THE QUMRAN COMMUNITY AND ITS LITERATURE (original) (raw)
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Strata: Bulletin of the Anglo-Israel Archaeological Society, 2017
Qumran is probably one of the most renowned and disputed sites in the ancient Near East. In large part this is because of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in caves in its immediate vicinity. The year 2017 marks the seventieth anniversary of the discovery of these scrolls, which changed the scholarly landscape of ancient Judaism and biblical studies and also put Qumran on the archaeological map. In celebration of this important milestone, this paper traces seventy years of scholarship on the archaeology of Qumran, with a view to highlighting key methodological issues surrounding the many heated debates about its nature and function as well as its relationship to the scrolls.
Qumran Chronicle, 2023
This study seeks to offer some new insights concerning the development and use of First Enoch and related Aramaic texts in the Dead Sea Scrolls by examining their importance for the Khirbet Qumran community. The first portion explores the transmission of First Enoch and related writings in the Dead Sea Scrolls to uncover what the copies of these texts tell us about the community at Khirbet Qumran and its precursor movement(s). The second section compares the theology of the prayers preserved in the Aramaic texts with those in the Hebrew Dead Sea Scrolls to show what they reveal about the use of the Enochic traditions by the Qumran sect and related groups. This investigation pro- 1 Józef T. Milik first published the Aramaic fragments of First Enoch from Cave 4. See further, Józef T. Milik, The Books of Enoch: Aramaic Fragments from Qumrân Cave 4 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1976). 2 THE QUMRAN CHRONICLE 31, 2023 poses that the Qumran community’s precursor movement(s) combined elements of pre-Maccabean Aramaic and Hebrew prayers but preferred the theological perspective of the penitential Hebrew prayer tradition. However, First Enoch and related works held a special status for the Khirbet Qumran community as its calendrical system and doctrine of evil shaped its theology for centuries. The Dead Sea Scrolls also show that the authors of the Enochic writings and those who collected and used them were influenced by literature and events in the Hellenistic world.
Gwynned de Looijer reexamines some key hypotheses that have driven scholars' understandings of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the archaeological site of Khirbet Qumran. She demonstrates that foundational hypotheses regarding a sect at Qumran have heavily influenced the way the texts found in the surrounding caves are interpreted. She also calls into question the use and function of certain terminology such as 'dualism' in order to explain differentiated peculiarities in texts as similar. De Looijer's approach abandons those assumptions to illustrate that the Dead Sea Scrolls might represent a wider range of backgrounds reflecting the many diverse forms of Judaism that existed in the Second Temple period.
Pp 75-124 in: David Stacey and Gregory Doudna, with a contribution from Gideon Avni, Qumran Revisited: A Reassessment of the Archaeology of the Site and its Texts. Oxford: Archaeopress, 2013
Argues that traditional reasons for supposing a programmatically adversarial relationship between the sect of the Qumran texts and Hasmonean high priests are insubstantial, and that the sect of the Qumran texts controlled the temple during some of the Hasmonean era. Argues that the Teacher vs. wicked high priest conflict alluded to in the texts reflects the end, not the beginning, of the era of the Hasmonean high priests, when there was a dispute between rival Hasmonean claimants familiar from history. This essay appeared in Qumran Revisited: A Reassessment of the Archaeology of the Site and its Texts, by David Stacey and Gregory Doudna with a contribution from Gideon Avni, available from BAR Publishing, Oxford, at https://www.barpublishing.com/qumran-revisited-a-reassessment-of-the-archaeology-of-the-site-and-its-texts.html. The publisher requests this statement to appear: This version is free to view and download for personal use only. It cannot be reproduced in any form without permission of the publisher.
Doctrines of the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Doctrine of the Community
This paper examines the origin and history of the Qumran community. Who were the Jews who lived in Qumran? Dead Sea Scroll scholars have argued for Sadducees (Schiffman), Pharisees (Girzberg), Zealots (Malik, Driver), unknown Jewish group (Talmon), early Christian sect (Eisenman), and Essenes (Sukenik). The Manual of Discipline now called Rule of the Community (1QS) has many parallels with the description of the Essenes by Josephus. A list of 36 items is given and referenced. The problems with identifying the Essenes as the Qumran community are also listed. Next, some summaries are given of the sectarian writings of the Qumran community: The Rule of the Community (1QS), The Damascus Document (CD), the Rule of the Congregation (1QSa), and the Temple Scroll (11QT). Finally a comparison is made between the Qumran community and the early church described in the book of Acts.