Geoff Hudson

In the DSS, Fragment 2, line 12 of 4Q521 does not tell us exactly what the writer meant by "reviving the dead". The same applies to fragment 7, line 6 which refers to God as "he who revives the dead of his people." Did the writers believe that the body would be brought back to life? There is NO MENTION of the body. Does "reviving the dead" mean raising the spirit of a man up to God after death?

And we cannot be too sure what Pharisees thought either. In Antiquities 18.1.2, the Pharisees are said to believe "that souls have an immortal ‘vigour' in them, and that under the earth, there will be rewards or punishments according as they have lived virtuously or viciously in this life; and the latter are to be detained in an everlasting prison, and that the former shall have the power to revive and live again." The logic is inconsistent. An immortal soul or spirit is exactly that. It cannot die, as Sadducees believe it does at death with the body (Ant.18.1.4). So, a soul does not need to be "made alive" again, and these must be the added words of a later Christian editor. If a soul that has done viciously is detained in a prison beneath the earth, then logically, a soul that has done virtuously is raised up from the prison to God in heaven, and implicitly this must be the meaning of "revive".

In War 2.8.11, Essenes are said to believe that "bodies are corruptible, and the matter they are made of is not permanent". Now this must surely have been the common understanding of all groups. In Antiquities, there is no reference to bodies being corruptible (bodies are only mentioned in connection with Sadducees who believed that souls or spirits die with bodies), and corruption of the body at death is taken for granted. Thus, again, I have to think that the references to "corruptible bodies" and that "the matter they are made of is not permanent" are the artificial distinctions from Pharisees applied by a later Christian editor to Essenes.

The Essenes believe that souls are "immortal and continue for ever". (War 2.8.11). The Pharisees believe the same. The difference in belief occurs at death. The Essene belief is that all souls rise to God immediately at death for judgement with subsequent reward or punishment (War 2.8.11). The Pharisaic belief is that judgement occurs beneath the earth, and that after judgement, the virtuous souls rise to God, but the others stay where they are for eternal punishment.

War 2.8.14 has Pharisees say, "all souls are incorruptible, but the souls of good men are only removed into other bodies – but that the souls of bad men are subject to eternal punishment." Here "bodies" are introduced in connection with Pharisees, whereas in Antiquities they are not. In Antiquities, souls rise from the prison beneath the earth. Again, one has to suspect that a Christian editor has added the awkward phrase "only removed into other bodies".

Geoff