spin

This is on Wise et al., a worthwhile translation, though it goes for a semantic translation which will not reflect the underlying Hebrew text literally, and can therefore be wrong when the translator hasn't got the semantic drift of the Hebrew.

Florentino Martinez is the best conservative (literal) translation. Forget Vermes (and Eisenman & Wise).

As one might know, I think the Essene hypothesis is ridiculous. It has never been seriously expounded and one can only find half-hearted efforts these days as it is assumed to be correct by most. VanderKam is one of the few who tries to argue it (unsuccessfully, naturally), along with Jodi Magness who botches Qumran archaeology because it is always read in the light of her Essenes.

As I always say, a principally celibate group doesn't have a hereditary leadership, ie sons of Zadok, sons of Aaron and sons of Levi. It makes a joke of the notion of celibacy. (And no, these strict torah observers are not going to pretend to be sons of Aaron...)

The toilet in the Qumran settlement tells you that the people at Qumran were not Essenes with their strict toiletry habits.

Shanks is a duffer, whose main interest is making money. A better introduction despite the fact that it is mainstream Essene hypothesis is Flint & VanderKam "The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls", especially the Flint chapters.


spin

Rick Sumner

One might, given that I already said you did :P

You pointed this out to me some time ago, and I am unable to think of any response. I've never seen this even remotely adequately addressed, hence my shying away from the EH (and, of course, therein lay the easy ad hoc).

But if not Essene, then who? I'm drawn to remember Cross' famous passage about the implausibility of it being a previously unheard of sect. Schiffman makes a reasonable case for Sadducee, but I'm not sure that it's reasonable enough.

See? I told you he'd doubtlessly and emphatically disagree. I should have written it in cryptic verse, I missed my chance to become a prophet.

Regards,
Rick Sumner

Peter Kirby

Spin, what is your opinion on Norman Golb, Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls? I own it but haven't read it (yet).

Also, if Rick or Celsus has an opinion on the book, I'm interested.

Hey, if you read this and have an opinion, I'm interested.

best,
Peter Kirby

spin

I can't help it if you are not looking, Jacob.

Did you understand what I wrote about the necessity of copying texts? Texts were in a constant state of being copied. Scrolls were simply not as durable as codexes. That's why the codex superceded the scroll.

What you must expect from a scrolls deposit is a dating for each scroll which should usually contain the deposit date, or at least be very close prior to the deposit date. The shape of the distribution curve I would expect for a totally uncontaminated corpus would be similar to that of a meteor (as it enters the atmosphere, with a long tail), where the deposit date should be somewhere near the largest cross-section.

If texts are contaminated by modern hydro-carbons (many texts were cleaned with castor oil and leather polishing products), they will appear to be younger than what they really are. This will certain cause those dribs and drabs I was talking about.

As Rick says, Pesher Habakkuk by itself falsifies Eisenman's theories. The text is securely dated by c14 to the 1st century BCE. Eisenman, unable to accept this, has to repudiate the c14, as Thiering has to. (Thiering attempts to pull a rabbit out of her hat, arguing that pHab was written on an old skin, therefore the c14 is misleading.)

As most scrolls come in in the 1st century BCE, we have a locus reflecting the 1st century BCE. We should expect a deposit in the 1st century BCE.

You might like to look for an article by Ian Young in Dead Sea Discoveries (2002, forget which number), in which he argues that the variety of Hebrew biblical text traditions reflects a status quo significantly prior to the epoch of Masada, based on the single biblical tradition (Massoretic) found at Masada.


spin

spin

You've obviously missed your calling!

The texts came from the temple, the only place able to support the number of scribes indicated by the hands used in the scrolls. This is not strange of course given that the leaders mentioned in the scrolls were priests, this would include the Sadducees, who I gather were the rump priesthood with the loss of the sons of Zadok. Schiffman's reasoning is partially correct, sadducee, but not a splinter group. Who else but the priesthood would hold temple accoutrements as indicated in the copper scroll? The we in MMT I think are the sons of Zadok. Who else can criticise the sons of Aaron? You don't criticise your betters. (Our major problem is that people take Josephus's account of the Sadducees as though it were, umm, gospel. He was shoehorning Jewish factions into Greek schools.)


spin

spin

Golb basically follows an old theory by Rengstorf (as I do), which argues that the scrolls came from the temple in Jerusalem. Added to that he argues that Qumran was a fort (which I don't agree with). He thinks that the scrolls were deposited at Qumran by people fleeing Jerusalem during the Jewish War (again I don't agree). What Golb was good at was showing problems in the status quo theories. He was so successful that he made numerous enemies.

I recommend giving it a read along with Schiffman "Reclaing the DSS" (if you haven't already), remembering that Schiffman falsely retrojects Pharisaic and Rabbinical ideas into a historical context where they don't belong, and perhaps Flint and VanderKam, remembering that VanderKam is a staunch Essene hypothesist.

Jodi Magness's book on Qumran archaeology is a bomb. Read with great care: it's very hard to separate facts from attitude.


spin

spin

You've obviously missed your calling!

The texts came from the temple, the only place able to support the number of scribes indicated by the hands used in the scrolls. This is not strange of course given that the leaders mentioned in the scrolls were priests, this would include the Sadducees, who I gather were the rump priesthood with the loss of the sons of Zadok. Schiffman's reasoning is partially correct, sadducee, but not a splinter group. Who else but the priesthood would hold temple accoutrements as indicated in the copper scroll? The we in MMT I think are the sons of Zadok. Who else can criticise the sons of Aaron? You don't criticise your betters. (Our major problem is that people take Josephus's account of the Sadducees as though it were, umm, gospel. He was shoehorning Jewish factions into Greek schools.)


spin

Amaleq13

Is there commentary? Or is that left to the introduction you suggested?


Thank you both for your suggestions. Luckily, I've got a Border's Visa and I can pretend that the book points I earn with the purchase means I'm not really spending all that much cash.

spin

Sadly his "popular" translation ("DSS Translated") is quite unhelpful. There are no commentaries (but that's no loss really, they are mostly wrong) and the introduction pushes the from of the Essene hypthesis mentioned by Rick ("the Groningen hypothesis"). His scholarly translation supplies the reader with the Hebrew text as well and information useful to the student/scholar.

I merely suggest the translation as you really need such a translation to read along with Wise, Abegg and Cook. One has to read all this stuff with extreme caution. You can't get unbiased scholarship in the field. Because of this the new reader finds him/herself accepting the Essene hypothesis as it is everywhere, unchecked, unanalysed, taken as fact.

There is such a bulk to the scrolls, fragments of over 800 texts, though there are many repeats, eg over 30 fragmentary copies of Psalms and Deuteronomy. Perhaps ten copies of MMT and more for the Zadokite Fragments (=Damascus Document) and the Community Rule (=Manual of Discipline). With so many texts the average reader finds the task more than a challenge.

I can appreciate the desire to have commentaries. Wise et al. provide the best thing available.


spin

Ted Hoffman

Thank you spin. That helped alot. Your encyclopaediac knowledge wrapped in colourful rhetoric inspires awe. :notworthy