Responses to 101 Questions about the Dead Sea Scrolls
Joseph A Fitzmeyer, S J
Description
From The Publisher:
A thorough explanation of all aspects of these invaluable documents, from the discovery of the first cave in 1947 through the excitement of finding further scrolls in ten other Qumran caves, down to the controversies and debates that surrounded their publication. Fitzmyer provides superb clarification of their impact on the study of the Old Testament, ancient Judaism, the New Testament and early Christianity.
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Table of Contents
ABBREVIATIONS
1. General
2. Dead Sea Scrolls
THE 101 QUESTIONS AND RESPONSES
1. What are the Dead Sea Scrolls?
2. What is Qumran and what relation do the Dead Sea Scrolls have to it?
3. How did the scrolls come to be deposited in the caves?
4. Who discovered the QS?
5. When were the QS discovered?
6. In what country were the QS discovered?
7. Where are the QS today?
8. Who owns the QS?
9. How did Israel acquire the seven major scrolls of Cave 1?
10. How did various foreign institutions get involved in the Cave 4 publication project?
11. Did any Cave 4 fragments fail to end up in the scrollery of the Palestine Archaeological Museum?
12. Could the QS lack any connection with the Qumran community?
13. What QS have been definitively published?
14. Are the QS all texts of the OT?
15. Of what sort are the nonbiblical writings of Qumran?
16. In what languages have the QS been written? Are there any NT texts among the QS?
17. Are there any NT texts among the QS?
18. How are the QS dated?
19. What sort of texts were discovered in Cave 1?
20. What sort of texts were discovered in Cave 2
21. What sort of texts were discovered in Cave 3?
22. What sort of texts were discovered in Cave 4?
23. What sort of texts were discovered in Caves 5 and 6?
24. What texts were found in Cave 7?
25. What texts were discovered in Caves 8, 9, 10?
26. What texts were discovered in Cave 11?
27. Are any of the QS related to the texts discovered at Masada or Khirbet Mird or in the caves of Murabba'at, Nahal Hever, 5e'elim, and Mishmar?
28. What is the Manual of Discipline?
29. What is the Damascus Document?
30. What is the War Scroll?
31. What are the Thanksgiving Psalms?
32. What are the pesharim?
33. What is the Genesis Apocryphon?
34. What is the Copper Plaque?
35. What is the Temple Scroll?
36. What is the Psalms Scroll of Cave 11?
37. What is the Targum of Job of Cave 11?
38. How have the QS aided the study of the text of the OT?
39. What do the QS contribute to our understanding of apocalyptic literature?
40. What light do the QS shed on ancient forms of the Hebrew or Aramaic languages?
41. What light do the QS shed on ancient Judaism?
42. Were the members of the Qumran community Torahobservant Jews?
43. How do the authors of the QS conceive of God?
44. What do the QS tell us about how the people who wrote them understood time and history?
45. Did the Qumran community have a messianic expectation?
46. Who was the Teacher of Righteousness?
47. Did the Qumran community believe that its Teacher of Righteousness was a Messiah?
48. Did the community think that the Teacher of Righteousness had been put to death?
49. Does any Qumran text mention crucifixion?
50. Did the Qumran community think that its Teacher of Righteousness was to come back?
51. But do not some texts mention the coming of the Interpreter of the Law at the end of days?
52. Did entrance into the Qumran community require a period of testing or initiation?
53. Were the members of the Qumran community celibate?
54. What was distinctive about the theological tenets of the Qumran community?
55. What do the QS tell us about the ritual life of the community?
56. Do the QS give us any information about the sectarian communal meals?
57. Do the QS tell us anything about the dietary habits of the community?
58. Do the QS tell us anything about how the community functioned and was governed?
59. Do the QS tell us anything about how members of the community settled their differences?
60. What is known about the Qumran community's calendar and celebration of festivals?
61. What do the QS tell us about the community's observance of the sabbath?
62. What was the community's attitude toward the Temple in Jerusalem?
63. What do the QS tell us about the community's dealings with Gentiles?
64. What relation do the QS have-to the Pharisees or Sadducees mentioned in the NT?
65. Who were the Essenes?
66. What other ancient writers tell us about the Essenes?
67. Is the identification of the Qumran community with the Essenes certain?
68. How does the Qumran understanding of God differ from that in the NT?
69. How do the QS help in the study of the NT?
70. Is John the Baptist mentioned in the QS? Could he have been a member of the Essene community at Qumran?
71. Is Jesus of Nazareth mentioned in any of the QS?
72. Is there mention of anything Christian in the QS?
73. Have genuine parallels to NT ideas and phrases been discovered in the QS?
74. Do the QS shed any light on christological titles used in the NT?
75. Does the title "Son of Man," which appears so frequently on the lips of Jesus in the Gospels, occur in the QS?
76. Is the "Servant of Yahweh" theme used in the QS?
77. What sort of parallels have been found to the Matthean Gospel?
78. What sort of parallels have been found to Johannine writings?
79. Is not the phrase "sons of light" used elsewhere in the NT too?
80. What sort of parallels have been found to Pauline letters?
81. What light have the QS shed on the Epistle to the Hebrews?
82. In the NT Jesus forbids divorce. Is there anything like that in the QS?
83. Did the subsequent history of the Qumran sect con-tribute in any way to Jewish Christianity?
84. What relation did the Qumran community have to later Christian monasticism?
85. Why have the scrolls from Cave 4 created such a problem as was recently described in news media?
86. What stirred up the recent interest in the QS?
87. Who assembled the team of scholars to work on Cave 4 fragments?
88. Was any Qumran scroll published by someone who was not part of the international team?
89. Why were there no Jewish scholars on the international team?
90. Have the Cave 4 texts so far published been competently handled?
91. How did it come about that there is a concordance of Cave 4 texts, when the texts themselves have not yet been published?
92. Who "bootlegged" Cave 4 texts by reconstructing them from the concordance?
93. How can a concordance be used to reconstruct a text?
94. Can the Cave 4 texts so reconstructed be trusted?
95. Have the photographs of all the Cave 4 texts been published?
96. Is this a wise or prudent course of action?
97. Have there been tendentious readings of the QS?
98. Have there been other tendentious readings of the QS?
99. Is there any truth to the claim that Allegro made that his colleagues on the team were suppressing texts?
100. Has there been a conspiracy to hold up the publication of the scrolls?
101. But do the QS contain anything that would tend to undermine Christian faith?
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
INDEXES
1. Biblical and DSS
2. Topical
3. Modern Authors
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