From the Earliest Descriptions of Its Contents to Its Official Publication By

Home , 4QMMT, Biblical archaeology, Elisha Qimron, Frank Moore Cross, John Strugnell

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

From the earliest descriptions of its contents to its official publication by Elisha Qimron and John Strugnell in the Discoveries of the Judean Desert series (DJD X),1 the document know as 4QMMT has both intrigued and puzzled its readers, and continues to do so. When first announced, this text was understood to be a letter written by the founder of the Qumran community, the so-called Teacher of Right- eousness, to his opponent the Wicked Priest, in order to explain the reasons for the Qumran community’s existence. Given that this text would appear to provide us with valuable information regarding the formation of the Qumran community, it should come as no surprise that many scholars consider it to be one of the most important docu- ments in the Qumran corpus. However, the initial interpretation of this text has been somewhat modified in recent years, and both its genre as a letter and its Qumranic origin have been questioned by some scholars. In spite of these ongoing debates, the contents of this document, when combined with the unfortunate delay in its publication and the subsequent court cases over intellectual property and the copyrighting of ancient manuscripts, have made 4QMMT one of the best known and most interesting texts from Qumran.2

1 E. Qimron and J. Strugnell et al., Qumran Cave 4.V: Miqsat Ma‘aseh Ha- Torah (DJD X; Oxford: Clarendon, 1994). 2 See for example Schiffman, “The New Halakhic Letter (4QMMT) and the Ori- gins of the Dead Sea Sect,” BA 55 (1990): 64-73; Kapera, “How not to Publish 4QMMT in 1955-1991,” in Qumran Cave Four and MMT: Special Report (ed. Z. Kapera; Krakow: Enigma, 1991) 55-67; idem, “How not to Publish 4QMMT. Part II: Spring 1991-Spring 1994,” The Qumran Chronicle 4. No. 1/2 (1994): 41-52; García Martínez, “Discoveries in the Judaean Desert: Textes Legaux,” JSJ 32/1 (2001): 71-89; T. H. Lim, H. L. MacQueen and C. M. Carmichael (eds.), On Scrolls, Artefacts and Intellectual Property (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001). 2 CHAPTER ONE

1.1. RESEARCH AND PUBLICATION HISTORY OF 4QMMT

Elisha Qimron and John Strugnell published the editio princeps of 4QMMT (DJD X) in 1994. The title of the document, 4QMMT, was proposed by the editors in 1981. The designation derives from the words “Some of the Works of the Torah” hrwth y#(m tcqm, which were found in line C26 of the composite text in DJD X.3 The manuscripts of this document, numbered 4Q394-399, were found in cave 4 at Qumran and they were delivered to the Palestine Archaeological Museum, now known as the Rockefeller Museum, in Jerusalem during the years 1953-1959. In the DJD edition, photo- graphs of all the fragments were published for the first time with transcriptions of the manuscripts and a composite text based on all of the available manuscripts. The palaeographic analysis of 4QMMT was performed by the editors and Ada Yardeni, who analyzed manuscripts 4Q397 and 4Q398.4 They dated all of the manuscripts palaeographically to the early or mid-Herodian period.5 Earlier, however, Frank Moore Cross had given one of the 4QMMT manuscripts a late Hasmonean date. In his seminal article “The Development of the Jewish Scripts” Cross listed “a late Hasmonean semi-cursive script from an unknown work in Hebrew to be edited by J. Strugnell” and he dated the script to the years 50-20 BCE. In another article Cross referred to 4Q398, and dated it either to the late Hasmonean or the early Herodian period.6 The oldest preserved manuscript is not likely to be the original composition, and the editors dated the document to around 150 BCE. It is generally considered either one of the earliest writings of the Qumran community or, alternatively, pre-Qumranic in its origin.7

3 The Hebrew word My#(m of the title has been translated either ‘precepts’ or ‘works’. 4 Yardeni, “4Q397. 4Q398. Script,” in Qimron and Strugnell, Qumran Cave 4.V: Miqsat Ma’aseh ha-Torah, 21-25, 29-34. 5 DJD X, 3-6; 14; 16-18; 21-25; 29-34; 38-39. 6 Cross, “The Development of the Jewish Scripts,” in The Bible and the Ancient Near East: Essays in Honor of William Foxwell Albright (ed. G. E. Wright; London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1961) 149; idem, “Palaeography and the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls After Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment. Vol I (ed. P. W. Flint and J. C. VanderKam; Leiden: Brill, 1998) 396-401. 7 Qimron and Strugnell, “An Unpublished Halakhic Letter from Qumran,” in Biblical Archaeology Today: Proceedings of the International Congress on Biblical Archaeology. Jerusalem, April 1984 (Jerusalem: IES, 1985) 401; DJD X, 121. Schiffman views 4QMMT as “a foundation document” of the Qumran sect, “The