We finally now have enough data to begin to write coherent history of Qumran
and of Essenes. Yet we also find today assertions that are quite misleading--
whether intentionally or not or mixed--that seek to segregate into separate
universes Essenes and Qumran.
If we look at the stone reliefs Titus had made after the war we see
propaganda, surely, but based on real looting. And didn't Josephus himself get
a Jerusalem scroll from his new-found friends? In War 5.496-7 we read of Roman
worries that, despite seige, supplies might be smuggled *into* the city. The
city the zealots expected to hold. In N. Golb's book laden with errors (e.g.,
on Herod coins; on reading 4Q448; on Pliny as if personally in Judaea and as
if his [source] text reflects postwar account), we see imagination (p.145-6)
that mule trains then could spirit *away* scrolls. Yet there is no material or
textual evidence that the Qumran scrolls arrived in such a scenario. None.
Only hope, or preference, sustains this illusion.
We need, we lack, a good history of scholarship (Wagner, Adam & Burchard,
Nickelsburg are mere good starts). How to explain "Ian," who uses false names
in public and private mail, declaring that in "infra hos [i.e. Essenes]
Engadda," "downstream" can in no wise be the translation of *"hos"*! What
motivation then, for such assertion by one who cannot read the text, even
identify the word at issue? What motivated someone else, a real scholar this
time, who apparently thankfully reconsidered, to write both "Farewell!" to
Essenes in the cemetery and that Essenes cannot be located (can't have it both
ways)?
The scholarship history needs to include Zeitlin's "it's an hoax!" and Joseph
Baumgarten in the 1958 Tradition first volume reassuring in "The Dead Sea
Scrolls: a Threat to Halakhah?"--Baumgarten whose body of work is the finest,
most extensive comparison of rabbinic literature and recognized Essene texts.
And Harding on Christ imagined visiting Qumran "monastery" (Illustrated London
News) and E. Wilson (New Yorker), both 1955. And Allegro BBC 1956 (though at
least he knew the Lion was Jannai, and wicked priest), and what he
borrowed from Dupont-Sommer. Sukenik on "precious Jewish heritage"; Yadin
agreeing, though he acknowledged, he didn't admire Essenes. In any case,
there's a great deal in Qumran and Essene overlapping histories to clarify
histories of Judaism and Christianity.
No, James (too late, among other things) was not Teacher of Righteousness, but
he sure was influenced by Essenes, as known before 1948, as was the author of
Apocalypse of John. Paul differed, on works of the law, now clarified by MMT,
to add to pHab, where self-identified Essenes/'osey hatorah of Judah differ
with the later Paul. Why, e.g., Luther disliked James ("straw") is now clearer.
I am saying that some works of Golb, Hirschfeld, Doudna, and "Hutchesson"
mislead about Qumran. Doudna made one of the most basic dating errors
possible, and extensively wrote as if science backed his exclusion of ms date
ranges before and after the time he a priori time wanted. Some otherwise quite
well-informed people today imagine C14 excludes texts, say, before 100 BCE or
after 5 BCE. But Doudna's imagined "ONE EVENT" is mistaken. His analogies with
a single shotgun blast, with a single battle, with a single volcano erruption
(DSS After 50 Yrs v.1) for c.900 skins and papyri plus use plus deposit are
all just plain wrong.
The confluence of evidence now establishes that Alexander Jannaeus was the
Qumran wicked priest (tyannical and superstitious par excellence, the Essene
sources Posidonius and Strabo assessed). He had been a priest before King.
Judah the Essene, the teacher of righteousness (appeared an estimated 390 + 20
years after 538 BCE) tried (cf. MMT and pPs) to get him to follow his
interpretation of torah, and failed. Judah went into exile in the "land of
Damascus." Jannai pursued the differently calendered Judah.
Look at "Honyah," KhQ 1313 ostracon, (Humbert-Gunneweg p.354), probable self-
written name of a scribe, looking just like the book hand in scrolls nearby.
Of course some scrolls, many, were brought from outside, from Essenes,
including those in Jerusalem inside the Gate of the Essenes. Qumran is unlike
Masada, waterwise, gets flooded, hence the scroll survival only in the caves
in the former. Pliny's source on Essenes, M. Agrippa, 15 BCE, wrote when Ein
Gedi (not Jerusalem!) was still ashes (from c. 40 BCE war)--please do not rely
on the Loeb translation that has misled many.
Essenes were neither small nor short-lived nor obscure (as Dio, to pick one of
many, can remind). One does not need to be a friend of the king to write
books. Essenes wrote more books than Sadducees. 1, 2 Maccabees is absent at
Qumran--odd, that, on Golb's proposal. One enters Cave 4 only after entering
the settlement; it's really par of the site. Sectarian Essene texts (e.g. S,
MMT, pesharim) were not found at Masada; they cluster on Qumran, not elsewhere.
Y.H. claims Qumran is well built and on a lovely site, owned by an aristocrat.
Perhaps that's why the finest luxury homes of Israelis today cluster about
Qumran. Rather, maybe read War 2.122 "...neither the huniliation of poverty
nor the pride of wealth is to be seen anywhere among them." Group wealth (like
3QCu for a future hoped-for temple) is not identical with individual wealth.
With or without reading "yahad" the Herodian Qumran ostracon still shows S-
related transfer of property at initiation year two.
Y.H. footnotes Broshi and Gunneweg on pottery origins, without mentioning they
disagree.
Of course there are two comb fragments in Cave 1 as any DJD reader knows. But
we have yet to get the Hirschfeld presupposition ruling on whether those comb
bits are necessarily foreign, like all scrolls forever, unrelated to the
khirbeh, no coastal road then beneath, or say something about locals--see the
path). It's no accident prettier Murabba'at combs are shown in colour on the
cover and inside the book both. Luxury impression certainly intended, as with
the late beads. See C. Murphy's book on wealth and the Essene Qumran relation.
The Y.H. book is quite inadequate on which items were from Period III, after
Essenes left, before zealots arrived, to transJordan, where later Epiphanius
knew of Jewish sect torah observers [Philo's bios praktikos; who reputedly
held deeds in greater esteem than words] named Ossaioi/Osshnoi.
best,
Stephen Goranson
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