The Dead Sea Scrolls are the most important and amazing manuscripts found in the past 100 years.
A cache of inscriptions and fragments of scrolls were discovered in 11 caves in Qumran, 13 miles east of Jerusalem, near the Dead Sea in Israel.
This unusual library of Jewish documents dates back to the 3rd century. BC e. - 68 AD e. It consists of parchment scrolls, several sheets of papyrus, and one unusual copper specimen. The texts are written with carbon ink, predominantly in Hebrew and partly in Aramaic (the Semitic language that Jesus allegedly spoke), as well as several texts in Greek. The study of the Dead Sea Scrolls, determination of their authorship has been going on since the late 40s of the XX century. - from the moment they were discovered. They shed light not only on the biblical texts, but also provide more information about the secret society of men and women, who are commonly called Essenes.
In 1947, Bedouin shepherds, having gone in search of a goat that had strayed from the herd, discovered an unknown cave in the rocks near the Dead Sea. Inside, against the wall, they found several ancient earthen jars with manuscripts wrapped in linen. In total, seven earthen jugs were taken out of the cave (called Cave 1). These findings marked the beginning of a 9-year exploration of the caves on the southwestern shore of the Dead Sea. While searching for the scrolls, archaeologists found caves plundered by local Bedouins, who profitably sold the manuscripts to Arab collectors in Bethlehem. Ultimately, about 800 documents were found from 11 caves in Qumran. In some caves (for example, Cave 4), archaeologists have found built-in shelves: apparently, the caves functioned as libraries for a long time.
Although some of the Qumran scrolls were written during Jesus' lifetime, none of them explicitly mentions him or his apostles. Perhaps the scrolls are part of a huge collection of manuscripts that has not yet been found. One of the most striking features of the artifacts is that they contain the most ancient texts of the Old Testament known today. An equally ancient Jewish document is the Nash Papyrus (2nd century BC), found in Egypt, with the Ten Commandments. The Dead Sea Scrolls can be divided into two categories: biblical - containing copies of the books of Scripture and commentaries on them, and non-biblical - consisting of prayer books and statutes of the society to which their authors belonged. All the books of the Old Testament are represented in the biblical texts with the exception of the book of Esther and the book of Nehemiah. Ezekiel's prophecies are here,Jeremiah and Daniel, as well as legends about such biblical characters as Noah, Abraham and Enoch, none of whom are mentioned in the canonical version of the Torah. Among the most important texts found in the caves of Qumran is the Great Scroll of Isaiah, containing 66 chapters of Isaiah; commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.as well as legends about such biblical characters as Noah, Abraham and Enoch, none of whom are mentioned in the canonical version of the Torah. Among the most important texts found in the caves of Qumran is the Great Scroll of Isaiah, containing 66 chapters of Isaiah; commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.as well as legends about such biblical characters as Noah, Abraham and Enoch, none of whom are mentioned in the canonical version of the Torah. Among the most important texts found in the caves of Qumran is the Great Scroll of Isaiah, containing 66 chapters of Isaiah; commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.none of which is mentioned in the canonical version of the Torah. Among the most important texts found in the caves of Qumran is the Great Scroll of Isaiah, containing 66 chapters of Isaiah; commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.none of which is mentioned in the canonical version of the Torah. Among the most important texts found in the caves of Qumran is the Great Scroll of Isaiah, containing 66 chapters of Isaiah; commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.commentaries on the book of the prophet Habakkuk - one of the books of the minor prophets of the Old Testament; a community rights book entitled Discipline Instruction, which included a list of the responsibilities of a Jewish sect leader and his disciples; and the Temple Scroll, the longest and perhaps the best-preserved of the Dead Sea Scrolls, and is the subject of debate today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.which is the subject of discussion today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.which is the subject of discussion today. It talks about the ideal structure and functioning of the new perfect temple, about its laws and sacred rituals.
Who wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls and hid them in the caves near Qumran? Researchers named the possible authors of the texts, a small group of Jews who lived in a village near Qumran, a sect of the Dead Sea. Usually she is identified with the Essenes, who led an ascetic lifestyle and, along with the Pharisees and Sadducees, were one of the three main Jewish sects, about which the Jewish historian of 37-100 wrote a lot. Josephus Flavius. Although the Essenes are not mentioned in the New Testament, they were mentioned in other sources of that time - the works of Josephus, Philo of Alexandria and Pliny the Elder. The Essenes left Jerusalem in protest against the spreading Judaism and settled in the Judean desert, away from Jerusalem, which, in their opinion, had lost its spirituality. They became ascetics, led a monastic lifestyle, although there were women among them. The fugitives were strict adherents of the Torah, or the Pentateuch (usually the name for the first five books of Scripture).
Not far from the caves with the scrolls, the ruins of Qumran, an abandoned fortress rebuilt in 150-130, were discovered. BC e. Studies have shown that a group of Jews lived in Qumran who led an ascetic lifestyle. There was a meeting place, mikvah (ritual pools) for immersion in water, aqueducts, reservoirs and storage facilities. It turned out that people did not live in the main village, but in the adjacent caves. In one long narrow room of Qumran, called the scriptorium, there were several benches on which, presumably, scribes were sitting, and two inkpots were also found. Archaeologists believe that it was in this room that copies of the biblical texts found in the caves were made. Although not a single manuscript was found in the scriptorium, it is associated with the caves in which the scrolls were discovered,as it contains pottery similar to cave.
Many of the Dead Sea Scrolls provide important information about the lives and beliefs of their creators. For example, calendars are known, including a complex solar one, consisting of 364 days, although the 354-day lunar calendar was more popular - it was he who was used in the Jerusalem temple. Another manuscript is a scroll with such a meaningful title: "The War of the Sons of the Sun against the Sons of Darkness." The "Sons of the Sun" were obviously members of the Dead Sea sect, while the "Sons of Darkness" were the rest of humanity. This scroll tells about the eternal struggle not only between these two sides, but also between the cosmic forces of good and evil, and also gives the community an idea of Armageddon. For the Dead Sea sect, Armageddon came earlier than they expected. During the first uprising of the Jews (66-73 years.) the Roman army captured and destroyed Jerusalem and several Jewish fortresses, including Masada, located on the eastern edge of the Judean Desert, near the Dead Sea.
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In the Battle of Masada in 73, the Jewish defenders chose to commit mass suicide to avoid falling into the hands of the Romans. An interesting fact is that among the fragments of 14 biblical non-canon scrolls found at Masada, there was a manuscript identical to the Qumran one. As in the documents of the Dead Sea sect, it used a 364-day solar calendar. Little information remains about what happened to Qumran when Roman legions entered it in 70. Apparently, the sectarians transferred the scrolls to storage in nearby caves before the attack of the Romans, but whether the locals died or they managed to escape remains a mystery.
Some scholars believe that the Dead Sea Scrolls have nothing to do with the inhabitants of Qumran at all. According to one version, the manuscripts were written by the priests of the second Jerusalem temple, and then transferred to Qumran and hidden away from the Roman legions. One interpretation of this hypothesis suggests that members of the Dead Sea sect secretly removed the scrolls from Jerusalem and hid them in caves. In this case, the sectarians were more likely the custodians of the manuscripts than their authors. However, these hypotheses are not consistent with the harsh criticism of the priesthood. Professor Norman Golb of the Institute of Oriental Studies at the University of Chicago believes that the scrolls reflect such a wide range of ideas that they were rather the result of the work of more than one community, but the views of various Jewish sects and communities of ancient Israel.
The most unusual and mysterious ancient manuscript of the Dead Sea is undoubtedly the copper scroll. Made of copper, it was found in 1952 at Qumran in Cave 3. The manuscript is written in Hebrew, which graphically differs from the language of other Qumran manuscripts and is probably dated to the middle of the 1st century. In addition, the copper scroll is the only text that is not a literary work. It is a listing of 64 underground storage facilities scattered throughout Israel. The scroll says that in these places there were hiding places with gold, silver, scrolls, ritual vessels, containers of incense, as well as weapons.
In 1960, it was estimated that the value of these hypothetical treasures would be over $ 1 million. Many were engaged in their search, but they did not find anything. Many scholars are convinced that the Hebrew text of the scroll is a kind of code. This point of view is supported by a series of two or three Greek letters that end seven items on the list. Given the specific nature of some of the listed items (in particular, ritual jugs and incense), a number of researchers believe that the described riches are the famous lost treasures of the Jerusalem temple, which were hidden before its destruction by the Roman legions in 70 AD. An amazing feature of the copper scroll is the last point list, the so-called Item 64. It says: “in a hole adjacent to the north, in a hole opening to the north,and a copy of this document was buried at his drain with an explanation and his measurements, and an inventory of each thing, etc. Does this point mean that there is another copper scroll hidden somewhere with more essential information to be found?
Although all the manuscripts found in Cave 1 were published from 1950 to 1956, publishing the texts of the Dead Sea Scrolls is a lengthy process. The ban on access to the scrolls has led some researchers (this is, in particular, stated in the book of Michael Baigent and Richard Lee "The Scrolls of the Dead Sea") to the conclusion that the Vatican is intriguing, not allowing information about the manuscripts to be made public, because it is afraid of the dissemination of those contained in scrolls of data on the period of early Christianity. The positions of these theorists weakened after the publication in the late 90s of the XX century. - the beginning of the XXI century. texts of several other manuscripts, in particular the publication of the entire collection of biblical scrolls. The publication of most of the materials from the Qumran Caves allows for a more precise definition of the meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Not only do they provide startling religious and historical data on a currently poorly documented period of history, but they also shed light on the sources of Judaism and early Christianity.
Interesting parallels have been drawn between the Dead Sea Scrolls and the recently translated Gospel of Judas, which offers a fresh look at Jesus' relationship with his betrayed, infamous apostle. This ancient papyrus wrapped in leather - the only text of the Gospel of Judas known today - dates back to 300. The manuscript was found in the 70s of the XX century. in a cave near the city of El Minya in Egypt and for several years passed from the hands of one antiquities dealer to another, first in Egypt, then in Europe, until he ended up in the United States, where in 2000 he was sold to the antiques dealer from Zurich Frida Nussberger-Chakos … The new mistress, Mrs. Nussberger-Chakos, soon sent the manuscript to Switzerland to the Basel philanthropic foundation for translation and restoration. In April 2006at a press conference in Washington, DC, the National Geographic Society announced the completion of the translation and restoration of the manuscript. As with the Dead Sea Scrolls, most of El Minya's texts have been lost, although some may still be held by antiques dealers and private collections. And we can only guess what was included in the treasury of Qumran library manuscripts. Maybe somewhere on the northwestern coast of the Dead Sea, in some cave, there are scrolls buried in the sands and waiting for an hour. And we can only guess what was included in the treasury of Qumran library manuscripts. Maybe somewhere on the northwestern coast of the Dead Sea, in some cave, there are scrolls buried in the sands and waiting for an hour. And we can only guess what was included in the treasury of Qumran library manuscripts. Maybe somewhere on the northwestern coast of the Dead Sea, in some cave, there are scrolls buried in the sands and waiting for an hour.