 in the Qumran Scrolls,’ in T. Klutz (ed.), Magic in the Biblical World: From the Rod of Aaron to the Ring of Solomon. JSNTS up 245. London: T&T Clark, pp. 66–84. Davila, James (2010), ‘Exploring the mystical background of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in T. H. Lim and J. J. Collins, eds, The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: OUP, 433–54. Eshel, E. (1999), ‘The identification of the “speaker” of the Self-Glorification Hymn,’ in D. W. Parry and E. Ulrich (eds), The Provo International Conference on the Dead Sea Scrolls: Technological Innovations, New Texts, and Reformulated Issues. STDJ 30. Leiden: Brill, pp. 619–35. Eshel, E. (2003), ‘Genres of magical texts in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in A. Lange, H. Lichtenberger, and K. F. Diethard Römheld (eds), The Demonology of Israelite-Jewish and Early Christian Literature in Context of their Environment. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 395–415. García Martínez, F. (2002), ‘Magic in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. N. Bremmer and J. R. Veenstra (eds), The Metamorphosis of Magic from Late Antiquity to the Early Modern Period. Leuven: Peeters, pp.13–33 (repr. in F. García Martínez [2007], Qumranica Minora. 2 vols. STDJ 63–64. Leiden: Brill, II : 109–30). Greenfield, J. C. and M. Sokoloff (1989), ‘Astrological and related omen texts in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic,’ JNES 48, 201–14. Greenfield, J. C. and M. Sokoloff (1995), ‘An astrological text from Qumran (4Q318) and reflections on some zodiacal names,’ RevQ 16, 507–525 (repr. in S. M. Paul, M. E. Stone, and A. Pinnick [eds] [2001] ‘Al Kanfei Yonah: Collected Studies of Jonas C. Greenfield on Semitic Philology. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill/Jerusalem: Magnes, pp. 554–72). Gruenwald, I. (1980), Apocalyptic and Merkavah Mysticism. AGAJU 14. Leiden: Brill. Jacobus, H. R. (2010), ‘4Q318: A Jewish zodiac calendar at Qumran?,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Contexts. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 365–95. James, W. (1902), The Varieties of Religious Experience: A Study in Human Nature. London: Longmans, Green, & Co.
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Kister, M. (forthcoming), ‘Divine and heavenly figures in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. Kister et al. (eds), The Religious Worldviews Reflected in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Leiden: Brill. Lange, A. (1997), ‘The Essene position on magic and divination,’ in M. Bernstein, F. García Martínez and J. Kampen (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organisation for Qumran Studies, Cambridge 1995. STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 377–435. Leicht, R. (2006), Astrologumena Judaica: Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der astrologischen Literatur der Juden. Texts and Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Judaism 21. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lyons, W. J. and A. M. Reimer (1998), ‘The demonic virus and Qumran studies: Some preventative measures,’ DSD 5, 16–32. Miller, E. (2009), ‘The “Self-Glorification Hymn” reexamined,’ Henoch 31, 307–24. Mizrahi, N. (2009), ‘The supposed relationship between the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Hekhalot literature: Linguistic and stylistic aspects,’ Meghillot 7, 263–98 [Hebrew]. Naveh, J. (1998), ‘Fragments of an Aramaic magic book from Qumran,’ IEJ 48, 252–61. (repr. in idem [2009], Studies in West-Semitic Epigraphy: Selected Papers. Jerusalem: Magnes, pp. 167–76). Newsom, C. (1985), Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition. HSS 27. Atlanta, GA : Scholars Press. Nitzan, B. (1994), Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry. Trans. J. Chipman. STDJ 12. Leiden: Brill. Popović, M. (2007), Reading the Human Body: Physiognomics and Astrology in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Hellenistic-Early Roman Period Judaism. STDJ 67. Leiden: Brill. Schäfer, P. (2009), The Origins of Jewish Mysticism. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Schäfer, P. (2010), ‘Hekhalot literature and the origins of Jewish mysticism,’ in M. Goodman and P. Alexander (eds), Rabbinic Texts and the History of Late-Roman Palestine. Proceedings of the British Academy 165. Oxford: Published for the British Academy by OUP, pp. 265–80. Swartz, M. D. (2001), ‘The Dead Sea Scrolls and later Jewish magic and mysticism,’ DSD 8, 182–93. Thomas, S. I. (2009), The ‘Mysteries’ of Qumran: Mystery, Secrecy, and Esotericism in the Dead Sea Scrolls. SBLEJL 25. Atlanta, GA : SBL . Vârtejanu-Joubert, M. (2009), ‘La mystique à Qumrân: regardes historiographiques et déconstruction de la notion,’ in C. Batsch and M. Vârtejanu-Joubert (eds), Manières de penser dans l’Antiquité méditerranéenne et orientale: Mélanges offerts à Francis Schmidt par ses élèves, ses collègues et ses amis. JSJS up 134. Leiden: Brill, pp. 23–36. Vermes, G. and M. D. Goodman (1989), The Essenes According to the Classical Sources. Oxford Centre Textbooks 1. Sheffield: JSOT Press.
Part Six
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Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions Ariel Feldman
Who Are the Patriarchs? The Greek loanword, ‘patriarchs,’ denoting ‘fathers, chiefs of a race,’ commonly refers to ‘the founding fathers of the people of Israel, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob’ (Sarna and Sperling, 2007, p. 689). However, Second Temple Jewish texts in Greek suggest a wider range of referents. Thus in the Greek translation of Chronicles patriarches (always in the plural) renders various titles of Israelite officials (1 Chron. 24.31; 27.29; 2 Chron. 19.8; 23.20; 26.12). ‘Patriarchs’ as a designation of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is attested to in 4 Macc. 7.19. In addition to these three, this work speaks also of ‘all the patriarchs’ (16.25). Similarly, while Heb. 7.4 calls Abraham a patriarch, Acts uses this term with reference to Jacob’s twelve sons, as well as to David (2.29; 7.8; 9). Following biblical parlance (Ringgren, 1974), the Hebrew and Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls refer to patriarchs as ‘fathers, ancestors (ʾbwt/ʾbht).’ It has also been suggested that the term ‘ancients’ (rʾšnym) in the phrase ‘covenant with ancients’ (CD 1.4; 6.2) refers to the patriarchs (cf. Lev. 26.45). Yet, since other occurrences of this term in the Damascus Document (CD 1.16; 3.10; 4.6, 8, 9; 8.17; 19. 29 and 4Q parallels [→35 Damascus Document]) point to the Israelites, it is likely that the covenant in question is the Sinaitic Covenant, though it is also possible that both the Covenant with the Patriarchs and the Sinaitic Covenant are implied (Dimant, 2010a, pp. 117–18). God is called the God of the fathers (4Q377 [Apocryphal Pentateuch B] 2 ii 5 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]; 4Q385a [pseudo-Ezekiela] 18a-b i 9; 11Q19 54.13 [→51 Temple Scroll]). He loved them (CD 8.15; 19.28), chose them (4Q266 11 11–12; 4Q393 [Communal Confession] 3 6), gave them promises (11Q19 55.12) and established a covenant with them (CD 8.18; 19.31). The Promised Land is the Land of the fathers (11Q19 49.12). As in the Hebrew Bible, the term ‘fathers’ may describe previous generations (1Q22 [Apocryphon of Mosesa?] 3.9–10; 4Q185 [Sapiential Work] 1–2 ii 14 [→63 Wisdom]; 4Q423 [Instructiong] 5 4; 4Q521 [Messianic Apocalypse] 2 iii 2 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]; 11Q19 59.15; 11Q20 16. 3; Aramaic: 4Q213a [Levib] 3–4 5, 4Q534 [Birth of Noaha] 1 i 7; 4Q542 [TQ ahat] 1 i 5, 12, 4Q544 [Visions of Amramb] 1 3; 4Q545 [Visions of Amramc] 1a-b ii 12, 17; 4Q546 [Visions of Amramd] 2 3). Some texts highlight the forefathers’ sin and unfaithfulness (CD 20.29; 1QS 1.25, 26 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]; 1QHa 12[4].34[35] [→37 Hodayot]; 4Q434 1 ii 3 [→29 Barkhi Nafshi]; 469
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4Q504 15 9; 19 7; 4Q506 131–132 12 [→54 Words of the Luminaries]; 4Q390 1 6–7 [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Ce] [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]; Aramaic 4Q550 [Jews at the Persian Court olim Proto Esther] 5+5a 1 [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]). The noun ʾbwt also occurs in phrases describing the societal structure of Israel (4Q368 5 3 [Apocryphal Pentateuch A]), its officials (1Q22 1.3; 4Q423 5 2; 11Q19 42.14) and the officials of the Yahad (1QS a 1.16, 24, 25; 2.13, 16 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; 1QM 2.1, 3, 7; 3.4 [→40 Milh.amah]; 4Q270 7 i 13 [→35 Damascus Document]; 4Q299 76 3 [→42 Mysteries]). Apparently, ‘the fathers’ of 4Q270 7 i 13, mentioned together with the ‘mothers,’ also refer to community officials. In light of these, in some cases it is difficult to determine whether a given text refers to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob or to the past generations of the Israelites as in 1QM 13.7–8; 14.8. Some consider these two passages to refer to the Sinaitic Covenant (Dimant, 2009b, p. 13; Schiffman, 2010, p. 243). However, the reference to ‘their seed’ in 13.8 suggests that a covenant with the patriarchs is implied (cf. Gen. 17.7, 19). Similarly, the phrase ‘the One who kept the covenant for our forefathers’ (14. 8), relying on Deut. 7.9 (cf. v. 8), may point to the covenant with the patriarchs. Also, the term ‘fathers’ may not be restricted to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Ben Sira’s ‘Praise of the Fathers’ (Sir. 44–50) [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related; 63 Wisdom] opens with Enoch (yet, includes also Adam, Shem and Seth in 49.16) and culminates in Simeon the Just. Tob. 4.12 [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts] names Noah along with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as his forefathers. 4 Macc. 13.17 refers to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob ‘and all our forefathers.’ In a similar fashion 4Q542 1 i 5, 11–12 lists Levi alongside Abraham, Isaac and Jacob among Amram’s ‘forefathers,’ although this may reflect a narrower, genealogical use of the term ‘fathers.’ The Visions of Amram appears to refer to Jacob’s twelve sons as ‘fathers’ (4Q544 1 3; 4Q545 1a-b ii 12). While the Genesis Apocryphon [→36 Genesis Apocryphon] does not employ this term, it portrays Noah as a patriarch (Falk, 2007, pp. 54–80). Thus, while Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are perceived as the main patriarchal figures in the Dead Sea Scrolls, as is also the case in later Jewish tradition (b. Ber. 16b), some texts include others. The inclusion of Jacob’s twelve sons in the discussion below is an attempt to offer a more comprehensive survey of the available materials.
Where Are the Patriarchs? Although Abraham, Isaac and Jacob (and, to a lesser extent, the twelve) are frequently mentioned in the Scrolls (either by name or as ‘fathers’), few compositions from Qumran focus on the patriarchs. These diverse writings are of different provenance and written in different languages (Hebrew or Aramaic) [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]. Reflecting various ideologies and audiences, they can be clustered according to the general strategy employed by them while dealing with the biblical text. One such group of texts comprises several works in Hebrew, of both sectarian and non-sectarian provenance, reworking Gen. 11–50 selectively, briefly and, predominantly, sequentially. A sectarian composition found in the scroll 4Q180 (Ages of Creation A) is concerned with the appointed periods of human history (Dimant, 1979). While its
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method of periodization is not entirely clear, the birth of Isaac seems to be related to its calculation (1 5; cf. 4Q181 [Ages of Creation B] 2 1 [perhaps a different composition; Dimant, 2009a; Ariel et al., 2015]). As 4Q180 rewrites patriarchal stories, it introduces various interpretative additions (Barzilai, 2002, pp. 215–28). This scroll identifies the three visitors to Abraham as angels (2–4 ii 4), clarifies God’s seeming unawareness of the nature of Sodom’s sins (2–4 ii 6–7 [Gen. 18.21]), identifies the location of the Aqeda as Zion and ascertains the length of Abraham’s journey to Mt Moriah (5–6 4). The scroll 4Q252 (Commentary on Genesis A) [→33 Commentaries on Genesis] contains sections exhibiting various exegetical techniques, ranging from rewritten Bible to pesher [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture; 44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. As it reworks Gen. 11–50, 4Q252 elucidates the chronology of Abraham’s travels (2 8–10), reads the story of Sodom and Gomorrah through the lens of the Deuteronomic legislation concerning an idolatrous city (3.2–6), explains the origins and the future destiny of Amalek (4.1–2) and expounds Jacob’s blessings (4.3–6) employing sectarian terminology (5.5). A related work, 4Q254 (Commentary on Genesis C) also rewrites several episodes from the patriarchal cycle, including Judah and Tamar (3+8 6-9), Reuben’s loss of the status of a firstborn son (3+8 11; perhaps alluding to Gen 49.4) and Jacob’s final blessings (4, 5-6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 14, 17) (Saukkonen, 2005; Yuditsky and Haber, 2017). The non-sectarian composition preserved in 4Q225 (4Qpseudo-Jubileesa) and 4Q226 (4Qpseudo-Jubileesb; 4Q227 is a different composition [Livneh, 2010, pp. 188– 201]) clarifies the length of Abraham’s stay in Haran (4Q225 2 i 2), presents him as an astronomer/astrologer (4Q225 2 i 5; Dimant, 2014, pp. 489–97) and offers an interpretation of the Aqeda story, featuring the Prince of Mastema, holy angels and the angels of Mastema (4Q225 2 i 9–2 ii) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Employing various exegetical techniques, including an ambiguous ‘explanation (pšr) conc[erning’ (3 ii 7) [→44 Pesharim], the scroll 4Q464 (Exposition on the Patriarchs) demonstrates a considerable interest in the patriarchal chronology. Among other dates, it clarifies the length of the Israelites’ stay in Egypt, 210 years (4Q464a, apparently, also a part of 4Q464, cf. Feldman, 2009), and attributes to Abraham a knowledge of the Holy tongue, i.e. Hebrew (3 i 8). The following table summarizes treatments of Gen. 11–50 in the texts discussed above (see Table 65.1). Table 65.1 Genesis Departure from Ur (11.31) Stay in Haran (11.31) Lot chooses Jordan Valley (13.10) Covenant of Pieces (15) God’s covenant with Abram; name changed to Abraham (17.3, 5) Three men visit Abraham (18.2) Sodom and Gomorrah (18)
4Q180
4Q252 2.8–9 2.9–10
4Q254
4Q225
4Q464
2i2
12
2–4 ii 2 (?) 2.11–12 (15.9, 17) 1 3–5 (17.3, 5) 2.1–2 (17.20) 2–4 ii 3–4 2–4 ii 4–7 2.2–6 (18.15–21) (18.31–32)
2 i 3–8 3 ii 2–5 (15.2, 3, 5, 6) (15.13–15) 2 i 1–2(?) (17.14)
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Table 65.1 Continued Genesis
4Q180
Birth of Isaac (21.1–3)
15
Abraham’s Journey to Mt Moriah 5–6 3–4(?) (22.4) The identification of Mt Moriah(?) 5–6 4 with Zion Binding of Isaac (22) Isaac blesses Jacob (28.3–4) Jacob’s journey to Haran (28.10) Purchase of land in Shechem (33.19) Rape of Dinah (34.1) Timna gives birth to Amalek (36.12) Joseph sold (37) Jacob’s blessings (49)
4Q252
4Q254
4Q225
4Q464
2 i 8–9; 4Q226 7 1–3
2.6–9 2.12–13
3 4, 6
2 i 9–2 ii
6 72 76 78
4.1–2 10? 4. 3–7, 5, 6
4, 5–6, 7, 9, 11, 12, 14, 17
While these scrolls deal briefly with selected patriarchal stories, two other works attested at Qumran offer a detailed rewriting of Genesis 11–50. The Book of Jubilees, represented at Qumran by fourteen or fifteen Hebrew copies (1Q17, 1Q18, 2Q19, 2Q20, 3Q5, 4Q176a, 4Q216, 4Q217[?], 4Q218, 4Q219, 4Q220, 4Q221, 4Q222, 4Q223–224, 11Q12), spans events from the birth of Abraham (11.15) to the death of Joseph (46) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]. While these manuscripts contain remains of some 215 of 1307 verses of Jubilees, it is fully preserved only in classical Ethiopic. This fact, as well as the limits of this survey, excludes Jubilees from this discussion. Like Jubilees, the Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen) [→36 Genesis Apocryphon], is a non-sectarian work devoting four of its extant twenty-three columns (19–22) to the events recorded in Gen. 12–15. In cols 19–21 Abraham himself is the narrator. However, from col. 21.23 the events are narrated in the third person. This shift is accompanied by a change in exegetical strategy, from an expansive rewriting (300 to 400 per cent expansion in relation to Genesis) to a closer rendering of the biblical text (130 to 140 per cent) (Falk, 2007, p. 96). Many features of the Apocryphon’s portrayal of Abraham are discussed below. Here, some of the larger exegetical patterns reflected in its treatment of the Abrahamic cycle are noted. The scroll depicts Abraham’s journey and stay in Egypt as foreshadowing Jacob’s descent to Egypt and Israel’s enslavement (e.g. 19.10 [cf. Gen. 42.1], 19.9 [cf. Gen. 37.14]; Segal, 2011). The particulars of Sarah’s abduction by Pharaoh are harmonized with the story of her seizure by Abimelech in Gen. 20 (20.16–18, 21, 28; Falk, 2007, pp. 80–4). The boundaries of the land promised to Abraham (21.8–19) correspond to the territory allocated by Noah to Shem’s son Arpachshad (Machiela, 2008). In addition to the interest in geography (note also the ‘modernizing’ of toponyms in 21.13–14), 1QapGen is sensitive to the chronological difficulties of the Genesis narrative (see Table 65.2), clarifying the length of Abraham’s sojourn in Canaan prior to his descent to Egypt (19.9), the length of
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Table 65.2 Abrahamic cycle in 1QapGen 19–22 Event
Genesis
Genesis Apocryphon
In Canaan In Egypt Back to Canaan Lot departs from Abraham God’s promise to Abraham and the command to walk the Land At the terebinths of Mamre The five kings’ campaign The Covenant of the Pieces
12.8–9 11.10–20 13.1–5 13.6–13 13.14–17
19.7–10a 19.10b–20.32 20.33–21.4 21.5–7 21.8–19a
13.18 14 15.1–4
21.19b–22 21.23–22:26 22.27–34
his stay in Egypt (19.23; 20.18), and the time that lapsed from his departure from Egypt to the Covenant of the Pieces (22.27–28) (Segal, 2010). Another group of texts features first-person discourses by Jacob’s sons. These nonsectarian works significantly expand the (mostly meagre) biographic data found in Genesis with extra-biblical traditions. One of these compositions, 4Q215 (4QNaphtali), is in Hebrew. As Naphtali relates the genealogy of his mother Bilhah (1–3 10), he provides the names of her parents (Ahiyot, the brother of Deborah, Rebekka’s nurse, and Hannah), makes her Zilpah’s sister and explains the etymology of Zilpah and Bilhah’s names (Stone, 1996). Other texts in this group are in Aramaic. In 4Q538 (Words of Benjamin) Benjamin relates the events narrated in Gen. 44–45 (Dimant, 2007). He reports how Joseph tested his brothers to determine whether they had any bad intentions towards Benjamin, implying that this was the main purpose of the testing (1–2). While the extant fragments of the scroll 4Q539 (Testament of Joseph; or better, Words of Joseph) do not contain the name of the speaker, it may well be Joseph who narrates the events of his life to his children (2–3 2), including Jacob’s lament (2–3 1, 3), the sale by the Ishmaelites (2–3 3) and the price paid for him (2–3 4) (Puech, 2001, p. 208). Somewhat more complex is the case of Aramaic Levi (better, Visions of Levi; Drawnel, 2010b, p. 307) [→24 Aramaic Levi; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 66 Revelation]. It is partially preserved in several manuscripts from Qumran (1Q21, 4Q213, 4Q213a, 4Q213b, 4Q214, 4Q214a, 4Q214b), as well as in Geniza fragments and in Greek translation. Comprising of units of different genres (e.g. autobiographical narration, prayer, visionary dream, rewritten Bible [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture], sapiential/professional instruction [→63 Wisdom] and a didactic poem [→60 Poetry and Hymns]), this composition seems to be a didactic work intended for the instruction of young priests (Drawnel, 2010b) [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Featuring Levi as the main narrator, it fleshes out this biblical figure, providing a wealth of exegetical traditions on Isaac, Jacob, Dina and Joseph, as well as Levi’s children and grandchildren. Related to Aramaic Levi are two other Aramaic texts featuring firstperson discourses by Levi’ son Qahat (Testament of Qahat [4Q542]; better, Admonitions of Qahat; Drawnel, 2006) and his grandson Amram (Visions of Amram [4Q543–548]); 4Q548 represents a different composition, and the relation of 4Q549 to Visions is unclear; Goldman, 2010, p. 425). Featuring instructions to one’s children (4Q542 1; 4Q543 1 a–c), autobiographical narration (4Q543 3, 4; 4Q544 1 and parallels) and
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vision(s) (4Q543 5–9, 14 and parallels), these two works may also belong with the priestly didactic literature (Drawnel, 2010a). Several other texts were initially identified as first-person addresses by Jacob’s sons. The fragmentary scroll 3Q7 was named Testament of Judah, yet the references to Levi (6 2) and to the Angel of Presence (5 3) hardly warrant this identification. This is also the case with 4Q484 which was tentatively designated as Testament of Judah. Preserving a single reference to Issachar (1), it was later suggested to be a copy of Jubilees (Puech, 1999), an identification that is disputed (VanderKam, 2009, pp. 7–8). Similar uncertainties exist in relation to the Aramaic scroll 4Q537 (Testament of Jacob). Both its generic affinities to the testamentary literature and the attribution of its vision(s) to Jacob are dubious. Finally, reference should be made to a scroll that deals with the chronology of Gen. 12–50 (and beyond). While chronological concerns are present in many of the aforementioned texts, Biblical Chronology (4Q559) appears to be unique among the Dead Sea Scrolls, as it offers a systematic treatment of the patriarchal chronology, with the extant fragments referring explicitly to Isaac, Jacob and many others (Wise, 1997; Puech, 2009, pp. 261–89).
Collective Portraits of the Patriarchs The following sketches of the patriarchs do not aim at being exhaustive. Rather, they attempt to note the more outstanding features of these figures which are not spelled out in their biblical descriptions.
Abram/Abraham The Scrolls present Abraham as an ideal figure. He keeps God’s laws, does not follow his own desires, and transmits these virtues to Isaac and Jacob (CD 3.2–3). As a result, he is recorded as friend of God, becomes a party in the eternal covenant (CD 3.3–4; for Abraham as God’s friend see also 4Q225 2 ii 10[?]; 4Q252 2.8; on the covenant see CD 12.11; 4Q225 1 4; 4Q378 [Apocryphon of Joshuaa] 22 i 4) and receives the land (4Q252 2.7–8). Abraham acts immediately once aware of God’s will, be it in the case of the command to walk the Promised Land (1QapGen 21.10) or the requirement of circumcision (CD 16.6). He proves himself faithful to God in the Aqeda (4Q226 7 1). Abraham has dream visions (1QapGen 21.8–14; 22.27–34), including a prophetic vision (1QapGen 19.14–17). He possesses knowledge of geography (1QapGen 19.12) and astrology/astronomy (4Q225 2 i 5) [→62 Calendars; 9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. He is renowned for his wisdom, which draws Egyptian nobles searching for scribal knowledge, wisdom and truth (1QapGen 19.23–25). He is a teacher, instructing from the book of the words of Enoch (1QapGen 19.25). Abraham is also a man of strong emotions: he ‘weeps bitterly’ and is ‘deeply troubled’ when Sarah is abducted (1QapGen 20.11–12, 16), he is disturbed by Lot’s departure (21.7), when Lot is captured, he weeps and then ‘collects himself ’ and comes to his rescue (22.5). He is a man of prayer: he prays ‘through sorrow and streaming tears’ when Sarah is taken away
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(1QapGen 20.12–16) and heals Pharaoh and his house by praying and laying on of hands (20.21–23, 28–29). He thanks and blesses God (1QapGen 21.3). Abraham is also a man of his word, fulfilling his promises to Melchizedek (1QapGen 22.24–26 [missing from the biblical account]). Abraham functions as a priest offering sacrifices (1QapGen 21.1–3 [Gen. 13.4], 20–21 [Gen. 13.18]). He instructs Isaac in priestly matters, both by example and by oral instruction, relying on ‘the book of Noah concerning the blood’ (Aramaic Levi 7.4; 10.10). His ‘decisions/judgements,’ which may also have to do with priestly matters, are transmitted from father to son (4Q542 1 i 8). Where the biblical description of Abraham is not sympathetic to him, an attempt is made to correct this impression. Not only does he not quarrel with Lot (omitted in 1QapGen 21.5), but upon his departure gives him more flocks (21.6). In the case of Pharaoh’s abduction of Sarah, the decision to present Sarah as his sister is reported to be a result of the prophetic dream (1QapGen 19.14–21). It is Abraham’s wisdom that brings Egyptian courtiers to his home, which leads to Sarah’s exposure after five years of successful hiding (1QapGen 19.23–24). Sarah’s exceeding beauty, when reported to Pharaoh, appears to set the events in motion (1QapGen 20.2–8). The gifts seem to be given to Abraham prior to Sarah’s capture, and not as a result of it (1QapGen 19.24– 25). He is greatly upset by the abduction (1QapGen 20.10, 12, 16). God miraculously protects Sarah’s chastity (20.17). Pharaoh divorces her (1QapGen 20.9, 23) and swears that he had not defiled her (20.30), thus making clear that Abraham can have her as his wife (cf. Deut. 24.4) (Falk, 2007, pp. 80–96).
Isaac God selected Isaac (5Q13 [Rule] 2 7 [Kister, 2001, p. 137]). Instructed by Abraham, Isaac keeps God’s commands and is recorded as God’s friend and a party in the covenant (CD 3.3–4). He seems to participate wilfully in the Aqeda (4Q225 2 ii 4). To him God decrees ‘the path’ (4Q185 1–2 ii 4–5). He is blessing Levi, the newly invested priest (Aramaic Levi 5.1), and instructs him in priestly lore (Aramaic Levi 6–10, cf. Fabry, 2006).
Jacob Like Isaac, Jacob is instructed by Abraham to observe God’s commands and becomes God’s friend (4Q372 [Narrative and Poetic Compositionb 1 21) and a party in his covenant (CD 3.3–4; for the covenant with Jacob see also 4Q372 3 9 [where Jacob may stand for all of Israel]; 4Q385a [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Ca] 3a–c 4 [= 388a 3 3]). The covenant with Jacob at Bethel, mentioned in the Temple Scroll (11QTa 39.8–10), entails a divine promise to create a temple and establish it forever (Brooke, 2013) [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. At Bethel God made himself known to Jacob (5Q13 2 6; cf. Kister, 2001, p. 137). It is also at Bethel that Jacob, following his and Levi’s visit to his father Isaac (Aramaic Levi 5.1), fulfils his vow by giving tithes to Levi (Aramaic Levi 5.2–3) (Kugel, 1993). There he invests and consecrates Levi as a priest (Aramaic Levi 5.4), yet it is Isaac who trains Levi in priestly matters. Still, Levi’s son, Qahat, encourages his children to hold firm to the command (apparently, of priestly nature) of their father
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Jacob (4Q542 1 i 7; cf. 4Q185 1–2 ii 4–5). He receives a blessing from an angel at Jabbok (4Q158 [Reworked Pentateucha] 1–2 7–9; the wording of the blessing is absent from MT ). Jacob’s visions may feature in 4Q537 (Testament of Jacob) and the New Jerusalem texts (1Q32, 2Q24, 4Q554, 4Q555, 5Q15, 11Q18) [→43 New Jerusalem], although the identification of the visionary in these texts is disputed (Tigchelaar, 2007).
Levi Not unlike Abraham, the Scrolls depict Levi as an exemplary figure. God separated Levi and appointed him, apparently, for a service (5Q13 2 8 [Kister, 2001, pp. 137, 141]). Given pride of place in a list of Jacob’s sons, he is called God’s beloved, an appellation reserved in Deut. 33.12 for Benjamin (4Q379 1 2). Levi is a man of righteous deeds (4Q542 1 i 8). In fact, he is exonerated in the case of Joseph’s sale, as he is reported to be away (Aramaic Levi 2.1), and, perhaps, also in the story of Dinah (Aramaic Levi 1.1–3; cf. Jub. 30). He prays, has dream visions of the heavenly realm, is invested as a priest, and officiates as such (Aramaic Levi 3, 4, 5; 4Q547 [Visions of Amrame] 8 2). Isaac instructs him in the priestly lore (Aramaic Levi 6–10). Levi himself is a wise teacher (CD 4.15–19; Aramaic Levi 13), endowed with a knowledge of future events (Aramaic Levi 13:16). He reads in books (Aramaic Levi 13.16), apparently, of the ancestors, and transmits them to his son, Qahat (4Q542 1 ii 9–11). As the head of the priesthood, he is ‘made greater than all’ (Aramaic Levi 4.11). Two scrolls in Aramaic, 4Q540 and 4Q541 have been associated with Levi and designated Apocryphon of Levi. While some scholars uphold this identification, particularly in the case of the seemingly priestly figure mentioned in 4Q541 (Apocryphon of Levib?) 9 (Brooke, 1993), the evidence is so fragmentary that both the claim that these are two copies of the same composition and the identification of the protagonist as Levi are far from certain (Collins, 1995).
Joseph Jacob’s ‘dear’ and ‘beloved’ son (4Q474 [Text Concerning Rachel and Joseph] 2–3), Joseph, not unlike Abraham (Rothstein, 2005), teaches scribal craft and wisdom (apparently, to the Egyptians [Drawnel, 2004, pp. 333–6]) and as a result is given glory, greatness and a high position with the kings (Aramaic Levi 13.6). The less sympathetic aspects of his biblical portrayal, such as the severe test to which he puts his brothers, are explained away by claiming that the test was intended to ascertain whether there was an ‘evil spirit’ towards Benjamin in their hearts (4Q538 [TJudah] 1–2 4). Joseph himself narrates his story in 4Q539 [TJ oseph] (Kugler, 2008).
Other Patriarchs As the Hebrew Bible, the Qumran Scrolls have little to say about most of the twelve. In addition to lying with Bilhah (4Q252 4.5–6; 4Q254 3+8 4), Reuben’s involvement in Dinah’s story is mentioned. He seems to be consulted prior to the reply to the Shechemites’ request concerning Dina and apparently is among those who respond to
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them (Aramaic Levi 1.1). According to Judah, he is absent when Joseph is sold (Aramaic Levi 2.1; Drawnel, 2004, pp. 230–3). Judah, Simeon, Gad, Zebulun, Issachar, Dan and Asher remain in shadow (yet see 4Q254 3+8 5–9 on Judah). At the same time, in several compositions Levi, Naphtali, Joseph and Benjamin narrate events of their lives. The extant fragments of 4Q215 (Naphtali) preserve a first-person address by Naphtali, in which he relates the genealogy of his mother Bilhah and the events that led to her being given to Jacob. Yet, 4Q215 reveals little about the figure of Naphtali himself. Similarly, Benjamin’s first-person discourse in 4Q538 has more to say about Joseph than about Benjamin.
Patriarchs as a Group The Scrolls mention Abraham, Isaac and Jacob together (4Q393 4 5; 4Q505 124 6), particularly, with reference to God’s covenant (4Q388a [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Cc] 7 ii 2; 4Q389 [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Cd] 8 ii 8–9), although there are cases where only the names of Abraham and Israel (=Jacob) (4Q393 3 7) or Isaac and Jacob (4Q508 [Festival Prayers] 3 3?) are cited. The names of the twelve are listed together according to the order given in Deut. 33 (yet Levi is mentioned first and Simeon is included) in 4Q379 (Apocryphon of Joshuab) 1 2. The three and the twelve are invoked as examples of righteous and sinful behaviour in an admonitory discourse (CD 3. 2–5; [Dimant, 1988, pp. 392–400]). While Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are cited as keepers of God’s commandments and his friends, Jacob’s sons are reported to have gone astray (2.16). As a result, they are ‘punished for their errors’ (3.4–7). While the nature of the ‘errors’ is not spelled out, these may be Reuben’s violation of Bilhah, Judah’s affair with Tamar and the sale of Joseph. Referring to these as ‘errors,’ i.e. unintentional sins, explains why they were not punished with capital punishment (Anderson, 1995). As mentioned above, several compositions from Qumran appear to include other biblical figures among the patriarchs. 1QapGen models its portrayal of Noah on Abraham (11.11, 15), yet as it features also Enoch, Methuselah and Lamech. It is likely that all of them are viewed as a chosen line of forefathers (Eshel, 2011). Texts reflecting Levitical/priestly concerns frame Abraham, Isaac and Jacob into a genealogical line leading to the Aaronite priesthood. In the sectarian scroll 5Q13 (5QR ule) a description of the annual ceremony for the renewal of the covenant, akin to the one described in 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], is preceded by a historical summary listing Adam (?), Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Levi and Aaron (5Q13 2 4–8; Kister, 2001). A nonsectarian scroll 4Q379 (Apocryphon of Joshuab) 17 4–5 links Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to Moses (the ensuing lacuna could contain the names of Aaron, Nadav and Abihu), Eleazar and Ithamar (cf. 4Q225 2 ii 10–12[= 4Q226 7.3–5]). In 4Q542 (TQ ahat) 1 i 7–8 Qahat exhorts his children to preserve the priestly ‘inheritance’ entrusted to them by their fathers, Abraham, Jacob and Levi. Through this chosen line the knowledge is transmitted. This knowledge can be in a written form, e.g. Book of Words of Enoch (1QapGen 19.25), associated with ‘scribal knowledge and wisdom and truth,’ Book of Noah Concerning the Blood (Aramaic Levi 10.10), and writings of the ancestors that Levi reads (Aramaic Levi 13.16) and then
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passes on first to Qahat and then to Amram (4Q542 1 ii 10–12; cf. also Visions of Amram being ‘A copy of the book “The words of the vision of Amram’ ” [4Q543 1 a–c 1]). It may also be in a form of non-written instruction in priestly matters, passed on from Abraham to Isaac (Aramaic Levi 7.4, 5; 10.10), to Levi (Aramaic Levi 6–10), to Qahat (4Q542 1 i 7–8) to Amram (4Q542 1 ii 9). This body of patriarchal knowledge, which was partly transmitted orally and comprising diverse subjects of a priestly and non-priestly nature, constitutes an alternative to what later becomes known as the rabbinic chain of tradition (Schiffman, 2010, p. 390). It appears that the notion of the transmission of knowledge within the patriarchal line is particularly endorsed by the non-sectarian Aramaic texts from Qumran. In general, of the non-sectarian texts it is the extant Aramaic scrolls that seem to offer a detailed treatment of the patriarchs (Dimant, 2010b). However, these observations need to be considered against the Book of Jubilees, which is an unparalleled repository of traditions on the patriarchs, many of which are shared with the aforementioned scrolls. While the relations between the Aramaic texts and Jubilees are debated (Kugel, 2007, 2011; Segal, 2010), it appears that the portrayal of the patriarchs in the Aramaic and Hebrew documents are not that different, even if sometimes the priestly Tendenz of some Aramaic texts gives their patriarchal figures a particularly priestly twist. The sectarian texts also refer to patriarchs (CD ; 4Q180; 4Q225), although some of the major sectarian works (1QS , 1QS a, 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]) do not mention them (Brooke, 2013). Yet, with the possible exception of the claim to be the true inheritors of the Covenant with the Fathers (CD 8.18; 19.31; Dimant, 2009b) and the sectarian take on some of Jacob’s blessings (4Q252 5), their view of the patriarchs does not appear to differ substantially from the non-sectarian scrolls, as they draw from the same pool of exegetical traditions.
Bibliography Anderson, G. A. (1995), ‘Intentional and unintentional sin in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in D. P. Wright et al. (eds), Pomegranates and Golden Bells: Studies in Biblical, Jewish, and Near Eastern Ritual, Law, and Literature in Honor of Jacob Milgrom. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, pp. 49–64. Ariel, H. et al. (2015), ‘The Pesher on the Periods A–B (4Q180–4Q181): Editing, language, and interpretation,’ Meghillot 11–12, 3–39 [Hebrew]. Barzilai, G. (2002), ‘Offhand exegesis: Passing allusions to interpretation of the Book of Genesis, as found in the Dead Sea Scrolls.’ (PhD diss. Bar-Ilan University) [Hebrew]. Brooke, G. J. (1993), ‘4QTestament of Levi d (?) and the messianic servant High Priest,’ in M. de Boer (ed.), From Jesus to John: Essays on New Testament Christology in Honour of Marinus de Jonge. JSNTS up 84. Sheffield: JSOT, pp. 83–100. Brooke, G. J. (2013), ‘Jacob and his house in the scrolls from Qumran,’ in D. Dimant and R. G. Kratz (eds), Rewriting and Interpreting the Hebrew Bible: The Biblical Patriarchs in the Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 171–88. Collins, J. J. (1995), ‘Asking for the meaning of a fragmentary Qumran text: The referential background of 4QA aron A [4Q540, 4Q541],’ in T. Fornberg and D. Hellholm (eds),
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Texts and Contexts: Biblical Texts in Their Textual and Situational Contexts: Essays in Honor of Lars Hartman. Oslo: Scandinavian University Press, pp. 579–90. Dimant, D. (1979), ‘The Pesher on the Periods’(4Q180 and 4Q181),’ IOS 9, 77–102. Dimant, D. (1988), ‘Use and interpretation of Mikra in the Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha,’ in M. J. Mulder and H. Sysling (eds), Mikra: Text, Translation, Reading and Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Ancient Judaism and Early Christianity. Assen/ Maastricht: Van Gorcum; Philadelphia: Fortress, pp. 379–419. Dimant, D. (2007), ‘Not “Testament of Judah,” but “Words of Benjamin,” ’ in A. Maman et al. (eds), Shaʿarei Lashon: Studies in Hebrew, Aramaic and Jewish Languages Presented to Moshe Bar-Asher. Jerusalem: Mosad Bialik, 1:10–26 [Hebrew]. Dimant, D. (2009a), ‘On righteous and sinners: 4Q181 reconsidered,’ in C. Batsch and M. Vârtejanu-Joubert (eds), Manières de penser dans l’antiquité méditerranéenne et orientale : Mélanges offerts à Francis Schmidt par ses élèves, ses collègues et ses amis. Leiden: Brill, pp. 61–85. Dimant, D. (2009b), ‘Sectarian and non-sectarian texts from Qumran: The pertinence and usage of a taxonomy,’ RevQ 24, 7–18. Dimant, D. (2010a), ‘The inheritance of the Land of Israel according to the ideology of the Qumran community,’ Meghillot 8–9, 113–33 [Hebrew]. Dimant, D. (2010b), ‘Themes and genres in the Aramaic texts from Qumran,’ in K. Berthelot and D. Stökl Ben Ezra (eds), Aramaica Qumranica: Proceedings of the Conference on the Aramaic Texts from Qumran in Aix-en-Provence, 30 June–2 July 2008. STDJ 94. Leiden: Brill, pp. 15–45. Dimant, D. (2014), History, Ideology, and Bible Interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls. FAT 90. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Drawnel, H. (2004), An Aramaic Wisdom Text from Qumran: A New Interpretation of the Levi Document. JSJS up 86. Leiden: Brill. Drawnel, H. (2006), ‘The literary form and didactic content of the “Admonitions (Testament) of Qahat,” ’ in F. García Martínez, A. Steudel, and E. Tigchelaar (eds), From 4QMMT to Resurrection: Mélanges qumraniens en hommage à Émile Puech. STDJ 61. Leiden: Brill, pp. 55–73. Drawnel, H. (2010a), ‘The initial narrative of the “Visions of Amram” and its literary characteristics,’ RevQ 24, 517–54. Drawnel, H. (2010b), ‘The literary characteristics of the “Visions of Levi” (so-called “Aramaic Levi Document”),’ JAJ 1, 303–19. Eshel, E. (2011), ‘The “Genesis Apocryphon”: A chain of traditions,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Proceedings of the International Conference Held at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem (July 6–8, 2008). STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 181–93. Fabry, H.-J. (2006), ‘Isaak in den Handschriften von Qumran,’ in F. García Martínez, A. Steudel, and E. Tigchelaar (eds.), From 4QMMT to Resurrection: mélanges qumraniens en hommage à Émile Puech. Leiden: Brill, pp. 87–103. Falk, D. K. (2007), The Parabiblical Texts: Strategies for Extending the Scriptures among the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: T&T Clark. Feldman, A. (2008), ‘The Story of the Flood in the Texts from Qumran (1Q19, 4Q370, 4Q422, 4Q464, 4Q577)’ (PhD diss., University of Haifa). Feldman, A. (2009), ‘A note on 4Q464a,’ Meghillot 7, 299–304 [Hebrew]. Goldman, L. (2010), ‘Dualism in the “Visions of Amram,” ’ RevQ 24, 421–32. Kister, M. (2001), ‘5Q13 and the ʿAvodah: A historical survey and its significance,’ DSD 8, 136–48.
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Kugel, J. (1993), ‘Levi’s elevation to the priesthood in Second Temple writings’, HTR 86, 1–64. Kugel, J. (2007), ‘How old is the “Aramaic Levi Document”?,’ DSD 14, 291–312. Kugler, R. A. (2008), ‘Whose Scripture? Whose Community? Reflections on the Dead Sea Scrolls Then and Now, By Way of Aramaic Levi,’ DSD 15, 5–23. Kugel, J. (2011), ‘Which is older, “Jubilees” or the “Genesis Apocryphon”?: An exegetical approach,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman, and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Proceedings of the International Conference Held at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem (July 6–8, 2008). Leiden: Brill, pp. 257–94. Livneh, A. (2010), ‘The Composition Pseudo-Jubilees from Qumran (4Q225; 4Q226; 4Q227): A New Edition, Introduction, and Commentary’. (PhD diss. University of Haifa). Machiela, D. (2008), ‘ “Each to his own inheritance”: Geography as an evaluative tool in the Genesis Apocryphon,’ DSD 15, 50–66. Puech, É. (1999), ‘Une nouvelle copie du Livre des Jubilés 4Q484=pap4QJubilésj,’ RevQ 19, 261–64. Puech, É. (2001), Qumrân Grotte 4. XXII: Textes araméens, Première partie: 4Q529–549. DJD 31. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (2009), Qumrân Grotte 4. XXVII: Textes Araméens, deuxième partie. DJD 37. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ringgren, H. (1974), ‘אב,’ in TDOT I: 1–19. Rothstein, D. (2005), ‘Joseph as pedagogue: Biblical precedents for the depiction of Joseph in Aramaic Levi (4Q213),’ JSP 14, 223–29. Sarna, N. M. and S. D. Sperling (2007), ‘Patriarchs, the,’ in M. Berenbaum and F. Skolnik (eds), Encyclopaedia Judaica. 2nd edn. Detroit: Macmillan, 15: 689–91. Saukkonen, J. (2005), ‘The Story Behind the Text: Scriptural Interpretation in 4Q252’ (PhD diss., University of Helsinki). Schiffman, L. H. (2010), Qumran and Jerusalem: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the History of Judaism. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Segal, M. (1998), ‘Biblical exegesis in 4Q158: Techniques and genre,’ Textus 19, 45–62. Segal, M. (2010), ‘The literary relationship between the Genesis Apocryphon and Jubilees: The chronology of Abram and Sarai’s descent to Egypt,’ Aramaic Studies 8, 71–88. Segal, M. (2011), ‘Identifying biblical interpretation in parabiblical texts’, in A. Lange, E. Tov, and M. Weigold (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Context: Integrating the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Study of Ancient Texts, Languages, and Cultures. VTS up 140. Leiden: Brill, pp. 295–308. Stone, M. E. (1996), ‘The genealogy of Bilhah,’ DSD 3, 20–36. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2007), ‘The imaginal context and the visionary of the Aramaic “New Jerusalem,”’ in A. Hilhorst, É. Puech, and E. Tigchelaar (eds), Flores Florentino: Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Early Jewish Studies in Honour of Florentino García Martínez. JSJS up 122. Leiden: Brill, pp. 257–70. VanderKam, J. (2009), ‘The manuscript tradition of Jubilees,’ in G. Boccaccini and G. Ibba (eds), Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 3–21. Wise, M. O. (1997), ‘To know the times and the seasons: A study of the Aramaic chronograph 4Q559,’ JSP 15, 3–51. Yuditsky, A. and E. Haber (2017), ‘4QCommentary on Genesis: Notes on new readings,’ Meghillot 13, 71–83 [Hebrew].
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Revelation Hindy Najman and Nicole Hilton
What Constitutes Revelation at Qumran? Often considered under the category of prophecy, revelation appears in many different forms throughout the Dead Sea Scrolls (DSS ).* How we define and conceive of divine encounter will influence the way we read and interpret the DSS . To be sure, the DSS are replete with biblical and especially prophetic traditions, and often pseudonymously invoke figures of the past when revealing divine mysteries. These figures of the past can best be understood as mediators between the earthly and heavenly worlds. In addition to invoking biblical figures of the past (e.g. Moses, Jeremiah or Ezekiel), there are other clear distinctions drawn between the books that constitute the ‘Law’ and those that are referred to as the ‘Prophets’ (for example, CD 7.17–18 [→35 Damascus Document]; 1QS 1.3; 8.15–16 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], and 4Q177 [Catena A] 5–6 5) [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]. It is clear that throughout the Qumran corpus the various expressions of divine encounter continued well beyond the preservation of authoritative biblical prophetic texts. Rather, the corpus preserves new texts that persist in their claim to be able to access divine and angelic encounter [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Texts discovered at Qumran express experiences of divine encounter that are similar to those expressed in earlier parts of the prophetic corpus. At Qumran the past traditions are reproduced. Yet, the DSS do not just replicate the biblical prophets and their narratives. Rather, newly transformed modes of revelation develop and take root, also known to scholars from later rabbinic traditions (in both aggadic and halakhic midrashim) [→58 Halakhah]. At Qumran, accounts of divine encounter, prophecy or revelation, as experienced in earlier scriptural traditions, are thus expanded, heightened and reworked [→56 Parabiblical Texts/Rewritten Scripture]. In what follows, we will consider three modes of revelation in which divine encounter is experienced in the DSS : Figure, Interpretation and Prayer, and Location. These expressions have been appropriated from older biblical traditions in order to create new and authoritative, revelatory, textual traditions. We will deal with each mode of revelation in turn. * The authors wish to thank Paul Franks and Eibert Tigchelaar for their helpful suggestions.
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Figure Figures of the past, as well as angelic figures, function as mediators to reconstitute the divine-human relationship.
Appropriation of the Old in Order to Create the New Beyond the classical prophets of the biblical texts, certain figures were able to gain prophetic status in the Yahad. Of interest to many scholars is the developing characterization of David as not only a king and musician but, as he is described in 11QPsa, also as a ‘man of God.’ Though not directly referred to as a prophet, the title ‘man of God’ is implicitly connected to the identification of ‘prophet’ in the biblical narratives (for example, Elijah and Elisha) and the two names, ‘prophet’ and ‘man of God’ are at times used synonymously (for example, 1 Kings 13.1–19). 11QPsa describes a corpus of over 4,000 songs and psalms attributed to David that are said to be written with inspiration [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. Many focus on the future and serve a prophetic, predictive function. Here David is again transformed, as he was earlier from king to divinely ordained musician, now into the divinely inspired author who wrote the very music that was previously attributed to him. (2 Chron. 7.6 describes David as a musician who constructs instruments and plays them in order to praise God.) Thus, David is represented as a divinely appointed musician or liturgist who not only wrote songs for God, but was also commissioned to mediate the human-divine relationship via inspired word and song (‘all these he spoke through prophecy’) (11QPsa 27.11).
Pseudo-Prophets The retellings of prophetic narratives, which we have called ‘pseudo-prophetic’ represent expanded and reworked biblical prophetic traditions. These texts seem to be participating in the textual tradition of the lives of the prophetic figures. The prophetic authorial voice is thus further shaped by the contemporary experience of the authors who contributed to the prophetic narratives. As one example, the pseudo-Ezekiel text links itself to the textual tradition of the biblical prophet Ezekiel by expanding and reworking certain narratives. These expansions show the effort to explain and interpret the textual traditions that accompany the figure of Ezekiel. The vision of the dry bones that were raised to life before Ezekiel (Ezek. 37) is thus further developed by the author of pseudo-Ezekiel, who attempts to explain why God chose to resurrect the bones and what the resurrection implies (see Table 66.1 below). The pseudo-Ezekiel text explains that the bones of the righteous will literally rise from the grave at a determined eschatological future time that is imparted exclusively to the prophet. Here, the effort to fill the gaps of the biblical tradition becomes an interpretive effort on the part of the author who himself contributes to the prophetic tradition. He not only continues the textual tradition of the prophetic narratives, but he and his receptive audience also participate in the prophetic experience. The explanations and expansions of the biblical book of Ezekiel are presented in the pseudo-Ezekiel text
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Table 66.1 Ezekiel 37.9–10
Pseudo-Ezekiel (4Q385 2 8–9)
Then he said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, mortal, and say to the breath: Thus says the Lord god : Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live.’ I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood on their feet, a vast multitude. (NRSV )
And again he said: ‘Prophesy over the four winds of the sky and the winds of the sky will blow upon them and they will live and a large crowd of men will rise and bless yhwh Sebaoth who caused them to live.’ And I said: ‘Oh yhwh when will these things happen?’ And yhwh said to [me . . .] (Trans. DSSSE )
as divine information that is conveyed from God to the prophet Ezekiel. By linking these new prophetic texts to the already established prophetic experiences of the biblical tradition, the authors of the DSS claim access to the prophetic experience in their own time.
Angels Throughout the biblical and extra-biblical traditions there are numerous accounts about angelic encounters that express divine engagement with the earthly realm. For example, Abraham is visited by an angel of the Lord in the land of Moriah as he is about to sacrifice Isaac. Abraham recognizes that the figure is a messenger of God and through the angelic discourse that Abraham experiences, he himself shares in the divine revelation saying, ‘on the Mount of the Lord there is a vision’ (Gen. 22.14). In Genesis 32 Jacob also encounters an angel who is not explicitly distinguished from the divine presence of God. Jacob recognizes that it was more than just an angel that he had encountered, for he had seen ‘God face to face’ (25.30). In turn, Jacob is transformed by the experience and given the name Israel [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions]. The experience of angelic encounter is also developed in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]. Parts of this text claim that those in prayer are doing so along with the angels which is made explicit in the following, 5 to praise Your glory wondrously with the gods of knowledge and the praiseworthiness of Your kingship with the holiest of the h[oly ones . . . 6 how shall we be considered [among] them? . . . 7 [What] is the offering of our tongues of dust (compared) with the knowledge of the g[ods? 8 ] our jub]ilation, let us exalt the God of knowledge[ 4Q400 2, Trans. Carol Newsom
Not unlike Jacob in Gen. 32, the Yahad is transformed as a result of the experience of divine encounter and angelic communion. The members become angelic beings who enable heavenly visitation and divine revelation [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons].
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Teacher of Righteousness No new prophets have been explicitly identified so far among the DSS , yet there is an elusive teacher figure (or office that was perhaps filled by a variety of individuals over time or in different locations) who is repeatedly said to be endowed with the ability to mediate between the divine and earthly realms. This figure or office, referred to as the Teacher of Righteousness in a variety of scrolls, enjoys an authoritative status as one who was able to interpret divine mysteries (1QHa 10.15 [→37 Hodayot]), instruct the Yahad in the Law, and provide knowledge and direction in all the ways of the Lord (CD 1.10–11) [→20 Historiography]. In many ways his presence within the sectarian texts is used to confer authority upon the Yahad (García Martínez, 2010). The Yahad looks to the Teacher figure for guidance in the Law, and further, the Teacher is understood to be the authoritative representative of the divine for the Yahad. But all those who remain steadfast in these regulations, coming and going in accordance with the law, and listen to the Teacher’s voice, and confess before God . . . and they lend their ears to the voice of the Teacher of Righteousness; and do not reject the just regulations when they hear them. CD 20.27–28, 32–33 trans. DSSSE
As a leader figure, the Teacher of Righteousness is said to function as an intermediary between the divine and the earthly realms. The biblical antecedents for the Teacher figure are likely drawn from Joel 2.23 (see also, Hosea 10.12: ‘Sow righteousness for yourselves; Reap the fruits of goodness; Break for yourselves betimes fresh ground of seeking the Lord, so that you may obtain a teacher of righteousness’ JPS ). Perhaps for the Yahad, the authoritative Teacher of Righteousness – by linking the position to the prophetic traditions – authorized whomever was in this position to unlock mysteries and reveal the appointed time.
Interpretation and Prayer Interpretation Interpreting texts and discerning their embedded mysteries are fundamental to many of the DSS . In the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the elected ten members of the Yahad are instructed to continuously read, interpret and bless together: And in the place in which the Ten assemble there should not be missing a man to interpret the law day and night, always, one relieving another. And the Many shall be on watch together for a third of each night of the year in order to read the book, explain the regulation, and bless together. 1QS 6.6–7 trans. DSSSE
In the DSS , the act of interpreting texts is not just important because it is necessary to understand what one is reading. More specifically the use of the lemma in the pesharim
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[→44 Pesharim] exemplifies the effort to interpret texts in order to unlock and reveal divine mysteries. In the eyes of the Yahad, the interpretation of many of the prophetic books (as well as the psalms attributed to David [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]) appeared to hold the same authority as the prophetic text itself. The act of interpreting authoritative texts such as the ‘Prophets’ in the form of a pesher thus extends the authoritativeness to the interpretative text. Many examples might be used to illustrate this point. The following conveys the function and purpose of pesher texts for the Yahad. And likewise the interpretation of the passage [concerns the trai]tors at the end of days. They are the violator[s of the cove]nant who will not believe when they hear all that is going to c[ome up]on the last generation from the mouth of the priest, to whom God placed into [his heart discernme]nt to interpret all the words of his servants the prophets through [whom] God enumerated all that is going to come upon his people. 1QpHab 2.5–10 And God told Habakkuk to write down the things that are going to come upon the last generation, but when that period would be complete he did not make known to him (i.e. Habakkuk). And when it says, ‘So that he can run who reads it’ (Hab. 2.2), its interpretation concerns the Teacher of Righteousness, to whom God made known all the mysteries of the words of his servants the prophets. 1QpHab 7.1–5
From these two passages it is evident that the prophetic text that is cited and interpreted contains divine mysteries unknown even to the prophets themselves. Yet, these mysteries are unlocked for the Yahad with the correct interpreter to whom God has given the correct words and has revealed their true meaning. Thus, the prophecy is only completed and realized in the time of the Yahad. In this way the effort to accurately interpret texts, specifically the authoritative books of the Prophets, represents for the Yahad the means to continue the human-divine relationship as is relevant for their own time and circumstance. The act of interpreting texts is participatory in the continued expansion and transformation of authoritative texts and traditions, and is thus an authoritative extension of prophetic activity and experience of divine encounter.
Prayer Prayer, developed communally in the form of liturgy, becomes the vehicle by which the heavenly and the earthly realms might be bridged, thus enabling the visitation of the angelic court [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. Through divine inspiration, the act of reading and interpreting texts becomes another means by which revelation is experienced as reflected in a variety of DSS . Prayer is an additional way in which the community is able to access the divine. Liturgical texts such as the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice function in developing the human–divine relationship through efficacious prayer. Many of the prayers of this text
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allude to prophetic call narratives from the books of Ezekiel and Isaiah. In essence these narratives are transformed into liturgical texts that become themselves a prophetic revelatory experience for the Yahad. A text belonging to the Instructor. The song accompanying the sacrifice on the seventh Sabbath, sung on the sixteenth of the (second) month. Praise the most high God, you who are exalted among all the wise divine beings. Let those who are holy among the godlike sanctify the glorious King, He who sanctifies by His holiness each of His holy ones. 4Q403 1 i 30–31Wise, Abegg, Cook
The language of holiness [→70 Purity and Holiness] is derived from Isa. 6.3 (‘And one would call to the other, “Holy, holy, holy! The lord of Hosts! His presence fills all the earth!” ’ JPS ) and Ezek. 3.12–13 (‘Then a spirit carried me away, and behind me I heard a great roaring sound: “Blessed is the Presence of the lord, in His place, with the sound of the wings of the creatures beating against one another, and the sound of the wheels beside them – a great roaring sound.” ’ On biblical antecedents in the characterization of the priestly figures of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice see, Newman, 2008, p. 50). Both texts describe the heavenly and divine experience of the biblical prophets as they are called and commissioned to be representatives of the divine voice. In the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice the priestly leaders take on a similar role by echoing the biblical prophets’ experience. The priestly figures that administer these blessings are thus further established as the elect divine intermediaries who maintain the human–divine relationship for the Yahad. The sixth among the chief princes will bless in the name of the powers of the divinities all the powerful of intellect with seven words of his wonderful powers; he will bless all whose path is perfect with seven wonderful words so that they are constantly with all those who exist eternally. 4Q403 1 i 21–23 DSSSE
The prayers of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice become inspired divine prayers that are initiated by figures who act as mediators for the Yahad, capable of transforming members into angelic beings themselves. Through this liturgical experience the members of the Yahad gain access to the heavenly realm which would otherwise not have been available [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. The blessings that the priestly leaders bestow on the members of the Yahad are divinely authorized, thus bridging the earthly-heavenly divide and enabling a prophetic revelatory experience.
Location The primacy of location is an integral component of the experience of divine encounter. The experience of the revelatory seems to require the correct or ideal location in either a literal or metaphorical sense.
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That some of the rule texts [→59 Rules] asserted a primacy of location for the Yahad is evident in the citation and use of Isaiah 40.3, found in 1QS 8.13–15 (also 1QS 9.19–20; 4Q259 3 5, etc.). The importance of location is not only of literal, i.e. the linkage to the site of Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran; 72 Forms of Community], but more broadly of metaphorical significance, i.e. to other locations within and outside of cities throughout the Second Temple Period. Using the metaphor of wilderness becomes a way for the authors of many of the DSS to characterize and authorize their experience of divine encounter (on the wilderness motif as a locus for purification and revelation see, Najman, 2006). In this sense, the wilderness becomes a metaphorical framework through which revelation may take place. This framework is equally important for the continued human–divine relationship which the Yahad pursues. The situating of the Yahad in the desert location has long been a subject in DSS scholarship. We suggest however, that not only is there evidence at Qumran itself for a literal understanding of the inner group, but that the metaphorical significance of the wilderness motif is also central to the efficacy of the prayers and rituals in the DSS . As worshippers who read, interpret and bless together daily (1QS 6.6–8), the members of the inner yahad envision a space that invites the experience of revelation. This type of space is created through the practice of inclusion and exclusion of certain members and relies on the correct positioning and actions of its members in order to conjure a particular and exclusive locus for revelation. Yet, before the Yahad can experience divine encounter, the desert location (which can be an actual desert or metaphorically a place of isolation) would first need to be established as an ideal locus for revelation. The citation of Isa. 40.3 in 1QS 8 lays the groundwork for such a divine encounter to take place. And when these have become a community in Israel in compliance with these arrangements they are to be segregated from within the dwelling of the men of sin to walk to the desert in order to open there His path. As it is written ‘in the desert, prepare the way of ****, straighten in the steppe a roadway for our God.’ 1QS 8.13–15 DSSSE
The wilderness which the Yahad is instructed to enter and prepare is conveyed as a place that is separated from the place of the ‘men of sin.’ By separating themselves and moving into the desert, the Yahad understands itself to be entering a physical place that is removed from the threat of defilement and thus, a place that is holy and worthy of the presence of the divine. In this way, the desert location as described in 1QS 8.13–15 might best be understood as representing the collective Yahad’s internal moral framework that must be cleared, prepared and made ready in anticipation of divine experience. This divine experience is further made possible through the facilitation of the Maskil, who is instructed to lead the Yahad at the time of entering the desert. He should lead them with knowledge and in this way teach them the mysteries of wonder and of truth in the midst of the men of the Community, so that they walk perfectly, one with another, in all that has been revealed to them. This is the time for making ready the path to the desert and he will teach them about all that has
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been discovered so that they can carry it out in this moment and so they will be detached from anyone who has not withdrawn his path from all injustice. And these are the regulations of behaviour for the inspector of these times. 1QS 9.18–21, DSSSE
As the locus for ensuing revelation, the desert becomes a place that is ideal for the human–divine relationship to flourish, a place in which divine mysteries are revealed and knowledge and truth are imparted to the Yahad. In the above passage, the meaning of ‘entering the desert’ is twofold. First, the desert location is the appointed place in which the appointed time can be realized. Yet, even if the correct time is achieved, the passage indicates that the future divine encounter would not be possible without first establishing the correct location for such an encounter. Second, it is only in the desert that the Yahad is able to learn these mysteries, imparted through the Maskil, which would otherwise not be made available. By entering the correct place, the Yahad is able to transform and reclaim the divine encounter that was lost with the destruction of the First Temple and the rejection of the Second. If an accepted member of the Yahad is approved as a member, then participation in divine discourse becomes possible. And no-one shall move down from his rank nor move up from the place of his lot. For all shall be in a community of truth, of proper meekness, of compassionate love and upright purpose, towards each other, in a holy council, associates of an everlasting society. And anyone who declines to enter the covenant of God in order to walk in the stubbornness of his heart shall not enter the Community of his truth . . . 1QS 2.23–26 DSSSE
By being a member of the inner group, one is simultaneously accepted into and able to participate in the holy council where the presence of the divine is seated. Emphasis on separation and the distinguishing from the ‘men of sin’ creates a conceptual sense of location that anticipates the experience of the divine. The members of the inner group must remove themselves from the location in which the presence of the ‘men of sin’ is abundant to a place that ensures their ability to remain acceptable as members of the future holy council. Conceptually, for the Yahad this space is understood to be beyond the reach of that which might hinder the presence of the divine. Thus, the bringing about of revelation is dependent in part on correct location. The situating of one’s self in the correct place is deemed necessary so as to initiate divine encounter.
Conclusion Notwithstanding the variety of genres in the DSS , this much is certain: the authors of the DSS claimed that their interpretations were divinely inspired, they understood their prayers to be angelic, and they believed they had the keys to unlock the revealed secrets of the past and the future [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Inspired
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by and following the traditions of the biblical prophetic texts, the Qumran corpus further substantiates the experience of divine encounter by claiming previously established and new experiences for themselves.
Bibliography Barton, J. (1986), Oracles of God: Perceptions of Ancient Prophecy in Israel after the Exile. London: Darton, Longman, and Todd. Brooke, G. J. (1998), ‘Parabiblical prophetic narratives,’ in P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill, I: 271–301. Brooke, G. J. (2006), ‘Prophecy and prophets in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Looking backwards and forwards,’ in M. H. Floyd and R. D. Haak (eds), Prophets, Prophecy and Prophetic Texts in the Second Temple Period. LHBOTS 427. London: T & T Clark International, pp. 151–65. Brownlee, William H. (1979), The Midrash Pesher of Habakkuk. SBLMS 24. Missoula, MT: Scholars Press. Collins, J. J. (1987), ‘Prophecy and fulfilment in the Qumran Scrolls,’ JETS 30, 267–78. García Martínez, F. (2010), ‘Beyond the sectarian divide: The “Voice of the Teacher” as an authority-conferring strategy in some Qumran texts,’ in S. Metso, H. Najman, and E. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts. STDJ 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 227–44. Jassen, A. P. (2007), Mediating the Divine: Prophecy and Revelation in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Second Temple Judaism. STDJ 68. Leiden: Brill. Kugel, J. L. (1990), ‘David the Prophet,’ in J. L. Kugel (ed.), Poetry and Prophecy: The Beginnings of a Literary Tradition. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, pp. 45–55. Najman, H. (2006), ‘Towards a study of the uses of the concept of wilderness in Ancient Judaism,’ DSD 13, 99–113. Najman, H. (2009), ‘Reconsidering Jubilees: Prophecy and exemplarity,’ in G. Boccaccini and G. Ibba (eds), Enoch and the Mosaic Torah: The Evidence of Jubilees. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 229–43. Newman, J. (2008), ‘Priestly prophets at Qumran: Summoning Sinai through the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice,’ in G. J. Brooke, H. Najman, and L. T. Stuckenbruck (eds), The Significance of Sinai: Traditions About Sinai and Divine Revelation in Judaism and Christianity. Leiden: Brill, pp. 29–72.
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God(s), Angels and Demons Hanne von Weissenberg
The Dead Sea Scrolls provide their readers with plentiful information about God (or gods), angels and demons. Some of these texts are of pre-Qumranic origin, such as the Book of the Watchers [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts] and the Book of Jubilees [25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], and some originate from the Qumran movement, such as the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah], Berakhot [→32 Berakhot], and the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot]. The Dead Sea Scrolls contain ideas expressing something about the relationship of human beings to God and God’s relationship to the created world, as well as the worldview and cosmology of the authors of these texts. Nevertheless, the information we can derive from these various sources does not necessarily create a coherent picture, nor did the Qumran movement [→72 Forms of Community] express its worldview or theology in systematic expositions or treatises. Theology (ideas of God) and anthropology (ideas of man) are intertwined in many ways in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Therefore, descriptions of God and the spiritual world reflect also how the authors of these texts understood humanity or the concept of man. At the same time, the concept of God is not merely a theoretical question, but the relationship to God is a practical issue demonstrated through the practices resulting from divine election. For instance, correct halakhic practices [→58 Halakhah] and the right calendar [→62 Calendars] reflect the relationship to God. In the Dead Sea Scrolls, we can find a variety of references to God. God is the ‘God of Knowledge’ (e.g. 1QS 3.15; 1QH a 9.26) and the ‘God of Truth’ (1QHa 7.25). God is a God of compassion and grace (1QH a 19.29), the God most high (ʾl ʿlywn), and the Lord of hosts. The holiness of God’s proper name yhwh is expressed in some of the Dead Sea Scrolls, both biblical and non-biblical, by writing it with different letters (paleo-Hebrew) or as four dots [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. God also has different roles in the Dead Sea Scrolls: he is the Creator, King and Ruler of the Created World. He is the protector of human beings, the keeper and renewer of the Covenant and, most importantly, the object of continuous praise performed both by angels and humans [→60 Poetry and Hymns]. In the Dead Sea Scrolls, God is described as the Creator and the almighty and omnipotent ruler of the created world, which includes both the human sphere and the spiritual world: ‘Behold, You are Chief of the gods and King of the glorious, Lord of every 490
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spirit and Ruler over every creature’ (1QHa 18.8). God is eternal and righteous. There is no other God and nothing can be compared with God: ‘You are an eternal God (ʾl ʿwlm) and all Your ways endure for eternity without end; there is none beside You’ (1QHa 15.31–32). It is clear in the Dead Sea Scrolls that there is nothing that compares to the grandeur of God. In comparison to their creator, humans are called a ‘vessel of clay,’ ‘vessel of dust,’ or ‘vessel of flesh’ (see esp. 1QHa and Instruction [→38 Instruction]). Humans have no capacity without their God and know nothing unless the knowledge is given by God. God is the ultimate source of knowledge, and it is only from God and through God’s choice certain elected human beings have access to knowledge and wisdom (e.g. 1QHa 9.21–23 [→66 Revelation; 63 Wisdom]). The omnipotence of God accentuates the powerlessness of humans. Human beings are subject to powers that rule over them. The destiny of human beings is in God’s hand, although some texts do seem to suggest the possibility of repentance and return (e.g. 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah). Repentance and ritual purification was understood as an entrance requirement for the Qumran movement (see 1QS 2.25–3.4; 5.1, 14 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 61 Liturgical Texts; 73 Daily Life]). In light of the powerlessness of human beings it is significant how God is seen as the protector and redeemer, shielding his followers from demonic forces and from those individuals who seek to harm them (i.e. in Hodayot): ‘Yo[u] have redeemed the soul of the poor one, whom they planned to put to an end, [. . .] You have redeemed my soul from the hand of the mighty’ (1QH a 10.32–35). Although God protects those who are his chosen people, he punishes those who oppose him (i.e. 1QHa 14.29, see also 1QM ). Furthermore, the relationship to God is also described with covenantal terminology: ‘All who enter the Yahad’s rule shall be initiated into the Covenant before God’ (1QS 1.16). Becoming a member of the Qumran movement was to enter the covenant community (i.e. CD 15.8b–10). God himself is the keeper and renewer of the covenant (Berakhot, 1QS 1.16–3.12). As God is omnipotent, he is the creator of both good and evil (e.g. 1QHa 7.13–17): the righteous and the wicked, angelic forces and demons. As God is described as a king and a ruler, the angels constitute his heavenly court. The most common term for an angelic figure is ‘messenger.’ The word ‘spirit’ is used for angels and demons, as well as spiritual qualities in human beings. Other terms that occur frequently are god or gods (ʾlym,ʾlhym), or sons of god. The term ‘holy ones’ can refer to both humans and angels (for angels as holy ones see for example 1QS , 1QM , 1QH , Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice). The angels are mediators of divine revelations in some texts (e.g. Visions of Amram [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions; 66 Revelation]), and control natural phenomena, such as winds and lightning (e.g. Book of Watchers, Berakhot). Songs of the Sage and Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice describe the angelic priesthood in the heavenly temple [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple], performing heavenly sacrifices. Particularly in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice angels are called many different names, such as ‘glorified ones,’ ‘chiefs of the realms,’ ‘gods of knowledge,’ etc., and the human priesthood is compared unfavourably to the angelic priesthood. Angelic figures that are a part of the chariots of the Most High God in Berakhot and Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice are called cherubim and ophanim. Angels are also
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described as chiefs, God’s servants, ‘the mighty ones of gods in strength.’ The principal angels are named Michael, Gabriel, Sariel and Raphael in 1QM , the ruler of the lot of light is variously called Melchizedek (11Q13 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]; Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice; 4Q544), Angel of Truth (1QS , 4Q177) or the Prince of Light (1QM , 1QS ). Some of the Dead Sea Scrolls express an interest in the names of the angels, such as the Enochic Book of the Watchers [28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts], and the Aramaic Visions of Amram (see also Josephus, J.W. 2.142 [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]). Two important texts describing the angelic sphere are the Book of the Watchers (part of 1 Enoch) and the Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related], both of pre-Qumranic origin but attested in several copies at Qumran. In an elaboration of Genesis 6.1–4 the Book of the Watchers describes the story of the fallen angels and their impure union with mortal women, producing giant offspring. The giants are killed, but their souls come out from their dead bodies. It is these ‘souls’ that become ‘evil spirits.’ Furthermore, the story of the fallen angels suggests that angels could have physical bodies and could sin. The Watchers descend from heaven, with tragic results for humankind. The Watchers reveal illicit knowledge to humans, and this act of instruction is described as sinful. Furthermore, the angelic instruction has negative effects on humanity, and the origin of evil in the world is explained as resulting from the fall of the angels. The fallen Watchers tradition is referred to in other Qumranic texts (i.e. CD 2.17–21; 4Q180 [Ages of Creation A]). According to Jubilees, angels have a hierarchy and different tasks, and at least some of the angels are created circumcised. One of the most important angelic characters is the Angel of Presence, who mediates between God and humanity, Moses in particular. This angel has a central role in the transmission of the law. The Angel(s) of Presence are also mentioned in 1QH a 14.13, 1QS b 4.25–26 [→45 Rule of Blessings]; ‘priests of the interior, attendants of the Presence of the King of the [most] holy ones’ are referred to in 4Q400. These are angels serving in the innermost sanctuary in God’s presence. In Jubilees, evil and sin in the world result from the existence of demons: Mastema, the leader of the giants, makes a deal with God, and one-tenth of his subordinates stay on earth as demons to cause sickness and evil. As angels are created by God, they are subordinate to God’s power, limited in knowledge, although wiser than human beings (e.g. 1QS 4.22). Angels are described as having strength and power (4Q404 [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]; CD ; 1QM ), they are more powerful than human beings, eternal and immortal. However, in the Dead Sea Scrolls there is no detailed description of the appearance of the angels. Angels reside in the heavenly realm, but they can also enter the human world. For the Qumran movement, the presence of angels was a reality; they were a community living in communion with angels, requiring a high degree of ritual purity [→70 Purity and Holiness]: ‘He has made them heirs in the legacy of the Holy Ones; with the Angels has He united their assembly, a yahad party. They are an assembly built up for holiness, an eternal Planting for all ages to come. As for me, to evil humanity and the counsel of perverse flesh do I belong’ (1QS 11.7–9, see also CD 15.15–17). In the Hodayot, the author experiences fellowship with the sons of heaven (1QH a 11.21–23).
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In liturgical texts, God as subject is described as Creator and King (e.g. in the Berakhot). He is also the object of continuous praise, and the task of worship is given both to the angels and human beings. In some texts, such as Daily Prayers, Berakhot and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, humans join in the prayer and praise with the angels [→61 Liturgical Texts]. For demons and their leader the evil angel, only a role as an object of curses is reserved. Demons and their leader are created by and thus subjected to the authority of God. Furthermore, their destiny and ultimate annihilation is predestined. The rule of Belial, which is a present reality for the Qumran movement, will last only as long as God allows it to continue. Demons are real threats to human beings, both to their health and well-being, as well as to their relationship with God. Protection is provided by the angels and God himself, through his election or predestination. The dominion of evil forces, including its duration, is predetermined by God in his wisdom. This explains the current situation in which the righteous experience suffering. Regardless of their afflictions in the present, they can hope for God’s interference in the future. All that is now and ever shall be originates with the God of knowledge. Before things come to be, He has ordered all their designs, so that when they do come to exist – at their appointed times as ordained by His glorious plan – they fulfil their destiny, a destiny impossible to change. He controls the laws governing all things, and He provides for all their pursuits. He created humankind to rule over the world, appointing for them two spirits in which to walk until the time ordained for His visitation. These are the spirits of truth and falsehood. 1QS 3.15–19, trans. Wise, Abegg and Cook
Both the supernatural world and the human sphere are divided into two different groups [→74 Ethics and Dualism]: good and evil, light and dark. The dualistic discourse on the two spirits in 1QS 3.13–4.26 divides humanity into two lots, ruled by the Prince of Lights and the Angel of Darkness respectively [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. In 1QM , the end-time war of the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness is described: ‘On that day the congregation of the gods and the congregation of men shall engage one another, resulting in great carnage’ (1QM 1.10, see also 1QHa 11.35–36). God, angels and demons together with the human sphere create a system with a clear hierarchical order. The ultimate supremacy and omnipotence of the Most High is not questioned and never threatened. The existence of angels and demons creates a system which can explain good and evil in the world. God is almighty; therefore even the evil in the world must be his creation, not an entirely independent entity. Both angels and demons are lesser divine beings. Whether demons in the Dead Sea Scrolls should be equated with the fallen angels, or the spirits of their giant offspring, or have some other origin, is not entirely clear. Furthermore, it might be necessary to make a distinction between demons and evil spirits as these two titles are not necessarily referring to the same entity of the spiritual world. However, the leader of the demonic forces is an evil angel. In some traditions this evil angel is a fallen creature, in others (1QS , 1QM ) its evil originates at creation by God. This figure is referred to by several names in the Dead Sea Scrolls, possibly all
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referring to the same entity: Belial, Mastema, Satan, Melchiresha, Beelzebub, Abaddon, Angel of Darkness. For example, in 1QS , the Angel of Darkness is the counterpart of the Prince of Light; in 1QM the Prince of Light and his spirits of truth are opposed by Belial, an angel of malevolence, and the spirits of his lot, the angels of destruction. Although a leader of demons, even this figure is created by God and thus subordinate to him: Belial controls the demons, God controls Belial, ‘But You, O God, reject every plan of Belial, and Your counsel alone shall stand, and the plan of Your heart shall remain for ever’ (1QH a 12.12–13). The leader of the evil forces is active both in the present age and in the final war, but his rule is of limited duration. Belial is one of the most frequently used names for the leading evil angel. According to the War Scroll (1QM 13.11) and the Treatise of the Two Spirits (1QS 3.25) it was God who created Belial as evil. The end of times is ruled by Belial, but the final judgement will end Belial’s existence (4Q174 [Florilegium] 2.14; CD 4.12–13; 5.18–19). Belial continuously threatens human beings, and can take possession even of some of the members of the movement (CD 12.2). The leading evil angel rules over other demonic or evil spirits of lower rank. These are referred to by different names, possibly representing different species of malevolent spiritual beings, and performing different tasks: ‘spirit,’ ‘evil spirit,’ ‘demon,’ ‘destroyer,’ Lilith, ‘messenger/s of mastema/ot,’ ‘angel(s) of destruction’ (i.e. 1QM 13.10–12; 4Q510 [Songs of the Maskil] 1.4–8). In CD 2.6 and 1QS 4.12 the angels of destruction are described as God’s servants, punishing the wicked. This emphasizes the fact that God is the ultimate ruler even of the evil forces. Demons and evil spirits cause pain and suffering, as well as spiritual damage and ritual impurity. They lead humans to sin and threaten life in every aspect. Demons can enter the human body, from which they can be expelled through exorcism. As an evil spirit enters a human body it can cause illness (4Q266 6 i 5–7 [→35 Damascus Document]; 1QapGen 20.16–17 [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]; 4Q560 [Exorcism]) [→64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. In order to protect the community, Belial or Melchiresha and his lot are cursed in the covenantal ceremony (i.e. the Berakhot). Since this is the period of Belial’s dominion, even those who are the chosen ones of God need protection from demonic spirits. Evil spirits can further be expelled by prayer, incantation and exorcism (i.e. 4Q444 [Incantation], 4Q510–511, 4Q560, 11QPsa 19.1–18 ‘Plea of Deliverance’ [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]). 11QApocryphal Psalms has four surviving exorcistic psalms, including the now canonical Psalm 91. Regardless of possible differences all evil spirits react with equal fear in the face of God’s instruction: And I, the Instructor, proclaim His glorious splendour so as to frighten and to te[rrify] all the spirits of the destroying angels, spirits of the bastards, demons, Lilith, howlers and [desert dwellers] and those which fall upon men without warning to lead them astray from a spirit of understanding. 4Q510 1 4–6, trans. Wise, Abegg and Cook
In sum, the Dead Sea Scrolls provide us with ample evidence of the developing angelology and demonology in the late Second Temple Period. Different groups might
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have had different ideas (see Acts 23.8) [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. This is true also in the Dead Sea Scrolls where no systematic treatment can be found. One of the reasons behind this development is a more stable monotheism, which allowed for a more developed spiritual world without it threatening the unique role of yhwh . Another reason is the emergence of a more transcendent understanding of God. Thus, angels were given a role as the messengers and servants of God, operating between the heavenly and human spheres. Furthermore, as one of the central roles of God is that of a king and ruler it is appropriate that he is surrounded by angels and holy ones. Some of these angels are elevated above their fellows. Although God has an extended court consisting of heavenly creatures, the omnipotence of the Most High is never questioned. Demonology, on the other hand, offers an explanation for suffering and illness in the world and creates an objectification of both the dark side of human nature and God. God is the creator of the entire universe, both good and evil, and even the evil spirits and their leader perform a God-given role.
Bibliography Alexander, P. S. (1999), ‘The demonology of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, II : 331–53. Chazon, E. G. (2003), ‘Human and angelic prayer in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon (ed.), Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19–23 January, 2000. STDJ 48. Leiden: Brill, pp. 35–47. Collins, J. J. (2000), ‘Powers in heaven: God, gods, and angels in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. J. Collins and R. A. Kugler (eds), Religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 9–28. Davila, J. R. (1999), ‘Heavenly ascents in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Leiden: Brill, II : 461–85. Lichtenberger, H. (2009), ‘Demonology in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament,’ in R. A. Clements and D. R. Schwartz (eds), Text, Thought and Practice in Qumran and Early Christianity: Proceedings of the Ninth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, Jointly Sponsored by the Hebrew University Center for the Study of Christianity, 11–13 January, 2004. STDJ 84. Leiden: Brill, pp. 267–80. Najman, H. (2000), ‘Angels at Sinai: Exegesis, theology and interpretive authority,’ DSD 7, 313–333. Steudel, A. (2000), ‘God and Belial,’ in L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov, and J. C. VanderKam (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls Fifty Years After Their Discovery: Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20–25, 1997. Jerusalem: IES , pp. 332–40. Wassen, C. (2007), ‘Angels in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in F. Reiterer, T. Nicklas, and K. Schöpflin (eds), Deuterocanonical and Cognate Literature Yearbook 2007. Angels: The Concept of Celestial Beings – Origins, Development and Reception. Berlin: De Gruyter, pp. 499–523.
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Eschatologies and Messianisms Kenneth E. Pomykala
Eschatology refers to teachings about the ‘last things,’ which in Early Judaism included the end of life or history, the final divine judgement of nations and persons, and respective rewards and punishments, whether in a newly transformed world or in a post-mortem existence. Qumran literature attests to a major strand of such teachings known as apocalyptic eschatology. Within this perspective eschatological events were often to be enacted through divinely ordained human or angelic agents, often called ‘anointed ones’ or messiahs. Messianism, therefore, refers to the set of ideas associated with the identity and activity of these eschatological agents.
Eschatologies Eschatological ideas at Qumran are rooted in concepts about the future found in the Hebrew Bible. The Hebrew prophets presumed a linear concept of time in which God would ultimately end a period of oppression, injustice and scarcity and restore an era of security, justice and prosperity for his people Israel (cf. Amos 9.11–15; Isa. 11.1–10). Working through historical processes God would save Israel and judge enemy nations. During the early Jewish period these ideas were developed in apocalyptic writings such as Daniel and 1 Enoch [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]. In general, this apocalyptic eschatology held that oppressive earthly kingdoms were animated by demonic powers and that God, through transcendent intervention, would soon bring the present evil age to its predetermined end and inaugurate an ideal age of righteousness and holiness. At that time, God would issue final judgement not only on nations, but on individuals, rewarding God’s elect and punishing Jewish apostates and foreign oppressors. This judgement would extend to those who had died, and the respective rewards and punishments would extend into an afterlife. The Dead Sea Scrolls reveal that the sectarians were an eschatological community, meaning their identity was shaped by the belief that the end of days was at hand. The Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] states: But in the mysteries of his understanding, and in his glorious wisdom, God has ordained an end of injustice, and at the time of his visitation he will destroy it forever. 1QS 4.18–19, trans. Vermes
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And though no confirmed apocalypses were discovered among the sectarian writings from Qumran, multiple copies of 1 Enoch, Daniel, and Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] were found among the Scrolls, suggesting that these apocalyptic writings were formative for the worldview of the movement. Moreover, in clearly sectarian writings the phrase ‘end of days’ occurs more than thirty times. In the much-debated text Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah], the end of days is invoked as a time of return to the Lord (4QMMT C 13–15, 21), and the Rule of the Congregation [→46 Rule of the Congregation] details the organization and conduct of the community for the end of days (1QS a 1.1). The phrase occurs most frequently in the pesharim [→44 Pesharim], where biblical texts are interpreted to reveal eschatological realities (cf. 1QpHab 7.1–2). The precise period of the end of days, however, is difficult to specify. Sometimes the phrase refers to the present (4QF lor 1.14–15), other times to the imminent future (1QS a 1.1). Accordingly, the end of days is probably best understood as the period of time – comprised of various stages – immediately before the time of salvation. The movement associated with the deposit of the Scrolls [→72 Forms of Community] apparently saw themselves as already living during the end of days, though they still expected additional events to transpire. Indeed, their self-understanding was shaped by their expectation of an imminent divine visitation. This expectation provided the rationale for their separation from other Jews and retreat into the wilderness to prepare for the coming of the Lord, in accordance with Isa. 40.3: ‘In the wilderness prepare the way of the lord, make straight in the desert a highway for our God.’ (NRSV; see also 1QS 8.12–16) [→66 Revelation]. Their eschatological preparation consisted of studying and rigorously keeping the Law of Moses. Not only did the Qumran community expect the end, but they appear to have calculated when it would occur, as had the book of Daniel before them (cf. Dan. 9.24– 27; 12.11–12). According to the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document] the end was expected a generation after the death of the sect’s founder, the Teacher of Righteousness: From the day of the gathering in of the unique Teacher until the end of all men of war who deserted to the Liar there shall pass about forty years. CD 20.13–15, DSSSE
A number of lines of evidence place the Teacher’s career during the last half of the second century bce . If his death occurred no later than 100 bce , then the end would have been anticipated somewhere between 80–50 bce [→20 Historiography]. The Pesher Habakkuk appears to confirm this dating, since by the time it was composed, in the middle of the first century bce , it was necessary to account for the delay of the end: ‘the last end time will be prolonged . . . for the mysteries of God are awesome,’ and ‘the last end time is drawn out for them, for all of God’s end times will come according to their fixed order’ (1QpHab 7.6–13 trans. Horgan). The community’s belief that God had fixed an imminent end seems to have outweighed their own faulty predictions and would continue to fuel their expectations for more than another hundred years. Presumably with the outbreak of the Jewish war against Rome in 66 ce the Qumran
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community thought the end had finally arrived. If so, the destruction of their desert settlement[→2 Archaeology of Qumran] and the disappearance of the movement from our sources suggest that their hopes were never realized. References to what will take place at the end of days are scattered throughout the sectarian literature, though some documents – such as 1QS a, 4QF lor, 4QC atenaa, 11QMelchizedek and various War Scrolls [→40 Milh.amah] – are focused on eschatological matters (for a reading of the central section of 1QS a as reflecting the present age see Hempel, 2013, pp. 47–62). Still, there is no systematic presentation of the nature of the end; nor do all the accounts present an entirely consistent depiction of it. Nevertheless, the broad outlines of expectations can be summarized. The community saw the end of days as an age of wickedness, in which they, as God’s elect people, were called to keep the Law (CD 6.2–14; 1QS 8.15). In this connection, the end of days would be a time of testing and purification for the community (4QF lor 2 1; 4QC atenaa 2 9–10), as the Sons of Belial sought to make them stumble (4QF lor 1 8–9). Some documents indicate that the community and its founder had already faced such ‘traitors’ of the last days (1QpHab 2.1–7), attesting a belief they were already living at the end of days – at least its initial stages. Nevertheless, it is clear, too, that the community anticipated a decisive turning point with the arrival of the messiahs of Israel and Aaron. In this messianic stage of the end of days, there would be a newly constituted community of all Israel, composed of the sect and other Jews who might join them, a community including men, women and children, whose life would now be governed by the Rule of the Congregation (1QS a 1.1–5). This rule would regulate the life of the community and its assembly, an assembly that would exclude the ritually impure and the physically imperfect because ‘the angels of holiness are with the congregation’ (1QS a 2.3–9) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 70 Purity and Holiness]. 1QS a also describes the procedure for an eschatological banquet at which both the priestly messiah and the messiah of Israel are present, though the priestly messiah clearly takes precedence – he enters first and is the first to bless the bread and the wine. Significantly, according to the Community Rule the procedure for meals among the Qumran community was nearly identical to that of the eschatological meal, save for the presence of the messiahs (1QS 6.2–6) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules). Thus, prior to the arrival of the messiahs the sectarians were proleptically enacting the eschatological banquet at their communal meals [→73 Daily Life]. The final stage of the end of days would bring the war between the sons of light and the sons of darkness. The sons of light consisted of the sect and other Jews who joined them at the end of days; the sons of darkness were comprised of the gentile nations, especially the Kittim, and apostate Jews (1QM 1, 15–19). Joined to this dualistic conception of the war is a more nationalist version in which Israel defeats its traditional gentile enemies in the course of a forty-year war (1QM 2–9) [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. Regulations for the army of the sons of light are determined more by principles of ritual and purity rather than military strategy, and the conduct of the war is directed by the priests. Yet the outcome was predetermined in favour of the sons of light (1QM 13.6). God and his angelic hosts, led by Michael, would fight on their behalf (1QM 10.1–5; 12.1–7; 17.6–8), defeating the sons of darkness. Even so, the royal Davidic messiah plays a key role in the victory and executes the king of the Kittim after the final
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battle, who in this context is the king of the Romans (4Q285 5 1–6). The victory of the sons of light inaugurates the ‘time of salvation for the people of God . . . and of everlasting destruction for all the company of Belial’ (1QM 1.5, trans. Vermes). Alongside depictions of the end summarized above, 11QMelchizedek characterizes the end in terms of the activity of a heavenly being, Melchizedek, probably an alternate name for the archangel Michael. According to this text, Melchizedek assigns the sons of light to his inheritance and announces for them liberation from Belial and forgiveness of sins. Then, in his role as judge, Melchizedek sees to the destruction of Belial, the demonic patron of the sons of darkness. Notably absent from this scenario are any references to human agents as found in the Rule of the Congregation or the War Scroll. Yet, this serves to illustrate the view of reality whereby earthly events are seen as reflections of heavenly events, a perspective familiar from apocalyptic works like Daniel (cf. Dan. 10.13, 20–21). Thus, Melchizedek’s declaration of atonement has its counterpart in the community’s role in making atonement (1QS a 1.3), and the destruction of Belial has its counterpart in the victory of the sons of light over the gentile forces in the eschatological war. Several texts demonstrate that the movement expected a new eschatological temple [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. The War Scroll, for example, presumes a temple building during the end of days (1QM 2.3; 7.11–12). 4QF lor 1 1–6 refers to three temples: ●
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a temple laid waste by foreigners because of Israel’s sin, probably referring to the present temple in Jerusalem which the movement had abandoned; a ‘sanctuary of men’ built by God for offering ‘works of thanksgiving,’ almost certainly referring to the sectarian community; and a temple God himself would build in the last days, where God would reign forever. Foreigners would be excluded from this final temple, ‘because his holy ones are there’ (4QF lor 1.4), referring either to the presence of angels or eschatological Israel.
Scholars debate whether the temple mentioned in the Temple Scroll (11QTa 29.8–10) should be identified with this eschatological temple [→51 Temple Scroll]. It may be that the Temple Scroll, which most likely stems from a precursor group of the Qumran movement, reflects a time when its authors still hoped to reform the standing temple according to their ideal model. Nevertheless, the movement who preserved the Temple Scroll, could easily have come to see its ideal temple as a model for the eschatological temple. Finally, it is evident that the movement believed in judgement after death, along with respective eternal rewards and punishments (1QS 4.6–8; 4.11–14), but how they conceived of the blessed afterlife is disputed. During the Second Temple Period, Jewish beliefs about the afterlife ranged from resurrection of the body (2 Maccabees 7), to resurrection of the spirit (1 En. 90.10; 104.2–6; Jub. 23.30–31), to immortality of the soul (Wisdom of Solomon). Some scholars argue that the sectarians hoped for bodily resurrection. 4Q521 [→39 Messianic Apocalypse] and 4Q385 (Pseudo-Ezekiela) [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related] attest to such a hope, but these documents are probably not sectarian compositions, though their presence in the
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Qumran library might suggest the movement was sympathetic to such views. Beyond these, however, the Scrolls contain few unambiguous data for the notion of bodily resurrection. Others see the sectarian viewpoint described in the Rule of the Community, where it says of the elect of God: He unites their assembly to the sons of the heavens . . . to be an everlasting plantation throughout all future ages.’ 1QS 11.8–9, DSSSE
This suggests a hope aimed at resurrection of the spirit for eternal fellowship with the angels, a fellowship, however, already being experienced by the community as a kind of ‘realized eschatology.’ In the end, it may be that diverse conceptions of the afterlife coexisted within the community.
Messianisms In the Hebrew Bible, ‘messiah’ (anointed one) refers to persons serving in divinely ordained positions of authority, most often Israelites kings (e.g. 2 Sam. 23.1; Ps. 2.2), but also high priests (e.g. Lev. 4.3; Dan. 9.25), and, in one case, a foreign king (Isa. 45.1). Prophets were also anointed to office (1 Kgs 19.16; Isa. 61.1) and could collectively be called ‘anointed ones’ (Ps. 105.16). In early Jewish literature, the term ‘messiah’ is sometimes applied to royal, priestly, and heavenly eschatological figures (e.g. Pss. Sol. 17.32; 1QS 9.10–11; 1 En. 48.10). In light of this usage, the term ‘messiah’ is used broadly to refer to any eschatological figure, whether royal, priestly, prophetic or heavenly, who serves as an agent of God’s purposes in the world. The fall of the Judean monarchy in 586 bce brought Israelite native kingship to an end. Some exilic and post-exilic prophecies expressed hope for the restoration of the monarchy (e.g. Ezek. 34.23–24; Hag. 2.20–23; Jer. 33.14–26), but others envisioned theocratic rule (e.g. Isa. 40–66), undoubtedly to be mediated by priests. The form of governance that initially emerged in post-exilic Judah was diarchic – represented by the civil ruler Zerubbabel and the high priest Joshua. Soon, however, the civil ruler disappears from the arrangement. Thereafter the Jewish high priest alone served as the head of the Jewish people, a form of governance that remained in place until almost 100 bce . Significantly, during this period (ca. 500–100 bce ) there is no clear evidence of hope for the restoration of the monarchy or any kind of messianism. Nevertheless, when messianism emerges at the end of the second century bce , its advocates could draw on a rich array of scriptural traditions about kings, priests and prophets to articulate and legitimate their expectations for eschatological agents. The Qumran Scrolls appear to preserve the earliest expressions of such expectations. Messianism at Qumran has attracted an enormous amount of scholarly attention, but it can still be asked how important it was to the movement. On the one hand, according to 4QMMT disagreements about messianism were not among the issues at the heart of debates between the movement and those outside it. Instead disagreements involved calendars [→62 Calendars], sacrifice and ritual purity [→70 Purity and
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Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. Nor is the king depicted as a messianic figure in the Temple Scroll – an early document – but as a monarch who is fallible and replaceable (11QTa 56.13–18). On the other hand, there are multiple references to messianic figures in the Scrolls, mostly in sectarian documents. Moreover, the arrival of the royal and priestly messiahs marks a key transition point during the end of days, and messianic figures play vital roles in the eschatological scenario. Thus, while messianism may not have been an animating feature in the movement’s disputes with other Jews, it came to hold a significant place in their eschatological hopes. A distinctive feature of messianism attested in the pertinent texts from Qumran is the expectation of both a royal and a priestly messiah. The first data to suggest this came from the Damascus Document with its repeated reference to ‘the messiah of Aaron and Israel’ (CD 12.23–13.1; 14.19; 19.10–11; cf. also 20.1). In isolation this phrase is ambiguous, referring either to one messiah with priestly and royal features or to two figures (since Hebrew allows for the distributive use of the singular ‘messiah’). For most scholars, however, evidence from other texts has confirmed the latter option. Thus, the Rule of the Community speaks of ‘the messiahs of Aaron and Israel,’ plainly having two figures in view (1QS 9.10–11). More importantly, in some texts separate royal and priestly eschatological figures appear (1QS a 2.11–15; 4QF lor 1 11–12; 1QS b [→45 Rule of Blessings]; cf. 4QTest 9–18 [→52 Testimonia]). Even the Damascus Document, in its interpretation of Num. 24.17, refers to both a priestly messiah and a royal messiah (CD 7.18–20). The idea of separate priestly and royal leaders mirrors the early post-exilic governance structure in Judah, but it also represents the response to what the movement considered the illegitimate merging of the priestly and civil/royal offices by the Hasmoneans [→20 Historiography]. One of the designations for the royal messiah at Qumran is the Branch of David (4Q252 5.1–4 [→33 Commentaries on Genesis]; 4QF lor 1 10–13; 4QpIsaa 8–10 11–24 [→44 Pesharim]; 4Q285 5 1–6 [→40 Milhamah]), a title drawn from Jer. 23.5; 33.15. Characterizations of this figure are derived from interpretations of Gen. 49.9–10, 2 Sam. 7.11–14, Amos 9.11, and especially Isa. 10.34–11.5. The description of this figure, however, is fairly limited: he is called the ‘messiah of righteousness’ and said to be sustained by a spirit of might, a fitting attribute for this king’s task to save Israel from its enemies. He therefore plays a key role in the eschatological war (4Q285 5 1–4). Then he would rule over the nations and judge the peoples with the sword, though his judging would be done in accordance with the instructions of the priests. In this regard, perhaps the most striking feature of the Davidic messiah as depicted in the texts from Qumran is that he routinely appears alongside and subordinated to priestly figures. Two other royal messiahs are named in texts from the Qumran caves, the Messiah of Israel and the Prince of the Congregation, titles regarded by many scholars as alternative designations for the Davidic messiah. The Messiah of Israel features in several earlier sectarian texts (1QS 9.10–11; CD 12.23; 1QS a 2.20) and is always paired with a priestly messiah. The coming of the royal and priestly messiahs, along with an eschatological prophet, will mark the end of the age of wickedness, when some are given over to the sword and apostates are excluded from Israel. The Messiah of Israel also plays a role at the eschatological banquet. The Prince of the Congregation is understood as the fulfilment of Balaam’s prophecy in Num. 24.17 that ‘a sceptre shall
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rise out of Israel’ (CD 7.19–20). In the War Scroll the Prince’s shield bears the names of the tribes of Israel (1QM 5.1–2), though nothing is said about his role in the war, which is under the direction of the priests. 1QS b 5.20–29 offers a blessing for the Prince, characterizing him as a figure possessing superior spiritual endowments who will judge righteously, defeat the ungodly, and establish the kingdom of God’s people. Finally, in 4Q285 5 4 the Prince of the Congregation is identified with the Branch of David, who defeats the Kittim in the eschatological battle. The subordination of royal messiahs to priestly figures is a consistent feature in the texts from Qumran and certainly reflects reservations about kingship. Biblical precedents for such reservations are found in Deut. 17.14–20 and Ezek. 40–48, where the king’s prerogatives are restricted. The interpretation of Deut. 17.14–20 in the Temple Scroll limits the king even more than the biblical text – he may only go to war with the permission of the high priest (11QTa 58.18–20) and is subject to a judicial council composed mainly of priests and Levites (11QTa 57.13–14). One might account for the sectarian elevation of priestly authority over kings by appealing to the decidedly priestly orientation of the movement itself (cf. 1QS 2.19–20; 6.8). Yet this priestly orientation may ultimately derive from the community’s fundamental commitment to divine kingship (cf., e.g. 1QH 18.8; 1QM 12.7–8; 19.1; Songs of Sabbath Sacrifice [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]). This commitment would relativize the status of all earthly kings and make God’s law the sole source of authority, which among the sectarians was interpreted by the priests (cf. 1QS a 5.9; 9.5–7). Thus, in the theocratic ideal envisioned in this literature, priests mediated divine rule and therefore took precedence over royal messianic authority. The priestly messiah is sometimes called the Messiah of Aaron, who is always mentioned along with the Messiah of Israel. As noted above, the arrival of these two figures would mark the end of the age of wickedness; at this time atonement for sins would also be made, presumably by the priestly messiah. Another title for the priestly messiah is Interpreter of the Law (CD 7.18; 4QF lor 1 11–12), a designation indicative of the role he would play. In CD 6.7, this same title is used of a past figure, the Teacher of Righteousness, in a context which also anticipates ‘one who would teach righteousness at the end of days’ (CD 7.11). Consequently, it appears the interpretative role of the priestly messiah was modelled on that of the Teacher of Righteousness. At the eschatological banquet, the priestly messiah would take precedence over the royal messiah (1QS a 2.11–15). In the War Scroll the priestly messiah speaks blessings and encouragement to the forces of the sons of light. Scriptural grounds adduced for the concept of a priestly messiah include Num. 24.17, where the ‘star’ was taken to represent the priestly messiah (CD 7.18–19), and Deut. 33.8–11, the blessing of Levi, cited in 4QTestimonia, a catena of messianic proof texts (cf. also 4QFlor 1 6–11). Moreover, traditions about an ideal priest in earlier documents found among the Scrolls – Aramaic Levi (1Q21 1 3–4 [→24 Aramaic Levi]) and Jubilees (ch. 31 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]) – undoubtedly stimulated sectarian ideas about a priestly messiah. Obviously, hopes for a priestly messiah represent dissatisfaction with the current ruling high priest in Jerusalem. In sectarian texts little is said about an eschatological prophet except that he would appear along with the messiahs of Aaron and Israel (1QS 9.11). In the Hebrew Bible
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prophets were anointed (1 Kgs 19.16; Isa. 61.1), but the title ‘messiah’ is never used of the eschatological prophet. Nonetheless, 4QTestimonia does cite Deut. 18.18–19, the divine promise to raise up a future prophet like Moses, alongside proof texts for a royal and priestly messiah. Nothing is said about the prophet’s role. Heavenly eschatological figures also appear in sectarian documents, though they are never called messiahs. In the eschatological war, the archangel Michael – sometimes called the Prince of Light – acts as the heavenly patron of the sons of light (1QM 13.10; 17.7–8). The role played by Michael here is similar to that of ‘one like a son of man’ in Daniel 7. As noted above, Melchizedek, the heavenly figure who appears at the end of days to proclaim liberty and forgiveness of sins and to destroy Belial (11QMelch) is probably an alternate name for Michael. This figure’s role is derived from the Jubilees legislation in Lev. 25.13 and its prophetic interpretation in Isa. 61.1, as well as from Ps. 82.1–2. 4Q491c, the so-called Self-Glorification Hymn [→40 Milh.amah; 37 Hodayot; 60 Poetry and Hymns; 61 Liturgical Texts], speaks of a figure enthroned in heaven, which some argue refers to Michael, but this identification is very uncertain. Several documents that are most likely non-sectarian speak of messiahs. First, 4Q541 (Apocryphon of Levib?) [→65 Patriarchs and Aramaic Traditions] refers to an eschatological high priest who will make atonement, teach according to the will of God, and banish darkness from the earth with ‘his eternal sun,’ though he will meet opposition in an evil generation (4Q541 9 i). This Aramaic document is a likely source for the Greek Testament of Levi in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs. Second, the Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521) reads, ‘[the heav]ens and the earth will listen to his (God’s) messiah’ (4Q521 2 ii 1), and goes on to announce that God will release captives, give sight to the blind, heal the wounded, give life to the dead, and preach good news to the poor (cf. Ps. 146.7–8; Isa. 61.1) [→39 Messianic Apocalypse; 11 Scrolls and Early Christianity]. The interpretation of this text is disputed, but it is reasonable to believe that God’s work would be enacted through the aforementioned messiah and that this messiah would be a prophet, especially because he preaches good news, a role ill-suited to God. In fact, 4Q521 may envision a new Elijah, since its profile of the messiah fits that of the prophet Elijah, who is said to have shut up the heavens and raised the dead (1 Kgs 17.1, 17–24). Third, 4Q246 [→49 Son of God Text], a text influenced by the book of Daniel, declares, ‘He will be called son of God and they will call him son of the Most High’ (2.1). The figure so named has been interpreted variously: in historical terms as a Seleucid king or Jewish king, perhaps Hasmonean; in apocalyptic terms, as the antichrist, an angelic figure like Michael, or a royal (Davidic) messiah, the last two identifications perhaps being the most likely. The two titles in 4Q246 correspond to titles used of Jesus in Luke 1.32, 35. Nonetheless, there is no consensus on the identity of the figure in 4Q246.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (1998), ‘Kingship and messianism in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. Day (ed.), King and Messiah in Israel and the Ancient Near East. JSOTS up 270. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, pp. 434–55.
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Collins, J. J. (2010), The Scepter and the Star. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Collins, J. J. (1997), Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: Routledge. Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hogeterp, A. L. A. (2009), Expectations of the End: A Comparative Traditio-Historical Study of Eschatological, Apocalyptic and Messianic Ideas in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. STDJ 83. Leiden: Brill. Pomykala, K. E. (1995), The Davidic Dynasty Tradition in Early Judaism. EJL 7. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Schiffman, L. (1989), The Eschatological Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Steudel, A. (1993), ‘ʾh.ryt hymym in the Texts from Qumran,’ RevQ 16, 225–46. Xeravits, G. (2003), King, Priest, Prophet: Positive Eschatological Protagonists of the Qumran Library. STDJ 47. Leiden: Brill.
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Jerusalem and the Temple Mila Ginsburskaya
Introduction Much has been written about Jerusalem and the Temple in the Dead Sea Scrolls (see, e.g. Brooke, 2005, pp. 417–34; Collins, 2006, pp. 231–54; Schiffman, 2010). However, since scholarship never ceases to evolve it is useful from time to time to look back at the old data for new vantage points. Such a revision is particularly appropriate today when so many changes are happening in Qumran Studies. Among them is the reconsideration of a thesis that for a long time constituted one of the main axes of Qumran research. It is the thesis that a group (or groups) responsible for producing and/or depositing the DSS had separated itself from the Temple – the centre of national worship in Jerusalem (see, e.g. Goodman, 2010). I will engage with the issue using the insights from Cognitive and Social Psychology [→21 Social Scientific Approaches]. My approach is based on two assumptions. (1) There are certain cognitive-psychological mechanisms that are universal to all humans, across times and societies. (2) Some of the mechanisms characteristic of the development of an individual also operate on a collective level. Although ever since their discovery the DSS have been mined for historical information [→20 Historiography], this could only be extracted by inference, in comparison with other literary sources (e.g. Josephus and Philo) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus] and archaeological data [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. Without this comparative framework we are left nearly clueless as the Scrolls were not written in order to document history. Thus, when the copy of the Damascus Document was found in the Cairo Geniza half a century before the discoveries at Qumran [→35 Damascus Document; 1 Discoveries], the task of identifying its provenance proved to be challenging. I therefore tend to agree with Philip Davies that what we can glean from the Scrolls is not history, but a ‘mnemohistory’ – a cultural or collective memory of the shared past that ‘serves to create or sustain a group’s identity’ (Davies, 2010, p. 42). And I also share Davies’ optimism that this reduction in ‘normal’ historical knowledge does not limit our possibilities for uncovering another historical dimension behind the DSS – the social psychology of the groups that produced our documents 505
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(Davies, 2010, p. 61). The starting point for my analysis will be the notion of Jerusalem as the centre of Temple worship.
Jerusalem as a Locus of the Temple Cult Both Jerusalem and the Temple boast a prominent presence in the Scrolls. The generic names ‘Jerusalem’ and ‘Temple’ (mqdš) occur across different genres. In non-legal texts, poetry [→60 Poetry and Hymns], liturgy [→61 Liturgical Texts], prophetic texts [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related], pesharim [→44 Pesharim] and Rules [→59 Rules], they are also often introduced with the help of a synecdoche, a figure of speech, in which a part is used to represent the whole or the whole stands for a part. Thus, for example, Jerusalem is often referred to as Zion (or Rock of Zion) and Judah, names which emphasize its national significance (e.g. 1QM [→40 Milh.amah] 12.13; 19.5; 4Q522 [Prophecy of Joshua] 9 ii 4; 4Q88 [Psalmsf ] 7 14, 16). Jerusalem is also a place where the ‘throne of David’ stands (4Q522 22–26 3–4). Interestingly, ‘House of the Lord,’ a common biblical designation for the Temple, is utilized only once in the non-biblical Scrolls (4Q522 [Prophecy of Joshua] 22–26 1). Both Jerusalem and the Temple are also represented by their prominent architectural/structural parts. Thus, Jerusalem is known by its ‘gates,’ ‘palaces,’ ‘citadels,’ ‘ramparts’ (e.g. 1QM 12.12–14; 4Q196 [Tobita] 18 7; 4Q522 22–26 5; 4Q554 (New Jerusalema) 2 iii 12; 11Q13 [11QMelchizedek] 3 9 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]). And the Temple is invoked through the mention of the altars, the Holy of Holies, sacrificial offerings, priests and other elements pertinent to cultic worship (e.g. CD 11.18–20; 1Q14 [pMicah] 10 3–4; 4Q169 [pNah] 3–4 i 11 [→44 Pesharim]; 4Q276 [Tohorot Ba] 1 4;[→70 Purity and Holiness] 4Q390 [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Ce] 2 i 2 [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]; and 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]). A majority of the DSS texts identify Jerusalem, directly or indirectly, as a location of the Temple. Two compositions, the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll] and the New Jerusalem [→43 New Jerusalem] present grand detailed designs for the Temple and for Jerusalem and envision the integration of the two. This is in contrast to the vision of Ezekiel (Ezek. 40–48) where the Temple complex is situated outside of the city. Jerusalem is God’s ‘chosen place,’ the dwelling of God’s name, the seat of His tabernacle, inseparable from it in its fate and in its glory. Thus, we read in Words of the Luminaries [→54 Words of the Luminaries]: Your tabernacle[ ] a place of rest in Jerusa[lem, the city that You ch]ose out of all the earth, that Your [name] should dwell there forever. [. . .] they shall bring their offerings: silver, gold and gems, even every precious thing of their lands, whereby to glorify Your people and Zion, Your holy city, as well as Your glorious temple, ‘there is neither adversary nor misfortune’ (1 Kgs 5.18). No, rather peace and blessing [ ] 4Q504 1–2 iv 2–13, trans. Wise, Abegg, Cook
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As a seat of the Temple Jerusalem is also the destination of pilgrimage (4Q522 22–26 1–3; 4Q166 [4QpHoseaa] ii 14–16). The special status of Jerusalem as the locus of worship comes across particularly vividly in a number of legal texts [→58 Halakhah]. Thus Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah typologically identifies Jerusalem and the Temple with the Israelites’ ‘camp’ in the wilderness built around the ‘tent of meeting’ (4Q394 3–10 ii 16). In the Damascus Document (e.g. CD 12.2) and the Temple Scroll (e.g. 11Q19 47.9, 11; 11Q20 12 9), which is written as a direct speech from God, Jerusalem is referred to as ‘the city of the/my temple:’ ʿyr hmqdš, ʿyr mqdšy. It is debated whether the phrase designates only the temple complex or the entire city (Schiffman, 2010, pp. 311–13). If the latter, then we should assume that purity restrictions pertinent to the holy zone of the Temple are extended to the whole city, including its residential areas. Thus we read in the Temple Scroll, And the city, which I will hallow by settling my name and [my] temp[le within (it)], shall be holy and clean of any unclean thing with which they may be defiled; everything that is in it shall be clean, and all that will be brought to it shall be clean: wine and oil and all foodstuffs and all mwšqh shall be clean. [. . .] for their (degree of) cleanness is according to (the degree of cleanness of) their flesh. And you shall not defile the city in which I settle my name and my temple . . . 11Q19 47.3–11 trans. Wise, Abegg, Cook; see also CD 12.1–2; 4Q394 [MMTa] 8 iv 8–12
Was the idea of extending the holy zone of the Temple to Jerusalem particular to religious rigorists or did it have older roots? Several prophetic passages point towards the latter option. Although the epithet ‘holy’ is attached to Jerusalem throughout the Bible, in Joel 3.17 as well as in Isa. 52.1 and Zech. 14.20–21 we are presented with a vision reminiscent of the Temple Scroll, 4QMMT and the Damascus Document. The most elaborate set of legal rules are found in Zech. 14: On that day there shall be inscribed on the bells of the horses, ‘Holy to the lord.’ And the cooking pots in the house of the lord shall be as holy as the bowls in front of the altar; and every cooking pot in Jerusalem and Judah shall be sacred to the lord of hosts, so that all who sacrifice may come and use them to boil the flesh of the sacrifice. And there shall no longer be traders in the house of the lord of hosts on that day. Zech. 14.20–21, NRSV
In Isa. 52, quoted in 4QTanh.umim (4Q176 8–11 2–3 [→50 Tanh.umim]) we read, Awake, awake, put on your strength, O Zion! Put on your beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city; for the uncircumcised and the unclean shall enter you no more. Isa 52.1, NRSV; cf. Ezek. 44.6–9 which expresses the hope that foreigners – the ‘uncircumcised’ – will not be admitted to the Temple.
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Notably, all of these texts describe the ideal future, which is outlined in sharp contrast with contemporary reality. And here we come to the central point of my discussion: the relationship between ideas and events; between mental representations and the actual world.
Temple and Jerusalem as Representations The studies of developmental, cognitive and social psychology explore how we, as human beings, make sense of the world around us. Continuously, beginning from our birth, we acquire information about the outside world, ‘digest’ it in our mind and in our body, integrate it with previously existing ‘meaning structures’ in our communication with and navigation through the outer reality (Lundh, 1983; Moscovici, 2000; Piaget, 1997; Wadsworth, 1979). Scholars speak of ‘cognitive maps,’ ‘cognitive representations’ and ‘social representations’ to refer to the mental models of reality created by individuals and collectives. However, as the famous saying of Alfred Korzybski goes ‘map is not territory’ (1933) although there is an obvious connection between the two. Indeed, as Moscovici (2000, pp. 62–3) has pointed out, representations can function autonomously from the context that produced them and, in turn, be used to shape the outer reality. Applying these insights to the Dead Sea Scrolls, it could be suggested that the Scrolls do not present us with objective documentary-style portrayals of the contemporary Temple and Jerusalem, but rather with a variety of representations created by different groups that wrote and used those texts. The only unequivocal piece of historically verifiable information we find in the Scrolls is that the Temple was indeed located in Jerusalem. Apart from that, we learn from the Scrolls how their authors and users experienced their reality, which is valuable in itself. It helps us better understand the socio-psychological processes that underlay the dynamics of religious movements in Second Temple Palestine [→10 The Scrolls and Early Judaism]. Incorporated within our ‘meaning structures’ are the recurring patterns of situations, the so-called ‘temporal invariants.’ Our ability to recognize them enables us to foresee the outcomes of similar types of situations and prepare ourselves accordingly. ‘A meaning structure which has developed as the result of the perception of a sequence of events, now can be activated in the form of a momentary perception of what the situation affords.’ (Lundh, 1983, p. 38). The ‘meaning structures’ of the people of the Scrolls include two strong invariant motifs that accompany the theme of Jerusalem and the Temple throughout the whole DSS corpus: (1) ‘crime and punishment’ (2) the promise of forgiveness, redemption and restoration. These motifs, inherited from biblical tradition, connect the past, the present and the future. From a Jungian perspective, they represent a classic example of a stretch between two opposite existential poles, with the life of the subject (individual or communal) happening right in the centre of the tension. The traumatic event of the
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destruction of the First Temple and Jerusalem, followed by the Babylonian exile, has been preserved and interpreted in the collective memory of the nation as a punishment for the acts of unfaithfulness committed by the people of Israel and their priestly leadership. It is replayed over and over again, not simply for the sake of commemoration, but as a warning to the present generation. The warning sometimes takes the form of prediction, so that the punishment is presented not as a possibility, but as inevitability. Thus we read in the Damascus Document: So listen, all you who recognize righteousness, and consider the deeds of God; for He has a suit against every mortal and He executes judgement upon all who despise him. When in their treachery they abandoned him He turned away from Israel and from His sanctuary and gave them up to the sword. CD 1.1–4 trans. Wise, Abegg, Cook, see also 1QpHab 9.3–7; 12.5–10; 4Q379 [4QApocryphon of Joshuab] 22 ii; 4Q387 [Apocryphon of Jeremiah Cb]
For the authors and the users of the Scrolls, recognizing the ‘temporal invariant’ that brings about God’s wrath would have been sufficient to ‘diagnose’ the present as gravely diseased and to predict a lamentable outcome. Would it not then be logical to expect that they would make an effort to avoid the route that takes them, along with the whole nation, towards this dire end? This question brings us to the next point of my discussion, which concerns the possibility of separation from the Temple cult in Jerusalem and the question of identity.
Separation and Identity The scholarly mind-map that dominated Dead Sea Scrolls research for over fifty years has been based on an assumption that the documents were produced by a certain ‘Qumran community’ (or several related communities) that separated itself from the Temple cult in Jerusalem and went to live at the shores of the Dead Sea. This model is currently undergoing a re-evaluation [→72 Forms of Community]. The importance of the Temple for the authors of the Scrolls and their communities is being emphasized (von Weissenberg, 2010, pp. 293–305). Moreover, the question is being asked whether it would be conceivable at all for any Jew of that time to contemplate separating themselves from the official Temple cult while preserving their identity (Goodman, 2009, pp. 202–13; 2010, pp. 277–87). While Goodman answers this question negatively, I would answer it positively. To avoid misunderstanding, I must say that I am not suggesting that any of the groups behind the Scrolls, at any point in their history, actually carried out the separation. Our textual evidence does not allow us to establish this unequivocally. However, I believe that such a move is not unthinkable and can be substantiated by the theories of cognitive and social psychology. Space permits me merely to outline my way of reasoning here in order to lay the groundwork for a more substantial analysis elsewhere. My basic premise, as I have already noted above, is that the Temple and Jerusalem as a physical place (i.e. the part of the ‘objective’ outer reality) should be distinguished from the Temple and Jerusalem as cognitive symbols and representations. The cognitive flexibility of symbolic representations underlies the human faculty of abstract thinking
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(Zerubabel, 1997, p. 79). This faculty also prepares us ‘to respond to anomalous information – to novelty’ by revising our internal maps and developing new meaning structures and forms of behaviour that facilitate our survival and successful functioning in the changed circumstances (Peterson, 1999, p. 19 and passim; Lundh, 1983). According to the behaviourist Skinner, When a person cannot engage in a behavior which he is strongly disposed to engage in, because it has become connected with punishment, the behavior may be said to have acquired a conflicting meaning for him – a conflict which may be temporarily solved by avoiding this behavior, and engaging in a behavior which is sufficiently similar to be reinforcing but sufficiently dissimilar not to be punishing. Lundh, 1983, p. 72; emphasis added
For the people behind the Scrolls, the ‘anomaly’ that generated a ‘conflicting meaning’ (‘cognitive dissonance’ in the terminology of Festinger, 1957) would be the continued participation in the illegitimate and defiled cult, which was expected to bring about God’s wrath and punishment. Now, we must ask whether the movement associated with the Scrolls were in possession of a paradigm sufficiently similar and at the same time sufficiently dissimilar to that of regular Temple worship in order to support such a split? I contend the answer is found in the old biblical idea that repentance and righteous living are as efficient as sacrifices in procuring God’s forgiveness and protection (see, e.g. Ps. 51.16–19; Hos. 6.6; Prov. 15.8). Although it continues to be debated whether some of these texts express an opposition to the Temple cult as such, most scholars agree that contrasting sacrifices with righteous living is a rhetorical device aimed at emphasizing proper intention as a condition to acceptable sacrifices. In certain circumstances, however, such rhetoric could be taken at face value. For example, in the absence of the Temple cult during the Babylonian exile, worship did not stop. In fact, certain biblical writings present the exile as an opportunity for repentance and atonement, a place where one’s heart begins to know God and finds His favour (e.g. Jer. 24.1–10). According to Knibb (2009, pp. 191–212), some groups dissatisfied with the administration of the restored Temple cult continued to consider themselves in exile. On their internal cognitive maps the Temple still did not exist, and Jerusalem continued to lie in ruins because the dysfunctional defiled Temple was worth the same as a non-existent Temple. The response to this situation could have been to transfer the value ascribed to Temple sacrifices to non-sacrificial forms of worship. We find a vivid example of such a reinterpretation in the Community Rule (1QS ; 4QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]). In this document the life of community members is presented as an equivalent to cultic worship. By ‘volunteering’ (mtndbym) to serve within the community they bring themselves, their talents and their belongings as freewill offerings (ndbh) to God (e.g. 1QS 1.11–13; cf. Lev. 7.16; 22.18–21). Their ‘unblemished’ behaviour procures atonement without ‘the flesh of burnt-offering and fat of sacrifices.’ Their prayers – the ‘offering of the lips’ – are compared to the ‘pleasant aroma of justice’ (1QS 9.3–6). Their meals and communal gatherings are presided over by priests (1QS 6.4–6, 8–9) [→73 Daily Life]. Holiness is the marker of the community, which is called the ‘Holy of Holies’ and the ‘Holy House of Aaron’ (1QS 9.6; 10.4 [→70
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Purity and Holiness]). Through the life of repentance and total compliance with God’s laws community members are ensuring for themselves a path to salvation, painted in bright colours and in stark contrast with the dire fate that awaits sinful outsiders (cf. 1QS 2.1–9; 4.2–14) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Jerusalem in this document is invoked indirectly through citing Isaiah’s call to prepare ‘the way of the Lord’ in the ‘wilderness’ (Isa. 40.3; 1QS 8.13–14), which heralds forgiveness and the restoration of Jerusalem (Isa. 40.2). Whether or not the group behind the Community Rule had actually departed to the desert, the text clearly indicates that the cognitive infrastructure necessary to facilitate such a shift of consciousness, accompanied by an action, was available within the framework of traditional Jewish self-definition. 4QF lorilegium and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifices [→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice] – two compositions traditionally linked in scholarship with the Community Rule – speak, respectively, of the ‘Temple of Man/Adam’ (mqdš ʾdm) and of a heavenly temple. The ‘Temple of Man’ where ‘the deeds of Torah/thanksgiving’ were offered as ‘smoking sacrifices’ (4QF lor 1.6) has been taken to refer to the community that substituted itself for the actual Temple (Brooke, 2005, p. 288). Even though this is not the only possible interpretation of the text (Wise, 1991, pp. 103–32), the very ambiguity testifies to the flexibility of symbolic thinking, where ‘Temple’ could be moved across different mindscapes. These mindscapes can also contain the mental designs of the ideal Temple and Jerusalem on earth, as well is in heaven. In conclusion to this brief analysis, I would suggest that separation from the Temple and Jerusalem could have been carried out without damage to the sense of Jewish selfidentity of the groups and individuals involved. Ethnic identity is, to a large extent, a discursively constructed phenomenon, which consists of multiple elements (Newsom, 2004) [→6 Ethnicity: A Fresh Religious Context of the Scrolls]. If an ethnic group is moved from its specific geographical territory (in our case Jerusalem and the Temple), the idea of the territory, preserved in its mental mind-map, continues to play a role in the group’s self-definition (Hall, 1997, pp. 17–33). Thanks to their capacity to function autonomously from the reality that has engendered them, representations serve to preserve and sustain identity outside of their original context. Continuity of meaning is ensured when representations fundamental to identity are incorporated within new meaning structures. Thus, the idea of the Temple would have continued to play a role in shaping the identity of the splinter group(s) through discourse as well as through reenactment of cultic worship by alternative means to which the value of the sacrificial cult has been assigned. Furthermore, the belief in the restoration of and return to Jerusalem and its Temple would have provided the separatists with a map oriented towards the future point, where physical and cognitive realities would again converge (e.g. 1QM 12.12–16; CD 3.20–4.4; 14.18–19; 4Q177 [4QC atena A] 12–13 i 9–11; 11Q5 [11QPsa] 22 11–15; 11Q13 [11QMelchizedek] [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]).
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2005), ‘The ten temples in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. Day (ed.), Temple and Worship in Biblical Israel. London: T & T Clark, pp. 417–34.
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Collins, A. Y. (2006), ‘The dream of a New Jerusalem at Qumran,’ in J. H. Charlesworth (ed.), The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Volume 3: The Second Princeton Symposium on Judaism and Christian Origins. Waco, TX : Baylor University Press, pp. 231–54. Davies, P. (2010), ‘What history can we get from the Scrolls, and how?,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 40–61. Festinger, L. (1957), A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance. Evanston, IL : Row, Peterson. Goodman, M. (2009), ‘Religious variety and the temple in the Late Second Temple period and its aftermath,’ JJS 60, 202–213. Goodman, M. (2010), ‘The Qumran sectarians and the temple in Jerusalem,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 277–87. Hall, J. M. (1997), Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity. Cambridge: CUP. Knibb, M. (2009), Essays on the Book of Enoch and Other Early Jewish Texts and Traditions. SVTP 22. Leiden: Brill. Korzybski, A. (1933), Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics. Lancaster: Science Press Printing Company. Lundh, L.-G. (1983), Mind and Meaning: Towards a Theory of the Human Mind Considered as a System of Meaning Structures. Uppsala: Ubsaliensis S. Academiae. Moscovici, S. (2000), Social Representations: Explorations in Social Psychology. Cambridge: Polity Press. Newsom, C. A. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Peterson, J. B. (1999), Maps of Meaning: The Architecture of Belief. New York; London: Routledge. Piaget, J. (1997), The Origins of Intelligence in the Child. London: Routledge. Schiffman, L. (2010), Qumran and Jerusalem: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the History of Judaism, Grands Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Weissenberg, H. von (2010), ‘The centrality of the temple in 4QMMT,’ in Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls, pp. 293–305. Wadsworth, B. (1979), Piaget’s Theory of Cognitive Development: An Introduction for Students of Psychology and Education. New York; London: Longman. Wise, M.O. (1991), ‘4QFlorilegium and the temple of Adam,’ RevQ, 15, 103–32. Zerubabel, E. (1997), Social Mindscapes: An Invitation to Cognitive Sociology. Cambridge, MA : Harvard University Press.
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Purity and Holiness Cecilia Wassén
Impurity in Israelite Religion For many peoples in the ancient world purity and impurity were part of a basic understanding of the world. This is evident in Israelite religion which categorized people, objects and places as either pure or impure. Also, like common taboos among different peoples, the Israelites considered bodily discharges and corpses as impure (Lev. 11–15; Num. 19) [→58 Halakhah]. In fact, impurity was an inescapable part of everyday life. These types of impurity, often called ‘ritual impurity,’ were not something people should avoid, except in connection to the sacred; on the contrary, procreation and burials of one’s parents were commandments. The common types of impurity are temporary, i.e. those stemming from menstruation, sex, childbirth and contact with a corpse. Biblical laws prescribe ways of becoming pure which typically involve purification by water and a period of waiting. Jonathan Klawans’ (2000, p. 23) characterization of ritual impurity is helpful: (1) The sources of ritual impurity are generally natural and more or less unavoidable. (2) It is not sinful to contract these impurities. (3) These impurities convey an impermanent contagion. The overarching function of purity regulations was to prevent impurity from coming into contact with the holy, most importantly the sanctuary (e.g. Num. 19.13, 20; see Milgrom, 1991, pp. 976–85). In other words, purity was a necessary prerequisite for God’s holiness to be present. Hannah Harrington explains that holiness ‘is an active force which comes from God,’ which ‘can be defined loosely as divine energy.’ Purity, on the other hand, ‘is a state of being; it refers to the absence of impurity’ (Harrington, 2004, p. 9; cf. Lev. 21.8). As we will see below, in the Dead Sea Scrolls the purity laws also aim at protecting sacred space, in this case not only with regard to the cult, but also the community’s special meetings and meals.
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Purity Concerns in the Dead Sea Scrolls and at Qumran The latter part of the Second Temple Period saw an increased interest in purity among Jews in general that extended far beyond the temple. About 850 stepped pools have been discovered in Judea as well as in Galilee, most of them stemming from the first century bce until 135 ce (Adler, 2013, pp. 243–5). The vast majority of them have been found in Judea with a unique concentration in Jerusalem where as many as 170 stepped pools have been uncovered (Adler, 2013, p. 243). Apart from residential areas, ritual baths also appear close to oil and wine presses, cemeteries and along pilgrimage roads (Zissu and Amit, 2008; Adler, 2008). The common use of stone vessels, apart from clay vessels, indicates a concern for purity as well, since these were seen as insusceptible to impurity (although according to the Damascus Document impure oil stains would render stone impure; CD 12.15–17 [→35 Damascus Document]). The archaeology at Khirbet Qumran indicates an intensified concern with purity, with possibly as many as ten ritual baths discovered [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. Jodi Magness points out that both the high number and their large size are distinctive features of the site (Magness, 2002, pp. 147–58). Here we may recall the requirements in CD 10.10–13 that there must be enough water to cover a man, otherwise an impure man will defile the water. In addition, Roland de Vaux’s archaeological team uncovered a relatively large number of stone lids and stoppers, as well as jars and craters made of stone, which can be associated with purity practices. The key texts concerning purity found at Qumran are the Damascus Document (D – attested both at Qumran and in the Cairo Genizah), the Community Rule (S [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community), Tohorot (4Q274; 4Q276–278), Ordinancesa-c (4Q159, 513–514), the Temple Scroll (11Q19–20 [→51 Temple Scroll) and 4QMMT (4Q394–4Q399; 4Q313 [4QcrypticAMMT g?] [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]). It is debated whether or not the rules on purity in these texts comprise a coherent system. Harrington’s assessment appears well founded: Although there are some differences between the texts, the similarity of the concept and laws of purity are more striking than the differences. Harrington, 2004, p. 12; for a contrasting view, see Werrett, 2007
Part of the sectarian literature, as well as other non-biblical texts from Qumran such as, e.g. Jubilees [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] exhibit a heightened concern about purity. As Harrington notes, the majority of laws recorded in the texts relate to purity and the cult (Harrington, 2004, p. 7). A focus on purity is evident, for example, in that prospective new members were allowed gradual access to pure things according to S [→73 Daily Life]. Only after a year were successful candidates allowed to touch the ‘purity of the Many’ and after two years ‘the liquid of the Many’ (1QS 6.13–21). Furthermore, literature from Qumran reveals a tendency to interpret the biblical purity laws in a stringent way. For example, sexual intercourse was prohibited in Jerusalem (CD 12.1–2) and rendered the couple impure for three days (11Q19 45.11–12 [→51 Temple Scroll]), rather than the traditional one day (Lev. 15. 18).
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Furthermore, a woman carrying a dead foetus was considered as defiling as a corpse (11Q19 50.10–11), which is a halakhic innovation. The stringency in purity rules is natural in light of the movement’s strive for holiness. According to a number of texts, the members of the movement made up a holy community, which is evident in common expressions such as ‘a holy congregation’ (1QS 5.2; 1QS a 1.9, 13 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]), ‘a holy council’ (1QS 2.25; 1QM 3.4 [→40 Milh.amah]; CD 20.25 [→35 Damascus Document]) and ‘men of perfect holiness’ (CD 20.2–7; 1QS 8.20). Furthermore, a common metaphor for the sect is that of a temple (e.g. 1QS 5.5–6; 8.4–6; 9.3–6; 4QF lorilegium 1–2 i 6). This use of metaphors does not indicate that the community saw itself as a replacement for the Jerusalem Temple, as some scholars argue, since metaphors are by definition not meant to be taken literally [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. Instead, the temple metaphors aim primarily to communicate the notion of the community as holy (Wassén, 2013, p. 69). The holiness of the community is based on the presence of the divine. Several texts express a firm belief that holy angels are present and that human and heavenly beings are in some sense united (e.g. 1QS 11.7–9; 1QHa 11.21–23 [→37 Hodayot]; 4Q510–511 [Songs of the Maskil]; see Wassén, 2011, pp. 533–7) [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. Hence, avoiding impurities is an ideal among the sectarians (e.g. CD 7.3–4). From a halakhic point of view impurity was of course unavoidable. But it was possible to keep certain meetings and meals pure by excluding the impure (e.g. 1QS a 2.8–9; see Wassén, 2016). And, it was of utmost importance to handle impurity properly, which only the sectarians were able to do since, according to sectarian ideology, only they knew the correct interpretation [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Hence according to D, members are ‘to distinguish between the impure and the pure and make known (the difference) between the holy and the profane’ (cf. Ezek. 44.23–24; Lev. 10.10a) based on the instructions of the founders of the ‘new covenant’ (CD 6.17– 20; cf. 12.19–20) [→20 Historiography]. In the view of D, the rest of the population is under Belial’s sway and caught in his nets of sins (CD 4.12b–5.15), one of which is defilement of the temple (CD 4.6–11). This occurs because men are having sex with menstruating women (which causes moral impurity; see below) and by incest (marriage between a man and his niece). In the latter case, the Qumran movement adopted an alternative interpretation to what is known from other sources (Wassén, 2005, pp. 113–22). They also appear to have separated from other people to some degree in order to protect their purity (e.g. 4QMMT C 7–8; CD 5.14–15; 6.15; 8.16/19.29; 1QS 5.16–20; see Wassén and Jokiranta, 2007, pp. 212–13).
Ritual and Moral Impurity In addition to ‘ritual impurity’ that derives from bodily phenomena as described in the P stratum of the Pentateuch (i.e. menstruation and death; see Lev. 11–15; Num. 19), the Holiness Code (Lev. 17–27) applies impurity language to grave sins, i.e. sexual transgressions, murder and idolatry (cf. Num. 35.33–34). There is no possible atonement for these crimes; instead sinners must be executed for defiling the land (Lev. 18.28–29).
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In contrast to many scholars who interpret the impurity terminology with regard to sin as metaphorical, Klawans makes a strong case for viewing ‘inner,’ or ‘moral,’ impurity, no less ‘real’ than ‘outer,’ or ‘ritual’ impurity. According to him, these categories are distinct in the Hebrew Bible, although there are cases where purity language is used metaphorically in connection to sin, such as in Isa. 1.15–17 and Ps. 51.4–5, 9 (Klawans, 2000, pp. 26–36). This question of moral versus ritual impurity is important for the interpretation of conceptions of impurity in the texts from Qumran. Many scholars have noted that sectarian texts link impurity and sin (Baumgarten, 1992, p. 209). Klawans may be going too far, however, by arguing that the movement merged the two categories: Ritual and moral impurity were melded into a single conception of defilement . . . At Qumran, sin was considered to be ritually defiling and sinners had to purify themselves [. . .] those who became ritually impure had not only to purify themselves, but to atone as well. Klawans, 2000, p. 90
It should be noted, however, that Klawans distinguishes between the sectarian texts (e.g. 1QS , D, 1QH , Tohorot, 4Q512 [Ritual of Purification B]), where he finds such an identification of ritual and moral impurity, and proto-sectarian texts (i.e. 11QT and 4QMMT ), where this notion is lacking. Primary examples of the alleged identification between ritual and moral impurity include 1QS 3.4–6 about one ‘who refuses to enter the covenant’: He cannot be purified by atonement, nor be cleansed by waters of purification, nor sanctify himself in streams and rivers, nor cleanse himself in any waters of ablution, Unclean, unclean is he, as long as he rejects the judgments of God. 1QS 2.26; trans. Charlesworth PTSDDSP 1
The same point is made in 1QS 5.13–14 concerning ‘the men of deceit.’ These passages reflect the basic view that ritual purification was not effective for a sinner. Clearly, moral and ritual impurity are interrelated in some of the texts from Qumran. At the same time, there is in my opinion little evidence that inner and outer impurity made up a ‘single conception of defilement’ (Klawans, 2000, p. 90). There is evidence that moral impurity was expanded in the Qumran movement compared to the Holiness Code to include all sins, as 1QS 5.13–14 expresses. 1QS 8.16–18 (a passage lacking in 4QS e) explicitly prohibits a sinner (one ‘who strays from any one of the ordinances deliberately’) from touching the ‘purity of the men of holiness.’ Similarly, the penal codes in S (1QS 6.24–7.25), D (CD 14.8–20; 4QD a 10 i–ii), and the fragmentary Miscellaneous Rules (4Q265 4 i–ii) exclude various sinners from ‘the purity’ (the expression is reconstructed in 4Q265), which includes special meals [→73 Daily Life; 22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies]. Such passages reveal an effort to exclude sinners from certain gatherings that were considered sacred because of the presence of the divine. These regulations likely reflect a conception of all sinners as morally impure. Yet, it is hard to find any evidence that impurity carriers of the ordinary kind were considered sinners,
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or morally impure. Most importantly, the majority of the laws related to ritual impurity are, like the P stratum, written in a neutral way as Martha Himmelfarb notes concerning 4QD (Himmelfarb, 2001, pp. 9–29). According to Klawans, the prayers in Ritual of Purification (4Q512), which likely were recited at purification rituals, express a penitential tone and thereby demonstrate that impurity carriers were in need of atonement [→61 Liturgical Texts]. Nevertheless, the blessings primarily express gratitude to God for purifying them through his grace. It seems natural in connection with purifying the body also to express gratitude for atonement of sins by God. Himmelfarb points out that although sin and impurity occur side by side in 4Q512 they remain separate (2001, p. 36). Klawans also points to a ‘penitential formula’ concerning an impure person (with either scale disease or discharge) in Tohorot A (4Q274 1 i 1), by reference to someone who lies ‘in a bed of sorrow’ and sits ‘in a seat of sighing’ (Klawans, 2000, p. 87). We may compare this with the appearance of one afflicted by scale disease and a male discharger in a fragmentary list of transgressors in 4QD e 2 ii 12 [→35 Damascus Document], which indicates that these impurity carriers were considered sinners (Baumgarten, 1996, pp. 145–6). Nevertheless, the reason why these people are considered sinful may be parallel to the case of Miriam (Num. 12), i.e. because of a conviction that the persons have sinned. Severe diseases, like scale disease and discharge, were likely considered the result of people making themselves open to demonic attacks because of their sins (Wassén, 2008, pp. 116–20). Hence, these persons are considered sinners not because of their ritual impurity per se, but because people believed that they had sinned. This is very different from the impurity resulting from, e.g. a couple having sex. In sum, in a number of Qumran texts sinners are considered (morally) impure and therefore banned from meetings, but we find little evidence that ritually impure people were normally considered sinners, except perhaps in cases of severe, defiling diseases.
Impurities and Purifications Corpse Impurity and First Day Ablution The most contaminating impurity in the Hebrew Bible is corpse impurity because a corpse contaminates items and persons without direct contact, and its defiling force never ceases [→58 Halakhah]. According to Num. 19, everyone who touches a dead person, a grave or enters into a house with a corpse is impure for seven days. They have to be sprinkled on the third and seventh day with special waters that contain ashes from the red heifer (‘water for cleansing’) in order to become clean. It is curious to note the irony that whereas the water purifies the unclean, the ashes from the ‘purification offering’ defile the person performing the ritual (Num. 19.19–20; cf. 19.7–10). The Temple Scroll adds additional purifications for the corpse contaminated; importantly, they have to bathe and launder their clothes on the first day of contact with the dead. In addition, they not only have to be sprinkled but also bathe and wash their clothes on the third and seventh day (11Q19 49.16–21). An immediate ablution after contact with a dead body appears to have been widely practised in Judaism as attested in Tobit (2.9) and Philo (Spec. Laws 3.206–207), [→12
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Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Other Literature] and by the presence of ritual baths in close proximity to cemeteries (Harrington, 2004, pp. 80–1). The practice of ablution on the first day is attested also in Ritual of Purification A (4Q414) 2 ii 1–2 and Tohorot A (4Q274). The latter outlines different cases of impure people touching others of a higher degree of impurity (for an analysis see Kazen, 2010, pp. 63–89). In these cases, the weaker kind of impurity increases, and such a person has to undergo ablutions before eating anything. For example, a purifying person who touches anyone in his or her primary impurity has to bathe and launder his or her clothes before eating anything (4Q274 1 i 8–9; cf. 4Q514 [Ordinancesc] 1 i–ii). These laws reveal an understanding of impurity as being layered. Milgrom explains that an initial ablution removed one layer of impurity and allowed such a person to function in society and touch profane things and persons, but not sacred things. The legislation in these texts demonstrates that all purifying persons should similarly immerse on the first day (Milgrom, 1995, p. 67). According to Num. 19, every open vessel in a corpse-contaminated tent becomes impure (19.15), and the tent and its contents should be sprinkled (19.18). Building on this, 11Q19 49.12–13 prescribes a thorough washing of the floors, walls and doorposts (cf. CD 12.17–18). Liquids and wet foodstuff in such a house are particularly susceptible to contracting impurity (11Q19 49.7–8, 12), presumably because dry food could not become impure (see Lev. 11.38). An explicit precaution concerning stains of oil (11Q19 49.12) is also apparent in D, which states that oil stains on wood, stones and dust can transmit impurity (CD 12.15–16). This could render stone vessels impure although they were probably not otherwise susceptible to impurity (for an alternative view see Miller, 2015, pp. 153–83). Hence, liquids are considered potent transmitters of impurity. This perspective also shines through in a fragmentary passage in 4Q274 3 i which explains that an impure person who touches crushed fruit with juice oozing out or ripe cucumbers (that may be moist) makes the fruit or vegetables impure. Similarly, 4QH arvesting (4Q284a) indicates that unclean people are prohibited from the process of making olive oil and from gathering crops that are moist from dew.
Bodily Impurities Purity laws concerning various genital discharges are presented together in Lev. 15. Although there are similarities in the ways impurity is transmitted, e.g. a man and a woman with discharges (a zav and a zavah) and the menstruant (a niddah) defile everything they sit or lie upon, there are also differences. In the Qumran texts there is a tendency to clarify, harmonize and to some extent intensify these regulations. Both sexual intercourse and emission of semen cause a one day impurity according to Lev. 15.16–18. The Temple Scroll, however, increases the impurity period to three days for semen emission (11Q19 45.7–11). Furthermore, whereas Lev. 15 details how a man with discharges transmits impurity, it does not say anything comparable concerning a person emitting semen, only that semen is defiling (Lev. 15.16–18). Qumran texts clarify this gap. Tohorot seems to apply the same laws concerning transmission of impurity by the male discharger to the semen emitter; it states ‘and when [a man] has an emiss[ion] of semen his touch is defiling’ (4Q274 1 i 8–9; cf. touching bed and seat
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in 4Q274 2 i 7–9; Werrett, 2007, p. 282). The same text also clarifies that semen and blood defile in the same way (1 i 7–8). There is a passage in D that similarly harmonizes the laws for various discharges; here as well, the semen emitter and the male discharger appear to defile in the same way, but unfortunately the text is highly fragmentary (4QD g 1 ii 3–18 parallel in 4QD a 6 i 14–16; 6 ii 1–13; Wassén, 2005, pp. 47–9). Werrett concludes, ‘the defiling power of semen has been intensified beyond that of the Torah’ (Werrett, 2007, p. 283). Nevertheless, an initial ablution would make the man, and a couple after intercourse, pure with regard to the profane sphere (11Q19 45.7–10; 4Q514 1 i–ii 3–4, 7; Milgrom, 1992, p. 567). The D text (4QD a 6 ii 1–4) indicates that any irregular bleeding in between menstruation brings about the status of a female discharger, which is stringent compared to rabbinic law (Baumgarten, 1996, p. 56). It adds that a female discharger is not allowed to enter the temple until sunset on the eighth day of purification, which is not mentioned in Leviticus but reminiscent of the legislation for a parturient (i.e. a woman after childbirth, cf. Lev. 15.29–30; cf. 12.4). The principle that the completion of purification does not happen until sunset was important in sectarian halakhah (cf. e.g. 4QMMT B 15.71–72; 11Q19 49.20).
Impurity and Exclusion The Temple Scroll imposes quarantine for various kinds of impurity carriers, distinguishing between the city of the sanctuary and regular cities. Building on the legislation for the wilderness camp in Num. 5.2–3, which lists three categories of impure people (the scale diseased, the male dischargers and the corpse impure), the Temple Scroll adds the categories menstruating women and parturients (11Q19 48.14–17). These are to stay in special places within ordinary cities. But those defiled by corpse impurity are not named among the segregated ones. The reason for this is likely the acceptance of first day ablution after which the corpse impure would not transmit impurity (Milgrom, 1992, p. 564). For the city of the sanctuary (Jerusalem) separate places of quarantine should be established for the scale diseased, dischargers and semen emitters (46.16–18). In this highly utopian depiction of the holy city, no women of fertile age (frequently impure through menstruating or giving birth), nor married couples (impure by sexual intercourse) were envisaged to live within the confines of the city. The practice of first day ablution allowed all purifying individuals to take part in communal activities, although staying away from things designated as pure (see below). Most impurity carriers would be in a process of purifying, e.g. the corpse impure, the semen emitter and a couple impure from sexual intercourse. This would also apply to people who had become impure by touching impure individuals (4Q274). All such impurity carriers would undergo ablutions soon after the defilement occurred. Thereby such mildly impure people only had to avoid sancta (i.e. the temple, priestly food and shared sacrifices) and things designated ‘the purity.’ This would evidently not have helped the dischargers or the menstruating women whose impurity lasted for an extended period. Impure people such as these would have had to be careful to avoid physical contact with others. Did the sectarians impose quarantine of any kind for the impure in accordance with the prescriptions in 11QT ? The regulations in 11Q19 are highly utopian, and
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would be impossible to implement in real life. We have seen that there is no reason for people in the process of purification to separate from others, since they could function in the profane sphere. But what about those in their primary impurity? Tohorot, which prescribes purifications when impure people of different degrees touch each other, may provide some clues. The laws concern both purifying people and primary impurity carriers, which makes it hard to see how any of the two are envisioned as isolated. Nevertheless, a few fragmentary lines explicitly prescribe that one category of impure people stay apart from others (4Q274 1 i 1–4), although it is unclear which one. Milgrom suggests that the passage concerns a person with scale disease (cf. Lev. 13) while Baumgarten argues for a male discharger (Milgrom, 1995, p. 61; Baumgarten et al., 1999, pp. 101–2). Thomas Kazen argues convincingly for an identification of a ‘purifying leper’ (Kazen, 2010, pp. 73–5). If he is correct, the law clarifies biblical legislation while confirming the principle of isolating the scale diseased. The law concerning a menstruant in 4Q274 1 i 4–5 may give us further indications as to how impure people were assumed to live: ‘She shall with all her effort not mingle during her seven days so as not to contaminate the ca[m]ps of the sanct[ities [of] Israel.’ This law implies that a menstruating woman was not quarantined, since she should be careful not to defile other people. Still, the ideal is that menstruating women should keep a certain distance from others, and likely stay at home if possible. At the same time, laws that exclude impure people from handling oil and wet foodstuff outside of the home indicate that they were not isolated at all. As noted earlier, unclean persons were banned from harvesting wet produce (4Q284a), which suggests that they could harvest regular, dry crops. We can conclude that the ideal is that impure people should refrain from intermingling, but to what extent this was possible would of course differ according to their situation. They would most likely not take part in communal activities like meals. It is clear, however, that impure and purifying people were prohibited from contact with sancta and things set apart as particularly pure and referred to as ‘the purity.’
‘The Purity’ (Tohorah) 1QS 6.16b–21b stipulates rules for gradual access to ‘the purity of the Many’ and ‘the liquid of the Many,’ as part of the admission process. Although the term for purity ‘tohorah’ does not refer to food explicitly it is usually translated ‘pure food’ or ‘pure meal,’ and scholars in general assume that ‘the purity’ here refers to communal meals that members ate in purity (e.g. Harrington, 2004, pp. 23–4). But the term tohorah has a wide connotation and apart from food also includes pure items, such as vessels and clothing (Lieberman, 1952; Avemarie, 1997). Similarly, Charlotte Hempel argues that the term mashqeh, e.g. in the expression ‘liquid of the Many,’ refers more broadly to ‘pure liquid (including the juices of ripe fruit) anywhere in the process of food production and preparation, serving, and only ultimately consumption’ (Hempel, 2012, p. 61). The question is, however, whether ‘the purity’ refers to regular, communal meals at all. E. P. Sanders argues that the regulations concerning ‘the purity’ in 1QS 6 instead concern special festive meals that were eaten in purity, not everyday meals (Sanders, 2000, pp. 21–3). There are many factors that favour such an interpretation (see Wassén, 2016). First, there are descriptions of meals that lack any notion of purity
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(1QS a 2.17–22; 1QS 6.3–6; see Hempel, 2012, pp. 56–7). Second, the penal codes (1QS 6.24–7.25; 4Q265 4 i–ii) distinguish between food reduction and exclusion from ‘the purity’ (Sanders, 2000, p. 21), and D even imposes differences in the length of time for the two types of penalties (4QD a 10 i–ii). This makes sense if the penalty of food reduction applies to regular, communal meals, while exclusion from ‘the purity’ concerns festive meals. Third, regulations in Tohorot and Ordinancesc stipulate that purifying people, who increase their level of impurity, may eat after they have undergone an initial purification. There would be no point in these regulations unless mildly impure people ate together with others. At the same time, they had to abstain from touching ‘the purity’ until they were wholly pure (4Q274 2 i 3). Finally, the claim that the sectarians purified before all meals, in accordance with Josephus’ description (J.W. 2.128) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus] lacks any basis in the Qumran texts. Scholars commonly refer to 1QS 5.13–14: ‘He must not enter the water in order to touch the purity of the men of holiness. For he cannot be cleansed unless they turn away from their wickedness [. . .].’ (trans. James H. Charlesworth). However, as demonstrated ‘the purity’ has nothing to do with ordinary communal meals, and hence 1QS 5.13–14 says nothing about immersion before regular meals.
Conclusion Impurity was a common part of everyday life among Jews in the late Second Temple Period and it was mostly unavoidable. The Qumran texts exhibit a great deal of concern for matters of purity and carefully detail how impurity is spread and how it can be removed through purifications. Great emphasis is placed on distinguishing between pure and impure things in order to prevent impurity from tainting things designated as pure and also on restricting the spread of impurity to sacred space. Purity is a prerequisite for holiness, which in turn derives from the presence of the divine. Thus, what primarily motivated the sectarians to carefully restrict the impure from the holy was a desire to create and preserve a holy community in which the heavenly and human spheres could meet.
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The Different Meanings of ‘Scribe’ The textual and material evidence of the Dead Sea Scrolls bears witness to the compositional, editorial and copying techniques of those who produced these scrolls. Scholars often call such producers of texts and scrolls ‘scribes,’ and several studies have been devoted to Jewish scribes in the Hellenistic and Roman periods (Schams, 1998; Hezser, 2001; Norton, 2009; see also, more broadly, Wise, 2015). Any general discussion of ‘scribes’ in this period is complex, in part because the English term has different meanings; in part because the meanings of Hebrew sofer, Aramaic safar and Greek grammateus – all generally translated as ‘scribe’ – developed and changed over time, and even differed between those languages. Thus, depending on text and context, a ‘scribe’ (sofer/safar/ grammateus) could be an administrative official; a person who drafts and sometimes also physically writes records and documents; a person who composes or edits literary texts; a sage who studies and teaches wisdom and ancient literature; a scholar who studies torah and the legal interpretation of texts; or someone who copies existing texts by hand. For those reasons, many other terms referring to educated persons, such as ‘sage,’ mevin, maskil, and perhaps also moreh, ‘teacher,’ are largely synonymous with ‘scribe’ (Lange, 2008). Though we should distinguish different occupations, individual scribes may have been involved in multiple activities. A composer, editor or student of texts may also have copied manuscripts by hand, in particular those very texts they composed or interpreted. This would hold true particularly for small closed scribal communities which studied, composed and copied texts, as has been argued for the assumed Qumran community. However, none of the preserved Dead Sea Scrolls directly applies the sofer/safar terminology in relation to contemporary scribal activities. We do not know how the producers of the Dead Sea texts and scrolls would have referred to their own literary text-producing activities.
Scribal Figures in Literature Whereas the ‘biblical’ scribes Ezra and Baruch are virtually absent from the Dead Sea Scrolls, the term ‘scribe’ is used in connection with other biblical figures who are not 524
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called ‘scribe’ in the biblical books. Thus, in the Book of Watchers Enoch is called ‘scribe of truth’ (1 Enoch 12.4 and 15.1 – the Aramaic part is lost, but probably had safar quš·ta [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts; 17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek]) and in the Book of Giants, ‘scribe of explanation/distinction (?)’ (safar paraša; 4Q203 8 4 and 4Q530 2 ii 14 [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]). Those references are not to Enoch as author or even copyist of books, but in 1 Enoch 12–16 and 4Q203 8 to Enoch as the one who records the reproof of the Watchers (4Q203 8 refers explicitly to a ‘document’). In the two Book of Giants passages (4Q203; 4Q530), Enoch is called a safar paraša who can interpret dreams. Within this context of dream interpretation (pšar; both in 4Q530 2 ii and 4Q203 8), the phrase safar paraša might be taken to mean ‘scribe of explanation.’ Aramaic Levi preserved in fragments from Qumran Cave 4, pages from the Cairo Genizah, and in rewritten form in the Greek Testament of Levi (TestLevi), contains an instruction on the teaching of wisdom (see chapter 13 in Greenfield, Stone and Eshel, 2004 [→24 Aramaic Levi]). Levi instructs his sons to teach their children ‘literacy (sfar) and teaching of wisdom,’ mentions the social glory one attains through wisdom, and refers to his brother Joseph as an example of such teaching. In this text, neither Levi, nor his children, nor Joseph, are termed scribes, but Josephus (Against Apion 1.290) calls Moses as well as Joseph scribes, and the latter even a hierogrammateus (here not a ‘sacred, i.e. priestly, scribe’ but a specialist of hieroglyphical writings) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Josephus]. In Aramaic Levi 13, literacy is connected with wisdom and with sages who attain positions at court, and less likely with a Levitical ideal of priests who give instruction and judgement. In this respect, the description of Aramaic Levi is very similar to that of the wise scribe in Ahiqar. In the Testament of Levi variant edition of Aramaic Levi 13, the teaching of literacy (13.2 grammata) is secondarily connected with wisdom, and first with the reading and instruction of the law of God [→63 Wisdom]. The section in 11QPsalmsa dubbed ‘David’s Compositions’ [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related] describes David as, wise, shining like the sun, literate (sofer), discerning, and perfect in all his ways before God and men, to whom God gave a discerning and enlightened spirit, so that he wrote psalms . . . all those he spoke through prophecy which was given to him from the Most High. 11Q5 27.2–11
The description corresponds in part to the one of David in 2 Samuel 23, but in distinction refers to him as wise (or ‘sage’), and ‘literate’ (or ‘scribe’). Also, where David speaks an oracle according to 2 Samuel 23, in 11Q5 27 he writes (or ‘composes’) psalms and songs [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns]. Another Second-Temple description of scribes, Sirach 38.24–39.11 on the wisdom of scribes, shares elements with both Aramaic Levi such as teaching of wisdom and travelling through other lands, and with 11Q5, such as the reference to the spirit of understanding. However, at best Sirach 39.8a refers indirectly to the
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production of texts [→63 Wisdom; 12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Other Texts].
Scribal Exemplars One assumes that literary descriptions of scribal figures such as Enoch, Levi or David disclose how some Second-Temple scribes reflected on their own scribal activity. For Enoch, this holds true both for his claim of universal knowledge, and for his interpretative capacities, and it is striking that ‘interpretation’ turns up in similar terms in different scribal descriptions (see below on the overseer) [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 66 Revelation]. In the case of Levi and the Levites, the familial transmission of literacy and instruction of wisdom (and law) expresses the self-identification of Second-Temple priestly groups. The description of David which connects inspiration (prophecy) and the production of (liturgical) texts may have been exemplary for the self-understanding of Ben Sira and later scribes. However, none of the above-mentioned texts display features that would warrant a direct association with the movements generally connected with the Dead Sea Scrolls collections [→72 Forms of Community]. Probably therefore, these scribal exemplars only account for some of the many new compositions discovered near the Dead Sea. A different kind of exemplar is the figure of the ‘Teacher of Righteousness’ [→20 Historiography]. The broken commentary of 4Q171 (4QpPsa) on Ps. 45.2 (‘my tongue is like the pen of a ready scribe’) refers to the ‘answer of the tongue’ of the elusive Teacher of Righteousness [→44 Pesharim], an expression also used by the first-person speaker of the Hodayot (e.g. 4.29; 8.24; 10.9) [→37 Hodayot]. The teacher is not portrayed as a writing scribe, but as enlightened by spirit, enabling him to interpret prophecy and to find the proper words of praise. Thus, the term ‘voice of the Teacher’ (CD 20.28, 32 [→35 Damascus Document]) characterizes the implied speaker of the Hodayot and the Pesharim and perhaps other new works (García Martínez, 2010, pp. 28–36). These anonymous texts appeal implicitly, and the Habakkuk pesher explicitly, to the teacher figure who encapsulates multiple scribal functions, such as instruction, interpretation of scripture and the formulation of words of praise. The composers of these texts apparently did not seek, like the Levites or Ben Sira, their own glory, memory or an eternal name, but effaced themselves. Though clearly literate, they made no such claims, and except perhaps for some of the Hodayot there is no trace of individual authorship.
Scribal Functions within the Dead Sea Scrolls Communities Whereas ‘scribe’ terms refer primarily to the intellectual activities involved in reading and writing, the physical act of writing, involved in the production of documents, or the copying of texts, is expressed by ‘writing’ (katab). The Damascus Document and the Community Rule [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] assign the task of keeping records of the
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property or violations of members to the so-called overseer. One such document seems to be 4Q477 (Rebukes Reported by the Overseer). In fact, the so-called ‘Rule for the overseer of a camp’ in CD 13 lists many tasks which would require the kind of expertise which is elsewhere ascribed to scribes, including the teaching of the explanation of the law, and the recounting of eternal events together with their interpretation. It is hard to decide whether 4Q477 presents the original document written by an overseer, and it has not yet been determined whether the same scribal hand is found in other manuscripts. Other leadership functions mentioned in the Qumran rule texts, like that of the maskil, are not directly connected to the act of writing, but rather with teaching or instruction (Hempel, 2013, pp. 162–71). Yet, the repeated connection between scrolls compositions and the maskil, establishes the maskil, and in a sense the described community as a whole, as literate (see also below).
Writers of Manuscripts It is unknown to what extent there was a differentiation between those who composed or edited texts, and those who actually wrote them down and copied them. Likewise, we are generally ignorant of the reason why persons actually wrote or copied specific texts and for whom they did so. Comparative data from the Hellenistic and Roman world suggest many different possibilities, ranging from authors of texts copying their own texts for friends or to create an audience, from readers borrowing manuscripts and copying texts for themselves—sometimes as an aid for memorizing— or others, professional scribes of different proficiency copying texts on their own or in ateliers, to students writing or copying of texts as part of their education (Popović, 2017). Texts could be read out loud (by a teacher, or a reader in a workshop) and written down simultaneously by multiple copyists, or copied visually from one or more so-called Vorlagen. Stegemann (1998, pp. 51–5) argued that Qumran would have been a production centre of scrolls for the entire Essene movement [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature: Philo, Josephus]. The limited physical research on the ink of the manuscripts indicates that some manuscripts were not copied in the Dead Sea region (1QapGen [→36 Genesis Apocryphon]) while others (1QHodayota) were [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture; 15 Scientific Technologies]. If we disregard a few outliers, the Scrolls were written during a period of almost two centuries. From a scribal perspective, therefore, the collection is hardly homogeneous. By carefully comparing texts and manuscripts, we may gain some insight in the varieties of producing texts and perhaps also differences between scribes. Some manuscripts show copyists to have copied their Vorlagen quite literally, up to the specific spelling of words. Other manuscripts display a wide range of textual as well as literary variance between manuscripts that preserve the same or a similar text. Such literary variance attests to ongoing scribal compositional and editorial activity, which, however, cannot automatically be attributed to the actual copyist of the manuscript. In fact, many of the works of which we have multiple copies from the Judean Desert are attested in varying literary forms, characterized by textual recensions (as in the case of 1QS 5 versus 4Q258 1 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules]),
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or by variant arrangements and collections of units. While scholars have looked at textual and literary variance within specific compositions or genres, there are very few studies that have tried to correlate variance to specific scribes or to particular scribal practices.
Scribal Practices Tov (2004) provides an almost comprehensive overview of scribal practices attested in the manuscripts from the Judean Desert. Thus, he lists characteristic features of individual scribes; identifications of scribal hands; the use of different languages [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], scripts and writing materials; the dimensions of sheets; the ruling of lines on sheets, with or without guide dots [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]; the form of writing blocks, and the size of columns and margins; conventions used at the beginnings and ends of scrolls [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]; the use of divisions between words, small sense units, sections, poetical units [→60 Poetry and Hymns] and books; scribal marks and procedures usually in the margins; special forms of writing of divine names; different correction procedures and, more generally, the degree of scribal intervention. Such features are important for comparative research: there are differences and correspondences with writing practices in Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, as well as with the rabbinic practices described in the talmudic tractate Soferim. Knowledge of scribal practices is crucial for the interpretation of fragmented material. For example, scrolls with a small column height of ten or fewer lines usually have a limited number of columns [→16 Reading and Reconstructing Manuscripts]. Thus, one may surmise from the few fragments of 4Q116 (4QD ane), which indicate a column height of nine lines, that this manuscript with remnants of Daniel 9 could not have contained the entire biblical book of Daniel [→27 Authoritative Scriptures: Writings and Related]. Likewise, 4Q510 [Songs of the Maskila] would not have included all the songs attested in 4Q511 [Songs of the Maskilb] [→61 Liturgical Texts; 67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 64 Mystical Texts, Magic, and Divination]. However, it is especially the correlation between different sets of data that sheds light on more general scribal practices and sometimes helps to differentiate and perhaps even identify (groups of) scribes. Some correlations between writing material and contents are well known: virtually no copies of books that later became part of the Hebrew Bible were written on papyrus, whereas the collection of papyrus manuscripts contains many liturgical texts (see Brooke, 2017). Other correlations pertain to language [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek] and script: the paleo-Hebrew and cryptic A scripts are only used for Hebrew texts. Or, to genre and format, such as is the case with most pesharim (Brooke, 2010) [→44 Pesharim]. Scholars have hypothesized that the scribes of the Pentateuchal manuscripts written in paleo-Hebrew script were most likely Sadducean (most recently Delamarter, 2010). Idiosyncratic scribal practices, such as the dicolon at the end of verses in 4Q156 (Targum Leviticus), may suggest a provenance different from other scrolls. Yet, the highly fragmentary and varied material, and the paucity of reliable data, ask for
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caution as well as for a comprehensive approach. For example, the Sadducean hypothesis does not really explain the paleo-Hebrew manuscript of Job or touch upon the few other paleo-Hebrew manuscripts, while a Samaritan connection has rarely been considered. Moreover, and apart from the dicolon, 4Q156 as the single Aramaic translation of a Pentateuchal book, is unique [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related].
The Hypothesis of a ‘Qumran Scribal Practice’ The most far-reaching correlation has been argued for by Tov (2004), who constructs an idiosyncratic scribal practice, reflected in orthography, morphology and scribal features, and which is found in virtually all copies of texts which were generally called sectarian. Some elements of this scribal practice are: a consistently full spelling using waw for /o/ and /u/; the preference for so-called ‘pausal’ forms of the qal imperfect, such as yiq·tolu; the frequent lengthening of some pronominal suffixes, the secondperson plural perfect forms, third-person singular independent pronouns, and some adverbially used nouns and particles; writing the tetragrammaton and other words for God in paleo-Hebrew letters or representing them by dots; the use of cancellations dots (and sometimes crossing out with lines) as the preferred correction procedure. The correspondence between ‘Qumran’ and this scribal practice seems statistically significant, but is not exclusive: a few manuscripts (e.g. 4Q109 [Ecclesiastes] [→63 Wisdom]), apparently to be dated before the settlement of Qumran, already display this practice, whereas a handful of broadly acknowledged ‘sectarian’ texts, such as two of the pesharim (4Q162 [pIsab] and 4Q169 [pNah]) and one of the copies of the Rule of the Community (4Q258 [4QS d]), do not reflect this practice. Overall, Tov interprets the evidence to indicate that in general the scribes writing at Qumran used a specific scribal practice. As with all statistical research, the problem here lies in the analysis of the data (Tigchelaar, 2010). Tov correctly points to many correlations, but some are strong and some are weaker. For example, virtually all manuscripts (including ‘biblical’ manuscripts [→55 Bible]) that use paleo-Hebrew letters for divine names have a full orthography. On the other hand, the use of cancellation dots hardly seems a characteristic correlated to other ‘Qumran scribal practice’ features. Specific features do seem to be clustered in a group of texts, but many manuscripts do not fit neatly within a binary categorization of ‘Qumran scribal practice’ and a ‘non-Qumran scribal practice.’ More importantly, the correlation of these features with a ‘sectarian’ group of texts or scribes overlooks other possibilities, such as the genre or function of texts, or dialectal features which influenced some scribes or texts more than others [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek].
Palaeography and Scribes Palaeography as the study of ancient handwriting aims at describing and deciphering ancient writings, but also at classifying scribal hands (typologically, geographically or
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chronologically), and at identifying the handwriting of individual scribes (Longacre and Tigchelaar, 2017) [→14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. Some manuscripts are written in unique or unusual hands (e.g. 4Q259 [4QS e]) suggesting individual idiosyncrasy or a different geographical provenance of the scribe. Many other manuscripts display rather similar hands. For example, the manuscripts written in so-called bookhands, by their very nature of a standardized form, tend to look alike. Close similarity holds true for several manuscripts written in the hand of the scribe of 1QS (who is commonly thought to have copied also the Rule of the Congregation [→46 Rule of the Congregation], the Rule of Blessings [→45 Rule of Blessings], 4QS amuelc [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related] and Testimonia [→52 Testimonia], and plausibly 4Q443 [4QPersonal Prayer], and to have corrected 1QIsaa [→26 Authoritative Scriptures: Prophets and Related]). Recently, Ada Yardeni proposed that at least thirty-six manuscripts written in a type of hand traditionally called ‘round’ or ‘rustic’ ‘semiformal Herodian,’ should be attributed, in spite of graphic differences between the writing in the manuscripts, to one individual scribe, active at Qumran in the late first century bce (Yardeni, 2007). Identification of multiple manuscripts copied by specific scribes would greatly add to our knowledge of scribes and copyists. However, such identifications are subjective given the present lack of a theoretical framework and methodological approach which assesses the significance of both graphic correspondences and graphic differences for the identification of individual scribes. 4Q175 (Testimonia) is written with considerably less care than 1QS , which might account for the different graphic appearance of details of letters and the overall writing. Yet, the many shared idiosyncratic features on a phonological and morphological level that suggest an influence of Aramaic on this particular scribe, strengthens the identification (Tigchelaar, 2003). As yet, Yardeni’s claim of one specific scribe seems overly optimistic and is in need of objectification. Whereas a subtype of the listed manuscripts displays remarkable correlations, such as the non-final use of pe, tsade and kap in final position, overall there is a large variety in letterforms other than lamed and alep and in morphology. In the case of the first hand of 1QpHab and that of 11Templeb [→51 Temple Scroll], the graphic correspondence is very close, while these two manuscripts alone share the typical crosses at the end of the line, features which combined strongly suggest one and the same scribe. This would indicate that the crosses in the Habakkuk pesher are not related to the genre of 1QpHab, but to the scribal practice of a specific scribe.
Schools and Education There is ample evidence of writing at the site of Qumran, ranging from excavated inkwells at the so-called scriptorium, the discovery of multiple ostraca, including two abecedaries, and the enigmatic piece of furniture generally interpreted as a writing bench [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. Theories about a school or other scribal education at Qumran are more speculative, based on the presence of scrolls in the Caves, assumptions about their origin, and suppositions about the nature of the settlement in relation to the communities described in the Scrolls. Thus, Lemaire refers
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to Instruction [→38 Instruction], the Damascus Document, the Rule of the Congregation and the role of the maskil, in his discussion of education at Qumran (Lemaire, 2006). Naturally, those who composed and copied the Scrolls must have been educated as scribes, whether at Qumran or elsewhere. However, the concrete evidence for this education is limited. Milik proposed that a manuscript like 4QE nocha (4Q201) ‘is perhaps a schoolexercise, copied by a young scribe from the master’s dictation’ (Milik, 1976, p. 141) [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts], but the ancient date and special handwriting of the copy indicates it was not copied at Qumran. Scholars have suggested Northern Syrian or Galilean influence on its script or orthography. 4QG enf (4Q6) may be another scribal exercise, apparently a single sheet of mediocre leather, starting with Gen. 48.1 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related] with uneven writing [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related; 14 Physicality of Manuscripts and Material Culture]. 4Q234, 4Q341 and 4Q360 are all either writing exercises (4Q341) or scraps for trying out one’s pen (4Q234 and 4Q360, the latter possibly by a scribe called Menahem). The presence of such scraps with writing exercises among the other scrolls of Qumran Cave 4 needs to be taken into account in any hypothesis about the collections in the caves. Shared scribal features indicate a shared scribal culture transmitted through schools, education or close contact. However, in spite of commonalities between copies of texts generally deemed sectarian, the scribal features of the manuscripts themselves do not indicate a common provenance or a specific scribal school. Rather, the collection as a whole, as described in many details by Tov, exhibits at the same time a large variety of manuscripts with different scribal practices, and a cluster of texts that reveal more conformity, and may reflect the scribal culture of its period.
Bibliography Brooke, G. J. (2010), ‘Aspects of the physical and scribal features of some Cave 4 “continuous” Pesharim,’ in S. Metso, H. Najman, and E. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts. STDJ 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 133–50. Brooke, G. J. (2017), ‘Choosing between papyrus and skin: Cultural complexity and multiple identities in the Qumran Library,’ in M. Popović, M. Schoonover and M. Vandenberghe, eds, Jewish Cultural Encounters in the Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern World. JSJS up 178. Leiden, Brill, 119–35. Delamarter, S. (2010), ‘Sociological models for understanding the scribal practices in the biblical Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 182–97. García Martínez, F. (2010), ‘Rethinking the Bible – sixty years of Dead Sea Scrolls research and rewriting scripture,’ in M. Popović (ed.), Authoritative Scriptures in Ancient Judaism. JSJS up 141. Leiden: Brill, pp. 19–36. Greenfield, J. C., M. E. Stone, and E. Eshel (2004), The Aramaic Levi Document: Edition, Translation, Commentary. SVTP 19. Leiden: Brill.
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Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hezser, C. (2001), Jewish Literacy in Roman Palestine. TSAJ 81. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Lange, A. (2008), ‘Sages and scribes in the Qumran literature,’ in L. G. Perdue (ed.), Scribes, Sages and Seers: The Sage in the Eastern Mediterranean World. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 271–93. Lemaire, A. (2006), ‘Lire, écrire, étudier à Qoumrân et ailleurs,’ in A. Lemaire and S. C. Mimouni (eds), Qoumrân et le judaïsme du tournant de notre ère. Leuven: Peeters, pp. 63–79. Milik, J. T. (1976), The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments of Qumrân Cave 4. Oxford: Clarendon. Norton, J. (2009), ‘The question of scribal exegesis at Qumran,’ in A. K. Petersen et al. (eds), Northern Lights on the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Nordic Qumran Network 2003–2006. STDJ 80. Leiden: Brill, pp. 135–54. Popović, M. (2017), ‘Reading, writing, and memorizing together: Reading culture in ancient Judaism and the Dead Sea Scrolls in a Mediterranean context,’ DSD 24, 447–70. Schams, C. (1998), Jewish Scribes in the Second-Temple Period. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Stegemann, H. (1998), The Library of Qumran: On the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2003), ‘In search of the scribe of 1QS ,’ in S. M. Paul et al. (eds), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov. VTS up 94. Leiden: Brill, pp. 439–52. Tigchelaar, E. J. C. (2010), ‘Assessing Emanuel Tov’s “Qumran scribal practice,” ’ in S. Metso, H. Najman, and E. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts. STDJ 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 173–205. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. STDJ 54. Leiden: Brill. Wise, M. O. (2015), Language and Literacy in Roman Judaea: A Study of the Bar Kokhba Documents. New Haven: Yale University Press. Yardeni, A. (2007), ‘A note on a Qumran scribe,’ in M. Lubetski (ed.), New Seals and Inscriptions: Hebrew, Idumean, and Cuneiform. Sheffield: Sheffield Phoenix, pp. 287–98.
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Forms of Community Alison Schofield
Identity formation is a complex and dynamic process. No less is true for the authors of the movement behind the Scrolls, or yahad, which evolved over the course of at least 150 years. During this time yahad members formed a collective identity through various markers of self and community, which were never static. Today we have only one synchronic snapshot of their textual identities from this library, gathered and hidden ca. 68 bce , and much of the difficulty in identifying the Yahad lies in understanding the long and dynamic history behind these texts. Scholars first identified the Yahad when a copy of their charter text, the Rule of the Community (S) from Cave 1 was published in 1951 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]. Around this time archaeologists began to excavate the neighbouring site of Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], and before long Roland de Vaux and others connected the site of Qumran with the ‘community’ (yahad) described in S [→59 Rules]. The residents of Qumran and the Yahad came to be viewed as synonymous, and thus the field of ‘Qumran scholarship’ was born (Knibb, 1987). Many scholars soon fleshed out this picture of the Yahad with details about the Essenes described in the Classical histories [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature] and in broad strokes painted a picture of the Yahad as an unusual Jewish sect of celibate males, living an ascetic life near the Dead Sea [→8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea]. Yet much has come to light about the Yahad since the publication of the earliest scrolls in the 1950s, and there are strong indicators that the Yahad encompassed a relatively diverse association of Jews, whose communities extended beyond the borders of Qumran proper.
How to Identify the Yahad? Jonathan Z. Smith’s model for understanding religious groups aids us in understanding the Yahad in a more nuanced way. Smith defines religious groups based on polythetic categories, or loose sets of overlapping characteristics which may or may not all be shared by every member of the group. Further, these characteristics may change over time without necessarily signalling the presence of a new religious identity (Smith, 1982, p. 18). A heuristic model such as this can account for some level of diversity – or even seeming contradictions – within the life of a religious movement such as the Yahad, 533
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without neglecting the overwhelming commonalities between the various sectarian texts. Rather than proposing any essentialist definitions of the Yahad, it will be useful here to map out some characteristics shared by the communities behind the Scrolls, particularly those of the discourse of self, shared texts and praxis (cf. Satlow, 2006).
An Emic Perspective Any non-normative definition of the Yahad must necessarily start with the group’s own self-identification. The yahad was in many ways a ‘textual community,’ built not only on the study and production of texts but also around the production of a common discourse of self. As Carol Newsom reflects, through all this intensive verbal activity the Qumran community created for itself a distinctive mode of speech, one that readers tend to recognize in the texts even when its precise definition remains elusive. Newsom, 2004, p. 2
It is precisely through this category of shared speech where we get the most poignant sense of the sectarian voice and self-understanding. As a whole, the Yahad created an imagined community through language, conceptualizing themselves to be ‘true Israel,’ just as other contemporaneous Jewish groups did in their own ways (compare Anderson, 2006). The texts of the Yahad, then, need not be mined for historical information alone [→20 Historiography], as the descriptions of their community history may be later imaginations or rationalizations of themselves (Davies, 2007); rather, they themselves are artefacts. The sectarian texts offer us insight into the perception of community and identity among the Yahad members. Scholars do not agree on which texts are products of or adapted by the Yahad, the so-named ‘sectarian texts.’ Devorah Dimant classifies sectarian texts (for her, equated with the Qumran community) according to their shared vocabulary of organization and institutions, as well as similar political and religious terminology (Dimant, 2011; but compare Hempel, 2003; Lange, 2003). A potential pitfall to identifying the Yahad simply through their texts is the danger of circular reasoning: we identify certain texts as sectarian based on their language and then use them to identify the nature of the sect itself. Nevertheless, considering a sum of factors such as common language [→17 Languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek], genre, content, implied readership and textual history, scholars have generally agreed on a set of texts authored [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls] by the Yahad (e.g. the Community Rule, the Damascus Document [→35 Damascus Document], the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah], the Hodayot [→37 Hodayot], and the Habakkuk pesher [→44 Pesharim]). From these, a general picture of sectarian consciousness emerges on the level of language and terminology.
Mapping Communities: Shared Discourse First, the members of the Yahad modelled a sense of communal identity by their own self-label of yahad. Reflecting the semantic range of togetherness or unity, from which we
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get ‘to join together’ or ‘to become one,’ this term parallels the common activities of its members, such as sharing property, eating together, giving counsel to one another, saying blessings and curses in unity (1QS 6.2–3 [→61 Liturgical Texts]), and meeting each night to study and worship together (1QS 6.7–8) [→73 Daily Life]. Yahad became a semitechnical designation for the followers of the movement (‘people of the Yahad,’ ‘followers of the Yahad,’ ‘yahad of God,’ ‘Spirit of the Yahad,’ etc.). Given their affinity for appropriating biblical language and imagery [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation], the members of the Yahad most likely took their name from the Bible rather than other sources (such as the Temple Scroll [→51 Temple Scroll; 25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]; see van der Kooij, 2011, pp. 112–13), and a probable source was Moses’ final blessing and his mention of the ‘yahad of the tribes of Israel’ (Deut. 33.5) [→55 Bible]. While the specific labels vary among the texts, the Yahad established common linguistic boundary markers that were built around a strong sense of insiders and outsiders. They themselves were known as the ‘Children of Light,’ ‘People of Righteousness,’ ‘Children of Truth,’ the ‘Elect of Righteousness,’ contrasted with the ‘Children of Darkness,’ ‘People of Wickedness,’ ‘People of Mockery,’ ‘Seekers of Smooth Things,’ etc. [→74 Ethics and Dualism]. Matthew Collins has recently applied models of deviance and labelling theory to many of these sobriquets and shown that the movement gradually developed more specific, definite labels for their enemies, and therefore themselves. Designations such as ‘Teacher of Righteousness,’ or ‘Spouter of the Lie’ went ‘from a descriptive function to an appellative one’ (Collins, 2009, p. 181), and this increasing linguistic specificity paralleled a heightened sense of a shared, ‘perceived history.’ For whether these textual identities were real or imagined, they were ‘real’ in their consequences, that is, in forming imagined discursive communities of sectarians as counterparts to an ‘other.’
The Rule Texts Of the sectarian texts, S gives us the keenest sense of how the Yahad understood itself. Despite its composite nature and various diverging witnesses, S generally reveals a sectarian world that was highly structured, with a hierarchical leadership concentrated around increasingly authoritative priestly groups (Levites, Aaronites and then Zadokites; e.g. 1QS 1.18–23; 2.19–23; 5.2–3; cf. CD 13.2–5; 14.3–8; 4Q266 11 8–9[→35 Damascus Document]). The authors of S saw themselves as the true covenant keepers for Israel and a community of Jews who willingly offer to observe the statues of God (1QS 1.7; 8.10). Strict standards of conduct were in place so that the Yahad members could uphold the virtues of truth, righteousness, humility, justice, introspection and covenantal love (1QS 1.5–6; 5.3–4; 8.2; 4Q256 9 3–4; 4Q258 1 3; 8 2). Paul Swarup has underscored the role that the language of the righteous ‘plant/planting’ and ‘temple/ sanctuary’ also played in the self-understanding reflected in S (Swarup, 2006) [→69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. Of the latter image, the authors of S described their leaders not only with the terminology of temple sacrifices, but also as if they were spatially structured along the lines of increasingly sacred space. Members themselves were ordered according to their relative degrees of holiness, with the priests in the centre,
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surrounded by the elders and finally the lay persons, in much the same layout as the Jerusalem Temple (1QS 6.8–9) [→70 Purity and Holiness]. In this way, the effective ‘sacrifices’ of the Yahad were also to atone for the land (1QS 8.7–10). Most likely the shared concept of the community-as-temple idea was a later theological selfunderstanding as the Yahad grew more distinct, and possibly more disillusioned, with the Temple practices in Jerusalem (Hultgren, 2007; Schiffman, 2000).
The Language of Leadership and Organization Other terms of community leadership are common to multiple sectarian texts. A central figure recognized in D is that of the Teacher of Righteousness, who is associated with the early years of the movement (CD 1.1–11 [→20 Historiography]) as well as with the inspired exegetical activities of the movement (1QpHab 7.4–5 [→44 Pesharim; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 66 Revelation]). Even though he is not mentioned in S, this figure is elsewhere closely tied to the Yahad with his role of teaching the Council of the Community (1QpMicah 8–10, 6–9 [→44 Pesharim]). Some suppose that the Teacher broke away from a mother movement, leading the group which would become the Yahad community behind S (García Martínez and Van der Woude, 1990), and many have attempted to locate the identity of the teacher in history (see the review of scholarship in Collins, 2010, pp. 88–121). However, as Loren Stuckenbruck reminds us, aside from extracting historical detail about the Yahad, we may benefit even more by studying the function of having a ‘collective memory’ of this figure and how the process of writing a selective history of this charismatic leader legitimated the existence of the Yahad itself (Stuckenbruck, 2010). Many sectarian texts also mention an important governing body within the Yahad, known as the Many (rabbim). The Many is not simply a functional synonym for the Yahad itself (per Lieberman, 1952; Licht, 1996; Charlesworth, 2000); rather it is used more specifically to describe the meeting of a majority of, if not all, fully-fellowshipped, non-probationary members for judicial purposes. The Many are nearly always mentioned in the context of an assembly, making decisions by vote (CD 13.7; 14.7; 1QS 5.2–3; 6.1–25; 7.3; etc.). This body, under the charge of the Inspector (Mebaqqer), was primarily in charge of examining prospective members (1QS 1.13–23) and members seeking re-admittance (1QS 7.23–24), so it must have excluded these two groups [→73 Daily Life]. Thus the Many here resembles the rabbim of later rabbinic literature, which describes a large gathering of leading Jews who have been organized to conduct specific business (b. Yev. 86b; Qiddushin 4.5).
The Many Versus the Zadokites Yet even the copies of S themselves do not consistently describe the leadership of the Yahad [→59 Rules]. 1QS 5 states that the supreme leaders of the Yahad are the Zadokite priests. However, in the parallel passage(s) found in the later Cave 4 copies (4QS b,d), the Many are mentioned as community leaders and there is no mention of the ‘children of
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Zadok.’ Some have explained these differences due to chronology, hypothesizing that there was a Zadokite takeover later in the Yahad’s history (e.g. Vermes, 1994), even though other evidence of such a coup is lacking. Others believe that the Zadokites eventually died out and were replaced by the Many, as reflected in the later Cave 4 copies (Alexander, 1996). Yet the situation is more complex because the textual development of S does not follow the simple chronology of the copies. It is reasonable to conclude that the traditions behind S developed in more than one scribal circle, which produced or retained slightly divergent copies, such as we find ultimately represented in the Qumran collection. Further, communal life may have varied over both time and place, where some ahad communities were governed by more hierarchal levels of leadership by Zadokite priests and others retained a more egalitarian structure, such as that of the Many, in much the same structure as the early Christian communities (Schofield, 2009b) [→11 Scrolls and Early Christianity].
Mapping Textual Communities: Shared Texts The ongoing study and production of texts was an important part of the movement’s collective identity and daily life (1QS 6.6–8; 8.11–12; cf. Popović, 2012) [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Yet how did the Yahad relate to all of the Rule traditions [→59 Rules]? Whose rules were they, and was ownership tantamount to authorship? The question of the relationship of S to D sits at the centre of the argument of who constituted the Yahad. Starting from a heavy reliance on the Classical histories of the Essenes (see below) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature], many scholars assumed that D was written for marrying Essenes, including women and children, who lived throughout the towns and villages, while S legislated for a stricter life of celibacy and was intended for those living at Qumran (e.g. Vermes, 1999, pp. 94–113) [→73 Daily Life]; others have gone so far as to assume that D and S even describe entirely different ‘Judaisms’ (Davies, 2005, p. 77). Others would explain the terminological and content differences in the texts by assuming that D reflects earlier stages of sectarian development, particularly because the section known as the Admonition describes the emergence of the sect and the role of the Teacher of Righteousness (Murphy-O’Connor, 1974; Knibb, 1994; Davies, 1983; Collins, 2009). Alternately, some believe that S represented the earlier formulation of the community, reflecting the ‘monastic life in the first phase of strict Essenism,’ while D was produced later by a group who left the community at Qumran and settled in the region of Damascus (Milik, 1959, p. 87; cf. Cross, 1995, p. 71 and a recent revival of this argument by Regev, 2010; see also Kratz, 2011). Both D and S traditions have undergone complex literary developments that make it difficult to identify any simple historical relationships between the two (see Hempel, 2013, pp. 123–50). Nevertheless, D does appear to retain an earlier core of legislation, one shown to be closely related to biblical legal traditions and with discourse that is closer in language and rhetoric to the priestly sources of the Bible (e.g. ‘congregation,’ ‘camps;’ Knibb, 1994; Hempel, 1998). S, in the final forms preserved for us, reflects a more complex and stringent process of entry into the movement and lifestyle, more communal activity and, in general, a more pronounced sectarian consciousness than
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can be found in the earliest strata of D (Hultgren, 2007). Yet there is no direct evidence that the differences between D and S were the result of a polemical break between the two communities (Collins, 2006, pp. 92–3; Schofield, 2009b, pp. 203–4). As a polythetic model would categorize them, both reflect an overwhelmingly similar sectarian discourse, even though the expression of community life was different through time and congregation. The Teacher takes on a prominent role in D, while he is absent in S; the overseer (Mebaqqer) is mentioned much more frequently in D in comparison to S; and S describes a more elaborate admission procedure to the community than does D [→73 Daily Life]. Yet while it is easy to focus on a few of these differences, the Rule traditions in general share a very similar worldview, social structures and legal regulations (Hempel, 2010). For example, S and D both share the same understanding of spatial organization, such as the idea that their members are organized as if they were living in impermanent conditions like the Israelites in the wilderness waiting to enter into their inheritance (1QS 2.21–22; CD 12.22–23; cf. 1QS a 1.28–2.1 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; Exod. 18.21; Deut. 1.15). Finally, the fact that the Yahad preserved and likely engaged with both sets of traditions is the strongest argument against any notable schism. Both S and D were found side by side at Qumran in nearly the same number of copies, and not only did the Qumran community preserve ten copies of D, they likely updated D in light of later forms of community life found at Qumran and elsewhere (for a ‘Qumran recension’ of D, see Davies, 1983; Hempel, 1998; Hultgren, 2007). Other Rule texts, such as 4Q265 (Miscellaneous Rules) also attest to a similar-yet-fluid pool of rule traditions. 4Q265 records an admission procedure and penal code with strong affinities to S, and it mentions a council of fifteen men (cf. 1QS 8.1–10; 9.3–6). Yet 4Q265 also contains sabbath legislation that is strongly reminiscent of that in D (CD 10.14–18) and mentions both children and the Yahad. Another example includes 5Q13 (Rule), which cites 1QS 3.4–5 (or a shared source; 5Q13 4 2–23), knows of the annual covenant renewal festival described in S, and reflects an admissions procedure that parallels the one found in D. As reflected in these unique yet overlapping texts, there must have been fluidity to the expressions of sectarian life and self-understanding over both time and place.
Multiple Communities In recent years, more scholars have recognized that the Yahad itself encompassed multiple communities besides that which lived at Qumran (Elgvin, 2005; Regev 2004; Schofield, 2008, 2009b; Collins, 2010) One basis for this theory is that S mentions gatherings of members in more than one location. In this way shall they behave in all their places of residences (mgwryhm). Whenever one fellow meets another, the junior shall obey the senior in work and in money. They shall eat together, together they shall bless and together they shall take counsel. In every place where there are ten men of the Community council, there should not be missing amongst them a priest [. . .]. 1QS 6.1–8 DSSSE
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Although S never uses the label, the communities described in S closely resemble the settlements known as ‘camps’ in D (cf. the War Scroll and 4QMMT [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]). The term ‘dwelling places’ in S also evokes an impermanent residence, and uses terminology found elsewhere in D (ʾrs. mgwryhm; 4QD a 6 iv 3; cf. Ezek. 20.38, ‘land of their residences’). Further, two closely related texts, copied alongside 1QS , do refer to ‘camps’ (1QS a 2.15 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]; 1QS b 3.29 [→45 Rule of Blessings]). In many sectarian texts, the camps are closely associated with the rule of the Many (CD 13.7; 4Q266), and both ‘camps of the Many’ and ‘yahad’ are mentioned in Rebukes Reported by the Overseer (4Q477 2 i 3), suggesting that the Yahad likely knew of a spatial arrangement of multiple satellite communities. In the context of ‘their residences,’ the authors of S mention a core community unit of ten members, with a priest or interpreter at the head. D describes a similar group of ten also with a learned priest in the context of the various camps (CD 12.22–13.3). It is difficult to decipher the relationship of these organizational bodies of ten members or whether they were an early form of communal organization for the Yahad (so Hempel 2013, pp. 79–105). Alternately, following Knibb and Leaney, Metso prefers to read this passage in 1QS 6 as an interpolation, which originated in circles outside of the Yahad itself (Leaney, 1966, p. 180; Knibb, 2000, p. 115; Metso, 2004, p. 324). Nevertheless, our description of multiple residences must have been part of the Yahad’s consciousness from an early period as it is present in all parallel, extant versions of S, including early versions of S, offering us little textual evidence that it was an interpolation.
An Elite Group in the Yahad? Further, a group of twelve men or twelve men and three priests is mentioned in various sectarian texts. In 1QS 8.1 it states, ‘In the Community council (there shall be) twelve men and three priests,’ which are also described as perfect in everything that has been revealed from all the law. This passage may be understood to mean that the twelve men and three priests constitute the Council of the Community or that this group was to be a special subgroup within the Council. On the former reading, these fifteen members were a symbol of the entire yahad itself, as indeed the ‘Council of the Community’ often appears almost interchangeably with yahad elsewhere (Metso, 2005, p. 234). Alternatively the passage could suggest that these fifteen constituted a subgroup of the council, who were either the founding members of the Qumran community (Sutcliffe, 1959; Murphy-O’Connor, 1969; Knibb, 1987), or – as Collins has described – an elite group set apart for special training within the Yahad (Collins, 2010; cf. Berg, 2007). Yet these fifteen leaders are distinguished from the rest of the council in that they are assigned specific roles among the other yahad members. The description of them likely was symbolic of the twelve tribes of Israel and the three priestly families, but because they acted as a special synecdoche of all Israel, these members were distinguished from the rest of the Yahad by their intensive study and discipline. According to Yonder Gillihan, these fifteen men of ‘perfect holiness’ followed laws in 1QS 8–9 based on the Halakhah for high priestly rights in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur (Gillihan, 2011, p. 302). Further, there are two different punishments described for ‘deliberate Torah
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transgressions,’ one for the general community (1QS 8.17–18) and a more stringent one for ‘the ones who behave perfectly.’ These two sets of penalties for the same infraction are the clearest indicators that two groups are in view here (Sanders, 1977, pp. 324–45; Berg, 2007, pp. 169–70). This body of leaders likely persisted over the years, but whether there were multiple hierarchies of fifteen within the Yahad at one time is less clear. Aside from any historical value, these groups of ten, twelve or fifteen offer symbolic capital to the authors of the various sectarian traditions. Those behind both S and D legitimated the sect’s connection to proper interpretation by suggesting there would be a learned priest with every gathering of ten. In describing a foundational and supremely holy group of fifteen men, the authors of 1QS 8 and 4Q265 collectively appropriated the language of Temple sacrifices and atonement in order to legitimate their roles as priests apart from a sanctuary.
Shared Praxis: The Penal Codes Finally, a third category through which we may map the Yahad and related communities is through related praxis. In general, these sectarians formulated an identity as an authentic community by drawing similar lines between what they viewed to be orthodox and heterodox manifestations of Jewish life (Boyarin, 2004, p. 70). While the halakhic practices are examined elsewhere in this volume [→58 Halakhah; 73 Daily Life; 70 Purity and Holiness], one might point out the penal code as a useful test case of sectarian life [→22 Postmodern Questions and Sexuality Studies]. Versions of the penal code are recorded in various S witnesses, Cave 4 copies of D and 4Q265, and they all include lists of infractions and punishments, such as for lying about property, insulting one another, bearing an unjust grudge and dozing at assemblies. It seems that these penal codes were related to actual practices of sectarian life (Gillihan, 2011, p. 508), and this is made clear by the many erasures and even updated punishments in 1QS 6.24–7.25 [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. At times, the penal codes reflect somewhat different punishment lengths and, in a few cases type; but they all retain a core of shared prohibitions in a similar order. Returning to our polythetic model for understanding the Yahad, it is clear that in the category of praxis, as reflected in the penal codes, various members of this movement shared the idea of a penal code, in a similar structure and format, and embedded these codes into a larger prose narrative. Nevertheless, the codes reflect somewhat different practices among multiple communities over time, which would be expected in a diverse movement with a measurable history. The question is raised as to whether their differences would signal the presence of separate religious identities, but the sum of the evidence appears to override this assumption.
The Classical Histories and the Life of the Essenes With few exceptions (notably Schiffman, 2010; Baumgarten, 2004), most scholars would relate the Essenes of the Classical histories to the Yahad [→12 Scrolls and
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Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. This so-called Essene hypothesis, with its various nuances, best accounts for a large body of overlapping characteristics between the Essenes and the Yahad, as known from their own texts. However, the historical accounts of the Essenes in Josephus, Philo and Pliny, among others, constitute only outsider, or etic, views of the movement, and one should read these sources with a critical eye towards their own rhetorical means and ends (Petit, 1992; Mason, 2009). It is worth noting that while Pliny the Elder is well known for his reference to the Essenes living on the northern end of the Dead Sea, both Josephus and Philo never mention any central settlement and describe the Essenes as a relatively populous, integrated movement ‘in every town’ (War 2.124) and in various groups in Judea and Galilee (Good Person 12.75; Hypoth. 11.1). Josephus depicts the Essenes as regularly interacting with non-Essenes, particularly in Jerusalem, and describes Essenes travelling between multiple settlements, further supporting the idea that there were various related communities under the umbrella of the larger movement. The idea that the Yahad was made up of celibate members derives primarily from the Classical sources. Josephus describes two forms of community life lived by members of the same sect. He and other authors describe the Essenes generally as celibate (Ant. 18.21; cf. Philo, Hypoth. 11.14–17; Pliny, Natural History 5.73), but Josephus also claims that there is another order of Essenes who marry (War 2.160). It is tempting to view these two orders as reflecting the two ways of life described in D of those who walk in perfect holiness and those who take wives and walk according to the order of the land (CD 7.6–7). But the relationship is not clear. Two groups do seem to be contrasted here in D, but Cecilia Wassén rightly notes that the primary contrast being made is between ‘those who walk in these [statutes]’ (CD 7.4–5) and those who refuse (9), rather than between two different orders of sectarians (Wassen, 2005, p. 131). The question of celibacy in the Yahad relates back to whether S represents the celibate members as mentioned elsewhere. In contrast to D, S does not mention women, and one could be celibate and follow the regulations of S. Yet it is surprising that S does not specifically legislate for celibate lives. Further, Maxine Grossman reminds us that in androcentric texts, ‘[t]he absence of women in the wording should not lead us to assume their absence from the world imagined in the text’ (Grossman, 2010, p. 241). And there are texts such as 4Q265, which speaks to the Yahad and the Many, while including legal material that addresses aspects of childbirth and family life. Another fragmentary example is 4Q502 (Ritual of Marriage), which parallels segments of S (1QS 4.4–6) and mentions ‘wife of a man’ and ‘to procreate,’ as well as men and women together. So while we note both the unusual absence of women and sexual regulations in S, there is no conclusive evidence that the Yahad included only male, celibate members.
Qumran: Site of Discovery The whole of the archaeological evidence supports the idea that Khirbet Qumran was a sectarian site by the time that the Scrolls were hidden [→2 Archaeology of Qumran; 3 The Manuscript Collections: An Overview]. Unusual features such as the relatively high number of ritual baths and the many ritual deposits of animal bones suggest such
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an association (e.g. Gunneweg, 2010; Magness, 2011). The proximity of the caves to the site, linked by ancient pathways [→8 The Regional Context of the Dead Sea] as well as the similarities in the pottery found among the caves and the ruins further link the Scrolls to Qumran. One find in particular has suggested that Yahad members lived at Qumran. The ‘Yahad Ostracon,’ discovered near the eastern perimeter wall, appears to contain the draft of a deed of gift by a certain Honi to Eleazar. Based on the reconstruction by the editors of a fragmented word, this ostracon makes reference to ‘fulfilling (an oath) to the Yahad’ (Cross and Eshel, 1997), but the context is not entirely clear (compare Yardeni, 1997; Lapin, 2010). Yet the question remains as to the role Qumran may have played among the Yahad, as there is no direct evidence that this was the entirety, or even the centre, of the movement. Most have assumed that S references Qumran in the lemma Isa. 40.3, ‘In the desert prepare the way of ****, straighten in the steppe a roadway for our God,’ (DSSSE ) which the authors interpret metaphorically to be the study of the Law (1QS 8.14–16). If this passage refers to a ‘move to the desert,’ it does exist already in an early copy of S (ca. 100–75 bce ), which was copied before or nearly contemporaneously with sectarian settlement at the site. The Yahad had been formed already prior to that point and likely persisted outside Qumran’s boundaries. Recent Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis of the pottery at Qumran indicates many of these samples were made of clay found well outside of Qumran, including that of some scroll jars (Yellin et al., 2001; Gunneweg and Balla, 2006 [→15 Scientific Technologies]), and such evidence suggests Qumran’s inhabitants remained engaged with outside communities, whether at Jericho (cf. the ‘Yahad Ostracon’), Jerusalem or elsewhere.
Conclusion Returning again to our polythetic categories of Jewish sects [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism], we find that the Yahad represented various community formations, ones which shared shifting clusters of characteristics in discourse, authoritative texts and praxis. Yet in each of these categories we must allow for fluidity over time and individual community, wherein there was some variation in language and practices without signalling a new movement. From this perspective, the Rule traditions associated with D and S do not represent two monolithic, or polemical, communities. At its core, D represents some of the earliest sectarian material, but both traditions represent various stages in the growth of one larger movement and were preserved contemporaneously. Rather than adhering to essentialist definitions of the Yahad as a marginal community on the fringes of the Dead Sea, we may better assume that it encompassed various communities, which saw different expressions of community life over time.
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Grossman, M. L. (2010), ‘Women and men in the Rule of the Congregation: A feminist critical assessment,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 229–45. Gunneweg, J. (2010), ‘Introduction to the “buried bones,” ’ in A. Adriaens, J. Gunneweg and D. Joris (eds), Holistic Qumran: Trans-Disciplinary Research of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 87. Leiden: Brill, pp. 63–6. Gunneweg, J. and M. Balla (2006), ‘The provenance of Qumran pottery by instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis,’ in J. Gunneweg, C. Greenblatt and A. Adriaens (eds), Bio- and Material Cultures at Qumran: Papers from a COST Action G8 Working Group Meeting held in Jerusalem, Israel on 22–23 May 2005. Stuttgart: Fraunhofer IRB , pp. 99–108. Hakola, R. (2007), ‘Social identities and group phenomena in Second Temple Judaism,’ in P. Luomanen, I. Pyysiäinen and R. Uro (eds), Explaining Christian Origins and Early Judaism: Contributions from Cognitive and Social Science. BIS 89. Leiden: Brill, pp. 259–76. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2003), ‘Kriterien zur Bestimmung “essenischer Verfasserschaft” von Qumrantexten,’ in J. Frey and H. Stegemann (eds), Qumran kontrovers: Beiträge zu den Textfunden vom Toten Meer. Paderborn: Bonifatius, pp. 71–85. Hempel, C. (2010), ‘Shared traditions: Points of contact between S and D,’ in S. Metso, H. Najman and E. Schuller (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Transmission of Traditions and Production of Texts. STDJ 92. Leiden: Brill, pp. 115–31. Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Hultgren, S. (2007), From the Damascus Covenant to the Covenant of the Community: Literary, Historical, and Theological Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 66. Leiden: Brill. Jokiranta, J. (2010), ‘Social-scientific approaches to the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 246–63. Jokiranta, J. (2011), ‘Sociology of Jewish life in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Seeking steps forward,’ in D. Nóra et al. (eds), The Hebrew Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 379–401. Knibb, M. A. (1987), The Qumran Community. Cambridge: CUP. Knibb, M. A. (1994), ‘The place of the Damascus Document,’ in M. O. Wise et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. New York: The New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 149–62. Knibb, M. A. (2000), ‘The Rule of the Community,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, II : 793–97. Kratz, R. G. (2011), ‘Der Penal Code und das Verhältnis von Serekh ha-Yachad (S) und Damaskusschrift (D),’ RevQ 25, 199–227. Lange, A. (2003), ‘Kriterien essenischer Texte,’ in J. Frey and H. Stegemann (eds), Qumran kontrovers: Beiträge zu den Textfunden vom Toten Meer. Paderborn: Bonifatius, pp. 59–69. Lapin, H. (2010), ‘Dead Sea Scrolls and the historiography of ancient Judaism,’ in M. L. Grossman (ed.), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, pp. 108–27.
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Leaney, A. R. C. (1966), The Rule of Qumran and its Meaning, Philadelphia: Westminster Press. Licht, J. (1996), The Rule Scroll: A Scroll from the Wilderness of Judaea 1QS • 1QSa • 1QSb. Jerusalem: Bialik Institute. Lieberman, S. (1952), ‘The discipline in the so-called Dead Sea Manual of Discipline,’ JBL 71, 199–206. Magness, J. (2011), ‘Dogs and chickens at Qumran,’ in A. D. Roitman, L. H. Schiffman and S. Tzoref (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Proceedings of the International Conference held at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem (July 6–8, 2008). STDJ 93. Leiden: Brill, pp. 349–62. Mason, S. (2009), Josephus, Judea, and Christian Origins: Methods and Categories. Peabody : Hendrickson. Metso, S. (2004), ‘Methodological problems in reconstructing history from Rule Texts found at Qumran,’ DSD 11, 315–35. Metso, S. (2005), ‘Whom does the term Yah.ad identify?,’ in C. Hempel and J. Lieu (eds), Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in Honour of Michael A. Knibb. JSJS up 111. Leiden: Brill, pp. 213–35. Milik, J. T. (1959), Ten Years of Discovery in the Wilderness of Judaea. London: SCM Press. Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1969), ‘La genèse littéraire de la règle de la communauté,’ RB 76, 528–49. Murphy-O’Connor, J. (1974), ‘The Essenes and their history,’ RB 81, 215–44. Newsom, C. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Petit, M. (1992), ‘Les Esséens de Philon d’Alexandrie et les Esséniens,’ in D. Dimant and U. Rappaport (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Forty Years of Research. STDJ 10. Leiden: Brill, pp. 139–55. Piovanelli, P. (2007), ‘Was there sectarian behavior before the flourishing of Jewish sects? A long-term approach to the history and sociology of Second Temple sectarianism’, in D. Chalcraft (ed.), Sectarianism in Early Judaism: Sociological Advances. London: Equinox, pp. 156–79. Popović, M. (2012), ‘Qumran as scroll storehouse in times of crisis? A comparative perspective on Judaean Desert manuscript collections,’ JSJ 43, 551–94. Qimron, E. (1992), ‘Celibacy in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the two kinds of sectarians,’ in J. Trebolle Barrera and L. V. Montaner (eds), The Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Madrid, 19–21 March 1991. STDJ 11. Leiden: Brill, I: 87–94. Regev, E. (2004), ‘Comparing sectarian practice and organization: The Qumran sects in light of the regulations of the Shakers, Hutterites, Mennonites and Amish,’ Numen 51, 146–81. Regev, E. (2007), ‘Atonement and sectarianism in Qumran: Defining a sectarian worldview in moral and halakhic systems,’ in D. Chalcraft (ed.), Sectarianism in Early Judaism: Sociological Advances. London: Equinox, pp. 180–204. Regev, E. (2010), ‘Between the two sects: Differentiating the Yah.ad and the Damascus Covenant,’ in C. Hempel (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context. STDJ 90. Leiden: Brill, pp. 431–49. Sanders, E. P. (1977), Paul and Palestinian Judaism: A Comparison of Patterns of Religion. Philadelphia: Fortress. Satlow, M. L. (2006), ‘Defining Judaism: Accounting for “religions” in the study of religion,’ Journal for the American Academy of Religion 74, 837–60.
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Schiffman, L. (2000), ‘Community without temple: The Qumran community’s withdrawal from the Jerusalem Temple,’ in B. Ego, A. Lange and P. Pilhofer (eds), Gemeinde ohne Tempel: Zur Substituierung und Transformation des Jerusalemer Tempels und seines Kults im Alten Testament, antiken Judentum und frühen Christentum. WUNT II .118. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 267–84. Schiffman, L. (2010), Qumran and Jerusalem: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and the History of Judaism, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Schofield, A. (2008), ‘Rereading S: A new model of textual development in light of the Cave 4 Serekh Copies,’ DSD 15, 96–120. Schofield, A. (2009a), ‘Between center and periphery: The Yahad in context,’ DSD 16, 330–50. Schofield, A. (2009b), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Smith, J. Z. (1982), Imagining Religion: From Babylon to Jonestown, Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Stuckenbruck, L. T. (2010), ‘The legacy of the Teacher of Righteousness in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in E. G. Chazon, B. Halpern-Amaru and R. A. Clements (eds), New Perspectives on Old Texts: Proceedings of the Tenth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 9–11, 2005. STDJ 88. Leiden: Brill, pp. 23–49. Sutcliffe, E. F. SJ (1959), ‘The First Fifteen Members of the Qumran Community: A Note on 1QS 8:1ff.,’ JSS 4, 134–8. Swarup, P. (2006), The Self-Understanding of the Dead Sea Scrolls Community: An Eternal Planting, A House of Holiness. London: T & T Clark. Kooij, A. van der (2011), ‘The Yah.ad – what is in a name?,’ DSD 18, 109–28. Vermes, G. (1994), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Qumran in Perspective, London: SCM . Vermes, G. (1999), An Introduction to the Complete Dead Sea Scrolls. Minneapolis: Fortress. Wassen, C. (2005), Women in the Damascus Document. AcBib 21. Atlanta: SBL . Yardeni, A. (1997), ‘A draft of a deed on an ostracon from Khirbet Qumrân,’ IEJ , 47, 233–7. Yellin, J., M. Broshi, and H. Eshel, (2001), ‘Pottery of Qumran and Ein Ghuweir: The first chemical exploration of provenience,’ BASOR 321, 65–78.
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Daily Life Cecilia Wassén
The depiction of daily life within the movement, part of which resided at Qumran, can be painted with broad strokes on the basis of the best preserved rule books, especially the Community Rule (S) [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad; 59 Rules; 72 Forms of Community], the Damascus Document (D) [→35 Damascus Document] and the Rule of the Congregation (1QS a) [→46 Rule of the Congregation]. Whereas the text in the various manuscripts of D (4QD a-h, 5QD, 6QD ) discovered at Qumran is highly homogenous, the copies of S (1QS , 4QS a-j, 5QS ) differ quite considerably (Baumgarten, 1996, pp. 6–7; Metso, 2007). Unless otherwise stated, I will refer to the best-preserved edition of S, i.e. 1QS . 1QS a was attached to the same scroll as 1QS . Nevertheless, in light of one or more fragmentary copies of the Rule of the Congregation in Cave 4, it should be considered as a separate document in its own right (Metso, 2007, pp. 51–6; Gayer, Stökl Ben Ezra and Ben-Dov, 2016; Ben-Dov, Stökl Ben Ezra and Gayer, 2017). Although 1QS a is often understood as a futuristic account, the bulk of its regulations makes sense for an actual community that saw itself living in the ‘end of days’ (1QS a 1.1) (Stegemann, 1998, pp. 113–15; Steudel, 1993; Hempel 2013 [orig. 1996], pp. 47–62). For points of comparison, I will also refer to the ancient accounts about the Essenes written by Josephus, Philo and Pliny the Elder [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature].
Marriage and Celibacy The terminology used in the rule books [→59 Rules] to describe the community differs, although there is some overlap as well, which raises the question whether the forms of community were different [→72 Forms of Community]. While D legislates for families in various ‘camps’ (CD 7.6–7; 12.22–33) in ‘the new covenant’ and for ‘the cities of Israel’ (CD 12.19), S provides regulations for members of the Yahad, a term that is absent from D (but has been reconstructed in the principal edition of 4QD e 3 iii 19 [→35 Damascus Document]). Traditionally the Yahad has been connected specifically with a celibate community living at Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran], often identified with the Essenes who were largely celibate according to the Classical sources. Yet some scholars have argued against the existence of a celibate branch altogether (Schiffman, 1994, pp. 127–43; Stegemann, 1998, pp. 193–8) since sexual 547
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abstention is not mentioned in the Scrolls, and celibacy goes against traditional Jewish values. The textual evidence from Qumran gives a somewhat complex picture. The rules D, 1QS a and 4QM iscellaneous Rules (4Q265) clearly reflect communities made up of families. Furthermore, many other documents refer to women and marital life, such as 4QMMT (4Q394–399 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah), the Temple Scroll (11QT ) [→51 Temple Scroll], 4QTohorot A (4Q274 [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]), 4QI nstructionb (4Q416 [→38 Instruction; 63 Wisdom]) and Ritual of Marriage (4Q502), to mention but a few. In contrast to the other rules, S does not mention women (apart from the expression ‘born of a woman’ in 1QS 11.21), but there is a promise of ‘fruitful offspring’ (1QS 4.7). The silence on wives in S is conspicuous given its many regulations; this shows at least, in contrast to the organization reflected in D, that S was not family oriented (Collins, 2010, p. 58). In addition, a passage in D, CD 7.4–6, points to the existence of celibacy within the movement: For all those who walk according to these matters in holy perfectness, in accordance with all his teachings, God’s covenant is a guarantee for them, that they shall live a thousand generations. And if they reside in camps, in accordance with the rule of the land, and take women and beget children, they shall walk in accordance with the law [. . .] DSSSE
Since those who take wives are singled out from among those who walk in ‘perfect holiness,’ it indicates that not all of these live in camps and marry. Yet it should be noted that all of them, regardless of marital status, are assumed to walk in ‘perfect holiness’ (Wassén, 2005, pp. 122–8; Wassén, 2016a). The cumulative evidence from the sectarian literature suggests that marriage was a common way of life within the movement, but there are also indications of a celibate praxis. The traditional picture of the Yahad as a celibate sect at Qumran (reflected in S) and married members living in camps all around the country has been challenged in different ways. In light of the proposals for a revised dating of the start of the sectarian settlement at Qumran to the first century bce (57 or 31 bce according to Humbert, 1994, pp. 209–11; 100–50 bce according to Magness, 2002, pp. 63–9), the close connection between S and the site of Qumran can no longer be maintained. That is, since the earliest S manuscripts including 1QS are dated to around 100–75 bce (Metso, 2007, pp. 2–6), the document was not written as a rule book for the community at Qumran. Furthermore, instead of taking the Yahad as relating to one community Alison Schofield and John Collins maintain that the Yahad is an umbrella term for several groups of different sizes (Collins, 2010, p. 67; Schofield, 2009, pp. 47–51). In this reconstruction Qumran is one community within the Yahad. Collins’ argument relies heavily on 1QS 6.1b–8: ‘In this way shall they behave in all their places of residence’ (DSSSE ). Although some members within the Yahad would have lived together, as Qumran exemplifies, it is not necessary that all small groups did. Instead, members were required to live in proximity to each other, but could still have lived in separate dwellings (Collins, 2010, pp. 65–8). In light of the shared terminology and similarities in the communal organizations reflected in S and D (e.g. units of ten 1QS 6.3; CD
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12.22–13.3), Collins has asserted that the division between the branches is not as sharp as is commonly assumed (Collins, 2010, pp. 65–9; cf. Schofield, 2009, pp.162–73; see also Hempel, 2013, pp. 79–105, 271–84). Similarly, like 1QS a, 4Q265 makes no visible difference between families and the Yahad (Schofield, 2009, pp. 173–80). This reconstruction points to heterogeneity rather than homogeneity within the movement. The hypothesis that the Qumran movement was divided into a married and a celibate branch is closely related to the question of an Essene identification, since the latter are described largely as celibate and male [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. Pliny the Elder depicts the asceticism of one group of the Essenes living in proximity to the Dead Sea, and contributing to the portrait, Philo and Josephus describe the Essenes as residing in communities all over the country characterized by an ascetic lifestyle that included abstention from marriage. Instead of marrying, Josephus tells his readers, the Essenes adopted the children of others (J.W. 2.120). At the same time, Josephus adds a short note explaining that there was another order of Essenes who married (J.W. 2.160–61), but only for the sake of procreation. These ancient sources about the Essenes give the impression that the celibate branch was the larger of the two, which does not correspond to the general picture found in the Qumran documents. Nonetheless, this divergence can perhaps be explained. The views on celibate Essenes by both Philo and Josephus, who clearly admire them, were influenced by the existing debate on marriage between Cynics, who largely rejected marriage, and Stoics who embraced it. Even though Philo and Josephus were themselves married and elsewhere commented on the necessity of marrying and having children (Rewards 108–110; Spec. Laws 3.36; Ant. 3.274), in this case both chose to take the Cynic position on marriage, highlighting the freedom from desires and putting devotion to God and philosophy above civic responsibilities (Deming, 2004, pp. 87–94). Josephus explicates the Essenes’ ‘disdain for marriage’ by referring to their virtues: ‘These Essenes reject pleasures as an evil, but esteem continence and the conquest over our passions, to be virtue.’ (J.W. 2.120). Writing about celibate Essenes provided an opportunity for ancient Jewish authors to present the sect as ideal, virtuous Jews in an anti-Jewish climate (Mason, 2009, pp. 239–79), which may have led them largely to ignore the Essene families (Wassén, 2005, p. 9). One may also speculate that Josephus, a native of Jerusalem (Life 2), would have known the Essene community in Jerusalem particularly well (‘many of them dwell in every city’ J.W. 2.124; cf. Philo, Hypoth. 11.1) and that his description may have been informed by life in that community. Since sexual intercourse in Jerusalem was forbidden (CD 12.1–2; 11QT 45.11–12) we know that at least here members abstained from marital relations. We should also take into consideration the time difference between the accounts of the Essenes (first century ce ) and bulk of the Qumran rule texts which were copied in the first century bce and likely composed early in that century at the latest; the praxis of celibacy within the movement may have grown to some extent during this period. The motivation for celibacy in this Jewish group remains unclear. Josephus’ and Philo’s explanations are loaded with their own misogynist opinions (J.W. 2.121; Hypoth. 11.14) that lack parallels in the sectarian literature from Qumran. Suggestions by scholars include purity concerns (menstruation, childbirth and sexual intercourse causing impurity [→70 Purity and Holiness]); strong apocalyptic expectations (why have children if this world is coming to an end? [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]);
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and imitation of angels or of priests serving in the temple [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons; 69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. None of these reasons are compelling (see Wassén, 2016b). The debate over the merit of marriage in the larger Roman-Hellenistic world and particularly the influence of the Cynics, who enjoyed ‘freedom from marriage,’ should be taken into account (Deming, 2004, pp. 86–94). Some Essenes may simply have preferred to devote their whole lives to serving God rather than having families (cf. 1 Cor. 7.32–35). It is noteworthy that another Jewish group, the male and female Therapeutae in Egypt, chose celibacy (Philo, Contempl Life 1–2, 11–40, 63–90), and that abstention from marriage later became a viable option in the early Jesusmovement [→11 Christianity]. This suggests that a celibate lifestyle was gaining ground in some segments of Jewish society at the end of the Second Temple Period.
The Cemetery Archaeological data from the cemetery at Khirbet Qumran adds complexity to the issue of marriage and celibacy [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. The graveyard contains about 1,200 graves that mostly follow a north–south orientation. Roland de Vaux, who led the excavations in the 1950s, excavated forty-three of these graves which predominantly contained single males. Nevertheless, among them he also discovered the skeletons of six women and five children in the southern parts, one female (T7) in the area he called the ‘main cemetery,’ and one female in a northern part of the cemetery (Tomb A). It should be noted that not all the skeletons were assessed for their sex (Zangenberg, 2000). Later excavations of ten graves mostly from the ‘main’ cemetery in the mid-1960s conducted by Solomon Steckoll revealed the remains of six males, four females and one child. Although some scholars have dismissed his findings (Magness, 2002, p. 169) others accept his basic identification of the skeletons (Taylor, 1999, pp. 303–4). Unfortunately, those skeletons are lost. The whereabouts of the skeletons from de Vaux’s excavation were largely unknown until a large portion resurfaced and were subsequently re-examined. Susan Sheridan analysed two collections of skeletons from Paris (eight) and Jerusalem (nine), and confirmed the identification of the female in Tomb A, but questioned the identification of the skeleton in T7 as female (Magness, 2002, pp. 169–72; Sheridan, 2002). Of the twenty-two skeletons that Olav Röhrer-Ertl and colleagues re-examined in Munich, nine were identified as male, eight as female – two of which came from the ‘main cemetery’ (T22 and T24b) – and five were those of children (Röhrer-Ertl, 2006). Nonetheless, on the basis of their height Joseph Zias has disputed the female sex of the skeletons in T22 and T24b (Zias, 2000, pp. 232–3). Although Zias’ views have gained wide acceptance, Sheridan dismisses his argument (Sheridan, 2002, pp. 238–9). Contra Röhrer-Ertl’s assessment, Zias also contends that all the tombs with women and children in the southern parts of the cemetery are in fact later Bedouin burials on the basis of their east–west orientation among other distinctive features (followed by Magness, 2002, pp. 168–75). Nevertheless, it should be noted that Röhrer-Ertl is certain that ‘All these individuals were unquestionably buried within the same time frame’ (Röhrer-Ertl, 2006, p. 192) and that Zias only studied the skeletons briefly (Zangenberg, 2000, pp. 62–3). Some scholars have also questioned de
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Vaux’s division of the cemetery into central and peripheral parts (Steckoll, 1969, pp. 37–8; Taylor, 1999). And, finally, during excavations in 2001 archaeologists discovered in the eastern part of the ‘Middle Finger’ what they interpreted as a ‘mourning enclosure’ in which they found the bones of two women in a secondary burial. Later Carbon-14 analysis – the first successful one on bones from Qumran – confirmed their date to the Second Temple Period (Eshel et al., 2002, p. 151) [→15 Scientific Technologies]. Clearly, the cemetery discussion is contentious, and a clear picture has not emerged from the divergent views. Still, in spite of attempts to do so, it is not possible to dismiss the female presence at the site and we cannot assume that Qumran was inhabited by men alone.
Marital Regulations There are plenty of regulations about marriage and marital life in the Scrolls that provide some insights into both praxis and values. In a departure from the general societal norms and laws, the Qumran movement prohibited marriage between a man and his niece, based on a gender inclusive interpretation of the law against marriage between a man and his aunt in Lev. 18.13 (CD 5.7–11; cf. 11QT 66.15–17 [→51 Temple Scroll]; 4Q251 [Halakha A] 17 2 [→58 Halakhah]). The sectarians also considered polygyny a form of ‘fornication’ (CD 4.20–21), although some scholars find here evidence also for a prohibition against any second marriage as long as either spouse is alive (Baumgarten, 1996, p. 71). The fragmentary text 4QD f 3 4–16 [→35 Damascus Document] provides specific marital laws: A father is obliged to reveal hidden blemishes of a daughter before marriage and not give her to someone ‘not fit for her.’ The importance of these instructions is underlined by scriptural references. The latter prohibition may be intentionally vague and likely calls on the father to give priority to the well-being of his daughter when selecting a prospective groom. Mirroring the strict attitudes towards female sexuality in contemporary society, the laws that follow prohibit a man from marrying a non-virginal first-time-bride or a widow who has engaged in sex after the death of her spouse. They also demand that a bride-to-be should be examined by ‘trustworthy and knowledgeable [women], selected by the command of the Inspector who is over [the Many]’ (4QD f 3 14, DSSSE ) if there is any doubt about her virginal status (a similar law is found in 4Q159 [Ordinancesa] 2–4 8–10). Although these laws place the authority of the marriage arrangements on the father and the prospective groom, marital laws in 4QD a 9 iii 1–4; CD 13.15–16 instead highlight the responsibilities of the supervisor (mebaqqer). The latter was to supervise both divorce and marriage within the movement, which indicates that the choice of a bride and bridegroom was of importance not only for the family but for the larger community as well. Charlotte Hempel has proposed that the former laws (in 4Q Df 3) largely stem from an earlier law code while the latter (in 4QD a 9 iii) belong to later communal laws (Hempel, 1998, pp. 65–70, 114–26). If she is correct, the divergence suggests that the sectarian leader, the supervisor, gained considerable authority over time (Wassén, 2005, pp. 197–8; Hempel 2013, pp. 253–70). Marital life was strictly regulated within the sect. The fragmentary catalogue of transgressors in D includes ‘one who lies with a pregnant woman’ (4QD e 2 ii 16). This
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praxis corresponds to Josephus’ note that the Essenes engaged in sex for procreation only and therefore abstained from it during pregnancy (J.W. 2.161). Furthermore, sex during the sabbath may also be condemned in D, but this reading is uncertain (4QD e 2 i 18–19). The penal code in D calls on the hardest possible sentence, namely expulsion, for ‘one who approach[hes] to have illegal sex with his wife not in accordance with the regulation’ (4QD e 7 i 12–13, DSSSE ). Whereas the exact crime remains elusive, scholars often understand the law in light of the ban on sex during pregnancy, or speculate that any form of non-procreative sexual act would be deemed fornication (Wassén, 2005, pp. 173–84). The presence of a law about sexual behaviour among other regulations, such as laughing foolishly (4QD e 7 i 4) and stealing food (7 i 11–12), raises questions about enforcement, i.e. how would anyone except for the couple know about their sexual praxis? It is likely that privacy was not possible (or necessary?) in a small house. Either way, the law presumes that family members were expected to expose infractions within their unit. We find a similar reliance on an informant system in the law that demands a wife to testify about her husband’s observance of the laws in 1QS a 1.11. Some scholars (e.g. Schiffman, 1989, pp. 18–19) emend the passage to make the subject male instead of female, which requires two changes in the Hebrew text. Nevertheless, given the informant system attested also elsewhere no emendation of 1QS a 1.11 appears necessary (Ilan, 1995, pp. 31–3; Wassén, 2005, pp. 140–1, 203–4).
Daily Life Daily life of the members of the movement must have looked somewhat different in the various communities. Qumran would provide suitable facilities for the kind of life that is described in S: members living, working, eating and worshipping together [→61 Liturgical Texts]. In such an environment all the activities during the day would have been strictly regulated with set times for work, common prayers and meals. Shared property, which S envisions, would make members rely on each other’s contributions and continuous work for their well-being. At the same time, 1QS 7.6–7 suggests that members still retained some control over their original possessions (cf. 5.24–25; 6.2). According to D, families contributed monthly portions of their salaries from their different jobs to the communal fund (CD 14.12–13). Hence, the financial level among members would have differed, possibly ranging from well-off slave-owners (CD 12.10–11; 11.12) to poor people in need of communal assistance (CD 14.14–16). The extent to which property was shared must have resulted in different types of community formations within the movement. Like most people in the ancient world, members of the sect would spend most of their time labouring. The sectarian rules do not dwell on everyday work, but Philo lists various typical occupations of the Essenes such as farming, raising animals, beekeeping, working in arts and craft (Hypoth. 11.5–9; cf. J.W. 2.128). Given the extensive library and the discovery of at least six inkwells at Khirbet Qumran (and one in Ein Feshkha [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]), scribal work must have been an important occupation at the site (Crawford, forthcoming) [→71 The Scribes of the Scrolls]. Other members were occupied with manual work such as pottery, growing and processing
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dates, shepherding and taking care of the day-to-day service in the building, such as food preparation, maintenance and cleaning. In addition to regular work, members had different responsibilities within the communities. 1QS a lists general duties of male members from the age of twenty-five; only from thirty years of age could a member serve as an official (1QS a 1.12; cf. CD 14.8–9; 1QM 6.12–13 [→40 Milh.amah]) and take part in legal decision making (1QS a 1.13–14). Female officials called ‘the Mothers’ appear in the penal code in D in association with ‘the Fathers’ (4QD e 7 i 13–15). Whereas the punishment for one who complains about ‘the Fathers’ is expulsion, anyone who complains about the Mothers only receives a ten day penalty. Apart from these lines, nothing is known about either ‘the Fathers’ or ‘the Mothers.’ In addition, male and female elders are mentioned in the very fragmentary 4Q502 (Ritual of Marriage; see Crawford, 2003 [→61 Liturgical Texts]). According to D and S members were closely guarded under sectarian authority and subjected to rigid discipline. Both documents reflect communities that from a sociological standpoint should be labelled ‘sects’ [→21 Social Scientific Approaches: Sectarianism] since they display high tension between the group and the rest of society, which is a hallmark of a sectarian identity (Wassén and Jokiranta, 2007). Members marked differences between insiders and outsiders through formal initiation rites (1QS 6.13–23; CD 15.5–15) whereby the new initiates promised by oath to live according to the interpretation of the Torah by the community. Groups of ten were ruled by a priest according to both D and S. They also submitted themselves fully to the authority of the community and were obliged to obey any higher ranking member (1QS 5.8–10, 23–24; 6.2; CD 13.11–12; 14.3–6). In addition, the supervisor had considerable influence over families in that he oversaw business transactions to some extent as well as marriage and divorce (4QD a 9 iii 1–5). Social interaction with outsiders was regulated; it is highly revealing that all members were prohibited from interacting with former members (4QD a 11 14–16; 1QS 7. 24–25). Along the same lines, Josephus explains that while members may assist the poor on their own accord, donations to relatives had to be approved by the supervisor (J.W. 2.134). Expulsion is a penalty in both D and S, e.g. in the cases of despising ‘the law of the Many’ according to D (4QD e 7 i 11) and slandering ‘the Many’ in 1QS 7.16. 4QD a 11 5–16 provides a rite for expulsion. Members would often come together for prayer, although individual prayers must have occurred as well. S speaks of prayer as a communal activity (1QS 6.3, 6) that should include a priest, if a minimum of ten people were present. With such small groups it is easy to imagine that they met in each other’s homes (Schuller, 2006, p. 63). 1QS 10.1–8 indicates that there were fixed times for prayers, i.e. on the sabbaths and festivals, as well as at sunrise, and at sunset (cf. 1QH a 20.7–14 [→61 Liturgical Texts]). Those daily prayers followed the rhythm of the luminaries: ‘At the commencement of the dominion of light in its time, during its rotation and at its retirement to its appointed abode [. . .] When the lights shine out of the holy vault, when they retire to the abode of glory’ (1QS 10.1–3 DSSSE ; cf. Josephus’ note on prayer at dawn J.W. 2.128; Schuller, 2006, p. 64). The set times for worship thereby followed the order of the cosmos and brought its participants into communion with the heavenly angels [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East]. Several texts express a firm belief in human-angelic union in worship (e.g. 1QH a 19.13–17; 26.10–14, 36 [→37 Hodayot]; 1QS 11.7–8; 4Q400–407
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[→48 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice]; [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]). Since the Qumran movement followed a calendar that differed from that of the temple (VanderKam, 1998), they had to meet at alternative places during the holidays for larger gatherings, possibly at Qumran, which likely served as a communal centre [→62 Calendars; 69 Jerusalem and the Temple]. ‘The many’ also met for ‘a third of each night’ ‘to read the book (the Torah?), explain the regulation, and bless together (1QS 6.6–7, DSSSE ). The combination of prayer and the study of sacred texts shows that the interpretation of Scripture was seen as a religious activity which was aided by prayer [→61 Liturgical Texts; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. Although commentators often understand lylh as ‘evening,’ it is more likely that night time was especially conducive to some exegetical activity. Jeremy Penner argues for a literal understanding of lylh ‘night’ based on sleep patterns in pre-modern society, which included a period when people typically were active in the middle of the night (Penner, 2012, pp. 165–208). The close association between the angels and the stars (e.g. 1 En. 18.15; 21:6 [→28 Authoritative Scriptures: Other Texts]; 4Q503 [Daily Prayers] 64) made the night a perfect time for meditation, inspiration and human–angelic communion. In short, if the praxis of nocturnal prayers was part of the pattern of prayers, we may speak of communal prayers three times during the twenty-four-hour period.
Meals Together with worship, the common meal constituted a regular and significant communal activity. It is reasonable to assume that sectarian members, whether they lived in family units or not, would regularly come together for common meals. Whereas S assumes that members ate together often, there are no hints in either D or 1QS a about how frequently members had common meals. Meals have always been social events that both join people together and enforce boundaries between those eating together and outsiders. Since in the Qumran movement meals were for members only, they marked clear boundaries between insiders and outsiders and reinforced a shared identity. The exclusion of sinners and impure individuals strengthened the exclusiveness of the meal further, even within the communities [→70 Purity and Holiness]. Also the food itself, correctly produced and stored according to strict purity laws, with a restricted amount for each member, expressed purity ideals and values of moderation and asceticism. Set rituals aimed at strengthening the conformity and cohesion within the movement, while the hierarchical seating arrangement signalled the placement of members within the sect (1QS 6.4; 1QS a 1.13–17, 21). These rituals applied to every meal of ten members or more (1QS a 2.22; cf. 1QS 6.2–6). The common unit of ten would allow for participants to gather for dinner in an ordinary house or in a triclinium. At Qumran, archaeologists have discovered a large quantity of jars containing animal bones – possibly as many as one hundred (Gunneweg, 2010) [→2 Archaeology of Qumran]. This phenomenon is unusual and should likely be associated with festive meals at holidays such as Passover when meat was consumed – a luxury item in antiquity. Based on archaeological considerations Humbert and recently also Magness argue that these bones are the remains of sacrifices (Humbert, 1994; Magness, 2016),
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which is supported by Josephus’ claim that the Essenes performed their own sacrifices (Ant. 18.19). Both 1QS and 1QS a emphasize the leading role of the priest, who was the first to bless the bread (food) and wine, before the blessings pronounced by all participants (1QS a 2.17–20; presumed in 1QS 6.4–6; cf. 10.14–15). Although the so-called ‘Messianic meal’ described in 1QS a regulates the rituals for a meal with the participation of the Messiah of Israel – or possibly two messiahs if ‘the priest’ should be identified with the Messiah of Aaron (so Schiffman, 1989, pp. 55–6) – the ending clearly asserts that the protocol was in effect for every meal ‘[when] at least ten me[n are gat]hered.’ Nonetheless, we may take the blessings of the Messiah of Israel in 1QS a 2.20–21 as an added feature for the eschaton in the near future [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Thereby the members enjoyed the common meal in anticipation of the eschatological feast. For both Philo and Josephus the common meal of the Essenes is noteworthy (Hypoth. 11.5; Good Person 85–86); Josephus indicates the Essenes shared a meal twice a day, purifying themselves and changing clothes beforehand, and remarks ‘they approach the dining room as if it were some [kind of] sanctuary’ (J.W. 2.128) [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. Several aspects of this description correspond well with the regulations in 1QS , i.e. the strict rules of decorum and the emphasis on purity. Most scholars assume that the entrance procedure in 1QS 6.13–23 regulates access to the common meal, while E. P. Sanders argues that these regulations rather concern festive meals (Sanders, 2000). A prospective member was allowed to take part in the pure food, called ·thrt hrbym, ‘the purity of the Many,’ only after a year (6.17), and ‘the drink of the Many’ mšqh hrbym after yet another year (6.20–21), since liquid could potentially transmit impurity to other items and food [→70 Purity and Holiness; 58 Halakhah]. Nevertheless, these purity terms have a broad meaning and should not be limited to food consumption alone (cf. e.g. 1QS 6.22; 4QD f 2 8–13; see Lieberman, 1952, p. 203; Avemarie, 1997; Hempel, 2012, pp. 61–2; Wassén, 2016c). The harsh condemnation of the wicked man in 1QS 5.13 presumes a purification prior to the pure meal: ‘He should not go into the waters to share in the pure food of the men of holiness,’ DSSSE . The importance of purity in connection with meals comes to the fore in penalties that bar sinners from all purities, including certain meals (1QS 6.24–7.5; 4QD a 10 i 14–ii 15 see Wassén [2016c]). Such moral impurity would threaten the holiness of the event (Harrington, 2004, pp. 27–30). Another form of penalty was food reduction, in 1QS by a fourth (1QS 6.25) and in 4Q265 (4Q265 4 i 8–10) by half, for various lengths of time. The same Hebrew term n῾nš ‘penalized,’ is used in the penal code in D (4QD a 10 ii 3), but Joseph Baumgarten has argued that the penalty must be of a different kind, since these members had access to food in their homes (Baumgarten, 1992, p. 54). Still, when members from different family units came together for common meals, it would be a shameful penalty to be served less than the others, and also affect an individual’s finances. The length of the penalties, ranging from ten days to a year, may even suggest that several families commonly shared meals together. In addition, penalties influenced the hierarchical seating order during the dinner as well, which was strictly regulated (1QS 6.4; 1QS a 2.17–22). Even men and women with a low grade of impurity had to immerse before eating if they increased their level of impurity through contact with a
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more severe form of impurity according to 4QTohorot A (4Q274) 1 i. These purity laws have no parallel in rabbinic literature and demonstrate that transmission of impurity, particularly during meals, was a concern within this ancient group. 1QS 6.2–3 highlights that the meal is part of the unifying activities of members: ‘they shall eat together, together they shall bless and together they shall take counsel,’ DSSSE . As we have seen, blessings and meals go together, and it is likely that deliberations would often be part of common meals as well. Klinghardt compares the statutes in 1QS with those for Hellenistic-pagan voluntary associations, and concludes that the activities in 1QS 6.2–3 (eating, praying and deliberating) likely occurred together in the same assembly, just as they did in the association meetings where meals often include deliberations (Klinghardt, 1994, pp. 261–2; Eckhardt, 2017 [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation]). Indeed, the meal regulations in both 1QS 6.4–5 and 1QS a 2.11–22 are blended with those for an assembly, which supports such a reconstruction. In addition, the hierarchical seating order appears to apply to assemblies as well as to meals (1QS 6.3–4, 8–11; cf. 2.19–23; 5.20–24; 1QS a 2.12–17), and assemblies are also subject to strict purity regulations (e.g. 1QS a 1.25– 26; 2.3–10; cf. 4QD a 8 i 6–9). In conclusion, the Qumran texts as well as the ancient sources about the Essenes provide glimpses into the daily life of an ancient movement that resided in different locations and whose members strove to maintain holiness throughout the day. The members had daily ritual baths, strict regulations for marital relations, regulated financial transactions, specific rituals in connection to exclusive meals, and set times for common prayers, all of which infused their everyday life with religious meaning while also strengthening the bonds within their communities.
Bibliography Avemarie, F. (1997), ‘ “Tohorat ha-rabbim” and “maqsheh ha-rabbim”: Jacob Licht reconsidered,’ in M. J. Bernstein, F. García Martínez, and John Kampen (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995: Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten. STDJ 23. Leiden: Brill, pp. 215–29. Baumgarten, J. M. (1992), ‘The laws of the Damascus Document in current research,’ in M. Broshi (ed.), The Damascus Document Reconsidered. Jerusalem: IES , pp. 51–62. Baumgarten, J. M. (1996), Qumran Cave 4. XIII. The Damascus Document (4Q266–273). DJD 18. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Baumgarten, J. M. and D. Schwartz (1995), ‘Damascus Document (CD ),’ in J. Charlesworth et al. (eds), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations: Damascus Document, War Scroll, and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 2. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, pp. 4–79. Ben-Dov, J., D. Stökl Ben Ezra and A. Gayer (2017), ‘Reconstruction of a single copy of the Qumran Cave 4 cryptic-script Serekh haEdah,’ RevQ 29, 21–77. Collins, J. J. (2010), Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Crawford, S. W. (2003), ‘Mothers, sisters, and elders: Titles for women in Second Temple Jewish and early Christian communities,’ in J. Davila (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls as
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Background to Postbiblical Judaism and Early Christianity. STDJ 46. Leiden: Brill, pp. 177–91. Crawford S. W. (forthcoming), Scribes and Scrolls at Qumran: A New Synthesis, Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Deming, W. (2004), Paul on Marriage and Celibacy: The Hellenistic Background of 1 Corinthians 7. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Eckhardt, B. (2017), ‘Temple ideology and Hellenistic private associations,’ DSD 24, 406–22. Eshel, H. et al. (2002), ‘New data on the east of Khirbet Qumran,’ DSD 9, 135–65. Gayer, A., D. Stökl Ben Ezra and J. Ben-Dov (2016), ‘A new join of two fragments of 4QcryptA Serekh haEdah and its implications,’ DSD 23, 139–54. Gunneweg, J. (2010), ‘Introduction to the “buried bones,” ’ in A. Adriaens, J. Gunneweg and D. Joris (eds), Holistic Qumran: Trans-Disciplinary Research of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. STDJ 87. Leiden: Brill, pp. 63–6. Harrington, H. K. (2004), The Purity Texts. Companion to the Qumran Scrolls. London: T&T Clark. Hempel, C. (1998), The Laws of the Damascus Document: Sources, Tradition, and Redaction. STDJ 29. Leiden: Brill. Hempel, C. (2012), ‘Who is making dinner at Qumran,’ JTS 63, 49–65. Hempel, C. (2013), The Qumran Rule Texts in Context. TSAJ 154. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Humbert, J-B. (1994), ‘L’espace sacré à Qumrân,’ RevQ 101, 161–214. Ilan, T. (1995), ‘The attraction of aristocratic women to Pharisaism during the Second Temple Period,’ HTR 88, 1–33. Klinghardt, M. (1994), ‘The Manual of Discipline in the light of statutes of Hellenistic associations,’ in M.O. Wise et al. (eds), Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences 722. New York: New York Academy of Sciences, pp. 251–67. Lieberman, S. (1952), ‘The discipline in the so-called Dead Sea Manual of Discipline,’ JBL 71, 199–206. Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Magness, J. (2011), Stone and Dung, Oil and Spit: Jewish Daily Life in the Time of Jesus. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Magness, J. (2016), ‘Were sacrifices offered at Qumran? The animal bone deposits reconsidered,’ JAJ 7, 5–34. Mason, S. (2009), Josephus, Judea, and Christian Origins: Methods and Categories. Peabody, MI : Hendrickson, pp. 239–79. Metso, S. (2007), The Serekh Texts. LSTS 62. London: T & T Clark. Penner, J. (2012), Patterns of Daily Prayer in Second Temple Period Judaism. STDJ 104 Leiden: Brill. Röhrer-Ertl, O. (2006), ‘Facts and results based on skeletal remains from Qumran found in the Collectio Kurth: A study in methodology,’ in J. Zangenberg (ed.), Qumran Site of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Archaeological Interpretations and Debates. Proceedings of the Conference Held at Brown University November 17–19 2002. STDJ 57. Leiden: Brill, pp. 181–93. Sanders, E. P. (2000), ‘The Dead Sea Sect and other Jews: Commonalities, overlaps and differences,’ in T. Lim (ed.), The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Historical Context. Edinburgh: T & T Clark, pp. 7–43.
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Schiffman, L. (1989), The Eschatological Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls: A Study of the Rule of the Congregation. SBLMS 38. Atlanta: Scholars Press. Schuller, E. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: What Have We Learned? Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press. Schiffman, L. H. (1994), Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philadelphia: JPS . Schofield, A. (2009), From Qumran to the Yah.ad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for the Community Rule. STDJ 77. Leiden: Brill. Sheridan, S. (2002), ‘Scholars, soldiers, craftsmen, elites? Analysis of the French collection of human remains from Qumran,’ DSD 9, 199–248. Steckoll, S. H. (1969), ‘Marginal notes on the Qumran excavations,’ RevQ 7, 33–44. Stegemann, H. (1998), The Library of Qumran: On the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998. Steudel, A. (1993), ‘ אחרית הימיםin the texts from Qumran,’ RevQ 16, 225–46. Taylor, J. E. (1999), ‘The cemeteries of Khirbet Qumran and women’s presence at the site,’ DSD 6, 285–323. VanderKam, J. C. (1998), Calendars in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Measuring Time. The Literature of the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: Routledge. Wassén, C. (2005), Women in the Damascus Document. AcBib 21. Atlanta: SBL . Wassén, C. (2016a), ‘The importance of marriage in the construction of sectarian identity in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in S. Byrskog, R. Hakola and J. Jokiranta (eds), Social Memory and Social Identity in the Study of Early Judaism and Early Christianity. NTOA/SUNT 116. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, pp. 127–50. Wassén, C. (2016b), ‘Women, worship, wilderness, and war: Celibacy and the constructions of identity in the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ in J. Baden, H. Najman and E. Tigchelaar (eds), Sibyls, Scriptures, and Scrolls: John Collins at 70. JSJSup 175. Leiden: Brill, II: 1361–85. Wassén, C. (2016c), ‘The (im)purity levels of communal meals within the Qumran movement,’ JAJ 7, 102–22. Wassen, C. and J. Jokiranta, (2007), ‘Groups in tension: Sectarianism in the Rule of the Community and the Damascus Document,’ in D. Chalcraft (ed.), Sectarianism in Early Judaism: Sociological Advances. London: Equinox, pp. 206–45. Zangenberg, J. (2000), ‘Bones of contention: “New” bones from Qumran help settle old questions (and raise new ones) – Remarks on two recent conferences,’ The Qumran Chronicle 9, 51–76. Zias, J. (2000), ‘The cemeteries of Qumran and celibacy: Confusion laid to rest?,’ DSD 7, 220–53.
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Ethics and Dualisms Marcus Tso
Defining ‘Ethics’ and ‘Dualism’ Both ‘ethics’ and ‘dualism’ are slippery terms with a range of meanings and some preliminary definitions are needed. Ethics can refer to a moral code, or to the reflection on and study of morality, or to morality itself (Tso, 2010, p. 3). As Glickman (1976, p. 1) broadly defines it, ethics, or moral philosophy, is ‘a consideration of the various kinds of questions that arise in thinking about how one ought to live one’s life.’ Some modern ethicists such as Frankena (1973, p. 8), following Kant, further delimit the scope of ethics to actions of ‘relatively great social importance,’ unmotivated by self-interest, not enforced by external sanctions, but rational and autonomous. Likewise, some comparative religious ethicists, such as Little and Twiss (1978), separate ethics from religion and law as distinct normative action guides that solve different problems and employ different conditions of legitimacy (Tso, 2010, p. 35). However, such modernist definitions are inappropriate for studying ancient texts such as the Scrolls. In contrast, other comparative religious ethicists such as Lovin and Reynolds (1985, pp. 1–35) propose a ‘holist’ or ‘empiricist’ approach, which seeks to explore the connections between a group’s ‘moral order’ and its beliefs about the ‘facts’ of the world (1985, p. 18). This approach is more appropriate for discussing the ethics in the community or communities behind the Scrolls. Thus, this article treats ethics as discourse and reflection on how one should live – the highest ends in life and the means to those ends. In the case of the Qumran literature, ethics thus defined is clearly linked to religious beliefs and law [→58 Halakhah], and reflect the sectarians’ worldview, part of which can be described as dualistic. Dualism, as defined by the much-cited 1987 article by Bianchi, now updated and expanded by Stoyanov (Bianchi and Stoyanov, 2005), is a ‘doctrine that posits the existence of two fundamental causal principles underlying the existence . . . of the world.’ Thus defined, dualism is a religio-historical phenomenon that is more specific than the ‘simple contrasting of good and evil, life and death, light and darkness’ (Bianchi and Stoyanov, 2005, p. 2505). Scholars have traced this kind of dualism to Zoroastrianism since Thomas Hyde (1636–1703), often understood as the idea of the coeternal opposition between two irreducible principles (Frey 1997, p. 281) [→9 Qumran and the Ancient Near East; 13 Scrolls and Non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature]. However, 559
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Bianchi’s definition does not require such a radical opposition. Rather, for them to be dualistic, the opposing principles only need to be involved in the explanation of the origin of the world and humanity. Therefore, dualism can be compatible with monotheism, polytheism and even monism (Bianchi and Stoyanov, 2005, pp. 2505–7). However, even such moderate dualism is not found in the Qumran literature (Duhaime, 2000). In other words, no text from the Qumran corpus explicitly attributes the ultimate origins of the world and humanity to two opposing principles. Nevertheless, some Qumran texts exhibit ideas that are more than merely opposing two contrasting terms, such as good and evil, but seem to envision some cosmic forces at work behind the stage of human moral order [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. Indeed, some texts, most notably the often-cited Two Spirits Treatise from 1QS [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad], explain the way the world and humanity are by appealing to two opposing spirits. Therefore, Qumran scholars have observed various forms of dualism that are not covered by Bianchi’s original typology (Bianchi and Stoyanov, p. 2509).
Dualisms in the Scrolls Soon after the discovery of the Scrolls from Cave 1 around 1947, when 1QS and 1QM [→ Milh.amah] came to light, scholars have noticed forms of dualism in these texts. The earliest monograph treatments of dualism in the Scrolls include those by Huppenbauer (1959) and von der Osten-Sacken (1969). These and other early studies tend to present dualism as a distinctive or even defining aspect of Qumran religious thought, to trace it to Persian influence, and to compare it with instances of dualism in the New Testament (Frey, 1997, p. 276; Xeravits, 2010, pp. 1–2). More recent studies in the collection of works edited by Xeravits (2010), complicate and modify the early impressions significantly. Aided by the full publication of materials from Qumran, especially from Cave 4, they have corrected the initial conclusion of strong and pervasive dualism in the early research based on the 1Q texts. Indeed, strong dualism, whatever its form, is not prominent outside of 1QS and 1QM (cf. Davies, 2010, p. 8). Frey (1997, pp. 277–80) summarizes well the newer awareness that dualistic texts from Qumran are not only limited in number, but also divergent in the kinds of dualism they contain, as well as not all produced by a single community. Instead of uniformity or consistency, Qumran scholars now see diversity and a yet-unresolved complexity in the origins and developments of dualistic thoughts in the Scrolls. Therefore, it has become customary and necessary to distinguish between various forms of dualism in Qumran scholarship. Using the categorizations first proposed by Charlesworth (1969), Gammie (1974) and Duhaime (1987b; 1988), developed by Frey (1997), and rehearsed by Stoyanov (Bianchi and Stoyanov, 2005), the following will delineate the types of dualism identified in the Scrolls and, where possible, illustrate them with texts from Qumran. Metaphysical dualism is defined by Charlesworth (1969, p. 389) as ‘the opposition between God and Satan,’ while Frey limits the term to ‘the opposition of two dominating [and coeternal] causal powers of equal rank.’ (Frey, 1997, p. 282). Frey’s definition for metaphysical dualism fits Bianchi’s definition for radical dualism, requiring three conditions (causal, coeternal and equal) as opposed to Bianchi’s moderate dualism,
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requiring only one condition (causal for cosmology and anthropology). Frey cites Zoroastrianism, as illustrated by Yasna 30.3–5; 45.2, as an instance of such absolute dualism. However, not only is this kind of absolute dualism not represented in early Christianity or Judaism, including Jewish sectarianism reflected in the Scrolls, it is not really true of Zoroastrianism either (Shaked, 1984, pp. 315–16). Cosmic dualism divides all of reality, creation and humanity with it, into two opposing sides. This broad category includes various expressions of this opposition, sometimes in cosmological terms such as light/darkness, sometimes in ethical terms such as good/evil (cf. ethical dualism below), and often in terms of spiritual beings such as angels/demons under the leadership of figures such as Michael and Belial [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. According to Frey, this form of dualism differs from metaphysical dualism in that the two opposing sides are not seen as ‘coeternal or strictly causal.’ Indeed, instances of cosmic dualism from the Scrolls seem always to assume that both sides are created by God and under his sovereignty. An example of cosmic dualism is 1QM 1.1b–3a, ‘The first attack by the sons of light will be launched against the lot of the sons of darkness, against the army of Belial . . .’ (DSSSE ). Spatial dualism also divides the world into two opposed or contrasted parts. It therefore can be regarded as a subspecies of cosmic dualism. However, it divides the world spatially into two realms, typically as heaven/earth, or the mundane/supramundane (Gammie, 1974, pp. 358, 360–2). One example is 1QHa 11.19–22a [→37 Hodayot], I thank you, Lord, because you saved my life from the pit, and from the Sheol and Abaddon have lifted me up to an everlasting height, so that I can walk about on a boundless plain. And I know that there is hope for someone you fashioned out of dust for an everlasting community. The depraved spirit you have purified from great offence, so that he can take a place with the host of the holy ones, and can enter in communion with the congregation of the sons of heaven. DSSSE
Here the author speaks of having lived in two realms, one earthly or even underworldly, and the other heavenly. Eschatological dualism, in contrast, divides the world temporally into two opposing ages, often conceived as an evil present age dominated by Belial opposed to an eschatological future age when evil will be eradicated, cf. e.g. 4Q286 [→32 Berakhot] 7a ii 5b–6, ‘And cursed is the wick[ed. . .] of his rule; and damned be all the sons of Beli[al] in all the iniquities of their office until their annihilation [Amen. Amen.]’ (Duhaime, 2000, p. 218) [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Ethical dualism is not simply the opposition between good and evil, but it divides all humanity into two polarized groups based on their ethical qualities, see e.g. 1QS 2.1b–5, And the priests will bless all the men of God’s lot who walk unblemished in all his paths [. . .] And the levites shall curse all the men of the lot of Belial. They shall begin to speak and say, ‘Accursed are you for all your wicked, blameworthy deeds. DSSSE
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Soteriological dualism, similarly, splits humanity into two lots, but the basis here is whether they are saved or lost. Charlesworth’s criterion of faith in a saviour is perhaps too restrictive, since salvation can be based on following the correct teaching of an inspired teacher or simply on God’s election, compare, e.g. CD 2.11–13 [→35 Damascus Document; 20 Historiography; 66 Revelation], And in all of them he raised up men of renown for himself [. . .] And he taught them by the hand of with his holy spirit and through seers of the truth. . . . But those he hates, he causes to stray. DSSSE
Theological dualism refers to a radical contrast between God and humanity (or the creation). Frey rightly limits this term to when the contrast or antagonism is the specific emphasis, since the distinction between God and his creation is so fundamental in Jewish thought and not dualistic per se. In this narrow sense strict theological dualism is hardly noticeable in the Scrolls, since God is not antagonistic to all humanity. Without this strict limit, an example might be 1QS 11.9–11, where the utter corruption of humanity is contrasted with God’s perfection and grace [→61 Liturgical Texts; 60 Poetry and Hymns], However, I belong to evil humankind, to the assembly of unfaithful flesh; my failings, my iniquities, my sins, [. . .] with the depravities of my heart, belong to the assembly of worms and those who walk in darkness [. . .] since the judgment belongs to God, and from his hand is the perfection of the path. By his knowledge everything shall come into being, and all that does exist he established with his calculations and nothing is done outside of him. DSSSE
Physical dualism denotes ‘the absolute division between matter and spirit.’ (Charlesworth, 1969, p. 389) and is unattested in the Scrolls. Anthropological dualism draws a sharp distinction between body and soul, and is likewise unattested in the Scrolls. Psychological dualism describes the presence of two internal and conflicting ethical influences within an individual. The most well-known example is from the Two Spirits Treatise in 1QS 3–4, most succinctly expressed in 4.23b, ‘Until now the spirits of truth and injustice feud in the heart of man’ DSSSE . While the above typology offers valuable clarity to the discussion of dualism in the Scrolls, not all types are prominent in the preserved texts, nor can all dualistic texts be classified by one type of dualism alone. Frey (1997), for example, sees in the Two Spirit Treatise a combination of ethical and psychological dualism subordinated to a cosmic dualism, and observes that this striking combination is anomalous among the sectarian texts, which tend to be dominated by a pure cosmic dualism. There is little doubt that cosmic dualism, as a broad category that can include other types of dualism, is dominant in the Scrolls, especially the sectarian texts, but other types are often at work simultaneously. For instance, the example for soteriological dualism above also contains elements of ethical dualism, and both also fit a general definition of cosmic dualism.
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The Relationship between Ethics and Dualisms in the Scrolls Beside cosmic dualism, one of the mostly commonly acknowledged forms of dualism found in the Scrolls is ethical dualism (see, e.g. Duhaime, 2000, p. 217). However, ethical dualism is not the only form of dualism that is ethically relevant. Other forms of dualism can operate in conjunction with, or independently from, ethical dualism, in ways that contribute to the shaping of ethics among the sectarian communities reflected in the Scrolls. First, cosmic dualism is often expressed in ethical terms, and thus divides the whole of reality ethically, and not just humanity. Therefore, the ethical division of humanity that ethical dualism speaks of is merely an aspect of an all-encompassing division in the entire cosmos, including spiritual beings on either side of the divide, with God on the side of light, righteousness and goodness. This worldview encourages personal identification with the group that is on the right side of the divide, with its attendant ethical norms, and therefore provides ethical motivations and deterrents for the sectarian way of life (see Tso, 2010, p. 155 for an early-first-century bce example of this in 1QS 1.16–2.18). Second, spatial dualism can also contrast the heavenly realm and the earthly realm in ethical terms, as the example above from 1QHa 11.19–22a [→37 Hodayot] intimates with its reference to an ethical cleansing. Such spatial dualism promotes an aspiration for attaining certain ethical norms that correspond to life in the higher realm. Third, eschatological dualism not only depicts the two ages in ethical terms (the present evil age versus the future age of righteousness), it anticipates the final destruction of evil in the future. Therefore, it is the form of dualism that foresees the end of all forms of dualism found in the Scrolls, and provides motivation for persisting in the ethical norms of the movement (see Tso, 2010, pp. 156–9 for mid-to-latefirst-century bce examples of this in 11Q13 [11QMelchizedeq] [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms], 1QpHab [→44 Pesharim] and 1QM [→40 Milh.amah). Fourth, soteriological dualism can be complementary with ethical dualism, as those who are saved and those who are lost are often characterized by the appropriate ethical qualities and behaviour. To see one’s ethical qualities as congruent with salvation provides another source of ethical motivation. Fifth, moderate theological dualism shows God as ethically perfect, while humans are ethically flawed. This contrast, similar to spatial dualism, prompts humans to aspire to the ethical quality of God and to renounce their own evil inclinations. In the example from 1QS 11.9–11 given above, divine grace is seen as necessary for humans to share in God’s righteousness. Finally, psychological dualism places ethical struggle within the human heart, with a clear link with the wider cosmic conflict between two opposing spiritual forces. Although psychological dualism is rare outside of the Two Spirits Treatise, it fills a gap in the sectarian’s understanding of why even members of the community still stumble from time to time.
Ethics in the Scrolls While ethics as it emerges from the Scrolls can be described as dualistic in the terms outlined above, that is not the only way, nor the most important way, to characterize it.
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Indeed, ethics can also be described as theonomous, communitarian and eschatological (Kimbrough, 1969; Kampen, 2000; Tso, 2010), among other distinctive features. Moreover, the qualified dualistic worldview of the sectarian literature is only a relatively minor basis of ethics as attested in the texts from Qumran. Other bases, already suggested by some of the characteristics above, include the movement’s scriptural traditions [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation], their communal identities, their responses to their political and cultural contexts, and their eschatological expectations (Tso, 2010). These bases or contributing factors of ethics in the sectarian texts often worked in conjunction with each other, but are of different prominence and importance in the Scrolls. First, the most influential and commonly noted factor is scriptural traditions [→25–28 Authoritative Scriptures; 55 Bible]. However, the group associated with Qumran [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] and the wider movement of which they formed a part [→72 Forms of Community] did not simply take authoritative texts and derive ethical norms from them in a straightforward way. Rather, scriptures were appropriated through what they believed to be inspired interpretation [→57 Exegesis and Interpretation; 66 Revelation] which took place in the context of the communal life [→72 Forms of Community; 73 Daily Life]. Furthermore, scriptures were appropriated differently in different texts, with diverse strands of biblical traditions being highlighted and variously transformed and reworked [→56 Parabiblical Texts/ Rewritten Scripture]. Thus, scriptural traditions provided some texts with part of their ethical vocabulary and conceptual frameworks, which were then developed and transformed along sectarian lines. Second, the role of self-identity in ethics as attested at Qumran is almost equally evident [→21 Social Scientific Approaches]. The identity assigned to the community, whether implicitly or explicitly, had implications for their ethics, whether in conduct or disposition. But here too there is diversity in the exact nature of that identity and its implications. Ethical descriptors were sometimes used to build self-identity, leading to the exhortation to live up to those descriptors. Even the use of scriptures was often influenced by the community’s identity. For example, the penal code in 1QS seems to read scriptural texts with a priestly identity, and the code thus formulated, promoted, protected and enforced the priestly values of purity and hierarchy. Third, despite their relative lack of prominence, responses to the political context or influences from foreign cultures also had perceptible effects on ethics in some sectarian texts [→7 The Yahad in the Context of Hellenistic Group Formation]. Sometimes a particular stance on ethics, such as the exclusive use of non-violent penalties in 1QS , may reflect a reaction against the political powers. In other instances, Hellenistic influence in terms of cultural and organizational norms, attenuated forms of dualism, naturalism, and determinism, and rhetorical device seem to have a role in the formulation of sectarian ethics [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]. For example, the rhetorical form and naturalism of Stoic ethical discourse are exhibited in 4Q298 (Words of the Maskil to All Sons of Dawn) in the way it lists virtues and in its fragmentary appeals to the created order as a basis for ethics, thus indicating at least indirect Hellenistic cultural influences [→13 Scrolls and Non-Jewish Hellenistic Literature]. Nevertheless, this factor is generally the least conspicuous among the four.
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Finally, the sectarians’ eschatological expectations often served as additional motivations for ethics, especially in the form of the final judgement [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. Additionally, their belief that they were already experiencing at least some aspects of eschatological realities provided some of the justifications for how they were to live in the present. However, in spite of the pervasive eschatological orientation of the many texts from Qumran, the role of eschatology is less pronounced than scriptures and identity. It did little to produce specific ethical norms, but served a secondary role by heightening ethical demands derived from other bases, and by motivating conformance to those demands. As a result of various combinations of the above contributing factors, ethics as attested at Qumran possess a distinctive set of characteristics, including theonomy, naturalism, dualism, determinism, rigorism/perfectionism, communitarianism and futurism. 1. Theonomy: The sectarian texts from Qumran, like other ancient Jewish literature, present God as the supreme source of all ethical norms, placing before the sectarians his demands through scripture and other revelation [→66 Revelation; 57 Exegesis and Interpretation]. While ethics was theonomous rather than autonomous, this theonomy was largely established by a particular sectarian handling of scriptural traditions [→55 Bible; 25–28 Authoritative Scriptures]. The movement regarded themselves as the sole possessors of God’s will in their times, guided by inspired exegesis and ongoing divine revelation [→44 Pesharim]. Thus, even the understanding of the sect’s divine command ethics was linked closely to their self-identity. Such a theonomous view of ethics contributed to an absolutist attitude and vehement opposition to outsiders who rejected the movement’s views. Moreover, the idea of the absolute rule of God as creator and lawgiver was the basis of naturalism, determinism and rigorism among the sectarians. 2. Naturalism: Ethical naturalism is evident in Qumran literature whenever a text appeals to God’s creation as a basis of sectarian norms, from calendrical issues [→62 Calendars] to marriage law [→73 Daily Life]. However, for the sectarians natural law depended on divine revelation for proper interpretation as much as scriptural law did – it was veiled in mystery. The ethics of the sectarians was naturalistic instead of wholly nominalistic, but this naturalism had a strong basis in theonomy and was likewise informed by the received scriptural traditions in the sectarian movement. Eschatology, especially the ‘realizing’ aspect that presented some of the expectations about the future age as already true to some extent, lifted up eschatological ideals as norms for the present [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. The idea that eschatological realities, because of their certainty, serve as naturalistic bases for present ethics can be described as eschatological ethical naturalism. 3. Determinism: The sectarian literature contains the idea that just as God has determined the order of creation, he has also predetermined the ethical paths of all people. Thus, good people will do good and evil people will do evil (cf. 1QS 3–4). This determinism is consistent with the idea that God is supreme and sovereign, and has encoded his moral will on nature. 4. Dualism: In what senses ethics as expressed in the texts from Qumran is dualistic has already been presented above. What can be added here is that both dualism and determinism in the Scrolls were subordinated under the sect’s belief in God’s absolute
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sovereignty, which was also the basis of the sect’s theonomous ethics. Furthermore, these convictions were sometimes expressed in biblical terms or otherwise adapted in ways that fit within the biblical monotheistic religion of which the sectarians were a part. Nevertheless, both dualism and determinism have some probable roots in Iranian religious thought, though possibly mediated through the general Greco-Roman cultural milieu and even Hellenized Judaism. Ironically, such possible foreign influences played an important role in the identity formation of an apparently xenophobic group. 5. Rigorism/Perfectionism: Despite their determinism, the movement still believed that moral effort and growth are not only necessary, but are expected of them. This implied rejection of moral complacency points to another characteristic of ethics as attested in the Scrolls – rigorism. The movement had a rigorist or perfectionist ethics, with a tendency towards greater stringency and insistence on both the demand and the possibility of perfect conformity to sectarian moral standards. This rigorism is of course consistent with the movement’s theonomous convictions. Moreover, this rigorist tendency is related to the sectarians’ priestly self-identity and their dualistic selfunderstanding. 6. Communitarianism: Ethics as endorsed in the texts from Qumran is also communitarian, rather than individualistic or universalistic. The movement not only had a large role in the development, instruction and enforcement of its ethics, it also viewed its ethics as its exclusive possession, and hence a particularistic ethics. Furthermore, this ethics prioritized the value of the community over that of individual members. This feature too was rooted in the group’s self-identity, dualism and determinism. 7. Futurism: Finally, ethics as represented in the Scrolls is eschatological and not merely this-worldly. The futurist aspect of eschatology served mainly to heighten motivation for ethical living, while ‘realizing’ eschatology more frequently was used to buttress ethical demands. Both aspects of eschatology had some basis in inherited scriptural traditions selectively appropriated and contributed to the formation of sectarian self-identity, as the movement located itself in the penultimate temporal location of God’s predetermined plan for the history of humanity and all creation. From the foregoing we can portray ethics among the sectarians as strongly theonomous and naturalistic, supported by authoritative scriptures, appropriated through exegesis, expressed in deterministic, dualistic and perfectionistic terms, and oriented eschatologically.
Bibliography Bianchi, U. and Y. Stoyanov (2005), ‘Dualism,’ in L. Jones (ed.), Encyclopedia of Religion. Detroit: Macmillan, IV, pp. 2504–17. Charlesworth, J. H. (1969). ‘A critical comparison of the dualism in 1QS III , 13–IV, 26 and the “dualism” contained in the Fourth Gospel.’ NTS 15, 389–418. Davies, P. R. (2010), ‘Dualism in the Qumran War Texts,’ in G. G. Xeravits (ed.), Dualism in Qumran. LSTS . London, T & T Clark International, pp. 8–19. Duhaime, J. (1987a), ‘A critical comparison of the dualism in 1QS III , 13-IV, 26 and the “dualism” contained in the Fourth Gospel,’ NTS 15, 389–418.
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Duhaime, J. (1987b), ‘Dualistic reworking in the Scrolls from Qumran,’ CBQ 49, 32–56. Duhaime, J. (1988), ‘Le dualisme de Qumrân et le littérature de sagesse vétérotestamentaire,’ Église et Théologie 19, 401–422. Duhaime, J. (2000), ‘Dualism,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I: 215–220. Frankena, W. K. (1973), Ethics. Englewood Cliffs, NJ : Prentice-Hall. Frey, J. (1997), ‘Different patterns of dualistic thought in the Qumran library: Reflections on their background and history,’ in M. J. Bernstein, F. García Martínez and J. I. Kampen (eds), Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995: Published in Honour of Joseph M. Baumgarten. STDJ 23. Leiden, Brill: pp. 275–335. Gammie, J. G. (1974), ‘Spatial and ethical dualism in Jewish wisdom and apocalyptic literature,’ JBL 93, 356–385. Glickman, J. (ed.) (1976), Moral Philosophy: An Introduction. New York: St. Martin’s. Huppenbauer, H. W. (1959), Der Mensch zwischen zwei Welten: Der Dualismus der Texte von Qumran (Höhle I) und der Damaskusfragmente. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Evangeliums. Zürich, Zwingli. Kampen, J. I. (2000), ‘Ethics,’ in L. H. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam (eds), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. New York: OUP, I: 272–76. Kimbrough, S. T. Jr. (1969), ‘The ethic of the Qumran community,’ RevQ 6, 483–98. Little, D. and S. B. Twiss (1978), Comparative Religious Ethics. New York: Harper & Row. Lovin, R. W. and F. E. Reynolds (eds) (1985), Cosmogony and Ethical Order: New Studies in Comparative Ethics. Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Osten-Sacken, P. v. d. (1969), Gott und Belial: Traditionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen zum Dualismus in den Texten aus Qumran. Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Shaked, S. (1984), ‘Iranian influence on Judaism: First century B.C.E. to second century C.E.,’ in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein (eds), The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume One: Introduction: The Persian Period. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 308–25. Tso, M. K. M. (2010), Ethics in the Qumran Community: An Interdisciplinary Investigation. WUNT II .292. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Xeravits, G. G. (ed.) (2010). Dualism in Qumran. LSTS . London: T & T Clark International.
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War and Violence Alex P. Jassen
Contextualizing War and Violence in the Dead Sea Scrolls The overwhelming majority of scholarly treatments of war and violence in the Dead Sea Scrolls concentrate on literary and historical analyses of the collection of texts outlining the anticipated eschatological war between the Sons of Light – representing the forces of good – and the Sons of Darkness – representing the forces of evil (see Duhaime, 2004). More general discussions of violence in the Dead Sea Scrolls tend to generate a synthetic portrait of end-time violence in the Scrolls and examine its possible scriptural background and contemporary apocalyptic setting (e.g. Sollamo, 2004; Davies, 2006 [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]). Treatments of present-time violence directed at the sectarian community generally draw on the relevant texts in order to reconstruct the origins and history of the sectarian community (e.g. Charlesworth, 2002 [→20 Historiography]). Other approaches attempt to explain the relationship between the violence of the Scrolls and ancient reports about the non-violent Essenes (Batsch, 2004 [→12 Scrolls and Hellenistic Jewish Literature]). This article moves beyond these purely literary and historical emphases in order to examine the social, theological and ideological setting of war and violence in the Dead Sea Scrolls. In so doing, my goal is to determine what such evidence tells us about the rhetorical function of violent language and imagery for the ideological worldview of the sectarian community (see Jassen, 2010). My analysis of war and violence is framed by the two chronological settings in which sectarian literature envisions their manifestation: present-time violence and eschatological violence. The violent destruction of foreign powers and sectarian enemies is widely anticipated in the Scrolls. In all cases, however, the expected destruction is deferred until the end of days: I shall not repay anyone with an evil reward; with goodness I shall pursue man. For to God (belongs) the judgment of every living being, and it is he who pays man his wages. I shall not be jealous with a wicked spirit, and my soul shall not crave wealth by violence. I shall not be involved in any dispute with the men of the pit until the day of vengeance. 1QS 10.17–19 [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad] DSSSE ; cf. 9.21–23; 1QHa 14.20–21 [→37 Hodayot]
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Violence outside of the framework of the eschatological battle is not legitimized and presumably did not exist. No literary or archaeological evidence [→2 Archaeology of Qumran] suggests that the community engaged in any military preparation for the expected eschatological battle. Thus, violence against others in the War Scroll [→40 Milh.amah] and related texts is always imagined. The ubiquitous presence of violence in the sectarian texts thus must be understood for its rhetorical effect rather than in a prescriptive manner. The view found in the Scrolls should be contrasted with other approaches in Second Temple Judaism. Groups such as the Hasmoneans and the Zealots often appealed to the ‘zeal of Phinehas’ (Num. 25.6–15; cf. Ps. 106.31) as a powerful model for presenttime violent resistance against both foreigner oppressors and apostate Jews (1 Macc. 2.24–27; Josephus, J.W. 4.155; Hengel, 1989, pp. 146–77). In contrast, allusions to Num. 25.6–15 or Ps. 106.31 in the Scrolls are either purely terminological or based on the same fervent rejection of foreigners (see 1QS 3.11–12; 8.9–10; 4QMMT C 31 [→41 Miqs.at Maʿaśeh ha-Torah]; cf. 4Q522 [Prophecy of Joshua] 9 ii 7; 6Q13 [Priestly Prophecy] 4). In all cases, the allusions are stripped of the violent zealotry (see Berthelot, 2007; contra Sharp, 1997). Indeed, 1QS 10.17–19 explicitly disassociates zeal and violence. Even in the imagined eschatological war, the warrior-priest imagery associated with Phinehas is absent (Batsch, 2010). The rejection by the priestly Dead Sea Scrolls community of the Phinehas tradition as deployed in Second Temple Judaism sends a clear statement: present-time violence is similarly rejected. In contrast, the sectarian writings envision the community as the victims of present-time violence perpetrated by more powerful Jews and foreigners. This violence, however, should be understood for its rhetorical effect in crafting a narrative of victimhood for the community.
Present-time War and Violence The sectarian community repeatedly identifies itself as the powerless victim in contrast to the empowered other – whether the armies of the Kittim or other Jews. Pesher Habakkuk, for example, is replete with references to the mighty armies of the Kittim, understood as a cipher for the Romans [→44 Pesharim]. Most of 1QpHab 2.10–4.17; 5.12–6.12 focuses on the devastating effect of the war machine of the Kittim/Romans, both as a historical memory and as part of the imagined unfolding drama of the end of days (cf. 4Q333 [Historical Text E] 1 4, 8). At the same time, the community attempted to contextualize the violence of the foreign enemies within its broader theological worldview. Pesher Habakkuk, for example, follows the scriptural model of understanding conquering foreigners as agents of divine wrath against Israel (e.g. Isa. 10.5–6; 47.6; Jer. 21.1–10). 1QpHab 9.4–7 identifies the armies of the Kittim as the divinely sanctioned ‘rest of the peoples’ (Hab. 2.8) sent to destroy the iniquitous ‘later priests of Jerusalem’ (cf. 1QpHab 4.8; 4Q171 [pPsa] 1–10 ii 18–20). Several texts similarly condemn the generally violent tendencies of more powerful Jews. The Hasmoneans are often the target of these accusations. For example, Pesher Nahum (4Q169 3–4 i; cf. 4Q167 [pHoseab] 2) condemns the ‘Lion of Wrath,’ a sobriquet
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for Alexander Jannaeus (103–75 bce ), for killing his Jewish opponents (cf. Josephus, J.W 1.92–98; Ant. 13.376–83). The condemnation of Hasmonean violence can also be found in Testimonia [→52 Testimonia], which expands upon Josh. 6.26 in order to direct a curse against the rebuilder of Jericho and his sons (4Q175 21–30; par. 4Q379 [Apocryphon of Joshuab] 22 ii 7–14). The accursed ‘man of Belial’ in 4QTestimonia is almost certainly John Hyrcanus (134–104 bce ), who undertook significant building projects at Jericho (Eshel, 2008). 4QTestimonia characterizes the rebuilt city as a flashpoint for violence and the spilling of innocent blood. Moreover, line 25 identifies John Hyrcanus and his sons as ‘weapons of violence.’ This expression draws from Gen. 49.5, where this imagery is applied to Simeon and Levi on account of their attack on Shechem. Other texts in the Second Temple Period valorize the violence of Simeon and Levi (e.g. Jubilees 30 [→25 Authoritative Scriptures: Torah and Related]; Aramaic Levi 78–79 [→24 Aramaic Levi]; see Batsch, 2005, pp. 117–25) and no doubt Levi’s successful aggression against foreigners provided a potent template for the militancy of the priestly Hasmoneans. In contrast, the sectarian community does not share in this valorization of Levi, but rather draws upon the scriptural censure of his violent actions to condemn Hasmonean violence. Similar condemnations of Hasmonean military practices can be found elsewhere in the Dead Sea Scrolls. CD 12.6–8 [→35 Damascus Document] prohibits the killing of non-Jews for financial gain and the plundering of the wealth of non-Jews even without killing them. These two laws likely reflect a polemical stance toward the expansionist wars undertaken by John Hyrcanus and Alexander Jannaeus, which significantly enriched the royal treasury (Schiffman, 1983, pp. 380–2). Several other criticisms are found in the Temple Scroll’s Law of the King (11QTa 56.12–59.21) [→51 Temple Scroll], a literary unit that reflects a generally negative attitude toward Hasmonean practices (Schiffman, 2008). As in the Damascus Document, 11QTa 56.15–19 reinforces the connection between warfare and the illegitimate amassing of wealth. 11QTa 57.5–15 requires the king’s royal guard to consist of only Jewish soldiers, no doubt an implicit criticism of the Hasmonean policy of using foreign mercenaries (Schiffman, 2008, pp. 495–7). Furthermore, the king is required to seek permission of the high priest and the Urim and Thummim prior to engaging in an offensive war (11QTa 58.18–21). The Hasmonean unification of royal and priestly offices, however, would have made this stipulation impossible to follow (Schiffman, 2008, p. 490). The ‘Seekers of Smooth Things’ represents another group associated with presenttime violence. This group – usually understood as the Pharisees – is not identified as actual perpetrators of violence. Rather, several texts condemn their misguided leadership as the source of violence and bloodshed. Pesher Nahum implicates the ‘Seekers of Smooth Things’ in ‘the sword of the gentiles will not be lacking, nor captivity or looting, nor fire among them, nor exile for fear of enemy’ and the proliferation of corpses (4Q169 3–4 ii 5–6 DSSSE ). This is no doubt related to Pesher Nahum’s earlier report that the ‘Seekers of Smooth Things’ corroborated with the Seleucid king Demetrius (4Q169 3–4 i 2) and that they ‘walk in treachery and lies’ (4Q169 3–4 ii 2; cf. ll. 8–10). The Damascus Document is more direct in its censure of those who ‘sought after smooth things’ for their violent persecution of the innocent (CD 1.18–21). The most pervasive narrative of present-time violence in the sectarian writings pertains to intra-Jewish violence committed against the sectarian community and its
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leaders. In the Pesher on Psalms, the ‘ruthless ones of the covenant who are in the House of Judah’ are condemned for plotting to destroy ‘those who observe the law’ (4Q171 1–10 ii 14–15 DSSSE ). Similarly, the ‘wicked of Ephraim and Manasseh’ attempt to ‘lay hands’ (i.e. with intent to kill; see Gen. 37.22; 1 Sam. 22.17) upon the priest and the men of the counsel (4Q171 1–10 ii 18–19). The Pesher further describes the ‘wicked princes’ who oppress ‘his holy people’ (4Q171 1–10 iii 7–8). Similarly, 1QpHab 10.13 describes how the Spouter of the Lie establishes a city of emptiness with bloodshed and how his followers persecute the sectarian community. The ‘traitors to the covenant who are in the House of Judah’ likely refers to a group previously aligned with the sectarian community. If the Spouter of the Lie is identical with the Man of the Lie, he too would have been a former ally of the community (see 1QpHab 2.1–2). The ‘wicked ones of Ephraim and Manasseh’ likely refers to the Pharisees and Sadducees and the ‘wicked princes’ is probably an allusion to the royal Hasmoneans. In all these cases, therefore, the sectarian community envisions itself as the victim or potential victim of violence perpetrated by more dominant Jewish groups. The Hodayot [→37 Hodayot] contain a similar narrative of victimhood for the sectarian leader. This theme is particularly prominent in the collection of hymns in 1QH a 10–17 considered by many scholars to reflect the personal experience of the Teacher of Righteousness [→20 Historiography]. In 1QH a 14.8, the hymnist’s enemies are referred to as a ‘fellowship of violence’ (cf. Ps. 64.3). The hymn in 1QHa 12.6–13.6 opens with the hymnist lamenting that his enemies drove him out as a bird from its nest (1QH a 12.9–10; cf. Prov. 27.8; Ps. 124.7) and that they plotted against him (1QH a 12.11). In column 10, the hymnist is portrayed as an innocent victim of his enemies’ violent aggression. They make repeated attempts on his life (1QH a 10.19, 25–26, 31, 34–35). 1QHa 10.27–28 employs graphic martial imagery in describing the enemies as ‘warriors encamped’ against the hymnist with their ‘weapons of war’ (cf. 1QHa 13.9–18). The narrative of victimhood is further personalized in the pesharim [→44 Pesharim], where it is framed as a struggle between the Wicked Priest and the Teacher of Righteousness. 1QpHab 9.8–12 interprets the ‘bloodshed and violence’ in Hab. 2.8 as an allusion to the oppression of the Teacher by the Wicked Priest. Further details are provided in 1QpHab 11.4–8, where the Wicked Priest is described as following the Teacher to his place of exile in order ‘to consume him with the heat of his anger.’ The Pesher on Psalms reports that the Wicked Priest even sought to murder the Teacher of Righteousness (4Q171 1–10 iv 8–10). It is possible that the community and its leaders experienced some of the violent aggression outlined above. These many descriptions, however, should not be understood in purely historical terms. Rather, collectively, they generate a narrative of victimhood for the sectarian community. In so doing, the sectarian writings create a powerful rhetorical tool. All other more dominant Jews – former community members, Pharisees and Sadducees, the Hasmoneans, the priests in Jerusalem, and even the high priest – are obsessed with the small group of covenanters living their life of true piety. In all likelihood, the rejection of the community by the rest of Jewish society was a result of indifference rather than persecution. Persecution, however, is a much more powerful internal rhetorical tool than indifference (see Newsom, 2004, p. 318). The
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imagined suffering reinforces the narrative of the sectarians as the true community of God in spite of their minority status and further delegitimizes all the other Jewish groups.
Eschatological War and Violence The preceding discussion should not give the mistaken impression that the sectarian community was pacifistic or that violent ideology only emerged at a later phase in the community’s history. It is indeed true that the community developed its ideology of war and violence over time (Jassen, 2010). More importantly, however, the tension between non-violence and violence is framed by the rhetorical distinctions between present-time history and eschatological time. Violence perpetrated against the community’s enemies is always imagined as part of the unfolding drama of the end of days [→68 Eschatologies and Messianisms]. As a powerless group, the sectarian community was undoubtedly aware that it was no match for the Seleucid or Roman armies or even the more powerful Jews in Jerusalem. The violent eschatological vision serves in the present primarily as a rhetorical tool to empower the disempowered community. The community crafted a ‘fantasy’ of retributive violence in which the balance of power is reversed and its enemies are therefore brought to justice (Scott, 1990, pp. 36–44). This fantasy plays out in three areas in sectarian literature: (1) the pesharim, where the vengeance visited upon sectarian enemies reverses the suffering of the community in the present time; (2) the Treatise on the Two Spirits, which imagines God in the end of days purging the world of all dominant forces of evil [→74 Ethics and Dualism]; and (3) the eschatological war as outlined in the War texts, in which foreign oppressors and apostate Jews alike will be annihilated [→40 Milh.amah]. The rhetorical effect of the imagined violence against others in the end of days can be seen in a series of pesher texts that frame the destruction of the enemies as a reversal of the present reality. For example, in the present time, the ‘wicked ones of Ephraim and Manasseh’ attempt to ‘lay their hands’ on the community. In the future, ‘God will ransom them (i.e. the community) from their hand’ and the wicked ones will be ‘given into the hand of the ruthless ones among the nations’ (4Q171 1–10 ii 18–20). A similar reversal awaits the ‘last priests of Jerusalem,’ who amass their wealth in the present time by plundering the people. In the end of days, they are themselves plundered by the Kittim (1QpHab 9.3–7). So too, the ‘wicked princes’ perish because of their oppression of God’s holy people (4Q171 [pPsa] 1–10 iii 7–8). The rhetorical nature of the reversal theme in the pesharim is underscored by the description of the eschatological suffering of the enemies with language that echoes the nature of their oppression of the righteous community in the present time. The texts describing the eventual downfall of the Wicked Priest evince a similar reversal theme. Because of his attempt ‘to destroy the poor,’ the Wicked Priest will suffer complete destruction (1QpHab 12.1–6; cf. 1QpHab 9.8–12). So too, God will hand over the Wicked Priest to the ‘ruthless ones among the nations’ because of his attempt on the Teacher’s life (4Q171 1–10 iv 7–10). Pesher Habakkuk describes the apparently violent
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death of the Wicked Priest as ‘vengeful acts’ (1QpHab 9.2; cf. 8.16–9.2, 8–12). Most scholars have mined these passages for clues as to the identity of the Wicked Priest (see Charlesworth, 2002, pp. 91–4). It is indeed possible these passages describe the historical death of the Wicked Priest and that the sectarians were aware of some of the details of the Wicked Priest’s death. The description of his suffering and death, however, fits better as part of the disempowered community’s broader fantasy of eschatological retribution against its bitter enemy (Scott, 1990, pp. 41–4). Indeed, several texts envision the righteous sectarians as either witnessing or partaking in the eschatological punishment of the wicked (1QpHab 5.5–6; 1QS 8.6–7; 1QM 11.13–14; 1QH a 14.32–38). The notion that the eschatological age will usher in a reversal of the status quo is also asserted in the Treatise on the Two Spirits (1QS 3.13–4.26). While the pesharim give voice to the reversal of the intra-Jewish conflict, the Treatise imagines a broader cosmic reversal with local consequences. The Treatise presumes that humanity is divided into two groups: those belonging to the lot of God and those belonging to the lot of the Angel of Darkness (1QS 3.17–21). Similarly, God placed in every human the competing spirits of truth and iniquity (1QS 4.15–18). In both settings, the forces of evil reign supreme in the present time [→67 God(s), Angels and Demons]. The Angel of Darkness and his minions are so powerful that they are even able to cause the sons of righteousness to sin (1QS 3.21–24). This portrait of the division of humanity in the present time explains the disempowered position of the sons of righteousness and the dominant position of the wicked. Yet, God has appointed a ‘time of visitation’ (1QS 3.14, 18; 4.18–19) when the status quo will be dramatically reversed. The fantasy of eschatological retribution is especially vivid: And the visitation of all those who walk in it shall be for an abundance of afflictions at the hands of all the angels of destruction for eternal damnation by the scorching wrath of the God revenges, for permanent terror and shame without end with the humiliation of destruction by the fire of the dark regions. And all the ages of their generations (they shall spend) in bitter weeping and harsh evils in the abysses of darkness until their destruction, without there being a remnant or a survivor among them. 1QS 4.11–14, DSSSE
The once powerful forces of iniquity will be destroyed forever and truth ‘shall rise up forever (in) the world’ (1QS 4.19, DSSSE ). Anyone from among the wicked who survive the carnage will be ‘purified’ by God (1QS 4.20–22), thus finalizing the reversal of the present-time imbalance of power. The most prominent description of end-time violence and warfare appears in the context of the eschatological war between the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness (1QM ; 4Q491–496; 4Q285; 11Q14; see Collins, 1997, pp. 91–109; Duhaime, 2004; Davis et al., 2016). Scholars have long debated how to characterize the genre of the War Scroll. Is it an eschatological rule text [→59 Rules], a military manual, an apocalyptic text, or liturgy (see Duhaime, 2004, pp. 53–60; Falk, 2016)? Undoubtedly, there are aspects of each of these elements in the text, and indeed it is not necessary to presume
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a single purpose for a text that clearly underwent modification over time (see Duhaime, 2004, pp. 45–53; Eshel, 2015, pp. 71–84). One of the unifying factors to all the War texts, however, is the imagined nature of the warfare. By deferring all violent retribution to the end time, the community could craft a highly idealized fantasy of eschatological retribution against its enemies (cf. Davies, 2006, pp. 230–2). The very language used in the Rule of the Community to defer violence (1QS 10.17: ‘I will not repay anyone with an evil reward’ [→47 Serekh ha-Yahad]) is employed in the War Scroll to describe the point in time when God’s fury is unleashed on the wicked: For you will deliver into the hands of the poor the [ene]mies of all the countries; and in the hand of those prone in the dust in order to fell the powerful ones of the nations, to return the reward of the wicked. 1QM 11.13–14, DSSSE adjusted; cf. 6.5–6; CD 7.9–10; 19.6–7
This passage gives voice to the community’s explanation of its present-time oppression in spite of its unwavering fidelity to God. When the time is right, the righteous community will enjoy its just reward as it witnesses the annihilation of its wicked enemies. While the imagined eschatological violence of the pesharim reflects internal Jewish affairs, the War texts envision a broader network of internal and external enemies. The enemies in the War Scroll are the longstanding national and ethnic enemies of Israel – Edom, Moab, Ammon and Philistia – and the present-day enemies, the Kittim (1QM 1.1–2; cf. Isa. 11.14; Dan. 11.41). The Sons of Darkness also include the ‘violators of the covenant’ (1QM 1.2). The community likely imagined that most apostate Jews would join forces with them in the end of days (see 1QS a 1.1 [→46 Rule of the Congregation]). It saw itself in the end of days as the reconstituted Israel; any remaining apostate Jews would thus be considered Sons of Darkness alongside the foreigners (Collins, 1997, pp. 91, 108). The eschatological war is therefore an opportunity to reverse the presenttime oppression of the sectarian community at the hands of more powerful Jews and foreigners. At the same time, the community as the reconstituted Israel renews the ageold conflict with Israel’s neighbours. In this sense, the eschatological war simultaneously reverses centuries of Israelite/Jewish disempowerment. One of the curious features of the War Scroll is the employment of military tactics and weaponry associated with the community’s foreign enemies. Most scholars have approached this material for its clues to the origins of the War Scroll and its genre (see summary in Duhaime, 2004, pp. 83–95). Without discounting the importance of these questions, there is an equally significant rhetorical effect to the nature of the military tactics and weaponry. Whether it reflects Hellenistic or Roman realities, the War Scroll clearly envisions the downfall of its enemies through the very mechanisms in which these enemies reign supreme in the present time. As such, the War Scroll manifests a form of eschatological retribution far more potent than anything previously encountered in sectarian texts. The War Scroll redeploys the Hellenistic/Roman war machine in crafting its fantasy of retributive justice. In so doing, the imbalance between the empowered and disempowered is dramatically inverted.
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Conclusions The Dead Sea Scrolls preserve several interconnected narratives of war and violence, some of which seem to be in tension. Faced with a present reality in which it recognized its marginalized and disempowered position, the community advocated for a nonviolent approach to its enemies while viewing itself as the persistent victim of violent oppression. At the same time, the community took refuge in its fantasy of eschatological retribution when the present imbalance of power would finally be reversed. Even rhetoric, however, can have real-time consequences. Despite the various rhetorical effects associated with eschatological violence, texts such as the War Scroll were clearly regarded as descriptions of how events would actually unfold in the end of days. For the community, the transition from historical time to eschatological time was considered at hand. As such, its fantasies of eschatological retribution did more than merely defuse its violent sensibilities in the face of its dominant enemies. Rather, the cumulative effect of these various narratives of violence likely primed the sectarians for what they believed to be the imminent transition from rhetoric to reality (see Scott, 1990, pp. 183–201).
Bibliography Batsch, C. (2004), ‘Le “pacifisme des Esseniens,” un mythe historiographique,’ RevQ 21, 457–68. Batsch, C. (2005), La guerre et les rites de guerre dans le judaisme du deuxième Temple. JSJS up 93. Leiden: Brill. Batsch, C. (2010), ‘Priests in warfare in Second Temple Judaism: 1QM , or the antiPhinehas,’ in D. Falk, S. Metso, and D. Parry (eds), Qumran Cave 1 Revisited: Texts from Cave 1 Sixty Years after Their Discovery. STDJ 91. Leiden: Brill, pp. 165–78. Berthelot, K. (2007), ‘Zeal for God and divine law in Philo and the Dead Sea Scrolls,’ SPA 19, 113–29. Charlesworth, J. H. (2002), The Pesharim and Qumran History: Chaos or Consensus? Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Collins, J. J. (1997), Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: Routledge. Davies, P. R. (2006), ‘The biblical and Qumranic concept of war,’ in J. H. Charlesworth (ed), The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Volume One: Scripture and the Scrolls. Waco: Baylor University Press, pp. 209–332. Davis, K. et al. (eds) (2016), The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday. STDJ 115. Leiden: Brill. Duhaime, J. (2004), The War Texts: 1QM and Related Texts. New York: T & T Clark. Eshel, H. (2008), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hasmonean State. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Eshel, H. (2015) Exploring the Dead Sea Scrolls: Archaeology and Literature of the Qumran Caves. Ed. S. Tzoref and B. Levi Selavan. JAJSup 18. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Falk, D. (2016), ‘Prayer, liturgy, and war,’ in K. Davis et al. (eds), The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday. STDJ 115. Leiden: Brill, pp. 275–94.
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Hengel, M. (1989), The Zealots: Investigations into the Jewish Freedom Movement in the Period from Herod I until 70 A.D. Edinburgh: T & T Clark. Jassen, A. P. (2010), ‘Violence and the Dead Sea Scrolls: sectarian formation and eschatological imagination,’ in R. S. Boustan, A. P. Jassen, and C. J. Roetzel (eds), Violence, Scripture, and Textual Practice in Early Judaism and Christianity. Leiden: Brill, pp. 13–45. Newsom C. A. (2004), The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran. STDJ 52. Leiden: Brill. Schiffman, L. H. (1983), ‘Legislation concerning relations with non-Jews in the Zadokite Fragments and in Tannaitic literature,’ RevQ 11, 379–89. Schiffman, L. H. (2008) ‘The king, his guard, and the royal council in the Temple Scroll,’ in F. García Martínez (ed.), The Courtyards of the House of the Lord: Studies on the Temple Scroll. STDJ 75. Leiden: Brill, pp. 487–504. Scott, J. C. (1990), Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. New Haven: Yale University Press. Sharp, C. J. (1997), ‘Phinehan zeal and rhetorical strategy in 4QMMT,’ RevQ 18, 207–22. Sollamo, R. (2004), ‘War and violence in the ideology of the Qumran community,’ in H. Juusola, J. Laulainen, and H. Palva (eds), Verbum et Calamus: Semitic and Related Studies in Honour of the Sixtieth Birthday of Professor Tapani Harviainen. Helsinki: Finnish Oriental Society, pp. 341–52.
Appendix A: Timeline of Events Dates
Key Events in and around Palestine
350 bce 332 Alexander conquers Tyre and Gaza. 331 Alexander squashes a Samaritan revolt. 323 Laomedon assigned Syria. 320 Ptolemy conquers Phoenicia. 318 Eumenes unsuccessfully invades Phoenicia. 316–314 Antigonus gains control of Phoenicia. 314 Demetrius left in charge of Syria. 312 Ptolemy defeats Demetrius at Gaza and regains control of Phoenicia. 312 Destruction of Akē-Acco, Joppa, Samaria and Gaza by Ptolemy. Antigonus retakes Syro-Palestine.
Key Events in the Mediterranean World 334 Alexander crosses the Dardanelles. 332 Egypt submits to Alexander. 331 Alexander defeats Darius III at Gaugamela. 323 Death of Alexander the Great. 323–281 Period of the Diadochi.
316 Seleucus flees to Ptolemy for protection from Antigonus. 312 Seleucus restored in Babylon.
306 Antigonus unsuccessfully invades Egypt. 302 Ptolemy invades Syria and returns to Egypt. 301 Syro-Palestine assigned to Seleucus 301 Battle of Ipsus. Defeat of Antigonus. after the Battle of Ipsus. Ptolemy seizes southern Syria and Palestine. 300 bce 296–295 Demetrius destroys Samaria.
259 Zenon tours Palestine. Influence of Tobias.
282 Death of Ptolemy I Soter I. Accession of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. 281 Assassination of Seleucus I Nicator. Accession of Antiochus I Soter. 274–271 First Syrian War. 264–261 First Punic War. 261 Death of Antiochus I. Accession of Antiochus II Theos. 260–253 Second Syrian War.
250 bce 246 Death of Ptolemy II . Accession of Ptolemy III Euergetes I. Death of Antiochus II . Accession of Seleucus II Callinicus. 246–241 Third Syrian War. 241–236 War of the Brothers between Seleucus II and Antiochus Hierax.
577
578
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Appendix A: Timeline of Events
Key Events in and around Palestine
Late 3rd cent. Onias II refuses to pay tribute to Ptolemy. Activities of Joseph and Hyrcanus Tobiad.
218 Antiochus III invades Palestine. 217 Ptolemy IV reconquers Palestine. Ptolemy visits Jerusalem.
200 bce 200 Antiochus III reconquers Palestine. Jerusalem welcomes Antiochus. 197 Judea becomes a Seleucid province.
175 Jason installed as high priest by Antiochus IV in place of Onias III .
Key Events in the Mediterranean World 226–225 Death of Seleucus II . Accession of Seleucus III Ceraunus (Soter). 223 Assassination of Seleucus III . Accession of Antiochus III the Great. 221 Death of Ptolemy III . Accession of Ptolemy IV Philopator. 219–217 Fourth Syrian War. 218–201 Second Punic War.
204 Death of Ptolemy IV. Accession of Ptolemy V Epiphanes. 202–199 Fifth Syrian War.
187 Death of Antiochus III . Accession of Seleucus IV Philopator. 180 Assassination of Ptolemy V. Accession of Ptolemy VI Philometor. 175 Assassination of Seleucus IV. Accession of Antiochus IV Epiphanes.
172 Menelaus installed as high priest by Antiochus IV in place of Jason. 171 Murder of Onias III . 169 Revolt of Jason. Antiochus IV loots the 169–168 Sixth Syrian War. temple in Jerusalem. 168 Roman intervention to stop Antiochus IV ’s invasion of Egypt. 168/7 Antiochus IV profanes the temple and suppresses Jewish religion. 168/7–165/4 Maccabean Revolt. 165/4 Rededication of the Temple. 164 Death of Antiochus IV. Accession of Antiochus V Eupator. 162 Execution of Menelaus. Alcimus 162 Assassination of Antiochus V. Accession appointed high priest. of Demetrius I Soter. 161 Treaty with Rome. Death of Judas Maccabee. Accession of Jonathan Maccabee. 160 Death of Alcimus. 157 Treaty between Jonathan and Bacchides. 152 Alexander Balas appoints Jonathan high priest. 150 bce 150 Death of Demetrius I. Alexander Balas prevails. 149–146 Third Punic War. 146 Macedonia and Achaea become Roman provinces. Destruction of Carthage. Destruction of Corinth.
Appendix A: Timeline of Events
Dates
Key Events in and around Palestine
579
Key Events in the Mediterranean World 145 Assassination of Alexander Balas. Accession of Demetrius II Nicator. Throne contested by Diodotus Tryphon and Antiochus VI Epiphanes Dionysus. Death of Ptolemy VI . Accession of Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II .
143 Arrest and execution of Jonathan by Tryphon. Accession of Simon Maccabee. 142 Demetrius II recognizes Jewish independence. 140 Simon confirmed as high priest and ethnarch.
140–138 Capture of Demetrius II by the Parthians. Accession of Antiochus VII Sidetes.
135/4 Assassination of Simon. Accession of John Hyrcanus I as high priest and ethnarch. Antiochus VII besieges Jerusalem. 134–129 Temporary Seleucid control of Judea until the death of Antiochus VII . 129 Death of Antiochus VII . Re-accession of Demetrius II . Throne contested by Alexander Zebinas. 128 Destruction of the Samaritan temple at Shechem by John Hyrcanus I 125 Assassination of Demetrius II . Accession and assassination of Seleucus V. Accession of Antiochus VIII Grypus. 116–88 Death of Ptolemy VIII . Throne contested by Ptolemy IX Soter II , Ptolemy X Alexander I, Cleopatra II and Cleopatra III . 113 Retirement of Antiochus VIII . Accession of Antiochus IX Cyzicenus. 111 Antiochus VIII reclaims throne from Antiochus IX . 104 Death of John Hyrcanus I. Accession of Aristobulus I as high priest and king. 103 Death of Aristobulus I. Accession of Alexander Janneus as high priest and king. 100 bce 96–95 Assassination of Antiochus VIII . Accession of Seleucus VI Epiphanes Nicator. Death of Antiochus IX . 95–83 Sons of Antiochus VIII and Antiochus IX fight for the Syrian throne. 88 Death of Ptolemy X. Uncontested co-rule of Ptolemy IX and Cleopatra Berenice III . 83–69 Tigranes, king of Armenia, controls Syria.
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Appendix A: Timeline of Events
Key Events in and around Palestine
Key Events in the Mediterranean World 81–80 Death of Ptolemy IX and assassination of Cleopatra Bernice III . Accession and assassination of Ptolemy XI Alexander II . Accession of Ptolemy XII Neos Dionysos.
76
Death of Alexander Janneus. Accession of Alexandra Salome as queen. Hyrcanus II appointed high priest. 69
50 bce
Romans defeat Tigranes and cede Syria to Antiochus XIII Asiaticus. 67 Death of Alexandra Salome. 68–65 Philip replaces Antiochus XIII . Aristobulus II and Hyrcanus II contest Antiochus XIII reinstated. the throne and high priesthood. Antipater of Idumea supports Hyrcanus II . 63 Pompey captures Jerusalem. 63 Syria becomes a Roman province. Hyrcanus II reinstated as high priest. Judea becomes a Roman province. Pompey appoints Scaurus as commander. 60 First Roman Triumvirate. 59 Julius Caesar confirms Ptolemy XII as king of Egypt. 57 Gabinius appointed governor of Syria. Failed revolt of Alexander, son of Aristobulus II . 56 Aristobulus II escapes from Roman imprisonment. Failed revolt of Aristobulus and his son Antigonus. 55 Failed second revolt of Alexander. 54 Crassus loots the temple in 54 Crassus appointed governor of Syria and Jerusalem. killed in battle against the Parthians. Accession of Cassius. 51–44 Death of Ptolemy XII . Throne contested by Cleopatra VII , Ptolemy XIII and Ptolemy XIV with Roman intervention. 49 Caesar crosses the Rubicon. Pompey murders Aristobulus II and his son Alexander. 48 Caesar confirms Hyrcanus II as high 48 Caesar defeats Pompey. priest. 48–47 Hyrcanus II and Antipater support Caesar in Egypt. Hyrcanus appointed ethnarch. Antipater appointed procurator. 44 Assassination of Julius Caesar. 43 Second Roman Triumvirate. 42 Mark Antony controls the East.
Appendix A: Timeline of Events
Dates
Key Events in and around Palestine 40
37 31 30
581
Key Events in the Mediterranean World
Parthians conquer Palestine and appoint Antigonus, son of Aristobulus II , as king and high priest. Hyrcanus II maimed. Herod the Great appointed as king by Rome. Herod captures Jerusalem. Execution of Aristobulus. Large earthquake in Judea. 31 Herod submits to Octavian. 30
27
Battle of Actium. Egypt becomes a Roman province. Suicides of Mark Antony and Cleopatra VII . Octavian given the name Augustus.
20–10 Herod rebuilds the temple. 6? Birth of Jesus of Nazareth. 4 Death of Herod. Division of the kingdom between Archelaus (ethnarch), Herod Antipas (tetrarch), and Philip (tetrarch). 1 ce 6
9 12
Archelaus deposed by the Romans. Judea becomes a Roman province with Coponius as governor. Marcus Ambivulus becomes governor of Judea. Annius Rufus becomes governor of Judea. 14
Death of Augustus. Accession of Tiberius.
19
Expulsion of the Jews from Rome.
37
Death of Tiberius. Accession of Caligula.
38 Herod Antipas deposed by Caligula. Aborted attempt of Caligula to set up a statue in the temple in Jerusalem. 41 Claudius adds Judea and Samaria to 41 Agrippa I’s territory. 44 Death of Agrippa I. Judea becomes a Roman province again with Cuspius Fadus as governor. 46? Tiberius Alexander becomes governor of Judea. 48 Ventidius Cumanus becomes governor of Judea. 49
Anti-Jewish riots in Alexandria.
15
Valerius Gratus becomes governor of Judea.
26–36 Pontius Pilate becomes governor of Judea. 30? Crucifixion and claimed resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth. 34 Death of Philip the tetrarch. 37 Caligula appoints Agrippa I as king over Philip’s tetrarchy.
39 40
Assassination of Caligula. Accession of Claudius.
Expulsion of the Jews from Rome
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Dates
Appendix A: Timeline of Events
Key Events in and around Palestine
Key Events in the Mediterranean World
50 ce 52
Antonius Felix becomes governor of Judea.
54 59? Porcius Festus becomes governor of Judea. 62 Lucceius Albinus becomes governor of Judea. 64 Gessisus Florus becomes governor of 64 Judea. 66 The First Jewish War. 66 68
68 69
Destruction of Qumran.
Death of Claudius. Accession of Nero.
Burning of Rome. Suppression of Jewish riots in Alexandria. Suicide of Nero. Accession of Galba. Year of the four emperors: Galba, Otho, Vitellius and Vespasian, who triumphs.
70
Capture of Jerusalem by Titus. Destruction of the Temple. 73/4 Capture of Masada. 79 81 96 98
Death of Vespasian. Accession of Titus. Death of Titus. Accession of Domitian. Assassination of Domitian. Accession of Nerva. Death of Nerva. Accession of Trajan.
100 ce 115–117 Possible Jewish unrest in Palestine
115–117 Jewish uprisings in Egypt and Mesopotamia. 117 Death of Trajan. Accession of Hadrian.
130 Jerusalem becomes colonia Aelia Capitolina. 132–135 Bar Kokhba Revolt. 138 Death of Hadrian. Accession of Antoninus. 150 ce
Sources Goldstein, J. A. (1989), ‘The Hasmonean revolt and the Hasmonean dynasty,’ in W. D. Davies and L. Finkelstein (eds), The Cambridge History of Judaism, Volume 2: The Hellenistic Age. Cambridge: CUP, pp. 292–351 and chronological tables 717–21. Grabbe, L. L. (1994), Judaism from Cyrus to Hadrian. London: SCM Press. Grabbe, L. L. (2008), A History of the Jews and Judaism in the Second Temple Period, Volume 2: The Early Hellenistic Period (335–175 BCE). London: T&T Clark. Hölbl, G. (2001), ‘Ptolemaic period,’ in D. B. Redford (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt. trans. E. Schwaiger. Vol. 3. Oxford: OUP, pp. 76–85. Le Glay, M. et al. (2005), A History of Rome. 3rd edn, trans. A. Nevill. Malden, MA : Blackwell.
Appendix A: Timeline of Events
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Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. Schürer, E. (1973), The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (175 B.C.–A.D. 135). Rev. edn; G. Vermes and F. Millar (eds). Vol. 1. Edinburgh: T&T Clark. Vermes, G. (2012), The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English. 7th edn. New York: Penguin.
Appendix B: Principal Printed Editions Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series (DJD) Alexander, P. S. and G. Vermes (1998), Qumran Cave 4. XIX: Serekh Ha-Yah.ad and Two Related Texts. DJD 26. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Allegro, J. M. with A. A. Anderson (1968), Qumrân Cave 4. I (4Q158–4Q186). DJD 5. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Attridge, H., T. Elgvin, J. T. Milik, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam (1994), Qumran Cave 4. VIII: Parabiblical Texts, Part 1. DJD 13. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Baillet, M., J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux (1962), Les ‘petites grottes’ de Qumrân: Exploration de la falaise, les grottes 2Q, 3Q, 5Q, 6Q, 7Q à 10Q: Le rouleau de cuivre. DJD 3. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Baillet, M. (1982), Qumrân grotte 4. III (4Q482–4Q520). DJD 7. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Barthélemy, D. and J. T. Milik (1955), Qumran Cave I. DJD 1. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Baumgarten, J. M., on the basis of transcriptions by J. T. Milik with contributions by S. J. Pfann and A. Yardeni (1996), Qumran Cave 4. XIII: The Damascus Document (4Q266–273). DJD 18. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Baumgarten, J. M., T. Elgvin, E. Eshel, et al. (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XXV: Halakhic Texts. DJD 35. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Benoit, P., J. T. Milik, and R. de Vaux (1961), Les grottes de Murabbaʿat. DJD 2. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Brooke, G. J., J. Collins, T. Elgvin, et al. (1996), in consultation with J. VanderKam, Qumran Cave 4. XVII: Parabiblical Texts, Part 3. DJD 22. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Broshi, M., E. Eshel, J. Fitzmyer, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam (1995), Qumran Cave 4. XIV: Parabiblical Texts, Part 2. DJD 19. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Charlesworth, J., N. Cohen, H. M. Cotton, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady (2000), Miscellaneous Texts from the Judaean Desert. DJD 38. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Chazon, E., T. Elgvin, E. Eshel, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XX: Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 2. DJD 29. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Cotton, H. M. and A. Yardeni (1997), Aramaic, Hebrew, and Greek Documentary Texts from Nah.al H · ever and Other Sites, with an Appendix Containing Alleged Qumran Texts (The Seiyâl Collection II). DJD 27. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Cross, F. M., D. W. Parry, R. J. Saley, and E. Ulrich (2005), Qumran Cave 4. XII: 1–2 Samuel. DJD 17. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Dimant, D. (2001), Qumran Cave 4. XXI: Parabiblical Texts, Part 4: Pseudo-Prophetic Texts. DJD 30. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Elgvin, T., M. Kister, T. Lim, et al., in consultation with J. A. Fitzmyer (1997), Qumran Cave 4. XV: Sapiential Texts, Part 1. DJD 20. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Eshel E., H. Eshel, C. Newsom, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady (1998), Qumran Cave 4. VI: Poetical and Liturgical Texts, Part 1. DJD 11. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
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Appendix B: Principal Printed Editions
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García Martínez, F., E. J. C. Tigchelaar, and A. S. van der Woude (1998), Qumran Cave 11. II: (11Q2–18, 11Q20–31). DJD 23. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Gropp, D. M. (2001), Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri for Wadi Daliyeh; M. Bernstein, M. Brady, J. Charlesworth, et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady, Qumran Cave 4. XXVIII: Miscellanea, Part 2. DJD 28. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Leith, M. J. W. (1997), Wadi Daliyeh Seal Impressions. DJD 24. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Pfann, S. J. (2000), Qumran Cave 4. XXVI: Cryptic Texts; P. S. Alexander et al., in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady, Miscellanea, Part 1. DJD 36. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Pike, D. M. and A. C. Skinner with a contribution by T. L. Szink, in consultation with J. VanderKam and M. Brady (2001), Qumran Cave 4. XXIII: Unidentified Fragments. DJD 33. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (1998), Qumran Cave 4. XVIII: Textes hébreux (4Q521–4Q528, 4Q576–4Q579). DJD 25. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (2001), Qumran Grotte 4. XXII: Textes araméens, première partie: 4Q529–549. DJD 31. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Puech, É. (2009), Qumran Cave 4. XXVII: Textes araméens, deuxième partie: 4Q550–575, 580–582. DJD 37. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Qimron E. and J. Strugnell (1994), Qumran Cave 4. V: Miqs.at Maʿaśe ha-Torah. DJD 10. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Sanders, J. A. (1965), The Psalms Scroll of Qumrân Cave 11 (11QPsa). DJD 4. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Skehan, P. W., E. Ulrich, and J. E. Sanderson (1995), Qumran Cave 4. IV: Palaeo-Hebrew and Greek Biblical Manuscripts. DJD 9. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1992; Repr. with corrections. Stegemann, H., E. Schuller, and C. Newsom (2009), Qumran Cave 1. III: 1QHodayota, with Incorporation of 4QHodayota-f and 1QHodayotb. DJD 40. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Strugnell, J., D. J. Harrington, and T. Elgvin, in consultation with J. A. Fitzmyer (1999), Qumran Cave 4. XXIV: 4QInstruction (Mûsar leMevîn): 4Q415 ff., with a Re-edition of 1Q26. DJD 34. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Talmon, S., J. Ben-Dov, and U. Glessmer (2001), Qumran Cave 4. XVI: Calendrical Texts. DJD 21. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Tov, E. with the collaboration of R. A. Kraft (1995), The Greek Minor Prophets Scroll from Nah.al H · ever (8H · evXIIgr) (The Seiyâl Collection I). DJD 8. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1990; Repr. with corrections. Tov, E., with contributions from M. G. Abegg, Jr., A. Lange, U. Mittmann-Richert, et al. (2002), The Texts from the Judaean Desert: Indices and an Introduction to the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert Series. DJD 39. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ulrich, E., F. M. Cross, J. R. Davila, et al. (1994), Qumran Cave 4. VII: Genesis to Numbers. DJD 12. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Repr. 1999. Ulrich, E., F. M. Cross, S. W. Crawford, et al. (1995), Qumran Cave 4. IX: Deuteronomy, Joshua, Judges, Kings. DJD 14. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Repr. 1999. Ulrich, E., F. M. Cross, R. E. Fuller, et al. (1997), Qumran Cave 4. X: The Prophets. DJD 15. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ulrich, E., F. M. Cross, J. A. Fitzmyer, et al. (2000), Qumran Cave 4. XI: Psalms to Chronicles. DJD 16. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Ulrich, E. and P. W. Flint (2010), Qumran Cave 1. II: The Isaiah Scrolls. DJD 32. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
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Appendix B: Principal Printed Editions
De Vaux, R. and J. T. Milik (1977), Qumrân grotte 4. II: I. Archéologie, II. Tefillin, Mezuzot et Targums (4Q128–4Q157). DJD 6. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Editions Outside of the DJD Series Beyer, K. (1984), Die aramäischen Texte vom Toten Meer, samt den Inschriften aus Palästina, dem Testament Levis aus der Kairoer Genisa, der Fastenrolle und den alten talmudischen Zitaten. 2 Vols. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Beyer, K. (1994), Die aramäischen Texte vom Toten Meer, Ergänzungsband. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Burrows, M. with J. C. Trever, and W. H. Brownlee (1950), The Dead Sea Scrolls of St. Mark’s Monastery, Volume 1: The Isaiah Manuscript and the Habakkuk Commentary. New Haven: American Schools of Oriental Research. Burrows, M. with J. C. Trever, and W. H. Brownlee (1951), The Dead Sea Scrolls of St. Mark’s Monastery, Volume II. Fascicle 2: Plates and Transcription of the Manual of Discipline. New Haven: American Schools of Oriental Research. Charlesworth, J. H., with F. M. Cross, J. Milgrom, et al. (eds) (1994), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 1: Rule of the Community and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 1. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H., with J. M. Baumgarten, M. T. David, et al. (eds) (1995), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 2: Damascus Document, War Scroll, and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 2. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H., and H. W. M. Rietz, with J. M. Baumgarten, et al. (eds) (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 3: Damascus Document II, Some Works of the Torah, and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 3. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H. and H. W. L. Rietz, with P. W. Flint, et al. (eds) (1997), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 4A: Pseudepigraphic and Non-Masoretic Psalms and Prayers. PTSDSSP 4A. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H. and C. A. Newsom, with H. W. L. Rietz, et al. (eds) (1999), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 4B: Angelic Liturgy: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. PTSDSSP 4B. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H. and H. W. L. Rietz, with C. D. Elledge, et al. (eds) (2002), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 6B: Pesharim, Other Commentaries and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 6B. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Charlesworth, J. H., H. W. M. Rietz, L. L. Johns, et al. (eds) (2011), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations, Volume 7: Temple Scroll and Related Documents. PTSDSSP 7. Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Habermann, A. M. (1959), Megilloth Midbar Yehuda: The Scrolls from the Judaean Desert. Edited with Vocalization, Introduction, Notes and Concordance. Tel Aviv : Machbaroth Lesifruth. [Hebrew]
Appendix B: Principal Printed Editions
587
Qimron, E. (2010–2014), The Dead Sea Scrolls: The Hebrew Writings. 3 vols. Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi Press. [Hebrew] Schechter, S. (1910), Documents of Jewish Sectaries: Volume 1: Fragments of a Zadokite Work. Cambridge: CUP. Sukenik, E. L. (1948), Megilloth Genuzoth I. Jerusalem: Bialik Foundation. [Hebrew] Sukenik, E. L. (1950), Megilloth Genuzoth II. Jerusalem: Bialik Foundation. [Hebrew] Sukenik, E. L. (1955), The Dead Sea Scrolls of the Hebrew University. Jerusalem: Magnes Press. [Hebrew 1954] Yadin, Y. (1962), The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness. Translated by B. and C. Rabin. Oxford: OUP. [Hebrew 1955] Yadin, Y. (1965), The Ben Sira Scroll from Masada. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and the Shrine of the Book. Yadin, Y. (1969), Tefillin at Qumran. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society and the Shrine of the Book. Yadin, Y. (1983), The Temple Scroll. 3 vols, with Supplement. Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society.
Appendix C: Electronic Resources Accordance 11. . Available for both Mac and PC , Accordance 11 provides a strong collection of fully searchable biblical texts in a wide variety of languages. Additional resources include morphologically tagged and searchable texts and translations of the biblical and nonbiblical Dead Sea Scrolls, as well as numerous electronic books related to the study of the Scrolls. BibleWorks 10. . Available for both Mac and PC , BibleWorks 10 provides a strong collection of fully searchable biblical texts in a wide variety languages. Optional add-on modules include the Dead Sea Scrolls English Translation Bundle: Biblical and Sectarian Texts and the Qumran Sectarian Manuscripts, the latter with morphological tagging. The Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library (revised edn 2006; E. Tov, ed.; Leiden: Brill). . The Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library includes morphologically tagged and searchable texts, English translations and digital images of the non-biblical Dead Sea Scrolls. The Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library Biblical Texts (n.d.; D. W. Parry and A. Skinner eds; Leiden: Brill). . The Dead Sea Scrolls Electronic Library Biblical Texts includes Hebrew transcriptions and English translations of the biblical texts, together with high-resolution images. The Digital Dead Sea Scrolls. . The Israel Museum in Jerusalem offers high-resolution, scrollable images of 1QI saa, 11QTemplea, 1QM 1–15, 1QS and 1QpHab. InscriptiFact: An Image Database of Inscriptions and Artifacts. . The University of Southern California’s West Semitic Research Project maintains an online database of high-resolution digital images, including many of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The images are available to registered users free of charge for educational and research purposes. IOQS – International Organization for Qumran Studies (Facebook Group). The IOQS Facebook group page features regular posts on news, publications and opportunities relating to the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls.
588
Appendix C: Electronic Resources
589
The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library. . The Israel Antiquities Authority offers images of the Dead Sea Scrolls for free public viewing, searchable by various criteria. This collection includes a large and growing number of invaluable multi-spectral digital images of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Logos 6. . Available for both Mac and PC , Logos 6 is electronic library software with a wide variety of biblical texts, commentaries and other resources. Specialized resources for the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls include the Qumran Biblical Dead Sea Scrolls Database, the Qumran Sectarian Manuscripts and The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition, as well as many electronic books on the Scrolls. The Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature . The Orion Center of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem hosts a website with resources for the study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and an extensive, searchable bibliography of works on the Dead Sea Scrolls published from 1995 onwards.
Appendix D: Major Reference Works Abegg, M. G., J. E. Bowley, and E. M. Cook (2003, 2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls Concordance. Vols 1, 3. Leiden: Brill. Abegg, M., P. Flint, and E. Ulrich (1999), The Dead Sea Scrolls Bible: The Oldest Known Bible Translated for the First Time into English. New York: HarperCollins Publishers. Collins, J. J. and D. C. Harlow (eds) (2010), The Eerdmans Dictionary of Early Judaism. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Dimant, D. (2012), The Dead Sea Scrolls in Scholarly Perspective: A History of Research. Leiden: Brill. Fabry H.-J. and U. Dahmen (eds) (2011–13), Theologisches Wörterbuch zu den Qumrantexten. 3 vols. Stuttgart: Kohlhammer. Fields, W. W. (2009), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Full History, Vol. 1. Leiden: Brill. Khan, G. et al. (eds) (2013), Encyclopedia of Hebrew Language and Linguistics. 4 vols. Leiden: Brill. Lim, T. H. and J. J. Collins (eds) (2010), The Oxford Handbook of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Sakenfeld, K. D. (ed.) (2006–2009), New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible. 5 vols. Nashville, TN : Abingdon. Schiffman, L. H. and J. C. VanderKam (eds) (2000), Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls. 2 vols. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tov, E. (2004), Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts Found in the Judean Desert. Leiden: Brill. Tov, E. (2010), Revised Lists of the Texts from the Judaean Desert. Leiden: Brill. Ulrich, E. (2010), The Biblical Qumran Scrolls: Transcriptions and Textual Variants. Leiden: Brill.
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Appendix E: Translations Berthelot, K., T. Legrand, and A. Paul (2008), La Bibliothèque de Qumrân 1: Torah. Genèse. Edition bilingue des manuscrits. Paris: Éditions du Cerf. Berthelot, K. and T. Legrand, (2010), La Bibliothèque de Qumrân 2: Torah – Exode – Lévitique – Nombres. Paris: Éditions du Cerf. Berthelot, K., M. Langlois, and T. Legrand, (2014), La Bibliothèque de Qumrân 3A: Torah – Deutéronome et Pentateuque dans son ensemble. Paris: Éditions du Cerf. Berthelot, K. and M. Langlois (2018), La Bibliothèque de Qumrân 3B: Torah – Deutéronome et Pentateuque dans son ensemble. Paris: Éditions du Cerf. Beyer, K. (1984, 2004), Die aramäischen Texte vom Toten Meer. 2 vols. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. García Martínez, F. and E. J. C. Tigchelaar (1997–1998), The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition. 2 vols. Leiden: Brill. Knibb, M. A. (1987), The Qumran Community. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lohse, E. (1971), Die Texte aus Qumran. 2nd edn. Munich: Kösel. Maier, J. (1995), Die Qumran-Essener: Die Text vom Toten Meer. 2 vols. Munich: E. Reinhardt. Steudel, A. (2001), Die Texte aus Qumran II. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Vermes, G. (2012), The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English. 7th edn. New York: Penguin Books. Wise, M., Abegg, M., and E. Cook (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation. Rev. ed. New York: HarperCollins Publishers.
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Appendix F: Introductory Works Alexander, P. (2006), The Mystical Texts: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Related Manuscripts. London: T&T Clark. Brooke, G. J. (2005), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament. Minneapolis, MN : Fortress Press. Campbell, J. G. (2004), The Exegetical Texts. London: T&T Clark. Collins, J. J. (2013), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Biography. Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press. Crawford, S. W. (2000), The Temple Scroll and Related Texts. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Crawford, S. W. (2008), Rewriting Scripture in Second Temple Times. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Cross, F. M. (1995), The Ancient Library of Qumran. 3rd edn. Minneapolis: Fortress Press. Davies, P. R., G. J. Brooke, and P. R. Callaway (2002), The Complete World of the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: Thames and Hudson. Duhaime, J. (2004), The War Texts: 1QM and Related Manuscripts. London: T&T Clark. Eshel, H. (2009), Qumran: A Carta Field Guide. Jerusalem: Carta. Falk, D. K. (2007). The Parabiblical Texts: Strategies of Extending the Scriptures among the Dead Sea Scrolls. London: T&T Clark. Fields, W. W. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: A Short History. Leiden: Brill. Fitzmyer, J. A. (1992), Responses to 101 Questions on the Dead Sea Scrolls. Mahwah, NJ : Paulist Press. Flint, P. W. (2013), The Dead Sea Scrolls. Nashville, TN : Abingdon Press. Grossman, M. L., ed. (2010), Rediscovering the Dead Sea Scrolls: An Assessment of Old and New Approaches and Methods. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Harrington, D. J. (1996), Wisdom Texts from Qumran. New York: Routledge. Harrington, H. (2004), The Purity Texts. London: T&T Clark. Hempel, C. (2000), The Damascus Texts. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Herbert, E. D. and E. Tov (eds) (2002), The Bible as Book: The Hebrew Bible and the Judaean Desert Discoveries. London: British Library. Lim, T. (2002), Pesharim. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press. Magness, J. (2002), The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Magness, J. (2011), Stone and Dung, Oil and Spit: Jewish Daily Life in the Time of Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Metso, S. (2007), The Serekh Texts. London: T&T Clark. Nickelsburg, G. W. E. and M. E. Stone (2009), Early Judaism: Texts and Documents on Faith and Piety. Rev. edn. Minneapolis, MN : Fortress Press. Schiffman, L. H. (1994), Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society. Schuller, E. M. (2006), The Dead Sea Scrolls: What Have We Learned? Norfolk: SCM Press.
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Appendix F: Introductory Works
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Shanks, H., ed. (1992), Understanding the Dead Sea Scrolls. A Reader from the Biblical Archaeology Review. New York: Random House. Stegemann, H. (1998), The Library of Qumran: On the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. Stökl Ben-Ezra (2016), Qumran. Jüdische Studien 3. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck. Stone, M. E. (2011), Ancient Judaism: New Visions and Views. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. VanderKam, J. C. (2010), The Dead Sea Scrolls Today. 2nd edn. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. VanderKam, J. C. (2012), The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Bible. Grand Rapids, MI : Eerdmans. VanderKam, J. C. and P. W. Flint (2002), The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Significance for Understanding the Bible, Judaism, Jesus, and Christianity. New York: HarperCollins. Vermes, G. (1994), The Dead Sea Scrolls: Qumran in Perspective. 3rd edn. London: SCM Press. Xeravits, G. G. and P. Porzig (2015), Einführung in die Qumranliteratur. Berlin: De Gruyter.
594
Index of Ancient Sources Please note that references to texts discovered in the Judaean Desert follow the numbering system and composition titles found in Emanuel Tov, Revised Lists of the Texts from the Judaean Desert (Leiden: Brill, 2010). HEBREW BIBLE/ OLD TESTAMENT Genesis 13–5, 40, 81, 153, 207–8, 229, 265–6, 282, 302, 310–12, 371, 373–4, 389, 391, 393, 435, 472–3 1–3 453 1 348, 392 1.14–19 392–3 1.14 393, 439 1.16 392 1.27 391–2 1.28 146 2 391–2 2.7 391 2.18–20 391 2.21–23 391 5 281 5.21–24 282 5.28–15.4 310 6–8 302 6.1–4 388, 492 7–9 435 7.10–8.18 435 7.11–8.14 435 11–50 470–2 11.10–20 473 11.31 471 12–50 474 12–15 472 12 207–9 12.8–9 473 12.10–20 208 13.1–5 473 13.4 475 13.6–13 473 13.10 471
13.18 14 15 15.1–4 15.2 15.3 15.5 15.6 15.9 15.13–15 15.17 17.3 17.5 17.7 17.14 17.19 17.20 18 18.2 18.15–21 18.21 18.31–32 19 20 20.1–18 20.4 20.6 20.7 20.11 20.13 21.1–3 22 22.4 22.14 25.30 26
473, 475 473 471 473 471 471 471 471 471 471 471 471 471 470 471 470 471 471 471 471 471 471 100 207–9, 472 208 208 208 208 208 208 472 472 472 483 483 208
26.7–14 28.3–4 28.10 32 33.19 34 34.1 35 36.12 37 37.14 37.22 42.1 44–45 48.1 49 49.4 49.5 49.8–12 49.9–10
208 472 472 483 472 261 472 261 472 261, 472 472 571 472 473 531 389, 472 471 570 303 501
Exodus 57, 81, 123, 229, 265, 267, 371, 373, 388–9, 395, 449 15 414, 418 15.26 142 16.23 398 16.29 398 18.21 133, 538 19–24 209 19.4 366 20.21 (SP ) 358 20.24 210 21–23 209 21.1–6 144 21.1 210
595
596 22.17 23.14–17 28.3 32–34 34–35 34 34.6–7 34.21 35.3 35.30–35
Index of Ancient Sources 463 210 449 366 395 354 300 398 398 449
Leviticus 13, 15–16, 39, 81, 259, 265, 395, 398, 519 4.3 500 7.16 510 10.9 133 10.10a 515 11–15 513, 515 11 398 11.38 518 12.4 519 13 520 15 518 15.16–18 518 15.18 514 15.29–30 519 17–26 210, 515 17.1–2 210 18.13 551 18.28–29 515 21.8 513 21.18–23 253 21.23 253 22.18–21 510 25.13 503 25.44–46 144 26 366, 416 26.45 469 Numbers 207, 265, 395, 398 5.1–5 399 5.2–3 519 6.3 133 6.24–26 340, 416 11–36 174 12 517 14.18 366
19
19.7–10 19.13 19.14 19.15 19.18 19.19–20 19.20 24.15–17 24.17 25.1 25.6–15 31 32 32.2–38 35.33–34
397, 513, 515, 517–18 517 513 397 398, 518 397, 518 517 513 358 501–2 209 569 398 206 206 515
Deuteronomy 39, 48, 81, 207, 209–10, 265, 267, 280, 326, 358, 371 1.15 538 5.28–29 358 7.8 470 7.9 470 8 428 12–23 356 12.13ff. 210 16.16–17 210 17.14–20 502 18.10–11 463 18.18–19 358, 503 18.18 136 20 302 23 354 24.4 475 27.4 16 28 416 32 414, 418 32.11 366 33 477 33.8–11 359, 502 33.5 535 33.12 476 Joshua 270–1, 359, 371 1 272
2.1 3.1 6.26 22 Judges 270–1 1.34 2.18 4.3 4.6 5 5.7 6.9 10.11–12 19–21 19.29 21 21.8–14
210 210 271, 359, 570 206
206 206 206 206 414 195 206 206 206 206 206 206
1 Samuel 125, 206–7, 270–1, 376, 387 1.6–9 206 1.7 206 1.11 133 1.22 133 2.3 387 8.3 133 10 206 10.18 206 10.27 63 10.27b 205 11 133, 205–7 11.1 205–6 11.2 206 11.6–8 206 11.11 206 11.12–14 206 12.3 133 12.12 206 15.22 144 22.17 571 25.26 271 2 Samuel 125, 206–7, 270–1, 376 7 271 7.11–14 501
Index of Ancient Sources 14.14 23 23.1
133 525 500
1 Kings 125, 228, 270–1, 273, 376 5.13 (ET 4.33) 449 5.18 506 7.12 449 13.1–19 482 17.1 503 17.17–24 503 18 270 19.16 500, 503 19.18 206 2 Kings 125, 228, 270–1, 273, 376 Isaiah 9, 81, 173, 212, 269, 271, 287, 321, 352–3, 362–3, 366, 371, 374, 486 1.10–16 144 1.15–17 516 5.23 1 33 6 348 6.3 348, 486 6.9–10 133 10.5–6 569 10.34–11.5 501 11.1–10 496 11.14 574 12.4–6 417 30.18b 296 35.5–6 321 35.5 136 40–66 500 40 352 40.2 511 40.3 487, 497, 511, 542 41 352 43 352 43.24 366 44 352 45.1 500 47.6 569 49 352
51 52 52.1 54 59 59.9 61.1 65.1 66.2 66.13
352 352, 507 507 352 362 362 136, 320–1, 500, 503 9 296 287
Jeremiah 57, 123, 125, 269–71, 287, 374, 390 7.21–26 144 10.12 450 21.1–10 569 23.5 501 24.1–10 510 33.14–26 500 33.15 501 41.5 97 51.15 450 Ezekiel 11, 39, 48, 269–71, 332–3, 374, 482, 486 1 300, 348 3 300 3.12–13 486 10 300, 348 20.38 539 22.27 133 34.23–24 500 37 390, 482 37.9–10 483 40–48 332–3, 502, 506 40.1 332 40.3 332 44.6–9 507 44.15 81, 336 44.23–24 515 Hosea 13, 212, 269–71 5.11 133 6.6 510 10.12 337, 484
597 Joel 269 2.23 3.17
337, 484 507
Amos 212, 269 5.12 5.21–23 9.11–15 9.11
133 144 496 501
Obadiah 270 Jonah 270, 373 Micah 212, 269–70, 374 1.2 134 1.5 134 2.12 81 Micah LXX 1.2
134
Nahum 212, 269–70, 337 1 418 3.1–7 212 Habakkuk 8–9, 270, 437, 485 2.2 485 2.5–6 416 2.8 571 2.9 133 2.12–13 416 2.15 416 2.19–20 416 Zephaniah 270, 374 Haggai 270 2.20–23
500
Zechariah 269 4.14 13.9 14 14.20–21
303 352 507 507
Malachi 13, 269–71, 321, 373
598 3.22–24 272 3.23 133 3.24 (ET 4.6) 321 Psalms 11, 13, 14, 37, 39–40, 45, 81, 243, 270, 273–5, 287, 321, 370–2, 374, 389, 414, 416–17, 419–20, 571 2.2 500 9–10 418 9 275 15.3 296 16–53 418 17–18 418 18 275 25 418 34 418 37 418 45.2 526 51.4–5 516 51.9 516 51.16–19 510 55.18 365 64.3 571 69 275 76 275 82.1–2 503 86 275 89 275 91–118 418 91 275, 426, 462, 494 101 275 103 174, 286 104 286, 418 104.24 450 105 365 105.16 500 106 275, 365 106.31 569 111–112 418 112 418 119 275, 372, 418 120–132 275 124.7 571 133–134 275
Index of Ancient Sources 145 146.7–8
57, 418 136, 320, 503
Proverbs 273–4, 276, 362–3, 414, 417, 449–55 1–9 276, 362 1–2 418 1.7 450 3.16 449 3.17 363 3.18 363, 449 3.19 450, 454 7 276 8.1–2 449 8.22–31 450 9 418 13–15 418 15.8 274, 510 15.27 133 27.8 571 31.10–31 418 Job 14, 129, 259–60, 273–4, 276, 414, 417, 451, 529 3.1–42.6 414 3–5 259 13–14 418 17.14–36.3 259 27.8 133 27.17 133 31–37 418 36.32 260 37.10–42.11 259 38.7 259 39.27 260 40.5 259 42.3 259 42.12–17 259 Job LXX 259
Lamentations 11, 274, 276, 414, 417, 431 1–4 418 3 418 4 418 Ecclesiastes/Qohelet 274, 414, 417, 431, 451 Esther 192, 273–4, 277 Daniel 125, 130, 134, 154, 192, 197, 212–13, 259, 270–4, 277, 284, 310–11, 329, 333–4, 350, 370, 376, 389, 452, 454, 496–7, 499, 503, 528 1.4 451 2 389 2.27–30 454 4 380, 389 5 389 6.11 365 7–12 154, 277 7 334, 503 7.13 134 7.23–27 454 8–10 333 9 365, 528 9.24–27 497 9.25 500 10.13 499 10.20–21 499 11–12 322–3 11 230–1 11.40–12.3 322 11.41 574 12.11–12 497 Daniel LXX 13
277
Song of Songs/Canticles 274, 414, 431 1.14 98
Ezra/Nehemiah 197, 273–4, 310–11
Ruth 273–4, 431
Ezra 16, 197, 284, 376
Index of Ancient Sources Nehemiah 16, 376 9 365 1 Chronicles 119, 207, 228, 274, 280, 376, 382–3, 469 24.1–19 230 24.7–18 438 24.31 469 27.29 469 2 Chronicles 119, 207, 228, 274, 280, 376, 382–3, 469 7.6 482 19.8 469 23.10 469 26.12 469 30.10–11 97 34.9 97 Masoretic Text (MT ) 57, 133, 154, 194–5, 205–7, 211, 246, 260, 275, 277, 284, 370–3, 379, 380, 390, 476 Aleppo Codex (MA) 273 Septuagint (LXX ) 3, 13, 57, 123, 132–3, 153–4, 161, 199, 205, 207, 273, 275, 277, 284, 371–2, 387, 390, 397, Codex Alexandrinus 273, 284 Codex Leningradensis (B19A) 273 Codex Sinaiticus 273–4, 284 Codex Vaticanus 273, 284 Pap. 967 273 Syriac Peshitta 142, 259, 260, 372
NEW TESTAMENT Matthew 135, 295 4.16 136 5.3–12 295 5.3 296 5.8 296 5.12 295 10.8 321 11.2–6 136 11.5 321 11.9–14 135 16.16 133, 136 24.15 134 26.63 133 Mark 3.11 3.17 4.11–12 5.41 7.34 8.29 9.11 13.26 14.36
133 134 133 134 134 136 133 134 134
Luke 135, 296, 351 1.15 133 1.32–35 351 1.32 133, 351, 503 1.33 351 1.35 133, 351, 503 1.48a 133 1.63 167 1.79 136 4.3 (Q) 133 6.20–26 295 6.20 296 6.24 296 6.27–36 296 7.2 144 7.18–23 136 7.22 321 9.20 136 10.5 135 11.2–4 135
599 16.8 16.9 16.11 16.13 24.27
135 133 133 133 273
John 1.34
133
Acts 2.27 2.29 6.1 7.8 7.9 9.2 9.20 13.35 16.13 23.8
142 469 134 469 469 144 133 142 143 495
Romans 1.3–4 3.20 3.28 8.15 11.12 11.25
133 133 133 134 134 134
1 Corinthians 7.32–35 550 16.22 134 Galatians 2.16 3.2 3.5 3.10 4.6
133 133 133 133 134
Titus 1.8
142
Hebrews 7.4
469
James 2.2
144
600 Jude 14
Index of Ancient Sources
283
Revelation 333, 348 4–5 348 20–21 66 20.1–6a 66 20.7–8a 66 20.10 66 20.12 66 20.14–15 66 21–22 332 21.1–2 66 21.9b–11a 66 APOCRYPHA Tobit 130, 132, 154, 274, 281–4, 310–11, 517 2.9 517 4.12 470 7.1 135 12.20 284 Wisdom of Solomon 453, 455, 499 24.14 98 Ben Sira (Sirach) 39, 45, 154, 274, 276, 278, 329, 375–6, 414, 417, 450, 452–5, 526 Prologue 273 1.14 450 1.20 450 3.21–24 459 4.11–19 450 6 418 6.18–37 450 14.20–15.10 450 14.20–27 295 15.10 450 18.33 278 24 124, 450 25.7–11 295 38.2 449 38.24–39.11 525 38.24 449
39.8a 525 39.27–44.17 278 44–50 470 44–49 272, 450 49.10 270 49.16 470 51 154 51:13–30 274, 278, 418 51.30 451 Baruch 4.1
450
1 Maccabees 376 1.16–40 276 1.59 437 2.24–27 569 4.46 136 14.41–43 136 2 Maccabees 376 2.1–8 305 2.13–15 273 4.13 218 6.7a 437 7 499 15.29–36 145 4 Maccabees 7.19 13.17 16.25
469 470 469
Syriac Psalms Psalm 151 132, 154, 274–5, 278 151A (ll. 3–12) 274–5 151B (ll. 13–14) 274–5 Psalm 154 274–5, 450 Psalm 155 275, 418
C. 27, fol. 56 261 P1185 261–2 T.S. 16, fol. 94 261 Aramaic Levi/Aramaic Levi Document 82, 109, 135, 261–2, 266, 281, 311, 356, 398, 453, 473, 502, 525 1.1–3 476 1.1 477 2.1 476–7 3 476 4 476 4.11 476 5 476 5.1 475 5.2–3 475 5.4 475 5.8 261 6–10 475–6, 478 6.3 261 7.1–9.8 262 7.4 475, 478 7.5 478 10.3 261 10.10 261, 475, 477–8 12.6–9 261 13 476, 525 13.2 525 13.5 261 13.6 476 13.16 476–7 78–79 570 83b–89 414–15 2 Baruch 6.5–9
305
Book of Giants 266, 282–3, 525
PSEUDEPIGRAPHA Aramaic Levi Document Manuscripts Bodleian Heb
1 Enoch 1, 81, 109–11, 154, 229, 262, 266, 281–2, 310–11, 356, 373, 378–9, 382, 388, 398,
Index of Ancient Sources 441, 451, 454, 492, 496–7 1–36 (Book of Watchers) 282, 374, 490–1, 525 6–11 114, 117 8.1 113 8.3 113 9.8 113 12–16 114, 525 12.4 525 14.8–25 459 15.1 525 17–36 114, 333 18.15 554 19.1 333 21.6 554 22.3 333 22.6 333 23.4 333 24–26 333 24.6 333 37–71 282 48.10 500 72–82 (Astronomical Book) 110–11, 113–14, 225, 282–3, 373, 441 72 110 72.6–32 110 72.35 111 73 110 73.4–8 111 74 110 74.10a 111 74.11 111 75.1b 111 76–77 110–11 78.6–8 111 79 110 81 113 82 110 83–91 282 90.10 499 91.11–17 451
601
92–105 93.1–10 93.10 94–100 99.10 104.2–6 106–107 106.19 108
282 451 451 295 295 499 311 454 282
Letter of Aristeas 153
2 Enoch 52.1–15
295
4 Ezra 454 13.21–50
Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs 261–2, 503
454
Jubilees 11, 81, 130, 154, 173, 207–8, 229, 242, 248, 262, 265–6, 281, 283, 311–12, 348, 356, 373–5, 378–80, 382–3, 388–9, 391–3, 397–8, 435–6, 459, 472, 474, 478, 490, 492, 497, 502–3, 514 2.8–10 393 2.21 397 3.8 392 4.15 283 4.17–22 283 4.22 283 5.1–10 283 6 303 6.23–38 435 6.32–38, 393 7.20–25 283 8–9 311 8.3–4 283 10.1–11 283 11.15 472 12.27 208 23.30–31 499 30 476, 570 31 502 46 472 49.17 253 50.7–13 397
Psalms of Solomon 154, 376 17.32 500 Pseudo-Philo (LAB ) 19.8–11 366 Sibylline Oracles 3 153
Testament of Levi 262, 503, 525 Testament of Moses 154 Visions of Levi 109, 112–13, 116, 473 13–61 112 31–47 112 1a 8–10 116 3c–7 116 102 116 DEAD SEA SCROLLS Damascus Document 32–3, 57, 124, 129–30, 132, 136, 156–7, 173, 209–12, 231–5, 248–9, 253, 261, 267, 269, 283, 298–9, 306–9, 315, 326, 335–7, 342, 346, 358, 388, 391, 396, 399, 401, 409, 427–8, 450, 469, 478, 492, 497, 501, 505, 507, 509, 514, 516, 526, 531, 534, 536–42, 547–8, 551–5, 570 1–16 (CD A) 129, 306 1–8 231, 306 1–2.1 307 1.1–2.1 232
602 1.1–12 1.1–11 1.1–4 1.1 1.4 1.10–11 1.11
232 536 509 232 469 484 131, 234 1.14 234 1.16 469 1.18–21 570 2.1–13 232 2.2–3.12 307 2.3–4 450 2.6 494 2.10 232 2.11–13 561 2.14–4.12b 232 2.16 477 2.17–21 492 2.18–21 283 3.2–5 477 3.2–3 474 3.3–4 474–5 3.4–7 477 3.10 469 3.12–4.12 307 3.14 81 3.20–4.4 511 3.20–4.2 370 4.3–4 81 4.6–11 515 4.6 469 4.8 469 4.9 469 4.12–5.19 307 4.12–13 494 4.12b–5.15 515 4.13 370 4.15–19 476 4.20–21 551 4.20 366 5.2 265 5.7–11 551 5.14–15 515 5.16 232 5.18–20 494 5.20–6.11 307 6.2–14 498
Index of Ancient Sources 6.2 6.5 6.7 6.10–11 6.12–7.9 6.15 6.16–17 6.17–20 6.18–19 6.19 7–8 7.3–4 7.4–6 7.4–5 7.6–7 7.9–8.13 7.9–10 7.9 7.11 7.15 7.17–18 7.18–20 7.18–19 7.18 7.19–20 7.19 8.3–19 8.15 8.16 8.17 8.18 8.19 8.29 9–14 9.5 9.9 9.16–10.3 9.16–22 9.20–21 10.4 10.6 10.10–13 10.10 10.14–23 10.14–18 10.14 10.17–23 11.1–12 11.12
469 81 502 136 307 515 296 515 429 81 308 515 548 541 541, 547 307 574 541 502 81, 265 269, 481 501 502 359, 502 358, 502 81 309 469 515 469 469, 478 469 469 306 269 271 427 299 274 408, 410 282 514 396 398 538 396 396 398 552
11.18–20 12.1–2
506 399, 507, 514, 549 12.2 494, 507 12.6–8 570 12.10–11 552 12.11 474 12.15–17 514 12.15–16 518 12.17–18 518 12.19–20 515 12.19 547 12.22–13.3 539, 549 12.22–23 538, 547 12.23–13.1 501 12.23 501 13 527 13.2–5 535 13.2 282 13.7 408, 536, 539 13.11–13 427 13.11–12 553 13.12–16 157 13.15–16 551 14 307 14.3–8 535 14.3–6 428, 553 14.7 536 14.8–20 516 14.8–9 553 14.12–13 552 14.12 408 14.14–16 552 14.18–19 511 14.19 501 14.20–21 249 14.20 133 15–16 306–7 15.1–17 157 15.5–16.2 427 15.5–15 553 15.5–6 428 15.8b–10 491 15.12 370 15.15–17 82, 492 15.15ff. 342 15.16 253 16.1–3 266
Index of Ancient Sources 16.1 396 16.3–4 391 16.6 474 19–20 129, 231, (CD B) 306, 308 19 308 19.5–26 307 19.6–7 574 19.10–11 501 19.28 369 19.29 515 19.31 469, 478 19.33–20.34 307 20.1 501 20.2–7 515 20.13–15 497 20.13–14 387 20.25 515 20.27–28 484 20.28 526 20.29 469 20.32–33 484 20.32 526 21.34 387 1Q5 (1QD eutb) 418 1QIsaa 8–9, 51–2, 54, 67, 180, 182, 186, 194, 530 31–33 67 1QI sab (1Q8) 8, 51–2, 54, 186
1.13 2.1–7 2.1–2 2.2 2.5–10 2.7–10 2.8–10 2.8 2.10–4.17 4.8 5.5–6 5.10 5.12–6.12 7 7.1–5 7.1–2 7.3–5 7.4–5 7.4 7.6–13 8.3 8.16–9.2 9.2 9.3–7 9.4–7 9.8–12 9.9–10 10.13 11.2–8 11.4–8 11.5 11.8 12.1–6 12.5–10
131, 336 498 571 131 485 81 271 569 569 569 573 131 569 389 485 280, 497 81 271, 536 131 497 131 573 573 509, 572 569 571–3 131 571 437 571 131 428 572 509
1Q10–12 (1QPsa-c) 274 1Q15 (1QpZeph) 270 1Q10 (1QPsa) 418 1Q16 (1QpPs) 270 1Q11 (1QPsb) 276 1Q17 (1QJuba) 472 1Q14 (1QpMic) 270, 276 8–10 6–9 536 8–10 6 131 10 3–4 506
1Q19–19bis (1QNoah) 266
1QpHab 8–9, 44, 51, 54, 129, 187, 194, 270, 276, 329, 336, 497, 530, 563, 569, 572
1Q20 (1QapGen ar) 8–9, 51, 54, 135, 155, 175, 186, 207–9, 248, 259, 266, 283, 310–13,
1Q18 (1QJubb) 472
603 378, 383, 388, 408, 414–16, 470, 472–3, 477, 527 0–5 311 2.1 283 2.16 283 6–15 311 6.1–6 311 6.20 414–15 7.2 283 11.11 477 11.15 477 16–17 311 18 310 19–22 472 19–21 472 19–20 208 19.7–10a 473 19.10b–20.32 473 19.9 472 19.10 472 19.12 474 19.14–21 475 19.14–17 474 19.23–25 474 19.23–24 475 19.23 473 19.24–25 475 19.25 311, 474, 477 20.2–8 416, 475 20.9 475 20.10 475 20.11–12 474 20.12–16 475 20.12 475 20.16–18 472 20.16–17 494 20.16 474–5 20.17 475 20.18 473 20.21–23 475 20.21 472 20.23 475 20.28–29 475 20.28 472 20.30 475 20.33–21.4 473 21.1–3 475
604 21.3 475 21.5–7 473 21.5 475 21.6 475 21.7 474 21.8–19 472 21.8–19a 473 21.8–14 474 21.10 474 21.13–14 472 21.19b–22 473 21.20–21 475 21.23–22.26 473 21.23 312, 472 22.5 474 22.24–26 474 22.27–34 473–4 22.27–28 473 1Q21 (1QTL evi ar) 109, 261, 473 1 3–4 502 1Q22 (1QDM or 1QapocrMosesa?) 187 1.3 470 3.9–10 469 1Q26 (1QI nstruction) 135, 160, 276, 318–19, 417, 452 1Q27 (1QMyst) 129, 135, 329–31, 417, 452–5 1i2 330 1i3 330 1i4 330 1i5 330 1 ii 5 133 32 330 6 2–3 330 1QS (Rule of the Community) 1, 3, 8–9, 32–3, 44, 51, 54, 82–3, 86, 91–2, 94, 123, 129–32, 136, 156, 186, 188, 193–4,
Index of Ancient Sources 205, 209–10, 235, 242–4, 248–52, 254, 266, 276, 281, 296, 299–300, 307–8, 326–7, 335–6, 339, 341, 344–6, 358, 363, 371, 399, 405–10, 415, 423, 427, 439, 443, 477–8, 484, 490–4, 496, 498, 500–1, 510–1, 514, 516, 526, 529–30, 533–42, 547–8, 552–6, 560, 564, 574 1–4 345, 409 1 409 1.1–15 287, 345 1.1–3 370 1.1 344, 408–9 1.3 481 1.5–6 535 1.7 86, 535 1.10 296 1.11–13 510 1.11 86 1.12 296 1.13–23 536 1.16–3.12 298, 345, 407, 428, 491 1.16–2.18 563 1.16 410, 491 1.18–23 535 1.18–2.10 339 1.18b–22a 299 1.23 244 1.24–2.1 415 1.25 4692 1.26 469 2–3 345 2.1–9 511 2.1–5 295 2.1–4 340 2.1b–5 561 2.1b–4a 299 2.1 470 2.2–17 416 2.2–4 339, 415 2.3 470
2.4–10 2.4–9 2.4 2.5–18 2.5–9 2.7 2.11–18 2.19–23 2.19–20 2.20–21 2.21–22 2.23–26 2.25–3.4 2.25 2.26 3–4 3.4–6 3.4–5 3.4 3.11–12 3.13–4.26
3.13–15 3.13 3.14 3.15–19 3.15 3.17–21 3.18 3.21–24 3.25 4.2–14 4.4–6 4.6–8 4.7 4.11–14 4.12 4.13 4.15–18 4.18–19 4.19 4.20–22
296 299 277 339 415 470 428 535, 556 502 410 538 488 491 515 516 562, 565 516 538 470 569 116, 154, 156, 159–60, 318, 329, 345, 407, 451, 453–5, 493, 560, 562–3, 572–3 427 339, 454 573 493 387, 490 573 573 573 494 511 541 499 548 499, 573 494 82 573 496, 573 573 573
Index of Ancient Sources 4.22 4.23 4.23b 5–11 5.1–9.25 5–7 5
451, 492 366 562 409 407 156, 158, 346 345, 406, 527, 536 5.1–13 345 5.1–13a 345 5.1–2 427 5.1 86, 303, 345, 408–10, 491 5.2–3 82–3, 535–6 5.2 82, 515 5.3–4 535 5.5–11 156 5.5–6 515 5.6 82, 86 5.7–24 428 5.8–10 553 5.8 86 5.9–10 82–3 5.9 82, 502 5.10 86 5.11–20 156 5.13–14 516, 521 5.13b–15a 345 5.13 555 5.14–6.8 345 5.14 491 5.15b–7.25 345 5.16–20 515 5.20–24 556 5.20–22 89, 157 5.21–22 157 5.22–6.13 157 5.22 86 5.23–6.1 427 5.23–24 553 5.24–25 552 6 86, 520, 539 6.1–25 536 6.1–8 428, 538 6.1b–8 548 6.2–6 498, 554
6.2–3 6.2 6.3–6 6.3–4 6.3 6.4–6 6.4–5 6.4 6.6–8
535, 556 133, 552–3 521 89, 556 548, 553 510, 555 428, 556 554–5 44, 431, 487, 537 6.6–7 81, 484, 554 6.6 553 6.7–8 535 6.8–11 556 6.8–9 510, 536 6.8 408–9, 502 6.8–23 345 6.13–23 427, 553, 555 6.13–21 514 6.13–16 157 6.13 86 6.16–22 157 6.16–17 82 6.16b–21b 520 6.17 555 6.20–21 397, 555 6.22 428, 555 6.24–7.27 345 6.24–7.25 157, 249, 407, 516, 521, 540 6.24–7.5 555 6.24–25 250 6.24 210 6.25–27 250 6.25 555 6.26–27 299 6.27–7.2 249 7.2–3 250 7.3 536 7.4–5 250 7.5–8 299 7.6–7 552 7.9–10 250 7.10 250 7.12–13 250 7.12 251 7.13–14 251
605 7.14 7.15–16 7.15 7.16–17 7.16 7.22–25 7.23–24 7.24–25 8–9 8 8.1–16 8.1–16a 8.1–10 8.1 8.2 8.4–6 8.6–7 8.7–10 8.9–10 8.9 8.10–14 8.10 8.11–12 8.12–16 8.13–15 8.13–14 8.14–16 8.15–16 8.15 8.16–9.2 8.16–18 8.16b–19 8.17–18 8.20–9.2 8.20 9.3–11 9.3–10.8a 9.3–6 9.4–5 9.5–7 9.6 9.10–11 9.11 9.12–25 9.12–21 9.12 9.14–21 9.18–21
250 250 250 249 553 249 536 553 345–6, 539 487, 540 345 345 538 539 535 515 573 536 569 82 458 535 44, 537 497 487 511 542 481 498 345 516 345 540 345 515 345 345 510, 515, 538 82 502 244, 510 136, 500–1 359, 502 345 287 339 427 488
606 9.19–20 9.21–23 9.21–22 9.21 9.26–11.22 9.26–10.17 9.26 10–11 10.1–8 10.1–3 10.4 10.4b 10.6a 10.9–11.22 10.9 10.14–15 10.14 10.14b–15a 10.17–19 10.17–18 10.17 11 11.3–4 11.6 11.7–9 11.7–8 11.8–9 11.9–11 11.21
Index of Ancient Sources 487 568 81 339 345 430, 443 339, 439 415–16 553 553 510 345 345 345 430 555 430 428 569 568 574 345 126 8 492, 515 460, 553 500 562–3 548
1QS a (1Q28a or Rule of the Congregation) 129, 186, 210, 248, 253, 339, 341–3, 407–9, 429, 478, 497–9, 530–1, 547–9, 553–5 1.1–5 341, 498 1.1–2 341 1.1 341, 408–9, 497, 547, 574 1.3 499 1.6–19 341 1.6 408–9 1.7 282 1.9 515 1.11 552 1.12 553
1.13–17 1.13–14 1.13 1.16 1.20–27 1.21 1.23 1.24 1.25 1.25–27 1.25–26 1.26–27 1.27–2.10 1.28–2.1 2.3–10 2.3–9 2.5–9 2.8–9 2.11–22 2.11–15 2.11–12 2.12–17 2.13 2.15 2.16 2.17–22 2.17–20 2.20–21 2.20 2.22
554 553 515 82, 470 341 554 82 470 470 82 556 277 341 538 82, 253, 556 498 342 253, 515 556 501–2 341, 343 556 470 539 470 428, 521, 555 555 555 501 554
1QS b (1Q28b or Rule of Blessings) 15, 129, 187, 300, 339–40, 341, 407–8, 414, 416, 429, 501, 530 1.1 339 1.1–2.21 340 2.22–3.21 340 3.22–4.21 340 3.22 82, 339–40 3.29 539 4.24–26 460 4.25–26 492 4.27 340 5.20–29 502 5.20 339
1Q30 (1QL iturgical Text A?) 14 265 1Q32 (1QNJ ? ar) 332–4, 476 1QM (War Scroll) 1, 8, 51–2, 54, 116, 129–30, 187–8, 193, 243, 248–9, 252–4, 299–300, 322–4, 335–6, 339, 351, 358, 363, 365, 399, 409–10, 415, 427, 429, 490–4, 498–9, 502, 534, 539, 560, 563, 569, 573–5 1 322–3, 498 1.1–3 81 1.1–2 574 1.1b–3a 561 1.2 574 1.5 499 1.10 493 2–9 498 2 323 2.3 499 3–8 323 3.4 515 4.8 415 5.1–2 502 6.5–6 574 6.12–13 553 7.1–3 253 7.3 254 7.4–5 254 7.5–6 254 7.5 254 7.6–7 254 7.11–12 499 9–14 323 10.1–5 498 10.6 370 11.6–7 358 11.13–14 573–4 12.1–7 498 12.7–8 502 12.12–16 511 12.12–14 506
Index of Ancient Sources 12.13 13
13.1–6 13.6 13.7–8 13.8 13.10–12 13.10 13.11 14 14.7 14.8 15–19 17.6–8 17.7–8 18 19 19.1 19.5
506 300, 415–16, 427 299 498 470 470 494 503 494 415–16 296 470 323, 498 498 503 415–16 417 502 506
1Q34–34bis (1QL itPra-b) 365, 425 1QH a (Hodayot) 8, 51–2, 54, 59, 129–30, 174, 179, 187–8, 234, 242–3, 264, 275–6, 287, 295–6, 300, 314–17, 318, 336, 339–40, 345, 363, 371, 386, 414, 416, 418, 430, 450, 490–2, 516, 526–7, 534, 571 4.29 526 5.12–14 430 6.13–18 295 6.14 296 6.19–33 243 7.12–20 430 7.13–17 491 7.21 430 7.25 490 8.24 526 9.16 450 9.21–23 491 9.21 450
9.26 10–17 10.9 10.15 10.19 10.25–26 10.27–28 10.31 10.32–35 10.34–35 10.36 11.4 11.7–9 11.19–22a 11.21–23 11.22–24 11.35–36 12.6–13.6 12.6 12.9–10 12.11 12.12–13 12.28 12.34 13.9–18 14.8 14.13 14.20–21 14.29 14.32–38 15.31–32 16 17–19 17 17.14 17.17 18.8 19 19.13–17 19.29 20.7–14 20.7–12 20.32–34 25–26 25.34 26.6–16 26.10–14 26.36
490 314–15, 416, 571 526 484 571 571 571 571 491 571 296 340 515 561, 563 492 460 493 571 340 571 571 494 340 469 571 571 492 568 491 573 491 59 59 59 366 450 491, 502 59, 314 460, 553 490 553 430 171 417 430 460 553 553
607 1QH b 314–17, 414, 416, 430 1Q38 (1QHymnic Composition?) 418 1Q71–72 (1QD ana-b) 274 2Q3 (2QE xodb) 276 2Q14 (2QPs) 274, 418 1 1–2 174 2Q15 (2QJ ob) 274 2Q16–17 (2QR utha-b) 274 2Q16 (2QR utha) 431 2Q18 (2QS ir) 154, 274, 278, 418, 450 2Q19 (2QJuba) 472 2Q20 (2QJubb) 472 2Q22 (2QapocrDavid?) 266, 417 2Q24 (2QNJ ar) 332–4, 476 3Q3 (3QL am) 274, 418 3Q4 (3QpIsa) 269 3Q5 (3QJub) 472 3Q7 (3QTJud?) 266, 474 53 474 62 474 3Q15 (3QC opper Scroll) 39, 65, 186–7, 194, 304–5 4Q1–118 130
608
Index of Ancient Sources
4Q1 (4QG en–Exoda) 265, 371
4Q52 (4QS amb) 67, 154 5–7 67
4Q6 (4QG enf ) 15, 531
4Q53 (4QS amc) 530
4Q11 (4QpaleoGen–Exodl) 265, 371
4Q56 (4QI sab) 15
4Q89 (4QPsg) 372, 418, 431
9 9 1–15 10 10 4–15
416 275 416 275
4Q57 (4QI sac) 276
4Q90 (4QPsh) 372, 418
4Q13 (4QE xodb) 169, 265
4Q69 (4QpapIsap) 173
4Q93 (4QPsl) 418
4Q16 (4QE xode) 431
4Q70 (4QJ era) 390
4Q97 (4QPsp) 372
4Q17 (4QE xod–Levf ) 265, 371
4Q71 (4QJ erb) 154, 390
4Q98f (4QPsw) 418
4Q72 (4QJ erc) 390
4Q98g (4QPsx) 274, 372
4Q72a (4QJ erd) 154, 390
4Q99–100 (4QJ oba-b) 274
4Q72b (4QJ ere) 390
4Q99 (4QJ oba) 418
4Q76 (4QXII a) 373 4 16–17 133
4Q101 (4QpaleoJobc) 274, 276, 418
4Q77 (4QXII b) 270, 373
4Q102–103 (4QP rova-c) 274
4Q20 (4QE xodj) 276 4Q22 (4QpaleoExodm) 358, 387 8 170 4Q23 (4QL ev–Numa) 265, 371 g
4Q26b (4QL ev ) 276 4Q78 (4QXII c) 270 4Q27 (4QNumb) 174, 387
4Q102 (4QP rova) 418 4Q79 (4QXII d) 270
4Q29 (4QD eutb) 418
4Q103 (4QP rovb) 418 4Q80 (4QXII e) 270
4Q30 (4QD eutc) 418 4Q82 (4QXIIg) 270, 373
4Q104–105 (4QR utha-b) 274
4Q37 (4QD eutj) 428, 431 4Q83–98 (4QPsa-w) 274 4Q41 (4QD eutn) 387, 428, 431
4Q106 –108 (4QC anta-c) 274
4Q84 (4QPsb) 418 4Q106 (4QC anta) 431
4Q44 (4QD eutq) 372, 418, 431
4Q85 (4QPsc) 418 4Q107 (4QC antb) 431 4Q86 (4QPsd) 418
4Q45 (4QpaleoDeutr) 418 4Q51 (4QS ama) 63, 154, 170, 173, 205–7, 387 2 a-d 3–4 133 10 6–19 205 10 9 133
4Q88 (4QPsf ) 274–5, 278, 414, 430 7–8 416 7 418 7 14–8 16 275 7 14 506 7 16 506
4Q109 –110 (4QQ oha-b) 274 4Q109 (4QQ oha) 431, 529 4Q111 (4QL am) 274, 431 4Q112–116 (4QD ana-e) 274
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q112–113, 115 (4QD ana-b, d) 130
4Q161 (4QpIsaa) 336 8–10 11–24 501
4Q116 (4QD ane) 528
4Q162 (4QpIsab) 529
4Q117 (4QE zra) 274
4Q163 (4Qpap pIsac) 336 22 3 82 23 ii 9–10 296
4Q118 (4QC hr) 274, 376 4Q119–122, 127 132
4Q164 (4QpIsad) 337 4Q119–122 (4QLXXL ev–Deut) 130 4Q123 (4QpaleoParaJosh) 271, 359 4Q126 (4QUnid. Text gr) 153 4Q127 (pap4QP araExod gr) 130, 153 4Q128–155 (4QP hyl A–U and 4QMez A–G) 129 4Q156 (4QtgLev) 259, 528–9 4Q157 (4QtgJob) 259–60, 276
4Q166–167 (4QpHosa-b) 270 4Q166 (4QpHosa) 2 14–16 507 2.16–17 277 4Q167 (4QpHosb) 2 569 4Q168 (4QpMic?) 270 4Q169 (4QpNah) 270, 337, 529 3–4 i 569 3–4 i 1–3 233 3–4 i 2 570 3–4 i 5 233 3–4 i 11 506 3–4 ii 2 570 3–4 ii 5–6 570 3–4 ii 8–10 570
4Q158–186 129 4Q170 (4QpZeph) 270 4Q158 (4QRP a) 131, 207, 358, 388 1–2 7–9 476 4Q159 (4QO rdinancesa) 388, 514 2–4 8–10 551 4Q160 (4QVisSam) 271, 388 3–4 ii 3 415 4Q161–165 (4QpIsaa-e) 269
4Q171 (4QpPsa) 129, 270, 325, 336, 526 1–10 i 27 400 1–10 ii 14–15 571 1–10 ii 18–20 569, 572 1–10 ii 18–19 571 1–10 iii 7–8 571, 572 1–10 iv 7–10 572 1–10 iv 8–10 571 3.15 131 3.19 131 4.27 131
609 4Q173 (4QpPsb) 270 4Q174 (4QF lor or 4QM idrEschata) 188, 337, 358, 498, 511 1–3 ii 3 134, 270, 273 1–2 i 271 1–2 i 6 515 1 189 1 1–6 499 14 499 16 511 1 6–11 502 1 8–9 498 1 10–13 501 1 11–12 359, 501–2 1 14–15 497 21 498 23 370 2 14 494 4Q175 (4QTest) 187, 271, 358–61, 502–3, 530, 570 1–8 358 9–13 358 9–8 501 14–20 359 21–30 271, 359, 570 4Q176 (4QTanh) 352–3 1–3 352 1 12–15 352 1 15 352 2–3 352 5 1–8 352 8–11 2–3 507 4Q176a (4QJubi?) 472 4Q177 (4QC atena A or 4QM idrEschatb) 337, 492, 498 2 9–10 498 5–6 5 481 12–13 i 9–11 511 14 4 415
610 4Q179 (4QapocrLam A) 276, 416–17, 430 1i 276 1 ii 276 2 276 4Q180–181 (4QAgesCreat A–B 229, 266, 283 4Q180 (4QA gesCreat A) 276, 374, 470–1, 478, 492 11 408 1 3–5 471 15 471–2 1 7–10 283 2–4 ii 2 471 2–4 ii 3–4 471 2–4 ii 4–7 471 2–4 ii 4 471 2–4 ii 6–7 471 5–6 3–4 472 5–6 4 471–2 4Q181 (4QA gesCreat B) 21 471 4Q183 (4QM idrEschate?) 276 4Q184 (4QWiles of the Wicked Woman) 248, 276, 362–4, 417, 419, 452–3 1 362 1 8–10 363 1 12–14 362 4Q185 (4QS apential Work) 376, 417, 452–3 1–2 ii 3–4 453 1–2 ii 4–5 475–6 1–2 ii 8–10 296 1–2 ii 13–14 296 1–2 ii 14 469
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q186 (4QH oroscope) 116, 225, 427, 464
4Q212 (4QE ng ar) 1 iv 13 451
4Q196–200 (4QToba-e) 132, 154, 283
4Q213–214b (4QL evia-f ar) 109, 116, 130, 261
4Q196–199(4QToba-d ar) 130, 274
4Q213 (4QL evia ar) 109, 182, 450, 473 1 i 9–10 450 1 i 14–15 450 1 ii + 2 5–6 450 4 5–7 311
4Q196 (4Qpap Tobita ar) 15 14 ii 6–7 135 18 7 506 4Q197 (4QTobb ar) 4 iii 3–4 135 4Q200 (4QTobe) 130, 274 64 415 4Q201 (4QE na ar) 175, 531 1 iv 1–4 113 1 iv 2 113 4Q202 (4QE nb ar) 1 iii 2–3 113 4Q203 (4QE nGiantsa ar) 311, 525 8 525 84 525 4Q204 (4QE nc ar) 5 ii 26–27 454 4Q208–4Q211 (4QE nastra-d ar) 110, 225, 373 4Q208 (4QE nastra ar) 110–12, 182, 439, 441–2 4Q209 (4QE nastrb ar) 110–12, 439, 441–2 4Q210 (4QE nastrc ar) 1 iii 3–9 111
4Q213a (4QL evib ar) 109, 473 1 i–ii 423, 3–4 5 469, 4Q213b (4QL evic ar) 109, 473 4Q214 (4QL evid ar) 109, 473 4Q214a (4QL evie ar) 109, 473 4Q214b (4QL evif ar) 109, 473 4Q215 (4QTNaph) 130, 266, 477 1–3 10 473 4Q215a (4QT ime of Righteousness) 131, 136, 430 1 ii 3 136 1 ii 5 136 1 ii 6 136 1 ii 7–8 136 1 ii 10 136 4Q216–224 (4QJuba-h) 130 4Q216 (4QJuba) 472
4Q211 (4QE nastrd ar) 110
4Q217 (4QpapJubb?) 472
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q218 (4QJubc) 472
4Q242–246 270, 277
4Q219 (4QJubd) 472
4Q242 (4QP rNab ar) 130, 277, 311, 333, 380, 417
4Q220 (4QJube) 472 4Q243–246 277 4Q221 (4QJubf ) 472 4Q222 (4QJubg) 472 15 415 4Q223–224 (4QpapJubh) 173, 472 4Q225–227 (4QpsJuba-c) 130 4Q225–228 (4QpsJuba-c and 4QText with a Citation of Jub) 266, 283 4Q225 (4QpsJuba) 471, 478 14 474 2 i 1–2 471 2i2 471–2 2 i 3–8 471 2i5 471, 474 2 i 8–9 472 2 i 9–2 ii 471–2 2 ii 4 475 2 ii 10–12 477 2 ii 10 474 3 ii 7 471 4Q226 (4QpsJubb) 15, 471 7 1–3 472 71 474 7 3–5 477 4Q227 (4QpsJubc) 283, 471 4Q228 (4QText with a Citation of Jub) 1i9 266 4Q234 (4QE xercitium Calami A) 266, 531
4Q243–245 (4QpsDana-c ar) 130, 155, 277, 333 4Q246 (4QapocrDan ar) 131, 277, 333, 350–1, 417, 503 1.1 350 1.2–7 350 1.3 350 1.6 350 1.9 350–1 2.1–3 350 2.1 133, 350–1, 503 2.4 350–1 2.5–9 350 2.5 351 4Q247 (4QPesher on the Apocalypse of Weeks) 283, 374 4Q248 (4QH istorical Text A) 230 2 230 4 230 6 230 7 230 8–10 230 4Q249 (4Qpap cryptA Midrash Sefer Moshe) 81 4Q251 (4QH alakha A) 130, 267 10 7–9 401 17 2 551 4Q252–254 (4QC ommGen A-D) 130, 266, 302–3
611 4Q252 (4QC ommGen A) 302–3, 388, 393, 408, 435–6, 471 1 66 1.3–2.5 435 2.1–2 471 2.2–6 471 2.2–3 435 2.6–9 472 2.7–8 474 2.8–10 471 2.8–9 471 2.8 474 2.9–10 471 2.11–12 471 2.12–13 472 3.2–6 471 4 303 4.1–2 471–2 4.3–7 472 4.3–6 471 4.5–6 476 5 472, 478 5.1–4 501 5.5 471 6 472 4Q253 (4QC ommGen B) 303 4Q254 (4QC ommGen C) 303, 471 3 4, 6 472 3+8 4 476 3+8 5–9 477 3+8 6–9 471 3+8 11 471 4 471–2 5–6 471–2 7 471–2 9 471–2 11 471–2 12 471–2 14 471–2 17 471–2 4Q254a (4QC ommGen D) 303, 435
612 4Q253a (4QC ommMal) 270 4Q255–264 (4QS a-j) 130–2, 344–6, 547 4Q255 (4QS a) 173, 344–5, 407, 428 11 344, 408–9 2 1–9 407 4Q256 (4QS b) 344–5, 406, 409–10, 536 2 1–13 407 3 1–4 407 53 82–3 5 7–8 82 91 410 9 3–4 535 19 443 19 1–7 407 20 443 20 1–7 407 23 1–3 407 4Q257 (4QS c) 173, 344, 428 2 1–8 407 3 1–14 407 5 1–5 407 5 7–8 407 5 12–14 407 4Q258 (4QS d) 182, 344–5, 406, 409–10, 529, 536 1 527 11 410 12 82–3 13 535 17 82 5 249 51 407 8 443 82 535 8 10–10 8 407 10 443 12 4 407 13 1–3 407
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q259 (4QS e) 345, 439, 516, 530 1 249 1 4–15 407 2 249 2 3–9 407 3 136 35 487 48 439 4Q260 (4QS f ) 2–5 2 1–5 3 1–3 4 1–10 5 1–7
443 407 407 407 407
4Q261 (4QS g) 3 3 2–4 33 4a–b 4a–b 1–6 5a–c 5a–c 1–9 6a–e 6a–e 1–5
249 407 133 249 407 249 407 249 407
4Q262 (4QS h) 428 1 1–4 407 4Q264 (4QS j) 1 1–10 407 4Q264a (4QH alakha B) 1 i 1–2 398 1 i 4–5 398 1 i 5–8 397 1 ii 1 397 4Q265 (4QM iscellaneous Rules) 130, 266, 346, 538, 540–1, 548–9 3 253 4 249 4 i–ii 516, 521 4 i 8–10 555 7 389
4Q266–273 (4QD a-h) 130, 300, 306–9, 517, 540, 547 4Q266 (4QD a) 182, 306, 337, 539 1a–b 1 337 1a–b i 1–5 307 2 ii 9–12 170 5i 307 5 ii 14 410 6 i 5–7 494 6 i 14–16 519 6 ii 1–4 519 6 ii 1–13 519 6 iv 1–5 401 6 iv 3 539 8 i 6–9 253, 556 8i9 253 9 iii 551 9 iii 1–5 553 9 iii 1–4 551 10 249 10 i–ii 516, 521 10 i 14–ii 15 555 10 ii 3 555 11 299 11 4–5 269 11 5–19 345 11 5–17 298, 428 11 5–6 553 11 8–9 535 11 11–12 469 11 14–16 553 4Q267 (4QD b) 276 5 ii 307 9i1 277 9 vi 4–5 250 4Q268 (4QD c) 1–7 4Q269 (4QD d) 11 11 ii+15 16 16 2
307
249 298, 428 299 269
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q270 (4QD e) 306, 410 2 i 18–19 552 2 ii 6–7 402 2 ii 12 517 2 ii 16 551 3 iii 19 547 7 249 7 i–ii 298–9, 428 7i4 552 7 i 11–12 552 7 i 11 553 7 i 12–15 250 7 i 12–13 552 7 i 13–15 553 7 i 13 470 7 i 18–19 269 4Q271 (4QD f ) 2 8–13 3 3 4–16 3 14
555 551 551 551
4Q272 (4QD g) 1 ii 3–18 519 4Q273 (4QpapDh) 173 4Q274, 276–278 (4QTohorot A-C) 130, 514, 516, 518, 520, 521 4Q274 (4QTohorot A) 518–19, 548 1i 556 1 i 1–4 520 1i1 517 1 i 4–5 520 1 i 7–8 519 1 i 8–9 518 2i3 521 2 i 7–9 519 3i 518 3 i 6–9 397 3 ii 4–12 397 4Q275 (4QC ommunal Ceremony) 300, 345, 428
4Q276 (4QTohorot Ba) 14 506 4Q280 (4QC urses) 299–300, 416, 427–8 2 5–7 299 4Q284 (4QP urification Liturgy) 82, 130, 415, 426 1 3–6 426
613 4Q287 (4QB erb) 299, 348 1–5 299 2 11–13 299 6–7 299 6 1–11 299 8 299 9 299 10 299 4Q288 (4QB erc) 299 1 1–7 299 4Q289 (4QB erd) 299
4Q284a (4QH arvesting) 518, 520 1 1–4 397 4Q285 (4QS efer haMilhamah) 322–3, 573 1 416 5 1–6 499, 501 5 1–4 501 54 502 8 300 4Q286–290 (4QB era-e) 298–301, 339, 374, 414, 416, 427–8, 490–1, 493–4 4Q286 (4QB era) 298, 348 1 ii–6 298 7i 298 7 ii 298 7 ii 1–12 299 7 ii 1–5 427 7a ii 1 299 7a ii 1–5 299 7a ii 5b–6 561 7a ii 11–12 299 12 298 12 1–3 299 13–15 298 17 298 20 298 20 4–10 299 20 a 299 20 b 4 299
4Q290 (4QB ere) 299 4Q298 (4QcryptA Words of the Maskil to All Sons of Dawn) 169, 427, 452, 564 4Q299–301 (4QMysta-c) 130, 135, 160, 329–31, 417, 452–5, 4Q299 (4QMysta) 3a ii–b 3 330 3a ii–b 9–16 330 55 330 52 5 330 69 1–2 330 76 3 470 4Q300 (4QMystb) 1 ii 3 330 1a ii–b 1–6 330 1a ii–b 3 330 1a ii–b 6 330 32 330 3 3–4 160 34 330 54 330 4Q301 (4QMystc?) 329 12 330 21 330 4Q302 (4QpapAdmonitory Parable) 131, 453
614 4Q303–305 (4QMeditation on Creation A–C 266, 453 4Q313 (4QcryptA MMT g?) 267, 415 4Q313c (4QcryptA Calendrical Document B) 440 4Q317 (4QcryptA Lunisolar Calendar) 440–2 1+1a ii 1–33 441 4Q318 (4QZ odiology and Brontology ar) 115, 442, 463 viii 6–9 115
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q323 (4QM ishmarot B) 437
4Q328 (4QM ishmarot F) 437
4Q324–30 83
4Q329 (4QM ishmarot G) 437
4Q324 (4QM ishmarot C) 174, 437, 440 4Q324a (4QM ishmarot D) 437 4Q324b (4QpapCalendrical Document A?) 437 4Q324c (4QM ishmarot E) 437 4Q324d (4QcryptA Liturgical Calendara) 439–40
4Q319–21 83 4Q319 (4QO tot) 345, 438–9, 443 4Q320–330 (4QC alendrical Texts A–H) 130, 229–30 4Q320 (4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot A) 114, 169, 225, 437, 439–40 1 ii 2 440 4Q321 (4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot B) 114, 225, 437, 439–41 3–4 440 4Q321a (4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot C) 114, 437, 441 4Q322 (4QM ishmarot A) 437
4Q324e (4QcryptA Liturgical Calendarb) 440 4Q324f (4QcryptA Liturgical Calendarc?) 440 4Q324g (4QcryptA Calendrical Document F?) 440 4Q324h (4QcryptA Calendrical Document G?) 440 4Q324i (4QcryptA Mishmarot J) 440 4Q325 (4QC alendrical Document/ Mishmarot D) 437 27 438 4Q326 (4QC alendrical Document C) 437 1 438,
4Q329a (4QM ishmarot H) 437 4Q330 (4QM ishmarot I) 437 4Q331–333 (4QH istorical Text C–E) 230 4Q331 (4QpapHistorical Text C) 230 4Q332 (4QH istorical Text D) 230 12 231 2 2–3 442 31 230 33 231 34 230 36 230 4Q333 (4QH istorical Text E) 231 14 569 18 569 4Q334 (4QO rdo) 415, 425, 438, 442 4Q337 (4QC alendrical Document E?) 437 4Q338 (4QG enealogical List?) 175 4Q339 (4QL ist of False Prophets ar) 1 198 4Q341 (4QE xercitium Calami C) 531 4Q343 (4QL etter nab) 175
4Q350 (4QAccount gr) 174, 199 4Q355 (4QAccount C) 174 4Q360 (4QE xercitium Calami B) 531 4Q364–367 (4QRP b-e) 131, 207, 358
Index of Ancient Sources
615
4Q375–376 (4QapocrMosesa-b?) 130
4Q383 (4QapocrJer A) 130, 277
4Q377 (4QapocrPent B) 1 174 2 174 2 ii 5 469
4Q364 (4QRP b) 373
4Q378–379 (4QapocrJoshuaa-b) 130, 271, 374
4Q365 (4QRPc) 355, 418, 438 23 267
4Q378 (4QapocrJoshuaa) 359 22 i 4 474
4Q365a (4QTa?) 355–6
4Q379 (4QapocrJoshuab) 271, 358–9 12 476–7 17 4–5 477 22 ii 359, 509 22 ii 7–14 271, 570
4Q385–386, 388, 391 (4QpsEzek) 130, 132, 270–1, 390, 482 4Q385 (4QpsEzeka) 125, 130, 277, 499 2 8–9 483 4Q385a (4QapocrJer Ca) 130, 277 3a–c 4 475 18a–b i 9 469 18a–b ii 4 415 4Q385b (4QpsEzekc) 130
4Q366 (4QRPd) 373 4Q367 (4QRPe) 373 3 5–14 169 4Q368 (4QapocrPentateuch A) 53 470 4Q369 (4QP rayer of Enosh) 266 4Q370 (4QAdmonFlood) 266, 388 4Q371–373 (4QNarrative and Poetic Compositiona-d) 130, 135, 266, 417 4Q372 (4QNarrative and Poetic Compositionb) 1 21 475 39 475 4Q373a (4QN arrative and Poetic Compositiond) 417
4Q380–381 (4QNon-Canonical Psalms A–B 131, 274–5, 414, 416, 430 4Q380 (4QN on-Canonical Psalms A) 1 ii 8 270, 275 4Q381 (4QN on-Canonical Psalms B) 376, 417–18 31 4 275 33 8 275 4Q382 (pap4QP araKings) 271, 388 4Q383, 384, 385a, 387, 387a, 388a, 389, 390 (4QapocrJer) 130, 270–1, 390
4Q385c (4QpsEzek: Unidentified Fragments) 130 4Q386 (4QpsEzekb) 277 4Q387 (4QapocrJer Cb) 130, 277, 509 4Q387a (4QapocrJer Cf ) 130 4Q388 (4QpsEzekd) 130, 277 4Q388a (4QapocrJer Cc) 130 33 475 7 ii 2 477 D1 415 4Q389 (4QapocrJer Cd) 130 8 ii 8–9 477 4Q390 (4QapocrJer Ce) 130, 271 1 6–7 470 2i2 506 4Q391 (pap4QpsEzeke) 130
616 4Q392 (4QWorks of God) 430 4Q393 (4QC ommunal Confession) 427, 430 36 469 37 477 45 477 4Q394–399 (4QMMT ) 62, 84, 120, 130, 173, 194, 209–10, 216, 267, 270, 325–8, 371, 375, 388, 396, 399–402, 478, 491, 497, 500, 506–7, 514, 516, 539, 548 A 325 B 84, 325 B 13–17 401 B 15.71–72 519 B 27–34 398 B 27–33 402 B 29–31 399 B 58–62 398 B 62–63 401 B 72–74 402 C 84, 270, 325 C 7–8 515 C 10 269–70, 273 C 13–15 497 C 21 497 C 26 325 C 27 133 C 31 569 4Q394 (4QMMTa) 325, 327, 438 1–2 325, 327, 438 3–10 ii 16 507 3–7 i 1 438 3a–4 1–3 325 8 iv 8–12 507 4Q396 (4QMMTc) 9a 170
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q397 (4QMMTd) 14–21 9–11 370 14–21 10 273 4Q398 (4QpapMMTe) 173 11–17 370 11–13 325 14–17 i 2–3 273 4Q400–407 (4QS hirShabb) 122, 130, 300, 315, 339, 347–9, 414–15, 417, 424–5, 429, 442, 459–61, 483, 485–6, 491–3, 502, 511, 553 Songs 1–5 347–8 Song 1 347 Songs 6–8 347–8 Song 6 348 Songs 7–13 348 Song 7 348 Song 8 348 Songs 9–13 347 Songs 9–12 348 Songs 12–13 347 4Q400 (4QS hirShabba) 347, 492 2 5–8 483 2 6–7 348 4Q401 (4QS hirShabbb) 15 4Q403 (4QS hirShabbd) 1 i 21–23 486 1 i 30–31 486 1 ii 6 171 4Q404 (4QS hirShabbe) 492 4Q405 (4QS hirShabbf ) 347 4Q406 (4QS hirShabbg) 276 4Q408 (4QapocrMosesc?) 425 4Q409 (4QL iturgical Work A) 425
4Q411 (4QS apiential Hymn) 414, 418, 453 4Q412 (4QS apientialDidactic Work A) 417, 452 4Q413 (4QC omposition concerning Divine Providence) 453 4Q414 (4QR itPur A) 82, 130, 174–5, 426 2 ii 1–2 518 78 426 4Q415–418c, 423 (4QI nstruction) 126, 131, 135, 160, 223, 276, 278, 318–19, 329, 348, 415, 417, 452–5 4Q415 (4QI nstructiona) 174–5, 318 2 ii 319 4Q416 (4QI nstructionb) 318, 548 1 319, 454 2 ii 9 160 2 ii 14 160 2 ii 18 160 2 ii 19–21 170 2 iii–iv 318 2 iv 453 7 160 4Q417 (4QI nstructionc) 318 1 i 6–5 453 1 i 8–9 454 1 i 15–18 319 1 i 27 319 1 10–11 160 2i 174 2 i 1–13 160 2 i 11 330 2 i 18–21 160
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q418 (4QI nstructiond) 15, 318 69 ii 454 69 ii 4–9 161–2 69 ii 4–5 161 81 319 4Q418a (4QI nstructione) 318 4Q418c (4QI nstructionf?) 318 4Q420–421 (4QWays of Righteousnessa-b) 130, 452–3 4Q421 (4QWays of Righteousnessb) 11 3 397 4Q422 (4QP araGen-Exod) 388 4Q423 (4QI nstructiong) 126, 276, 318 1–2 i 318 1 453 52 470 54 469 4Q424 (4QI nstruction-like Composition) 131, 452–3 4Q425 (4QS apientialDidactic Work B) 453 4Q426 (4QS apientialHymnic Work A) 414, 453 4Q427–432 (4QH a-f ) 130, 314–17, 414, 416, 430 4Q427 (4QH a) 417 7 i–9 460
7 i 13–18 7 ii 14–22
430 430
4Q428 (4QH b) 315–16 4Q431 (4QH e) 1 417 4Q433 (4QH odayot-like Text A) 314, 414, 416, 430 4Q433a (4QpapHodayotlike Text B) 314, 414, 416, 430 4Q434–438 (4QB arkhi Nafshia-e) 130, 286–8, 414–15, 430 4Q434 (4QB arkhi Nafshia) 286, 428 1 i 1–13 286 1 i 1–2 296 1 ii 286 1 ii 1–4 286 1 ii 3 469 2 286–7 2 1–10 287 2 11–13 287 2 11 286 4 286 7b 287 4Q435 (4QB arkhi Nafshib) 1 i 1–8 286 2i 286 5 286 4Q436 (4QB arkhi Nafshic) 1 i–ii 286 4Q437 (4QB arkhi Nafshid) 1 1–2 286 2 i–ii 286 2 i 1–16 286 2 ii 287 4 287
617 4Q438 (4QB arkhi Nafshie) 4 287 4Q439 (4QL ament by a Leader) 418, 430 4Q440 (4QH odayot-like Text C) 314, 414, 416, 430 4Q440a (4QH odayot-like Text D) 414, 416, 430 4Q443 (4QPersonal Prayer) 530 4Q444 (4QI ncantation) 169, 416, 426, 494 4Q445 (4QL ament A) 417, 430 4Q448 (4QApocryphal Psalm and Prayer) 131, 274–5, 430 21 135 2 8–9 135 4Q460 (4QN arrative Work and Prayer) 9 175, 199 4Q462 (4QN arrative C) 1 9–10 136 4Q464 (4QE xposition on the Patriarchs) 242, 266, 471 3i8 471 3 ii 2–5 471 6 472 72 472 76 472 78 472 10 472 12 471 4Q464a (4QN arrative E) 471
618 4Q468e (4QH istorical Text F) 231 3 231 4Q468f (4QH istorical Text G) 231 4Q469 (4QNarrative I) 418, 430 4Q471 (4QWar Scroll-like Text B) 322 4Q471b (4QS elfGlorification Hymn) 315, 417, 430, 459–61 4Q474 (4QText Concerning Rachel and Joseph) 266 2–3 476 4Q475 (4QR enewed Earth) 131 4Q477 (4QR ebukes Reported by the Overseer) 427, 527 2i3 539 4Q481a (4QapocrElisha) 271 4Q484 (4QpapTJud?) 474 1 474 4Q491–4Q497 (4QM a-f and 4QpapWar Scrolllike Text A) 130, 322 4Q491–4Q496 (4QMa-f ) 573 4Q491 (4QM a) 11 i (4Q491c) 415 11 i 12–18 (4Q491c) 417, 460, 503 4Q496 (4QM f ) 365
Index of Ancient Sources 4Q501 (4QapocrLam B) 417, 430 4Q502 (4QpapRitMar) 130, 425, 428, 541, 548, 553
4Q510 (4QS hira) 528 1 4–8 494 1 4–6 494 4Q511 (4QS hirb) 528
4Q503 (4QpapPrQuot) 424–5, 441–2, 493, 554
4Q512 (4QpapRitPur B) 82, 415, 426, 516–17 7–9 3 426 33 iv 1–3 426
4Q504–506 (4QD ibHama-c) 130, 365–6, 386, 415, 424–5, 506
4Q513–514 (4QO rdinancesb-c) 514
4Q504 (4QD ibHama) 365, 376, 394, 425 1–2 ii 8–9 366 1–2 iv 2–13 506 1–2 vii 4 365 1–2 v 17–18 366 3 ii 365 84 366 15 9 470 19 7 470
4Q514 (4QO rdinancesc) 521 1 i–ii 518 1 i–ii 3–4 519 1 i–ii 7 519
4Q505 (4QD ibHamb) 365, 425 124 6 477 4Q506 (4QD ibHamc) 365, 425 131–132 12 470 4Q507–509 (4QP fFêtesa-c) 365 4Q507 (4QP fFêtesa) 425 4Q508 (4QP fFêtesb) 425 33 477 4Q509 (4QpapPfFêtesc) 365, 425, 443 4Q510–511 (4QS hira-b) 130, 300, 339, 347–8, 414, 416, 426, 460, 462, 491, 494, 515
4Q521 (4QMessianic Apocalypse) 131–2, 136, 320–1, 417–18, 499, 503 2 ii 1–2 320 2 ii 1 320–1, 503 2 ii 2 320 2 ii 5–8 320 2 ii 8 321 2 ii 12–13 320–1 2 ii 12 321 2 iii 2 321, 469 2 iii 6 321 7 + 5 ii 6 321 7 + 5 ii 8 321 8 320 8 8–9 320 93 320 11 320 4Q522 (4QP rophecy of Joshua or 4QapocrJoshc?) 271, 274, 359, 376 9 ii 4 506 9 ii 7 569 22–26 1–3 507 22–26 1 506
Index of Ancient Sources 22–26 3–4 22–26 5
506 506
4Q524 (4QT b) 355 4Q525 (4QB eatitudes) 124, 131, 276, 295–7, 416–17, 450, 452–3 1 1–3 450 2–3 ii 1–6 295 2 ii + 3 3–4 450 14 ii 14–16 450 15 4–6 296 21 2–8 296 25 4 278 4Q528 (4QHymnic or Sapiential Work B) 414, 416 4Q529 (4QWords of Michael ar) 266, 311 4Q530 (4QE nGiantsb ar) 311, 525 2 ii 525 2 ii 4 525 4Q534–536 (4QB irth of Noah ar) 266, 283 4Q534 (4QB irth of Noaha ar) 1i7 469 1 ii+2, 15–17 283 7 2–4 416 4Q536 (4QB irth of Noahc ar) 2 ii 11–13 416 4Q537 (4QTJacob? ar) 266, 474, 476 53 311 4Q538 (4QTJud ar) 266, 473, 477 1–2 473 1–2 4 476
619
4Q539 (4QTJ oseph ar) 266, 473, 476 2–3 1 473 2–3 2 473 2–3 3 473 2–3 4 473
4Q545 (4QVisions of Amramc ar) 1a–b ii 12 469–70 1a–b ii 17 469
4Q540–541 (4QapocrLevia-b? ar) 130, 135, 266
4Q546 (4QVisions of Amramd ar) 23 469
4Q540 (4QapocrLevia? ar) 476
4Q547 (4QVisions of Amrame ar) 82 476
4Q541 (4QapocrLevib? ar) 476, 503 9 476 9i 417, 503 4Q542 (4QTQ ahat ar) 130, 266, 311, 473 1 473 1i5 469–70 1 i 7–8 477–8 1i7 476 1i8 475–6 1 i 11–12 470 1 i 12 469 1 ii 9–11 476 1 ii 9 478 1 ii 10–12 478 4Q543–548 (4QVisions of Amram ar) 116, 130, 135, 311, 470, 473, 478, 491–2
13
469–70
4Q548 (4QVisions of Amramf ar) 473 4Q549 (4QVisions of Amramg? ar) 473 4Q550 (4QJ ews at the Persian Court ar) 131, 277 5+5a 1 470 4Q551 (4QAccout ar) 277 4Q552–553 (4QF our Kingdoms ar) 130, 270, 277, 333–4 4Q554, 554a, 555 (4QNJa-c ar) 130, 332–4 4Q554 (4QNJa ar) 333, 476 2 iii 12 506 13 334
4Q543 (4QVisions of Amrama ar) 1 a–c 473 1 a–c 1 478 3 473 4 473 5–9 474 14 474
4Q558 (4QpapVisionb ar) 51 ii 4 134
4Q544 (4QVisions of Amramb ar) 492 1 473
4Q559 (4QpapBib Chronology ar) 271, 283, 474
4Q554a (4QNJ b ar) 333 4Q555 (4QNJ c ar) 476
620
Index of Ancient Sources
4Q560 (4QM agical Booklet ar) 416, 426, 463, 494
6Q5 (6QpapPs?) 274
4Q561 (4QHoroscope ar) 116, 225, 427, 464
6Q7 (6QpapDan) 274
4Q577 (4QText Mentioning the Flood) 266 4Q578 (4QH istorical Text B) 230 5Q5 (5QPs) 274, 372, 418 5Q6–7 (5QL ama-b) 274, 431 5Q7 (5QL amb) 418 5Q9 (5QWork with Place Names or 5QapocrJosh?) 271 5Q10 (5QapocrMal or 5QpMal?) 270
6Q6 (6QC ant) 274, 431
6Q9 (6Qpap apocrSam– K gs) 271
5Q14 (5QC urses) 427 5Q15 (5QNJ ar) 332–4, 476 5Q16 (5QUnclassified frags.) 418
8Q2 (8QPs) 274, 418 8Q5 (8QHymn) 426
6Q15 (6QD ) 276, 306, 547
11Q1 (11QpaleoLeva) 13, 130
6Q16 (6QpapBened) 427 11Q2 (11QL evb) 276 6Q17 (6QC alendrical Document) 438
11Q5–9 (11QPsa-e) 274
7Q8 (7QpapUnclassified fragments gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 282
11Q5 (11QPsa) 14, 57, 129, 154, 187–8, 274–6, 278, 372, 414, 418, 430, 450, 482, 525 17.24–18.18 275 18.25–19.18 275 18.3 450 18.12 450 19.1–18 494 21 418 21.11–22.1 274, 278 22 416, 418 22.1–15 275 22.11–15 511 24 418 24.3–20 275 26.9–16 275 27 443, 525 27.2–11 525 27.9–10 275 27.11 270, 370, 482 28.3–14 132, 275
7Q11 (7QpapUnclassified fragments gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 282
11Q6 (11QPsb) 129, 274, 414, 418, 430 6 418
6Q18 (6QpapHymn) 276, 426 6Q26 (6QpapAccount or Contract) 40, 42
7Q2 (7QE pJer gr) 153, 224, 270–1, 282
5Q12 (5QD ) 306, 547 5Q13 (5QR ule) 298, 300, 428, 477, 538 2 4–8 477 26 475 27 475 28 475 4 427 4 2–23 538
7Q13 (7QpapUnclassified fragments gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 282 8Q1 (8QG en) 15
6Q13 (6QP riestly Prophecy) 4 569
6Q30 (6QpapProv) 274 5Q11 (5QS ) 547 1i 407
7Q12 (7QpapUnclassified fragments gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 282
7Q4, 8, 11–14 (7QpapUnclassified fragments gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 244 7Q4 (7QpapBiblical Text? Gr or 7QpapEn gr?) 1 282 2 282,
Index of Ancient Sources 11Q7 (11QPsd) 3 274 11Q10 (11QtgJob) 14, 129, 259–60, 276 11.8 133, 30.4–5 259, 38.5–6 259, 11Q11 (11QapocrPs) 116, 129, 274–6, 416, 426, 443, 462–3, 494 56 374 11Q12 (11QJub) 129, 472 11Q13 (11QMelch) 129, 229, 351, 492, 498–9, 503, 511, 563 1–4 ii 10–12 370 1–4 ii 18 370 2.17–20 271 2 18 273 39 506 11Q14 (11QS efer haMilhamah) 129, 322, 416, 573 1 ii 300 11Q17 (11QS hirShabb) 130, 347–9, 415, 417, 425, 442, 459 11Q18 (11QNJ ar) 332–4, 476 11Q19 (11QTa) 14, 82, 122, 124, 129, 168–70, 174, 187–8, 207, 209–10, 265–7, 281, 333, 354–7, 373–6, 378–80, 383, 388, 395–9, 401, 438–9, 443, 475, 499, 501–2, 506–7, 514, 516, 518–19, 535, 548, 570 2–34 355 2–5 354
3.1–13.7 3–13 6–65 13–29 14–29 17.8–9 23.9–10 24.11 25 29.8–10 30–47 36–48 39.8–10 39.12 40.14–15 42.14 45–47 45.7–18 45.7–11 45.7–10 45.11–12 46.9–18 46.16–18 47.3–18 47.3–11 47.9 47.11 48–51 48 48.14–17 49.5–50.19 49.7–10 49.7–8 49.12–13 49.12 49.14–17 49.14–16 49.14 49.16–21 49.20 50.5–9 50.5 50.6 50.10–19 50.10–11 50.16–19 50.17 51–66 51–53
399 356 354 438 356 253 82 82 188 499 356 355 475 82 82 470 356 398–9 518 519 514, 549 398 519 398 507 507 507 356 188 398, 519 397 397–8 518 518 469, 518 399 398 398 517 519 267 401 397 398 515 398 267 356 210
621 54.13 55.12 56.4 56.12–60.21 56.12–59.21 56.13–18 56.15–19 56.20–21 57–59 57.5–15 57.13–14 58.18–21 58.18–20 59.15 60.16–21 66 66.15–17
469 469 265 399 570 501 570 267 356 570 502 570 502 469 463 188 551
11Q20 (11QT b) 44, 354–5, 514, 530 1–6 438 12 9 507 16.3 469 11Q21 (11QTc?) 355 Cave Inscriptions 7Q-Arch 2 heb/ar 40 WADI DALIYEH WDSP 2 181 WADI MURABBA’AT Mur 3 Isa 269 Mur 5 43 Mur 6 47 Mur 17 47–8 Mur 30 181 Mur 42 290–2 Mur 43 290 Mur 44 290, 293 Mur 45 290 Mur 46 290–1 Mur 47–48 289 Mur 47 290 Mur 48 290 Mur 49–52 290 Mur 72 47
622 Mur 88 XII Mur 114 Mur 117
Index of Ancient Sources 269–70, 373 47 47
NAH. AL H. EVER (Please note that references to P.Yadin papyri have been listed with their 5/6H.ev designation.) 5/6H.ev1–36 292 5/6H.ev 1b 274 1b 4 274 5/6H.ev 19 181 5/6H.ev 21 181 5/6H.ev 42 293 5/6H.ev 43 292 5/6H.ev 44.6 290 5/6H.ev 45.11 290 5/6H.ev 49 290, 293 5/6H.ev 50 290, 293 5/6H.ev 51 290 5/6H.ev 52 200, 289, 291–3 5/6H.ev 53 290 5/6H.ev 54 290–1, 293 5/6H.ev 55 290 5/6H.ev 56 290 5/6H.ev 57 291, 293 5/6H.ev 58 291 5/6H.ev 59 291–2 59.2 291 5/6H.ev 60 290 5/6H.ev 61 290 5/6H.ev 62 291 5/6H.ev 63 291 5/6H.ev 64 38, 291 5/6H.evPs 270 8H.evXIIgr 47, 130, 134, 153, 187, 199, 269–70, 276 IV 31 134 NAH. AL H. EVER /SEIYAL XH.ev/Se 2 Numb 15, 292
XH.ev/Se 4 Ps XH.ev/Se 7 XH.ev/Se 8a
XH.ev/Se 11 XH.ev/Se 12 XH.ev/Se 30 XH.ev/Se 50 XH.ev/Se 60–65 XH.ev/Se 60 XH.ev/Se 64 MASADA Mas 1 Gen Mas 1h Sir
Mas 1k ShirShabb
Mas 1d Ezek Mas 1e Psa Mas 1f Psb Mas 11 apocrJosh
274 175 181–2, 198, 293 181 181, 292 289–90, 292 198 292 292 292
47 45, 47, 274, 278, 450 347, 415, 417, 425, 442, 459 269 270, 274 45, 270, 274 359
UNKNOWN PROVENANCE X1 (XJosh) 15, 271 X5–7, 19 (XJudga-d) 15, 271 X8 (XpaleoDan?) 270 X12–13 (XLev) 15 X20 (XIsa) 269 X21 (XJer) 269 X23 (XDan) 270 X24 (XpapDan) 270
X25 (XNeh) 274 X26 (XpapEna or XQ8) 15 XQDeut 16 HELLENISTIC JEWISH WRITINGS Josephus Against Apion 1.40 452 1.290 525 Antiquities 3.274 6.68–71 6.68–70 13 13.171–73 13.298 13.299–300 13.311–13 13.311 13.376–83 14.84–85 14.93–95 14.120 14.366 15.187–201 15.365–72 15.371–79 15.373–78 17.219 17.345–48 17.346 18 18.4–10 18.11 18.18–22 18.19 18.20 18.21 18.22 18.23 18.25 18.26 18.116–19 19.300–305 20.267–68
549 133 205 150 148 148 359 458 148 570 231 231 231 145 102 158 148 458 231 458 148 150–1 151 142, 148 145, 149 142, 555 142, 146 142, 541 144 151 151 151 101 144 150
Index of Ancient Sources Life 2 8–9 10–11 10 11–12 54 336–39 355–67 Jewish War 1.78–80 1.92–98 1.120 1.162–63 1.172 1.180 1.386–96 2 2.1–116 2.111 2.113 2.117–277 2.119–61 2.119 2.120 2.121 2.122 2.124 2.128 2.129–32 2.129 2.131 2.134 2.135 2.136 2.138 2.141–42 2.142 2.159 2.160–61 2.160 2.161 2.167 2.277–568 2.285–89 2.567
549 149 149 149 149 143 149 149
148, 458 570 145 231 231 231 102 148, 150–2 151 144 148, 458 151 148–9 142 549 549 142 146, 541, 549 431, 521, 552–3, 555 142 142, 458 144 553 142 458 458 458 492 458 549 541 552 151 151 144 148
3.11 4.155 4.439 4.452–85 4.453 4.469–72 4.473 4.475–81 4.476–85 4.476–77 4.480 4.481 5.145 15.121–22
148 569 103 100 104 99, 104 100 103 99 100 99 99 148 102
Philo Agriculture 44 143 Alleg. Interp. 1.52–8 140
623 134 137–38 148 152 157 165 191 311 346 371
143 143 143 143 143 143 143 143 143 143
Flaccus 41 45 47–49 53 122
143 143 143 143 143
Flight 30–38
146
Unchangeable 61–62 160
Good Person 12.75 541 47 142 72 140 75–91 139–40 75 140, 142, 144, 146 76 140–2 77 141–2 78 141, 144 79 141–2 80–81 141 80 141 81–82 143 81 141, 143 82 141–2 83 141, 143 84 141–2 85–86 555 85 141–3 86 141–2 87 141–2 88 141 89–91 141–2, 145 91 142–3, 146
Embassy 132
Heir 123
Decalogue 100 101
140 140
Drunkenness 87 144 Contempl. Life 139 1–2 550 1 140 2 142 11–40 550 29 431 63–90 550 70 144 80 431 Dreams 2.100 2.127 2.293
143 143 143
143
144
624
Index of Ancient Sources
Hypothetica 139 11.1 142, 145–6, 541, 549 11.2 145 11.3 145–6 11.4–5 142 11.4 145, 549 11.5–9 552 11.5 142, 145, 555 11.6 145 11.7 145–6 11.8 145 11.9 145 11.10 142, 145 11.11 145 11.12 142, 146 11.13 142, 146 11.14–17 146, 541 11.14 146 11.18 146 Joseph 136 242 Migration 92
143 143
144
2.64 2.69 2.123 3.36 3.137 3.206–207
140 144 144 549 144 517
MUL .APIN 111 I iv 33–39 115
Worse 147–48
146
RABBINIC WRITINGS
GREEK INSCRIPTIONS IG II 2 1275 88 IG II 2 1326 87 IG II 2 1339 88 IG II 2 1361, 22–23 89 IG II 2 1368, 32–41 89 IG II 2 1369, 31–36 89 IG XII Suppl. 365 90 Inscriptions de Délos 1520 90 MDAI (A) 66 (1941) 228 no. 4 92 SEG 46.1519 90 SEG 55.1660 88 SEG 56.1920 88 SEG 57.1188 87
Table B Tablet 44
Mishnah Avot 3.6
112, 441 116
460
‘Eduyot 1.7 8.4
402 402
Kelim 8.4
397
Makhshirin 6.4
397
‘Ohal 2.2
397
Parah 3.7 8.5–7
401 397
Moses 2.107
144
Virtues
139
LATIN INSCRIPTIONS CIL I2 581 93
Qiddushin 4.5
536
Planting 108
144
ZOROASTRIAN WRITINGS
Terumot 11.2
397
Posterity 67
143
Yasna 30.3–5 45.2
Yebamot 6.6
146
Rewards 11 108–10 108–9
140 549 146
Yoma 1.6
397
Spec. Laws 1.50–53 144 1.269–72 144 2.62 143
561 561
BABYLONIAN WRITINGS Alamdimmû 116
Pirke Avot 3.23
449
Enūma Anu Enlil 111 Tablet 14 112 Table A 112
Sifra Shemini 8.1
397
Index of Ancient Sources Sifre Numbers 6 401 Tosefta Naz. 5.1 Parah 3.6 3.8 Shabb. 13.2 13.4 Talmud b. B. Bat. 14b b. Ber. 16b
397
401 401
260 126
273
470
b. Eruv. 54b
460
b. Naz. 53a
397
b. Shabb. 115a
260
b. Rosh Hashanah 25a 437 b. Yebam. 63a
146
b. Yev. 86b
536
y. Shabb. 16.1
260
Targumim Tg. Neof. Tg. Ps-J.
133 133
CLASSICAL AND ANCIENT CHRISTIAN WRITINGS Aristotle Meterologica 2.4 98 Nicomachean Ethics 1.5 140 10.7–8 140 Politics 1253b–1255b 144 Athenasius Dipn. 5.210e–f 12.527e–f
88 88
Basilius Seleuciensis Scr. Eccl., Sermones xli. 30–31 160 Chryssipus On Various Types of Life 140 Cicero Paradoxa Stoicorum Pro. 4 140 De legibus 2.36
161
Diodorus Siculus Bibliotheca Historica 2.28 98 2.48.6–9 98 19.98 98 19.98–100 98 19.99 103 19.99.1 99 19.100 103 Diogenes Laertius Lives 7.121 140
625 7.130
140
Vitae Philosophorum 1.6–9.10 159 1.8 159 9.6 160 10.38–39 161 Eusebius Hist. eccl. 6.16.3
37
Praeparatio Evangelica 8.11.1–18 139 Galen De Simplicium Medicament Facultatibus 9.2.10 99 Iamblichus De Pyth. Vita 167–69 141 Vita Pyth. 6.29–30 29 37–57 71–81 71 72 73 74 80–81 96–100 96 97–98 98–99 100 248–49 256 Justinus Epitome 36.3
157 157 157 157 157 158 158 158 158 157 158 158 158 158 158 158
99, 101
626
Index of Ancient Sources
Livy History of Rome 39:8–19 93
Porphyry Abstin. 1.53
Pausanias Græcæ Descriptio 5.7.50 99, 101
Pseudo-Plato Greater Alkibiades 1.121–22 159
Piacenza Pilgrim Itinerarium 10/166 Plato Laws 5.739c Republic 3.416d 3.416e 5.449c 5.462c
99
157
141 157 157 141
Pliny Historia Naturalis 5.7 100 5.15 99 5.15 (73) 100 5.73 541 12.54 (111–23) 100 12.54 (111–15) 102 30.4 159 Plutarch De Iside et Osoride 46–47 156, 159
Seneca de Otio 1.4
140
140 140
Strabo Geogr 6.2 6.2.44 16.2.41–42 16.2.42 16.2.43 17.1.15
99 98 99 103 99 99
Tacitus Historia 5.6–7 5.7
99 100
Theophrastus Historia Plantarum 9.6.1–4 100 9.6.1–2 99 Virgil Aenid
47
BYZANTINE AND MEDIEVAL WRITINGS Adomnan De Locis Sanctis 2.17.2 99 At-Tamimi Al-Murshid 36b–37a 54b–55a
99 99
Descriptio locorum 31–32 32
99 99
Maimonides Mishne Tora Ahava, Hilkhot Tefillin we Mezuzah we Sefer Tora I,4 174 Mt. Athos Ms. Koutloumousiou 39 (catalogue #3108) 109, 261 31–47 109
Index of Modern Authors Abegg, M. G. 4, 186, 189, 438–41, 443–4, 486, 493–4, 506–7, 509, 575, 585, 590–1 Adam, A. 139, 147 Adler, Y. 514, 521 Adriaens, A. 175, 184–5, 544, 557 Aharoni. Y. 14 Aharonovich, Y. 20, 35 Albani, M. 111, 115, 117, 439, 442, 444 Albrecht, M. von 163 Albright, W. F. 7, 9, 52, 71 Alexander, P. S. 44, 48, 128, 235–6, 251, 255, 262, 312, 315–6, 322, 324, 344–6, 349, 382, 384, 406–7, 409, 411, 417, 419–20, 425, 427, 433, 439, 443–5, 447, 459–62, 464–6, 495, 537, 542, 584–5, 592 Allegro, J. M. 55, 61, 65, 189, 304–5, 352–3, 361, 584 Allen, W. H. 60 Alliata, E. 106, 297 Al-Rawi, F. N. H. 112, 117 Amar, Z. 99, 105 Amihay, A. 395, 400, 403 Amit, D. 514, 523 Anderson, A. A. 353, 361, 584 Anderson, B. 534, 543 Anderson, G. A. 477–8, Aneziri, S. 87, 94 Angel, J. L. 187, 189, 349, 354–7 Argall, R. A. 145, 147 Ariel, D. T. 103, 105, 107 Ariel, H. 471, 478 Arnold, R. C. D. 420, 423, 425, 427, 429, 433 Arubas, B. 99, 107 Ascough, R. 90, 94 Atkinson, K. 149–50, 152, 442, 444 Attridge, H. 340, 357, 385, 447, 584 Aubin, M. 248, 255 Auld, A. G. 384 Aune, D. E. 160, 162 Austin, W. G. 245 Auwers, J.-M. 285
Avemarie, F. 520–1, 555–6 Avery-Peck, A. J. 79, 84, 444 Avigad, N. 14 Avni, G. 36 Baasten, M. F. J. 48 Baden, J. 85, 346, 558 Baek, K. S. 128, 152, 522 Baillet, M. 36, 40, 42–3, 48, 55, 305–6, 308–9, 334, 428, 438, 442–4, 446, 584 Balla, M. 542, 544 Bar Adon, P. 14, 101, 103, 105 Bar-Asher, M. 479 Barclay, J. M. G. 139, 147 Bardtke, H. 90–1, 94 Bar-Nathan, R. 25, 34, 102, 105–6 Barthélemy, D. 10, 13, 40, 42, 48, 54–5, 189, 334, 412, 435, 444, 584 Bartlett, J. R. 147 Barton, J. 379, 384, 405, 411, 489 Baruch, Y. 20, 34 Barzilai, G. 471, 478 Batsch, C. 466, 479, 568–70, 575 Batten, A. 87, 94 Bauckham, R. 465 Baumgarten, A. I. 89, 94, 157, 162, 220, 222, 226, 540, 543 Baumgarten, J. M. 301, 306, 308, 328, 349, 364, 403, 428, 433, 436, 442, 444, 516–17, 519–22, 543, 547, 551, 555–6, 567, 584, 586 Beall, T. S. 144, 147–9, 152 Bearman, G. 184 Becker, E.-M. 377 Becker, U. 204, 213 Beckwith, R. 437, 444 Bekkum, W. van 419–20 Bell, C. M. 424, 426–7, 429, 433, Ben-Dov, J. 114, 117, 169, 177, 225–7, 341, 343, 437–40, 442–5, 447, 464–5, 547, 556–7, 585
627
628
Index of Modern Authors
Ben-Hayyim, Z. 193–4, 201 Bennet, C. M. 103, 106 Benoit, P. 56, 189, 289, 293 Berenbaum, M. 36, 480 Berg, S. A. 416, 420, 539–40, 543 Bergmeier, R. 145, 147, 149, 152 Berlin, A. 413, 420 Berner, C. 214, 271–2 Bernstein, M. J. 117, 300, 303, 312, 327–8, 380, 382, 384, 389, 394, 408, 411, 440, 446–7, 466, 521, 556, 567, 585 Berrin [Tzoref], S. L. 338 Berthelot, K. 120, 127, 201, 264–8, 465, 479, 569, 575, 591 Bertram, A. 58 Betz, H. D. 217–18, 226 Beyer, K. 195, 197–8, 201, 586, 591 Bianchi, U. 559–60, 566 Bilde, P. 139, 144, 147 Billerbeck, P. 167, 177 Black, M. 118, 137, 351 Blau, J. 194, 201 Bloch, R. M. 99, 106 Boccaccini, G. 268, 285, 411, 480, 489, 543 Bockmuehl, M. N. A. 160, 162 Boer, M. de 478 Bohak, G. 127, 154–5, 262, 457–66, 462, 464–5 Bonani, G. 180–1, 184 Bond, H. K. 189 Borgen, P. 162 Bourke, D. 108 Boustan, R. S. 465, 576 Bow, B. A. 147 Bowden, J. 214 Bowen, A. C. 445 Bowley, J. E. 186, 189, 590 Boyancé, P. 157, 162 Boyarin, D. 540, 543 Boyd-Alkalay, E. 171, 175 Brady, M. 118, 584–5 Brand, M. T. 287–8, 299–300 Brandt, P. 274, 278 Bremmer, J. N. 465 Brizemeure, D. 186, 189 Brooke, G. J. 1–4, 55, 58, 61, 69, 71–2, 119–28, 123, 127, 132, 137, 186, 189, 211–13, 215, 223, 226, 230, 235, 264–5, 268–9, 272, 284, 287–8, 296, 300, 302–3,
303, 321, 340, 349, 351, 364, 369–72, 374–6, 382–4, 406–7, 410–11, 421, 423, 425, 433–5, 444, 463, 465, 475–6, 478, 489, 503, 505, 511, 528, 531, 584, 592 Broshi, M. 20, 34, 40, 43, 48, 168, 173, 175–6, 179, 184, 230–1, 235, 283–4, 546, 556, 584 Brown, R. E. 162, 190 Brownlee, W. H. 9, 52–4, 213, 346, 408, 411, 489, 586 Burkert, W. 161–2 Burnett, C. 465 Burrows, M. 9, 53–4, 344, 346, 405, 411, 586 Burton, D. 184 Byrskog, S. 558 Callaway, P. R. 58, 592 Campana, M. G. 179, 184 Campbell, J. G. 245, 247, 255, 380–2, 384, 543, 592 Cancik, H. 433, 464 Cansdale, L. 24, 29, 34, 103, 106 Cargill, R. R. 17, 20–4, 27, 34 Carmichael, C. M. 62, 72 Carmignac, J. 413, 419–20 Carr, D. M. 123, 127 Carson, D. A. 312, 384 Carswell, J. 40, 48 Cenival, F. de. 88, 94 Chalcraft, D. J. 237–41, 237–41, 523, 543, 545, 558 Chambon, A. 19–20, 23, 35, 102, 105, 107 Charlesworth, J. H. 122, 127, 137, 303, 340, 349, 366, 446, 512, 516, 521–2, 536, 543, 556, 560, 562, 566, 568, 573, 575, 584–6 Chazon, E. G. 50, 268, 272, 284, 288, 300, 316, 331, 365–6, 376, 384, 386, 394, 403, 420, 422, 424, 430, 432–4, 495, 546, 584 Chilton, B. 79, 84 Chipman, J. 340, 446, 466 Cioată, M. 215, 300, 434, Clamer, C. 101, 106 Claussen, C. 50, 108, 543 Clements, R. A. 50, 124, 127, 300, 331, 376, 420, 422, 434, 495, 546 Coblentz Bautch, K. 280–5, 285 Cohen, C. 447 Cohen, N. 584 Cohen, S. 86, 89, 94, 119, 127
Index of Modern Authors Cohn, L. 147 Cohn, Y. B. 426, 433 Cohn-Sherbok, D. 147 Collins, J. J. 33–4, 44, 48, 50, 58, 78–9, 84–5, 94, 106, 108, 121, 127, 132, 137, 147–50, 152, 157–8, 160, 162–3, 202, 213, 216–17, 226–7, 237, 241, 243, 248, 255–6, 268, 272, 278, 285, 308, 320–1, 340, 346, 351, 377, 382, 384–5, 390, 394, 406–7, 411, 420–1, 423, 426, 433, 442, 444, 447, 455–6, 465, 476, 478, 489, 495, 504, 536, 538–9, 543, 548–9, 556, 558, 573–5, 584, 590, 592 Collins, M. A. 59–73, 59, 64, 69–71, 234–5, 535, 537, 543 Colson, F. H. 139, 147 Cook, E. M. 4, 186, 189, 486, 493–4, 506–7, 509, 590–1 Cooperman, B. D. 433 Corbo, V. 101, 106 Corley, J. 434 Cotton, H. M. 39, 43, 48–9, 181, 184, 199, 201, 289, 292–3, 584 Court, J. M. 147 Craffert, P. F. 239, 241 Crawford, S. W. 43–4, 49–50, 248, 255, 277–8, 313, 356–7, 445, 552–3, 556–7, 585, 592 Crenshaw, J. L. 451, 455 Cross, F. M. 16, 55–6, 102, 106, 169, 175, 186, 189, 205–6, 213, 351, 537, 542–3, 584–6, 592 Crown, A. D. 103, 106 Cryer, F. H. 147 Csepregi, I. 465 Cunio, K. 66, 71 Czajkowski, K. 292–3 Dahmen, U. 193, 197, 201, 273–9, 275, 278, 590 Daley, S. C. 63, 71 Daly-Denton, M. 152 Dasen, V. 95 David, M. T. 586 Dávid, N. 73, 377, 403 Davies, P. R. 32, 34, 58, 72, 204, 211, 213, 228–36, 234–5, 307–8, 323–4, 346, 437, 444, 505–6, 512, 534, 537–8, 543, 560, 566, 568, 574–5, 592
629
Davies, W. D. 434, 567, 582 Davila, J. R. 62, 71, 424, 433, 459, 465, 495, 556, 585 Davis, K. 176, 573, 575 Davis, M. T. 543 Day, J. 503, 511 Debel, H. 7–16 Delamarter, S. 528, 531 Delcor, M. 95, 279 Deming, W. 549–50, 557 Denis, A.-M. 410–11 Dietrich, W. 214 Diewert, D. 420 Dik, J. 170, 175, 185 Dillon, J. 147 Dimant, D. 16, 64, 71, 86, 94, 106, 214–15, 284–5, 336–8, 376, 403, 408, 411, 430, 433, 469–71, 473, 477–9, 521–2, 534, 543, 545, 584, 590 DiTommaso, L. 333–4 Dochhorn, J. 376 Doering, L. 289–94, 292–3, 326–7, 397, 400, 403 Dombrowski, B. W. 89, 94, 543 Donaldson, G. 72 Donceel, R. 20, 29, 34 Donceel-Voûte, P. 20, 29, 34, 99, 106 Donner, H. 106 Doudna, G. L. 21, 24, 36, 179–81, 183–4 Douglas, M. 315–16 Drawnel, H. 109–18, 109–13, 116–17, 261–2, 441, 444, 453, 456, 473–4, 476–7, 479 Driver, G. R. 17, 34 Drost-Abgarjan, A. 203 Duhaime, J. 116–17, 128, 152, 322–4, 552, 560–1, 563, 566–8, 573–5, 592 Duke, D. 441, 444–5 Dunayevsky, I. 108 Dupont-Sommer, A. 61, 156, 158, 163 Du Toit, J. S. 60–4, 69, 71 Easton, R. L. 185 Eck, W. 292–3 Ecker, A. 88, 94 Eckhardt, B. 86–96, 88, 90, 92, 94–5, 156, 163, 556–7 Edelman, D. V. 235 Edenburg, C. 214
630
Index of Modern Authors
Edrei, A. 400, 403 Edwards, D. R. 36, 108 Edwards, S. M. 248, 256 Egger-Wenzel, R. 434 Ego, B. 546 Ehrlich, C. 522 Eisenman, R 62 Elgvin, T. 176, 318–19, 331, 406, 411, 453, 456, 538, 543, 584–5 Elledge, C. D. 586 Elwolde, J. F. 201, 421 Eshel, E. 230, 235, 261–3, 301, 380, 384, 426, 433, 461–2, 465, 477, 479, 525, 531, 542–3, 584 Eshel, H. 16, 20, 34, 37, 40, 43, 48–50, 98, 102–3, 106, 108, 175, 230, 235, 293, 324, 420, 546, 551, 557, 570, 574–5, 584, 592 Esler, P. F. 14, 16, 45, 49, 125, 127, 236, 239, 241, 244–5, 292, 294 Evans, C. A. 137, 213, 376, 464 Fabry, H.-J. 137, 190, 193, 197, 199, 201, 273, 278, 445, 475, 479, 590 Falk, D. K. 49, 82, 85, 125, 127, 286–8, 288, 298–301, 312, 316, 366, 382, 384, 420–1, 423–34, 424–5, 430, 432, 434, 439, 442–3, 445–6, 470, 472, 475, 479, 573, 575, 592 Faraguna, M. 176 Fassberg, S. E. 193, 197, 199, 201 Faust, A. 97, 106 Feldman, A. 215, 300, 434, 469–80, 471, 479 Festinger, L. 510, 512 Festugière, A. J. 157, 163 Fidanzo, M. 50 Fieger, M. 137 Fields, H. 51–8 Fields, W. W. 16, 39, 49, 51–8, 58, 64, 71, 590, 592 Fineman, D. A. 324 Finkelstein, L. 567, 582 Finsterbusch, K. 285 Fitzmyer, J. A. 137, 230–1, 235, 285, 296, 312, 351, 442, 445, 584–5, 592 Fitzpatrick-McKinley, A. 152, Flint, P. W. 58, 128, 147, 152, 175, 179, 184–5, 189–90, 256, 278, 370, 377, 384, 420–1, 444–5, 489, 495, 522, 585–6, 590, 592–3 Floyd, M. H. 489
Flusser, D. 322–4, 351 Fornberg, T. 478 Forster, G. 101, 106 Foucault, M. 246–7, 255 Fox, M. V. 412, 456 Fraade, S. D. 44, 49, 124, 127, 327, 389, 394, 399, 403 Frankena, W. K. 559, 567 Franzka, S. 170, 176 Fréchet, R. 147 Frerichs, E. S. 72 Frey, J. 50, 95, 108, 116–17, 132, 137, 149, 152, 543–4, 559–62, 567 Freyne, S. 152 Friebel, K. G. 412, 456 Fröhlich, I. 443, 445 Fröhlich, P. 95 Fuller, R. E. 585 Gabrielsen, V. 87, 95 Galor, K. 34–6, 106–8 Gammie, J. G. 560–1, 567 García Martínez, F. 4, 40, 43–4, 49–50, 117, 137–8, 163, 213, 251, 255, 259–60, 272, 288, 296, 300, 325, 327–8, 331, 334, 351, 355, 357, 359, 361, 377, 414, 420–1, 441, 445–7, 456, 462, 465–6, 479–80, 484, 489, 521, 526, 531, 536, 543, 556, 567, 576, 585, 591 Gärtner, H. 162 Gathercole, S. 285 Gayer, A. 341, 343, 547, 556–7 Geertz, C. 246, 255 Geller, M. 464–5 Gemeinhardt, P. 214 George, A. R. 112, 117 Gerth, H. 241 Gertz, J. C. 214 Gibson, S. 103, 106, 108 Gillihan, Y. M. 88, 91, 93, 95, 157, 163, 539–40, 543 Ginsburskaya, M. 505–12 Ginzberg, L. 403 Glessmer, U. 177, 436–40, 443, 445, 447, 585 Glickman, J. 559, 567 Glueck, N. 36 Goff, M. J. 131, 137, 319, 331, 364, 421, 441, 444–5, 449–56, 451–2, 454–6 Goffman, E. 237, 241
Index of Modern Authors Golb, N. 24, 29–30, 34, 62, 95 Goldman, L. 306–9, 307–8, 473, 479, Goldstein, J. A. 582 Goldstein, R. 206, 213 Goodblatt, D. 176, 185 Goodman, M. D. 92–5, 121, 127, 139, 148, 151–2, 162, 213, 457–8, 466, 505, 509, 512 Goranson, S. 142, 147 Gordley, M. E. 287–8 Gorski, A. 170, 175 Grabbe, L. L. 235, 543, 582 Graham, W. A. 381, 384 Grappe, C. 447 Greenblatt, C. 175, 184, 544 Greenfield, J. C. 116–17, 261–3, 421, 442, 445, 463–5, 525, 531 Greenhut, Z. 103, 106 Gregory, G. 421 Gripentrog, S. 95 Gropp, D. M. 440, 446, 585 Grosjean, F. 200, 202 Gross, A. 354, 357 Grossman, M. L. 49–50, 61, 64–6, 68, 70–1, 211, 213–15, 217, 226–7, 231, 236, 241, 246–56, 247–9, 255–6, 327, 385, 531, 541, 544, 592 Gruen, E. S. 153, 155, 219, 226 Gruenwald, I. 459, 465 Guillaume, P. 445 Gunneweg, J. 35, 49, 175–6, 184–5, 542, 544, 554, 557 Günther, S. 214 Gzella, H. 192–203, 192–3, 195–200, 202–3 Haak, R. D. 489 Haak Romeny, B. ter 123, 128 Haber, E. 471, 480 Haber, S. 522 Habermann, A. M. 586 Hachlili, R. 20, 26, 34, 102, 106 Hadas, G. 103, 106 Hadas, M. 158, 163 Hadas-Lebel, M. 139, 147 Hahn, O. 171, 175–6, 178, 185 Hakola, R. 544, 558 Hall, J. M. 80, 85, 511–12 Halliday, M. A. K. 242 Halpern-Amaru, B. 316, 331, 546
631
Hammond, P. C. 98, 107 Hamon, P. 95 Haran, H. 168, 171, 176 Haran, M. 176 Harding, G. L. 10–11, 13, 20, 34, 53–5 Har-El, M. 104, 107 Harkins, A. K. 248, 256, 314–17, 315–17, 416, 421 Harland, P. 87, 95 Harlow, D. C. 50, 421, 590 Harrington, D. J. 318–19, 382, 384, 453, 456, 585, 592 Harrington, H. K. 82, 85, 513–14, 518, 520, 522, 555, 557, 592 Hartman, L. 479 Hartog, P. B. 125, 128, 132, 137, 153, 155–6, 162–3, 219, 226 Harviainen, T. 576 Hasselbalch, T. B. 241–3, 243 Hayes, E. R. 190 Hayward, R. 340 Hazan, S. 70–1 Heger, P. 400, 403 Hellholm, D. 478 Hemmer Gudme, A.-K. de 445, Hempel, C. 1–4, 16, 32–5, 49–50, 106–8, 120, 124, 128, 147, 204, 210, 213–15, 224, 226, 234–6, 240–1, 267–8, 300, 307–9, 326–8, 331, 342–3, 345–6, 372, 377, 405–12, 406, 409–11, 434, 445, 465, 498, 504, 512, 520–2, 527, 532, 534, 537–9, 543–5, 547, 549, 551, 555, 557, 592 Hengel, M. 89–90, 95, 158, 163, 351, 433, 464, 569, 576 Henze, M. 153–5, 215, 338, 394 Hepper, N. 107 Herbert, E. D. 71–3, 377, 384, 592 Herr, M. D. 436, 445 Herrmann, R. 89, 95 Hezser, C. 524, 532 Hilhorst, A. 377, 480 Hillel, V. 261–3 Hilton, N. 481–9 Himmelfarb, M. 517, 522 Hirschfeld, Y. 20–4, 29–30, 35, 97, 103, 105, 107 Hizmi, H. 20, 35 Hogan, K. 421 Høgenhaven, J. 55, 58, 304–5, 352–3
632
Index of Modern Authors
Hogeterp, A. L. A. 129–38, 137, 277–8, 504 Hölbl, G. 582 Holmén, T. 137–8 Holm-Nielsen, S. 386, 394 Horbury, W. 292, 294, 434 Horgan, M. P. 276, 278, 338, 497 Horowitz, W. 111, 114, 117, 440, 444 Horst, P. van der 199, 202 Houston, G. W. 43, 45, 47, 49 Howell, F. 240 Hübner, U. 108, 202 Hughes, J. 386, 394, 418–19, 421 Hugo, P. 214 Hultgren, S. 307–9, 344–6, 346, 536, 538, 544 Humbert, J-B. 19–24, 27, 34–6, 49, 102, 105–8, 548, 554, 557 Hunzinger, C.-H. 55–6 Huppenbaur, H. W. 560, 567 Ibba, G. 268, 285, 480, 489 Ilan, T. 248, 256, 552, 557 Ingelaere, J.-C. 447 Inowlocki, S. 145, 147 Jacobus, H. R. 435–48, 437, 439–42, 445, 463, 465 Jain, E. 187, 189, 278 James, W. 461, 465 Jassen, A. P. 79, 85, 395, 403, 489, 568–76, 568, 572, 576 Jaubert, A. 435–6, 446–8 Johns, L. L. 586 Johnson, W. A. 45, 49 Johnston, R. 185 Jokiranta, J. 132, 137, 153, 155–6, 162–3, 219, 221–2, 226, 235–6, 238, 240–1, 244–5, 300, 344, 346, 446, 515, 523, 544, 553, 558 Jones, L. 384, 566 Jong, A. de. 159, 163, 224, 226 Jonge, H. J. de 285 Jonge, M. de 478 Joosten, J. 242–3 Joris, D. 544, 557 Jull, A. J. T. 180, 182, 185 Jull, T. A. J. 175 Juusola, H. 576
Kahila Bar-Gal, G. 169, 176, 179, 185 Kaiser, O. 190 Kallai, Z. 206, 214 Kalman, J. 60–4, 69, 71 Kamesar, A. 139, 147 Kampen, J. I. 117, 300, 319, 327–8, 448, 452–3, 456, 466, 521, 556, 564, 567 Kapfer, H. 92, 95 Katz, S. T. 293 Katzoff, R. 43, 49, 175 Kaufman, S. 259–60 Kazen, T. 518, 520, 522 Kessler, N. 50, 543 Kennedy, C. J. 170, 176 Kenyon, K. 106 Keyes, C. W. 162 Khan, G. 201, 590 Kim, S. H. 238, 241 Kimbrough, S. T. 564, 567 Kingsley, P. 157, 163 Kissinger, J. 65, 72 Kister, M. 308–9, 461, 466, 475–7, 479, 584 Kittel, B. 421 Klawans, J. 513, 516–17, 522 Klein, A. 187, 189 Klinghardt, M. 91, 95, 556–7 Klinzing, G. 190 Kloppenborg, J. S. 163 Klutz, T. 465 Knauf, E. A. 108 Knibb, M. A. 35, 283, 285, 406, 411, 510, 512, 533, 537, 539, 543–5, 591 Knohl, I. 315, 317, 351 Knox, K. 185 Kobelski, P. J. 116–17, 300 Koch, J. 111, 117 Köckert, M. 208, 214 Kooij, A. van der 63, 73, 89, 96, 535, 546 König, J. 50 Korzybski, A. 508, 512 Kottsieper, I. 167–77, 173, 176, 178–85, 186–8, 190, 193, 197, 202 Koyfman, S. A. 389, 394 Kraft, R. A. 380–1, 384, 585 Kratz, R. G. 186, 190, 193, 197, 202, 204–15, 205–12, 214–15, 271–2, 285, 326–7, 410–11, 478, 537, 544 Krauss, S. 200, 202 Krausz, Y. 62, 72
Index of Modern Authors Kreuzer, S. 278 Kugel, J. L. 261, 263, 380, 384, 392, 394, 413, 421, 475, 478, 480, 489 Kugler, R. A. 72, 77–85, 78–9, 82, 84–5, 226–7, 263, 423–4, 432–4, 467, 480, 495 Kuhn, K. G. 186, 190 Kuhn, T. 246, 256 Kurtz, P. M. 214 Kutscher, E. Y. 194, 202 Lacoudre, N. 186, 189 Lange, A. 63, 72–3, 120, 123, 127–8, 160–3, 176–7, 185, 190, 206, 215, 226, 231, 236, 256, 272, 274, 276–8, 285, 331, 372, 377, 379, 384, 407, 409, 411, 424, 433–4, 437, 445–6, 452–3, 456, 463, 465–6, 480, 524, 532, 534, 544, 546, 585 Langlois, M. 176, 332–4, 591 Lapin, H. 44, 49, 220, 227, 542, 544 Larson, E. 199, 201 Last Stone, S. 400, 403 Laulainen, J. 576 Lawrence, L. 244–5 Leaney, A. R. C. 539, 545 Lee, P. 414, 421 Le Glay, M. 582 Legrand, T. 591 Leicht, R. 464, 466 Leith, M. J. W. 585 Lemaire, A. 39–40, 49, 385, 530–2 Leonhard, C. 434 Leonhardt-Balzer, J. 156–63 Lesley, M. 362–4, 364 Levine, B. A. 128, 289 Levinson, B. M. 214 Lewis, N. 172, 176, 200, 202 Libby, W. F. 179, 185 Libman, E. 171, 175 Licht, J. 323–4, 343, 386, 394, 407–8, 412, 521, 536, 545, 556 Lichtenberger, H. 127–8, 160, 163, 190, 296, 331, 433, 445–6, 464–5, 495 Lieberman, S. 520, 522, 536, 545, 555, 557 Lieu, J. M. 35, 543, 545 Lifshitz, B. 289, 294 Lightfoot, J. B. 142, 147 Lim, T. H. 34, 61–2, 68–9, 72, 106, 108, 127, 148, 163, 213, 226–7, 243, 256, 265, 268–72, 274, 278, 280, 282, 285, 338,
633
369–71, 374–5, 377, 385, 420, 446–7, 465, 522, 557, 584, 590, 592 Linke, B. 93, 95 Lindars, B. 384 Little, D. 559, 567 Livneh, A. 471, 480 Loffreda, S. 101, 106 Löhr, H. 434 Lohse, E. 591 Lönnqvist, K. 176 Lönnqvist, M. 176 Lopez-Menendez, M. 240 Lorberbaum, Y. 400, 403 Lovin, R. W. 559, 567 Lowth, R. 413, 421 Lübbe, J. 359, 361 Lubetski, M. 191, 532 Lucassen, B. 318 Luchsinger, J. 202 Lundh, L.-G. 508, 510, 512 Luomanen, P. 544 Lyons, W. J. 64, 72, 245, 384, 463, 466, 543 Machiela, D. A. 175–6, 208, 215, 310–13, 313, 472, 480 MacQueen, H. L. 62, 72 Maeir, A. M. 50, 324 Magary, D. R. 412, 456 Magen, Y. 18, 20–4, 26, 29, 31, 35, 97, 107 Magness, J. 17, 20–3, 26–7, 31, 35, 50, 102, 107, 150, 152, 219, 221, 227, 324, 406, 412, 514, 522, 542, 545, 548, 550, 554, 557, 583, 592 Mahan, J. H. 69, 72 Maier, J. 353, 410, 412, 442–3, 446, 591 Maillot, S. 88, 95 Maman, A. 479 Manns, F. 297 Marcus, R. 144, 148 Markovich, M. 162 Martin, M. 186, 190 Martone, C. 341–3 Marttila, M. 215, 377 Martus, S. 214 Mason, E. F. 50, 215, 317, 320–1, 350–1 Mason, S. 79, 85, 119, 121, 128, 149–52, 541, 545, 549, 557 Master, D. 521 Mathys, H.-P. 202
634
Index of Modern Authors
Mayer, B. 108 Mayerhofer, K. 186, 190 Mazar, B. 108 Mazor, G. 20, 34 McClay, R. T. 340 McCready, W. O. 522–3 McDonald, L. M. 385 McLaren, J. 148–53 McLaughlin, J. 88, 95 Mebarki, F. 58 Meier, J. P. 395, 403 Meiser, M. 278 Mendels, D. 141, 148 Metso, S. 32–3, 35, 132, 138, 187, 189–90, 204, 210–11, 215, 299–300, 345–6, 406–7, 409, 412, 439, 446, 489, 531, 532, 539, 544–5, 547–8, 557, 575, 592 Meyers, E. M. 219, 227 Migne, J.-P. 162 Milgrom, J. 399, 403, 478, 513, 518–20, 522, 586 Milik, J. T. 10–11, 13, 16, 36, 40, 42–3, 48, 50, 54–5, 88, 95, 102, 106, 175–6, 182, 185, 187, 189, 259–60, 285, 289, 293, 298, 300, 304–6, 308–9, 329, 333–4, 350–1, 409, 412, 428, 439, 441, 444, 446, 531–2, 537, 545, 584, 586 Millar, F. 148, 583 Millares Maciá, L. 88, 95 Miller, D. 79, 85 Miller, E. 461, 466 Miller, S. 419, 421, 518, 522 Mills, C. W. 241 Mimouni, S. C. 532 Mitchell, D. C. 359, 361 Mittmann-Richert, U. 407, 409, 411, 424, 434, 453, 456, 585 Mizrahi, N. 349, 459, 466 Mizzi, D. 17–36, 18, 20–1, 23–4, 29–31, 35 Młynarczyk, J. 20, 23, 35 Morag, S. 195, 202 Morris, J. 139, 148 Moscovici, S. 508, 512 Moyise, S. 133, 138 Mroczek, E. 285, 358–61, 369, 377, 380, 384 Mulder, M. J. 479 Müller, R. 123, 128, 215 Muraoka, T. 48, 197, 201–2, 421 Murphy, B. M. 167, 173, 175–6
Murphy, C. M. 159, 163 Murphy-O’Connor, J. 307–9, 345–6, 537, 539, 545 Nagar, Y. 20, 35 Najman, H. 85, 123, 128, 189, 265, 268, 281, 285, 311, 313, 346, 349, 369, 377–8, 383–4, 421, 465, 481–9, 487, 489, 495, 531–2, 544, 558 Naveh, J. 463, 466 Nebe, G. W. 193, 195, 203 Netzer, E. 30, 36, 101, 103, 107 Neugebauer, O. 110–11, 118, 441, 446 Neusner, J. 79, 84 Nevill, A. 582 Newman, J. H. 126, 128, 339–40, 347–9, 349, 365–6, 421, 432, 434, 486, 489 Newsom, C. A. 188, 190, 220, 227, 237, 240–3, 247–8, 256, 314, 316–17, 349, 405–7, 410, 412, 416, 421, 430, 434, 455–6, 459, 466, 483, 511–12, 534, 545, 571, 576, 584–6 Nicholls, M. 42, 49 Nicholson, L. J. 248, 256 Nickelsburg, G. W. E. 64, 72, 153–5, 216–17, 226–7, 384, 446, 448, 592 Nicklas, T. 495 Niehr, H. 202 Nigro, L. 98, 107 Nimmer, D. 62, 72 Nir-El, Y. 168, 173, 175–6 Nissenbaum, A. 103, 107 Nitzan, B. 298–301, 340, 415–16, 419, 421, 424, 428, 432, 434, 439, 446, 462, 466 Noam, V. 395–404, 397–8, 400, 402–3 Nogalski, J. D. 215 Nóra, D. 544 North, J. 93, 95 Norton, J. 187, 190, 524, 532 Offerhaus, U. 201 Oikonomopoulou, K. 50 Olson, D. T. 366, 466 Osten-Sacken, P. von der 560, 567 Pabst, H. 276, 279 Pajunen, M. S. 187, 190, 286–8, 299–301, 369–77, 421, 430, 434, 443, 446 Pakkala, J. 123, 128, 215, 377
Index of Modern Authors Palva, H. 576 Panayotov, A. 465 Pardee, D. 294, 413, 418, 421 Parente, F. 153 Parker, H. N. 49 Parry, D. W. 85, 177, 179, 185, 395, 403, 407, 412, 424, 434, 443–4, 447, 465, 575, 584, 588 Patrich, J. 15, 20, 27, 29, 31, 36, 40, 43, 49, 99, 107 Paul, A. 591 Paul, S. M. 137, 201, 255, 324, 377, 447, 465, 532 Peleg, Y. 18, 20–4, 26, 29, 31, 35, 97, 107 Penner, J. 288, 300, 366, 420–1, 432–4, 442, 446, 554, 557 Penner, K. M. 288, 420–1, 433 Perdue, L. G. 452, 456, 532 Perrin, Y. 49 Peters, D. M. 295–7 Petersen, A. K. 330–1, 382, 384, 532 Peterson, J. B. 510, 512 Petit, M. 541, 545 Peursen, W. Th. van 48 Pfann, S. J. 43–4, 49, 56, 118, 169, 176, 184, 186, 190, 235–6, 284, 341, 343, 437, 440, 445–7, 584–5 Pfoh, E. 241 Philip, J. A. 157–8, 163 Philonenko, M. 116, 118 Piaget, J. 508, 512 Piccirillo, M. 106 Piérart, M. 95 Pietersen, L. K. 244–5, 245, 384, 543 Pike, D. M. 585 Pilch, J. J. 241 Pilhofer, P. 546 Pillinger, R. 128 Pingree, D. 115, 118, 464 Pinnick, A. 176, 185, 300, 420, 422, 434, 465 Piovanelli, P. 240–1, 545 Plicht, J. van der 179, 183, 185 Ploeg, J. P. M. van der 9, 52, 448 Polak, F. 242–3 Poland, F. 87, 89, 95 Polaschegg, A. 214 Politis, K. 103, 107 Pomykala, K. E. 496–504, 504 Poole, J. B. 167, 169, 177, 184
635
Popović, M. 37–50, 39, 49–50, 116, 118, 127, 138, 219, 225, 227, 268, 271–2, 278–9, 285, 324, 380, 385, 464, 466, 527, 531–2, 537, 545 Porath, R. 98, 105, 107–8 Porten, B. 187, 190 Porter, S. E. 132, 137–8, 376, 464 Porzig, P. 593 Preus, J. S. 78, 85 Puech, É. 58, 186–7, 189, 230, 236, 270, 272–3, 279, 282, 285, 297, 304–5, 314, 317, 321, 333–4, 351, 355, 357, 377, 446, 473–4, 479–80, 585 Pyysiäinen, I. 544 Qimron, E. 61–2, 122, 128, 193–4, 203, 325–7, 354, 357, 370, 377, 397–8, 401, 403–4, 407–8, 412, 438, 446–7, 545, 585, 587 Rabin, C. 241–3, 324, 447, 587 Rabin, I. 167–8, 170–1, 174, 176, 178–9, 185 Rafferty, I. 446 Rajak, T. 145, 149, 150, 153, 218, 227 Rand, M. C. 354, 357 Rappaport, U. 403, 521, 545 Rasmussen, K. L. 174, 176, 179, 183, 185 Ratzon, E. 439, 441–2, 445, 447 Redford, D. B. 582 Reed, R. 167, 169, 177, 184 Reed, S. A. 37, 50 Reeves, J. C. 448 Regev, E. 33, 36, 222, 227, 239, 241, 537–8, 545 Reimer, A. M. 463, 466 Reinhartz, A. 522–3 Reiterer, F. 495 Rengstorf, K. H. 24, 36 Reshef, D. 103, 107 Rey, J.-S. 319, 465 Reymond, E. D. 275, 278, 279, 413–14, 421 Reynolds, F. E. 559, 567 Rezetko, R. 384 Riaud, J. 148 Richter, H.-P. 190 Ricks, S. D. 177, 185 Rietz H. W. L. 586 Rietz, H. W. M. 586 Rinngren, H. 78–9, 85, 469, 480
636
Index of Modern Authors
Rives, J. B. 80, 85 Rochberg, F. 445 Rodgers, Z. 152 Roetzel, C. J. 576 Rofé, A. 206, 215, 387, 394 Röhrer-Ertl, O. 550, 557 Roitman, A. D. 69–72, 226, 241, 255, 479–80, 545 Römer, T. 444 Römheld, K. F. D. 127–8, 226, 411, 433, 465 Rom-Shiloni, D. 214 Rosenson, J. 99, 108 Rothstein, D. 476, 480 Roy, A. 177 Rubenstein, J. L. 400, 403 Rück, P. 176–7 Ruiten, J. T. A. G. M. van 393–4 Runesson, C. S. 522 Ryder, M. L. 169, 173, 177 Safrai, S. 445 Safrai, Z. 98, 108 Sakenfeld, K. D. 590 Saley, R. J. 584 Samuel, A. Y. 8, 16, 51–4, 58 Samuel, H. 214 Sander, R. 186, 190 Sanders, E. P. 520–2, 540, 545, 555, 557 Sanders, J. A. 36, 385, 443, 447, 585 Sanders, S. 227 Sanderson, J. E. 585 Sandhaus, D. 20, 34 Sarna, N. M. 469, 480 Satlow, M. L. 534, 545 Satran, D. 50, 227 Saukkonen, J. 303, 471, 480 Saulnier, S. 436–7, 444, 447 Saur, M. 202 Scanlin, H. P. 63, 72 Schäfer, P. 293, 433, 459, 461, 464–6 Schäfer-Lichtenberger, C. 243 Schams, C. 524, 532 Schaps, D. 175 Schechter, S. 306, 309, 403, 587 Schiffman, L. H. 36, 49–50, 61–2, 69, 71–3, 85, 120, 128, 155, 185, 190, 226, 241, 248, 255–6, 278, 288, 301, 324, 341, 343, 353–4, 356–7, 384, 396–9, 403, 406, 411–12, 420–1, 433, 470, 478–80, 495,
504–5, 507, 512, 522, 536, 540, 543–7, 552, 555, 558, 567, 570, 576, 590, 592 Schipper, B. U. 214 Schmid, K. 137, 214 Schmidt, F. 442, 447, 466, 479 Schniedewind, W. M. 242–3, 419, 421 Schofield, A. 32–3, 36, 89, 95, 121, 128, 132, 138, 204, 215, 285, 307–9, 346, 406, 412, 533–46, 537–8, 546, 548–9, 558 Scholz, S. 377 Schoonover, M. 127, 531 Schöpflin, K. 495 Schrader, E. 118 Schuller, E. M. 72, 126, 128, 187–90, 226–7, 248, 253, 256, 288, 314, 317, 340, 369–70, 377, 418, 420–4, 430, 433–4, 446, 489, 522, 531–2, 544, 553, 558, 585, 592 Schult, H. 103, 108 Schultz, B. 20, 36, 322–4, 322–4 Schürer, E. 148, 583 Schwagmeier, P. 137 Schwaiger, E. 582 Schwartz, D. R. 95, 176, 185, 400, 403, 433, 495, 556 Schwartz, S. 219, 227, 242–3 Scott, J. C. 572–3, 575–6 Seely, D. R. 287–8 Segal, B. L. 65, 72, 322, 324 Segal, M. H. 207, 215, 285, 386–94, 387, 394, 472–3, 478, 480 Segert, S. 422 Seland, T. 162 Selavan, B. L. 575 Shai, I. 98, 108 Shaked, S. 465, 561, 567 Shanks, H. 61, 593 Sharp, C. J. 569, 576 Shemesh, A. 124, 127, 253, 256, 266, 268, 285, 396, 399–400, 403–4 Shepherd, D. J. 259–60, 259–60 Sheridan, S. 550, 558 Shimony, C. 103, 108 Shmidman, A. 287–8 Sievers, J. 153 Sigismund, S. 278 Silberman, N. A. 61, 72 Silman, Y. 400, 404 Silk, M. 70, 72
Index of Modern Authors Skehan, P. W. 55, 585 Skinner, A. C. 585, 588 Skolnik, F. 36, 480 Smith, J. Z. 533, 546 Smith, M. 145, 148–9, 151, 153 Smith, P. 103, 107, 177 Smithuis, R. 262 Sokoloff, M. 442, 445, 463–5 Sollamo, R. 300, 446, 568, 576 Sperber, D. 200, 203 Sperling, S. D. 469, 480 Spiro, S. I. 184 Stacey, D. 21–4, 29, 31, 36 Stadel, C. 198, 203 Starcky, J. 55 Steck, O. H. 204, 215, 271–2 Steckoll, S. H. 550–1, 558 Stegemann, H. 17, 27, 36, 63, 73, 187–8, 190, 204, 211, 215, 314, 317, 325, 342–3, 408, 410, 412, 430, 434, 527, 532, 544, 547, 558, 585, 593 Stegmann, M. von H. 190 Steinberg, J. 279 Stemmler, M. 95 Stendahl, K. 129, 138 Sterling, G. E. 94, 202, 227 Stern, E. 98, 108 Stern, M. 445 Stern, S. 241, 437, 447 Steudel, A. 186–91, 186–8, 190, 193, 197, 202, 212, 215, 273, 279, 318, 327, 351, 479, 495, 504, 547, 558, 591 Stinespring, W. F. 213 Stock, B. 44, 50 Stökl Ben Ezra, D. 40, 43–4, 50, 120, 127, 201, 341, 343, 413–22, 423, 425, 434, 465, 479, 547, 556–7, 593 Stoll, D. 187, 190 Stone, M. E. 50, 116–17, 220, 222–3, 227, 261–3, 384, 403, 422, 465, 473, 480, 525, 531, 592–3 Stoyanov, Y. 559–60, 566 Strack, H. 167, 177 Strawn, B. A. 543 Strenski, I. 78, 85 Strobel, A. 101, 108 Strugnell, J. 15–16, 55–6, 190, 318–19, 325–7, 370, 377, 403–4, 420, 438, 447, 453, 456, 585
637
Stuckenbruck, L. T. 135, 138, 285, 340, 349, 421, 489, 536, 546 Sturdy, J. 434 Sukenik, E. L. 8–10, 51–4, 314–15, 317, 322, 324, 408, 587 Sussmann, Y. 327, 377, 401, 404 Sutcliffe, E. F. 539, 546 Suys, V. 92, 95 Swartz, M. D. 458, 466 Swarup, P. 535, 546 Sysling, H. 479 Szink, T. L. 585 Tadmor, T. 213 Taha, H. 98, 107 Tajfel, H. 244–5 Talmon, S. 137, 169, 177, 340, 369, 377, 436–40, 442, 445, 447, 585 Tanzer, S. 416, 422 Taylor, J. E. 20, 27, 29, 36, 44–6, 50, 97–108, 97–9, 101–8, 121, 128, 139–48, 139, 141, 144–8, 550–1, 558 Tcherikover, V. 142, 148 Teeter, A. 212, 215 Teeter. D. A. 214 Tempska, U. 62, 73 Thomas, S. I. 329–31, 459, 466 Thompson, T. L. 147, 214 Tiemeyer, L.-S. 190 Tigay, J. H. 394 Tigchelaar, E. J. C. 4, 38, 44, 50, 85, 123, 128, 163, 175, 177, 251, 255, 259–60, 285, 319, 327, 331, 334, 346, 355, 357, 361, 377–8, 384, 418–19, 422, 441, 445, 447, 456, 465, 476, 479–81, 524–32, 529–30, 532, 558, 585, 591 Tobin, T. 340 Too, Y. L. 44, 50 Toorn, K. van der 47, 50 Tov, E. 36–7, 43, 49–50, 56, 63, 71–3, 120, 123, 128, 137, 169–70, 172–3, 176–9, 185–6, 190, 199, 201, 203–6, 215, 224, 227, 255–6, 288, 324, 377, 379, 381, 384–5, 390, 394–5, 403, 407, 409–13, 418, 422, 424, 434, 444, 446–7, 456, 465, 480, 495, 528–9, 531–2, 585, 588, 590, 592 Tov, L. 66–7, 73 Trafton, J. 303
638
Index of Modern Authors
Trebolle Barrera, J. 446, 522, 545 Trever, J. C. 9, 16, 52–4, 58, 346, 411, 586 Troxel, R. L. 412, 456 Trümper, M. 92, 96 Tso, M. K. M. 559–67, 559, 563–4, 567 Tubach, J. 203 Tubb, J. 103, 108 Turner, J. C. 244–5 Twiss, S. B. 559, 567 Tzoref, S. 71–2, 226, 241, 255, 335–8, 338, 479–80, 545, 575 Ullmann-Margalit, E. 64, 73, Ulrich, E. 85, 154–5, 175, 268, 280, 285, 327, 369, 372, 377, 379–81, 385, 443, 447, 465, 584–5, 590 Ulrichsen, J. H. 162 Uro, R. 544 Uusimäki, E. 124, 128, 187, 190, 295, 297, 450, 456 Vandenberghe, M. 127, 531 VanderKam, J. C. 36, 49–50, 58, 72–3, 85, 111, 118, 120, 128, 147, 155, 175, 179, 184–5, 189, 190, 215, 224, 227, 256, 266–9, 271–2, 274, 278–9, 285, 288, 301, 317, 325, 327–8, 353, 371, 377, 379, 384–5, 411, 416, 420–2, 433, 436–9, 441, 443–8, 474, 480, 489, 495, 543–4, 554, 558, 567, 584–5, 590, 593 Van Seters, J. 229, 236 Vârtejanu-Joubert, M. 461, 466, 479 Vasholz, R. I. 259–60 Vaux, R. de 10–11, 13, 18–23, 26–7, 32, 35–6, 40, 42–3, 48, 53–6, 97, 103, 105, 189, 289, 293, 304–5, 308–9, 334, 444, 514, 533, 550, 584, 586 Veenstra, J. R. 465 Vegas Montaner, L. 446, 522, 545 Vermes, G. 4, 66, 139, 142, 148, 251, 255, 344–6, 406, 409, 411, 439, 443–4, 457–8, 466, 496, 499, 537, 546, 583–4, 591 Vielhauer, R. 187, 191, 269–72 Voitila, A. 300, 446 Wacholder, B. Z. 436, 438–9, 443, 448 Wacholder, S. 436, 438–9, 448 Wadsworth, B. 508, 512 Waerden, B. L. van der 111, 157–8, 163
Wajdenbaum, P. 214 Walker-Ramisch, S. 157, 163 Wallert, A. 171, 177 Wassén, C. 49, 248, 256, 288, 420–1, 433, 445, 495, 513–23, 515, 517, 519–20, 522–3, 541, 546, 547–58, 548–53, 555, 558 Warrior, V. M. 80, 85 Water, R. van de 183, 185 Watson, G. E. 413, 418–19, 422 Weber, M. 238–41 Webster, B. 181, 185 Weeks, S. 285, 449, 451, 456 Weidner, E. F. 110–11, 118 Weigold, M. 63, 72, 120, 128, 176, 226, 256, 277–8, 285, 411, 434, 480 Weinbender, J. 280–5 Weinfeld, M. 88, 90, 96, 157, 163, 213, 287–8, 428 Weiss, Z. 433 Weissenberg, H. von 215, 325–8, 326–8, 370, 377, 385, 490–5, 509, 512 Weitzman, S. 201, 203, 242–3 Wendland, P. 147 Weninger, S. 202 Wenning, R. 108 Werker, E. 103, 108 Werline, R. A. 147 Werman, C. 268, 396, 399, 404 Werrett, I. C. 514, 519, 523 Wess, T. J. 170, 176 West, M. L. 163 Whitaker, G. H. 139, 147 Widengren, G. 118 Willi, A. 199, 203 Williamson, H. G. M. 312, 384 Wills, L. M. 227, 356–7 Wilson, A. 356–7, Wilson, B. R. 239–41 Wilson, E. 60–1, 65 Wilson, S. G. 163 Wimbush, V. L. 256 Wimmer, S. 101, 108 Winston, D. 116, 118 Wise, M. O. 4, 34, 36, 42, 49–50, 62, 73, 177, 230, 236, 315, 317, 356–7, 440, 442–3, 445, 448, 474, 480, 486, 493–4, 506–7, 509, 511–12, 524, 532, 544, 557, 591 Wold, B. G. 318–19
Index of Modern Authors Wolff, T. 179, 185 Wolters, A. 305 Woodward, S. R. 169, 177, 179, 185 Woolf, G. 44–5, 50 Wooten, W. 72 Worchel, S. 245 Woude, A. S. van der 213, 259–60, 334, 355, 357, 445, 536, 543, 585 Wright, D. P. 478 Wright, B. G. III 216–27, 227, 248, 256, 407, 412 Xeravits, G. G. 256, 324, 504, 560, 566–7, 593 Yadin, A. 324 Yadin, Y. 10, 14–16, 48–9, 52–3, 58, 106, 127, 169, 177, 190, 198, 203, 289, 292, 294, 324, 354–5, 357, 397–8, 401, 404, 447, 587
639
Yarbro Collins, A. 505, 512 Yardeni, A. 31, 36, 39, 49, 181, 184, 186–7, 190–1, 198, 203, 289, 293, 327, 377, 530, 532, 542, 546, 584 Yellin, J. 542, 546 Yucha, R. 103, 108 Yuditsky, A. 471, 480 Zahn, M. M. 207, 215, 378–85, 378–80, 382–3, 385 Zangenberg, J. 29, 34–6, 97–8, 106–8, 550, 557–8 Zerubabel, E. 510, 512 Zias, J. 550, 558 Zimmern, H. 110, 118 Zissu, B. 514, 523 Zsengellér, J. 384 Zuckerman, B. 184–5, 259–60, 342, 360, 431 Zuckerman, K. 184–5, 342, 360, 431
640
Subject Index Aaron 136, 232, 330, 359, 477, 498, 501–2, 510, 555 Aaronite priesthood 82, 477, 535 and Zadokites 82 Abaddon 494, 561 abecedaries 530 Abihu 477 Abimelech 208, 472 ablution (immersion) 251, 516–9, 521, 555 Abraham 207–8, 232, 261, 302, 310–12, 469–78, 483 Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS ) 180 Achaemenids 103, 196–7 acrostics 418 Adam 365–6, 392, 470, 477 admission 89, 158, 238, 344, 520, 538 admonition 231–2, 307, 409, 537 admonitions 84, 276, 306–8, 326, 399 adjurations see oaths afterlife 284, 496, 499–500 Albright, William Foxwell 7, 9, 52 Albright Institute see American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR ) Alexander Balas 350 Alexander Jannaeus 101, 103, 105, 233, 359, 570 Alexander the Great 46, 98, 153, 218 Allegro, John 55, 61, 65, 304–5, 352 alphabet 193, 418 Amelek, Amelekites 302, 471–2 American Schools of Oriental Research (ASOR ) 7, 9, 52 Ammon/Ammonites 206, 334, 574 Amram 116, 473, 478 animal bones 19, 27, 30, 221, 541, 554 husbandry 145, 552 sacrifices 140, 144, 398 skin 167, 169, 178 annalistic calendars 230–1, 442 annalistic texts 229, 442
Antigonus Mattathias 145 Antiochus IV Epiphanes 142, 230, 276, 322–3, 350–1, 437 angelology 282, 284, 494 angels 114, 116, 259, 262, 284, 298, 319–20, 340, 347–8, 351, 363, 416, 429, 451, 454, 457, 459–61, 471, 476, 481, 483, 485–6, 490–6, 498, 550, 554, 561 Angel of Darkness 116, 159, 493–4, 573 Angel of Presence 474, 492 Angel of Truth 159, 492 angelic guides 332–3 angelic liturgy 347, 459–60 angelic worship 300, 420 Angels of Destruction 457, 494, 573 communion with 300, 316, 420, 425, 460, 483, 492, 500, 553–4, 561 fallen or rebellious 113, 232, 282–3, 298, 311, 427, 457, 492–4 mediation by 266, 482, 486, 491–2 presence of 253–4, 498, 499, 515 priesthood 347–8, 417, 459, 491 anthropology 83–4, 319, 490, 561 apocalyptic apocalypse 65, 230, 320–1, 332, 348, 378, 382, 389, 454, 497 apocalypticism 83, 135, 223, 231, 295–6, 311, 318–19, 389–90, 453–4, 457, 496, 503, 549, 568, 573 literature 123, 127, 229–30, 311, 451, 459, 496–7, 499 visions and revelation 332, 350, 459 and wisdom 160, 223, 295, 319, 453 apocrypha 154, 274–5, 277–8 apotropaism apotropaic hymns 426, 462 apotropaic prayers 262, 275–6, 416, 426 apotropaic rituals 300, 427 Aqeda 471, 474–5 Aramaic calendars 441–3
641
642
Subject Index
Aramaic language 20, 38, 120–1, 134–5, 142, 196–201, 261, 282, 284, 289–92, 310–12, 333, 413, 439, 463, 470, 525 in Achaemenid Empire 197 Hasmonean 197–9 morphology 197–8 orthography 198 at Qumran 198–9 Aramaic manuscripts 55, 70, 120, 124, 134–5, 154, 193, 198, 200–1, 277, 289, 310, 332, 473, 478 archaeology 10, 17–34, 44, 97, 101–2, 121, 211, 216, 219, 221, 228–9, 248, 514, 541–2, 550–1, 544, 569 Archelaus 151, 231, 458 Aristobulus 231, 458 Aristotle 98, 144 asceticism 139, 533, 549, 554 asphalt (bitumen) 97–100 associations 238–9 See Hellenistic associations Assyria 350 astrology 113–16, 225, 330, 441–2 Astronomical Book (1 Enoch) 110–14, 373, 441 astronomy 83, 110–12, 114–15, 225, 439–42, 449 Athos, Mt. (Koutloumousiou) 109, 261–2 atonement 129, 286, 330, 427–8, 437, 499, 502–3, 510, 515–17, 536, 540 authority authoritative traditions 374 authoritative writings 370–1 Babatha archive 14, 43, 45, 47–8, 125, 200, 292 Babylonia(n) 109, 113–14, 121, 462 āšipu (enchanters) 113–14 astrology 111–16, 440, 442 astronomy 110–12, 114–15, 225, 440–1 Babylonian exile 98, 509–10 calendar 111, 114, 442 lexical lists 109 scribal education 109, 262 Bacchanalian cult 93–4 Baillet, Maurice 55, 306, 428, 443 Balaam’s Oracle 358, 501 Bar Kokhba 38, 48, 195, 200, 289–3
coins 292 letters 10, 14, 43, 48, 194, 198, 200, 289–93 Revolt 38, 43, 46–7, 103, 194, 198, 289–93 Barkhi Nafshi (4Q434–438) 286–7 Barosoum, Igantius Afrem I 8 Barthélemy, Dominique 10, 13, 54–5, 435 Beatitudes (4Q525) 295–6, 450 Bedouin, Ta’amireh 7–8, 10–11, 13–15, 51–4, 102, 289, 550 Beelzebub 494 Belial 232, 287, 296, 298–300, 303, 323, 337, 339, 359, 427, 493–4, 498–9, 503, 515, 561, 570 Ben Ba‘yan, Jonathan 289–90, 292–3 Ben Galgula, Yeshua 289–90, 292–3 Ben/Bar Kosiba, Shim‘on see Bar Kokhba Benoit, Pierre 56 Ben Sira (book of) 39, 54, 124, 154, 273–4, 276, 278, 295, 329, 375, 417, 449–55, 526 Ben Yoezer, Yose 402 Berakhot (4Q286–290) 298–300 Bethlehem 8, 51–2, 54 Biblical Archaeology Review 56 Bible and biblical scholarship 204–13, 369–76 biblical criticism 204–5, 217 biblical law 209–10 biblical texts 205–7, 213, 280 interpretation and expansion 81 textual development 207, 335 textual pluriformity 63 blessings and curses 84, 296, 298, 300, 302, 326, 415–16, 419, 535 blessings at meals 287, 428, 431 Boethusians 396, 401 Book of the Watchers 282, 374, 490–2, 525 boundaries maintenance 246 rites and rituals 426 Branch of David 501–2 bread 158, 498, 555 Brontologion 115–16, 463 Brownlee, William H. 9, 52–4, 408 burial practices 26, 30, 46, 102–3, 124, 513, 550–1 Burrows, Millar 9, 53–4
Subject Index Cairo Genizah 109, 129, 261–2, 284, 306, 396, 462, 464, 505, 514, 525 calendars 80, 83, 111, 114, 116, 229–31, 266, 274, 281, 283, 302, 325–6, 375, 393, 433, 435–43, 490, 500, 554, 565 calendrical calculations 83, 229, 232 Calendrical/Mishmarot Texts 230–1 calendrical rites 425–6 calendrical texts 126, 283, 345, 424, 426, 437–42 equinoctial month 112, 441 lunar calendars see Moon solar calendars see Sun synchronistic calendars 439–41 Callirhoe see ‘Ein az-Zara camps 121, 248, 254, 307, 428, 537, 539, 547–8 canon and canonicity 273–4, 280, 369–70, 374–6, 379 Cave of the Letters 14, 43, 289 celibacy 27, 101, 146, 248, 255, 318, 341, 533, 537, 541, 547–50 cemeteries 15, 18, 20, 26–7, 29–30, 33, 102–3, 221, 248, 514, 518, 550–1 skeletal remains 46, 550–1 childbirth 399, 513, 519, 541, 549 children 8, 46, 143, 146, 341, 498, 537–8, 548–50 Children of Darkness 296, 416, 535 Children of Light 416, 535 Children of Truth 535 Christianity (Early) 13, 58, 65, 71, 87, 119, 129–37, 217–19, 223, 537, 561 comparative methodology 131–3 comparative texts 129–30 linguistic connections 132–3 Chronicles 119, 207, 228, 376, 382 circumcision 122, 366, 428, 474, 492, 507 cisterns 17–18, 27, 46, 105 cognitive maps 508, 510 cognitive theories 242, 300, 330, 505, 508–11 coins 18, 21, 37, 43, 47, 91, 103, 292 collections of compositions 372–3 collective memory 234–5, 505, 509, 536 community communal meals 27, 129, 142, 145, 428, 458, 498, 510, 513, 515, 520–1, 535, 552, 554–6
643
festive meals 520–1, 554–5 meals 90, 139, 287, 426, 428, 516, 520–1, 554–6 communal meetings 157, 250–1, 253, 408, 513, 515, 517, 535, 540, 556 communal prayer 365, 461, 544 communal transgression and punishment 157, 249–52, 539–40, 521, 552–3, 555 Community Hymns 315, 416 community organization 78, 81, 89–90, 217, 336, 344, 405, 410, 497, 536–7, 539 Contenson, Henri de 11 contracts 39, 172–3, 192, 194, 197–8, 201, 292 Copper Scroll (3Q15) 194, 304–5 cosmos 319, 330, 426, 429, 553, 563, covenant 326, 354, 469, 490 covenant ceremony 298–300, 339–40, 345, 407, 423–5, 427–9, 494, 538 Covenant Code 209–10 Sinaitic covenant 354, 469–70 creation of man and woman 391–2 Cross Jr., Frank Moore 55–6, 169, 186 cryptic Cryptic A script 439–40, 528 cryptic script 81, 193, 267, 341, 437 cryptic texts 173, 427 cryptic vision 277, 454 cultic laws 209–10, 326 cultic worship 506, 510–11 cynicism 84, 549–50 daily life 547–56 Damascus 81, 104, 306–7 Damascus Document (CD ) 32–3, 136, 156–7, 231–5, 248–50, 253, 267, 269, 298–300, 306–8, 326, 336–7, 342, 346, 358, 388, 391, 396, 399, 401, 409, 427–8, 450, 469, 497, 501, 505, 507, 509, 514, 526, 547–8, 551, 570 arrangement of 306 composition of 307 eschatology in 497, 501 expulsion liturgy 298–300, 428
644
Subject Index
halakhic issues within 249–50, 253, 306–7, 342, 396, 547–8, 551 historical review in 231–3 marriage and celibacy 547–8, 551 relationship with 1QS 32–3, 307–8 structure and organization 336 Daniel 120, 125, 134, 154, 192, 197, 212–13, 230, 259, 270–4, 277, 284, 311, 322, 329, 333–4, 350, 370, 380, 389, 452, 454, 496–7, 499, 503, 528 date palms 20, 31, 97, 99 David 37, 270, 273, 275, 278, 281, 366, 370–1, 419, 462, 469, 482, 485, 506, 525–6 Davidic messiah (royal messiah) 321, 351, 498, 501–3 Day of Atonement 428, 437 Dead Sea 7, 9–10, 14, 17, 37, 39, 51, 97–105 Dead Sea Discoveries 406 Dead Sea region 97–105 archaeology of 101–2 communication and transportation 103–4 fortified settlements 97, 103–5 in the Hellenistic/Early Roman Period 98–101 in the Iron Age 97–8 Jordan Valley 100–2, 174 Lake Asphaltitis 99–100 palm trees 20, 98, 100–1 salt industry 97, 99 shaft graves 102–3 water 104–5 Dead Sea Scrolls academic and scholarly impact 63–4 acquisition and publication of 51–8 connection with Khirbet Qumran 24–6 controversies 56, 61–3 discoveries of 7–16, 51–4 new technologies and 70 ownership of 61–3 popular and cultural impact 64–9 popularization of the scrolls 60–1 public engagement with 69–70 recent scholarship 216–17 significance of 57–8, 63–4
deeds 39, 173, 292 Demetrios (Demetrius) 233, 570 demonic spirits/forces 363, 416, 491, 493, 494, 496 demonology 262, 284, 494–5 demons 113, 127, 159, 363, 426, 457–8, 462–3, 490–4, 517, 561 desert 223–4, 345, 487–8, 494, 497–8, 511, 542 determinism 233, 287, 319, 330, 336–7, 352, 387, 389, 454, 482, 493, 496, 498, 527, 564–6 Deuteronomic Code 209–10 Digital Dead Sea Scrolls (Israel Museum) 186, 588 Dionysians 87 Discoveries in the Judaean Desert (DJD ) 10, 15, 54–5, 57, 122, 131, 186, 216, 230, 306, 314, 325, 381, 437–8, 453 divination 113, 330, 458, 463–4 divinity divine encounter 481, 483, 485–9 divine encounter, location of 486–8 divine knowledge 361, 389, 450, divine mysteries 481, 484–5, 488 divine (supernatural) revelation 264–5, 267, 281, 335, 379, 400, 450, 454–5, 481–9, 491, 565 divine wrath 296, 299, 350, 509–10, 569, 573 divorce 146, 396, 551, 553 divorce documents 39 doxology 366, 415, 443 Drori, Amir 56 dualism 116–17, 159–60, 283, 311, 319, 323, 337, 363, 457, 559–66 anthropological dualism 562 cosmic dualism 116–17, 287, 299, 561–3 eschatological dualism 561, 563 ethical dualism 561–3 metaphysical dualism 560–1 physical dualism 562 psychological dualism 562–3 soteriological dualism 562–3 spatial dualism 561, 563 theological dualism 562–3 dwq 114–15, 439–41
Subject Index Early Judaism 119–27, 217–19 École Biblique et Archéologique Française 9–10, 13, 52, 54 Edom, Edomites 97, 231, 334, 574 education 69–70, 126, 150, 261, 450, 452, 527, 530–1 Egypt 37, 46, 84, 104, 119, 121, 123, 144, 230, 311, 350, 471–6, 550 Egyptian associations 88, 90 Egyptian cosmetics 98 Egyptian embalming 99–100 Egyptian magicians 208 Egyptian papyrus 122, 172–3, 224 Egyptian scribal tradition 174, 528 ‘Ein Boqeq 30, 104 ‘Ein el-Ghazal 105 ‘Ein el-Ghuweir 103–4 ‘Ein ez-Zara 30, 99–104 ‘Ein Feshkha 13, 20, 38, 102, 104–5, 552 ‘Ein Gedi 16, 30, 38, 97–102, 104–5, 289–93 Eleazar 477 elect 81, 232, 287, 306, 319, 335–7, 451, 496, 498, 500 Elect of Israel 81, 336 Elect of Righteousness 535 election 233, 302, 307–8, 428, 490, 493, 562 Elijah 133–4, 136, 320–1, 388, 482, 503 Elisha 388, 482 Enoch 120, 154, 208, 281–3, 310–11, 316, 333, 379, 459, 470, 474, 477, 525–6 1 Enoch 81, 110–14, 154, 266, 282–3, 295, 373–4, 379, 382, 388, 451, 454, 496, 525 astronomy 110–12 Enūma Anu Enlil 111–12, 116, 441 Ephraim 212, 335, 571–2 eschatology (eschatological) 79, 83, 129, 136, 160, 162, 276, 283, 295–6, 298–9, 307, 320–23, 330, 341–3, 358–9, 362–3, 389, 451, 455, 457, 461, 482, 496–503, 561, 563, 565–6 annihilation 493, 561, 574 blessing 339–40 community 287, 496 high priest 461, 503 interpretation 363 judgment 160, 454, 573–5
645
liturgies 275, 320, 415, 429 prophet 321, 501–3 retribution 573–5 rituals 300, 427 temple 499 texts 130, 363, 573 violence 568, 574–5 war 81, 332–3, 427, 499, 501–3, 568–9, 572–4 esotericism 67, 193, 225, 233, 329, 348, 459 Essaioi 142 Essenes 17, 30, 61, 67–8, 100–1, 121–2, 131–2, 139–52, 156, 158, 211, 229, 248, 305, 308, 320, 405, 432, 457–8, 462–3, 527, 533, 537, 540–1, 547, 549–50, 552, 555–6, 568 common life 145–6 Every Good Person is Free 140–5 gender issues 146 Hypothetica 145–7 sacrifice 144 Essene Hypothesis 15, 121, 132, 335, 541 Esther 192, 273–4, 277 ethics 559, 563–6 and communitarianism 564–6 and determinism 564–6 and dualism 563, 565–6 and eschatological expectation 565 and foreign influence 564 and futurism 565–6 and naturalism 564–5 and rigorism 565–6 and scriptural traditions 564 and self-identity 564 and theonomy 565–6 ethnic identity 77, 79–84, 103, 511 in antiquity 80, 83–4 characteristics 81–2 in Judea 122 at Qumran 81–3 ethnos 79–80, 82–4, 122 evil spirits 374, 416, 457, 462, 476, 492–5 exorcism 416, 426, 462–4, 494 exorcistic psalms/hymns 275, 462, 494 exorcistic spells 463 exorcistic texts/manuals 462–3 expulsion 238, 240, 249, 298–300, 426, 428–9, 552–3
646
Subject Index
Ezekiel 269, 333, 348, 390, 482–3, 506 Ezekiel (prophet) 270, 277, 332–3, 370, 481–3 Ezra (person) 124–5, 524 feasts and fasts 424, 428 festivals 438, 553 Festival Calendar 356 festival liturgy 428 Festival of Wood Offering 439 First Jewish Revolt (also Jewish War) 21, 37, 46–7, 100, 102, 194, 305, 323, 497 flood calendar 393, 435 interpretations 232, 302–3, 393, 435 folly 362–3 food 141, 145, 156, 287, 396–8, 423, 520–1, 552–4, 555 impurities 397–8 laws 122, 158, 397–8, 507, 518–20, 554 reduction of 521, 555 Former Prophets 270–1 Foucault, Michel 246–7 fourth philosophy 151 Gabriel 16, 333, 492 Galilee 100, 119, 142, 199, 292, 514, 541 Gamul 231, 438–9 gates 110, 439, 441–2 Geertz, Clifford 246 gender discourse 248–9 Genesis 207–8, 265–6, 302–3, 310–12, 391–3, 435, 471–3 Genesis Apocryphon (1QapGen) 8–9, 51, 54, 175, 208–9, 310–12, 383, 470, 472–3 Genesis Commentaries (4Q252–254) 302–3 genital discharges 399, 513, 518–20 Genizah(/ot) 44, 46, 48, 274 Giants, Book of 266, 282–3, 311, 525 God, ideas of 490–1 God of knowledge/wisdom 387 Gomorrah 302, 471 Göttingen Qumran Dictionary Project 186 graves 17, 20, 26, 29, 102–3, 550 Greco-Roman philosophy 140
Greek 20, 38–40, 45–7, 60, 121, 133–4, 140, 142, 192, 199–200, 224, 282–4, 289–92, 304 funerary inscriptions 199, 201 influence of 200 koiné 199 Greek manuscripts 13, 42, 60, 121, 132, 173 Greek Minor Prophets Scroll (8HevXIIgr) 134 Greek Testament of Levi (TL evi) 262, 503, 525 Greeks 79, 84, 94, 101, 228, 264 Hagu, Book of 282, 374 halakhah 78, 209–10, 325–6, 332, 388, 395–402, 409, 519 ancient pre-sectarian 308, 397–8 halakhic interpretation 84, 124, 266–7, 284, 389, 490 halakhic works (legal texts) 130, 210, 221, 284, 326, 395–6, 399, 507 sectarian exegesis 398 sectarian innovation 398–9 tannaitic 397, 400–1 Harding, Gerald Lankester 10–11, 13, 53–5 Hasmoneans 97, 99–100, 145, 223, 376, 437, 501, 569–71 heaven heavenly knowledge 451, 454 heavenly realm 300, 316, 348, 417, 429, 457, 459–60, 476, 481, 484–6, 491–2, 495, 499, 500, 503, 521, 561, 563 heavenly sanctuary 298–9, 417 heavenly temple 491, 511 Hebrew 38, 55, 60, 120, 133, 192–6, 198, 200–1, 241–2, 261, 276, 284, 289–92, 304, 410, 419, 439, 463, 470, 490, 528–9 Classical Hebrew 194–5 Late Biblical Hebrew 194 Mishnaic Hebrew 194–5, 304 morphology 193–6 paleo-Hebrew 13, 55, 193, 276, 410, 490, 528–9 Qumran Hebrew 133, 193–6, 241 Hebrew University of Jerusalem 4, 8–9, 51–2, 56
Subject Index Hekhalot literature 329, 348, 459–60 Hellenism 78, 87–94, 200–1, 217–19, 311, 550, 564, 574 Hellenistic calendars 440 Hellenistic Jewish literature 139–55 Jewish compositions 153–5 Josephus 148–53 Philo 139–47 Hellenistic literature 156–62 Hellenistic philosopher communities 157–9 Hellenistic philosophy 160–2 Hellenistic associations 87–94, 156–9, 432, 556 comparison with the Yahad 89–91 geography of 88 marzēah. 88 organization 87 and religion 87, 92–3 Herculaneum Villa of the Papyri 43–6, 222–3 Herodium 289, 293 Herodotus 161, 228 Herod the Great 14, 101–2, 105, 119, 147, 151, 458 development in the Dead Sea Region 101–2 high priest 93, 325, 340, 343, 348, 429, 461, 500, 502–3, 539, 570–1 historical texts 230–1 historiography 211, 220–3, 228–35 Hodayot (1QH a) 8, 51–2, 54, 171, 187, 234, 242–3, 287, 295–6, 300, 314–16, 318, 339–40, 386, 414, 416, 418, 430, 450, 491, 526, 553, 561, 563, 571 Holiness 86, 140–2, 144, 209–11, 244–5, 299–300, 320, 348, 399, 402, 462, 486–8, 490–2, 495–6, 498–9, 510, 513–21, 535, 539–41, 548, 555–6, 561, 571–2 extension of 399 Holiness Code 209–10, 515–16 holy council 460, 488, 515 holy ones 141, 320, 462, 486, 491–2, 495, 499, 561 men of holiness 86, 516, 521, 555 perfect holiness 515, 539, 541, 548 and purity 513–21
647
Holy of Holies 340, 506, 510, 539 Homer 125, 161, 420 horoscopes 79, 330 House of Judah 571 human-divine relationship 482, 485–8 Hunzinger, Claus-Hunno 55–6 hymns 286–7, 413, 416, 429, 460 Iamblichus 157–8 identity formation 242 ‘Ijha, Ibrahim 51 immersion 251, 521 impurity 29, 253–4, 307, 327, 330, 341, 396–8, 400–2, 462, 494, 513–21, 549, 555–6 corpse 397–8, 402, 426, 513, 515, 517–19 liquids 397–8, 402, 518, 555 menstruation 399, 426, 513, 515, 518–20, 549 moral 327, 515–17, 555 oil stain 514, 518, 520 physical/bodily 254, 426 ritual 29, 396, 494, 513, 515–17 scale disease 517, 519–20 sexual 254, 399, 426, 514 incantation 99, 426, 462, 494 incantation bowls 462 inclusion and exclusion 156–7, 232, 244–5, 252–5, 330, 336–7, 342, 487 insider-outside language 330, 336–7 physical defects 253 rules of 252–5 ink 173–5, 178–9, 183, 188, 418, 527 composition and production 173–4 damage to 174–5 inkwells 25, 175, 530, 552 inscriptions 15, 38, 46, 87, 88, 94, 192, 196, 198–201, 221, 323 funerary inscriptions 192, 196, 199–201 inspiration inspired authorship 264 inspired interpretation 125, 271, 374, 389, 564–5 Instruction (1Q/4Q) 160–1, 223, 276, 318–19, 453–5 Instrumental Neutron Activation Analysis 542 intercalation 436, 438–9
648
Subject Index
interpretation 386–94 biblical interpretation 81, 133–4, 207–9, 306, 386–94 interpreting texts 484–5 nature and character of 390–1 pesher interpretation see Pesharim scriptural interpretation 363, 366 interpreter of the Law 232, 359, 502 intertextuality 137, 207, 242, 281, 359, 426, 443 Isaac 109, 112, 208, 261, 302–3, 453, 469–78, 483 Isaiah 81, 212, 269, 271, 348, 353, 362–3, 511 Isaiah Scroll (1QI saa) 8–9, 51–2, 54, 182 Isaiah Scroll (1QI sab) 8, 51–2, 54 Isha’ya, George 8, 51 Israel (true remnant) 229, 232–3, 244, 534 Israel Antiquities Authority 15, 56–7, 70, 184 Israeli Department of Antiquities see Israel Antiquities Authority Ithamar 477 Jabesh Gilead 205–6 Jacob 208, 302–3, 453, 469–78, 483 Jeremiah 57, 123, 269–71, 287, 390 Jeremiah (prophet) 270, 277, 481 Jericho 11, 17, 25, 29–30, 37, 46, 97–105, 304, 359, 542, 570 Jerusalem 81, 91–4, 100, 104, 119, 121–2, 142, 144, 148, 152, 198, 230, 276, 287, 292, 304, 325, 329, 332–3, 342, 353, 396, 398, 499, 502, 505–11, 514, 519, 536, 541–2, 549, 569, 571–2 Jesus 52, 58, 71, 132–5, 136, 218, 315, 321, 351, 503 Jesus Movement 63, 65, 68, 132, 134, 348, 550 Job 276 Job, Aramaic 259–60, 276 John Hyrcanus I 101, 105, 145, 230, 345, 359, 570 John Hyrcanus II 230–1 John the Baptist 101, 132–3, 136–7, 321 Jordan River 101, 104, 219 Jordanian Department of Antiquities 10, 53
Joseph 262, 277, 302–3, 389, 472–3, 476–7, 525 Josephus 99–101, 103–4, 121, 132, 139, 141, 144–6, 148–52, 154, 158, 199, 205, 229, 273, 359, 405, 452, 458, 462–3, 521, 525, 541, 549, 552–3, 555 on the Dead Sea region 99, 100, 103–4 on the Essenes 149–52 source material 149 jubilees 207–8, 229, 242, 248, 262, 265–7, 303, 311–12, 348, 356, 373–5, 378–9, 382–3, 388–9, 391–3, 397, 435–6, 459, 472, 478, 490, 492, 497, 502–3 Judah (patriarch) 212, 471, 477 Judas the Essene 458 Judas Maccabeus 145 Judean Desert 7, 13–16, 25, 37, 39, 45–7, 56, 97, 192, 200, 383, 527, 528 judgment (final) 232, 455, 494, 496, 565 Jum’a Muhammad 7, 51 Kando see Shanin, Khalil Eskander (Kando) Kenyon, Sir Frederic G. 7, 16 Ketef Jericho see Wadi el-Mafjar Khirbet Mazin 103, 105 Khirbet Mird 11, 38 Khirbet Qumran 10, 13, 15, 18–34, 51, 131, 153, 211, 217, 306, 326, 405–6, 409, 514, 541–2, 550–3 alternative theories 26–32 caves 20, 24, 29 cemeteries 20, 26–7, 29–30 material culture 18–20 relationship between settlement and scrolls 24–6, 32–3 revised chronology 21–2, 406 settlement chronology 21–4 settlement ruins 18 Kingdom of God 135–6 King, Law of the 356, 399, 570 Kiraz, Anton 9, 52 Kittim 230, 322–3, 334, 498, 502, 569, 572, 574 Lamech 310–11, 477 lament 352–3, 417, 429
Subject Index Lamentations 276, 417 land 81 languages 121, 132–5, 192–201, 241–2, 292, 304, 333, 528 Arabic 38, 47, 196 Latin 14, 38, 42, 47, 192, 195, 223, 284 Nabatean 38, 45, 47, 88, 132, 175, 197 Ugaritic 88, 196 Latter Prophets 269–71 lemma 212, 271, 335, 337, 387–8, 484, 542 Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library 70, 184, 186, 188, 589 letters 13–14, 39, 47–8, 55, 172–4, 192, 201 Levi 82, 109, 112, 114, 120, 261–2, 316, 323, 359, 379, 423, 450, 470, 473–8, 502, 525–6, 570 Levi, Aramaic (also Aramaic Levi Document) 261–2, 356, 450 Levites 82, 261–2, 323, 339, 341, 477, 502, 525–6, 535, 561 Liar, the 234 Life of Adam and Eve 382 Lion of Wrath 569 Lippens, Philippe 10 Liquid of the Many 514, 520 literary issues literary development 206–7 literary genre 304–5, 332, 347, 352, 382–3, 387–90 literary traditions 135 liturgy (liturgical) 120, 287, 298–300, 339, 344, 348, 353, 365–6, 409, 415, 418–19, 423–33, 442, 459–60, 485–6, 506, 573 blessings 298 compositions/material 125–6, 201, 347–8, 352–3, 365, 371, 407 poetry 348, 430 recitation/performance 298, 353, 423–4, 427–9, 460–1 texts 332, 348, 414–15, 418–19, 423–33, 438, 442–3, 485–6, 493, 526 traditions 201 Livy 93, 228 Luminaries 392–3, 439, 553 Maccabean revolt 375–6 Maccabees 119 Macedonians 98
649
M. Aemilius Scaurus 231 magic 113, 127, 208, 300, 330, 457–64 magical poetry 416 magical recipe books 462 –3 Malki-tsedeq see Melchizedek Malki-rešaʿ see Melchiresha Man of Belial 359, 570 Man of the Lie 234, 571 Man of Scoffing 234 Manasseh 212, 335, 571–2 Manaemus (Menahem) the Essene 458 manuscripts manuscript production 122–3 manuscript statistics 371–4 Many, the (ha-rabbim) 82–3, 249, 299, 336, 340, 345, 406, 408, 428, 484, 514, 520, 536–7, 539, 541, 551, 553, 555 liquid of the Many 514, 520 purity of the Many 90, 514, 520–1, 555 Maoza 45 Marmadji, A. Sebastianus 8–9 marriage 80, 146, 149, 248, 255, 292, 312, 318–19, 326, 336, 356, 396, 428, 453, 515, 537, 541, 547–53, 565 marital regulations 551–2 Masada 14, 25, 30, 37–8, 43, 45–8, 100–2, 154, 192, 199, 269, 278, 292, 347, 359, 425, 450, 459 Maskil 287, 307, 316, 339, 345, 347, 407, 410, 425, 427–30, 454, 460–2, 487–8, 524, 527, 531 Hymn of the Maskil 345, 430, 439, 443 Masoretes 273 Masoretic Text 7, 133, 154, 194–5, 205–7, 211, 246, 260, 266, 273, 275, 277, 284, 370–3, 379–80, 390, 476 Mastema 471, 492, 494 materiality material culture 122–3, 167–75 material reconstruction 186–9 Mebaqqer (Overseer) 307, 336, 427–8, 527, 536, 538, 551 Melchiresha‘ 116, 300, 427, 494 Melchizedek 116, 351, 475, 492, 499, 503 membership 86–7, 238–9 men of the community 303 men of holiness 86, 516, 521, 555 Merkabah traditions 299–300, 348
650
Subject Index
Messianism 58, 125, 133, 136–7, 303, 341, 358–9, 361, 429, 498, 500–3 messiah 287, 320–1, 341–3, 351, 358–9, 361, 496, 498, 500–3 Messiah of Aaron 502, 555 Messiah of Israel 343, 501–2, 555 Messiahs of Aaron and Israel 136, 359, 498, 501–2 Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521) 136, 320–1 messianic banquet 341, 343, 428, 498, 501–2, 555 Methuselah 310–11, 477 Mevin (‘understanding one’) 318–19, 453–4, 524 Mezuzot 13, 40, 42–3, 129, 174 Michael 333, 351, 492, 498–9, 503, 561 Midrash 389, 399–400, 410 aggadah 389, 481 halakhah 389, 481 tannaitic 399 Milik, Józef T. 10–11, 13, 54–5, 182, 187, 305–6, 329, 350, 439, 441 Miqs. at Ma‘aśeh ha-Torah (4QMMT ) 84, 120, 194, 209, 216, 267, 270, 325–7, 375, 396, 497, 507, 548 addressees 327 legal opinions in 326–7, 396 Miqwa’ot (ritual baths) 27, 221, 514, 518, 541, 556 Mishnah 267, 401, 452 Moab/Moabites 97, 209, 334, 574 moon 110–15, 226, 365, 392–3, 426, 439–42, 463 lunar calculations 111–12 lunar calendar 130, 229–30, 436, 439–40 lunar month 110–11, 114, 229, 436, 439–41 lunar phases 225, 440–1 lunar years 439, 441 luni-solar cycle 436–7, 439, 441 selenodromion 115, 463 morphology 195, 197, 205, 529–30 Moses 124, 136, 146, 154, 209–10, 232, 264–7, 270, 281, 316, 340, 354, 358–9, 366, 370, 379, 477, 481, 492, 497, 503, 525, 535, Muhammad ed-Dib 7, 216 Musa, Khalil 7
mysteries (4Q299–300) 329–30, 454–5 mystery (rāz nihyeh) 126, 160–1, 235, 319, 329–30, 453–4 mystery religions 161–2, 432 mysticism 348, 458–62 Nabateans 97–8 Nabatean language 38, 45, 47, 88, 132, 175, 197 Nag Hammadi texts 65, 71 Nah.al Arugot 14–15, 38 Nah.al David see Wadi Sdeir Nah.al Harduf 14 Nah.al H. ever 14, 38, 43, 45–8, 102, 132, 134, 181, 187, 199, 289, 292 artefacts 48 deposition of texts 46–7 texts 45–8 Nah.al Michmash 15, 38, 46 Nah.al Mishmar 14, 38, 199 Nah.al Se’elim see Wadi Seiyal Nahash the Ammonite 205–6 nakedness 251 Nash Papyrus 9, 52–3 Nazirite 133 New Jerusalem 332–4 New Testament 132–7, 144, 199, 295–6, 351, 375–6, 560 New Testament testimonia 358, 361 Noah 120, 232, 261, 302–3, 310–12, 379, 435, 459, 470, 472, 475, 477 oaths 141–2, 307, 348, 396, 416, 427–8, 542, 553 Ohan, Nasri 51–2 Onias III 343 opobalsam cultivation 99–102 Origen 37 Orion Center 589 orthography 198, 205, 242–3, 259, 315, 333, 529, 531 ossuaries 52 ostraca 14–15, 31, 38, 47, 167, 292, 530, 542 palaeography 25, 44, 196, 529–30 palaeographic dating 40, 130, 193, 196, 259, 298, 318, 320, 333, 339, 341, 347, 350, 358, 365
Subject Index Palestine Archaeological Museum 10–11, 13–14, 53–5, 184, 304 palimpsest 38, 47 papyrus 13, 38–40, 47–8, 122, 167, 170, 172–4, 224, 282, 291, 365, 432, 528 parabiblical texts 131, 277, 378–83, 414 parallelism 348, 418, 451 parallelismus membrorum 413, 418–19 parascriptural 378, 381–2, 435 parchment 52, 167–75, 178–9, 183, 298, 350 Passover 252, 254, 554 patriarchs 120, 135, 207–9, 283, 302–3, 469–78 patriarchal chronology 471, 474 pedagogy 126, 327, 450, 451 penal codes 88, 249, 254–5, 345, 407, 516, 521, 540 Pentateuch see Torah People of Mockery 535 People of Righteousness 535 People of Wickedness 535 periodization 229, 232, 337, 471 Persians 79, 197 Pesharim 125, 153, 210–12, 233–5, 245, 267, 269–71, 302, 306, 308, 315, 335–8, 358, 374, 386, 388–90, 405–6, 408, 419, 463, 471, 484–5, 497, 506, 526, 528–9, 571–4 continuous pesharim 210, 335–8, 389 history within 211, 233–4, 337 interpretation 81, 125, 212, 306, 308, 336–7, 388–9 sectarian terminology in 335–6 thematic pesharim 210, 335–7 Pesher Habakkuk 8, 9, 51, 54, 129, 187, 270, 329, 437, 497, 526, 530, 534, 569, 572 Pesher Nahum 212, 233, 335, 569–70 history in 233 Pesher Psalms 571 Pfann, Stephen 56, 341 Pharisees 92, 122, 124, 149, 152, 212, 335, 345, 396, 400, 402, 570–1 Philistia 574 Philo 132, 139–47, 149–50, 158, 160–1, 229, 405, 432, 457, 517, 541, 549, 552, 555 Philodemus 44–6, 222
651
Phinehas 569 phonology 197, 418, 530 physical defects/imperfection 253–5 physiognomy 115–16, 157, 225, 287, 427, 464 Pliny the Elder 100–2, 132, 152, 229, 541, 549 on the Essenes 100–1 on Jericho 102 Ploeg, Johannes P. M. van 9, 52 Plutarch 159–60 poetry 413–20, 430 defining 413 function 419–20 genres 415–18 mystical 417 narrative 417 rhetorical devices 419 stylistic devices 418–19 Pompey 231, 323 Posidonius 88, 98–9 pottery 15, 18, 20–1, 23–5, 27, 29, 37–40, 42, 47–8, 98, 102, 105, 542, 552 kilns 18, 27 pottery-production centre 29, 31 workshop 18, 31 poverty/poor 296 prayer 79–80, 82, 125–6, 243, 287, 299, 316, 323, 340, 365–6, 386, 415, 423–8, 431–2, 442–3, 458, 461, 483, 485–8, 493–4, 510, 552–4, 556 communal 461, 554 nocturnal 554 prayer texts 126, 130, 314, 316, 432 predestination 79, 232–3, 493 priesthood 81–3, 89, 92, 140, 144, 146, 238, 250, 266–7, 307, 319, 322, 326, 329–30, 332, 339–40, 342–3, 347, 356, 359, 361, 395–6, 400, 425–6, 436, 439–40, 473–6, 478, 485–6, 491, 498, 500–2, 506, 509–10, 525–6, 535, 537, 539–40, 550, 555, 564, 566, 569, 571 Aaronide priesthood see Aaronide priesthood blessings and curses 295–6, 299, 339–40, 428 compositions 109, 114, 116, 120, 207 education/instruction 109, 261–2
652
Subject Index
halakhah 400, 402 ideology 223, 320 priest over the many 299, 428 priestly authors 112, 262 priestly courses (mishmarot) 83, 114, 225, 229–31, 437–8, 440–1 priestly messiah 136, 321, 343, 359, 498, 501–3 priestly scribes 113, 122, 329 Zadokite priesthood see Zadokite priesthood Prince of Light 351, 492–4, 503 Prince of the Congregation 322–3, 336, 429, 501–2 procreation 146, 513, 549, 552 property and possessions 58, 90, 129, 141, 143, 145–6, 156–8, 220, 244, 249–50, 296, 305, 463, 527, 535, 540, 552 prophecy 125, 134, 210, 277, 329–30, 335, 338, 350, 371, 388–90, 417, 420, 481–2, 485, 526 prophetic poetry 417–18 Prophets, The (nevi’im) 269–72, 371, 481 proto/pre-Samaritan texts and text types 266, 358–9, 387 Proverbs 276, 449–54 Psalter/Psalms 270, 275, 371–3, 414, 429–31 pseudepigrapha 154, 261, 281 pseudepigraphy 264, 281, 310–11, 375, 459, 462, 481 Pseudo-Ezekiel 132, 270–1, 390, 482–3 pseudo-prophets or pseudo-prophetic 482–3 Ptolemies 119 purification 29, 129, 139, 141, 159, 307, 428, 487, 491, 498, 513, 516–21, 555 purification offerings 398, 517 purification rites and rituals 129, 307, 426, 517 purity 27, 31, 58, 79, 82–3, 124, 142, 217, 221, 244, 249, 253–5, 262, 307, 326, 354, 356, 395–6, 400, 428, 492, 498, 500, 507, 513–21, 549, 554–6, 564 purity regulations 58, 326, 356, 513, 556 ritual purity 27, 31, 82, 221, 252–5, 326–7, 356, 492, 500 Purity of the Many 90, 514, 520–1, 555
Pythagoras 157–8 Pythagorean communities 157–8 admission 157–8 common property 157 daily life 158 Qumran caves 8, 10–11, 13, 39–43 discovery of 8, 10–11, 13 dwelling caves 41 manuscripts from 39–40 material culture 37, 40, 42 storage caves 41–2 storage jars 41–2 Qumran community 27, 79, 81–4, 90, 121, 131–2, 193, 221, 223–5, 232–3, 242–5, 275–6, 307, 325, 327, 335–7, 342–6, 405–6, 459–61, 492, 497–8, 509–10, 515, 533–42, 547–8, 564 compositions 193, 275–6, 280, 327 history and origins 211, 307, 325, 337 identity 131–2, 224, 233, 335, 430 ideology 196, 221, 223, 242, 492, 497–8, 515 terminology within 193, 244, 336, 410 Qumran manuscripts 37–50 Cave 4 texts 130–1 deposition of 46–7 language of 120–1 library or collection 43–6 material culture see Materiality material remains 39–40 paleographic dating 40 Qumran movement 30–4, 44, 77–8, 82–3, 86, 120–2, 126, 131–2, 158, 221–5, 306–8, 335, 340, 347–8, 375, 401, 425, 490–4, 497–502, 510, 515–16, 535–7, 540–2, 547–52, 554, 556 and 4QMMT 325–6 authoritative texts within 264, 266–7, 269–72, 275, 280–1, 283–4 as ethnic identity 80–4 history of 211, 220, 232 identity of, 27, 30–3, 121, 132, 305, 335 Rabbinic Judaism 119, 126, 260, 267, 396 rabbinic halakhah 396, 400–2
Subject Index rabbinic literature 88, 389, 396–7, 401–2, 536, 556 rabbinic traditions 168, 260, 366, 481 radiocarbon dating 179–83, 193 Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (AMS ) 180 radiocarbon dating calculations 181–2 Raphael 284, 333, 492 Red Heifer 396, 517 religious thought and Hellenism 92 at Qumran 77–9 religious movements 238–40, 508, 533 repentance 327, 366, 427, 491, 510–11 resurrection 58, 133, 321, 482, 499–500 revelation 481–9 Reworked Pentateuch 266–7, 333, 373, 387 Rewritten scripture 207–9, 378, 380, 382–3, 395 rewritten texts and traditions 123, 310, 380 rituals and rites 80, 82, 87, 129, 217, 298–300, 307, 356, 395, 400, 423–9, 432–3, 460, 487, 498, 517, 533, 554–5 affliction rituals 426–7 blessings and curses 300 boundary rites 426 calendrical see Calendars covenant ceremony see Covenant ceremony cursing and expulsion 300, 426, 428 exchange and communion 429–31 explusion rites 298–300, 426, 428–9, 553 political rituals 429 purification rites 129, 307, 426, 517 rites of passage 424, 427–8 Romans 37, 47, 101, 119, 147, 228, 323, 499, 569, 572, 574 Early Roman Period 98ff, 104, 211, 310, 524 Roman Period 44, 46–7 Rule texts 78, 156, 210, 253, 336, 341, 372, 374, 405–10, 487, 527, 535–6, 538, 547, 549 Rule of Blessings (1QS b) 187, 339–40, 407–8, 414, 429, 530 Rule of the Community (esp. 1QS ) 8–9, 32–3, 44, 51, 54, 81–3, 86, 94, 123, 132, 136, 156, 193, 205, 209–10,
653
235, 242, 244, 249–52, 287, 296, 336, 339–42, 344–6, 399, 405–10, 415, 423, 427, 430, 439, 443, 484, 496, 498, 500, 510–11, 533, 568, 552–6, 574 4QS manuscripts 344–5 community identity 86, 242, 244, 248–9, 510–1 covenant ceremony see Covenant ceremony daily life 552–6 eschatology 136, 496, 498, 500–1, 568, 574 on membership 86–9 penal code 249–52 relationship with CD 32–3, 307–8 rule text 132, 156, 210, 405–10, 533 textual development 205, 345–6 Treatise on the Two Spirits see Treatise on the Two Spirits Rule of the Congregation (1QS a) 186, 248, 253, 339, 341–3, 407–8, 428–9, 497–9, 530–1, 547, 574 Rujm el-Bahr 103–4 Saad, Yusef 54 Sabbath 58, 122, 139–41, 143, 293, 307, 347–8, 365–6, 396–8, 415, 425–6, 436–8, 442, 459–60, 486, 538, 552–3 sacred space 92, 253, 282, 513, 521, 535 sacrifice(s) 79, 87, 109, 140, 144, 254, 262, 326, 354, 356, 396, 400, 475, 491, 500, 506–7, 510–11, 519, 535–6, 540, 554–5 Sadducees 92, 122, 150, 152, 335, 396, 401, 528–9, 571 sages (hakāmim) 452, 524 Salome Alexandra 230 Salome Komaïse 45, 200, 292 Samaritan Pentateuch 123, 205, 371 Samaritans 193, 195, 529 Samuel 125, 206–7, 270–1, 376, 387, 525 4QS ama 205–7 Samuel, Athanasius Yeshue 8–10, 15, 51, 53 Sarah 207–8, 311, 416, 472, 474–5 Sariel 333, 492 Satan 116, 303, 494, 560 Schechter, Solomon 306
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Subject Index
scientific analysis 178–84 chemical analysis 178–9 digital imaging 183–4 DNA analysis 179 infrared photography 183 radiocarbon dating 179–83 scribalism 524–31 Qumran scribal practice 529 scribal corrections 205–6, 320, 440, 528–9 scribal culture 122–3, 358, 531 scribal errors 57, 205–6, 304 scribal exemplars 526 scribal functions 526–8 scribal hand 310, 314, 339, 352, 528–30 scribal markings 358, 528–9 cancellation dots 529 dotting for Tetragrammaton 358, 490, 529 guide dots 528 scribal practice 39, 122–3, 262, 320, 432, 440, 358, 528–31 scribal schools and education 530 –1 supralinear additions/markings 206, 440 scriptorium 530 scriptural traditions 330, 359, 481, 500, 564–6 scripture 81, 280, 380 secrets 457–9 sectarianism 30–2, 77, 121, 221–3, 237–40, 255, 375, 542, 553, 561 attributes of 240 sectarian hypothesis 29–33 sectarian roles 249 sectarian settlement 21, 26, 27, 31, 221, 542, 548 sociology of 238–40 voluntary associations 238–9 Seekers of Smooth Things 212, 336–7, 535, 570 Šelamzion (Salome) 230 Self-Glorification Hymn (SGH ) 315, 417, 459–61, 503 selenodromion 115, 463 Seleucid calendar 437 Seleucids 114, 119, 153, 323, 350, 437, 503, 570, 572 semantics 133, 194, 205, 243, 276, 418, 534
semen emission 426, 518–19 Septuagint (LXX ) 3, 13, 57, 123, 132–4, 153–4, 161, 199, 205, 207, 259, 273–5, 277, 284, 371–2, 387, 390, 397 Serekh 406–10 compositions 408–9 terminology and function 409–10 texts 407–9 sexuality 93, 100, 249, 251–2, 254, 302, 460, 513–15, 517–19, 541, 549, 551–2 Shammai the Elder 402 Shanin, Khalil Eskander (Kando) 8, 10, 13–14, 51, 53–4 Shechem 262, 472, 476, 570 Shemihazah 113 Shemuel, Eliezar bar 43, 45, 48 signs (‘otot) 439 Simeon 477, 570 Simeon the Just 470 Simon the Essene 458 Sinai, Mount 209–10, 264–5, 267 Six-Day War 14, 63 Skehan, Patrick 55 slavery 141–2, 144, 146 sobriquet(s) 233–4, 322, 337, 535, 569 social identity theory 244–5 social psychology 244, 505, 508–9 social-scientific approaches 217, 221–2, 237–45 and archaeology 221 and sectarianism 238–40 societal discourse and writing 375–7 sociolinguistic approaches 241–3 ‘anti-language’ 242 and identity formation 242 linguistic innovation 242–3 Sodom 100, 302, 471 Son of God 133, 350–1, 503 Son of God Text (4Q246) 350–1, 503 Song of Hannah 387 Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q400– 407) 171, 300, 315, 339, 347–8, 414–15, 417, 425, 429, 442, 459–61, 483, 485–6, 491–3, 511 Sons of Darkness 81, 287, 322–3, 457, 493, 498–9, 561, 568, 573–4
Subject Index Sons of Light 81, 86, 135, 159, 322–3, 337, 457, 460, 463–4, 493, 498–9, 502–3, 561, 568, 573 Sowmy, Butros 9, 52–3 spirit(s) 116, 127, 129, 159–60, 206, 244, 254, 262, 295–6, 299, 319, 348, 363, 374, 416, 427, 457, 462–3, 464, 476, 486, 491–5, 499–501, 525–6, 535, 560–2, 568, 573 and Belial 299, 427, 494 dualism 129, 363 perfection 244, 254 poor in 295–6 two spirits 159–60, 262, 560, 563, 573 world 127, 363, 493, 495 Spouter of the Lie 234, 535, 571 State of Israel 8, 10, 14, 54 stanza division 418 Starcky, Jean 55 Stegemann method 187–8 Stephan, Stephan Hanna 51 stichography 413, 418–19 St. Mark’s Monastery 8–9, 51, 53 stoicism 84, 140, 549, 564 stone vessels 18, 514, 518 Strabo 100 Strugnell, John 15, 55–6, 325 study (of sacred texts) 120, 126–7, 140–1, 265, 428, 431–2, 450, 453–4, 458, 460, 497, 534–5, 537, 539, 542, 554 Sukenik, Eleazar Lipa 8–10, 51–4, 314–15, 408 sun 111–14, 145, 158, 365, 392–3, 425, 439, 441–2, 503, 519, 525, 553 solar calendar (364-day) 110–11, 114, 130, 225, 229, 262, 325–6, 356, 392–3, 397–8, 425, 428, 435–40, 442–3, 459 solar month 439–40 synagogues 48, 51, 137, 141, 143–4, 222 synagogue liturgy 300, 348, 366 syntax 195, 197, 242–3, 348, 418, Syriac Peshitta 142, 259–60, 372 Talmud 273, 401, 528 Tanh.umim (4Q176) 352–3 Targumim 133, 199, 259
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Teacher, voice of the 484, 526 Teacher Hymns 287, 314–15, 340, 416 Teacher of Righteousness 93, 124–5, 131, 211, 232–4, 245, 264, 271, 307, 315, 320, 325–6, 337, 375, 389, 437, 457, 461, 484–5, 497, 502, 526, 535–8, 571 Tefillin (phylacteries) 10, 13, 40, 129, 169, 174, 424, 426 Tell es-Sa’idieh 102 Tell es-Sultan 98, 100, 103 Temple (Jerusalem Temple) 92, 122, 129, 144, 229, 305, 326–7, 329–30, 366, 395–6, 438, 515, 536, 505–11 idealized 356 temple city 399 temple cult 129, 326–7, 509–10 temple worship 82, 144, 399, 506, 510 Temple Scroll (11Q19a) 14, 44, 82, 122, 124, 168–9, 188, 209–10, 265–7, 281, 333, 354–6, 373, 375, 378, 383, 388, 395–9, 401, 438–9, 443, 499, 501–2, 506–7, 514, 517–19, 548, 570 and halakhah 395–9, 517–19 and the Law of the King 356, 399, 570 related manuscripts 354–5 sources for 356 Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs 261–2, 503 Testimonia (4Q175) 358–61 tetragrammaton (divine name) 198, 249, 312, 320, 358, 490, 495, 528–9 dotting for 358, 490, 529 substitution for 320, 490, 529 textuality textual authority at Qumran 264–5, 269, 280–1, 361 textual criticism 123, 205–7 and 4QS ama 205–6 textual development and transmission 122–3, 224, 372, 379–80 textual quotation 358 Therapeutae 139–40, 143–4, 432, 550 throne room vision 348, 350 Timotheus I 11, 37 Tobit, Book of 274, 283–4 toilets and latrines 254, 423
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Subject Index
Torah 122, 124–5, 264–7, 340, 354, 366, 370, 398, 450, 453, 497, 519 Tosefta 401 Tov, Emanuel 56, 123, 528–9, 531 Treatise on the Two Spirits 116, 154, 156, 159–60, 235, 318, 329, 345, 407, 451, 453–5, 493–4, 560, 562–3, 572–3 Trever, John C. 9, 52–4 Twelve, The (also Minor Prophets) 269–70, 373 United Nations 8, 10, 52 Urim and Thummim 330, 570 Vaux, Roland de 10–11, 13, 18, 21, 23, 26–7, 40, 53–6, 103, 289, 304, 514, 533, 550–1 Vision of the Dry Bones 390, 482 Visions of Amram 116 Visions of Levi 109–10, 116 priestly knowledge in 109 Wadi al-Mafjar 15, 38, 46–8 Wadi Daliyeh 14, 37–8, 46, 181 artefacts 46 Wadi Murabba‘t 10–11, 13, 38, 43, 46–8, 129, 194–5, 199, 289, 292 caves 43 mezuzah 43 texts 46–8 Wadi en-Nar 105 Wadi Qumran 18, 102 Wadi Sdeir 14–15, 38 Wadi Seiyal 11, 14, 38, 289 Wadi Suweinit see Nahal Michmash war and violence 322–3, 568–75 eschatological violence 568, 574–5 present-time violence 568–70, 574 as retributive fantasy 572–5 War Scroll (esp. 1QM ) 8, 51–2, 54, 116, 248–9, 252–4, 299, 322–3, 339, 351, 358, 363, 399, 409–10, 427, 429, 490, 494, 498–9, 502, 534, 539, 569, 573–5 and Belial 427, 494 inclusion and exclusion 252–4 purity issues 254–5
use of serekh in 409–10 and violence 569, 573–5 Watchers, Myth of the Fallen 112–14, 117, 232, 282–3, 310–11, 388, 492 water springs 104–5 water system 18, 105 Weber, Max 238–40 Wicked of Ephraim and Manasseh 571–2 Wicked Priest 234, 245, 325, 337, 437, 571–3 wicked princes 571–2 wilderness 81, 398, 487–8, 497, 507, 511, 519, 538 Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184) 362–3 Wilson, Bryan R. 239–40 wine 31, 158, 262, 498, 507, 514, 555 Wisdom (Lady) 362–3, 449 wisdom (sapiential) 449–55 blessings 295 literature 451–5 poetry 417–18 texts 160–1, 276, 295, 453–5 tradition 124, 126, 318, 329–30, 453 women 33, 46, 139, 143, 248–9, 253–5, 283, 341, 362–3, 492, 498, 515, 519–20, 537, 541, 548, 550–1, 555 Words of the Luminaries (4Q504–506) 365–6, 386 work and labor 27, 42, 140–2, 145, 552–3 farming 30, 97, 318, 552 Writings, The (ketuvim) 273–8 X 114–15, 439–41 Yadin, Yigael 10, 14–15, 52–3, 289, 292, 354–5 Yahad 33, 81, 86–94, 130–2, 233–5, 248–9, 298–9, 329, 336, 339, 340–1, 344, 346–8, 365, 400, 414–15, 419–20, 427–8, 430, 459–60, 462, 470, 482–8, 490–2, 533–42, 547–9 and celibacy 248, 547–9 council of the Yahad 298, 336, 341, 427, 536, 539 and Hellenistic associations 89–94, 156–9 historiography 233–5
Subject Index identity 33, 132, 346, 462, 533–6, 539–40 literature of 347–8, 414–15, 419, 537–8 membership into 86–7, 89, 299, 339, 341, 427 revelation to 482–8 structure and organization 336, 339, 470, 484, 536–7, 539–40 Yahad Ostracon 542 Yohanan 230 Zadokite priesthood 81–3, 336, 340–3, 406, 429, 535–7 and Aaronites 82 eschatological role 343
high priesthood 340, 343 leadership 81, 340–2 406, 429, 535 and the Many 82–3, 342, 536–7 Zadok, sons of see Zadokite priesthood. Zarethan 102 zeal and zealotry 569 zealots 569 Zion 275, 353, 471, 506–7 Zoara 97, 104 zodiac zodiacal calendar 442 zodiacal circle 442 zodiacal signs 110, 115, 441–2, 463 Zoroastrianism 156, 159–60, 559, 561
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