Qumran Archives - The Bart Ehrman Blog

The Dead Sea Scrolls

In my previous several posts I discussed the discovery and contents of the Nag Hammadi Library. A lot of people on the blog know about all that, since it is a major topic of discussion among scholars of early Christianity. But the reality is that among the general populace, no one really knows about it. People may have heard about the “Gnostic Gospels,” but they don’t realize that there is such a *thing* as the Nag Hammadi Library (or, obviously, why it is called that). On the other hand, everyone has heard of the Dead Sea Scrolls, even if they have no clue what the scrolls are, what they contain, and how they were found. The Dead Sea Scrolls are by virtual consensus the most significant manuscript discovery of the twentieth century. And they are decidedly *not* to be confused with the Nag Hammadi Library! Here is what I say about the scrolls in my New Testament textbook. (These paragraphs actually say more about the Essenes that produced the scrolls than the scrolls themselves.) [...]

BDEhrman2020-04-03T13:35:36-04:00June 23rd, 2015|Early Judaism, Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Public Forum|

Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls

Yesterday I talked about the significance of the Dead Sea Scrolls for understanding Jesus and the milieu out of which earliest Christianity grew. My basic point is that if Jesus was a Jew, then to understand him, you have to understand Jews in his world. And the Dead Sea Scrolls provide us valuable information to that end. I am not saying that the Dead Sea Scrolls are representative of what all or even most Jews thought at the time. They clearly are not. If the “Essene hypothesis” is right – and it is the view held by the vast majority of the experts (among whom I do not number myself) (and among whom they do not number me either! ) – then the Scrolls were produced by a Jewish sect that had very distinctive views of its own that were not, in many respects, shared by outsiders. In particular, this was a group of Jews who insisted that the coming apocalyptic judgment, soon to arrive, would bring destruction not only to the hated Romans and [...]

BDEhrman2020-04-03T18:33:06-04:00May 16th, 2013|Early Judaism, Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

The Dead Sea Scrolls and Christianity

As we used to say back when I was a committed Christian, with respect to prayer: Be careful what you ask for! So I asked for questions that you would like me to address, and I have been receiving them in droves. Some of them I will be able to answer very quickly as a response to the comment itself, some I will handle in a post – or more, depending on how complicated the matter is. (If I intend to answer them in a post, I won’t reply to the comment, just to save some time; but I’ll post the comment/question itself). In any event, I have plenty to keep me busy now for a while! I’ll probably address them in the order in which I received them. For today: Question: Can you write a post on how the Qumran Scrolls advance our understanding of the birth of Christianity? Response: This is a question that can be answered in one sentence, or in a very long and dense book or … anything [...]

BDEhrman2020-04-03T18:33:14-04:00May 15th, 2013|Early Judaism, Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Historical Jesus, Reader’s Questions|

Qumran and Masada

As I anticipated, my last day in Israel was the real climax. We did three things of note (and several other things not of note): the ruins of Qumran, Masada, and the Dead Sea itself. I was disappointed with how our tour dealt with Qumran. At the visitors’ center they now have a rather ridiculous little film to introduce the site, but it consists almost entirely of a dramatization, in which an imaginary member of the Essene community describes his experience in the community; much of the description involves a “human interest” element, suggesting that John the Baptist may have been connected with the sect. There is little in the film about the ancient evidence for the Essenes, and almost nothing about the modern discovery of the scrolls themselves, what they contain, why they’re significant, or the substantial debates surrounding the character of the ruins of Qumran (is it the Essenes’ community? A Roman villa? A fort? What are the arguments?) and surrounding the relationship of the scrolls to it (what ties them to the [...]

BDEhrman2020-04-03T18:33:22-04:00May 12th, 2013|Bart’s Biography, Early Judaism, Hebrew Bible/Old Testament, Reflections and Ruminations|

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