HARRIS-DOCUMENT-2019.Pdf

Rebecca L. Harris

2019

ABSTRACT

Living in the Liminal: The Present as a Place of Access in Qumran Sectarian Literature

Rebecca L. Harris

Before the emergence of early Christian notions of liminality or inaugurated eschatology, the authors behind the Qumran sectarian literature understood the present as a liminal time-space in which participation with the divine was already possible for certain individuals. Behind this belief lay a calculated approach to the organization of time and space that located the existence of the group on the brink of a transition to the new age. In this study, I argue that the Qumran movement’s constructions of time and space establish the context for its members’ present participation with the divine with the goal that this participation would ultimately lead to permanent incorporation into the eternal realm at the end of the age. Through a robust program of ritual-liturgical activities, the present time and space of the sect became a place of regular communion with the divine, and its rituals a catalyst for the individual’s future incorporation into the ranks of divine beings.

Drawing on insights gleaned from temporal and spatial theories, I first demonstrate how the sectarian authors construct the time and place of the movement as a social space in which earthly and heavenly spheres overlap, making human-divine communion possible for the properly aligned individual. Living in the last days provided the temporal alignment and membership in the group the spatial alignment necessary for present communion with the divine through the ritual-liturgical activities of the sect. Additionally, membership imbued the individual with an eternal quality, making him fit to participate with divine beings in the worship of the sect and paving the way for his permanent incorporation into their realm. Finally, considering the significant liturgical texts of the group through the lens of performance theory, I argue that performance of the liturgy functioned not only as a means of achieving present communion with the divine, but ultimately aimed to secure the individual’s place in the eternal realm at the end of the age and even sought to hasten its arrival.

Acknowledgements

This study would not have been possible without the support I have received from the Rice University Department of Religion and its faculty. I am especially indebted to Dr. Matthias Henze, chairman of my committee, whose excellent mentorship and guidance have taught me more than I could ever give him credit for. Dr. Henze’s masterful insight and careful feedback helped guide me at every turn in the development of this work. I am grateful also for the other members of my dissertation committee, Dr. April DeConick and Dr. Richard Lavenda, whose expertise have added depth and clarity to the project.

Finally, I would like to express my deepest appreciation for my family – especially my parents, whose love and support paved the way for this accomplishment long before I ever set eyes on the goal. Their example of hard work, dedication, and excellence taught me how to achieve, yet not lose sight of the most important things. Most importantly, I wish to thank my biggest cheerleader and my loyal ally in all things, my husband, JR. He is my constant source of inspiration and courage. Lastly, to Lylah and Nehemiah – you two were a bigger part of this than you will ever know. I am forever grateful for the joy and balance you bring to the journey.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter 1: Introduction ...... 1 ACCESSING THE DIVINE IN A POSTEXILIC CONTEXT ...... 1 THE GROUP BEHIND THE TEXTS: CURRENT TRENDS IN QUMRAN RESEARCH ..... 3 THE FOCUS OF THE STUDY ...... 4

Chapter 2: Literature and Method: Whose time is it? ...... 9 INTRODUCTION ...... 9 THE SECTARIAN LITERATURE ...... 11 ANALYZING TEXTS: WHAT DO THEY DO? ...... 15 SPATIALITY AND TEMPORALITY IN ANCIENT LITERATURE ...... 17 Spatial Theory and the Construction of Social Space ...... 17 Time-Space ...... 19 RITUAL AND PERFORMANCE ...... 23 Negotiating the Liminal State through Ritual ...... 23 Enacting Change through Performance ...... 24 Ritual and the Experience of Time ...... 25 OUTLOOK TO THE STUDY ...... 27

Chapter 3: Constructing Time and Space: the Last Days as a Liminal Time-Space in the Qumran Sectarian Manuscripts ...... 28 INTRODUCTION ...... 28 CONSTRUCTING THE PRESENT...... 30 The Present as Lived Space ...... 30 The Construction of a Liminal Time-Space ...... 31 THE PRESENT IN CHRONOLOGICAL FOCUS ...... 32 Overview of the Historical Review in the Damascus Document ...... 33 The Rise of the Teacher ...... 35

“END TIMES” AND WILDERNESS SPACES: PLACES OF POSSIBILITY ...... 38 end times) ...... 38) קץ האחרון last days) and) אחרית הימים

The Construction of Liminal Space: The Wilderness and Damascus ...... 41 Wilderness...... 41 Damascus ...... 43 LOCATING THE SECT IN THE END TIME EVENTS ...... 45 The Eschatological Period and the Eternal ...... 45 Epochal Time and the Existence of Multiple Time-Spaces ...... 48 Accessing the Eternal ...... 50 CONCLUSION ...... 52

Chapter 4: Becoming Eternal: Sectarian Identity as a Means of Access to the Divine ...... 53 INTRODUCTION ...... 53 THE SECT AS FACILITATOR OF GROUP AND INDIVIDUAL HOLINESS ...... 54 Joining the Sect ...... 54 Human Sanctuary and Eternal Structure: The Sect as Facilitator of Group Holiness ...... 60 The Lot of the Eternal: The Sect as Facilitator of Individual Holiness ...... 64 THE PRIESTLY FUNCTION OF THE GROUP ...... 67 Providing Atonement ...... 69 Dispensing Judgment ...... 72 Custodians of Knowledge ...... 74 THE PLACE OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN THE ETERNAL-DIVINE STRUCTURE ...... 78 Securing A Place in the Eternal Realm ...... 79 The Place of Individual Worship ...... 81 Joining the Ranks of Angels ...... 86 CONCLUSION ...... 92

Chapter 5: Rituals of Incorporation: Achieving Communion with the Divine and Incorporation into the Eternal Realm ...... 94 INTRODUCTION ...... 94 SECTARIAN CONCEPTIONS OF THE ETERNAL ...... 96

Sectarian Notions of the Eternal Realm in Relation to the Earthly Sphere ...... 96 LITURGY AS THE SPACE THROUGH WHICH THE SECTARIAN ACCESSES THE DIVINE ...... 98 The Space of Lived Experience ...... 98 Liturgy as a Means of Facilitating Present Communion and Future Incorporation ...... 100 Worshiping with Angels (The Hodayot) ...... 101 Communing with Angels and Eschatological Agents (the Rule of the Blessings and the Rule of the Congregation) ...... 106 Worship in Heavenly Spaces (The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice) ...... 112 Waging War with Angels in Their Midst (the War Scroll) ...... 119 HASTENING THE ARRIVAL OF THE END ...... 127 Periodization and Predetermined Times ...... 127 Entrainment and Changing Times ...... 130 Hastening Time through Ritual Enactment ...... 133 CONCLUSION ...... 136

Chapter 7: Conclusion...... 138

Appendix: The Kingdom of God: a Liminal Social Space ...... 141 INTRODUCTION ...... 141 CONSTRUCTING THE KINGDOM...... 145 RIGHTS/RITES OF ACCESS ...... 148 EXPERIENCING THE KINGDOM ...... 151 CONCLUSION ...... 154

Bibliography ...... 156 1

Chapter 1

Introduction

What role do notions of time and space play in the beliefs and practices of the worshiping community? What type of sacred space is necessary to access the divine? The sixth century B.C.E. destruction of the Jerusalem temple led worshipers reeling from the loss to search for ways to access the divine that did not rely upon a physical structure. Sacred time took on additional significance, providing some compensation for the loss of this sacred space.1 In the absence of the temple, the observance of the Sabbath and festal holidays facilitated a means of communion with the divine that transcended spatial limits. God himself was no longer believed to be tied to a physical structure, so worshipers living in disparate locations could establish communion through other means. For the group behind the sectarian manuscripts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, sacred space, redefined, and sacred time formed the locus of communion between human and divine beings in the time of the group.

ACCESSING THE DIVINE IN A POSTEXILIC CONTEXT In the wake of the great national disaster, the people bereft of country and temple began to chart new paths of access to the divine that resulted in shifting and competing views regarding who can approach God and how he may be accessed. The earlier notion that God’s presence was tied to the temple structure was replaced by a belief that God’s presence is transcendental and extends beyond geographical boundaries. This expanding sense allowed for greater possibilities in the ways contact with the divine might be conceptualized and experienced.

1 Jared Calaway argues that in the New Testament book of Hebrews, sacred space and sacred time became entwined in the notion that sacred space (the sanctuary) could be accessed through sacred time (the Sabbath), and the roots of this alignment can be found in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice. Jared C. Calaway, The Sabbath and the Sanctuary: Access to God in the Letter to the Hebrews and its Priestly Context (Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2. Reihe; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013).

As notions of God’s presence expanded, competing ideas surfaced regarding who might gain access to the divine and how such access might be achieved. The priestly class and religious aristocracy no longer held sway over the vast majority of the worshiping community to the degree they had maintained in preexilic times. Rites of access were not restricted to this class of leaders alone since communion with the divine could be conceptualized as taking place beyond the confines of the temple grounds. Even when the temple was rebuilt, the type of centralized religious authority that was previously attributed to the priesthood remained dispersed in light of competing views. For some, like the group behind the Qumran sectarian manuscripts, the temple was considered defunct owing to corrupt leadership, so communion with the divine had to be achieved through other means.

Members of the movement of which Qumran was a part maintained that God is transcendental and not bound to any earthly location or structure. Even so, conceptions of sacred space are a significant feature of their beliefs; however, the concern is with separation between types of spaces, not with particular geographical locations. Initiates of the sect upheld strict purity standards in order to maintain their status in the group. The character of a space – whether it was characterized by wickedness or righteousness – was significant because members believed that physical or social separation from the wicked was necessary for the maintenance of purity and righteousness, and such maintenance was itself a precondition for access to the divine.

Conceptions of time also held a prominent place in the beliefs of this group. While sacred space created the place from which access to the divine might be achieved, notions of time established the intervals at which this communion would occur. For members of the movement, concepts of space and time were intertwined, and when the proper spatial and temporal conditions were in place communion with the divine was possible. Two notions of time were of utmost importance in the writings of the sect: the periodization or organization of time and ritual- liturgical time. Locating their own time as the last days or the end of the age, sectarian writers cast the present time of the sect as a type of transitional period in which access to the divine was a present possibility. Ritual or liturgical time then established the moment at which such access might be achieved.

The convergence of a separate social space, carved out by sectarian beliefs and practices, and a transitional time, marked by a permeable nature, created the conditions necessary for the

3 sectarian’s present communion with the divine in the moment of worship. At the same time, this present communion paved the way for permanent incorporation into the divine realm at the end of the age – an expectation the sectarians eagerly anticipated and even sought to hasten. For the sectarian worshiper, the practice of sacred space in ritual-liturgical time facilitated the experience of divine-human communion in the present and secured the individual’s future lot with the angels as well.

THE GROUP BEHIND THE TEXTS: CURRENT TRENDS IN QUMRAN RESEARCH In past decades, Qumran scholars generally believed the group behind the sectarian manuscripts consisted of a small, sectarian population that lived in the desert and likely dwelt in some of the caves in the vicinity of the Qumran settlement. This particular group, or “community,” was thought by many to belong to the wider Essene movement.2 Though certain critics have challenged the connection, arguing that the archaeological evidence does not agree with descriptions of the group in the texts, a careful examination of the sectarian rule texts reveals that the group described in the sectarian manuscripts closely matches the lifestyle reflected in the archaeological remains at Khirbet Qumran and in Josephus’s account of the Essenes.3

Recently, the size and breadth of the sect have again become a focus of discussion. The once-established practice of referring to the sect as the “Qumran community” reflects the understanding that the group behind the sectarian manuscripts consisted of an isolated community located at Khirbet Qumran. However, some have recently argued that the sect consisted of multiple communities dispersed throughout the region and should be thought of in terms of a “movement” rather than a “community.”4 Conceptualized in this way, the group

2 Eleazar Sukenik was the first to suggest that the group that preserved the Dead Sea Scrolls was part of the broader Essene movement. This theory came to be known as the Qumran-Essene hypothesis. Eleazar L. Sukenik, Megillot Genuzot: Mi-tokh Genizah Kedumah she-Nimtseᵓah be-Midbar Yehuda: Seqirah Rishonah (2 vols.; Jerusalem: Bialik, 1948).

3 Kenneth Atkinson and Jodi Magness examine the relationship of the group described in the Community Rule to the archaeological remains of Khirbet Qumran and Josephus’s testimony, concluding that Josephus’s testimony likely reflects a later stage in the Essene movement of which the sectarian community at Qumran was a part. Kenneth Atkinson and Jodi Magness, “Josephus’s Essenes and the Qumran Community,” JBL 129, no. 2 (2010): 317-342.

4 John Collins points to 1QS 6:1-8, which indicates multiple places of residence for members of the sect, as evidence that the texts were composed with more than one community in mind. John J. Collins, “Forms of Community in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honour of Emanuel Tov (eds. S.M. Paul, R.A. Kraft, L.H. Schiffman, and W.W. Fields; VTSup 94; Leiden: Brill,

4 associated with the texts appears less as a fringe movement and more as a well-known segment of Jewish society operative around the turn of the millennia. This understanding of the group and the currency of its beliefs fits well with the picture that emerges in New Testament literature, particularly in descriptions of the Kingdom of God. The similar views of the present expressed in these groups of texts indicate that many of the ideas communicated in the scrolls carried wide appeal to the extent that they were shared by other, contemporaneous or near-contemporaneous groups.5 Considering the beliefs of the sect in this way, as belonging to a network of ideas shared among other expressions of Judaism from the same period, has implications for our understanding of the group’s aims in ritual activity.

THE FOCUS OF THE STUDY In this study, I bring together areas of Qumran research that are typically considered separately. Traditionally, questions related to time and eschatology, social identity, and liturgical practice have been discussed as distinct topics of inquiry. My intention here is to bring these subjects together in a way that casts light on sectarian conceptions of time – particularly, what members of this movement thought about the present and how they sought to negotiate this period. In addressing these questions, attention to space rounds out an important part of the discussion as notions of the present in Qumran thought indicate not only the time, but also the place of certain eschatological activity.

Qumran notions of the present belong to the rich constellation of apocalyptic ideas prevalent in Jewish and Christian literature composed around the turn of the millennium. The

2003), 97-111. Collins further develops this idea in Beyond the Qumran Community: The Sectarian Movement of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2010), 52-87.

5 See, for example, James H. Charlesworth, ed. John and Qumran (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1972); Hartmut Stegeman, The Library of Qumran: on the Essenes, Qumran, John the Baptist, and Jesus (Leiden; Grand Rapids: E. J. Brill; Eerdmans, 1998); Carsten Claussen, “John, Qumran, and the Question of Sectarianism” Perspectives in Religious Studies 37, no. 4 (2010): 421-440; Mary L. Coloe and Tom Thatcher, eds., John, Qumran, and the Dead Sea Scrolls: Sixty Years of Discovery and Debate (SBL: Early Judaism and Its Literature; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011); Lawrence H. Schiffman, Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: the History of Judaism, the Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society, 1994); Matthias Henze, Mind the Gap: How the Jewish Writings Between the Old and New Testament Help Us Understand Jesus (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2017); George J. Brooke, The Dead Sea Scrolls and the New Testament (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005); Bruce Chilton, et al., eds., A Comparative Handbook to the Gospel of Mark: Comparisons with Pseudepigrapha, the Qumran Scrolls, and Rabbinic Literature (The New Testament Gospels in their Judaic Contexts 1; Leiden: Brill, 2010); Florentino García Martínez, ed. Wisdom and Apocalypticism in the Dead Sea Scrolls and in the Biblical Tradition (Bibliotheca Ephemeridum theologicarum Lovaniensium 168; Leuven: Peeters, 2003).

5 book of Daniel constructs time in such a way that the present is conceptualized as part of a final period before God establishes his eternal kingdom (Dan 7:26-27).6 In the Enochic literature, the heavenly or otherworldly coexists with a “this worldly” structure, or the present, and even impinges upon it. Some degree of permeability between the spheres is granted in this period for certain individuals – namely, apocalyptic seers and angels. In New Testament literature, the Kingdom of God is an otherworldly reality that is present and accessible to certain humans, though certain aspects of the kingdom are not yet fully manifest. The late first or early second century Jewish apocalypses, 2 Baruch and 4 Ezra, envision the eschaton not as a single event, but as a series of events that occur over the course of a transitional period.7 In these groups of texts, the present or the final period is represented as a transitional stage and a site of ongoing eschatological activity with expanded opportunities for divine-human communion.

The goal of this study is to consider how the group behind the scrolls utilized liturgical material to cultivate the experience of communion with the divine during the present time of the sect with the goal that the individual may become incorporated into the eternal realm at the end of the age. Ritual and liturgical practices provided the means through which human-divine communion may be experienced in the present. However, from the vantage point of the group, certain temporal and spatial conditions must be in place for the rituals to achieve their desired outcomes. Membership in the sect also plays a role as it further qualifies certain individuals for present communion with the divine and helps secure their future incorporation into the ranks of divine beings. For these members, the proper temporal-spatial conditions, along with membership in the group, set the stage for the type of ritual activity believed to provide access to otherworldly realities.

6 The image in Dan 7:26 of all the kingdoms of the earth being given over to God’s eternal kingdom is reminiscent of the eschatological takeover envisioned in 1QH XI. This text is discussed in detail in chapter 4. Much has been written on the eschatology of the book of Daniel. See, for example, Philip R. Davies, “Eschatology in the Book of Daniel,” JSOT 5/17 (1980): 33-55; Matthias Henze, “The Use of Scripture in the Book of Daniel,” in A Companion to Biblical Interpretation in Early Judaism (ed. Matthias Henze; Early Judaism and Its Literature 29; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011): 279-309.

7 Cf. 2 Bar 19:5; 20:1-2; 22:1-7; 4 Ezra 7:26-43. Matthias Henze, Jewish Apocalypticism in Late First Century Israel: Reading Second Baruch in Context (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 142; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2011), 291. Regarding the eschatological picture in 2 Baruch, Henze writes, “The promised time is not a single event but a sequence of eschatological events viewed together. ‘The end’ is a period of undisclosed length that covers the transition from this world to the next.”

Chapter two introduces theories of time and space and ritual performance to illustrate how the sectarian authors constructed the present as a liminal time-space in which access to the divine was already available to certain individuals. The interconnectedness of time and space in ancient thought is examined, since the notion that time and space are intertwined undergirds sectarian conceptions of the present as a liminal state. Additionally, I discuss the ways in which ritual and performance theories shed light on the ritual activity implied in the literature of the sect,8 and how ritual activity might influence the experience of time.

In chapter three, I argue that the authors of important sectarian manuscripts, such as the Damascus Document, Community Rule, and Pesharim, construct a view of time that positioned their own group at the very end of the present age, in a period referred to as the “last days.” This period is considered a time ripe with possibility for those individuals who choose to separate themselves from the rest and participate in the life of the sect. Though the age itself is regularly classified as wicked, the sectarian authors carve out for the group a separate space, a wilderness space, that allows them separate from “the wicked,” including other expressions of Judaism, and cultivate holy living according to their own rules and regulations. The creation of this separate social space and its position in the period known as the last days then provide the temporal- spatial axis for the individual’s present communion with the divine and serve as an important step toward the goal of future incorporation into the eternal realm.

In chapter four, I draw on notions of liminality proposed by Victor Turner to discuss the significance of membership in the sect. While constructions of time and space establish the proper temporal-spatial alignment for communion with the divine, membership in the sect provides the individual with the knowledge and qualities necessary to access divine beings and spaces. Through initiation into the sect, the individual gains access to the group knowledge which allows him to live in a manner worthy of association with divine beings and become grafted into an eternal entity. The sectarian authors regularly refer to the movement as an “eternal planting” or an “eternal society,” which seems to indicate that membership in the sect imbues the individual with an eternal quality. Here, I argue that membership is perceived as necessary for the individual’s present communion with the divine and functions as a crucial step

8 I borrow the term “implied” from Rodney Werline, who speaks of the implied rituals of the group, or those rituals which may be inferred from the texts. Rodney Werline, “Ritual, Order and the Construction of an Audience in 1 Enoch 1—36,” DSD 22 (2015), 326.

7 toward his goal of incorporation into the divine economy. It does not, however, guarantee his future inclusion. Eschatological judgment remains a personal matter. So while membership provides the proper space, knowledge, and association for communion with the divine, successful incorporation into the ranks of eternal beings is also contingent upon individual merit.

The discussions in chapters three and four are foundational for addressing the concerns of chapter five: How did the sectarians achieve the goal of communion with divine beings and what did they hope to accomplish through it? Constructions of time and space, along with membership in the sect, provide the necessary context for the individual’s communion with the divine. Ritual performance then functions as the means through which this communion is achieved. Through ritual, the beliefs and anticipations of the sect become part of the lived experience of its members. Through the analysis of sectarian texts such as the Rule of the Blessing, the Rule of the Congregation, the War Scroll, and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice through the lens of performance theory, I aim to demonstrate that these texts were used liturgically with the intention of doing something in the world, not merely saying something about it. On one level, ritual enactment of the texts allowed the worshiper to commune with the divine in the moment of worship. On another level, the sectarians’ liturgical performances aimed to enact change and even realize predetermined events, perhaps with the goal of hastening the arrival of eschatological judgment and their own incorporation into the eternal realm. With the proper temporal-spatial alignment in place and through initiation into the sect, individuals might participate in the liturgical practices of the group which facilitated the experience of worship with angels and access to the divine, while reaching toward the ultimate goal of securing a permanent place among them and hastening the events that would make this goal a reality.

In an appendix, I question whether early Christian representations of time mark as significant a departure from earlier Jewish beliefs as some have assumed. Here, I argue that early Christian notions of the Kingdom of God depict a liminal present that is in many ways very similar to the present constructed by the people behind the Qumran sectarian literature. The structure of the appendix follows the basic outline of the study, first considering the ways in which New Testament images of the Kingdom of God are constructed along temporal and spatial lines in a manner that reflects Qumran constructions of the present. I then look at the significance of membership or initiation into the early Christian movement for facilitating the

8 individual’s experience of the present as a place of access to divine realities, and conclude with a consideration of the ways in which some early Christians sought to make otherworldly realities present through their practice and participation in the Kingdom of God.

Chapter 2

Literature and Method: Whose time is it?

INTRODUCTION Time and space are not neutral categories in ancient literature. They are constructions created by cultures for the purpose of expressing beliefs about the world and providing rules for navigating it. This leads to the question, “Whose time is it?” If time is constructed, then who is behind the construction? Before we can discuss the significance of temporal representations in a text, we must have some understanding of the people behind the text and how they perceived the world.

A society’s sense of time is closely connected to its notions of space, and in the ancient world views of time and space are so entwined that expressions of time cannot be comprehended apart from that culture’s understanding of how space is constructed. Sacha Stern observed, in ancient Jewish literature from around the turn of the century, what he identified as an absence of reflection on time as an abstract category, an entity in itself, or an element of creation.9 However, does this necessarily imply that concepts of time do not exist in ancient Jewish thought?10 Conceptions of time in ancient Jewish thought, and in Qumran literature in particular,

9 Sacha Stern, Time and Process in Ancient Judaism (Oxford: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2003, 2007). The goal of Stern’s work is to determine whether a concept of time can be discerned in ancient Jewish sources. Stern’s approach is two-fold and includes, on the one hand, a linguistic-literary analysis of Hebrew terms used to express time, and on the other, an anthropological approach that claims the concept of time is not universal nor is it necessary for a society to function. Beginning with early Rabbinic culture and working backwards in history to early Judaism (represented in the Hebrew Bible and Qumran literature) and the Ancient Near East, Stern argues that early Jewish views of time were process-based and did not refer to time as a whole. Jewish views and terms for time, Stern contends, describe succession and duration by concrete events and nowhere envision time as something abstract or universal.

10 Mette Bundvad provides a helpful critique of Stern’s Time and Process in Ancient Judaism, in which she challenges both Stern’s anthropological and linguistic approaches, claiming they are not viable arguments against the notion of time in ancient Judaism. The anthropological approach, she contends, falls short in its ability to demonstrate divergent time conceptions among different societies, and a lack of linguistic evidence on the concept of time cannot disprove the presence of such a concept within a culture. Bundvad also questions Stern’s very narrow definition of the concept of time and wonders whether Stern is himself doing the very thing he warns against – that is, “imposing a modern category on ancient material” (p. 288). In her response, Bundvad proposes that an early Jewish concept of time may be discernible in the coordination of discrete processes (biological, social, subjective/objective, clock-timed, etc.) within time. “Coordinating events according to a temporal axis requires a concept of time” (p. 294), Bundvad claims, and the Hebrew writers demonstrated this ability. Instead of imposing a particular definition of time on the text, Bundvad suggests we instead explore why the Hebrew writers used

10 are rather more concrete than abstract. Time is connected to people, places, and events. Time, understood this way, is inextricably linked to social space, which is itself a thing constructed. Through a variety of literary works and styles, the authors behind the Qumran sectarian manuscripts depict the present time and space of the group as a place of special access – a place where heaven and earth meet, and humans and divine beings commune together.

In recent years, spatial and temporal theories have increasingly gained currency in the field of biblical studies. The recognition that time and space are constructions, especially in ancient thought patterns, has provided scholars with a new frame through which to analyze texts and discuss their purpose. The application of ritual and performance theories, likewise, has provided new insights to discussions of old texts. In this project, I draw on the insights of spatial and temporal theories to demonstrate how the authors of the sectarian literature conceptualized their own time and place in the world. Through their writings, these authors generate for their community a sense of spatial separation from other expressions of Judaism and a belief that they occupied a special place at the very end of the age. This space is best described as a liminal space – a transitional space that although rooted in the present, earthly realm already embodies aspects of the otherworldly and eternal. The creation of this liminal space opened up the possibility that members of the sect might enjoy greater levels of access to the divine through membership in the sect and participation in its rituals. Ritual and performance theories then provide a helpful lens through which we might consider what members aimed to achieve through the performance of the group’s rituals.

Before we discuss the significance of these theories for the study of the sectarian literature and what this study contributes to our knowledge of the beliefs and goals of the sect, it is necessary to identify the texts included in the study and how they relate to each other. This chapter is organized into the following sections that provide the groundwork for the study: 1) The Sectarian Literature (Which texts are discussed and how do they relate to each other?), 2) Analyzing Texts: What do they do? 3) Spatiality and Temporality in Ancient Literature, 4) Ritual and Performance, and 5) the Goal of the Study.

particular metaphors and depictions of time and use this as our starting point. Mette Bundvad, “Defending the Concept of Time in the Hebrew Bible,” SJOT 28, no. 2 (2014): 280-297.

THE SECTARIAN LITERATURE Among the more than nine hundred manuscripts discovered in the caves near Qumran, some are believed to have been authored by members of the group associated with the site. This group of texts most likely reflects the views and beliefs of people who resided in various locations and subscribed to the regulations laid out in the documents. It is now generally recognized that these texts, here referred to as the “sectarian” literature, represent a movement whose reach extended well beyond the Qumran settlement.11 While those individuals who resided in or near Qumran might have practiced a more strict form of the religion, some of the primary documents related to the group provide legislation for communities that embraced marriage and perhaps adopted a more flexible lifestyle than the type practiced at Qumran. In this project, I use the term “sect” to refer to the religious movement represented by this collection of texts.12

The primary texts discussed in this study include the Damascus Document (CD), the Community Rule (1QS), the War Scroll (1QM), the Rule of the Congregation (1QSa) and the Rule of the Blessings (1QSb),13 the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, the Hodayot (1QH), and occasionally, the Pesharim. The Damascus Document and the Community Rule are often referred to as rule texts, since they deal with matters of legislation and governance particular to

.(בכול מגוריהם) 1QS VI, 2 alludes to membership in multiple locations – wherever they dwell 11

12 Others have preferred the term “yaḥad”, which is a self-designation of the group. However, yaḥad is only used in this technical sense in the Community Rule and the Pesharim. In past decades, scholars regularly referred to the group as the Qumran community, recognizing the close association between the people who occupied the site of Qumran and the scrolls discovered in the caves nearby. In recent years, it has become increasingly common to speak of this group and their literature as a sect or a movement within Judaism. See, for example, Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 7-8. Robert Kugler recently advanced the view that what we regularly refer to as sects or religious groups are really different expressions of Jewish ethnicity. Regarding the people of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Kugler proposes that we “treat them no longer as a Jewish sect, but rather as one expression of Judaean ethnicity among others.” Robert Kugler, “The War Rule Texts and a New Theory of the People of the Dead Sea Scrolls: A Brief Thought Experiment,” in The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday (ed. K. Davis, et al.; STDJ 115; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2016), 163-172; and idem, “Ethnicity: A Fresh Context for Locating the ‘Religion’ of the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Companion to the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. G. Brooke and C. Hempel; London: T&T Clark, 2018), pp.77-85. Kugler’s point is well taken. However, I choose to use the term “sect” here as it captures the religious ideology and separatist tendencies expressed in this group of literature. The people who composed and used this literature did not consider their movement just one expression of Judaean ethnicity, but believed they were chosen and privileged above the rest. This conviction led them to draw firm boundaries between their group and others – a practice characteristic of sectarian movements.

13 1QSa (= 1Q28a) is often referred to as the Rule of the Congregation, and 1QSb (= 1Q28b) is also known as the Rule of the Blessings. Both texts were appended to the 1QS version of the Community Rule.

12 members of the movement. While these texts are closely related, they bear some remarkable differences as well. As for their similarity, the authors of both texts refer to their group as people of the covenant. The rules and regulations outlined in each text are nearly identical and both express a belief in predeterminism and hold similar eschatological views. Regarding their differences, the Damascus Document (more than the Community Rule) deals with the group’s conceptual realities; it provides a structured view of past events that informs the present situation and future anticipations of the sect’s membership. The Teacher figure mentioned in the Damascus Document is absent from the Community Rule. The Damascus Document also provides legislation concerning women and children, assuming their inclusion in the group, whereas women and children are nowhere mentioned in the Community Rule. In the Community Rule, the term yaḥad appears as the preferred self-designation of the sect, yet this technical reference is absent in the Damascus Document. Despite their dissimilarities, the vast majority of scrolls scholars believe the two texts are closely related and likely belonged to the same movement.14

The War Scroll, though classified by some as a rule text, exhibits a mixed genre which includes liturgical material, apocalyptic content, and some legislation.15 While the text does it is not strictly a rule in the same sense as the Damascus 16,(סרך) refer to itself as a serekh

Document and the Community Rule. Here, I treat the War Scroll as a mixed genre text that includes liturgical material.17 Sectarian features of the War Scroll include a belief in

14 Cf. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 6, and Charlotte Hempel, The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 154; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013), 9-10, 123-136, 139- 150. It is also worth noting that both the Community Rule and the Damascus Document continued to be copied and used during the occupation of the Qumran settlement. This points to the ongoing significance of each text for the group that preserved them.

15 The earliest interpreters of the text considered it apocalyptic. Yigael Yadin classified the War Scroll as a military manual for an eschatological war. Yigael Yadin, The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness (Oxford: Oxford University Press [Hebrew 1955]), 1962. Jean Carmignac classified it as a liturgy for a future time. Jean Carmignac, La Règle de la Guerre des Fils de Lumière contre les Fils des Ténèbres: Texte restauré, traduit et commenté (Paris: Letouzey & Ané, 1958). In his discussion of the genre of the War Scroll, Jean Duhaime concludes that the text is an eschatological rule, not a liturgy. Jean Duhaime, The War Texts: 1QM and Related Manuscripts (Companion to the Qumran Scrolls 6; London; New York: T & T Clark, 2004), 61.

16 Cf. 1QM V, 3; VIII, 14; IX, 10; XVI, 3.

17 George Brooke considers the text a liturgy in George J. Brooke, “Aspects of Theological Significance of Prayer and Worship in the Qumran Scrolls,” in Prayer and Poetry in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Eileen Schuller on the Occasion of her 65th Birthday (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 39.

13 predeterminism and the divine chosenness of the members of the sect, who are referred to as the Sons of Light. The text also includes the same kind of material found in the Community Rule and the Damascus Document,18 shares a level of intertextuality with the Rule of the Blessings,19 a figure known in the Rule of the ,(נשיא העדה) and mentions the Prince of the Congregation

Blessings and perhaps also the Rule of the Congregation.20 Some of the arrangements in the Rule of the Congregation find parallels in sections of the War Scroll,21 and the shared language, imagery and ranks in the War Scroll and the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice imply a shared provenance between those two texts as well.22

The Rule of the Congregation and the Rule of the Blessings (1QSa and 1QSb), were appended to the 1QS version of the Community Rule, suggesting they were used alongside this longer rule text and considered complimentary to it. These texts also include language common to the Community Rule and the Damascus Document, such as the self-referring titles “the Yaḥad” and “the Sons of Zadok,”23 similar penal codes,24 and reference to the significance of the 25.(ספר ההגי) Book of Haggai or Book of Meditation

18 Jean Duhaime notes that both the War Scroll and the Rule of the Congregation include the same kind of material as the Community Rule and the Damascus Document, but with an eschatological focus. Duhaime, The War Texts, 54.

19 See Dongshin D. Chang, “Priestly Covenant in 1QM and 1QSb,” in The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday (ed. K. Davis, et al.; STDJ 115; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2016), 147-162.

20 Cf. 4Q285 IV, 2, 6; 7:4; 1QSb V, 20. The title also appears in the pesher on Isaiah (4Q161 2—6, 19). In 1QSa רואש כול עדת ) II, 12, an eschatological priestly figure is referred to as the head of the entire congregation of Israel .(ישראל

21 See George Brooke, “Aspects of Theological Significance,” 45.

22 Noam Mizrahi points to these shared features of the texts in “The Cycle of Summons: A Hymn from the Seventh Song of the Sabbath Sacrifice (4Q403 1 i, 31-40),” DSD 22 (2015), 48-49.

23 Cf. 1QSa I, 24; II, 2-3, 11, 18; 1QSb III, 22; V, 21.

24 Cf. 1QSa I, 1—II, 10; 1QS VI, 24—VII, 25; also 1QM VII, 1-7.

25 Cf. CD X, 6; XIII, 2; XIV, 7-8; 1QSa I, 7.

The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, in its current form, belongs to the corpus of sectarian literature, though a number of scholars consider the Songs a pre-sectarian document that was taken up and adapted by the sect, and edited to include sectarian terminology.26 Even if the text was not an original composition of the group, the addition of sectarian terminology and its shared imagery, language, and ranks with other texts like the War Scroll warrant its inclusion in a discussion of the sectarian literature. The Songs include the inscription “for the Maskil” which appears in other important sectarian texts, such as the Community Rule, the (למשכיל)

Damascus Document, the War Scroll, and the Hodayot,27 and shares with these texts a belief in human communion with the divine through the practice of the liturgy.

Finally, the Hodayot and the Pesharim include references to the founding figure of the movement, the Teacher mentioned in the Damascus Document, demonstrating their close connection with the sect. The Hodayot also share with the Community Rule the view that humans are frail and can be compared to dust or clay, but that those whom God chooses do not remain in a debased state, but are glorified by Him.28 Both the Hodayot and the Pesharim are generally counted among the sectarian literature.29 The network of relations exhibited among these texts demonstrates their special significance to the members of the sect who composed, copied, and revised these texts, and used them in ritual and liturgical practice.

26 For more on the sect’s possible adoption and adaptation of the text, see Torleif Elgvin, “Temple Mysticism and the Temple of Men,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context (ed. Charlotte Hempel; STDJ 90; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 236-237; Carol Newsom, The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Tranlsations, vol. 4B. Angelic Liturgy: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice (ed. J. H. Charlesworth; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1999), 5; Philip Alexander, The Mystical Texts: Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and Related Manuscripts (Library of Second Temple Studies 61; London: T & T Clark, 2006), 128-131.

.may also be an indication of an adaptation of the text by the sect. Cf (למשכיל) ”The inclusion of “for the Maskil 27 4Q400 3 ii + 5:8; 4Q401 1—2:1; 4Q403 1 i, 30; 1 ii, 18; 4Q406 1, 4.

28 Cf. 1QS XI, 14-22; 1QHa V, 20-25; VII, 12-16; XI, 21-23.

29 For example, Carol Newsom includes the Hodayot, Pesharim, and War Scroll, among the sectarian literature in The Self as Symbolic Space: Constructing Identity and Community at Qumran (STDJ 52; Leiden: Brill, 2004), 20- 21. Esther Chazon posits the Hodayot enjoyed a prominent place in the Community’s worship. Esther G. Chazon, “Liturgical Function in the Cave 1 Hodayot Collection,” in Qumran Cave 1 Revisited: Texts from Cave 1 Sixty Years after Their Discovery: Proceedings of the Sixth Meeting of the IOQS in Ljubljana (ed. D. K. Falk, S. Metso, D. W. Parry, and E. J. C. Tigchelaar; STDJ 91; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 135-149.

ANALYZING TEXTS: WHAT DO THEY DO? The sectarian texts mentioned above represent a variety of genres: rules, liturgy, poetry, scriptural interpretation, and apocalyptic. Despite such a wide variety of forms, many of the texts include liturgical features that indicate they were intended for use in worship. While the Damascus Document and Community Rule are generally considered rule texts, which provide legislation for the governance of the group, they also include liturgical sections, scriptural interpretation, and poetry. The War Scroll, as mentioned above, exhibits multiple genres, including liturgy. Although the Rule of the Congregation and the Rule of the Blessings are often counted among the rule texts, as their titles imply, these texts also include liturgical features. The blessings in the Rule of the Blessings may have been pronounced as part of a ceremonial ritual, while the banquet described in the Rule of the Congregation might have been embodied as a ritual practice of the group.30 Organized into thirteen songs, one for each of the first thirteen Sabbaths, the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice are one of the longer liturgical orders of the group as their use spans a thirteen-week period. The Hodayot, whether used individually or corporately, are liturgical in nature, consisting of prayer language, or speech directed toward God. What all these texts have in common, besides their inclusion in the sectarian corpus, is that they were likely used liturgically in the regular, ritual practices of the sect.

The Pesharim, though significant for understanding the sectarian authors’ views concerning their own time and place and the purpose of the sect, do not include features commonly associated with liturgy. However, they were likely part of the initiate’s formal education in matters related to the sect’s beliefs and teachings.31 As such, they would have powerfully influenced members’ conceptions of the world and their place in it. For the purpose of this project, the Pesharim are included in the discussion of sectarian constructions of time and space as they shed light on the group’s understanding of the present as a liminal time-space at the end of the age. In the discussion of the group’s ritual and liturgical practices, only those texts

30 For more on the possible liturgical use of these two texts, see chapter 5, pp. 104-110.

31 Cf. 1QpHab VII, 3-5. In her work on exegesis and time in the Pesharim, Devorah Dimant notes the significance of the Pesharim for illuminating the initiate/reader in regard to the understanding the full meaning of prophecies. Devorah Dimant, “Exegesis and Time in the Pesharim from Qumran,” Revue des études juives 167, no. 3-4 (July- Dec, 2009), 373-393. Shemaryahu Talmon stresses the role of the Teacher as an inspired interpreter. As such, his influence on texts like the Pesharim would have powerfully shaped the views and beliefs of initiates as the group became more cohesive. Shemaryahu Talmon, The World of Qumran from Within (Leiden: Brill, 1989), 284-285.

16 that include liturgical features or describe rituals that may have belonged to the group’s worship practices are examined.

In this study, I use the terms “liturgy” and “liturgical” in a broad sense. Liturgy is here thought to include a wide variety of religious activity, including prayers, poetry, and blessings used in the regular worship of the sect. Stefan Reif has argued that early Jewish liturgy should be conceptualized in broad terms, extending beyond formal cultic activities, and including activities such as prayer, the study of sacred texts, eating, and blessing.32 This observation is particularly relevant for the study of the sectarian literature, which emphasizes prayer, study, and blessing in place of animal sacrifice and worship in the Jerusalem temple.

The texts discussed in this study belong to a growing body of literature emergent in early Jewish and Christian circles that support corporate worship in non-institutional settings. Even before the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, some groups had become increasingly disillusioned with its practices and disassociated themselves from formal worship in its precincts. The movement behind the sectarian literature represents one such group. In place of animal sacrifices offered by priests, the members of the sect functioned as a human sanctuary, offering up sacrifices of prayer and worship. Bilhah Nitzan, in her work on the prayers and religious poetry of the sect, points out that prayer became increasingly fixed as part of regular worship in the Second Temple period.33 Esther Chazon also notes this development in the Qumran liturgy and draws attention to its significance as it indicates that communal prayer at fixed times predates rabbinic practice.34 Through worship practices involving the recitation or performance of liturgy, members of the sect sought ways to establish communion with the divine that did not necessitate participation in the Jerusalem establishment.

Liturgy and ritual are twin concepts in the study of sectarian worship practices. While liturgy provided the raw material for ritual practice, it was the performance of the liturgy in ritual

32 Stefan C. Reif, “Prayer in Early Judaism,” in Prayer from Tobit to Qumran (ed. R. Egger-Wenzel and J. Corley; DCL 1; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2004), 439-464.

33 Bilhah Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry (trans. Jonathan Chipman; Leiden; New York; Kӧln: E.J. Brill, 1994).

34 Esther Chazon, “A Liturgical Document from Qumran and Its Implications: ‘Words of the Luminaries’ (4QDibHam)” (Ph.D. diss., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1991), 81-98 (Hebrew).

17 action that bridged the gap between the sectarian’s conceptual reality, expressed in the written form of the liturgy, and his lived experience, realized in its performance. The performance of rituals was significant for the group because of what they sought to achieve – present communion with the divine and incorporation into the eternal realm at the end of the age. In order for the ritual to achieve its intended purpose, the proper conditions must be in place. Constructions of time and space which positioned the sectarians in a liminal time-space, the last days, established a social space in which worshipers might achieve this present communion with the divine and ultimately seek their full incorporation into the eternal realm.

SPATIALITY AND TEMPORALITY IN ANCIENT LITERATURE

Spatial Theory and the Construction of Social Space How, then, is this social space created – this space that facilitates the sectarian’s lived experience of communion with divine beings? In the last half of the twentieth century, some theorists began to advance the argument that time and space are not neutral categories, but constructions formed by societies for the purpose of communicating particular ideas about the world. Yi-Fu Tuan and Michel Foucault were some of the first to propose theories of space as something other than the physical, perceptible world. Tuan focused on space and place as sites of lived experience,35 while Foucault developed the idea of space as something other than the physical, perceptible, and geographical. Foucault famously coined the term heterotopia to indicate an “other space” – a space that is different or disruptive, and exists outside of the everyday experiences of life.36 Heterotopias, for Foucault, are transitory and liminal. Moreover, heterotopias are not readily accessible in the same way as public spaces; entry is either compulsory or requires the performance of sacred rites.37 The Damascus Document and the Community Rule, along with the Pesharim, conceptualize social spaces that closely parallel Foucault’s description of the

35 Yi-Fu Tuan, Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota, 1977).

36 Michel Foucault, The Order of Things: An Archaeology of the Human Sciences (New York: Vintage Books, 1971); idem, “Texts/Contexts of Other Spaces,” Diacritics 16/1 (Spring, 1986): 22-27. In “Texts/Contexts of Other Spaces,” Foucault distinguishes between utopias, which he defines as “sites with no real place . . . fundamentally unreal spaces” and heterotopias, which are “outside of all places” and “absolutely different from all the sites that they reflect and speak about” (p. 24). Here, Foucault builds on the work of phenomenologists, such as Gaston Bachelard.

37 Foucault, “Texts/Contexts and Other Space,” 26.

18 heterotopia. Entry into the sect was contingent upon an individual’s successful completion of a rigorous initiation process – a practice that helped ensure the integrity of the social space as a liminal place suited for communion with the divine.

Henri Lefebvre is the architect behind what many think of today as spatial theory. In his ground-breaking work, The Production of Space, Lefebvre lays out a conceptual triad for classifying and analyzing different types of space: 1) spatial practice, 2) representations of space, and 3) representational spaces.38 The first concept, spatial practice, is perceived space. It refers to real, geographical locations. Lefebvre here uses the example of “the daily life of a tenant in a government-subsidized high-rise housing project,” also motorways and air transport.39 Representations of space, the second concept, refers to “conceptualized space, the space of scientists, planners, urbanists, technocratic subdividers and social engineers” . . . individuals who “identify what is lived and what is perceived with what is conceived.”40 This is also the world of texts and authors whose works attempt to capture conceptions about the perceived world and record them through a system of verbal expressions and signs. The third category, representational spaces, is the one that concerns us most in this project. Representational spaces indicate “space as directly lived through its associated images and symbols, and hence the space of ‘inhabitants’ and ‘users’ . . . space that “[tends] towards more or less coherent systems of non- verbal symbols and signs.”41 This is social space, and the site of ritual practice. When Lefebvre speaks of the production of space, he refers to this social space, which is constructed by societies for the purpose of facilitating certain goals.

Edward Soja took up Lefebvre’s views and popularized them through his own formulation of a spatial trialectic. Soja uses the terms “Firstspace,” Secondspace,” and “Thirdspace” to describe Lefebvre’s concepts. 42 Thirdspace, for Soja, refers to lived spaces of

38 Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space (trans. Donald Nicholson-Smith; Oxford, UK; Cambridge, Mass.: Blackwell, 1991); trans. of La production de l’espace (Paris: Anthropos, 1974), 33, 38-39.

39 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 38.

40 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 38.

41 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 39.

42 Edward W. Soja, Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1996), 10; also idem, Postmodern Geographies: The Reassertion of Space in Critical Social Theory (London: Verso Press, 1989).

19 representation.43 It is space constructed by societies that serves the purposes of the society that formed it. When used as a critical method for the study of ancient texts, spatial theory enables the reader to see how the groups behind these texts view the world and their place in the order of events. Kelley Coblentz Bautch, a biblical scholar who has employed critical spatial theory in her work on apocalyptic literature, notes: “Despite Lefebvre’s hesitance to use spatial theory on literary texts, on the grounds that one could find space everywhere in every form, biblical scholars generally have embraced spatiality as an exegetical tool.”44 Critical spatial theory provides biblical scholars with a particularly helpful lens through which to analyze ancient texts and discuss their functions for the societies that produced and used them. Though texts help produce the second category, Lefebvre’s representations of space and Soja’s Secondspace, the purpose or function behind many texts, particularly liturgical texts, is to influence the reader/performer’s lived experience – to construct a certain type of social space.

Time-Space When we think about or discuss time in ancient Judaism, what we are really dealing with are notions of time-space. Time-space is somewhat different from “spacetime” – a term used in physics that is based on Albert Einstein’s work on relativity. In the sectarian manuscripts, the authors are not concerned with various dimensions of time from a mathematical-scientific perspective, but rather with the qualities of times (or periods) as they are shaped by the events which fill a particular time-space. Mikhail Bakhtin explored this notion of time-space in his work on genre theory. For Bakhtin, the “chronotope,” literally rendered “time-space,” represents

43 Soja, Thirdspace, 10.

44 Kelley Coblentz Bautch, “Spatiality and Apocalyptic Literature,” HBAI 5/3 (2016), 274-275. Liv Lied has also made good use of spatial theory in her work on 2 Baruch and the Damascus Document. Liv Ingeborg Lied, “Another Look at Damascus: The Spaces of the Damascus Document in the Light of Edward W. Soja’s Thirdspace Approach,” in New Directions in Qumran Studies: Proceedings of the Bristol Colloquium on the Dead Sea Scrolls, 8-10 September 2003 (LSTS 52; ed. J. G. Campbell, W. J. Lyons and L. K. Pietersen; London: T & T Clark International, 2005), 101-25; and idem, The Other Lands of Israel: Imaginations of the Land in 2 Baruch (JSJSup 129; London; Boston: Brill, 2008). Spatial theory has also been a prominent feature in Alison Schofield’s work. Alison Schofield, “The Wilderness Motif in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Israel in the Wilderness: Interpretations of the Biblical Narratives in Jewish and Christian Traditions (ed. Kenneth E. Pomykala. Themes in Biblical Narrative: Jewish and Christian Traditions 10; Boston: Brill, 2008), 37-53, and idem, “Re-Placing Priestly Space: The Wilderness as Heterotopia in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam (ed. Eric F. Mason, Samuel I. Thomas, Alison Schofield, and Eugene Ulrich; vol. 1 of A Teacher for All Generations: Essays in Honor of James C. VanderKam; ed. Samuel I. Thomas; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2012), 469- 490.

“the intrinsic connectedness of temporal and spatial relationships that are artistically expressed in literature.”45 As a formal category, the chronotope, or the notion of time-space, indicates “the inseparability of space and time.”46 Time and space, in ancient Jewish thought, were not considered as separate entities or dimensions, though they are often conceptualized in such ways in more recent times. The notion of time, especially, as a type of meta-structure is very much a modern construction. John Bender and David Wellbery highlight this modern development in time-thought in their introduction to Chronotypes: The Construction of Time. They posit that “this temporalization of experience—this notion of time as the framework within which life forms are embedded and carry on their existence—is the defining quality of the modern world.”47

If ancient Jewish authors did not think of time as a type of meta-structure in which all experience could be plotted, then what did the authors of the sectarian literature intend when they הקץ ) ”and “the end time 48(אחרית הימים) ”employed terminology such as “the last days

While these terms indicate some sense of chronology, they are also imbued with ?49(האחרון spatial significance. The period, “the last days” or “the end time,” in the sectarian texts indicates not only the time in which the sect existed, but also the space its members occupied.50 It was a place apart from the rest of the “evil age”51 – a period which overlapped with “the last days.”52

45 Mikhail M. Bakhtin, The Dialogic Imagination: Four Essays by M. M. Bakhtin (ed. Michael Holquist; trans. Caryl Emerson and Michael Holquist; Austin: University of Texas Press, 1981), 84.

46 Ibid.

47 John Bender and David E. Wellbery, eds., Chronotopes: The Construction of Time (Standford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1991), 1. Bender and Wellbery also point to Reinhart Koselleck, who argues that there emerged in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries the notion that all experience and change occurred within this meta-structure called “time.” Reinhart Koselleck, Futures Past: On the Semantics of Historical Time (trans., Keith Tribe; Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press, 1985).

48 See, for example, CD IV, 4; 1QpHab II, 5; and 4QpHah 3—4 ii, 2.

49 See 1QpHabVII, 7, 12-13; 1QS IV, 16; and 4Qp Nah 3—4 iv, 3.

50 This idea will be developed in chapter three in the section, End Times and Wilderness Spaces.

.(קץ הרשע) Cf. CD VI, 4 51

52 In this project, “period” is also used to indicate this notion of time-space. A period, in this sense, is not only a temporal marker or a reference to a set duration, but includes the events it contains. It is a thing of substance and

In this way, the “evil age” and “the last days” might be understood as distinct periods, or time- spaces, which overlap and coexist.53 Time, in this sense, is localized; it is bound to space and identified by the events which fill it.

Allen C. Bluedorn draws attention to the interconnectedness of time and space in his discussion of epochal time.54 Bluedorn, who approaches the subject of time from the field of business and management studies, makes some observations that are especially germane to the study of ancient groups and useful to this particular study. In The Human Organization of Time, Bluedorn addresses the following principles, which are of special interest here: 1) all times are not the same,55 2) times are constructed by societies, and 3) these constructed times influence the lived experience. While biblical scholars working on notions of time in the mid twentieth century tended to view time as a distinct entity shared in common by all peoples, places, and generations, most scholars now recognize the situation is much more complex.56 In his discussion of different types of time, Bluedorn distinguishes between fungible, or Newtonian-

which is often translated as “period” or “age” may ,קץ quality, not merely a unit of measurement. The Hebrew term be used in a temporal or spatial sense. In the HB, it typically means “end” (cf. Ezek 7:2; Dan 8:17). In the scrolls, often includes both temporal and spatial senses; it regularly appears with a descriptive term indicating the nature קץ CD I, 5; XX, 15; 1QH) קץ חרון of a particular period/time-space. Some common occurrences of this use include ,(CD VI, 14; XII, 23; XIII, 20; XV, 7; 1QpHab V, 7-8; 4QShir 1:6) קץ הרשע ,(VII, 17; XI, 28; XXII, 5; 4QpHos i:2 which usually describes the complete number of predetermined periods (1QS IV, 16; CD II, 10; 1QH-a ,קצי עולם and in the scrolls, see Gershon Brin, The Concept of Time קץ V, 15; 4Q417 1i, 7; 4QH-a 7ii, 6). For more on the use of in the Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 264-276.

in עולם These periods are positioned within a meta-structure that comprises all these individual units. The term 53 the scrolls indicates an entity in which all things exist, so smaller time-space units belong to this meta-structure that ;(גורל is paralleled with עולם) is both temporal and spatial in nature. Cf. 1QS IV, 16; 1QH-a IX, 18-20; 1Q181 1ii, 4 1QH-a XI, 22.

54 Allen C. Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time: Temporal Realities and Experience (Standford, Calif.: Standford University Press, 2002), 31-34.

55 This is, in fact, the title and subject of the first chapter.

56 Examples of this earlier approach include Oscar Cullmann, Christ and Time: The Primitive Christian Conception of Time and History (Philadelphia: Westminster), 1964; John Marsh, The Fullness of Time (New York: Harper, 1952); John A.T. Robinson, In the End, God . . . A Study of the Christian Doctrine of the Last Things (Cambridge, UK: James Clarke & Co., 1950; repr., Eugene, Oreg.: Wipf & Stock, 2011); and James Muilenburg, “The Biblical View of Time,” HTR 54.3 (1961): 225-252. These authors did, however distinguish between Greek and Hebrew notions of time, usually considering Greek notions of time as cyclical and Hebrew/Jewish as linear and aiming toward the ultimate goal of eschatological salvation. James Barr broke down some of these earlier assumptions in his landmark study, Biblical Words for Time (Naperville: Allenson), 1962.

22 linear time, and epochal time, which allows for the existence of multiple “times” at once. Epochal time is event-based time.57 Since events occur in time and give shape to this expression of time, epochal time is also spatial in nature. It takes its form and definition from the events (קצים/קץ which fill it. This understanding of time is expressed in the notion of “periods” (often in the sectarian literature.58 Each period bears a distinct character or shape and is constructed according to its defining events.

The authors of the Qumran sectarian literature understood their own time and place as separate – not only from past generations and other lands, but also from other inhabitants of the present generation, occupying nearby (perhaps even the same) geographical spaces. Through their representations of past periods of time and interpretations of the present in light of those events, these authors portrayed the present, or the time and space of the movement, as a distinct social space characterized by the experience of liminality. Liminality refers to a state of in- betweenness and includes both spatial and temporal dimensions.59 Separation from other expressions of Judean culture, whether or not this entailed geographical distancing, played an important role in facilitating the sectarians’ experience of belonging to a liminal space. The creation of this separate social space involved the establishment and maintenance of social boundaries, which enabled members of the sect to live as though they were citizens of a separate time-space not governed by the rules of other periods.60 For the sectarian authors, the time is the last days and the space is membership in the sect – an eternal society with present connections to the divine. Through initiation into this social space, individuals might participate in the rituals and liturgy believed to facilitate communion with the divine.

57 Bluedorn argues that “originally all human times were epochal.” Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time, 31.

58 This notion of epochal time and its relevance for understanding sectarian constructions of time is discussed in greater detail in the following chapter.

59 Bjørn Thomassen, “The Uses and Meanings of Liminality,” International Political Anthropology 2/1 (2009), 16. Liminality is discussed in greater detail in the next section under the subtitle, “Negotiating the Liminal State through Ritual” (pp. 23-24).

60 Russell Arnold argues that the liturgical practices of the sect served to establish its communal identity and set up important boundary markers that separated members of the group from other facets of society and confirmed their election by God. Russell C. D. Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy in the Religion of the Qumran Community (STDJ 60; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2006).

RITUAL AND PERFORMANCE Through their constructions of time and space, the sectarian authors created of a separate social space in which communion with the divine might be experienced as a present reality. This is the space in which the conceptual realities of texts become part of the lived experiences of individuals, and ritual is the instrument that makes it possible. Ritual, according to Catherine Bell, is an acting out or performance of conceptual orientations.61 Through ritual enactment, participants aim to make present the world of the text or the ritual so that it becomes an experiential reality. In this project, I draw on the work of both ritual and performance theorists to show how the liturgical practices of the sect aimed to facilitate its members’ access to divine beings and spaces.

Negotiating the Liminal State through Ritual The stages of liminality proposed by Victor Turner62 and Arnold van Gennep63 provide a useful framework for understanding the group’s goals, since ritual activity in the sectarian texts is tied up with notions of liminality. In the model proposed by van Gennep and taken up by Turner, transition from one state to another involves a middle stage, a liminal state characterized by openness, disorientation, and even danger. While van Gennep and Turner focused primarily on transitional processes related to the individual (e.g. illness, puberty) or the individual within a group (e.g. graduation, ritual passage into adulthood), Bjørn Thomassen points out that “liminal situations can be applied to whole societies going through a crisis or ‘collapse of order’.”64 The crisis or “collapse of order” depicted in the Qumran sectarian manuscripts is the transition of the group from a this-worldly reality to life in otherworldly existence – a transition that includes the dissolution of the present, earthly order.

In contrast to shorter experiences of liminality, which are framed by societal structures and have fairly predictable and immediate outcomes, there is an unknown factor in liminal states

61 Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1992; repr. 2009), 19.

62 Victor Turner, The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-Structure (Abingdon; New York: Routledge, 2017; repr., Transaction Publishers, 1969).

63 Arnold van Gennep, The Rites of Passage (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1961).

64 Thomassen, “The Uses and Meanings of Liminality,” 19.

24 experienced on a societal level as they extend over longer durations of time.65 Rituals and liturgy may then provide a means for safely navigating this type of liminal state. In Qumran literature, the social space of the sect is depicted as a liminal time-space in which certain individuals, through regular ritual and liturgical performance, might experience present communion with divine beings with the goal of achieving permanent incorporation into the eternal realm.66 Participation in the sect and the performance of its rituals provided members with the means by which they might navigate the present, liminal state and safely arrive at the future goal and become incorporated into the ranks of eternal beings.

Though some have suggested that the ritual activities of the sect (atonement, in particular) were mainly concerned with maintaining the present order of things and providing temporary substitution for the Jerusalem establishment,67 I argue here that the goal of the group’s ritual activity was rather to enact change in the world and even hasten the arrival of eschatological events. Ritual, in this study, primarily refers to the liturgical practices represented in the group’s literature.68 Since many of the texts mentioned above include liturgies that were likely performed by members of the group at regular intervals, performance theory is a fitting tool for the analysis of these texts.

Enacting Change through Performance Performance theory has emerged as an academic discipline only in recent decades. Though some forms of performance studies rely on the works of theater professor and director, Richard Schechner,69 and anthropologist, Victor Turner,70 the roots of performance theory can be traced

65 Thomassen, “The Uses and Meanings of Liminality,” 21-22.

66 The performance of liturgy may also serve to heighten the experience of communion with the divine for members of the group. Thomassen proposes that there are varying degrees to which liminality may be experienced and when certain coordinates converge, such as temporal and spatial dimensions or personal and group levels, the experience of liminality is intensified. Thomassen, “The Uses and Meanings of Liminality,” 17-18.

67 See the discussion in The Priestly Function of the Group (chapter 4), particularly note 210.

68 While members of the group appear to have engaged in other ritual activities, such as ritual immersion, that are not necessarily liturgical in nature, I focus here on the worship activities of the group – activities designed to establish communion with the divine, rather than those intended more for the maintenance of purity and status within the group.

69 Richard Schechner, Between Theatre and Anthropology (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University Press, 1985).

25 back to J. L. Austin’s development of speech-act theory in the middle of the twentieth century.71 Performance studies and speech-act theory in particular understand ritual as action that effects change and transformation.72 Austin developed a classification system for different types of speech acts, most of which he terms “illocutionary acts.” For Austin, saying is doing: “to say something is to do something, or in saying something we do something, and even by saying something we do something.”73 In addition to his category of illocutionary acts, Austin develops the notion of perlocutionary acts. Whereas the goal of the illocutionary act is achieved in the saying itself, the perlocutionary act aims to achieve something through the performance of the speech act.

The liturgical practices of the sect might be best understood in light of Austin’s discussion of perlocuationary acts. Through the regular performance of liturgical orders and powerful speech acts, conceptual realities such as those described in the group’s literature, become part of the experiential reality of the ritual performers. Such activity enacts change and seeks the realization of events for the purpose of establishing future or otherworldly realities in the present time and place of the worshipers. John Searle, building on Austin’s categorization of speech acts, considers such acts declarative.74 The ultimate goal of declarative speech exists somewhere beyond the speech itself; it is rather concerned with establishing or making present the realities expressed through performative speech.

Ritual and the Experience of Time For members of the sect, the realization of events is not necessarily subject to the flow or passage of time. On the contrary, the speed or duration of time might be altered by the fulfillment of

70 Victor W. Turner, The Anthropology of Performance (New York: PAJ Publications, 1988).

71 J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words (ed. J. O. Urmson and M. Sbisà; 2d ed.; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975 [1962]).

72 In Ritual: A Very Short Introduction, Barry Stephenson considers various understandings and expressions of performance theories. Stephenson credits Austin and the emergence of performance theory with providing an important corrective to the study of ritual through its “emphasis on ritual’s dramatic and aesthetic qualities.” Barry Stephenson, Ritual: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015), 87.

73 Austin, How to do Things with Words, 94. Italics in the original.

74 John R. Searle, “A Classification of Illocutionary Acts,” in Language in Society, vol. 5, no. 4 (Apr., 1976), 1-23, and idem., Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969).

26 certain events. In Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity, Roy Rappaport argues that ritual both constructs time and influences the worshiper’s experience of time.75 So while ritual enactment aims to effect change in the world, it also influences the participant’s role and experience of the present.

Rappaport distinguishes between mundane time, by which he means the everyday rhythms and activities of life, and liturgical time, which he considers time out of (mundane) time.76 In contrast to the ever-changing nature of mundane time, Rappaport supposes “that which occurs in liturgical time out of time is characterized by punctilious repetition and is thus represented as never-changing,”77 Liturgical performance may then function as a means of ushering the worshiper into the experience of the never-changing, eternal realm. It allows him to temporarily step into a social space that is not governed by the regular rhythms of nature and mundane time, but is successionless and changeless. Such an experience may even elicit a sense of being in an otherworldly space.78

Like Austin and Searle, Rappaport believes the significance of ritual performances lies in what they aim to do: “performative acts realize states of affairs.”79 Contrary to dramas, in which performance is concerned with storytelling and entertainment, ritual performances affect the world, even if only a small corner or population of it. Liturgical acts, like those described in the sectarian texts, function as a means of ushering the worshiping community into the presence of divine beings. For the group behind the sectarian literature, the experience of present communion with divine beings was significant not only for the way it shaped the worshiper in the present but also for its implications for the individual’s future. Ritual and performance theories allow us to see how the liturgies performed by members of the sect might have shaped their beliefs about the present while also seeking to realize their future expectations.

75 Roy A. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).

76 Rappaort also refers to liturgical time as extraordinary or sacred time. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, p. 12-15.

77 Rappaport, Religion and Ritual, 15.

78 Rappaport, Religion and Ritual, 19-25.

79 Rappaport, Religion and Ritual, 133.

OUTLOOK TO THE STUDY In the next few chapters, I draw on theories of time and space and ritual performance to demonstrate how the sectarian authors constructed the present as a liminal time-space in which access to the divine was already available to certain individuals. I argue that through these constructions of time and space, a new social space emerges in which communion with the divine is considered a present reality for members of the movement. The ultimate goal of this communion is incorporation into the eternal realm – an imminent expectation, the seeds of which have already taken root in the present through the member’s incorporation into the sect. Ritual action then provides the locus for this communion in the present and aims to make that communion permanent by securing the sectarian’s position in the divine economy and hastening the arrival of eschatological events.

Chapter 3

Constructing Time and Space: the Last Days as a Liminal Time-Space in the Qumran Sectarian Manuscripts

INTRODUCTION A number of years ago, Jacob Licht pointed out that apocalypses tend to deal with time in an all- inclusive manner, ordering the events of history according to a set number of periods.80 Since Licht, a number of other scholars have dealt with this phenomenon, notably Michael Stone in his article, “Apocalyptic Historiography.”81 Stone indicates that while some Hebrew Bible texts present schematic treatments of time, it is “apocalyptic literature that first strives to embrace the whole span of time, to comprehend the overall structure of history in a pattern from the beginning to the eschaton.”82 The authors behind the sectarian manuscripts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls embrace this way of thinking about time and use similar framing strategies to locate their own time and place in a transitional phase between two ages. In this way, the authors construct the present as a liminal time-space in which new possibilities of access to the divine are available to members of the sect.

Time and space are intimately connected in the thought-world of the sectarian authors. Time is the space or interval in which certain events take place.83 For the sectarians, the time is

80 Jacob Licht, “Time and Eschatology in Apocalyptic Literature and in Qumran,” JJS 16 (1966): 177-182.

81 Michael Stone, “Apocalyptic Historiography,” in Ancient Judaism: New Visions and Views (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011), 59-89. See also Adela Yarbro Collins, Cosmology and Eschatology in Jewish and Christian Apocalypticism, JSJSup 50 (Leiden: Brill, 1996).

82 Stone, “Apocalyptic Historiography,” 59-60.

83 Sacha Stern understands time in the HB as process-based. By this, he means that ancient Jewish writers did not think about time in the abstract, but thought only in terms of events. While I cannot go so far as Stern and conclude that this indicates there is no notion of time in the HB, time was conceptualized quite differently in early Jewish literature than it appears in later rabbinic writings and modern discussions. Time in the HB and Second Temple Jewish literature was defined by the events that filled it; time was not thought of in abstract terms. See Sacha Stern, Time and the Process in Ancient Judaism, Oxford: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2003, 2007. Mette Bundvad offers a helpful response to Stern in which she challenges Stern’s narrow definition of “time” and questions whether there might be other ways of discerning notions of time in the Hebrew texts. Mette Bundvad, “Defending the Concept of Time in the Hebrew Bible,” SJOT 28, no. 2 (2014): 280-297.

29 the last days and the space is the wilderness – an untamed, mostly uninhabited space with ties to previous divine action and revelation. In their view, “the last days” is a period defined by eschatological activity. This activity includes events in the recent past (such as the founding of the sect), the group’s present (the time of separation and dwelling in camps in the desert/wilderness), and the near future (the anticipated advent of certain eschatological figures and final judgment). It is a period of openness and possibility due to its transitional nature between times and spaces. Living in this period and belonging to the sect opens up the possibility of access to the divine, which includes access to divine spaces and to the beings that inhabit those spaces. Constructions of time and space play an integral role in sectarian conceptualizations of the present as a liminal state in which access to the divine was a lived reality.

This chapter is divided into four main sections: 1) Constructing the Present, 2) The Present in Chronological Focus, 3) “End times” and Wilderness Spaces: Places of Possibility, and 4) Locating the Sect in the End Time Events. In the first section, I define my use of the terms “time-space,” “present,” and “liminality/liminal” and explain how spatial and ritual theories contribute to our understanding of these concepts in the sectarian manuscripts. Second, I examine the sectarian authors’ positioning of the present in relation to significant events remembered in the national history. In this construction, the fall of the Watchers to the foundation of the movement marks one period, while the rise of the Teacher figure and removal to the wilderness inaugurates a new time-space for those involved in the movement. In the third are used to define this period – the קץ האחרון and אחרית הימים part, I examine how the terms time of the Teacher and his successors. I also discuss how this framing of the present period as “the last days” or “end times” opens up new possibilities for divine-human communion in the present and how the construction of space contributes to the interpretation of the present as a liminal time-space. Finally, in the last part I conclude with a view of future events expected to occur in this final period and the location of the sect in these events.

CONSTRUCTING THE PRESENT

The Present as Lived Space The “present” in this project refers to the lived space of the sectarians.84 It includes the time in which the sectarian texts were composed and used as well as the spaces of practice. In the sectarian manuscripts, the present, or the lived time-space of the sect, is regularly referred to as “the last days” or “end times.” These terms indicate the sectarians’ particular conceptual understanding of their position in world events. This understanding is based on a specific construction of historical events and their relation to the present, time-space of the sect. By positioning events (past, present, and future) within a particular scheme and interpreting present events in light of certain eschatological expectations, the sectarians construct a temporal-spatial narrative that casts the present time-space of the movement in a place of transition.85

Henri Lefebvre’s theory of social space (the third part of the trialectic) is instructive here, as it recognizes that space is a construction, a product of human thought and activity, rather than something abstract or passive.86 Edward Soja, building on Lefebvre’s theory of the spatial triad,87 stresses the interconnectedness of material, conceptual, and lived spaces. Though Soja primarily uses the term “space” in his discussion, space here includes the notion that time, as conceived and lived, is part of spatial constructs.88 For Soja, lived space, or Thirdspace, is “a meta-space of radical openness.”89 This view of the lived space as a space of openness is very much in line with the sectarian authors’ perception of the present as a time-space unbounded by

84 This lived space might also be referred to as the experiential reality of the sectarians. While I recognize that we cannot know for sure how a text was used and experienced, spatial analysis allows us to consider how texts may have been used and what participants sought to achieve through their recitation or ritual enactment.

85 Positioning (that is, establishing certain events in relation to others) is one of the methods by which the sectarian authors construct time and space. Other methods might include the interpretation of events according to a certain structure, the creation/anticipation of eschatological events not yet underway, and the re-imaging of space. Positioning understood this way is a tool of sectarian constructions of time and space.

86 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 26-27. Here, Lefebvre distinguishes among mental space, physical space, and social space, positing that social space is a production of society.

87 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 33.

88 Soja, Thirdspace, 65-66, 72.

89 Soja, Thirdspace, 34.

31 the laws which governed previous ages or pertain to those living outside the sect. For these authors, the present time-space of the sect is characterized by new possibilities of access to the divine, including access to divine knowledge in the form of revelation and access to divine space and beings through ritual performance.

The Construction of a Liminal Time-Space The image of the present that emerges from the sectarian manuscripts might best be described as a liminal state. It does not fit the pattern of previous ages, nor does it belong entirely to the new age. It is a place “betwixt and between,” to borrow a phrase from Victor Turner,90 or in the words of Henri Lefebvre, an-Other that includes but is more than the sum of two parts.91 Turner’s understanding of liminality is based on the stages of liminality laid out by Arnold van Gennep in The Rites of Passage.92 Van Gennep identifies three stages in the transition from one state to another: 1) preliminal rites/rites of separation, 2) liminal rites/rites of transition, and 3) postliminal rites/rites of incorporation. The middle stage, liminal rites, is what Turner refers to as “betwixt and between.” It is not bound to the laws of the previous state nor the anticipated state, but is a stage characterized by periods of dramatic change and often associated with marginal or hybrid states.93

The individual who becomes involved with the sectarian movement described in the scrolls participates in two processes of transition. One involves movement from one human/earthly state to another, while the other process involves transition from a human/earthly state to a divine/otherworldly state. The first transition, becoming a sectarian, includes the following phases: 1) separation from society (van Gennep’s “separation”), 2) initiation into the group (transition), and 3) membership and participation in the life of the sect (incorporation).

90 Turner describes liminality and liminal personae as “neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial.” He goes on to say that “liminality is frequently likened to death, to being in the womb, to invisibility, to darkness, to bisexuality, to the wilderness, and to an eclipse of the sun or moon.” Turner, The Ritual Process, 95.

91 Henri Lefebvre, La Présence et l’absence: Contribution à la théorie des representations (Paris: Casterman, 1980), 143.

92 van Gennep, The Rites of Passage.

93 Turner, The Ritual Process, 5.

While these stages of transition were regularly completed as new initiates joined the sect, the second layer of transition, which aimed at incorporation into the otherworldly realm, could only be completed with the final consummation of the future events of the Eschaton.

The transition from the human/earthly state into an otherworldly existence includes 1) separation from society (separation), 2) participation in the life of the sect – joining the sect, following its regulations, and participating in its rituals (transition), and 3) full incorporation into the otherworldly – assuming leadership roles and activities alongside angels (incorporation). The first layer of transition, joining the sect, exists for the purpose of facilitating the second layer – full incorporation into the otherworldly. This expectation of incorporation into the otherworldly, which will be discussed in greater detail in the last section, has implications in the present life of the sectarian as it positions the present time-space of the sect in a liminal state. Other positioning strategies, such as locating the group at the end of the age, also serve to establish the present as a transitional state – an-Other that lies somewhere betwixt and between the human/earthly and divine/otherworldly.

THE PRESENT IN CHRONOLOGICAL FOCUS In order to establish the present as a liminal state, the sectarian authors construct the time-space of the sect as a transitional state between two ages. The author of the Damascus Document (CD) marks the beginning of the present time of the sect with the rise of the Teacher figure and removal to the wilderness.94 This event takes place at the end of the review of events related to the national history. While the author casts the movement as an extension of ethnic Israel and considers the sectarians heirs to the covenant (CD I, 3-8), only a portion of the postexilic Jewish population are in view here. The remnant in the Damascus Document is quite limited in scope, excluding many of those who survived the captivity. In the Damascus Document, the heirs of the covenant are those who follow the Teacher and the teachings of the sect (CD I, 7-12).95 They are the ones living in the last days, the ones who experience the events about which the prophets

94 While many have written about and have sought to understand historical allusions in the manuscripts (such as the 390 years in CD I, 5-11 or mention of the Wicked Priest in 1QpHab I, 13) and interpret them according to certain known events and figures, my goal here is rather to focus on the conceptual realities of the sectarian authors. How did these authors envision their own time and place? What purpose did such conceptualizations serve for members of the sect?

95 Parallel passages appear in 4Q268 1, 11-17 and 4Q269 4 i, 3—4 ii, 1.

33 spoke. However, their existence is far from passive or conciliatory as their literature demonstrates. For group members, the last days are an active period in which identity formation determines eternal fate and future roles, and ritual activates and hastens the consummation of the age and transition to the next.

Overview of the Historical Review in the Damascus Document The historical review in the Damascus Document is framed on either side by events pertaining to enjoins the members of the sect 96(ועתה שמעו) the rise of the sect. A formal call to attention

(perhaps including potential initiates) to listen and understand the group’s place and purpose. They are the remnant, not only because they or their ancestors belonged to the few who survived the destruction and captivity, but rather because they alone among the survivors “considered their iniquity and knew that they were guilty men” (CD I, 8-9 // 4Q266 2 i, 12-13).97 Here described as a plant root that springs up from Israel and Aaron to inherit the land (CD I, 7 // 4Q266 2 i, 11-12), at the conclusion of the review, which returns to the subject of the group’s origins, they are the men of understanding from Aaron and wise men from Israel whom God and understanding (שמע) raises up after the destruction (CD VI, 2-3 // 4Q266 3 ii, 10).98 Hearing

are distinguishing characteristics of this group,99 and these qualities provide members with (בינה) special knowledge and the ability to interpret what was previously unknown or hidden in earlier prophetic texts. In the Damascus Document, this includes knowledge regarding the order and span of human history, and the ability to interpret the times.

Following a brief mention of the group’s origins, which locates their rise around 390 years after the destruction of Jerusalem, the authors of the Damascus Document launch into a

96 CD I, 1.

97 All quotations from the scrolls are from The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader unless otherwise noted. The Dead Sea ויבינו Scrolls Reader (eds. Donald W. Parry and Emanuel Tov; 6 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 2004). The Hebrew here is .בעבוונם ויעדו כי אשמים המה

ויקם מאהרון נבונים ומישראל :4Q266 3 ii, 10 .ויצמח מישראל ומאהרון שורש מטעת לירוש את ארצו :4Q266 2 i, 11-12 98 .חכמים וישמיעם

99 These terms appear together as descriptors of the group in the introduction to the historical review (4Q266 2 i 12- 13) and at its conclusion when the focus returns to the origins of the sect (4Q266 3 ii, 10).

34 review of history from a deterministic perspective (CD II, 2-14 // 4Q266 2 ii, 2-13).100 The review itself functions in part as a warning for initiates so they may learn to choose what pleases God and to walk in his ways (CD II, 13-17 // 4Q266 2 ii, 13-17). Beginning with the Watchers, the authors provide a select review of Israel’s history, presented in alternating periods of wickedness and righteousness.101 The fall of the Watchers and the ensuing destruction are described as a period of wickedness: “they did not keep God’s commandments” . . . and so “his wrath [was kindled against them]” (4Q266 2 ii, 18-21). This period of wickedness continues through Noah (all his sons strayed; 4Q266 2 ii, 21) up to the time of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. While these three patriarchs are credited with keeping God’s commandments, the children of Jacob – those who went down to Egypt and sojourned in the wilderness – strayed and were punished (4Q266 2 ii, 21-24). From this generation, there emerges a remnant that returned to the law (4Q266 3 i, 1-2). The sectarian authors identify their movement as an extension of this group.

At the conclusion of the historical review, the text moves rather fluidly from Moses and Aaron to the origins of the sect. The original lawgiver, Moses, and his generation, which is is set in apposition to 102,(עצה) and without counsel (בינה) described as lacking understanding those who in the latter days will correctly interpret and uphold the law – the sectarian authors

100 There is a high probability that the number 390 is symbolic and not meant to be an exact dating of the emergence of the group. The number may be an allusion to the number of years decreed for the punishment of Israel in Ezekiel 4:5. Collins notes that the author of CD locates the group’s origins in a state of exile. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 35. For a more in depth discussion of the reference to 390 years, see Michael A. Knibb, “The Exile in the Literature of the Intertestamental Period,” HeyJ 17/3 (July 1976): 253-272 (repr. in Essays on the Book of Enoch and Other Early Jewish Texts and Traditions [SVTP 22; Leiden: Brill, 2009) and Michael A. Knibb, “Exile in the Damascus Document,” JSOT 25 (1983): 99-117.

101 In 2 Baruch, a late first or early second century Jewish apocalypse, the history of Israel is presented in alternating periods of wickedness and righteousness, represented by dark and light waters. Cf. 2 Baruch 53:1— 74:4.

.]כי עם[ בלא בינות הוא] גוי אוב[ד עצות ]המה מאשר איו בהם בינה[ :See 4Q266 3 ii, 4-5 102

35 and their group.103 The Teacher plays a significant role in this, but does not appear until sometime after the initial formation of the group.104

The Rise of the Teacher In the Damascus Document, the rise of a certain Teacher figure – the Teacher of Righteousness Though the 105.(אחרית הימים) is connected to the events of the last days – (מורה צדקה/יורה הצדק) appearance of this figure seems to be an event of the past in the context of CD I, 10-14, the in CD VI, 11 // 4Q266 3 ii, 17 has (יורה הצדק) reference to the Teacher of Righteousness sometimes been taken as a reference to a figure who is yet anticipated in the authors’ future.106 However, it is more likely that the image here refers to a figure remembered from the past or existing in the present of the group. Here it is helpful to take a closer look at this reference to the rise of the Teacher within its narrative setting. The following passage (CD VI, 2-11)107 appears at the end of the historical review discussed in the previous section.

2. But God remembered the covenant of the forefathers; vac and He raised up from and from Israel (נבונים) Aaron insightful men and He taught them and they dug the well: ‘the well the princes (חכמים) wise men .3 dug, the nobility of the people 4. dug it with a rod’ (Num 21:18). The well is the Law, and its ‘diggers’ are 5. the captives of Israel who went out of the land of Judah and dwelt in the land of Damascus; 6. because God had called them all princes, for they sought him and

103 1QS V, 8 describes the sectarians as those who return to the law of Moses.

104 In 4Q266 3 ii, 10-17, the Teacher does not appear until sometime after the group has departed to “Damascus” and has functioned under the leadership of other figures and specialists – the Ruler/Interpreter and the Nobles/Excavators. 4Q268 I, 16-17 mention a period of twenty years of groping before God raised up a Teacher.

105 CD VI, 11 // 4Q266 3 ii, 17.

106 Philip Davies reads CD VI, 11 as an early memory of the group – one in which the one who would teach righteousness is a still-anticipated figure expected to appear at the end of days. For Davies, CD I, which presents the Teacher as a figure who appeared in the past, represents a later stage in the group memory. With the addition of this layer, the authors perhaps signal that the last generation is to be understood as the present. Philip R. Davies, “What History Can We Get From the Scrolls and How?” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context (ed. Charlotte Hempel; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 36-37. Davies’ reading of the Teacher references in CD I and CD VI are quite possible, but perhaps not the only way of explaining the alternate perspectives in these two passages. In CD VI, 11, the reference to the Teacher appears within a certain, forward-looking narrative context and may very well represent narrative time rather than historical time from the vantage point of the author.

107 See 4Q266 3 ii, 9-17 for a parallel text from the Qumran caves.

7. their honour was not denied by a single mouth. vac And the ‘rod’ is the interpreter of the Law of whom 8. Isaiah said, ‘he brings out a tool for his work’ (Isa 54:16). vac The ‘nobility of the people’ are 9. those who come to ‘dig the well’ by following the rules that the Rod made and without these rules ,(קץ הרשיע) to live by during the whole era of wickedness .10 (עד עמוד) they shall obtain nothing until the appearance of .(יורה הצדק באחרית הימים) one who teaches righteousness in the last days .11

until”) in line 10 indicates narrative perspective. It is the time between the“) עד The term formation of the group and the rise of the Teacher, and does not necessarily imply that the Teacher figure has not yet appeared.108 In this way, the authors, drawing on collective or group memory, depict the time of anticipation of the Teacher even though the actual arrival of this figure is an event of the past at the time of writing.

Without delving too deeply into questions regarding the historical circumstances of the Teacher figure(s) implied in these texts, what stands out as significant for the current discussion is that the rise of the (or a) Teacher figure seems to signal the arrival of the final earthly period – קץ ) ”or “the end times 110,(דורות אחרונים) ”last generations“ 109,(אחרית הימים) ”the last days“

113,(קץ חרון) the period of the sect.112 Another period – the period of wrath – 111(האחרון

108 Charlotte Hempel points out that the origins of the group in CD are depicted as a two-stage process. Hempel identifies in CD four separate accounts of the sect’s origins of varying degrees of complexity (CD 1:3-11a; 2:8b-13; 3:12b—4:12a; 5:20—6:11a), and believes that the more complex descriptions may indicate some temporal distance between the composition of these passages and the actual origins of the sect. Charlotte, Hempel, The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies (Texts and Studies in Ancient Judaism 154; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013), 66- 78. The two-stage origin stories discussed here, CD I, 3-11 and VI, 2-11, are more complex and may reflect a time of composition at a later stage in the movement.

109 CD IV, 4 and VI, 11 // 4Q266 3 ii, 17.

110 CD I, 11-14 // 4Q266 2 ii, 14-16.

111 1QpHab VII, 7, 12-13; 1QS IV, 16; 4QpNah 3—4 iv, 3.

.demarcates the time of the sect in 1QFlor 1—2 i, 2, 6, 15 and 19; CD IV, 4 and 1QSa I, 1 אחרית הימים The term 112

113 CD I, 5; XX, 15; 1QH VVII, 17; XI, 28; XX, 5; 4QpHos i, 12.

,coincides with the last days of the sect – 115(קץ הרשע) or wickedness 114,(קץ חרבן) destruction although its beginning likely predates the inauguration of this period referred to as the “last days/end times.” In the historical review, certain righteous individuals arise during periods of wickedness. Examples of this include Noah, and Moses and Aaron.116 The authors position the Teacher in the same line of tradition. He is a righteous individual, a leader, who arises in the CD VI, 10-11 // 4Q266 3 ii, 16-17).117 Yet the rise of the ;קץ הרשע) midst of an evil age

or (אחרית הימים) ”righteous individual (the Teacher) here inaugurates a new phase, “the last days a period within the last days, that exists while the evil age persists and offers the sectarian the possibility of new relations with the divine in the present and the hope of a permanent dwelling with the divine at the completion of this final phase.

In the Damascus Document, the Teacher figure plays a prominent role in the inauguration somewhat אחרית הימים of the last days.118 While the Rule of the Congregation identifies the generally as the time of the movement,119 the Damascus Document links it to the activity of a Teacher figure. This connection appears also in Pesher Habakkuk, which locates the activity of the Teacher in the last days and connects it to the last generation.120 The somewhat nebulous origins of the sect take on a distinct temporal-spatial form with the rise of this leader, so that a new social space emerges. In the Damascus Document and Pesher Habakkuk, the rise of this

114 CD V, 20.

115 CD VI, 14; XII, 23; XIII, 20; XV, 7; 1QpHab V, 7-8; 4QShir 1, 6.

116 CD II, 1 // 4Q266 2 ii, 21 and CD V, 18-19 // 4Q266 3 ii, 5.

extends up to the appearance of (קץ הרשעה) Cf. CD VI, 14. See also CD XII, 23. Here the era of wickedness 117 the Messiah.

118 George Brooke has pointed out that there are no allusions in the literature of the sect to rituals or festivals commemorating the appearance of the Teacher figure or the emergence of the sect. Brooke conjures that the absence of such literature might indicate an intentional move on the part of the sectarian authors to connect the group to the broader religious tradition. George J. Brooke, “Aspects of Theological Significance of Prayer and Worship in the Qumran Scrolls,” 42-43.

119 See 1QSa I, 1.

.(דור אחרון) ”and the “last generation (אחרית הימים) ”1QpHab I, 2; II, 5-7. The terms here are “the last days 120

38 figure signals the inauguration of a new quality of existence – a separate time-space with its own set of new possibilities for human-divine interaction in the present.121

“END TIMES” AND WILDERNESS SPACES: PLACES OF POSSIBILITY In the sectarian manuscripts, constructions of time and space facilitate the experience of liminality. By locating their movement at the end of the present age and conceptualizing their removal from society as a creation of liminal space, the authors blur the boundaries between the earthly-temporal and otherworldly-eternal so that the present for the sectarian becomes a place of new possibilities of access to the divine.

(end times) קץ האחרון last days) and) אחרית הימים

Some years ago, Annette Steudel penned a very important article in which she argues that the in the sectarian texts should be understood in a future-eschatological sense, as אחרית הימים term pertaining to “the last days” or “end times.”122 In the decades prior, there had arisen a tendency in Hebrew Bible scholarship to translate the term in a de-eschatologized sense, meaning something like “in future days.”123 Some scrolls scholars followed this line of thinking, rendering the term as a future time not pertaining to the present period of the sect.124 However, appears in multiple sectarian texts as a אחרית הימים as Steudel so aptly demonstrates, the term

קץ means of referring to the present time of the group.125 I include in this discussion the term

121 Phillip Davies argues that the Teacher in the Damascus Document is an eschatological figure who comes “to replace the dwrš htwrh of CD VI as the real founder of the true Israel, of the sectarian movement.” In this view, the Teacher and his followers form a type of splinter group, replacing the parent group and redefining the sect. Philip R. Davies, “What History Can We Get From the Scrolls and How?” 44-45.

.in the Texts from Qumran,” Revue de Qumran 16/2 (1993): 225-46 אחרית הימים“ ,Annette Steudel 122

.in the Texts from Qumran,” 225-26 אחרית הימים“ ,Steudel 123

124 Jean Carmignac understood the term as related primarily to future events. See Jean Carmignac, “Notes sur les Pesharim,” in Revue de Qumrân 3 (1962), 505-538 and “La future intervention de Dieu selon la pensée de Qumrân,” in Qumrân: Sa piété, sa théologie el son milieu (ed. M. Delcor; Paris: Leuven, 1978), 219-229. George Brooke rendering it as “latter days.” George J. Brooke, Exegesis ,אחרית הימים sought to maintain an eschatological sense of at Qumran: 4QFlorilegium in its Jewish Context, JSOTSup 29 (Sheffield: JSOT, 1985).

in the Texts from אחרית הימים“ ,Steudel describes it as a “presently continuing period of time.” Steudel 125 Qumran,” 228.

and seems to אחרית הימים the end times) as it is sometimes used interchangeably with) האחרון functions as another designation for the same period.126 It is a period that begins with the origins of the group and extends into the future to include events the authors believed would soon take place. This eschatological sense of the terms is central to the sectarian authors’ construction of their present as a liminal time-space.

From the perspective of the sectarian authors, “the last days” comprise a span that begins with the origins of the movement and continues in the present. In the Damascus Document, is contrasted with “the last days” or the time of the Teacher and the sect ( לפנ ים) ”former times“

regularly refers to the period of the sect. It is אחרית הימים ,CD V, 17; VI, 11). In the pesharim) described as the time of the unfaithful, those who did not listen to the Teacher (1QHab II, 5). latter generation) to refer to the individuals who) דור אחרון Pesher Habakkuk often uses the term

is paralleled with אחרית הימים ,live in this period (1QpHab I, 2-3; VII, 1-2). In 4QCatena A 9:2

and refers the present time of the sectarians and their opponents, the “Seekers after דור אהרון

While this period extends into the future to include events 127.(דורשי החלקות) ”Smooth Things yet anticipated from the authors’ perspectives, it is not primarily future-otherworldly in focus, but rather present-earthly. The evidence in the scrolls indicates a period that belongs to the present and includes events remembered from the sect’s recent past as well as events anticipated in the near future.128

The notion that “the last days” describes the authors’ present, imbued with eschatological fervor, is expounded in Florilegium. This midrash draws on portions of 2 Samuel, the Psalter, and other scriptural passages to develop the role of the sect in the eschatological

126 In Pesher Habakkuk, for example, these two terms appear to function as synonyms for the same period. 1QpHab II, 5; VII, 7, 12

.in 4QMMT-f I, 11, might also be included in this discussion אחרית העת Other variations of these terms, such as 127 However, for the sake of space, I have decided not to include them all here.

128 Future events expected in this period will be discussed in further detail below.

”interpreted “sanctuary ,(בית) ”events already underway. The sectarian community is the “house

”As such, the “temple of men 129.(אחרית הימים) ”that God will build in “the last days ,(מקדש)

functions in a substitutionary or corresponding role to the Jerusalem temple, sending (מקדש אדם) up offerings of good deeds rather than animal sacrifice (4QFlor 1—2 i, 21:6-7).130 They are the sons of Zadok (a common epithet for the sect in the scrolls) who turn aside from the people in the last days.131 In Florilegium, the present activity of the sect, serving an atoning function as a human sanctuary, is set within the same period as future eschatological events anticipated – the rise of a messiah figure and an interpreter (4QFlor 1—2 i, 21:10-12).

When this description of the last days in Florilegium is read alongside the use of the term in the Damascus Document (particularly CD VI), the present and future implications of the term in each text are comparable. The last days or end times is a period in which eschatological activity is already underway. It is a period of openness – not bound to the regulations of periods and 133(מקדש אדם) prior, or to those of the future state still anticipated.132 The sanctuary of men

129 4QFlor 1—2 i, 1-3.

130 While I do not necessarily think the sectarians considered their own group a permanent substitute for the Jerusalem Temple, they believed their activity served an atoning function in the present, perhaps as a temporary substitution for what they perceived was a defunct Temple cult. Cf. 1QS V, 5-6; VIII, 5-6; IX, 3-5; 1QM II, 5. For many years, a common assumption in scrolls scholarship was that negative attitudes toward the Jerusalem temple in the scrolls indicated the sect’s withdrawal from the physical temple institution. For example, Eyal Regev argues that the sectarians gradually rejected the Jerusalem Temple and formed a substitute cult in which rigorous ritual and moral purity facilitated the means necessary for proper worship of God. Eyal Regev, “Abominated Temple and a Holy Community: The Formation of the Notions of Purity and Impurity in Qumran,” DSD 10/2 (2003): 243-278. However, the view that the sectarians withdrew from the Jerusalem Temple has been called into question by many. George Brooke demonstrates that attitudes toward the Temple in the sectarian texts are multifarious and may reflect various stages in the development of Temple ideology. George J. Brooke, “The Ten Temples in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Temple and Worship in Biblical Israel (ed. John Day; London: T & T Clark, 2005), 417-34. Martin Goodman argues that “dissatisfaction with the Temple was widespread in the late Second Temple period without dissatisfaction leading to withdrawal from Temple worship.” Martin Goodman, “The Qumran Sectarians and the Temple in Jerusalem,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Context (ed. Charlotte Hempel; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 271. Alison Schofield argues that the sectarian wilderness space “contested the alleged coherence and dominance of the Jerusalem temple, but did not entirely supersede it.” Schofield, “Re-Placing Priestly Space: The Wilderness as Heterotopia in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” 470.

131 4Flor 1—2 i, 21:14-17.

132 Soja describes Thirdspace as a place of radical openness. It is not an “anything goes” philosophy, but a method that allows us to move and expand present categories and knowledge; either/or thinking opens up to both/and/also. Soja, Thirdspace, 56-60.

– are those who by virtue of their temporal-spatial location 134(שבי ישראל) penitent of Israel separation from society and living in the last days – are granted new possibilities of access to the divine in the present period.

The Construction of Liminal Space: The Wilderness and Damascus The construction of time, or temporal positioning, is one of the ways the sectarian authors carve out for their group a liminal state in which new channels of access to the divine become possible. However, the construction of time would be amorphous without space in which to root it. For the sectarian authors, the construction of the last days bears spatial significance as well. The last days are the time in which the sectarians occupy a certain conceptual space – one of separation from the larger community. Through the construction of separate space(s), the sectarian authors establish boundaries to separate those who belong to the sect from those who do not, and create the place(s) from which access to the divine becomes a present possibility for certain individuals.

Wilderness The wilderness motif, known from the Pentateuchal narratives and taken up in the prophetic literature, becomes a central metaphor for the sect’s understanding of the desert, or “wilderness,” as a liminal space. While memories, images, and interpretations of the wilderness is the particular designation (מדבר) ”appear in a number of sectarian texts, the term “wilderness preferred by the authors of the Community Rule. Isaiah 40:3 is a foundational text for the authors of the Community Rule who interpret the prophecy as applying to their own time, providing the reason for their separation from the larger community and removal to the desert.

. . . they shall separate from the session of the perverse men and go into the wilderness (מדבר) there to prepare the way of the Lord, as it is written, “In the wilderness ,(מדבר) ”a highway for our God (ערבה) prepare the way of the LORD, make straight in the desert (Isa 40:3). This means the expounding of the Law, decreed by God through Moses for obedience, that being defined by what has been revealed for each age, and by what the prophets have revealed by His holy spirit. (1QS 8:13-16a)135

133 4QFlor 1—2 i, 21:6.

134 CD VI, 5.

135 1QS 8:13-16a:

The wilderness is here understood as a place of divine access.136 It is a place of revelation, and also of “continuing theophanic expectation.”137 As Alison Schofield points out in her article on the wilderness motif in the scrolls, “the wilderness symbolizes both time and place.”138 The desert itself becomes a sacred space in the time of the community. It no longer stands as a place of rebellion or turning against God, as it does in the time of Moses, but rather becomes a place to draw near to God and await his arrival.

The scrolls’ authors depict their wilderness time-space as the antithesis of the earlier, Israelite wilderness period. The leader of the new community, the Teacher, expounds and interprets the law given to Moses, offering new revelation for the present.139 In this way, the wilderness motif becomes a container to be filled with a different set of events and experiences.140 Negative events previously associated with the wilderness are replaced by an

יבדלו מתוך מושב הנשי העול ללכת למדבר לפנות שם את דרכ הואהא כאשר כתוב במדבר פנו דרך **** ישרו בערבה מסלה לאלוהינו היאה מדרש התורה א]ש[ ר צוה ביד מושה לעשות ככול הנגלה עת בעת וכאשר גלו הנביאים ברוח קודשו

136 See Schofield, “The Wilderness Motif in the Dead Sea Scrolls.” Hindy Najman also discusses the revelatory aspect connected to the wilderness motif, noting that in the texts from Qumran, “wilderness becomes the ideal place for divine inspiration, prophecy of the future, and vision of the heavens.” It is “not only the place for—dedicated to—God, but also the path to God” (p. 109). Hindy Najman, “Towards a Study of the Uses of the Concept of Wilderness in Ancient Judaism,” DSD 13/1 (2006): 99-113.

137 Schofield, “The Wilderness Motif,” 46.

138 Schofield, “The Wilderness Motif,” 42.

139 Molly Zahn argues that the D (Damascus Document) and S (Community Rule) material from the Qumran caves demonstrate authorizing strategies similar to what we find in Deuteronomy, the Temple Scroll, and Jubilees. While Moses functions as the conduit of the revelation of Torah in Deuteronomy (and other Mosaic discourse), the sectarians, guided by the Teacher, are the recipients of divine revelation in D and S. Molly M. Zahn, “Torah for ‘The Age of Wickedness’: The Authority of the Damascus and Serekh Texts in Light of Biblical and Rewritten Traditions,” DSD 20 (2013): 410-432.

140 Henri Lefebvre introduced the idea that space is a construction, not an empty container to be packed at random with various parcels. Social space is produced intentionally, not packed haphazardly. Henri Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 27. Liv Lied develops this idea in her article on the spaces in the Damascus Document, which I discuss in greater detail in the following section. Lied, “Another Look at Damascus: The Spaces of the Damascus Document in the Light of Edward W. Soja’s Thirdspace Approach.”

43 image of the wilderness as a place of purification, revelation, nearness to God, and divine salvation.141

Damascus

is the authors’ preferred name for the (דמשק) ”In the Damascus Document, “Damascus group’s dwelling spaces. The land of Damascus (CD VI, 5) is contrasted to the pathless in which the traitors wander (CD I, 11-16). Scrolls scholars now (תוהו לא דרך) wasteland generally agree that “Damascus” in the Damascus Document does not refer to the actual geographical location of the ancient city, Damascus, in northern Israel/Syria.142 So to what does “Damascus” refer in the Damascus Document? Some have understood Damascus as an allusion to Qumran143 or a reference to a place of exile or punishment.144 However, neither of these interpretations fully account for the use of “Damascus” in the Damascus Document.

141 George Brooke argued that the spatial terminology (wilderness) in the Community Rule was initially a scriptural allusion to the place from which divine salvation would appear, but that later the actual move to the desert by some members of the community resulted in a literal rendering of the typology so that Qumran became the expected location of divine salvation (p. 310). George J. Brooke, “Isaiah 40:3 and the Wilderness Community,” in New Qumran Texts and Studies: Proceedings of the First Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Paris 1992. (STDJ 15; ed. G. J. Brooke with the assistance of F. García Martínez; Leiden: Brill, 1994), 117-32.

142 Some of the first scholars to work on the Damascus Document did, however, interpret “Damascus” quite literally as a reference to the geographical location in northern Israel/Syria. See, for example, Solomon Schechter, Documents of Jewish Sectaries (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1910), 10-15 and Robert H. Charles, “The Zadokite Fragments,” in Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament in English (ed. R. H. Charles; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1913), 792-93. These scholars, working in the early twentieth century, did not have access to the texts from the Qumran caves, which provide a richer context for interpreting the meaning of “Damascus” in the Damascus Document.

143 R. North, “The Damascus of Qumran Geography,” PEQ 87 (1955): 33-48 and W. D. Davies, The Gospel and the Land: Early Christian Literature and Jewish Territorial Doctrine (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1974 [repr. 1994]), 100.

144 Murphy-O’Connor, “An Essene Missionary Document? CD II, 14—VI, 1,” RB 77 (1970), 221 and W. D. Davies, “The Birthplace of the Essenes: Where is Damascus?” RevQ 14/56 (1990), 503-19. In this piece, Davies posits that Damascus is either a reference to the geographical location known by the name or to Babylonia, a place of exile. Hindy Najman understands the wilderness motif in the scrolls as encompassing a variety of uses, including a place of suffering and exile, a place of purification, and a locus for revelation. Following Knibb, she considers the experience of the Babylonian exile as a continuing reality for the sectarians and proposes the location of the Teacher, according to Pesher Habakkuk, might be seen as a place of loneliness and suffering apart from the Jerusalem temple. She points out that in the Damascus Document and the Community Rule, however, the wilderness appears in a more positive light as a place of purification and separation from sinfulness. Najman, “Towards a Study of the Uses of the Concept of Wilderness in Ancient Judaism,” 101-108.

Damascus, in the Damascus Document, refers to the time and place of the sect, but is not necessarily limited to the Qumran settlement. Damascus is primarily a conceptual category. At the end of the historical review concerning events related to the national history, the authors turn their attention to the history of the sect, rooting its origins in a particular conceptual space – the ,In CD VI, Damascus is a space apart, a place of separation 145.(ארץ דמשק) land of Damascus which the sectarians understand as a necessary prerequisite for proper worship. The (קץ הרשע) readers/participants are instructed to carefully keep the law in the age of wickedness and . . .

To separate from corrupt people and to avoid filthy wicked lucre gained by vow or by consecration or by embezzling temple wealth and to refrain from “robbing the poor of his people, making widows’ wealth their booty and killing orphans” (cf. Isa 10:2) and to distinguish between defiled and pure and to explain the difference between holy and profane and to keep the sabbath day according to specification and the holidays and the fast day according to the commandments of those entering the new covenant in the land .(CD VI, 14b-19) .(ארץ דמשק) of Damascus

Damascus is, first and foremost, a place apart from the wicked. Some years ago, Liv Lied noticed this feature of the use of Damascus in the Damascus Document and, drawing on a Thirdspace approach, argued that Damascus is not presented “as a place of punishment during the time of evil, but rather as a blessed sojourn away from lawless Judah.”146 Lied convincingly demonstrates that while Damascus represents an exilic space in the Damascus Document, exile here does not refer to punishment but to an interim space away from the place of punishment, which is in the land of Judah.147 Damascus, by contrast, is a type of safe haven for the sectarians – a place where they can live according to the commandments during the time of evil.

Both Damascus and the wilderness motif function primarily as conceptual categories in the sectarian manuscripts, signaling the transitional or interim nature of the space(s).148 While

145 CD VI, 5.

146 Lied, “Another Look at the Land of Damascus,” 122.

147 Lied, “Another Look at the Land of Damascus,” 114.

148 Alison Schofield also notes this sense of impermanence in the sectarians’ descriptions of their living spaces. The Schofield points out, reflect “their own theological ,(מחנות) ”and “camps (מגוריהם) ”designations “their residences self-understanding of living in an impermanent age.” Even Jerusalem is referred to as a camp (4Q394 8 iv, 10),

45 the authors of the Damascus Document consistently refer to their time-space as “Damascus” and do not employ the wilderness terminology so characteristic of the Community Rule, “camp” language in the text is reminiscent of the earlier wilderness period, during which the (מחנה)

Israelites were organized into camps (Ex 18:21-22).149 Damascus and the wilderness function as symbols for the present time-space of the sect – creating an interim space in which greater degrees of access to the divine become possible and are paired with the expectation of complete incorporation into the divine realm in the future.

LOCATING THE SECT IN THE END TIME EVENTS From the perspective of the sectarian authors, the last days of the sect include future events (the appearance of an eschatological prophet and/or messiah, judgment) as well as events of the recent past (the formation of the group and rise of the Teacher) and the present (separation from the wicked and the present dwelling of some in camp or wilderness spaces). While the present positioning, in the last days, offers some means of access to the divine for the sectarian in good standing, the ultimate goal is incorporation into the divine/eternal realm following the final events of the present age. For members of the movement, the present is a place of inaugurated eschatological activity in which eternal realities are to some degree already accessible.

The Eschatological Period and the Eternal In Qumran thought, the eschatological period was characterized by heightened experiences of the a quality associated with God’s realm and nature. Membership in the group – (עולם) eternal offered a point of entry to eternal realities that were not accessible in other periods or to those in the texts of the Dead Sea עולם outside the group. While there is no singular meaning of

Scrolls, it typically indicates perpetuity, permanence, and that which is unchanging, and at times includes a spatial sense.150 Only those individuals who successfully navigate the treacherous

which indicates the sectarian belief that the present age itself is impermanent and fleeting. Alison Schofield, From Qumran to the Yaḥad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for The Community Rule (STDJ 77; Leiden: Brill, 2009), 132-137.

149 See, for example, CD XIII, 1, 13, 20 and 1QS 2:21-22.

150 1QH V, 24; XIV, 15; XVI, 5-12; 1QS II, 7-8, 23; V, 13; IX, 4; X, 4; 1QM XII, 7; XV, 1; XVII, 6-8. Ernst Jenni, concludes that the term's most basic meaning ,עולם through his extensive work on biblical and extra-biblical uses of

46 liminal state gain full access to eternal realities and become incorporated into the eternal realm.151 For the sectarian living in the present, eschatological period, permanent incorporation into this realm remains a future anticipation that can only be achieved following the final eschatological events of the present age. These events include the complete annihilation of the wicked and all wickedness at the final judgment and the subsequent saturation of the earth with the eternal. An eschatological judgment followed by the complete annihilation of wickedness is envisioned in a number of the prominent sectarian texts.

‘The star’ (Amos 5:26) is the interpreter of the Law who comes to Damascus, as it is written, ‘A star has left Jacob, a staff has risen from Israel’ (Num 24:17). The latter is the leader of the whole nation; when he appears he will shatter all the sons of Sheth (Num 24:17). CD XVII, 18-21.152 Then the sword of God shall hasten to the time of judgment and all the children of His truth shall awaken to put an end to [the children of] wickedness, and all the children of guilt shall be no more . . . there is no escape for the creatures of guilt, they shall be trampled down to destruction with no rem[nant. (1QHa XIV, 29-30, 32) In these texts and many others, the wicked and the wicked age are synonymous with transience, mortality, and impermanence.153 The only way for an individual to persist beyond the present is “farthest time.” Ernst Jenni, Das Wort ‘olam im Alten Testament (Berlin: Tӧpelmann, 1953), 25. In some of the extends significantly beyond this definition to עולם manuscripts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, the meaning of include notions of space and permanence. Gershon Brin, in his survey of time in the Hebrew Bible and the Dead sometimes includes a spatial sense in the scrolls, in addition to the temporal sense עולם Sea Scrolls, observes that carried over from the Hebrew Bible. Brin, The Concept of Time, 226.

151 This will be demonstrated in chapter 4.

152 The interpretation of this passage has been discussed at length by John J. Collins, The Scepter and the Star: Messianism in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls (2d ed.; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2010). Hartmut Stegemann discusses the development of messianic ideas in the Qumran scrolls in “Some Remarks to 1QSa, to 1QSb, and to Qumran Messianism,” RevQ 17, no. 1/4 (November 1996): 479-505. See also Todd S. Beall, “History and Eschatology at Qumran: messiah,” in Judaism in Late Antiquity: a systemic reading of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Leiden: Brill, 2001), 125-146; George Brooke, “The Pre-Sectarian Jesus,” in Echoes from the Caves: Qumran and the New Testament (STDJ 85. Ed. Florentino García Martínez. Leiden: Brill, 2009), 33-48; Adela Yarbro Collins and John J. Collins, King and Messiah as Son of God: divine, human and angelic messianic figures in biblical and related literature (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008); and Philip R. Davies, “Judaism in the Dead Sea Scrolls: the case of the messiah,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls in their Historical Context (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 2000), 219-232. While there may be some disagreement among scholars regarding the number of messiahs anticipated by the sect and specific identifying features, there is general agreement that this text describes one or more messiah figures and places him/them within the context of eschatological judgment. A messiah figure is also expected to appear during the final eschatological battle depicted in 1Q33 XI and XV. Cf. CD II, 5-7, which describes the annihilation of those not chosen.

153 Cf. 4Q266 2 ii, 18-21; 1QpHab V, 4-8; CD XII, 20—XII, 1; 1Q33 I, 5; XV, 1-2; XVII, 5—XIX, 8.

47 age is to become incorporated into the eternal. Following the destruction of wickedness, which marks the end of the present age, those individuals who have already become united with the eternal will live in the new age and inherit alongside angels.154

God is regularly associated with the heavenly and the realm of the eternal in the sectarian literature. The sectarian, on the other hand, exists in two spheres simultaneously. He belongs to the present age and earthly sphere, yet by virtue of his identification with the holy-righteous (that is, the sect), he already possesses qualities of the eternal and has some access to heavenly spaces. The sectarian texts anticipate an imminent end to the present age, marked by an eschatological judgment, at which time the righteous are expected to be permanently separated out from the wicked and united to the divine-eternal, while the wicked and wickedness are completely annihilated and eternally separated from any association with the righteous or access to the divine. The final picture that emerges following the eschatological judgment is that of a renewed, purified earthly sphere, inhabited by righteous individuals whose union with the eternal leads to the complete infiltration of earth by the eternal. Earth is not destroyed, along with the wicked that inhabited it during the age of wickedness, but is transformed so that it aligns with the qualities of the heavenly sphere. The sectarians’ union with the eternal in the present, wicked age, which facilitates some degree of access to the divine and heavenly spaces, becomes a permanent feature of the renewed, earthly sphere in the new age (1QHa XIV, 12-17).

The present, constructed as a type of liminal space rife with eschatological activity, offered the sectarian living in the last days the ability to experience the eternal through the ritual and liturgical practices of the sect. Viewed this way, the Eschaton was considered a process already underway, in which new pathways of access to eternal realities emerged for those individuals who joined themselves to the sect. The social space of the sect was a place of inaugurated eschatology, where earthly and heavenly realms overlapped and certain humans might commune with divine beings and experience some degree of the eternal while anticipating their full incorporation into this realm.

154 Cf. 1QS X—XI; 1QHa XI, 21-23; XIX, 9-14. This idea is further developed in chapter 4.

Epochal Time and the Existence of Multiple Time-Spaces

One issue left to be resolved is the question of how the period described as “the last days” relates to “the age of wickedness,” particularly in regard to the final, eschatological events still anticipated. In the sectarian texts, these periods appear to coincide, or perhaps overlap. However, the mention of “the last days” is generally restricted to individuals and activities pertaining to the sect. Those outside the movement are only included at the end of this phase, at the final judgment. “The age of wickedness,” on the other hand, appears to apply to both sectarians and non-sectarians, though its effects may be related more directly to those not belonging to the sect.155 In the Damascus Document, a set of regulations meant for the present concludes with the following:

These are the rules for the sage to live by with all that is living, according to the regulation for every occasion. If the seed of Israel lives according to this law, they shall never know condemnation. vac This is the rule for those who live in c[am]ps, who live by until the appearance of the Messiah of ,(בקץ הרשעה) these rules in the era of wickedness Aaron and of Israel. (CD XII, 20—XIII, 1) The rules here function as a line of demarcation, separating those who live in the camps from others who live in the period of wickedness. The existence of the sect is set within the period of wickedness, yet its members are kept separate from at least some of its effects by virtue of their participation in the group and adherence to its regulations. A similar idea can be seen in Pesher Habakkuk.

The chosen are those who have observed his commandments in the time of their distress,156 for that is what it means when it says ‘eyes too pure to see evil;’ vacat that means they have not let their eyes lead them into fornication during the time of (1QpHab 5:8) .(בקץ הרשעה) wickedness

In each of these texts, the existence of the sect is positioned during this time of wickedness, but the sectarians are not necessarily a part of it.157 The sectarians envision themselves as living in a

155 1QpHab V, 5-8; CD XII, 23.

156 “Time” in “the time of their distress” is supplied by the translators. No word for time appears in the Hebrew text ”.A closer rendering of the Hebrew might be “in their distress .בצר למו :here

,might also refer to this period of wickedness. See, for example (קץ חרון) ”The designation the/a “time of wrath 157 CD I, 5 and 1QH-a 11:28.

49 time-space separate from, yet coinciding with, the wicked age. It is indeed the enduring wickedness of the age that makes this separation necessary. By living in a separate time-space, the sectarians are able to practice the rules and regulations of their time,158 and so serve an atoning function for the land159 and secure their transition to the other worldly160 even while the wicked age persists. While this poses some challenge to modern conceptions of time, which tend to view time as an overarching structure that encompasses all the events of history both past and present, the sectarian authors are quite comfortable with the notion that multiple time-spaces may exist at once.

Time, as conceptualized by these ancient Jewish authors, was not “fungible” in the Newtonian sense that time is absolute and flows uniformly in one direction, but rather was thought of as “epochal.”161 Allen C. Bluedorn describes epochal time as time defined by events: “the time is in the events; the events do not occur in time.”162 In this way, the sectarians might

158 1QS 1, 13-14.

159 Cf. 1QS V, 5-6; VIII, 5-6; IX, 3-5; 1QM II, 5.

160 Through membership in the sect, one became part of an eternal structure – an eternal planting (1QS VIII, 5; XI, 8; 1QH-a XIV, 15; XVI, 6), an eternal fountain (1QSb I, 3, 6; 1QH-a XIV, 17; XVI, 8; XVIII, 31; 4QInstr-d 81+81a, 1). This identification with the eternal secures the sectarians future existence once eschatological judgment takes place. Those belonging to the eternal will possess the world, while the wicked and unjust are destroyed by fire and violence (1QH-a XIV, 13-18, 29-32; cf. 1QMilhamah I, 5; XV, 1-2).

161 Allen C. Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time: Temporal Realities and Experience (Standford, Calif.: Standford University Press, 2002), 31-41.

162 Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time, 31. Original emphases. This understanding of space offers an alternative to the binary thought structures that dominated biblical scholarship throughout most of the twentieth century, and pervade some sectors up to the present time. Many have argued that notions of time as cyclical appear more in Greek literature and contrast with the Judeo-Christian notion of time as linear. See, for example, John Warwick Montgomery, The Shape of the Past (Minneapolis, Minn.: Bethany Fellowship, 1975), 42, and Oscar Cullmann, Christ and Time, 51-60. Norbert Lohfink distinguishes between Greek-cyclical and Hebrew-linear notions of time in an article on Qoheleth, “Das Koheletbuch: Strukturen und Struktur,” in Das Book Kohelet: Studien zur Struktur, Geschichte, Rezeption und Theologie (ed. Ludgar Schwienhorst-Schӧnberger; Berlin; New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1997), 39-21 and in his later commentary, Qoheleth: A Continental Commentary (Minneapolis, Minn.: Fortress Press, 2003), 4. Even some more contemporary scholars who have offered certain innovative approaches to the texts tend to fall back on the cyclical/linear language. For instance, Joseph Angel provides an insightful exploration of the angelic priesthood in the Dead Sea Scrolls in which he deals with the conceptual realities of the group and argues that the liturgical practices of the sect facilitated the experience a realized eschatology, which allowed them to temporarily escape the linear historical existence. While Angel’s study contributes much to an understanding of the authors’ conceptual realities regarding the otherworldly priesthood and celestial temple, he tends to lean on the cyclical/linear dichotomy that undergirds much biblical scholarship on time. Joseph L. Angel, Otherworldly and Eschatological Priesthood in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 299-103. James Barr was one of the first to push back against this sharp division between Greek/Hebrew, cyclical/linear, notions of time. See his landmark study, Biblical Words for Time (Naperville: Allenson, 1962).

50 conceptualize their experience of time, or their time-space, as distinct from others coinciding with it. They might even experience in their time-space a level of interaction with divine realities that does not occur in other time-spaces.

Communion with the divine and incorporation into the divine realm is the ultimate goal of the sectarian worshipers. The construction of a view of time that places the time-space of the sect in the last days, in a space apart from the wicked, helps facilitate the partial, temporary realization of this goal in the present in ritual-liturgical time, while the ultimate goal of full incorporation into the divine realm still lay on the horizon. The divine realm, or the eternal, is the overarching structure that encompasses all the earthly periods and time-spaces.163 In the sectarian mindset, the only hope for survival at the end of the present period is incorporation into the divine realm, since the present age of wickedness is expected to end in total annihilation and destruction.164 Through the construction of this separate time-space the sectarians created a place in which communion with the divine might be experienced in the present and individuals might live in a manner befitting divine beings in the hope that they may one day dwell among them.

Accessing the Eternal Ritual, particularly in the form of regular, liturgical practices, was the means by which the sectarians sought present access to the divine and secured incorporation into the otherworldly at the end of the age.165 Routine practices, such as those we find in the Community Rule – reading

Like Barr and others who have more recently challenged the appropriateness of this binary division in discussions of time in the ancient world, I find conceptions of time in the ancient Jewish and Christian sources to be rather complex and nuanced and the binary categories insufficient for communicating the broad range of views on time in these texts.

163 In the scrolls, smaller units of measurement (days, years, generations, periods, appointed times) are described as לכל ) or as units of existence belonging to this overarching reality. See, for example 1QS IV, 16 ,עולם components of וידע את שני מעמד ומספר ופרוש קציחם לכל הוי עולמים ) CD II, 9-10 ;(לעת עולם ולכול קצי נצח) 1QSb IV, 26 ;(קצי עולם .(מועדי עולמים) and 1QM XII, 3 ;(ונהיית עד מה יבוא בקציהם לכל שני עולם

164 Cf. 1QH XII, 35-36; XIV, 13-18, 29-32; and 1QM I, 5-12.

165 I follow Catherine Bell’s understanding of ritual as a category that comprises both thought and action. Bell consciously dismantles the thought-action dichotomy maintained by many of her predecessors in ritual theory. Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009), 6-8, 69-93.

Torah aloud, interpreting Scripture, and blessing/praying together – facilitate regular, frequent communion with the divine in the sectarian’s daily life.

In any place where is gathered the ten-man quorum, someone must always be engaged in day and night, continually, each one taking his turn. The ,(תורה) study of the Law general membership will be diligent together for the first third of every night of the year, and (לדרוש משפט) interpreting Scripture ,(לקרוא בספר) reading aloud from the Book (1QS VI, 6-7a) .(לברכ ביחד) praying together

The continual study of Torah, along with nightly Scripture reading, interpreting, and blessing together as a group, cultivates a sense of liminality, an in-betweenness, in the sectarian’s experience of the present.166 Judith Newman, drawing on Roy Rappaport’s work on ritual and religion, points out that through the regular practice of both frequent (nightly) and long ritual orders167, participants remain continuously in an out-of-mundane state.168 The frequency with which daily liturgical rites presumably took place in the sect, combined with the occasional enactment of longer liturgies facilitated and maintained the sectarian’s experience of living in an alternate state – a separate time-space away from the wicked age.

Through the enactment of longer liturgies, such as the War Scroll and Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, participants not only sought communion with the divine, but also acted out their anticipated roles in the divine economy and in doing so sought to secure their position in the future state. Catherine Bell argues that ritual functions as “a strategy for the construction of certain types of power relationships.”169 The participants described in the War Scroll are ranked and organized into set courses.170 Similar rankings appear in 1QSa I, 27 – II, 22, which includes a description of an eschatological banquet, and the Songs, where the rankings and organization

166 The vast amount of liturgical material found among the scrolls attests to the centrality of this practice in the sect. Psalms and hymns were especially prominent and may have provided the content for the practice of blessing together as a group.

167 The continual study of the law mentioned in 1QS VI, 6 and the practice of longer ritual texts, such as the War Scroll or Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, fall under the category of long ritual and liturgical orders.

168 Judith H. Newman, “Accessing Eternity: The Transformation of Time through Speech and Blessing” (unpublished conference paper: Toronto, 2016), 9. See also, Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 216-220.

169 Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice, 197.

170 1QM II, 1-5; VI, 14—VII, 2; VII, 9-15.

52 of angels parallels the structure of the Jerusalem priesthood.171 The ritual enactment of these texts was a means through which participants might construct their ranks within the community and secure their position in the divine economy at the end of the age. Not only was one’s participation in the divine economy at stake, but also the nature of one’s participation in the future of that economy when righteous individuals (the sectarians) would join the ranks of the angels.172

The function of rituals and liturgical practice are discussed in further detail in chapter five. Although this chapter focuses primarily on the sectarians’ construction of time and space, a brief mention of ritual is appropriate here since it is through ritual practice that the possibilities created by the sectarian construction of a separate time-space become part of the lived reality of the group. The construction of a separate time-space, apart from the influences of the wicked age, provides the necessary conditions for accessing the divine. However, it is through ritual that this access becomes part of the lived experience of the sectarians.

CONCLUSION The authors of the sectarian literature construct time and space in such a way that the present becomes a liminal time-space in which access to the divine is already possible for certain individuals. By positioning their movement at the end of the age and establishing spaces for their existence that mirror the camp and wilderness spaces in which the first covenant was received, the sectarians carved out for themselves a separate time-space rife with possibility. The construction of this time-space offered the sectarians the possibility of present access to the divine and held out the possibility of permanent incorporation into the eternal realm in the near future. However, present communion with the divine and incorporation into the eternal were contingent upon other factors as well, namely, the initiate’s successful incorporation into the sect and the proper performance of ritual activities and liturgical service.

171 4QShirShabbd 1 i, 1-29.

172 This type of negotiation or construction might be seen in the texts mentioned above – the eschatological banquet in 1QSa I, 27—II, 22 and the rankings of human and divine beings in 1QM and ShirShabb. While ShirShabb describes the ranks and worship of angelic beings, the human participants in this liturgy might have constructed their own power relationships through the enactment of the text.

Chapter 4

Becoming Eternal:

Sectarian Identity as a Means of Access to the Divine

INTRODUCTION The sect itself plays a significant role in the sectarian’s experience of the present and expectation for the future. While the construction of time creates the possibility of access to divine time- space in the present, entry into the community is entry into a liminal time-space with its own set of relations to the eternal in the present and future. Participation in the group secures the individual’s position among the ranks of the eternal so that person may access the divine in the present through liturgical communion and become incorporated into the eternal structure at the end of the age. According to the sectarian mindset, the sect exists to: 1) facilitate group and individual holiness, 2) atone for the land and individuals, and 3) secure the individual’s future incorporation into the eternal structure. The first point (facilitating group and individual holiness) provides the necessary conditions for the sectarian’s experience of the eternal/divine in the present, while the second and third points have implications for the sectarian’s future incorporation and position in the divine realm.

This chapter is organized into three sections, which together elucidate the role of the sect in the individual’s incorporation into the eternal/divine structure. Although full incorporation into the eternal remains a future expectation, aspects of this realm become part of the sectarian’s present experience through participation in the sect. In the first section, Facilitating Group and Individual Holiness, I discuss the two-fold initiation process through which an individual may become a member of the sect and participate in its knowledge and nature, allowing the sectarian to commune with the divine in the present. Incorporation into this earthly-human structure is foundational to the sectarian’s future, full incorporation into the eternal-divine structure. Part two addresses the priestly function of the sect. While paying particular attention to its role in providing atonement for the land and individuals, I also mention the sect’s role in dispensing

54 judgment and guarding group knowledge. In part three, I bring up a less frequently discussed aspect of sectarian thought: the individual. Group membership affords the individual some degree of present access to the eternal. However, one’s rank within the sect and future role in the eternal structure are contingent upon individual actions and merit. The present, for the sect, was not a time of passive waiting, but a liminal time-space in which access to the divine was already a partial reality and present action influences future roles and outcomes.

THE SECT AS FACILITATOR OF GROUP AND INDIVIDUAL HOLINESS For the sectarians, who believed they were living in a wicked age, the sect provided a holy refuge. Entry into the sect was a rigorous and lengthy process, designed to ensure that religious standards were upheld and the purity of the group maintained. Individual atonement was a necessary precursor for entry into the group, conceptualized as a human sanctuary and an eternal structure. Through the implementation of strict regulations and annual examinations, anyone who compromised the integrity of the group could be expelled. The appropriate behavior of individual members communing together facilitated a type of group holiness that allowed sectarian writers to conceptualize the sect as a holy, eternal structure. However, the individual was never completely subsumed into this corporate entity. One’s rank within the group and future incorporation into the eternal realm were dependent upon individual merit, though such opportunities themselves were only made possible through participation in the group.

Before we explore any further the role of the sect in facilitating group and individual holiness, it is helpful to briefly discuss the process of initiation into the sect. How does an individual become part of the sect and what benefits are afforded the new initiate?

Joining the Sect In the previous chapter, I briefly described how entry into the sect allowed the sectarian to participate in a liminal time-space. While successful initiation into the sect signifies the culmination of one level of transition – separation from the wicked age and incorporation into the sect – the sect exists for the purpose of facilitating another transition – the individual’s incorporation into the eternal structure. So the culmination of one process (entry into the sect) allows the individual to participate in a liminal state with ties to both the present world and the

55 future age, though unbound to the laws of either state. This liminal state and the group and individual identities associated with it are the focus of this chapter.

The physical process of initiation into the sect includes the following: 1) volunteering for admittance (1QS I, 7-9), 2) a two-stage/two-year examination process (1QS VI, 12-21), and 3) full incorporation into the life of the sect (1QS 21-23).173 While incorporation into the sect signals the completion of one transition, from the era of wickedness into the life of the sect, the end result of this transition is ultimately incorporation into a liminal state. The members of the sect perceived their own time and place as a space caught between two spheres: the human/earthly and the divine/eternal. Liminal spaces are often described in terms of danger and uncertainty; they exist between two poles, yet are anchored in neither.174 This sense of danger in liminality is captured in a number of the Hodayot. One poem, however, stands out for the way in which it portrays the sectarian’s expectation of future incorporation into the eternal structure. The author uses an extended metaphor to describe the transition from one state to another. The liminal state in between is characterized as a place of extreme danger, uncertainty, and affliction.

Many have already offered interpretations of 1QHa XI – a text which paints in vivid terms the excruciating pains of a woman in labor and offers two potential results for the birth.175

173 The Damascus Document describes a similar process of initiation. Though the preserved text is fragmentary, there is mention of examination followed by a year of instruction. This text also includes a list of those excluded from joining the congregation. (4Q266, fr. 8 i, 1-9). While the processes of initiation described in the Damascus Document and the Community Rule are similar, they are not the same. Jutta Jokiranta explores some of these differences in Jutta Jokiranta, “An Experiment on Idem Identity in the Qumran Movement,” DSD 16 (2009): 309- 329. See also James C. VanderKam, “The Oath and the Community,” DSD 16 (2009): 416-432.

174 Mary Douglas argues that the liminal, or what falls between traditional classification categories, is typically considered polluting and dangerous. Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo (New York: Routledge, 1966; repr. 2002). Victor Turner also discusses the association between danger and liminal states in his chapter on Liminality and Communitas. Victor Turner, The Ritual Process, 94-130. Danger is likewise a characteristic of Michel Foucault’s heterotopia, or “other space.” Foucault coins the phrase “crisis heterotopia” to describe certain liminal states that occupy privileged, sacred, or forbidden spaces. Among these, he includes pregnancy and the cemetery, or death. Foucault, “Texts/Contexts of Other Spaces,” 24.

175 In The Self as Symbolic Space, Carol Newsom interprets this metaphor as an illustration of a bifurcated experience of the self; the sectarian is double and possesses within himself an evil twin. So the two pregnancies in this metaphor illustrate two potential outcomes for the sectarian. In this interpretation, the goal is to achieve a healthy birth. However, the possibility of failure – discovery that one is pregnant with wickedness – remains a constant reality and serves as a warning. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, pp. 245-253. Chamberlain interprets this passage as a reference to a messianic figure. J. V. Chamberlain, “Another Qumran Thanksgiving Psalm,” JNES 14 (1955): 32-39. Others see it as a metaphor for the inauguration of eschatological events, but not necessarily a reference to a messianic figure. See Svend Holm-Nielsen, Hodayot: Psalms from Qumran (ATDan2;

I offer here yet another interpretation – one that takes into consideration the role of danger and the contrasting outcomes of the two pregnancies.

3. [ ] You have made my face to shine [ ] 4. [ ] for Yourself, with eternal glory together with all [ ] 5. [ ] Your mouth, and You have delivered me from [ ] and from [ ] 6. [ ] now [my] soul [ for] they did [n]ot esteem me. They set [my] soul as a boat in the [d]epths of the sea, 7. and as a fortified city befo[re her enemy. ] I am in distress, as a woman about to give birth to her first born. For her pangs come over her, 8. and she has excruciating pain in her birth canal, writhing in the womb of the pregnant one. For children come into life through the crashing waves of death, 9. and she who is pregnant with a male child is afflicted by her birth pains. For through the crashing waves of death she delivers a male child, through the pains of Sheol there bursts forth 10. from the womb of the pregnant one, a wonderful counsellor with his strength. A male child is safely delivered from the crashing waves. Into the one who is pregnant with him rush all 11. the crashing waves, and excruciating pains when they are born, and terror to their mothers. And when he is born, all pangs come suddenly (אפעה) to the womb of the pregnant one. But she that is pregnant with wickedness .12 experiences excruciating pain, and the crashing waves of the pit for all works of terror. 13. And the foundations of the wall break as a ship upon the water, and the clouds thunder with a roar. Those who sit in the dust, 14. as those who go down to the seas are terrified by the roar of the water, and all their wise men are as sailors on the deeps. 15. For all their wisdom is swallowed up by the roar of the seas, when the ocean depths boil over the springs of water, and they are tossed up to the towering waves 16. and crashing waves by their roar. And when they are tossed up, Sh[eo]l [and Abaddon] shall open. [And al]l the arrows of the pit, 17. when they descend into the deep, shout out, and the gates [of Sheol] open [for all] the works of wickedness. and the ,(עול) Then the doors of the pit shut up the one who is pregnant with injustice .18 Vacat (1QH a XI :3 —18 ) .(אפעה) eternal bars shut up the spirits of wickedness

Aarhus: Universitetsforlaget, 1960), 61—64; Sigmund Mowinckel, “Some Remarks on Hodayot 39:5-20,” JBL 75 (1956): 265-76; Lou H. Silberman, “Language and Structure in the Hodayot (1QH 3),” JBL 75 (1956): 96-106.

In this poem, the soul of the individual is compared to a boat endangered at sea and a fortified city facing attack.176 Both images paint a picture of extreme and imminent danger, and that sense of danger carries over into the description of the first pregnancy. The birth of a male child is an event surrounded by the threat of death. Each of these images represents the (גבר) experience of liminality, or life in an in-between state. The boat at sea is between two land- ports, the one from which it departed and its destination.177 The image of a fortified city before its enemy depicts a juncture between security and uncertainty; the city’s residents, who perhaps previously found some security in the strength of their walls, now await attack and face an uncertain future. Finally, the author rests on the image of pregnancy – or more specifically, labor and delivery – which in antiquity posed a much greater threat for both mother and baby than it typically does today in more developed countries. From this image, the poet develops an extended metaphor illustrating the role of the sect in the sectarian’s anticipated future incorporation into the eternal realm.

In this poem (as is common in the Hodayot), the individual stands in the foreground. The sectarian author compares himself to a woman about to give birth (l. 7). While the pain and anguish of labor are described in vivid detail, the author’s primary concern is the outcome of the birth. The image of a woman in labor, enduring excruciating pain, serves to heighten the intensity, and perhaps even describe the sectarian’s own experience of living in an age of wickedness. Yet what matters is the outcome of the birth; at the end of struggle and through the “crashing waves of death,” a male child is safely delivered (ll. 9-10). This successful birth depicts the safe delivery of an individual’s soul into the realm of the eternal.178 The first woman

176 While elsewhere the image of a fortified city might represent strength and security, here the accompanying provides a strong indication of threat and imminent danger. For a similar ,(מלפני איוב) ”reference, “before her enemy assessment of the image of the fortified city in 1QHa XI, see Carol Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, p. 245.

177 The ship, for Foucault, “is the heterotopia par excellence.” He describes it as “a floating piece of space, a place without a place, that exists by itself . . .” Foucault, “Texts/Contexts of Other Spaces,” Diacritics 16/1 (Spring, 1986), 27.

178 Another possible interpretation might be that the first pregnancy and birth represents the initiate’s successful entry into the sect. However, the interpretation offered above seems more likely since this pregnancy and birth is contrasted to a second pregnancy in which the outcome bears eternal consequences (cf. 1QHa XI, 18).

58 represents the faithful sectarian or perhaps even the sect, which provides the context necessary for the sectarian to achieve successful incorporation into the eternal structure.179

In contrast to this successful birth, the poet mentions another pregnancy – one that ends in destruction and demise. While the first pregnancy lacks a character description, the second l. 12).180 The two pregnancies ;אפעה) ”woman is described as one “pregnant with wickedness result in drastically different outcomes at the moment of birth – the first is safely delivered from the looming threats associated with the liminal state (labor and delivery), while in the second pregnancy the threats are realized and the pregnancy fails. Despite the presence of excruciating labor pains (l. 12), birth does not occur for the second pregnancy and the one pregnant with .(אפעה) l. 18) is eternally confined to Sheol along with all the spirits of wickedness ,עול) injustice

Although the pregnancy metaphor in 1QHa XI, 1-18 depicts future outcomes for two types of individuals (righteous/sectarian and wicked/non-sectarian), one’s alignment with either the Lord181 or the forces of Belial has implications for the present as well. These present implications are elucidated more fully in the second half of the poem, 1QHa XI, 19-36, which describes the present elevation of the sectarian and the impending destruction of those aligned with Belial. The poem shifts at l. 19 to an expression of thanksgiving for the poet’s present status among the divine/eternal.

19. vacat I give thanks to You, O Lord, for You have redeemed my soul from the pit. From Sheol and Abaddon

179 The tension between individual and group identity is a recurring theme in the sectarian manuscripts, and factors into my hesitation to draw a firm conclusion here regarding exactly who the woman symbolizes. In subsequent sections, I deal more fully with the significance of group and individual identity in the individual’s experience of the present and expectation for the future.

and notes that the author likely (אפע/אפעה as “nothingness” (related to אפעה Carol Newsom translates the term 180 sometimes אפעה ,(here engages in a “learned play on words.” In the Hebrew Bible (cf. Isa 30:6; 50:5; Job 29:16 from) אפעה means “serpent.” Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, p. 243, 246. Also see BDB, 821. The term .may mean “groan” or “viper.” In Isa 42:14, it describes the sound (groan) a woman makes in labor (פָּעָּ ה

the host of the ,(סוד עולם) the eternal council ,(אדוני) In 1QHa XI, 19-22, the sectarian is associated with the Lord 181 רוחות ) and the spirits of knowledge ,(עדת בני שמים) the congregation of the sons of heaven ,(צבא קדושם) holy ones .(דעת

so that I might walk about on ,(רום עולם) You have raised me up to an eternal height .20 and know that there is hope for him whom ,(משור לאין חקר) a limitless plain The perverse spirit You .(סוד עולם) You created from the dust for the eternal council .21 have cleansed from great transgression, that he might take his stand with with (יחד ;and enter together (or in the Yahad ,(צבא קדושים) the host of the holy ones .22 And for man, You have allotted an .(עדת בני שמים) the congregation of the sons of heaven with the spirits (גורל עולם) eternal destiny to praise Your name together with shouts of joy, and to ,(רוחות דעת) of knowledge .23 recount Your wonders before all Your creatures. (‎1Q‎ H‎ a ‎XI‎ :‎19‎ —23‎ )‎ ‎ For the poet, elevation to an eternal space is already possible in the present by virtue of his incorporation into sect. Line 22 may even be an explicit reference to initiation into the sect, into

is here understood as a reference to the Yaḥad or ביחד the Yaḥad.182 Yet, regardless of whether

evokes initiatory (לבוא ב-) interpreted more generally as “together,” the language of entering in practice and transition from one state to another. The human speaker, who has been elevated to an eternal height, here takes his place among holy ones and joins with the ranks of heavenly beings. The present of the sectarian is here portrayed as a time-space in which access to line ;פדה) divine/eternal space and beings is granted to the individual who has been redeemed

19) from the pit and initiated into the company of holy beings (ll. 21-22).183

Initiation into the sect was, for the sectarian, incorporation into an eternal entity. Elsewhere in the Hodayot and in the rule texts (the Community Rule and the Damascus an eternal 184,(מטעת עולם) Document), the community itself is described as an eternal planting

in l. 22 as “community.” Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, p. 253. Geza יחד Carol Newsom renders 182 Vermes also opts for the more general term “community” in his translation of the Hodayot. Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (rev. ed.; London, England: Penguin Books, 2011), p. 267. A similar phrase .appears in 1QHa VI, 18, where it appears to refer explicitly to initiation into the sect (הוגשתי ביחד)

183 Another text that powerfully illustrates the role of the sect in the individual’s incorporation into the eternal structure is 4Q257 III (Frgs. 1a iii, 2a-g). According to this text, “it is only by the spirit of the counsel of the truth regarding the ways of man that all his iniquities shall be atoned for, so that he may look upon the light of life. And it is by a holy spirit (belonging) to the Community through his truth that he shall be cleansed from all his iniquities ”.(וברוח קדושה ליחד באמתו יטהר מכול עוונותו)

184 Cf. 1QS VIII, 5; XI, 8; 1QHa VI, 15; VIII, 6. Similar terminology appears in CD I, 7 and 1QHa VIII, 10.

187.(מקור עולם) and an eternal fountain 186,(אוחזת עולם) an eternal possession 185,(יחד עולמים) yaḥad

One’s identification with this eternal entity, the sect, facilitated the sectarian’s present elevation to eternal spaces and communion with divine beings, and positioned the individual for future incorporation into the eternal realm. The poem in 1QHa XI ends with a view toward eschatological judgment – an event that would result in the total annihilation of the forces of Belial (ll. 26-36). The assurance of the sectarian author rests in his decision to take a stand in the

1QHa XI, 24)188 and join the ranks of the community, thus ;גבול רשעה) domain of wickedness securing his eternal destiny among the spirits of knowledge (1QHa XI, 22-23).

Human Sanctuary and Eternal Structure: The Sect as Facilitator of Group Holiness A tension, or balance in imbalance, exists between the holiness conferred through the sect and the degree of purity required of an individual for participation in the sect. On one hand, the sect serves as a facilitator of group holiness. On the other hand, some degree of purity or atonement is expected before an individual can join the group.189 Upon successful entry into the group, the new initiate becomes privy to group knowledge, which enables him to walk perfectly in the era of wickedness (1QS I, 1-15). The regular rhythms of the group – its set times for study, worship, prayer, and communal meetings – further facilitate this lifestyle of holiness. According to 1QS III, 6-12, the sect both facilitates atonement for the individual and requires purification and perfect obedience from him before the new initiate may be incorporated into the group.

can there be (עצת אמת) For only through the spirit pervading God’s true society .6 all ,(דרכי איש יכופרו) atonement for a man’s ways 7. of his iniquities; thus only can he gaze upon the light of life and so be joined to His truth by His holy spirit, purified from all

185 Cf. 1QS III, 12; 4Q255 II, 9.

186 Cf. 1QS XI, 7; 4Q418 frag. 55, 12.

187 Cf. 1QHa XIV, 17; XVIII, 31; 1QSb I, 3, 6; 4Q418 81+81a, 1.

,(גבול צדיקים) In 1QHa XV, 14-15, the sectarian author locates himself within the domain of righteousness 188 which exists in the presence of God.

189 Additionally, failure to maintain group regulations resulted in expulsion or varying degrees of discipline and exclusion from certain activities. Cf. 1QS V—VII, 25; IX, 15-16; 1QH XIV, 13-10; XVI, 16-20.

,(תכופר הטתו) iniquity. Through an upright and humble attitude his sin may be covered .8 and by humbling himself before all God’s laws his flesh 9. can be made clean. Only thus can he really receive the purifying waters and be purged by the cleansing flow. Let him order his steps to walk faultless 10. in all the ways of God, just as He commanded for the times appointed to him. Let him turn aside neither to the right nor the left, nor yet 11. deviate in the smallest detail from all of His words. Then indeed will he be accepted and then only shall ,(בכפורי ניחוח) by God, offering the sweet savour of atoning sacrifice he be a party to the Covenant of (1QS III, 6-12) .(יחד עולמים) the eternal Yahad .12

Joining the group allows the initiate to become part of an eternal edifice (l. 12); however, a certain degree of purity or faultlessness is required of him before he may gain entry to the sect. As lines 7-8 suggest, the perfection of one’s way only becomes possible with some level of access to the group’s instructions and beliefs. The lengthy initiation process may have provided the means necessary for the pledger to gain some access to the group knowledge in the initial stages of initiation, which might then enable him to live according to the group’s regulations and so demonstrate his qualification for full initiation.190 Yet it was only upon full initiation into the sect that the pledger received all the benefits and privileges of membership and became incorporated into the eternal edifice, the “eternal Yaḥad” (l. 12). The rules of the sect provided for its holy status, ensuring that each member who entered the group was pure and fit for incorporation into a group so pure and holy it already bore marks of the eternal.

(עולם) ”Regularly in the sectarian manuscripts, the group is referred to as an “eternal

מטעת ) ”entity. One of the most common metaphors applied to the sect is the “eternal planting

In the Hebrew Bible, the image of a plant is used to describe the restoration of the 191.(עולם people and the remnant that survives the exile (Isa 60:21; 61:1-3; Jer 31:28; 42:10). God plants his people in the land and the anticipated result is that they will produce righteous deeds and

190 The significance of group knowledge and what it afforded the initiate will be discussed in greater detail in the next section: The Priestly Function of the Group.

or בית קודש) ”Cf. 1QS VIII, 5; XI, 7-9; 1QHa XIV, 7-9; CD I, 7-8. In 1QS, the metaphor “house of holiness 191 sometimes appears in collocation with the “eternal planting” as a parallel description of the group. See (מבנית קודש 1QS VIII, 5 and XI, 7-9.

62 bring glory to him.192 The plant metaphor is especially prominent in the Enochic literature.193 In the Book of the Watchers, Noah’s descendants are the eternal plant (1 En 10:3), the plant of righteousness and truth that appears after the catastrophic flood and destruction of the Watchers and their children (1 En 10:16).194 In the Book of Dreams, Enoch intercedes for God to leave a remnant on the earth and to raise up the righteous and true flesh “as a seed-bearing plant forever” (1 En 84:5-6). This righteous flesh is identified in the Apocalypse of Weeks (1 En 93:5) as Abraham and his descendants.195 The meaning of the plant metaphor remains fairly consistent in the Hebrew Bible and enochic literature, where it refers to historical Israel, or the surviving remnant of the people. In the Qumran sectarian literature, however, the metaphor is applied more narrowly to a subset of the people: the sectarians.

When such men as these come to be in Israel, then shall the party of the Yahad truly be בית ) Jub 16:26), a temple for Israel) (למטעת עולם) ’established, vacat an ‘eternal planting ,and—mystery!—a Holy of Holies for Aaron196; true witnesses to justice ,(קודש לישראל

192 Patrick Tiller briefly discusses the plant metaphor in the Hebrew Bible in “The ‘Eternal Planting’ in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” DSD 4, no. 3 (Nov., 1997), 314-15.

193 George Nickelsburg draws attention to the use of the plant metaphor in the enochic literature, noting that while the metaphor regularly refers to historical Israel in the 1 Enoch texts and Jubilees, it includes an eschatological dimension in the expectation that “in the end time God will again [choose] the eschatological community of the elect from the eternal plant of righteousness.” George W. E. Nickelsburg, 1 Enoch 1: A Commentary on the Book of 1 Enoch, Chapters 1—36; 81—108 (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), 445. Loren Stuckenbruck also mentions the plant metaphor in his discussion of 1 Enoch 93:5. Stuckenbruck contends that the plant metaphor in 1 En 93:5 differs from its usage in the Book of Watchers, as it here refers to a select group among Abraham’s offspring. Loren T. Stuckenbruck, 1 Enoch 91—108 (NewYork; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2007), 99-102. Following Stuckenbruck’s compelling analysis, it appears the sectarian authors of the Qumran texts had a precedent in the enochic literature for their application of the metaphor to a particular group within Israel.

194 In 1 En 10:3, God commands Sariel to go to Noah and “Teach the righteous one what he should do, the son of Lamech how he may preserve himself alive and escape forever. From him a plant will be planted, and his seed will endure for all the generations of eternity.” Rafael, Gabriel and Michael are then commissioned to imprison the lead Watchers and destroy their children. The command to Michael includes the injunction, “Destroy all perversity from the face of the earth, and let every wicked deed by gone; and let the plant of righteousness and truth appear, and it will become a blessing, (and) the deeds of righteousness and truth will be planted forever with joy” (1 En 10:16). Translation by George W. E. Nickelsburg and James C. VanderKam, 1 Enoch: A New Translation (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004).

195 “After this a man will be chosen as the plant of righteous judgment, and after him will go forth the plant of righteousness forever and ever” (1 En 93:5). Cf. Jub 16:26; 21:24; and 36:6. For more on the plant imagery in these texts, see Tiller, “The ‘Eternal Planting,’” pp. 315-324.

”.might also be rendered “a most holy council for Aaron ,וסוד קודש קודשים לאהרון ,The Hebrew here 196

chosen by God’s will to atone for the land and to recompense the wicked their due. (1QS VIII, 4-7)197 While the image of an eternal planting is perhaps taken up from the Enochic literature, in the Community Rule the metaphor applies strictly to the members of the sect. Moreover, the author combines this metaphor with an image of the sect as a human sanctuary.198 The sect, as an eternal planting, consists of those who, in the last days, are divinely chosen and will survive the catastrophic events of the eschatological judgment. As a human sanctuary, the sectarians fulfill temple and priestly functions in the present and anticipate their full incorporation into the eternal-heavenly sanctuary.199 The “eternal planting” and “temple for Israel” are imbued with eschatological force in the sectarian literature. By joining the eternal entity – the sect – initiates don its eternal nature and participate in the benefits granted by this identification. These benefits include present contact with the eternal (communion with angels)200 and future incorporation into the eternal-divine realm.201 Though not yet part of the eternal realm, the sectarians considered themselves as already becoming eternal by virtue of their incorporation into the eternal sect/Yaḥad – a necessary prerequisite for incorporation into the eternal-divine realm.

197 Cf. 1QS XI, 7-9.

198 In a discussion of the eternal planting metaphor in the Community Rule, Judith Newman points out that the eternal planting is closely associated with the human temple metaphor and belongs to the notion that the Temple is the omphalos mundi. This ideology in Israel and the ancient near east, Newman notes, “was also closely tied to creation and cosmos, body and community.” Through this intertwining of metaphors, the sect conceptualizes itself 1QS XI, 7-9). Newman, “Accessing Eternity,” 10. For a more ;מבנית קודש) in spatial terms – as a holy structure detailed discussion of these interrelationships in temple ideology, see Christopher R.A. Morray-Jones, “The Temple Within: The Embodied Divine Image and Its Worship in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Other early Jewish and Christian Sources,” Paradise Now (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2006) (reprinted from SBLSP, 1998).

199 Paul Swarup discusses these two images in his monograph, The Self-Understanding of the Dead Sea Scrolls Community: An Eternal Planting, A House of Holiness (London: T&T Clark, 2006). Swarup maintains the sectarians considered their own community as a proleptic sanctuary. They fulfilled priestly functions in the present as a type of substitute for the defiled Jerusalem temple, while they anticipated the establishment of a new, eternal sanctuary in the near future. For Swarup, the eternal planting and sanctuary of men were two sides of the same coin; both metaphors were central to the group’s self-understanding and distinguished the sect from the rest of Israel.

200 Cf. 1QHa VII, 2-8; 1QM XII, 1-2, 7-8. This will be discussed more fully in the following sections.

201 Cf. 1QS XI, 8; 1QHa XIV, 13-14.

The Lot of the Eternal: The Sect as Facilitator of Individual Holiness As much as the sect required holiness of initiates, it also provided the means for initiates to live holy lives. Without access to the shared knowledge of the sect, initiates would have no reliable means by which to measure their actions and behavior. Knowledge also played a prominent role in negotiating power relationships within the community. The more access one had to the shared knowledge, the greater the opportunity the individual might have to fulfill the actions required to advance in rank (1QS V, 20-24). While a certain level of purity or holiness was required for individuals to join the sect and remain in it, the cultivation of individual holiness was necessary for one’s personal advancement in the group and to ensure the individual’s future incorporation into the divine structure. Both the Hodayot and the Damascus Document stress the role of individual decision or action in determining a person’s fate in the end times.

23. But I, a creature of 24. clay, what am I? Kneaded with water, for whom am I to be reckoned, and what is כיא ) my strength? For I have taken my stand within the domain of wickedness ,(התיצבתי בגבול רשעה 25. and I am with the wretched by lot. The soul of the poor dwells with great tumults, thus great disasters accompany my steps. (1QHa XI, 23b-25)202

These lines belong to 1QH XI, the poem discussed earlier in this chapter, and appear on the heels of the poet’s account of his elevation to an eternal height and incorporation into the eternal council/Yaḥad.203 Entry into the sect includes an invitation to join in an eternal destiny with angels. The poet here recognizes what Carol Newsom refers to as the sectarian’s dual nature.204 On the one hand, he is dust-like, a creature of clay, and born into the domain of wickedness. On the other hand, by virtue of his incorporation into the sect and identification with God and his forces, he has taken on a new, eternal nature and may associate with divine beings. It is on

202 Emphases are mine.

203 1QHa XI, 20-23.

204 Newsom uses the term masochistic sublime to refer to this tendency in the Hodayot to construe the self as base, as nothingness, in contrast to “the absolute being of God” (p. 220). At every turn, human lack meets with God’s fullness and the result is an uneasy intersection, in the individual, of God’s activity and knowledge and the human’s suffering and guilt. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, pp. 220-221.

65 account of this incorporation into the sect that the poet may assert, “I have taken my stand within the domain of wickedness” (l. 24).

The significance of the sect in facilitating holiness and participation with the eternal is a regular theme in the major sectarian manuscripts. Yet this emphasis on incorporation into the sect and adoption of group identity is held in tension with an awareness of the individual’s singleness before God. Initiation confers upon the sectarian a new identity; he becomes part of an eternal structure and a joint heir in the lot of the holy ones. While this group identity affords the sectarian certain privileges, his individuality is never completely out of sight. In 1QS XI, the author both extols the privileges of the group and his own privileged place before God on account of his association with the sect.

5. Upon the eternal 6. has my eye gazed—even that wisdom hidden from men, the knowledge, wise prudence from humanity concealed. The source of righteousness, gathering 7. of power, and abode of glory are from fleshly counsel hidden. To them He has He has made .(לאוחזת עולם) all these has He given—an eternal possession (בחר) chosen them heirs in the legacy with the Angels has He united their assembly, an ;(בגורל קדושים) of the Holy Ones .8 They are an assembly built up for .(ועם בני שמים חבר סודם לעצת יחד) Yahad party for all (למטעת עולם) an eternal Planting ,(מבנית קודש) holiness 9. ages to come. (1QS XI, 5-9) In this first part, the author recognizes that his ability to gaze upon the eternal, join with angels, .of the Holy Ones is rooted in his identification with the sect (גורל) and share in the legacy

Knowledge hidden from the general population is made available to the sectarian and this knowledge is a source of righteousness and power. It is a sign that he has been chosen and elevated to the position of heir alongside the angels. On account of this position, which is achieved through incorporation into the sect, the sectarian receives some assurance that his place in the eternal realm is secure. In the following section of text (1QS XI, 9-22), the sectarian’s individuality comes to the forefront as the author expresses his humanness and fleshliness and concludes that justification and the perfection of one’s way only comes through union with God. In lines 11-17, the author turns from a focus on his human state and expresses confidence in his justification.

11. As for me, if 12. I stumble, God’s lovingkindness forever shall save me. If through sin of the flesh I fall, my justification will be by the righteousness of God which endures for all time .(משפטי בצדקת אל תעמוד לנצחים)

13. Though my affliction break out, He shall draw my soul back from the Pit, and firm my steps on the way. Through His love He has brought me near; by His lovingkindness shall He provide

By His righteous truth has He justified me; and through .(משפטי) my justification .14 for all my sins. By His righteousness shall (יכפר) His exceeding goodness shall He atone He cleanse me of human 15. defilement And the sin of humankind—to the end that I praise God for His righteousness, the Most High for His glory. Blessed are You, O my God, who has opened to knowledge 16. the mind of Your servant. Establish all of his works in righteousness; raise up the to be among those chosen—(כאשר רציתה) son of Your handmaiden—if it please You of humankind, to stand (לבחירי)

17. before You forever. (1QS XI, 11-17). Participation in the sect affords the author a degree of confidence in his expectation of ll. 7-8 above) because he is ,בחר) justification before God. He considers himself already chosen a member of the sect. Consequently, he believes he is already justified (l. 14) and expects God to continue to justify him and atone for his sins should he stumble (ll. 11-14). Yet, although membership in the sect appears to provide justification for the author in the present, it does not necessarily secure the initiate’s future incorporation into the eternal structure. In lines 16-17, the author expresses some uncertainty regarding his future standing among the human chosen ones. The liminal state, like the time of birth or a ship at sea, was a dangerous place because of its uncertain outcome. While the sect provided the means necessary for the initiate’s present justification, providing knowledge for holy living and allowing the individual to join in its eternal nature, the individual’s future incorporation into the eternal structure remained unsettled until the time of the eschatological judgment.

THE PRIESTLY FUNCTION OF THE GROUP In addition to facilitating group and individual holiness, the sectarian writers believed the sect could effectually atone for the land and individuals during the last days. The sectarians understood themselves as a priesthood of sorts, though without a temple. As such, members, through their actions and prayers, might atone for the land, individuals, and sin. Moreover, the leaders of the sect believed that they were custodians of a secret knowledge imparted only to the group and its members, and this knowledge granted them special access to the divine. Along these same lines, they also assumed the responsibility of dispensing judgment – a role deemed necessary to maintain the purity and integrity of the group, and its members’ access to the divine. These three priestly functions of the group are discussed here: 1) atoning for the land, individuals, and sin, 2) serving as custodians of knowledge, and 3) dispensing judgment. According to the sectarian authors of the Community Rule, the Damascus Document, and the Hodayot, these priestly actions provided for the sustenance of the sect in the liminal period and prepared the way for its members’ eventual incorporation into the eternal realm.

Much has been written about the potential priestly origins of the sect. In previous decades, scrolls scholars tended to read 4QMMT as evidence of a split in the Jerusalem priesthood.205 More recently, a number of scholars have called into question this reading of the text.206 The question of whether or not the origins of the sect were rooted in the priestly establishment remains a topic of debate. Many now suppose that the sect was comprised of both

205 Elisha Qimron and John Strugnell, DSD 10. Qumran Cave 4. V 5, Miqsat Ma‛aśeh ha-Torah (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994). A small minority of scholars continue to maintain that 4QMMT was initially authored by the Teacher of Righteousness and his followers and addressed to the leader of the Jerusalem priesthood. For example, see Eyal Regev, Sectarianism in Qumran: A Cross-Cultural Perspective (Berlin: deGruyter, 2007), 104- 107.

206 John Kampen cautions against reading the authors and recipients of the text so literally. He further suggests the addressee of the document may belong to the same movement but be geographically removed from the writer’s group. John Kampen, “4QMMT and New Testament Studies” in Reading 4QMMT: New Perspectives on Qumran Law and History (ed. J. Kampen and M. J. Bernstein; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996), 129-144. Steven Fraade and Maxine Grossman have both independently argued that 4QMMT was composed for internal use. Steven D. Fraade, “To Whom it May Concern: 4QMMT and its Addressee(s),” RevQ 19/4 (2000): 507-26. Maxine L. Grossman, “Reading 4QMMT: Genre and History,” RevQ 20/1 (2001): 3-22. For a more complete discussion of the various interpretations of 4QMMT, see H. von Weissenberg, 4QMMT: Reevaluating the Text, the Function, and the Meaning of the Epilogue (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2009), 143-168.

68 priests and lay members.207 While some of the sectarian manuscripts require the presence of priests for certain activities,208 it appears that all members of the sect, whether from priestly circles or not, carried out many priestly functions.209

Although a detailed discussion of the potential priestly origins of the group or the priestly versus non-priestly status of its members is beyond the scope of this project, it is likely that the group was composed of individuals from both priestly and non-priestly backgrounds. The thing most significant for our purposes here is to recognize that all members, regardless of their prior affiliations or lineages, assumed priestly responsibilities in the community – atoning for the land and individuals, guarding group knowledge, and dispensing judgment in order to maintain the integrity of the group. The community itself is described in temple terms; it is “a foundation of for all those who are holy and belong to the (כפר) that atones (מוסד אמת לישראל) ”truth for Israel truth and condemns any who break the statutes.210 As a type of human temple, the sectarians sought to fulfill temple functions they believed were lacking in the Jerusalem establishment.211

in the community. Geza Vermes (איש) and laymen (כוהנים) 1QS VIII, 1 mentions the presence of both priests 207 believes the sect was originally a mix of priests and lay people. Geza Vermes, “The Leadership of the Qumran Community: Sons of Zadok—Priests—Congregation,” in Geschichte-Tradition-Reflexion: Festschrift für Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburtstag: Vol1. Judentum (eds. H. Cancik, H. Licktenberger, and P. Schäfer; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1996), 375-84. In a 2010 article, Heinz-Josef Fabry posits that the prominence of Aaronites and Zadokites in the sectarian texts may indicate an attempt of the sectarian writers to dissolve the tension/rivalry between the two priesthoods. Heinz-Josef Fabry, “Priests at Qumran: A Reassessment,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Texts and Contexts (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 258-9.

208 Cf. 1QS I, 18-19; II, 11-12; VI, 3-5, 18-19; CD IX, 13-15; XIII, 2-7.

209 1QSa I outlines the ages at which members may participate in various duties within the sect. All initiates are instructed in the laws of the group. Male members may receive special instruction and assume responsibilities within the group, which include serving the congregation and taking part in legal disputes (l. 13), and assuming command appointments (l. 14). Though some of these tasks were previously reserved for priests, in 1QSa they are assigned to members of the group based on the individual’s intelligence and performance. Cf. 1QS V, 23-24.

קודש קודשים ) 1QS V, 5-7. Cf. 1QS VIII, 8-9; here, the community is described as a Holy of Holies for Aaron 210 .(בית תמים ואמת בישראל) and a blameless and true house in Israel ,(לאהרון

211 Over the years, there has been much debate regarding the question of whether the sectarians considered their movement a replacement for the Jerusalem temple, a temporary substitute for it, or something else. Many years ago, Bertil Gärtner argued that the community regarded itself as a spiritual temple. Bertil Gärtner, The Temple and the Community in Qumran and the New Testament: A Comparative Study in the Temple Symbolism (Society for New Testament Studies Monograph Series 1; New York: Cambridge University Press, 1965), 16-46. Others have seen the sect as a type of substitute temple. Advocates of this view include the following: Lawrence Schiffman, “Priestly and Levitical Gifts in the Temple Scroll,” in The Provo International Conference on the Dead Sea Scrolls: Technological Innovations, New Texts, and Reformulated Issues (Leiden: E J Brill, 1999), 480-96; Hannah K.

Providing Atonement Acting as a type of substitute temple, the sectarians believed their actions helped atone for the land, for individuals, and for sin. A connection between sin and the land appears in a few places and likely goes back to Deuteronomic notions of the centrality of the temple and its role in providing for the expiation of sin.212 In the Deuteronomistic History, the possession of the land is tendentiously tied to the issue of sin. This is a significant issue with which the sectarian writers concerned themselves. When the land becomes corrupt, due to sin, consequences ensue.213 Since the sectarians considered the Jerusalem priesthood corrupt, atonement had to come from elsewhere and they sought to secure it through their own priestly activity apart from the Jerusalem temple. In the Community Rule, a select group within the sect leads the work of atoning:

1. In the party of the Yahad there shall be twelve laymen and three priests who are in the light of all that has been revealed from the whole (תמימים) blameless 2. Law, so as to work truth, righteousness, justice, lovingkindness and humility .one with another ,(לעשות אמת וצדקה ומשפט ואהבת חסד והצנע) 3. They are to preserve faith in the land with self-control and a broken spirit, atoning by working justice and (ולרצת עוון) for sin They are to walk with all by the .(בעושי משפט וצרת מצרף) suffering affliction .4 standard of truth and the dictates proper to the age. When such men as these come to be in Israel,

Harrington, The Purity Texts (Companion to the Qumran Scrolls 5; London; New York: T&T Clark, 2004), 37-38; Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of the Holy Land: From the Destruction of Solomon’s Temple to the Muslim Conquest (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 116-117; Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2002), 113; Jonathan Klawans, Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supercessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006); Johann Maier, “Temple” in the Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, vol. 2 (ed. L. Schiffman and J. C. VanderKam; 2 vols.; San Diego: Academic Press, 2000), 921-927. Here, I take the approach that the sectarians did not consider their movement a permanent replacement for the Jerusalem temple, but rather a temporary substitute.

212 Moshe Weinfeld argues that while the author of Deuteronomy elevates the chosen place (Jerusalem and the temple), he at the same time divests it of religious significance, so in the D material God’s name dwells in the temple but not God’s self, and in P God dwells in the midst of his people. Moshe Weinfeld, Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1972), 197. This understanding of God’s presence as with his people and not necessarily rooted to a particular place may underlie sectarian notions of the wilderness or the sect as the location of God’s presence.

213 Cf. Deut 30:15-20; 2 Kgs 24:18-20; Jer 1—10; 25; 52; Ezek 11; Ps 137.

5. then shall the party of the Yahad truly be established, vacat an ‘eternal planting’ and—mystery!—a Holy ,(בית קודש לישראל) Jub 16:26), a temple for Israel) true witnesses to justice, chosen ;(וסוד קודש קודשים לאהרון) of Holies for Aaron .6 and to recompense (לכפר בעד הארץ) by God’s will to atone for the land 7. the wicked their due. (1QS VIII, 1-7) This text, mentioned previously for its references to the sect as an eternal entity of divinely chosen individuals, is worth discussing further here in light of its significance for understanding the priestly function of the sect. According to the expectations laid out in this passage, a particularly holy group within the sect must be in place for atonement to occur.214 In place of animal sacrifice, these individuals offer works of truth, righteousness, justice, lovingkindness and humility (l. 2). They atone for sin by working justice and suffering affliction (ll. 3-4), and this in turn provides atonement for the land (l. 6).215 Atoning for sin and the land are connected here and elsewhere in the sectarian texts.216 While in the sectarian mindset the act serves a purpose in the present, providing a substitute sacrifice in place of the defunct Jerusalem priesthood, the work of atonement was also future-oriented. Providing atonement for sin and the land was preparatory for the time when the eternal planting would spread over the whole earth and wickedness would be destroyed in its wake (1QHa IV, 13-19).

At the eschatological judgment, the abolition of wickedness coincides with the complete earthly takeover of the eternal planting. According to the picture painted in 1QHa IV, the land are (אנשי אשמה) itself is not destroyed, just the wicked who dwell in it. The men of guilt

and be consumed in the flames of the everlasting fountain, which (אש) expected to burn in a fire

214 Various interpretations have been offered for this group. John Collins points out that “the numbers have symbolic significance, referring to the twelve tribes and three priestly families.” While Collins maintains a degree of uncertainty as to whether or not this group actually existed within the sect, he argues that the reference most likely indicates a special subgroup within the yaḥad – perhaps “an elite group set aside for special training.” John J. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 70-72. Edmund Sutcliffe understands the twelve men and three priests as a reference to the original council that formed the community. Edmund F. Sutcliffe, S.J., “The First Fifteen Members of the Qumran Community: a note on 1QS 8:1ff,” JSS 4/2 (1959): 134-48. Sarianna Metso believes the reference signifies the entire yaḥad since walking in perfection is a requirement for all members. Sarianna Metso, Whom does the Term Yaḥad Signify?” in Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in Honour of Michael A. Knibb (ed. C. Hempel and J. M. Lieu; JSJSup 111; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 230.

215 Judgment is also mentioned in this passage (ll. 6-7), but is not treated here since it is addressed in a subsequent section.

216 Cf. 1QS IX, 4-5; 4QS VI, 1-5; and 1QH XIV, 8-19.

71 is another metaphor for the sect (1QHa IV, 17-19). In this vivid portrayal of the eschatological judgment, the author envisions the sect as an eternal planting that casts its shade over the entire earth and a spring of light that becomes an eternal fountain and consumes the wicked in its brilliant flames. The present, then, is a time in which the sect functions as a substitute temple in order to offer atonement for the land in preparation for the eschatological judgment and the total takeover of the earth by the righteous remnant.

Along with atoning for sin and the land, the members of the sect played a role in atoning for certain individuals. This function did not include everyone, but only those who joined themselves to the group. Regarding the members of the Yaḥad, the Community Rule instructs, for all those in Aaron who volunteer for holiness, and for those in Israel (כפר) They are to atone“ who belong to truth, and for Gentile proselytes who join them in community” ( 1Q S V : 6 ).217 The are common (אהרון) ”and “Aaron ,(בית אמת) ”those who belong to truth“ ,(יחד) titles, Yaḥad appellations for members of the sect. Although we may not know the extent to which some members may have continued to participate in worship at the Jerusalem temple, they did not depend on it solely for expiation of sin for the land or for their own atonement.218

Entry into the sect allowed the individual to take on a new, corporate identity marked by truth and holiness, while also receiving expiation on an individual level.219 Though

לכול המתנדבים :The Hebrew in this line places “holiness in Aaron” and “house of truth in Israel” in apposition 217 .1QS V, 6). These and similar terms refer to the sect in 1QS VIII, 5-9; IX, 6) לקודש באהרון ולבית האמת בישראל William Grasham discusses the use of these terms for the sect in “The Priestly Synagogue: A Re-Examination of the Cult at Qumran,” (Ph.D. diss., University of Aberdeen, 1985). See also George J. Brooke, “Patterns of Priesthood, Priestliness, and Priestly Functions in Some Second Temple Period Texts,” Judaïsme Ancien 4 (2016): 1-21. Charlotte Hempel, “The Sons of Aaron in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Flores Florentino: Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Early Jewish Studies in Honour of Florentino García Martínez (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2007), 207-224. Others reference self-designations of the sect in works dealing with the organization and function of the sect. Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy, 29-51. Charlotte Hempel, The Qumran Rule Texts in Context: Collected Studies (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2013). Alison Schofield, From Qumran to the Yaḥad: A New Paradigm of Textual Development for The Community Rule (STDJ 77; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2009). John J. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 52- 87.

218 Josephus (first century CE) mentions an Essene who prophesied and taught in the Jerusalem Temple during the reign of Aristobulus. Cf. J.W. 1.78-80 and Ant. 13.310-14. If the sect is to be connected with the Essenes, as many believe, it is possible that the Essenes did not completely avoid the Jerusalem Temple during the time of separation.

219 Commenting on 1QS V, 4b-7a, Paul Swarup observes that initiates would “function as the spiritual sanctuary making expiation for all those joining the community and would judge those who transgressed the covenant.” Swarup, The Self-Understanding of the Dead Sea Scrolls Community, 168.

72 righteousness could only come from God, atonement for sin, which restored an individual’s righteousness, was the responsibility of community members.220 The poet of 1QHa X, 10-11 to all who repent of (רפא) to transgressors but healing (פח) claims, “I became a snare

(רפא) is not mentioned in this passage, healing here (כפר) transgression.”221 Though atonement conveys a similar meaning. The sectarian, because of his identification with the group, becomes at once a source of healing and atonement to those in the group and a snare to those who fail to follow its way. Atonement provided a means for the individual to remain in right standing within the group, securing his participation in the eternal planting/human sanctuary, and increasing the likelihood that he will also become incorporated into the eternal structure at the final judgment. While failure was always a possibility and expulsion from the group a dire consequence for those who transgressed, the atoning activity of the group helped initiates maintain their standing and navigate the treacherous waters of the liminal state while anticipating the final, eschatological events that would (hopefully) lead to their permanent incorporation into the eternal.

Dispensing Judgment Atoning for individuals and dispensing judgment are two sides of the same coin in the life and activity of the sect. Both were necessary to maintain the integrity of the group as a holy institution and an environment proper for those who considered themselves to be in the process of becoming eternal and believed they already engaged with divine beings. Though rendering judgment, especially in regard to purity matters, was typically the responsibility of religious authorities,222 in the sectarian literature all members share in these priestly responsibilities of

,to the Most High ‘O (צדקע) ’,In 1QS X, 11-12, the author exclaims, “To God shall I say, ‘O, my Righteousness 220 Seat of my good, source of knowledge and Fount of holiness, height of glory, Almighty, eternal Splendour.’” The Hodayot are also replete with references to God as the source of righteousness. 1QHa III, 6; V, 23, 25; VI, 15; VII, 14-15; VIII, 14, 19-20; IX, 6, 26; XII, 38-40; XIX, 18; XX, 19, 3.

1QHa, 10-11). The numbering and translation of this passage are from) ואהיה פח לפושעים ומרפא לכול שבי פשע 221 Eileen M. Schuller and Carol A. Newsom, The Hodayot (Thanksgiving Psalms): A Study Edition of 1QHa (Early Judaism and its Literature 36; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature), 32-33.

222 See Ezek 44:24; Deut 17:8-9; 19:17; 21:5; 1 Chron 23: 1-4; 2 Chron 19: 8. In the pre-temple era, judgment was often the responsibility of religious authorities associated with the tabernacle. Cf. Deut 17:8; Ex 28:29-30; Num 27:21.

73 providing atonement and dispensing judgment. Here, the work of atonement is regularly paired with lists of exclusions and injunctions to discipline or remove individuals who fail to maintain group standards.223

Judgment and exclusion are necessary to maintain the holy status of the group because one unrepentant member can pollute the whole.224 Exclusion provided the means for maintaining the integrity of the group in the case of unrepentance, while temporary limitations and purity rituals provided a means of atonement for unintentional sins.225 In 1QS V, 6-7, the command to atone for those who volunteer for holiness and belong to the truth is immediately followed by the injunction to “condemn any who transgress a regulation” and later an injunction to stay away from impurity and everything false (1QS V, 15) because being joined to such a person may cause the sectarian to incur guilt (1QS V, 14-15). Blamelessness is a necessary precondition for the sect to exist as an eternal structure in the present (1QS VIII, 1-6) and to facilitate its members’ safe passage through the liminal time-space to achieve successful incorporation into the eternal realm at the eschatological judgment.

Some texts presuppose that the sectarians also play a role in the eschatological judgment of the wicked. The War Scroll portrays the sectarians (the Sons of Light) waging war against the forces of Belial. The result of this battle is a time of salvation and dominion for the people of God and “eternal annihilation for all the forces of Belial” (1QM I, 5). Following the victory, the text illustrates the total saturation of the earth with light: “Then the Sons of Righteousness shall shine to all ends of the world, continuing to shine forth until the end of the appointed seasons of darkness. Then at the time appointed by God, His great excellence shall shine for all the times of

223 Cf. 1QS VI, 25—VII, 25 (exclusions/prohibitions) and VIII, 1-7 (atonement), and 1QS V, 1-7 (atonement) and V, 14-20 (exclusion of the impure).

224 In the Damascus Document, this injunction extends to those who have a weak mind or body, or are too young to make responsible choices. The reason for such exclusion in CD XV, 15-17 is that holy angels are in the midst of the community and, presumably, they might abandon the community or become polluted through unseemly action.

225 Cf. 1QS VI, 24—VII, 25 and CD XIV, 18-22. Aharon Shemesh argues that the penal code found in these Qumran texts is based on earlier Hebrew Bible texts and plays a role in the development of Midrash as well. Aharon Shemesh, “The Scriptural Background of the Penal Code in the Rule of the Community and the Damascus Document,” DSD 15 (2008): 191-224. See, also, Charlotte Hempel, who offers a sketch of the development of the penal code in the Damascus Document and Community Rule texts. Charlotte Hempel, “The Penal Code Reconsidered,” in Legal Texts and Legal Issues: Proceedings of the Second Meeting of the International Organization for Qumran Studies, Cambridge, 1995 (ed. M. J. Bernstein et al.; STDJ 23; Leiden: Brill, 1997), 337- 348.

. . .” (1QM I, 8). This image closely parallels the takeover of righteousness depicted in 1QHa XIV, 14-19. Light imagery is a prominent feature of both texts. In 1QHa XIV, the sectarians are depicted as a spring of light whose flames engulf and completely consume the men of guilt. In these texts, the authors presume an active role for the members of the sect in the annihilation of the wicked which makes way for the righteous to move into those spaces and help establish a righteous reign for all future ages.226

Custodians of Knowledge Along with atoning for sin and dispensing judgment, the sectarians adopted another priestly role as custodians of group knowledge.227 Knowledge is conceptualized in various ways in Qumran thought. Particularly important to members of the sect is the belief that they have been entrusted with a type of hidden knowledge revealed to certain individuals through divine inspiration. Guarding this revealed knowledge was a priority of the group, since access to it allowed the individual to learn how one must behave in order to achieve incorporation into the eternal realm. The initiatory period provided a two-fold line of defense in this process. On one hand, it limited access to the revealed knowledge of the group until the initiate had been tested and approved, in this way defining an individual’s status with the group as well as influencing his future fate. On the other hand, the probationary period ensured that the knowledge the individual brought into the group as a full, contributing member was in line with the teachings of the sect. Leaders then decided when an individual was deemed fit to gain access to the revealed knowledge and contribute to it as a full, participating member of the sect.228

226 Cf. 1QHa XI, 35-36; XIV, 17-18, 29-31; 1QM I, 8-9; 4Q492 1, 8.

227 Providing instruction is considered a priestly role in the sectarian texts as well as in other Second Temple period must be present (כהן מבונן ההגי) Jewish texts. CD XIII, 2 specifies that a priest knowledgeable in the book of Haggai at all times, while in 1QS VIII, 1-16 the elect group of twelve laymen and three priests are responsible for the In the Hebrew Bible, Ezra the priest rises to the role of interpreter of the Law .(מדרש התורה) expounding of the Law for the community returning from exile (Ezra 7:1-12).

is granted this role in 1QS IX, 12-21. In 1QS VI, 16-19, the Council of the general (משכיל) The Instructor 228 decides who may proceed in the initiation process and the priests and men of their (עצת הרבים) membership ,determine who may receive access to the group’s secret teachings. In CD XIII (הכוהנים ורוב אנשי בריתם) Covenant in 1QS IX; he is responsible to teach the (משכיל) fills a role similar to the Instructor (המבקר) the Overseer ,7-13 those joined to the group and determine their place within the (פקד) members about the works of God and appoint group.

Knowledge in the sectarian texts frequently refers to the proper interpretation of torah.229 By the time of Ezra-Nehemiah, some form of a written Law of Moses was considered authoritative.230 Judaism in the Second Temple Period was diverse and multiple interpretations of torah coexisted.231 Moreover, during this time, torah was not limited to written texts.232 Categories of revelation were also included in this type of knowledge and served as a type of currency that determined one’s status. Foremost among these, for members of the group, were the interpretive traditions derived from the Teacher, whose patterns of interpretation set the mold for sanctioned forms of knowledge within the sect.233 Knowledge was considered an asset, or a possession, that an initiate brought to the group. It was only upon the completion of the initiation process, when the initiate had been inducted into the teachings of the sect, that the new member’s knowledge might be joined to the knowledge of the group.234 This ensured that any

.(תורה) 1QS VI, 18 refers specifically to the initiate’s understanding of Torah 229

230 John J. Collins, The Invention of Judaism: Torah and Jewish Identity from Deuteronomy to Paul (Oakland: University of California Press, 2017), 52-57.

231 Collins concludes that “it is not clear whether there was any attempt to enforce a particular interpretation of the Law outside of the temple area,” though the common people might have sided with the Pharisees. Collins, The Invention of Judaism, 109. Carol Newsom discusses the development of a need for interpreters of torah. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 33-34. She notes, “The most striking difference between the representation of knowledge in Deuteronomy and in Ezra-Nehemiah, however, is in the role of Levitical intermediaries. Whatever the exact nature of the Levitical activity (whether careful reading by phrases and units, translation, and/or explicit interpretation), knowledge of torah is not the immediate experience that it is represented to be in Deuteronomy. No longer is torah unproblematically ‘in your mouth and in your heart’ (Deut 31:14). The ordinary Israelite requires assistance to understand.”

232 Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 24. Newsom rightly observes that “not all that was regarded as scripture was torah or formed the basis for specific norms of conduct, and not everything that was believed to be required by God had a textual basis in scripture.” This is especially true of the group behind the sectarian manuscripts, as these authors regarded special revelation and proper interpretation of the texts as the type of knowledge needed for participation in the group and interaction with divine beings. Also see Jon Levenson, “Psalm 119 and the Modes of Revelation in Second Temple Judaism,” in Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross (eds. P. D. Miller, P. D. Hanson, and S. D. McBride; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987), 559-74.

233 Collins writes that members of the sect presented their teachings as “interpretation of the Torah, in a tradition derived from the Teacher” and these interpretations, though not attributed pseudonymously to ancient visionaries (as is often the case with apocalypses), “were subsumed under a higher revelation, and assumed a view of the world that was apocalyptic, in the sense that human behavior was shaped by supernatural forces and subject to a judgment that would determine the fate of individual beings for all eternity.” Collins, The Invention of Judaism, 122.

דבריו לפי ) ”After the first year, the group may inquire into “the details of his understanding and works of the Law 234 1QS VI, 18-19), but it was only at full membership that the initiate’s understanding may be ;שכלו ומעשיו בתורה incorporated to the point that other members might draw upon his counsel and judgment (1QS VI, 22)

76 knowledge he contributed was in line with the revealed, group knowledge. At this point, the new .or secret teachings of the group (הון) ”initiate would receive further initiation into the “wealth

Only then would his material possessions would be incorporated as well (1QS VI, 18-22).

Knowledge, for the sectarians, was also time-conditioned. Through the mode of revelation, varying degrees or types of knowledge were believed to be dispensed at different times. Regarding revelation in the Community Rule, Carol Newsom observes that “the coupling of references to Moses with parallel references to ‘the prophets’ suggests both that the community considered the disclosure of torah to Moses to have been a form of prophetic revelation and that the revelation of torah was continued by later prophets.”235 The sectarians believed that they were the latter day tradents of torah and the only ones to have the true interpretation of torah and the proper understanding of its application in their time. This notion of timed revelation appears repeatedly in the Community Rule, often as part of the instructions for a leader responsible for expounding or teaching torah.

into the Covenant (חוקי אל) He is to induct all who volunteer to live by the laws of God of Mercy, so as to be joined to God’s society and walk faultless before Him, according to 1QS) .(כול הנגלות למועדי תעודותם) all that has been revealed for the times appointed them I, 7-9)

decreed by God through Moses for (מקדוש התורה) This means the expounding of the law ככול הנגלה עת ) obedience, that being defined by what has been revealed for each age (1QS VIII, 15) .(בעת

These are the statutes for the Instructor. He is to conduct himself by them with every and the value (לתכון עת ועת) living person, guided by the precepts appropriate to each era of each person. He is to work the will of God according to what has been revealed for studying all the wise legal findings of earlier ,(ככול הנגלה לעת בעת) each period of history times, as well as every statute applying to his own time. (1QS IX, 12-14) The type of knowledge revealed in the time of the sect granted the sectarians special status. Believing they lived in the last days and had the final, definitive interpretation of the law for their

235 Newsom cites 1QS VIII, 15-16 as evidence. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 70.

77 own time, the sectarians thought they alone were afforded a privileged position which authorized them to associate with their angelic counterparts in the present.236

In the view of the sect, knowledge provided access. Consequently, certain forms of knowledge must be restricted to those individuals who had proven themselves worthy of access to the divine and capable of properly handling revelation.237 Only full initiates were further instructed into the divine mysteries as such knowledge created new channels of access to divine realities and offered the opportunity to share in the same lot as the angels. Knowledge is a prominent feature of the angels, the heavenly priesthood, in the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice.238 The sectarian writers considered their own group akin to the angels in their knowledge of divine mysteries. This knowledge allows them to associate with the angels in the present and secure a permanent place alongside angels in the eternal realm. In the Hodayot, the sectarians are regularly pictured as sharing in a common lot with angels.

The perverse spirit You have cleansed from great transgression, that he might take his with the (ביחד) and enter together 239,(צבא קדושים) stand with the host of the holy ones congregation of the sons of heaven. And for man, You have allotted an eternal destiny

236 Bjӧrn Frennesson has written about the sect’s notion of communing with angels. Frenneson rather systematically goes through sectarian texts that detail this notion of humans and angels coming together in a common rejoicing. While Frenneson suggests that liturgy does not actually function as a tool in actually realizing this contact/communion, he maintains that the texts reflect and confirm “that there is such a thing as communion with angels.” Bjӧrn Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing”: Liturgical Communion with Angels in Qumran (SSU 14; Uppsala: Uppsala University Press, 1999), 42-43. In the following chapter, I discuss this question of whether or not the sectarians believed that their liturgy facilitated human-divine connection in the present and I conclude that it did.

237 Cf. 1QS IX, 14-16.

are בינה and דעת In her critical edition of the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, Carol Newsom points out that 238 common attributions of angels. Summarizing the findings of a detailed presentation of angelic appellations, Newsom writes, “Of all the qualities which are associated with the angels in the Sabbath songs, however, knowledge as ‘those who ,(אלי דעת) ’is the most prominent. The angels are repeatedly designated as ‘angels of knowledge etc. In fact the superiority of the angelic praise arises ,(מיסדי דעת) ’those who establish knowledge‘ ,(ידעים) ’know precisely from their more exalted understanding of divine mysteries.” Carol Newsom, Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition (Harvard Semitic Studies 27; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1985), 23-30 (citation is from p. 30). Also see Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing,” 48 and Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 209-16.

239 In his commentary on the hymns, Jacob Licht suggests the phrase, “take his stand with the host of the holy ones,” refers to a place in the divine throne room. Jacob Licht, The Thanksgiving Scroll (Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1957), 84, 163.

to praise Your name together with ,(גורל עולם עם רוחות דעת) with the spirits of knowledge shouts of joy, and to recount Your wonders before all your creatures. (1QHa XI, 21-23)240 According to this text, the individual who joins the sect also shares in an eternal destiny with the angels. As guardians of the revealed knowledge belonging to the group, the sectarians determine who may enter into the group and share in its knowledge, and only those who enter in may share in a common lot with their divine counterparts, the spirits of knowledge. Access to the group knowledge grants the sectarian, among other things, the ability to commune with angels in the present and share in a common lot and eternal destiny with these holy ones.

THE PLACE OF THE INDIVIDUAL IN THE ETERNAL-DIVINE STRUCTURE As the first two sections demonstrate, the sect itself provides the context or structure through which the individual may achieve holiness in the present and become established among the ranks of divine beings. By entering into the sect, the sectarian becomes privy to knowledge necessary for righteous living, further separating himself from the wicked age.241 The priestly activity of the group further provides for the individual’s maintenance of purity through the work of atoning and maintaining a holy space in which the sectarian may live in a manner necessary to maintain his right standing. While the sect fulfilled a significant role in facilitating holiness, an individual’s future fate and rank within the group, perhaps also his future rank within the eternal structure, were matters of individual merit and achievement. The sect, as an eternal edifice and holy space, helps facilitate an individual’s incorporation into the eternal, yet the final burden of responsibility ultimately falls on the individual to secure his place in the eternal realm.

240 Also 1QHa XIX, 9-14: Your compassion is for all the children of Your will, for You have made them know the You have given them insight (ברזי פלאכה) and in the mysteries of Your wonder ,(בסוד אמתכה) counsel of Your truth For Your glory’s sake You have cleansed man from transgression, so that he can purify himself for You .(השכלתם) from all filthy abominations and the guilt of unfaithfulness, so as to be joined wi[th] the children of Your truth; in That bodies, covered with worms of the dead, might rise up from the .(בגורל עם קדושיכה) the lot with Your saints dust to an et[ernal] council; from a perverse spirit to Your understanding. That he might take his position before You with the eternal hosts and spirits [of truth], to be renewed with all that shall be and to rejoice together with those who know. ,is a present reference to the sect. Here (לסוד עולם) ”In 1QS II, 25 and 4QShirShabb 1 i, 34, the “eternal council though it is unclear whether the term refers to the present reality or future hope of the sectarian, the sectarian’s membership in the group provides access to the eternal realm and a joint inheritance with angels.

241 In chapter 3, I discuss the significance of constructions of time and space in the sect’s separation from the wicked age. Participation in the revealed knowledge of the group then functions as another aspect of this separation, which establishes the proper context for the individual’s participation with the divine.

Securing A Place in the Eternal Realm In the rule texts and the Hodayot, the image of the sect as an eternal entity (e.g. the eternal planting, the human sanctuary) is held in tension with the notion that the individual is responsible for his own fate and is judged independently. This focus on the agency and responsibility of the individual in securing his fate may be seen in CD IV. The passage below appears within the context of a review of the group’s origins, which includes an emphasis on their chosen status and the time of their appearance – in the last years of the final age (CD IV, 3-9).242

,(ובשלים הקץ למספר השנים האלה) When the total years of this present age are complete there will be no further need to be connected to the house of Judah, but instead each will the wall is built, the boundary ;(כי אם לעמוד איש על מצודו) stand on his own tower removed (Mic 7:11). (CD IV, 10-12) This passage draws a sharp distinction between the way things were in former times and the regulations for the present. Though connection to Judah (and its leadership) may have brought some sense of assurance in the past, the author indicates that with the turning of the age, new conventions replace the old. The individual is not judged primarily according to the status of the group or age to which he belongs, but rather according to his own merit.243

In order to secure a place in the eternal realm at the turn of the age, the individual must 1) belong to the chosen group, the remnant, and 2) maintain good standing within the group so that when the final judgment ensues, he may achieve full incorporation into the eternal ream and escape the destruction of the wicked. Achieving initiation did not automatically secure an individual’s future fate since individual failure and expulsion from the group remained constant

CD IV, 4), and at the time of writing, the ;אחרית הימים) According to this passage, the sect forms in the last days 242 in “these ,(שלים הקץ) author of this text locates himself and his contemporaries at the completion of this period CD IV, 8-9). While the use of “days” and “years” here may seem incongruous, the term “the ;השנים האלה) ”years By contrast, the phrase .(קץ) last days” generally applies in a metaphoric sense to the last part of the last period/age “these years” tends to appear in a more literal sense as a reference to the present, and here the author locates the present at the very completion of the present age, indicating the author places himself and his audience even nearer to the end than the phrase “the last days” typically suggests.

243 Cf. CD II, 4-7; 4Q266 frag. 3, i and iii, 23-25. This text has often been considered as evidence that the sect identified itself with the House of Judah. However, as John Bergsma demonstrated in his article on Qumran self- identity, the group regularly identifies itself as “Israel” and shows no clear preference for Judah or identification of its members as Judeans. According to Bergsma, CD IV, 10 “asserts that after the present period of tribulation, it will no longer be necessary to join the Yaḥad in the last days.” John S. Bergsma, “Qumran Self-Identity: ‘Israel’ or ‘Judah’?” DSD 15 (2008), 181.

80 possibilities.244 While the penal codes in the Damascus Document and the Community Rule offered a means of rehabilitation for some transgressions, certain offenses and failure to comply with reinstatement measures would result in expulsion. Such expulsion would necessarily mean severance from the sect, which functioned as the individual’s present connection to the eternal and provided the basis for his hope for an inheritance or place within the eternal lot.

Initiation into the sect and incorporation into its eternal edifice allowed the individual to identify with and even become part of something eternal during the present, finite age, yet the individual’s own identity was not subsumed into the corporate structure to the point that his individuality was lost. This individual aspect of the eternal planting and holy sanctuary metaphors might be seen in 1QS XI, 7-9, though it is perhaps not readily apparent:

He .(לאוחזת עולם) To them He has chosen all these has He given—an eternal possession with the Angels has ;(בגורל קדושים) has made them heirs in the legacy of the Holy Ones He united their assembly, an Yaḥad party. They are an assembly built up for holiness .(למטעת עולם עם כול קץ ניהיה) an eternal Planting for all ages to come ,(סוד מבנית קודש) (1QS XI, 7-9) This text brings together the images of the sect as an eternal planting and a holy sanctuary – metaphors used elsewhere for the sect, but here the temple imagery deserves some comment. Elsewhere in the Community Rule, the group is described as a foundation of truth for Israel בית קודש לאהרון ) the holy house of Aaron uniting as a Holy of Holies 245,(מוסד אמת לישראל)

In Florilegium, the group is 246.(בית יחד לישראל) and the synagogue of Israel (להיחד קודש קודשים

used מבנית Yet only here in 1QS XI, 8 is the term 247.(מקדש אדם) called a sanctuary of humans

244 See, for instance, CD VIII, 1-10, which discusses the judgment/punishment for defectors, and CD II, 5-7, which promises destruction for all who rebel. Similarly, 1QS II, 25—III, 9 guarantees judgment for the one who refuses to enter the covenant/sect.

245 1QS V, 5.

246 1QS IX, 6.

for him. The term (לבנות) 4Q 174, frgs. 1—2i, 21:6. Here, God commands that a sanctuary of humans be built 247 .(to build) בנה 1QS XI, 8) is a derivation of the verb) מבנית

81 as a reference to the corporate structure of the sect.248 Elsewhere (such as in 1QH V, 21; IX, 22, מבנית refers to the human body. The description of the sect in 1QS IX as a מבנית ,(and XV, 4, 9 brings together the images of the sect as a united, corporate structure with the idea that each individual component remains itself an independent structure. The individual, though incorporated into the corporate structure of the sect, never loses his individual nature and this individuality plays a role in worship, determining rank, and in eschatological judgment.

The Place of Individual Worship Worship, for the sectarians, consists of both corporate and individual activities. Since many have already undertaken the work of discussing the sect’s various forms of corporate worship,249 I focus here on individual worship activities.250 Just as the sect helps facilitate the individual’s holiness and connection to the eternal, the individual plays a role in maintaining the group’s identification as an eternal edifice and its connection to the divine-eternal realm. The

in the (מבנה/מבנית) ”Judith Newman points out that there are only eight other occurrences of the term “structure 248 sectarian manuscripts, the majority of which appear in the Hodayot. Regarding the different uses of the term, Newman concludes that “the holy and eternal Body of the Yahad is composed of individual bodies that by themselves are made of much more profane and earthy ‘stuff.’” Newman, “Accessing Eternity,” 10.

249 Those who have written about communal forms of worship in the sectarian texts include: Esther G. Chazon, “Liturgical Function in the Cave 1 Hodayot Collection,” 135-149; Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry; Richard S. Sarason, “Communal Prayer at Qumran and Among the Rabbis: Certainties and Uncertainties,” in Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19-23 January, 2000 (ed. E. Chazon; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2003), 151-72. Eileen M. Schuller, “Some Reflections on the Function and Use of Poetical Texts Among the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19-23 January, 2000 (ed. E. Chazon; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2003), 173- 189; Svend Holm-Nielsen, “For What Purpose were the Hodayot Written?” in Hodayot: Psalms from Qumran (Aarhus: Universitetsforlaget, 1960), 348. Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy in the Religion of the Qumran Community. In another article, Esther Chazon notes the communal and individual uses of some of the Hodayot and other hymns: “The Function of the Qumran Prayer Texts: An Analysis of the Daily Prayers (4Q503),” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years After their Discovery. Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20-25, 1997 (ed. L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov, and J. C. VanderKam; exec. Ed. G. Marquis; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society in cooperation with the Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, 2000).

250 To my knowledge, only a few have drawn attention to the place of individual worship within the sect, and usually as part of a related discussion. For instance, see George J. Brooke, “Reading, Searching, and Blessing: A in The Temple in Text and Tradition: a Festschrift in ”,יחד Functional Approach to Scriptural Interpretation in the Honour of Robert Hayward (London; New York: T&T Clark, 2016), 140-56; Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 191-196, 287-300. Lawrence Schiffman, Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls (Philadelphia; Jerusalem: Jewish Publication Society, 1994), 301. Bilhah Nitzan distinguishes between hymns that were composed for communal use and those that represent expressions of individual members, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry (STDJ 12; Leiden: Brill, 1994), 323.

82 individual’s enactment of certain practices serves as a means of affirming his own status while also preserving the group’s identity and integrity as belonging to the eternal.251 This particular role of the individual is apparent in the worship instructions stipulated in 1QS VI, 6-8:

must always be (איש) In any place where is gathered the ten-man quorum, someone day and night, continually, each one taking his ,(דורש בתורה) engaged in study of the Law turn. The general membership will be diligent together for the first third of every night of (לדרוש משפט) interpreting Scripture ,(לקרוא בספר) the year, reading aloud from the Book (1QS VI, 6-8) .(לברך ביחד) and praying together

According to this text, an unbroken chain of individuals engaged in the study of the law is required for groups consisting of at least ten men. In addition to this continual chain of study, the nocturnal meeting described in the second half of this passage includes at least three different worship activities that are here part of a communal gathering, yet belong to individual practice as well.252 While it is likely that some form of these practices existed in other strands of Judaism of the period, the sectarians’ enactment of them was highly regimented, occurring at regular intervals each night, and included an unbroken chain of individuals studying Torah, perhaps in was (דורש) order to maintain a constant connection to the divine-eternal. Study or interpretation apparently both an individual and a group activity, depending on when and how it was carried likewise, may have been undertaken ,(ברך) and praying/blessing (קרא) out.253 Reading

251 Although any reconstruction of the group’s specific worship practices must remain tentative at best, it is possible to discern in the group’s literature some indications of how certain texts may have been used by the sectarians.

252 These lines have often been discussed within the context of sectarian worship practices. See, for instance, James VanderKam, who believes that it was not the practices themselves that distinguished the sectarians from other Jewish groups of the same period, but rather their belief that they had the only correct interpretation of Scripture. James C. VanderKam, “To What End? Functions of Scriptural Interpretation in Qumran Texts,” in Studies in the Hebrew Bible, Qumran, and the Septuagint Presented to Eugene Ulrich (ed. P. W. Flint, E. Tov, and J. C. VanderKam; VTSup 101; Leiden: Brill, 2006), 305.

may refer to different collections of texts. For more on the possible meanings of משפט and תורה The terms 253 Torah and Scripture in this period, see Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 23-36; Jon Levenson, “The Sources of Torah: Psalm 119 and the Modes of Revelation in Second Temple Judaism,” in Ancient Israelite Religion: Essays in Honor of Frank Moore Cross (ed. P. D. Miller, P. D. Hanson, and S. D. McBride; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1987), 559-74; John J. Collins, “The Transformation of the Torah in Second Temple Judaism,” JSJ 43 (2012): 455- 74; Hindy Najman, Seconding Sinai: The Development of Mosaic Discourse in Second Temple Judaism (JSJSup 77; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003).

83 individually as well as in group contexts.254 Although the degree to which these activities were undertaken individually and communally is not entirely clear, there is some physical evidence indicating the practices of reading and blessing, not just study, were also carried out by individuals and did not always occur strictly in group settings.

A very small manuscript, 4QHc, which preserves some of the Hodayot known from 1QHa, was found among the manuscript cache discovered in Qumran Cave 4. The size of this manuscript, in contrast to the large, elaborate 1QHa scroll, suggests that the small edition was composed for personal use. 4QHc contains only twelve lines per column and, owing to its small height, could not have contained the entire text known from 1QHa. The preserved portion overlaps with 1QHa XIII—XIV. Eileen Schuller and Carol Newsom suggest this copy may have been intended for individual use and probably only included the Teacher Hymns.255 These hymns, composed in the first person singular voice, were likely meant to be representative of the sectarian who recited/performed the text.256 The circumstance that each of the hymns in the Hodayot collection are composed in the first person singular lends further support to the hypothesis that they were composed with the individual in mind – to guide his thought, worship, and prayer/blessing.257 So while it is likely that one or more of the Hodayot were used in the

254 Following the work of André Lemaire on the sectarian educational context, George Brooke suggests that education in the sectarian movement likely involved more reading and writing than was common in local schools, where education was primarily conducted orally. Additionally, Brooke proposes that the act of reading in the sect was not passive, but “seems to involve comprehension and some kind of active engagement with the text as it was performed,” and this active performance helped ensure that the reading/interpretation was in line with the group’s teachings. Brooke, “Reading, Searching, and Blessing,” 145.

255 Eileen M. Schuller and Carol A. Newsom, The Hodayot (Thanksgiving Psalms): A Study Edition of 1QHa (Early Judaism and its Literature 36; Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012), 4.

256 Regarding the use of the Hodayot, Carol Newsom argues that the recitation of the Hodayot constitutes a speech act that “strategically obscures who the speaking subject is” and serves as a powerful “instrument in the formation of subjectivity.” By speaking/praying the Hodayot, the individual becomes more deeply immersed in the beliefs of group, adopting them as his own. In regard to the hymns generally associated with the Teacher or a leader figure (often called the Teacher Hymns), Newsom proposes these hymns represent the leader’s role and responsibilities. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 201, 287-300.

257 Carol Newsom suggests the Teacher Hymns were circulated within the group as a means of helping new initiates conform to the thought patterns of the group. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 191-346. George Brooke further indicates that the Hodayot serve an exegetical purpose in the group as they regularly endorse particular, “right” interpretations of authoritative texts, thus guiding the initiate in his knowledge and understanding of the ways of the sect. George Brooke, “Reading, Searching, Blessing,” 153.

84 time of corporate blessing described in 1QS VI, 6-8,258 it appears that at least some of the Hodayot were used for individual reading, study, and/or blessing as well.

Another indication of individual worship practice occurs in the hymn at the end of the Community Rule. The hymn is prefaced with an injunction for the sectarian to praise God at 1QS X, 1). These times are connected to the day/night ;קצים אשר חקקא) certain ordained times cycle and so occur twice daily, and at other times are related to the cycle of the moon or times of need. While such times of worship may indeed occur within a communal setting, what follows in this text is a hymn of blessing offered in the first person singular voice.259 Particularly notable 1QS X, 13, 14, 16) God at all ;ברך) in this hymn is the speaker’s declaration that he will bless times.

At break of day and darkling sky shall I enter the covenant of God, and when they depart I shall recite His laws; then shall I prescribe my bounds, never to turn back. By His law shall I convict myself, my wickedness the measure, my sin before my eyes, as a statute engraved. To God shall I say “O, my Righteousness,” to the Most High “O, Seat of my good, source of knowledge and Fount of holiness, height of glory, Almighty, eternal Splendour.” What He teaches me, that shall I choose, as He judges me, so shall I delight. when I spread my ;(אברך) When I first begin campaign or journey, His name shall I bless with the offering, the issue of (אברכנו) bed, then shall I rejoice in Him. I will bless Him my lips when in ranked array; before I lift hand to mouth to savour the delightful bounty of the earth; when fear or terror break out, in habitation of dire straights or desolation, .(1QS X, 10-16) ”(אברכנו) Him shall I praise

This hymn speaks to times of blessing that may occur in both communal and private settings.260 Surely some instances of blessing likely took place at times when the sectarians gathered together. “When in ranked array” may refer to the covenant ceremony and other group meeting times in which the sectarians are instructed to organize themselves by rank.261 The injunction to

258 George Brooke makes this observation in “Reading, Searching, Blessing,” 153.

259 This hymn is often called the Hymn of the Maskil since it appears in the first-person voice of this figure. However, as Carol Newsom observes, this hymn should not be interpreted as the personalized expression of an individual as “it is utterly formulaic in its sentiments and expression.” Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 166.

260 Cf. 1QS VII, 1, which indicates that anyone who speaks the divine name at any time and for any reason, even while reading a book or blessing, should be expelled.

261 Cf. 1QS I—II, VIII, 4-10; XI, 8-9.

85 bless before meals might also indicate a communal setting as archaeological evidence from Qumran indicates that at least one segment of the sect regularly dined communally.262 However, other times mentioned – at the break of dawn and at night, at the beginning of a journey, when terror breaks out or disaster strikes – are perhaps more ambiguous. Such times of blessing may occur within a group setting, but may also conceivably take place when the sectarian is on a journey or otherwise away from the group.

The totalizing image of blessing here indicates that the individual, even outside of the group context, should carry on this manner of blessing at all times. Although the inclusion of a first-person hymn at the end of the Community Rule may, on one hand, serve as a useful conclusion to the document and aid in the formation of the sectarian self,263 the hymn also lends itself to recitation by the individual in private or group settings and encourages the formation of the individual self, not just the self as part of a communal identity. The times for praise (1QS X, 1-8, 13-17) appear at the beginning of the hymn, underscoring the necessity of worship at all times. What follows in 1QS X, 18-19 is an anticipation of eschatological judgment.

To no man shall I return evil for evil, I shall pursue a man only for good; for with God כיא את ) resides the judgment of all the living, and He shall pay each man his recompense .(1QS X, 18-19) .(אל משפט כול חי והואה ישלם לאיש גמולו

The judgment described here is distributed individually and may indicate that the sectarians believed an individual’s good standing in the group and before God was dependent upon the degree to which the individual successfully carried out sectarian ritual activities, such as regular blessing. This practice of individual worship helped maintain the juridical status of both the sect and the individual. Through an unbroken chain of study (1QS, VI, 6-7), individuals engaged in the rotation helped ensure that this point of connection between the sect and the divine was continuously maintained, and through regular blessing at the prescribed intervals, the individual might ensure that his own future in the eternal realm was secure. The degree to which the individual successfully carried out his duties further influenced his rank within the group and perhaps also his future place within the eternal structure.

262 Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls, 113-126.

263 Newsom suggests the hymn was used in the shaping of the sectarian, helping him conform to the teachings of the sect, and functions as a representation of “the ideal sectarian self.” Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 167.

Joining the Ranks of Angels An individual’s rank within the sect was a highly individualized matter, which determined his degree of authority and status within the group. Those in leadership positions decided who might be admitted to the group and ranked individuals according to their knowledge and merit. This hierarchical structure reflects the sect’s aims to maintain order and purity within its ranks and to tightly govern advancement and demotion or expulsion. Beyond this present-focused aspect of an individual’s rank, rank within the sect may also be significant for the sectarian’s anticipated future place within the eternal realm. While this last point is more implicit than explicit in the texts, and perhaps even speculative, it will be discussed briefly at the end of this section.

Both the Damascus Document and the Community Rule grant a considerable amount of attention to matters of initiation, expulsion, and rank determination. Discussions of rank often appear within the context of initiation rites or reasons for expulsion, perhaps because initiation into the group marks an individual’s entry into the rank system and expulsion serves as the ultimate expression of demotion for those offenses considered unpardonable.264 In the Community Rule, rank is reassessed yearly and established in the Covenant Renewal Ceremony (1QS I—II). The ceremony described here is highly formulaic and includes the invocation of blessings and curses to create a boundary between those inside the covenant from those outside.265 Once initiation is confirmed, rank is established according to the quality of each member’s spirit.

They shall do as follows annually, all the days of Belial’s dominion: the priests shall pass בסרך לפי ) in review first, ranked according to their spiritual excellence, one after another

264 For instance, CD XX, 1-13 demands expulsion for the individual who enters the covenant and then consistently fails to uphold the group’s standards, while CD VI, 11—VII, 4 consists of a list of punishable offenses that do not necessarily result in expulsion. The penal code in 1QS (VI, 24—VII, 26) consists of individual offenses and their punishments. While most of the offenses listed here are pardonable, some require expulsion. For instance, the individual who gossips about the general membership or murmurs against the secret teachings of the group should be banished and never allowed to return (1QS VII, 16-17). Also, any individual who willfully leaves the group after ten years of membership remains permanently expelled as does any member who shares food or finance with him following the expulsion (1QS VII, 22-25). Aharon Shemesh discusses matters of expulsion in more detail in “Expulsion and Exclusion in the Community Rule and the Damascus Document,” DSD 9/1 (2002): 44-74.

265 Russell Arnold discusses the ways in which blessings and curses and other rituals establish boundaries between the members of the group and those outside the group. Russell D. Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy, 52-81.

Then the Levites shall follow, and third all the people by rank, one 266.(רוחותם זה אחד זה after another, in their thousands and hundreds and fifties and tens. Thus shall each Israelite know his proper standing in the Yaḥad of God, an eternal society. (1QS II, 19- 23) The hierarchical structure is detailed to the extent that even within the different classes (priests, Levites, lay members) members are organized by spiritual merit. The Damascus Document includes similar guidelines for determining rank and explicitly attributes this task to the Overseer 267.(מבקר)

He shall observe everyone who is added to his group as to his actions, his intelligence, his ability, his strength, and his wealth and write him down by his place according to his share in the allotment of Light.

וכל הנוסף לעדתו יפקדהו למעשיו ושוכלו וכוחו וגבורתו והונו וכתבוהו במקומו כפי נחלתו בגורל האור

(CD XIII, 11-12)

perhaps including a view toward ,(גורל) According to the Damascus Document, one’s rank or lot the individual’s future inheritance with the angels, is dependent upon the physical, mental, and material qualities he exhibits. Even one of the Hodayah shows a concern for an individual’s position within the community.

And thus I was brought into association (or in the Yaḥad) with all the men of my council. and in ,(לפי שכלו אגישנו) In accordance with a man’s insight I will advance him .(וכרוב נחלתו אהבנו) accordance with the abundance of his inheritance I will love him (1QHa VI, 18-19)268 In each of these texts, an individual’s rank within the sect is determined by the qualities he exhibits, whether physical (CD, 1QHa), spiritual (1QS), or material (CD, 1QHa). Rank was significant within the group context because it determined an individual’s status in the sect – in

266 A more literal rendering of the Hebrew here is “according to their spirits, one after another.”

267 CD XIII, 7.

268 This Hodayah belongs to a collection of hymns found at the beginning of the scroll, sometimes classified as Community Hymns (cols. I—VIII). Schuller and Newsom, The Hodayot (Thanksgiving Psalms), 3. In Schuller and Newsom’s recent reconstruction of 1QHa, the passage above occurs at VI, 29-30. The classification of this hymn as a Community Hymn is significant because it indicates that a number of scholars believe this hymn reflects the voice of community members and not necessarily a leader/Teacher figure. If this classification accurately reflects the authorial voice, then community members also apparently played a part in determining the ranks of other members.

88 what order he might enter during a ceremony, where he might sit at a banquet, and when he could speak during a meeting. Such status indicated an individual’s power and authority within the sect.269 Although the sect is often depicted as a unified whole in the metaphorical expressions of the group (e.g. the eternal planting, the human sanctuary) and in the self- designation “Yaḥad” which appears in a number of texts,270 the hierarchical ordering of individual members indicates that the sectarian’s identity remained distinct. While the preservation of individuality served a purpose in negotiating power relations within the group, might it also have played a role in the sectarian’s anticipation of his future place within the eternal realm?

Many of the titles applied to angels in the sectarian literature are also used of the humans who belong to the sect and vice versa. The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, a liturgical text expressing praise for the heavenly priesthood, contains the greatest collocation of angelic terms ”and “chief ,(נשיא) ”prince“ ,(קדוש) ”in any single sectarian text.271 Terms such as “holy one

which describe the various ranks and functions of angels in the Songs, elsewhere describe ,(ראש) the members of the sect. Although my conclusions here remain tentative, what I hope to demonstrate is that this shared vocabulary may indicate a sense of commonality among the ranks of human and divine beings that has implications for the sectarian’s future role in the eternal structure.

In the sectarian texts, the title “holy one(s)” is regularly applied to God, angels, and humans. In the Songs, it typically refers to angelic beings,272 while in the Damascus Document, the Rule of the Congregation and the War Scroll it more frequently refers to the sectarians who

269 Catherine Bell and Talal Asad have developed theories detailing the ways in which rituals function as a means of negotiating power relationships within a group. Catherine Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice, 197-223. Talal Asad, Genealogies of Religion: Discipline and Reasons of Power in Christianity and Islam (Baltimore, Md.: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993). Also see Maurice E. F. Bloch, Ritual, History and Power: Selected Papers in Anthropology (London: Anthlone Press, 1989) and Roy A. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion in the Making of Humanity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999).

270 Yaḥad appears as a designation for the group in 1QS, the Hodayot, and the Pesharim.

271 Carol Newsom discusses these terms in detail in Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition (Harvard Semitic Studies 27; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1985).

272 4Q400 1 i, 2, 3, 15, 17, 19; 4Q400 1 ii, 6; 4Q403 1 i, 24, 31. Cf. 1QS XI, 8; 1QSb 1, 5.

89 have separated themselves from the age of wickedness.273 In some texts, “holy ones” indicates both human and divine beings.274 Though the term “holy ones” does not generally imply a specific rank, it does indicate status, and in the Rule of the Congregation a certain ranking or ordering of holy ones may be discerned. Here the speaker describes the elevation of an individual to the head of the holy ones.

and (ברוש קדושים) For he chose you . . . and to place (you) at the head of the Holy Ones with you to bless . . . by your hand the men of God’s council, rather than by the hand of the prince of . . . one another. May you (abide forever) as an Angel of the Presence (in the holy habitation, to the glory of the God of hosts. (1QSb IV, 22-25 (כמלאך פנים)

Holy Ones in this passage likely refers to the angelic host. In this blessing, the individual who is elevated is likened to an Angel of the Presence, or one of the beings who ministers in the divine throne room. Human and divine roles are blended, perhaps indicating an expectation that earthly roles may be somewhat transferrable in the eternal realm – that the individual who achieves elevation within the group may receive a preferred role in the eternal structure as well.

A number of terms typically used of humans are applied to angels in the Songs. In the commonly indicates an individual affiliated (כהן) ”Hebrew Bible as well as in the scrolls, “priest

focuses exclusively כהן with a temple or local religious shrine.275 By contrast, the Songs’ use of on the angelic priesthood and its worship in the heavenly temple.276 The content of the praise is not disclosed. Rather, the actions and roles of the angelic priests are the primary concern. Some have argued that this focus on the beings offering praise rather than on the content of the praise keeps the focus on the angelic worshipers.277 Disclosure of the content would turn the attention

273 CD VII, 4-5; XX, 2-8, 24-25; 1QM III, 5; VI, 6. 1QSb IV, 22-26.

274 1QM X, 10-12; ; XII, 12; 1QSb, 22-26.

275 CD IV, 2; IX, 13, 15; XIII, 2, 5; XIV, 3-6; 1QpHab II, 8; VIII, 8, 16; IX, 4, 9; 1QS I, 18, 21; II, 19; V, 2; VI, 4- 5, 8; 1QM VIII, 10-15 (and throughout the War Scroll).

276 Contra Carol Newsom and others, Joseph Angel proposes that the priesthood depicted in the Songs is not an angelic priesthood, but the “human angelmorphic priesthood at Qumran.” Joseph Angel, Otherworldly and Eschatological Priesthood in the Dead Sea Scrolls (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010), 98.

277 Carol Newsom argues, “To describe the content of the angelic praise or to quote the words of the angelic psalms would direct attention more specifically to the God who is praised. Describing the angels in the act of praise but not describing the content of praise leaves the attention on the angels themselves, and it is clearly the priestly angels

90 to God and away from the angelic priests. Why would the author of the Songs deliberately keep the focus on these angelic beings rather than on the divine being who is the object of their praise? In this text, the angels may serve as exemplars for the sectarian worshipers who themselves aspire to such roles in the divine economy.

This shared vocabulary, applying to both human and angelic figures in the scrolls, may indicate a deliberate mirroring of roles. By achieving a certain rank or position within the sect, the individual might also establish a position for himself within the eternal structure. Sectarian (משרת) or minister ,(נשיא) prince ,(ראש) worshipers who hold or aspire to the ranks of chief within the sect have in the Songs liturgy examples of angelic beings in comparable roles.278 In the Songs, the angels are ordered hierarchically and distinguished by rank. Though the terms most often appear in ,נשיא and ראש which distinguish the angelic organization, particularly military contexts and apply to human leadership, here they distinguish various ranks of angels within the heavenly priesthood. This hierarchical structuring mirrors the ranks of individuals within the sect and may indicate a kind of transferrable status between earthly and eternal realms for those individuals who achieve incorporation into the eternal.

Certain characteristics as well describe both human and angelic figures in the scrolls. The sectarian authors frequently refer to their own group as “those who know” or those who Angels also possess this divinely conferred knowledge and 279.(דעת) possess special knowledge understanding.280 Both the sectarians and angels likewise possess the quality of lastingness or who fascinate the author of this work.” Carol Newsom, “He has Established for Himself Priests: Human and Angelic Priesthood in the Qumran Sabbath Shirot,” in Archaeology and History in the Dead Sea Scrolls: The New York University Conference in Memory of Yigael Yadin (JSTOR/ASOR Monograph Series, no. 2; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1990), 108. See also Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy, 140-142 and Bilhah Nitzan, “Poetical and Liturgical Writings from Qumran,” JQR 85, no. 1-2 (July—October, 1994), 176-177.

278 Newsom indicates that “the language of council and assembly, used elsewhere in QL both for the heavenly and earthly communities (e.g., 1QS v, 20; 1QH iii, 22) occurs frequently in the Shirot with reference to the angels.” Newsom, Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition, 29. See, for instance, 4Q400 I, i, 4; I ii, 9; 4Q403 I i, 11, 19, 22, 34; ii, 9, 29, 24; 4Q405 XXIII i, 3; cf. 1QHa III, 21; IV, 24; 1QS II, 25; VIII, 5; 1QM I, 10.

279 CD I, 1; XII, 20; XX, 5; 1QpHab XI, 1; 1QS I, 11-12; IV, 4, 22, 25-26; IX, 17-18; XI, 6, 15-18; 1QSa I, 28; 1QM XIII, 3; XVII, 8; 1QHa V, 24-26; VI, 12, 25; VII, 12; IX, 21, 31; X, 18; XV, 27; XVIII, 27-29; XIX, 9, 14, 28; XX, 13.

280 1QS III, 11 specifies that knowledge originates with God. This idea may also be found in 1QHa IX, 8, 26; XIX, 7-8. Knowledge is a defining quality of angels in 4Q400 2, 1; 4Q403 1 i, 31, 36; 1 ii, 35; 4Q405 17, 3; 23 i, 3, 8;

For the sectarians, these qualities are conferred through incorporation into 281.(עולמים) eternality the sect and certain ranks are achieved through merit-based promotions.282 By entering into the sect, initiates become grafted into a structure that is already eternal in nature, gain access to special knowledge necessary for membership and advancement, and achieve ranks that help secure their future incorporation into the eternal structure and may even determine their role within it.

Although any reflection on the sect or human priesthood is largely absent in the Songs, one portion of preserved text provides a brief mention of the group behind the scroll.283 Here the author sets up an analogy between the sectarian community and the angelic priests.

How shall we be considered [among] them? And how shall our priesthood (be considered) in their dwellings? And [our] holiness their holiness? [What] is the offering of our tongues of dust (compared) with the knowledge of the gods? (4Q400 2, 6-7) The comparison centers on the qualities of the two priesthoods, with the questions serving a rhetorical function indicating the superiority of the angelic priesthood. Yet although the author draws a contrast in the qualities of the two priesthoods, there is an implicit comparison in the assumption that the two priesthoods are similar enough in structure that they can be compared. The common language used to describe human and angelic ranks in the scrolls indicates that the authors considered their own organization a reflection of the divine order to the extent that it might function as a gateway to participation in the eternal realm.284 Membership in the sect

11QShirShabb II, frg. 3, 5; IV, frgs. 12-15, 5; 1QHa XI, 23. John Collins notes that in the Songs knowledge is a feature shared by God and the angels and that heaven also is a place of knowledge. The significance of knowledge for members of the sect is reflected in the idea that “life in the yahad was structured to enable and facilitate participation in the heavenly cult.” John J. Collins, Scripture and Sectarianism: Essays on the Dead Sea Scrolls (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 203.

is another shared feature of angels and sectarians in the scrolls. Carol Newsom writes that the (ברך) Blessing 281 primary task of angels in the Songs is to praise God. Newsom, Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice: A Critical Edition, 29.

282 The texts do not mention how the angels come into their positions, but it may be that their various ranks, like their eternal nature and knowledge, are innate qualities.

283 In chapter 5, I discuss a passage in the Songs that may provide another, albeit implicit, reference to the group behind the liturgy. The eruption of praise that occurs in Song 7 includes the praise of the heavenly temple itself, which may include the praise of the group that identified as a human sanctuary.

284 Joseph Angel contends that the image of the heavenly temple in the Songs is a projection of the “real” earthly temple. Angel, Eschatological Priesthood, 97-98. The Jerusalem temple itself is portrayed in the HB as a

92 provides some degree of assurance that the initiate may be counted in the lot of the eternal. However, the detailed, hierarchical rankings of both humans and angels in the sectarian literature suggest that an individual’s rank was nearly as important as his incorporation into the sect since it determined his status within the group and perhaps his future role in the eternal realm as well.

CONCLUSION For the authors of the sectarian literature, membership in the sect provided a communal connection to the eternal that had implications for the individual’s present and future. Entry into the sect ushered the initiate into a liminal time-space which, on the one hand, functioned as a type of safe space separate from the age of wickedness, yet on the other hand, could not fully protect the sectarian from the threats associated with living in a liminal state. While incorporation into the sect grafted the initiate into a structure already possessing an eternal nature, the individual’s future was not entirely settled on the basis of membership in the group. The sect provided the space and knowledge necessary for the individual’s incorporation into the eternal structure at the end of the age, but ultimately the fate of the individual rested on his own merit.

Priestly activity was one of the ways in which members of the sect navigated the treacherous, liminal state. Operating as a type of substitute temple, a sanctuary of humans, members might atone for sin, individuals and the land. Such atonement was necessary to maintain their righteous status before God and to prepare the land for the period following the eschatological judgment when all wickedness would be destroyed and the eternal planting would spread over the earth. The knowledge and atonement gained through membership in the sect allowed individuals to join in worship with angels in the present and secure a future lot within them in the eternal structure.

Life within the sect, like the depiction of the angelic priesthood in the Songs, was hierarchically ordered. Individual members were ranked according to knowledge and merit. microcosm of creation – of heaven and earth. This image is discussed in detail by Jon Levenson, who also draws upon other ANE portrayals of human temples as microcosms of the ideal world. John D. Levenson, Creation and the Persistence of Evil: The Jewish Drama of Divine Omnipotence (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1988), 78-99. Also see Jonathan Klawans, Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple (Oxford; New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 111-144. Klawans points out that it is important to distinguish between those texts that describe the temple as representing the world and those “that describe a temple in heaven to which the Jerusalem temple constitutes an earthly analogue” (p. 111). The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice belongs to the latter category of texts.

While there was opportunity for advancement, apparently this only occurred annually and fixed an individual’s status for the coming year; however, exclusion or expulsion from the group could take place at any time for certain egregious offenses. Maintaining one’s status in the group was necessary to facilitate the sectarian’s communion with angels in the present and provide assurance of his future inheritance with their lot, while rank determined his authority and influence within the group and perhaps also his future position in the eternal realm.

The present, for the sectarian, was a treacherous time-space in which one’s personal fate hung in the balance. Membership in the sect and careful adherence to its regulations were the only means through which the individual might successfully navigate the dangers of the liminal state and achieve successful incorporation into the eternal structure at the end of the age. This membership though, far from passive, involved regular, ritual activity. Participation in the sect included commitment to a lifestyle replete with ritual activity carried out at prescribed times. Through the proper performance of certain rituals, the sectarians believed they might attain present access to the divine and even hasten the arrival of the final eschatological events. The sect provided the appropriate space in which such rituals might be enacted.

Chapter 5

Rituals of Incorporation:

Achieving Communion with the Divine and Incorporation into the Eternal Realm

INTRODUCTION For scholars engaged in the study of ancient texts, references to ritual behavior offer exciting avenues for research into the life of a group. Yet at the same time, they pose some daunting challenges. Often scholars lack the contextual knowledge necessary to grasp what certain references signify.285 Since the ancient performers of these rituals are no longer accessible, scholars are left with only archaeological and textual remains for any attempt to reconstruct the rituals themselves and discern their various functions within a group.286 Given this lack, spatial theory provides a useful lens for the study of rituals in ancient texts as it seeks to uncover the ideological motivations behind diverse representations of the world.

A closer look at the rituals described in the Qumran sectarian literature reveals that constructions of time and space play a significant role in the expected efficacy of certain ritual performances. By constructing their own time as the last days and adopting a lifestyle that positioned group members in a space apart from the wicked age, the sectarians created a world in which they alone were perfectly poised for present communion with the divine. This present communion further provided some degree of assurance of the sectarian’s anticipated full incorporation into the eternal realm at the turn of the age. Through their constructions of time and space, the authors of the sectarian manuscripts narrow the scope of inclusion (who may commune with the divine) and the site of communion (the time, place, and means through which such union may take place).

285 Kelley Coblentz Bautch makes this observation in her study, “Spatiality and Apocalyptic Literature,” HeBAI 5/3 (2016), 281.

286 Rodney Werline notes this challenge in “Ritual, Order and the Construction of an Audience in 1 Enoch 1—36,” 325. On the methodological challenges in identifying and assessing ancient Jewish liturgical texts, also see George J. Brooke, “Aspects of the Theological Significance of Prayer and Worship in the Qumran Scrolls,” 36.

The sectarians constructed time in such a way that they conceptualized the present, or the time of the group, as the last days of the present age – a liminal period in which the boundaries between heaven and earth were permeable for certain individuals (chapter 3). While the period conceptualized as “the last days” presumably includes all those living during this time (sectarian or non-sectarian), communion with the divine was limited to group members. Only successful initiates who became incorporated into the group benefited from its eternal nature, which enabled them to achieve present communion with the divine and aspire to future incorporation into the eternal realm at the end of the age (chapter 4). Ritual performance provides a further narrowing of the process by indicating the time, place, and manner in which communion with the divine might be achieved.

Texts served a powerful function within the ritual-liturgical life of the sect. While some may have functioned as tools for study and personal reflection, others provided a liturgical framework for the performance of rituals intended to establish future or otherworldly realities. Performative and speech acts were not merely reflective gestures, but powerful acts performed for the purpose of effecting real change in the present. Ritual acts, by nature, are concerned with enacting change; they aim to actuate the other reality so that it becomes part of the lived experience of the ritual participants. In her work on ritual and relationships of power, Catherine Bell argues that ritual action is not merely symbolic, but constitutive: “Ritual is the thing itself. It is power; it acts and it actuates.”287 Through the performance of certain rituals at their ordained times, the sectarians enact the world of the text for the purpose of 1) facilitating communion with the divine in the act of performance, and 2) calling into existence the realities described and inducing anticipated eschatological events.

The goal of this chapter is to demonstrate how rituals implied in the sectarian literature functioned to facilitate present communion with the divine and establish otherworldly realities in the time of the sect. However, before launching into a discussion of the rituals themselves, it is first necessary to briefly consider sectarian conceptions of the cosmos, since these views shape their expectations of how ritual performances function and what they may achieve. In the first

287 Bell, Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice, 195. Emphasis is in the original. Rodney Werline applies Bell’s theory to prayer in the Hebrew Bible. This study is a useful examination of prayer as a ritual that serves as a means of negotiating power relationships and enacting the terms of the utterance. Werline, “Prayer, Politics, and Power in the Hebrew Bible,” Interpretation 68/1 (2014), 5-16.

96 section, I examine sectarian conceptions of the divine, eternal realm and its relation to their own time and place within the earthly sphere. These conceptions undergird the sectarian authors’ portrayals of various rituals enacted by the group. The second section draws on spatial theory to demonstrate how rituals described in texts become part of the real, lived experience of the group and facilitate aspirations, such as present communion with the divine and future incorporation into the eternal structure. In the third section, I return to the aspect of time to show how ritual time differs from other “times” and may even be considered as malleable in relation to the ritual performance and what it aims to accomplish. The rituals described in the sectarian literature were both present and future-oriented. In addition to facilitating present communion with the divine and securing future incorporation into the divine-eternal structure, some ritual enactments may have been performed with the intent of “speeding up” time and hastening the arrival of the otherworldly reality the sectarians sought to join.

SECTARIAN CONCEPTIONS OF THE ETERNAL

regularly appears in the sectarian texts in descriptions of the sect and (עולם) ”The term “eternal those things related to God and the divine realm. Although heaven and earth do sometimes appear as a binary construction describing separate spatial spheres, it is the eternal that more frequently appears in the scrolls in contrast with those things that are earthly and fleeting. Since vary somewhat among texts and the term is interpreted differently among עולם the meanings of various modern readers, it is necessary to clarify how the sectarian authors employed this term and how it relates to their particular views of the cosmos.

Sectarian Notions of the Eternal Realm in Relation to the Earthly Sphere

appears in high concentration in some of the sectarian manuscripts.288 While it עולם The term most frequently indicates qualities of perpetuity or permanence, it also sometimes includes a spatial sense.289 Used in this way, it describes the realm of God. Whereas heaven and earth

is especially prevalent in the Hodayot, the Community Rule and the War עולם ,Among the major sectarian texts 288 Scroll.

in עולם In his study on terms for time in the Hebrew Bible and Dead Sea Scrolls, Gershon Brin concludes that 289 the scrolls is used in four senses: 1) in the sense eternity, 2) as a superlative, 3) in relation to God (indicating both eternity and greatness), and 4) as a place. Brin, The Concept of Time, 284-290.

97 appear in the scrolls in binary constructions, carrying over from their use in texts like does not have a single binary referent. It often includes the עולם Deuteronomy and the Psalms,290 heavenly, but is employed more broadly in the sectarian literature to indicate the enduring, עולם changeless nature of God as well as those people and spaces belonging to him. Though does often stand in contrast to things that are earth-like, such as dust and clay, it is not spatially is often refers to God and עולם ,limited to those things existing in the heavens. In the Hodayot his realm, yet its reach extends to certain holy and righteous individuals on earth as well.

on (ונהיות עולם) You have [gi]ven [ ] to ears of dust, and You have engraved eternity [ ] the heart [of stone ] You have ceased [ ] so as to bring him into a covenant with Yourself and to establish [him before the judgment of the watchers (?)] in the eternal ,1QHa XXI) .(עד נצח) as a light of the perfect light forever and ever ,(במכון עולם) abode 12-14)291 The eternal realm coexists with the earthly present in sectarian thought and its qualities – lastingness and changelessness, which imply immortality – can be experienced on earth by certain humans. Although the sectarian lives in the earthly present, his experience is not limited to the earthly because 1) he lives in the last days, a liminal time-space, and 2) he belongs to the sect, which corporately functions as an eternal entity. So, while the eternal includes heavenly spaces and indicates the realm of God and his entourage, its impact and presence is understood as already infiltrating the earthly sphere through the existence of the sect and the actions of its members. Through this expanded sense of the eternal in sectarian literature, the boundaries between heaven and earth appear more permeable for the sectarians who are already becoming eternal (see chapter 4) and so have some degree of access to the heavenly world even while they dwell on earth. The coexistence of heavenly and earthly spheres is not an innovation of the sect. However, expanded notions of the eternal that allowed for some degree of permeability or overlap between heavenly and earthly spheres in the last days are a mark of these sectarian authors.

290 Cf. Deut 4:26; 10:14; 30:19; 31;28; Pss 50:4; 57:5; 96:11; 115:16; Ecc 5:2.

291 Cf. 4Q418 69 ii, 13, a text in which the heavens are associated with eternal life. Also 1QHa XXII, 1, which במעון ) explicitly identifies heaven as the dwelling place of the holy: [ in the ho]ly [habitation] which is in heaven .In the sectarian texts, “the holy” is a regular designation of the sectarians as well as of angels .(קודש אשר בשמים

LITURGY AS THE SPACE THROUGH WHICH THE SECTARIAN ACCESSES THE DIVINE The present was a liminal state in which the sectarians believed communion with the divine was both possible and necessary in order to attain full incorporation into the eternal realm at the time of eschatological judgment. Eschatology played a significant role in sectarian constructions of the present, shaping future expectations as well as facilitating the present experience of eternal realities. The heavenly or eternal was not merely something “out there” in a future time and place, but a present reality that already impinged upon the sectarian’s daily experience through the performance of certain ritual, liturgical acts. Rituals and liturgical orders provided the means through which the sectarian worshiper might access otherworldly realities in the present, achieving a level of communion with the divine that offered some degree of hope or guarantee in his future, permanent incorporation into the eternal realm.

The Space of Lived Experience As Henri Lefebvre observed decades ago, social space is constructed or produced. Lefebvre, building on Hegelian and Marxist concepts of production, describes social space as a construct that “subsumes things produced, and encompasses their interrelationships in their coexistence and simultaneity.” While social space is “itself the outcome of past actions,” it is also “what permits fresh actions to occur.”292 Social space is the space of rituals and lived experience – the space in which the conceived enters the realm of the lived. It is the context in which ritual action enacts and makes present alternate realities.

By constructing a liminal social space, the sectarian writers make present communion with the divine a reality for group members. The performance of certain ritual acts or liturgical orders in the proper place and time provide the conditions necessary for this divine-human interaction. The sectarian texts are replete with references to the precise times at which certain blessings should be recited and various rituals performed.293 In the enactment of these rituals at

292 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 73.

293 Cf. CD III, 12-15a; 1QS IX, 26b—X, 10; 1QpHab XI, 6-8a; and 1QM II, 4. A number of scholars have written about the Qumran calendar and its significance for the performance of certain worship practice. See, for example, Sacha Stern, “Qumran Calendars: Theory and Practice,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: In Their Historical Context (ed. Timothy Lim; Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 2000); James C. VanderKam, “Calendar Texts and the Origins of the Dead Sea Scroll Community,” in Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects (ed. Michael Wise et al., New York: New York Academy of Sciences, 1994), 371-

99 their proper times, expectations for divine-human interaction in the present might be realized. These rituals were not seen to occur in time so much as the rituals themselves shaped and determined the times.294 Lefebvre observed that, “With the advent of modernity time has vanished from social space. It is recorded solely on measuring-instruments, on clocks, that are as isolated and functionally specialized as this time itself.”295 Such was not the case in the time of the sect. Rather, time was made visible in social space, and for members of the sect, ritual performance provided the means through which a particular view of the world and expectations regarding the present might be made manifest in the lived experience of the group.

There is no neutral space or time in literature; space and time are constructed, interpreted, and created. As Liv Lied so poignantly reflects in her study of 2 Baruch through the lens of spatial theory, “The writing of history is just as much a creative business as is the imagining of future times. Just like the future, the past and the present are constructed, to adhere to the overall imagined goal of history.”296 For the sectarian writers, this construction includes a review of Israel’s history that envisions the present time as the end of the present, wicked age. Within this time-space, present communion between divine and human beings becomes a reality and hope for full incorporation into the eternal realm is activated through the performance of sectarian rituals and liturgical orders.

Ritual enactment “makes present” the world of the text and draws the conceived reality into the world of the lived, experiential reality. In the case of texts such as the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice and the War Scroll, which envision heavenly or future realities, performance of the liturgy aims to draw these otherworldly realities into the real, lived experience of the sect. Through ritual performance, the conceived future or otherworldly reality of the text becomes part

388; and Carol A. Newsom, “‘Sectually Explicit’ Literature from Qumran,” in The Hebrew Bible and its Interpreters (ed. W. H. Propp, B. Halpern, and D. N. Freedman; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1990): 167-187.

294 Granted, certain festivals aligned with particular phases of the lunar cycle and, in the sectarian movement, blessings and worship activities were prescribed for certain times of the day and night. However, even with this prescribed alignment between the rituals and their “times,” it was the festivals and worship activities that gave meaning to the times in which they occurred. Cf. 1QS I; VI, 3-8; X, 13-16; 1QM XIV, 2-5a; 1QpHab XI, 6-8.

295 Lefebvre, The Production of Space, 95.

296 Liv Ingeborg Lied, The Other Lands of Israel: Imaginations of the Land in 2 Baruch (JSJSup 129; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2008), 18.

100 of the lived experience of the group, thus creating a social space that allows for present communion between human and divine beings in ritual time and seeks to make that communion permanent.

Liturgy as a Means of Facilitating Present Communion and Future Incorporation Achieving present communion with the divine was one of the primary aims of sectarian ritual enactments. The ritual practices of the group consisted of shorter activities, performed on a regular basis (even multiple times a day), as well as longer liturgical orders that were likely performed less frequently but covered longer periods of time. Shorter activities include ritual immersions and the recitation of prayers and blessings at particular times. Through the frequent practice of these rituals, the sectarian regularly experiences a sense of time outside of mundane time, which allows for short intervals of communion with the otherworldly.297 Longer liturgical orders, on the other hand, facilitate a sustained experience of extraordinary time and draw the performer more fully into the world of the text. Roy Rappaport observes,

The longer a ritual continues the fuller can be the development of the peculiar characteristics of time out of time . . . with, possibly, more profound alterations of consciousness and deeper and more enduring effects upon the psyches of participants.298 And furthermore,

When a liturgical order is composed of rituals that are both lengthy and frequent, participants are maintained more or less continuously outside of mundane experience, permanently in the case of religious specialists spending their lives in cloistered communities.”299 For members of the sect, who engaged in both short, frequent rituals and longer liturgical orders, this means that ritual performers might remain fairly consistently in an otherworldly state of experience. This sense of otherworldly experience is communicated in the literature in references to the group’s present communion with angels, as well as in depictions of angelic worship in the heavenly realm, an eschatological banquet with messianic figures, and an eschatological battle waged alongside angels. By participating in this liturgy which depicts and

297 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 198-199.

298 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 201.

299 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 209.

101 enacts otherworldly scenarios, the sectarian may experience the eternal realm and commune with divine beings through the social space created in the ritual performance.

Though present communion with the eternal was certainly important for members of the sect, present communion in liturgical time was not the ultimate goal. The ultimate goal was to survive the destruction of the present, wicked age and become part of the eternal structure. Present communion facilitated that purpose by uniting members with the divine in the present age and establishing their fit-ness for habitation with divine beings. Yet, rather than wait passively for the time in which full incorporation into the eternal realm might occur, the sect sought the imminent manifestation of this eschatological hope. Through ritual enactment, members aimed to usher future and otherworldly realities into the present so that they might be made manifest in the life and time of the sect. The texts included in the discussion below were likely used in the liturgical practices of the group as a means of accessing the otherworldly and achieving present communion with the divine.

Worshiping with Angels (The Hodayot) Present communion with the divine is assumed in some of the poetic liturgy preserved at Qumran. The Hodayot regularly blur distinctions between heavenly and earthly spaces, and in a few places depict a joint communion or rejoicing among angelic and human beings. While the poetic form is reminiscent of Hebrew Bible poetic genres, this form is adapted in the Hodayot to express a wide variety of religious thoughts and experiences, including eschatological hope and elevation to the divine realm.300 In his monograph, “In a Common Rejoicing,” Bjӧrn Frennesson

300 The Hodayot are among those texts whose use is disputed. Bilhah Nitzan describes the Hodayot in this way: “The genre of the song of thanksgiving, which in the Bible is primarily utilized to express thanks for salvation from physical distress, here becomes a versatile literary tool for the expression of other religious feelings, such as apocalyptic fears, dependence, or mystical elevation.” Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 28. The number of copies found further implies that these hymns enjoyed a special place in the life of the group and were likely used in both communal and individual worship settings. In their study edition of the Hodayot, Eileen Schuller and Carol Newsom write, “The fact that there are eight copies preserved and that 1QHa was a large and elegantly crafted scroll indicates that these psalms had importance and authority for the community that wrote them and preserved them in caves near the Dead Sea.” Schuller and Newsom, The Hodayot, 1. In The Self as Symbolic Space, Carol Newsom argues that Hodayot were used to shape the self-understanding of members of the sect. According to Newsom, the Hodayot do not reflect everyday discourse, but a type of dialogical speech or prayer. The recitation of the Hodayot facilitates the construction of a certain type of self that functions as the site of divine activity. Newsom, The Self as Symbolic Space, 191-208, 236. Lawrence Schiffman argues against a communal liturgical use of the Hodayot, seeing the hymns rather as “individual plaints, perhaps composed by a leader of the sect.” In any event, he regards these hymns as “not part of a regular order of prayer,” but contends “they belong to a genre of devotional, introspective poetry.” Lawrence H. Schiffman, Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls (Philadelphia and Jerusalem:

102 suggests that in the minds of the sectarians, the boundaries of heaven were extended to include the sect, so that “being a member of that community was tantamount to living in an outpost of the heavenly world, being enabled to perceive and share its beauty and joy, ‘in a common rejoicing’ (1QH XI, 14; cf. 1QH III, 23).”301 Allusions to this common rejoicing, a type of present communion between human and divine beings, do not appear only as future expectations, but also reflect the sectarian writers’ views of present realities.302

Time and space in the Hodayot often appear fluid, leaving the modern reader to try to sort out whether certain references indicate earthly or otherworldly aspects. Some consider this a real confusion of time and space in the thought patterns of the sectarian writers.303 However, as Frennesson so aptly observes, “it can just as well stem from a deep understanding of what in fact typifies liturgy, namely its being able to break through the walls and bounds of time and space,

Jewish Publication Society, 1994), 301. Esther Chazon, Bilhah Nitzan, and George Brooke are also among those scrolls scholars who tend to classify the Hodayot as private prayer texts. Esther G. Chazon, “The Function of the Qumran Prayer Texts: An Analysis of the Daily Prayers (4Q503),” in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Fifty Years After their Discover. Proceedings of the Jerusalem Congress, July 20—25, 1997 (ed. L. H. Schiffman, E. Tov, and J. C. VanderKam; exec. Ed. G. Marquis; Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society in cooperation with the Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, 2000), 218. Bilhah Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 323. Brooke, “Aspects of Theological Significance of Prayer and Worship in the Qumran Scrolls,” 47-48. Years ago, Svend Holm-Nielsen argued the contrary – that the Hodayot were composed for cultic use in the ceremonies of the sect. Svend Holm- Nielsen, Hodayot: Psalms from Qumran (Aarhus: Universitetsforlaget, 1960), 348. While this view has fallen out of favor in more recent years, a general lack of evidence regarding the intended use of the Hodayot leaves scholars at a general impasse. Arguments favoring the cultic/communal use of the Hodayot or relegating the hymns to the space of private prayer depend largely on inference. Based on the content and structure of some of the hymns, and the size and elegance of the 1QH scroll, I am inclined to think that the group used at least some of the Thanksgiving Hymns in communal worship gatherings. Yet, as important as the question of setting may be in general discussions of the use of the Hodayot, for our purposes here it is somewhat tangential to the point. In the Hodayot, the speaker is active and through performance of the liturgy (prayer) aims to generate present communion with the divine, whether the prayer is uttered alone or in a communal setting.

301 Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing,” 11. In The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader numbering system of the text, 1QH XI, 14 = XIX, 14, and 1QH III, 23 = XI, 23.

302 Frennesson acknowledges that the sectarians were indeed forward-looking, looking forward to a new land and a new age, but proposes that the present was perhaps more prominent in the minds of sectarian authors than was the eschaton. Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing,” 24-25. I agree with Frennesson on the priority of the present in sectarian thought. However, Frennesson further suggests that this focus on the present – setting it up as a reflection of the future expectation – makes the eschaton itself less relevant. Regarding this point, I am less certain. It seems to me that the sectarians’ concern for the present is directly related to their goal of incorporation into the eternal realm at the eschaton. Future hope and expectation then is not diminished, though present experience is elevated in the life of the sect.

303 See, for example, Elliot R. Wolfson, “Mysticism and the Poetic-Liturgical Compositions from Qumran: A Response to Bilhah Nitzan,” Jewish Quarterly Review 85 (1994), 196.

103 thus creating not confusion but contact, communion.”304 The Hodayot, which may have been used in both communal and personal worship settings,305 create the sense of a convergence of times (divine-eternal and human-finite) and spaces (heavenly and earthly) through which a new social space emerges. Within this new social space, human and divine beings commune together in the service of divine worship.

so that I might walk about ,(העליתני לרום עולם) You have raised me up to an eternal height and know that there is hope for him ,(ואתהלכה במישור לאין חקר) on a limitless plain The perverse spirit .(לסוד עולם) whom You created from the dust for the eternal council You have cleansed from great transgression, that he might take his stand with the host of the holy ones, and enter together with the congregation of the sons of heaven. And for ותפל לאיש גורל ) man, You have allotted an eternal destiny with the spirits of knowledge to praise Your name together with shouts of joy, and to recount Your ,(עולם עם רוחות דעת wonders before all Your creatures. (1QHa XI, 22b-23) In this passage, human worshipers are granted access to eternal spaces for the purpose of communal worship with angelic beings. The debasement of the individual, who is described frequently in the Hodayot as one created from dust and possessing a perverse spirit, is here countered by his elevation to the eternal council. This elevation reflects both his new social status as a member of the sect and the access gained through this identity. On account of his being lifted up and now sharing in the same lot as angels, the human worshiper gains present access to divine beings and spaces, at least in the moment of worship. As Angela Kim Harkins argues, the hymns function as a performative script intended to guide the ritual performer into an experience with the divine.306

304 Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing,” 42-43. Frennesson goes on to say, “In the essence of liturgy lies the capacity somehow to bring it all together: past, present, and future, that which is above and that which is below.” Then, in the very next paragraph, Frennesson indicates that he does not mean to go so far as suggest that these texts “function as the tool in ‘actualising’ such a communion,” but that “they reflect it rather than realise it.” As I argue here, I believe that Qumran liturgical texts – and more precisely, the group members’ enactments of them – were in fact aimed at achieving present communion with the divine, and that such experience was ostensibly attained through the construction of a particular type of social space.

305 See note 300 above for a review of some of the arguments regarding the use of the Hodayot.

306 Angela Kim Harkins, Reading with an “I” to the Heavens: Looking at the Qumran Hodayot through the Lens of Visionary Traditions (Ekstasis 3; Berlin: De Gruyter, 2012).

104

Regularly in the Hodayot and other sectarian literature, the worshiper is pictured in the appears frequently in these texts where it גורל of the holy ones, or angels.307 The term (גורל) lot tends to indicate 1) an individual’s alignment with God or evil forces,308 2) an initiate’s rank within the group,309 or 3) an individual’s future destiny.310 There is, however, significant crossover in these various uses, since an individual must already belong to the lot of God in order to gain initiation into the sect. Moreover, future destinies were determined according to one’s association, making one’s lot with God/Light or Belial/darkness the deciding factor in determining whether an individual would attain redemption at the eschatological judgment or suffer the annihilation of the wicked. So an individual’s lot was a reality or position experienced in the present, though it carried with it future implications as well.

אנשי ) For You have brought [Your] t[ruth and g]lory to all the men of Your council And .(ובגורל יחד עם מלאכי פנים) in the lot together with the angels of presence ,(עצתכה there is no mediator for [your] h[oly ones ] for [ ] [ ] in her. They will return at Your glorious word, and they shall be Your princes in the [eternal] lo[t ] blossom as a flo[wer ] forever, to raise up a shoot to be the branches of an eternal planting. (1QHa XIV, 12b-15a) This passage portrays members of God’s council, initiates of the sect, sharing in a common space or rank with the angels of the presence. They are granted the same access as the holy ones who dwell in God’s presence, and for whom there is no mediator. The implications of this image are both present and future-oriented. In addition to the present communion gained, initiates are promised a position in the eternal lot. The eternal planting, one of the sectarian authors’ favorite metaphors for the movement, here indicates the present status of the group’s membership – they are already part of an eternal entity – and points to the permanence of this position by tying it to the place (both status and space) of angelic beings that dwell in heavenly spaces.

307 The mention of one’s “lot” is a consistent theme in texts such as the Damascus Document, Community Rule, and the War Scroll as well, and its use often reflects dualistic ideas present throughout the literature.

308 In sectarian thought, humans could belong to either the lot of God/Light or the lot of Belial/darkness. Cf. CD XIII, 12; 1QS I, 10; 1QM I, 5, 11, 13; IV, 2.

309 Cf. 1QS II, 23; VI, 22.

310 Cf. 1QHa XI, 22; XIX, 11-14; 1QM XV, 1-2; XVII, 6-7.

105

Each of the Hodayot passages mentioned so far represent situations in which the initiate achieves present access to divine beings or spaces through participation in the sect and its worship. The present and future implications of the initiate’s belonging to the sect, construed as an eternal entity, are painted in vivid terms in 1QHa XIX, 10-14. Here, initiation into the eternal council entails a physical transformation in addition to the spiritual transformation initiates undergo, which allows them to associate with heavenly beings. This physical transformation perhaps includes a transition from mortality to immortality.

For Your glory’s sake You have cleansed man from transgression, so that he can purify himself for You from all filthy abominations and the guilt of unfaithfulness, so as to be .(ובגורל עם קדושיכה) joined wi[th] the children of Your truth; in the lot with Your saints That bodies covered in worms of the dead, might rise up from the dust to an et[ernal] from a perverse spirit to Your ;(להרים מעפר תולעת מתים לסוד ע]ולם[) council understanding. That he might take his position before You with the eternal hosts and to be renewed with all ,(ולהתיצב במעמד לפניכה עם צבא עד ורוחי ]אמת[) [spirits [of truth להתחדש עם כול נהיה ועם ידעים ) that shall be and to rejoice together with those who know 1QHa XIX, 10-14)311) .(ביחד רנה

In this passage, members of the sect rise up to join with angels in worship. Elsewhere in the sectarian manuscripts, eternal council (like eternal planting) refers to the present identity of sectarian members.312 So the common rejoicing with angels indicates the sectarian’s conceptual understanding of his present reality in the performance of the prayer. Through the enactment of the liturgy, the human worshiper enters into a particular kind of social space – a liminal space unconstrained by traditional boundaries. Within this liminal time-space, future anticipations may be experienced as present realities. The enactment of the liturgy becomes the site of communion between the human and divine in the present while at the same time it anticipates the permanent incorporation of the human worshiper into the ranks of the eternal.

According to this text, permanent incorporation into the eternal structure appears to involve a physical transformation from a mortal, earthly body to one fit for heavenly spaces and

311 Cf. 4Q427, which includes an exhortation for the human worshiper to praise among the angels. Frennesson reads this text not as an indication of realized eschatology, but as “an expression of God’s transcendent presence.” Frennesson, “In a Common Rejoicing,” 54.

312 Cf. 1QS II, 23, 25; VIII, 5.

106 eternal in nature. While the image of bodies covered in worms rising up from the dust may be understood metaphorically,313 it may also hint at a developing belief in the afterlife and the real communion of human and divine beings in heavenly spaces. This physical transformation is perhaps indicating that the sectarian’s full incorporation into the ,(חדש) described as a renewal eternal realm is a type of renewal not unlike the perpetual renewal of the luminaries, which is a sign of their eternal nature (1QS X, 3-5a). In the Hodayot, the individual’s future fate is wrapped up with his present associations. The ability to commune with the divine is gained through membership in the sect, an entity already comprising aspects of the eternal. However, it is the enactment of the group’s liturgy that creates the social space in which the human worshiper may experience present communion with the divine beings and take his permanent position among their ranks. By performing the poetic hymns, the initiate enters into an experiential space in which communion with divine beings is already a present reality.

Communing with Angels and Eschatological Agents (the Rule of the Blessings and the Rule of the Congregation) Two of the shorter Qumran rule texts, The Rule of the Blessing (1QSb) and The Rule of the Congregation (1QSa), are performative in nature. Through the performance of the liturgy, worshipers elicit the manifestation of divine realities in their present experience. The Rule of the Blessings and the Rule of the Congregation are closely related to the longer rule texts, the Damascus Document and Community Rule, and were found appended to the 1QS scroll.314 Though the form and content of the Rule of the Blessings and the Rule of the Congregation differ considerably, each addresses matters pertaining to present practices of the group and includes subjects of future anticipation. The liturgical nature of these two documents and their addition to the longer serekh text, 1QS, suggest they played an important role in the life of the group and were probably part of its regular ritual or ceremonial practices.

313 Eileen Schuller and Carol Newsom render this line: “so that a corpse-infesting maggot might be raised up from the dust to the council of [your] t[ruth]” (1QHa XIX, 15; 1QHa XIX, 12 in The Dead Sea Scrolls Reader). Schuller and Newsom, The Hodayot, p. 61.

314 1QSa and 1QSb were originally attached to the 1QS scroll, but were published later than the text of 1QS. Cf. Alison Schofield, From Qumran to the Yaḥad, 188-190. Sewing seams separate each of these documents, suggesting they were at one time circulated and used independently. For more on the physical description of these texts, see Hartmut Stegemann, “Some Remarks to 1QSa, to 1QSb, and to Qumran Messianism,” 480-487.

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The Rule of the Blessings consists of a series of four blessing formulas arranged according to the priestly blessings in Numbers 6:24-26.315 Aside from certain formalistic features identifying the leader of the liturgy and the recipients of the blessings, the entire text of the Rule of the Blessings reads as performative speech, or blessings meant to be recited in a ceremonial context. The genre of the Rule of the Congregation, on the other hand, is varied. The text includes a section on communal legislation and rules for assembly, followed by a list of those excluded from admittance and a section detailing instructions for a special banquet to take place in the last days.316 Though the Rule of the Congregation includes some descriptive and legislative material that is more instructive than performative in nature, portions of the text depict ritual actions that were likely performed by group members at key times. Some of these actions or types of speech align with what speech act theorists refer to as perlocutionary or declarative acts – that is, speech that aims to elicit a certain response through the utterance itself.317 The blessings recorded in the Rule of the Blessings are powerful speech acts that anticipate or call into existence certain types of divine-human communion so that they become realities in the experience of the blessings’ recipients.

315 Józef Milik observed that the blessings in 1QSb are arranged according to the structure of the priestly blessings in Num 6:24-26. Dominique Barthélemy and Józef T. Milik, Qumran Cave 1 (DJD I; Oxford: Clarendon, 1955), 121-129.

316 While the banquet in the Rule of the Congregation has been the subject of much scholarly debate, the greater portion of this text has received far less attention. Much of the Rule of the Congregation deals with legislation intended for present practice within the community, while the Rule of the Blessings, which is only occasionally a focus in scrolls scholarship, details blessings for members of the sect that anticipate both present and future fulfillment. Charlotte Hempel argues that the first few lines of the Rule of the Congregation, which identifies the content as intended for the last days, along with “the description of a banquet in the messianic age in 1QSa 2:11b-22 have dominated and, indeed overshadowed, the interpretation of 1QSa 1:6—2:11a,” which comprises a greater portion of the document. Charlotte Hempel, The Qumran Rule Texts in Context, 50.

317 Speech act theory is concerned with the question: What does the utterance do? J. L. Austin, pioneer behind the theory of speech acts, distinguished between illocutionary and perlocutionary speech acts. In an illocutionary act, the goal is achieved in the saying. Naming a pet and giving an order are examples of this type of speech. Perlocutionary acts, by contrast, elicit response or action. The goal is to achieve something through the performance of the speech act. Austin included a third category in his discussion, the locutionary act, which is the actual performance of the utterance. J. L. Austin, How to Do Things with Words (ed. J. O. Urmson and M. Sbisà; 2d ed.; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975). John Searle continued the discussion, taking up the term “illocutionary act” to refer generally to any type of speech act. Searle identified five types of illocutionary acts (or “speech acts”): 1) assertives describe, 2) directives aim to elicit a response/action, 3) commissives, like a promise, bind the speaker to an action, 4) expressives express emotions and thoughts, and 5) declaratives aim to bring about change through the utterance itself. John R. Searle, “A Classification of Illocutionary Acts,” in Language in Society, vol. 5, no. 4 (Apr., 1976), 1-23, and idem., Speech Acts: An Essay in the Philosophy of Language (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1969).

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In the Rule of the Blessings, four groups are identified for special blessings: 1) the general membership (I, 1-3), 2) a priestly leader of the community (II—III, 20),318 3) the priests (III, 22-23), and 4) the prince of the congregation (V, 20). Like other liturgical texts associated with the sect, the Rule of the Blessings is composed for the Maskil (I, 1; III, 22; V, 20), indicating this figure likely recited the blessings included therein. While the blessings generally follow standard blessing forms and content known in the Hebrew Bible and related literature,319 a few of the blessings stand out for their references to a close communion shared between angels (and perhaps other divine beings) and the human recipients of the blessings.

May !(יברככה אדוני מ]מעון קו[דשו) [May the Lord bless you from His [ho]ly [habitation וישימכה מכלול הדר בתוך ) he set you, perfected in honour, in the midst of the Holy Ones may He re]new for you the [eternal] covenant of the priesthood. May He make] ;(קדושים (1QSb III, 25-26) (ויתנכה מקומכה במעון קודש) [.a place for you in the holy [habitation

ואתה כמלאך ) May you (abide forever) as an Angel of the Presence in the holy habitation to the glory of the God of host[s. May you serve the Lord forever and ,(פנים במעון קודש ordering destiny ,(בהיכל מלכות) b]e all around. May you [ ] the kingdom of God a Council of the Yahad [with ,( ומפיל גורל עם מלאכי פנים) with the Angels of the Presence ולכול ) for all the ages of eternity ,(ועצת יחד ]עם קדושים[ לעת עולם) the Holy Ones] forever (1QSb IV, 24b-26) !(קצי נצח

These two passages appear in the third blessing formula, addressed to the Sons of Zadok, the priests (1QSb III, 22). The blessings, which call for the priests’ elevation to the holy habitation, the heavenly-eternal realm, are framed as present expectations that may include aspects of future fulfillment as well. Through the act of uttering the blessings, the ritual performer elicits a divine response – in this case, the elevation of the human recipient of the blessing to divine spaces. The speech act aims to make present this reality that might otherwise remain future-oriented or otherworldly, beyond the grasp of these priests. Yet, through the enactment of the blessing, the

318 The beginning of this section is missing the formulaic introduction provided for each of the other groups. However, it seems fairly certain that there is a shift in address around the end of column I and beginning of column II as the blessing takes up the language of Num 6:24-26 and deals with matters related to priestly leadership (e.g. “righteous judgment” in II, 26). Milik argued the blessings are arranged according to a 4-blessing formula found in the priestly blessing in Numbers. Barthélemy and Milik, Qumran Cave 1, 121-129. Geza Vermes also identifies four groups singled out for blessing in this text. See his introduction and translation of the text in The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (rev. ed.; London: Penguin Books, 2011), 387-390.

319 Cf. Num 6: 24-26; Ruth 2:4; Pss 121:7; 134: 3.

109 priests’ elevation to heavenly spaces – even the throne room where they might exist as angels of the Presence – becomes part of the lived reality of the ritual performers.

In 1QSb IV, 24b-26, there seems to be a future aspect to the blessings as well. The suggests an ongoing nature to this elevated position. Not only does the speech עולם repetition of act aim to achieve a present realization of the priests’ elevation and communion with divine beings, but it is also concerned with securing this destiny for all the ages of eternity! This expectation is what I refer to as the sectarian’s future incorporation into the eternal realm. While these blessings are concerned with the present realization of otherworldly realities and their ongoing fulfillment, the final blessing formula in the Rule of the Blessings includes blessings related more explicitly to eschatological events yet anticipated. One indication of this shift is that the recipient of these blessings is the Prince of the Congregation (V, 20) – a figure whose advent is yet anticipated in the writing of this text.320

by which to bless the Prince of the ,(למשכיל) vacat Belonging to the Instructor whom [ ] And He shall renew for him the covenant of (את נשיא העדה) Congregation ,of His people forev[er (מלכות) so as to establish the kingdom ,(ה]י[חד) the [Ass]ociation that ‘with righteousness he may judge the poor,] [and] decide with equity for [the me]ek of the earth,’ (Isa 11:4) walk before Him blameless in all the ways of [ ] and establish His coven[ant as holy in] distress for those who seek H[im. May] the Lord li[ft] you up to an eternal height, a mighty tower in a wall securely set on high! Thus may you d[estroy peoples] by the might of your [mouth,] lay waste vacat the earth with your rod! (1QSb V, 20-24) The Prince of the Congregation is often interpreted as a messianic figure. His appearance here is associated with the eschatological destruction of wickedness (V, 24-29) and he is described as “the scepter over the rulers” (V, 27b-28a).321 In this final blessing formula, the text shifts from a present to a future orientation. Although members of the sect are not the direct recipients of this blessing formula, they are certainly implicated in it. The covenant of the Association and the

320 This Prince of the Congregation is also mentioned in 1QpIsa-a frags. 2—6;15; 4Q285 frag. 4:2, 6; 7:4. In these texts as well, the Prince appears to be a future figure whose arrival is expected to coincide with certain end-time events, such as the final defeat of the Kittim.

,of Num 24:17 appears in a messianic context also in CD VII, 18-21; 1QM XI, 6-7; 4Q175 I (שבט) The scepter 321 12-13. Other descriptions in the scrolls of eschatological judgment and the destruction of wickedness do not always include the appearance of a messianic figure or figures. Cf. 1QHa XIV, 29-35; CD II, 5-7; 1QM I, 1-5.

110 kingdom of His people are initiates of the group – those who have joined the covenant community and already strive to live as members of the eternal kingdom. The future events anticipated here include the permanent incorporation of the sectarians into the eternal realm.

In the first three blessing formulas, the pronouncement of blessing aims to invoke the realities described in the present experience of the blessings’ recipients. This includes the members’ and priests’ present communion with angels in heavenly spaces. Though the final blessing formula turns toward matters yet anticipated, it also concerns the group’s present. The invocation of this blessing is perlocutionary, or declarative – aiming to bring about a change in the members’ lived reality by drawing the realities of the future into the present. Although the realities depicted in this section are not yet manifest in the present experience of the group, the very act of declaration aspires to make them part of the present experience.

The final portion of the Rule of the Congregation includes a description of a ritual that, like the final blessing formula in the Rule of the Blessings, is concerned with the “making present” of future events. The banquet scene in 1QSa II, 11-22 is generally interpreted as a ritual portraying an end-time event. Some have called it an “eschatological banquet”322 or a While the first and longer .(משיח) messianic banquet,”323 due to the appearance of a messiah“ portion of the Rule of the Congregation deals with rules for the governance of the sect and exclusions from service (I, 4—II, 11), the last section provides a detailed outline of a ceremonial ritual in which the Messiah of Israel appears and joins the events taking place. The author of the text does not draw a temporal distinction between the rules for governance and the banquet scene, but frames the entire text as “the rule for the congregation of Israel in the Last Days” 1QSa I, 1). The “Last Days” is a period already underway ;הסרך לכול עדת ישראל באחרית הימים) according to sectarian constructions of time; it refers to the present time of the sect. For the author of 1QSa, the rule for the present includes a ritual performance that hinges on divine action – God sending the Messiah – for its ultimate completion.324

322 Milik, Qumran Cave 1, p. 121.

323 Lawrence Schiffman, The Eschatological Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Atlanta: SBL, 1989), 53.

324 Hartmut Stegemann believed 1QSa was a rule intended for the present. Hartmut Stegemann, “Some Remarks to 1QSa, 1QSb, and Qumran Messianism,” 75. John Collins criticizes this view on the basis that there is no evidence

111

11. The procedure for the [mee]ting of the men of the reputation [when they are called] 325(יוליד) to the banquet held by the party of Yahad, when [God] has fathered

among them: [the Priest,] as head of the entire congregation of (המשיח) the Messiah .12 Israel, shall enter first, trailed by all 13. [the ]c[lan heads of the Sons of] Aaron, those priests [appointed] to the banquet of the men of reputation. They are to sit may s[it,] and the (]מש[יח ישראל) be[fore him] by rank. Then the [Mess]iah of Israel .14 heads 15. of the th[ousands of Israel] are to sit before him by rank, as determined by [each man’s comm]ission in their camps and campaigns. Last, all 16. the heads [of the con]gregation’s cl[ans,] together with the wis[e men of the holy congregation,] shall sit before them by 17 rank. [When they] gather [at the] communal [tab]le, [to drink w]ine so the communal table is set 18. and [the] wine [poured] for drinking, [none may re]ach for the first portion 19. of the bread or [the wine] before the Priest. For [he] shall [bl]ess the first portion of the bread 20. and the win[e, reach]ing for the bread first. Afterw[ard] the Messiah of Israel [shall re]ach 21. for the bread. [Finally,] ea[ch] member of the whole congregation of the Yahad [shall give a bl]essing, [in descending order of] rank. This procedure shall govern 22. every me[al], provided at least ten me[n are ga]thered together. vacat (1QSa II, 11-22) While there is no way of knowing whether or not this ritual was actually performed in the time of the sect, it is certainly plausible that group members performed the ceremony in anticipation of the Messiah’s arrival. The detailed instructions for certain figures (the Priest) and subsets within the sect (heads of the sons of Aaron, heads of congregation’s clans, the wise men), along with the roles outlined for the entire congregation, provide the necessary information for the performance of a messiah present in the time of the sect. He considers 1QSa “a rule for a future age, on that has not yet come to pass.” John J. Collins, Beyond the Qumran Community, 75-76. Here, I argue that the rule is intended for present use, though some aspects of the performance (namely, the arrival of the messiah) await future fulfillment. The enactment of the text aims to make present those realities described in the rule that are not yet manifest and make them part of the group’s lived experience.

325 The reading of this word has been contested, since the physical remains are somewhat unclear. Based on is the better reading. D. Barthélemy and the (יוליד) evidence from more recent, computer imaging, it seems yolid translators of the text in the DSSR follow this reconstruction, as does Geza Vermes in his translation of the scrolls: The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English.

112 of the ritual. If the ceremony described here was performed as a ritual of the group, it is entirely possible that the ritual enactors expected their performance to do something in the present – perhaps even to elicit the arrival of the Messiah. Whereas the Rule of the Blessings is concerned with the effects of the speech, 1QSa II, 11-22 is concerned with action.326

Performance theory proves a useful tool in the analysis of this type of text as it allows us to imagine how the text might have functioned as an object of ritual or liturgical use and what goals ritual performers sought to achieve through its enactment.327 In contrast to the more descriptive and didactic nature of the communal rules and exclusions in the first part of the text, the banquet scene is 1QSa II, 11-22 is a performance piece. It was intended for performance in the present time of the sect, before the arrival of the Messiah of Israel, with the intent that the performance itself would play a role in “making present” the advent of the Messiah and his communion with the group. Through the performance of the banquet scene in the Rule of the Congregation and the blessing of the priests in the Rule of the Blessings, the sectarians sought to make future, otherworldly realities present in the time of the performance. The blessing of the priests, a powerful, declarative speech act, secured these priests’ present elevation to otherworldly spaces, while the enactment of the eschatological banquet scene sought to make present in the time of the sect the future realities anticipated in the liturgy.

Worship in Heavenly Spaces (The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice) One of the longer liturgical orders of the group, the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice facilitated an extended experience of communion with the divine, inviting human worshipers to witness and even participate in a dynamic heavenly worship scene. The Songs were most likely intended for communal performance as part of a regular liturgical cycle.328 Although the text is

326 Performance theory is closely related to speech act theory. Whereas speech act theory deals with utterances, performance theory may be conceptualized more broadly to include actions that may or may not be accompanied by speech.

327 Performance theory is typically associated with the ethnographic works of Victor Turner and Richard Schechner, which highlight the performative nature of societies and demonstrate how performances provide a window into understanding the values and identities within a society. Victor W. Turner, The Anthropology of Performance (New York: PAJ Publications, 1988). Richard Schechner, Between Theatre and Anthropology (Philadelphia: Pennsylvania University Press, 1985). While performance theory is often used to analyze existing cultures and their religious and social activities, it is also useful for the analysis of ancient texts that depict ritual performances.

328 Bilhah Nitzan posits that the repetition in the Songs may point to liturgical use and demonstrate a cultic status of the song of the angels; she concludes that the Songs were probably intended for liturgical use. Nitzan, Qumran

113 quite broken in places, preserved in nine fragmentary copies from the Qumran caves and a copy from Masada, a clear structure is discernible.329 The text consists of thirteen songs, composed for each of the first thirteen Sabbaths of the year.330 One of the features of the text that has sometimes puzzled scholars is the meaning of the Songs within a worship setting. The Songs, ,(למשכיל) presumably written for recitation in communal gatherings and addressed to the Maskil describe angelic praise in heavenly spaces and call upon angels to worship.

שיר עולת השבת ) Song of the sacrifice of the eighth Sabbath .(למשכיל) For the instructor on the tw[enty-]third [of the second month. Praise the God of all . . . all you ,(השמינית second among the priests of ,(הללו לאלוהי כול מ כול קדושי עולמים) [eternally [holy ones the inner sanctum, the second council in the wonderful dwelling among the seven[ among all who have knowledge of] eternal things. And exalt Him, O chiefs of princes with His wondrous portion. (4Q403 1 ii, 18-20) The human audience-participants do not appear to be the direct addressees of the calls to praise. Yet this lack of human address does not necessarily imply that the text was not used liturgically in the life of the group.331 The Songs, which convey heavenly realities, are not merely

Prayer and Religious Poetry, 281-282, 285. Philip Alexander contends that the Songs likely functioned as a communal ascent and were meant to be performed as an active liturgy. Philip S. Alexander, “Qumran and the Genealogy of Western Mysticism,” in New Perspectives on Old Texts: Proceedings of the Tenth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 9-11 January, 2005 (STDJ 88; ed. E. G. Chazon, B. Halpern-Amaru, and R. Clements; Leiden: Brill, 2010), 224-226. In another place, Alexander argues that the Maskil does not recite the Songs on his own, but along with others in “a public liturgy, in which a prayer-leader leads a congregation, who may join him in reciting in whole or in part the words of the hymns.” Alexander, The Mystical Texts, 44. Carol Newsom considers the document a liturgy, the form of which “is not that of a revelation but of an act of worship.” Carol A. Newsom, “He Has Established for Himself Priests,” 114.

329 For more on the discovery, reconstruction, and publication of this text, see Carol A. Newsom, “‘He has Established for Himself Priests’: Human and Angelic Priesthood in the Qumran Sabbath Shirot,” in Archaeology and History of in the Dead Sea Scrolls: the New York University Conference in Memory of Yigael Yadin (ed. L. H. Schiffman; JSPSup 8 – JSOT/ASOR MS 2; JSOT Sheffield: Press, 1990), 101-120, and Hartmut Stegemann, “Methods for the Reconstruction of Scrolls from Scattered Fragments,” in Archaeology and History of in the Dead Sea Scrolls: the New York University Conference in Memory of Yigael Yadin (ed. L. H. Schiffman; JSPSup 8 – JSOT/ASOR MS 2; JSOT Sheffield: Press, 1990), 189-220.

330 Newsom, “He has Established for Himself Priests,” 102.

331 Bilhah Nitzan is among those scholars who consider the Songs a communal liturgy. Beyond this general classification, she further identifies three different approaches to the literary image of angelic praise in the Songs: 1) cosmological – the praise of all creatures (human and angelic) enjoy the same status, 2) uniqueness – the praise of angelic beings is elevated above that of earthly creatures, and 3) mystical – certain righteous human beings may join with the heavenly entourage in praise. Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 273-274.

114 descriptive, but invite the ritual actor to join in these realities and experience them as the angels do in their worship.

How did the Songs function as a liturgy of the sect if we only find in the Songs calls for the angels to worship? The human worshipers themselves are nowhere directly enjoined to ,(למשכיל) ”participate in the praise. However, the standard address of the Songs, “for the Maskil suggests a performative component to the liturgy332 and may imply that the text is intended for community use under the direction of the Maskil.333 Judith Newman has recently argued that the ascription, found also in the Hodayot, serves to sacralize the text by virtue of its connection to the leader of the movement, who claims to have esoteric knowledge.334 These considerations, along with the terms of address in the Songs that apply to both human and angelic beings, suggest the Songs were intended for ritual use in the sect.335 Yet, unlike the Community Rule, which provides both the structure and content for its ritual use,336 the Songs describe only the structure of the angelic worship. The content of the praise is unspecified, perhaps leaving room for the unscripted praise of worshipers, within certain categories of praise.

[Psalm of exaltation by the tongue] of the third of the chief princes, exaltation the God of the exalted [ ]l seven times with seven words of wondrous exaltations. Psalm of praise by the tongue of the fou[rth] to the Warrior who is above all[ gods] with

332 Philip Alexander argues that the Maskil himself becomes a mediator for the group on the basis of his ascent to heavenly places. Initiates believe they might also join in a type of mystical union with the angels because the Maskil functions as a mediator between heavenly and earthly realms. Alexander, The Mystical Texts, 85-90.

333 The attribution occurs also in the Damascus Document and the Community Rule, where it applies to the leader’s role in governing matters pertaining to the life of the sect. Cf. CD VII, 21-23; XIII, 22-23; 1QS III, 13; IX, 12, 21. It is also found in the Rule of the Congregation (1QSb I, 1; III, 22-24; V, 20). As noted in chapter 2, the Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice may have originally been a pre-sectarian text that was adopted by the group. The addition of .may be an indication of the group’s adaptation of the text למשכיל

334 Judith H. Newman, Before the Bible: The Liturgical Body and the Formation of Scriptures in early Judaism (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018). See chapter 5: The Hodayot and the Formative Process of Performing Scripture. Cf. 1QHa XX, 4.

335 John Strugnell originally pointed out that some terms of address in the Songs apply to members of the sect as well. For instance, “all who walk in uprightness” (4Q403 I i, 17), “those appointed for righteousness” (4Q403 I i, 25), and “holy ones” (4Q403 I i, 28) are terms used elsewhere for members of the group. John Strugnell, “The Angelic Liturgy at Qumran – 4QSerek Sirot ‘Olat Hassabat,” (VTSup 7; Leiden: Brill, 1960), 326-334.

336 For example, see the initiation ceremony in 1QS I—II.

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its seven wondrous powers; and he will praise the God of power seven times with seve[n] words of [wondrous] prais[e. (4Q403 1 i, 1-3 + MasShirShabb II)

Song of the sacrifice of the seventh Sabbath on the sixteenth .(למשכיל) For the instructor of the month. Praise the God of the exalted heights, O you exalted ones among all the gods of knowledge. Let the holiest of the god-like beings magnify the King of glory who sanctifies by His holiness all His holy ones. O you chiefs of the praises of all the god- like beings, praise the majestically [pr]aiseworthy God. For in the splendor of praise is the glory of His kingship. (4Q403 1 i, 30-32). These two excerpts illustrate the structure of the descriptions of praise and calls to praise in the Songs. Though the precise content of the praise is not specified, categories of worship (e.g. “exalt . . . with seven words of wondrous exaltations,” and “praise the majestically praiseworthy God”) help organize the liturgy. One might imagine a scenario in which the worship leader recites a portion of text which includes a call to praise and then pauses while the congregation erupts with individual affirmations of the divine qualities identified in that portion of text. The lack of specified content of praise in the Songs may serve the purpose of creating space for unscripted expressions of praise offered in coordination with the praise of angelic beings. As others have already argued, linguistic features in the text and its preservation in multiple copies indicate the Songs were revered by the group and likely enjoyed a prominent place in its liturgical cycles. Additional indications of its liturgical use might be seen in the form of the text and in the image of the temple in Song 7.

Carol Newsom describes the literary structure of the composition as a pyramid.337 The content and style of the songs build up to a climax in Song 7 and then descend in parallel structure.338 The sixth through eighth songs form a central section “dominated by a variety of

337 Newsom, “He has Established for Himself Priests,” 102-103. Nitzan, on the other hand, envisions the literary structure of the Songs as a cycle of praise. The first two songs begin the cycle with an invitation to praise. Songs three through six form the main body of the text, which includes an invitation to praise followed by a justification (“for God is . . .”). The cycle closes with the seventh song, which she considers an invitation to praise alone. Songs eight through thirteen concern the heavenly sanctuary and angelic chariot, and express a further elevation. In Nitzan’s view, the liturgy reaches a crescendo not with the seventh song, but with the praise of the sanctuary and the chariot in the concluding songs. Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 308-317.

338 Christopher R. A. Morray-Jones, on the other hand, identifies the eleventh song as the climactic moment, since it describes God’s presence descending into the Holy of Holies and would have been performed on the twelfth Sabbath, immediately following the covenant renewal occurring during the Festival of Weeks. Christopher R. A. Morray-Jones, “The Temple Within: The Embodied Divine Image and Its Worship in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Other Jewish and Christian Sources,” in SBLSP 37 (1998), 417-420. Philip Alexander argues that the thirteenth song should be identified as the climax of the liturgy. Alexander, The Mystical Texts, 49-52.

116 repetitious literary structures in which the number seven is prominently featured.”339 This also happens to be the best preserved section of text. The preserved portions of the first five songs and the last five songs are unfortunately badly damaged, making it difficult to discern with certainty the literary structure. However, the unparalleled significance of the seventh Sabbath song seems fairly clear. Flanked on either side by songs that emphasize the number seven through endless repetition, in the seventh Sabbath song the heavenly temple itself erupts in praise.

With these let all the f[oundations of the hol]y of holies praise, the uplifting pillars of the supremely exalted abode, and all the corners of its structure. (4Q403 1 i, 41)

באלה יהללו כול י]סודי קוד[ש קודשים עמודי משא לזבול רום רומים וכול פנות מבניתו

And all the decorations of the inner shrine make haste with wondrous psalms in the inner s[hrine ] of wonder, shrine to shrine with the sound of holy multitudes. And all their decorations [ ]. And the chariots of His inner shrine give praise together, and their cherubim and thei[r] ophanim bless wondrously [ ] the chiefs of the divine structure. And they praise him in the holy inner shrine. (4Q403 1 ii, 13-16)

וכול מחשבי הדביר יחושו בתהלי פלא בדבי]ר [ פלא דביר לדביר בקול המוני קודש וכול מחשביהם ] [ יהללו יחד מרכבות דבירו וברכו פלא כרוביהם ואופניה]ם [ רושי תבנית אלוהים יהללוהי בדביר קודש

The image of praise in the seventh song is rapturous and all-encompassing, resounding from every corner of the heavenly spaces. All the angelic beings and even the structure of the temple itself burst forth in ecstatic praise. Considering this song within the context of liturgical use, the emphatic nature of the praise, along with repeated calls to worship, sing, and chant, draws the ritual performer into the throne room, where he becomes a co-participant in this heavenly worship scene. Even the heavenly temple itself bursts into praise.

The praise of the temple structure in this song is often interpreted as an indication of the totality of praise that occurs at this moment in the liturgy and a further indication of the central

339 Newsom, “He has Established for Himself Priests,” 103.

117 significance of this song.340 This moment of glorious praise is so extraordinary that even a typically inanimate structure joins in the worship. Although the heavenly temple is the primary referent here, it is rather interesting that this praise of the temple structure occurs in a liturgical piece highly valued by a group that conceptualized its own structure as a human sanctuary. Such imagery supposes that members of this sanctuary of men assume a special place in the liturgy – their role inscribed through the image of the heavenly temple joining in the angelic worship service.341 This image of the temple, as well as those references to angels in the text that elsewhere apply to the members of the sect, indicates that human worshipers performed the Songs liturgy as full participants in it, not merely observers. They could join in the heavenly praise as it occurred because their priesthood in some way mirrored the angelic priesthood and the human sanctuary reflected the heavenly.342 In a time when the Jerusalem temple was considered invalid by members of the sect, the group itself functioned as the vehicle through which members might achieve communion with the divine realm.343 Moreover, the human sanctuary surpassed the Jerusalem temple in terms of access as it offered its members direct access to the throne room in the time and space of the liturgical performance.

As the title of the text and the descriptions of the songs imply, the focus of the text is on a particular type of sacrifice – a “heavenly song of sacrifice.”344 Whereas other Sabbath songs

340 Carol Newsom makes a compelling case for the singular importance of this song in the liturgical cycle. Cf. Newsom, “He has Established for Himself Priests,” 109-110. Bilhah Nitzan agrees with Newsom’s assessment that the seventh Sabbath held a special place within the order. Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 309.

341 Philip Alexander takes a different approach in his interpretation of this portion of text, suggesting that “God’s heavenly temple is a temple built out of the praises of the angels” and in this text “is apparently represented as a structure of angels.” Alexander, The Mystical Texts, 31.

342 See chapter 4 for a discussion of the comparison between the two priesthoods. In 4Q400 2, 6-7, the author draws a comparison between the human and angelic priesthoods by posing the questions: “How shall we be considered [among] them? And how shall our priesthood (be considered) in their dwellings? And [our] holiness their holiness? [What] is the offering of our tongues of dust (compared) with the knowledge of the gods?” While many read this text as a series of rhetorical questions in which the obvious answer is that the sectarian priesthood does not compare to the heavenly priesthood, I suggest that the author’s comparison implies that he considers the two priesthoods structurally similar enough that they can be compared. The human structure of the sect is meant to reflect the divine order so that participation in that realm becomes possible.

343 Philip Alexander argues that because the celestial temple was superior to the earthly, the sectarians’ access to the heavenly negated the necessity of access to the earthly. Alexander, “Qumran and the Genealogy of Western Mysticism,” 232-234.

344 Nitzan discusses occurrences of other early Jewish texts in Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 285-292.

118 might have been offered alongside animal sacrifices, recitation of the Songs in Qumran sectarian circles facilitated the joint communion of human and divine beings in the act of offering a sacrifice of praise.345 The social space of the community and the enactment of the ritual provided a new locus of human-divine communion for the sect during a tumultuous time when the Jerusalem temple was not a valid option. Here, the image of the temple as the site of human- divine contact is taken up in a new way. In a number of Hebrew Bible texts, aspects of God’s being extend to earth at the site of the temple. For instance, in Isaiah 6:1, Isaiah sees the train of God’s robe fill the temple, and the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies is regularly depicted as the footstool of God.346 In contrast to this image of God reaching or extending down into the earthly sphere, in the Songs liturgy the sectarian worshiper is elevated to heavenly spaces in a type of mystical ascent so that he is able to witness the angelic worship and participate in it.347 The sectarians, who consider themselves a human sanctuary,348 offer a type sacrifice befitting such a structure. In place of animal sacrifices going up to God and aspects of God’s being reaching down into an earthly temple, members of the human sanctuary attain direct access to heavenly spaces, where they offer songs of praise in concert with the angelic priesthood that ministers in the heavenly temple.

345 This was not necessarily an attempt to abolish the Jerusalem temple cult, but a means to provide an effective substitute for it. See chapter 4.

is mentioned in the (הדום) ”Footstool“ .(הֲ דֹם) In 1 Chr 28:2 and Pss 99:5; 132:7, the ark is God’s footstool 346 description of the heavenly temple in 4Q403 1 ii, 2. Cf. Ps 113:4-8, which depicts God extending down or making himself lower.

347 There has been much debate in scrolls scholarship as to whether or not “mystical” is an appropriate term to use in regard to this type of literature. Much of this debate centers on the ways in which various scholars interpret the term. Some understand “mystical” in a more narrow sense, as applying to a specific genre or experience that only appears in later texts. Cf. Eliot R. Wolfson, “Mysticism and the Poetic-Liturgical Compositions from Qumran: A Response to Bilhah Nitzan,” JQR 85 (1994), 185-202, and Esther Chazon, “Human and Angelic Prayer in the Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scroll. Proceedings of the Fifth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 19—23 January, 2000 (ed. E. G. Chazon; STDJ 48; Leiden: Brill, 2003), 36. Others employ the term more widely, preferring to see “mystical” as an apt description of texts or experiences that communicate some type of special union or communion of human and divine beings. Bilhah Nitzan, Philip Alexander and Christopher Rowland are among those who consider “mystical” an appropriate description of the communion of human and divine beings in some of the scrolls literature. Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry, 274-276, 282-296. Alexander, “Qumran and the Genealogy of Western Mysticism,” 215-235; idem, The Mystical Texts, 5-11. Christopher Rowland, The Open Heaven: A Study of Apocalyptic in Judaism and Early Christianity (London: SPCK, 1982), 113-123.

348 See chapter 4.

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As a longer liturgical order of the group, the performance of the Songs likely served a purpose beyond that of facilitating present communion between human and divine beings in the moment of worship. Daniel Falk argues that the Songs cycle forms a liturgical progression designed to “engender a progressive religious experience among the worshiper.”349 The liturgy, presumably performed over a span of thirteen weeks, was concerned with both the ritual transformation of the participants over the course of the cycle and with the realization of their permanent incorporation into the eternal realm as co-participants in the heavenly priesthood. Rappaport’s observations regarding the function of longer liturgical orders are instructive here – particularly his assertion that longer liturgical orders create a sense or experience of already being in the otherworldly sphere.350 Through the enactment of this liturgy over a three-month period, along with the regular, more frequent performance of daily rituals, the ritual participants remain suspended in an out-of-mundane experience.351 The world created through the performance of the text becomes part of the worshiper’s lived experience in the present; however, the ultimate goal is the crystallization of this experience so that it becomes an enduring reality.352 Another long liturgical order of the group, the War Scroll, appears to have functioned in a similar capacity.

Waging War with Angels in Their Midst (the War Scroll) The War Scroll (1QM) is one of the longer texts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, consisting of nineteen columns, most of which are well-preserved. Since its initial discovery, the genre of this text has been contested. It has been variously classified as a rule text, an apocalyptic piece, a liturgical drama and a military manual.353 While each of these genre

349 Daniel Falk, “Liturgical Progression and the Experience of Transformation in Prayers from Qumran,” DSD 22 (2015), 283.

350 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 19-24.

351 Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 198-209.

352 According to Rappaport, performative acts realize states of affairs. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, 132-133.

353 Cf. Jean Duhaime, The War Texts, 53-61. Duhaime surveys the multiple genre approaches and concludes that 1QM is neither an apocalypse nor a cultic drama, though he recognizes that the text contains a liturgical dimension. According to Duhaime, the War Scroll more closely parallels the Greco-Roman tactical treatise and is a type of eschatological rule for the last days. Alex Jassen considers the quest to find a single genre marker in the War Scroll as misguided and suggests instead that it should be understood as a combination of idealized revenge fantasies and prescriptive war tactics. It provided a means (whether read or enacted) through which the sectarians might express

120 classifications has some merit and identifies with certain features of the text, the War Scroll most likely functioned as a liturgical order of the group with some parts of the text intended for ritual performance. Yigael Yadin noted certain apocalyptic features of the war described in the text and considered the scroll a type of guide for navigating the eschatological war about to take place.354 When read or enacted, the War Scroll might serve as a source of encouragement and insight for those coping with the reality of their own suffering, while the performance itself aimed to hasten the ultimate victory of the Sons of Light, which would bring about an end to their suffering.

The text appears to have a complex redactional history. In addition to the large, well- preserved manuscript found in Cave 1, six other copies of this text and War Scroll-like texts were found in Cave 4.355 Some of the first scholars to work on the text believed that 1QM was probably a unity, though the author may have drawn on multiple sources in its composition.356 Since then, however, scholars have largely questioned the unity of the text, often pointing to the Cave 4 manuscripts as evidence that the text was used and reworked over a much longer period of time than was previously supposed.357 What this means in regard to its use and function is

hope or anticipation for an eschatological age in which they would be empowered. In this way, Jassen understands the War Scroll as a type of propagandist tool designed to help prepare members for the impending eschatological war. Alex P. Jassen, “Violent Imaginaries and Practical Violence in the War Scroll,” in The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday (ed. K. Davis, D. M. Peters, Y. S. Baek, and P. W. Flint; STDJ 115; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2016), 183.

354 Yigael Yadin, The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1962 [Hebrew 1955]), 14-15.

355 For a complete list of these texts and an overview of their relation to 1QM, see Jean Duhaime, The War Texts, 40-43.

356 Eleazar Sukenik and his son, Yagael Yadin, were some of the first to work on this text and consider it a unity. Following them, Jean Carmingnac also stressed the unity of the text, and even pointed to the Teacher of Righteousness as the author. Duhaime, The War Texts, 45-48. Among those who later questioned the unity of the text, Duhaime includes André Dupont-Sommer, Chaim Rabin, Matthias Krieg, J. P. M. van der Ploeg, Peter von der Osten-Sacken, Jürgen Becker, and Philip Davies.

357 For more on the Cave 4 manuscripts, see Duhaime, The War Texts, 50-53, and George Brooke, “Text, Timing, and Terror: Thematic Thoughts on the War Scroll in Conversation with the Writings of Martin G. Abegg, Jr.” in The War Scroll, Violence, War and Peace in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature: Essays in Honour of Martin G. Abegg on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday (ed. K. Davis, D. M. Peters, Y. S. Baek, and P. W. Flint; STDJ 115; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2016), 50-56.

121 that the War Scroll seems to have enjoyed a special status at Qumran.358 Like some of the other important sectarian works found in Cave 1, such as the 1QS version of the Community Rule and the large and elegantly crafted Hodayot manuscript (1QHa), the size and careful preservation of the 1QM scroll point to its exceptional significance for the people who preserved it.

The debate over the genre of this text is closely related to its literary structure and the question of function. What purpose did this text serve for members of the sect? Although the entire text may not consist of liturgical material – that is, writing composed for public recitation and performance within a religious setting – liturgical passages play a central role in the War Scroll.359 In addition, other portions of the text that consist of narrative descriptions might also function as a type of speech act. In a discussion regarding the extreme verbosity of the text in its description of the writing on banners and implements of war, George Brooke suggests that the writing itself could be considered a speech act:

“The text might have been perceived by its authors as a forceful speech act, which, even if it was not effective for defeating the opposition physically, was at least able to create a sense of anticipated victory involving God and his angels, a victory far more powerful than any likely or imminent defeat. The enemy will be written into capitulation, texted into defeat.” 360 This observation about the significance of writing as a type of speech act offers a profound contribution to our understanding of the function of the War Scroll. If writing about the anticipated outcomes of war might be considered a forceful speech act, then much of the War Scroll, not just the more overtly liturgical sections, are concerned with effecting change through speech and action.

358 A number of scholars have drawn attention to the scroll’s special status. See, for instance, Brooke, “Text, Timing, and Terror,” 51 and Devorah Dimant, “The Composite Character of the Qumran Sectarian Literature as an Indication of Its Date and Provenance,” in History, Ideology and Bible Interpretation in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Collected Studies (FAT 90; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2014), 183.

359 Duhaime identifies the following as liturgical passages: 1QM X—XIV; XV, 7b—XVI, 1; XVI, 15b—XVII, 9; XVIII, 6b—XIX, 8). Duhaime, The War Texts, 48-49.

360 Brooke, “Text, Timing, and Terror,” 52. Russell Arnold makes a similar observation regarding the importance of writing in the War Scroll. Writing on banners, which appears rather out of place within the context of active warfare, might rather serve as a means of communication during the battle. Arnold, The Social Role of Liturgy, 198. Taking Arnold’s observation a step further, the very act of writing these inscriptions (whether it only happened in the writing of the War Scroll or whether such acts were actually performed by the group) functioned as a type of speech act – a forceful proclamation by the author (and perhaps performers) regarding the anticipated outcome of the war.

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The War Scroll opens abruptly with a battle scene in which the Sons of Light, to be identified with the members of the movement, launch an attack against the Sons of Darkness, who are aligned with Belial.361 In this first column, the purpose of the war is emphasized, along with its anticipated outcome. The war achieves “eternal annihilation for all the forces of Belial” and ushers in “a time of salvation for the People of God, and a time of dominion for all the men of His forces” (I, 5). Following the total destruction of wickedness (cf. I, 6), the text articulates the takeover and dominion of the Sons of Light in language rather reminiscent of the eternal plant spreading over the earth in 1QHa XIV.

Then [the Sons of Rig[hteousness shall shine to all ends of the world, continuing to shine forth until the end of the appointed seasons of darkness. Then at the time appointed by God, His great excellence shall shine for all the times of [ ] for peace and blessing, glory and joy, and long life for all Sons of Light. (1QM I, 8-9a) As is often seen in apocalyptic literature of the period, this text depicts an end-time reversal of fortunes in which the wicked, those who have enjoyed wealth and power on earth, face harsh and decisive judgment, while the righteous are finally vindicated for the suffering and injustice they have faced. The purpose of the war, as outlined here, is to 1) bring about the eschatological judgment, in which the righteous receive vindication and reward while the wicked face annihilation, and 2) show the strength of God (I, 11).

Much of the War Scroll consists of detailed instructions regarding the preparation of the implements of war (III—VI). As others have already noted, the writing on banners is rather excessive, particularly in a war-time context. However, it is perhaps the content of the writing that is most significant for the group behind the text. Some of the trumpets are inscribed with titles such as “The Called of God,” “The Princes of God,” and “The Rule of God” (III, 2-3), proclaiming God’s reign and identifying those belonging to Him. Others declare outcomes: “On the trumpets of the slain they shall write ‘the hand of the might of God in battle so as to bring down all the slain because of unfaithfulness’” and “On the trumpets of ambush they shall write ‘Mysteries of God to wipe out wickedness’” (III, 8-9a). The text prescribes similar inscriptions on banners, harps, and weaponry (IV—V). Though such inscriptions may seem unnecessary and the act of writing them impractical when war is imminent, in the text they function powerfully as

361 The text appears to be addressed to the Maskil, like many of the other liturgical texts discussed already. .(is preserved in the text, since the rest of the word breaks off (1QM I, 1 למ However, only

123 a means of asserting future outcomes. Such statements are declarative or perlocutionary. The writing itself (also the performance of the text, if it occurred) aim to enact the realities inscribed on the implements through the act of writing or uttering them into existence.

It is within this context of declarative speech acts that the limitations regarding participation come into fuller relief.

No youth or woman shall enter their encampments from the time they leave Jerusalem to go to battle until their return. No one crippled, blind or lame, nor a man who has a permanent blemish on his skin, or a man affected with ritual uncleanness of his flesh; none of these shall go with them to battle. All of them shall be volunteers for battle, pure of spirit and flesh, and prepared for the day of vengeance. Any man who is not ritually clean in respect to his genitals on the day of battle shall not go down with them into 1QM) .(כיא מלאכי קודש עם צבאותם יחד) battle, for holy angels are present with the army VII, 3-6)362 The restrictions imposed in 1QM VII have often been explained in light of the priestly nature of the group behind the text,363 the holy nature of war in general going back to Deuteronomistic literature, and the sectarians’ belief that angels were present among them.364 Each is a valid explanation; however, the presence of angels seems to be a driving concern here and even an experiential reality for those behind the text. If the enactment of the text through its writing, speech, or performance sought to make present the realities described in the text, then communion with angels belongs to the realm of experiential reality for members of the sect. The archaeological evidence from Qumran, along with purity injunctions in some of the rule texts, suggest that at least some members of the movement were already attempting to live in a manner that would make them fit to commune with angels in the present and participate in heavenly worship. Through the maintenance of purity standards and the performance of powerful, liturgical speech acts, the realities expressed in the text – victory over the forces of darkness and present communion with angels – become part of the lived realities of the sectarian ritual

362 Communion with angels is also mentioned in 1QM X, 9-12 and XII, 7. The legislation in this portion of text is based on the laws for a war camp in Deut 23:9-14.

363 1QM X, 1-8 describes the priestly role in warfare and appeals to Moses as the originator of the practice. The priestly nature of the group is evidenced by the titles used of its leaders and the regular practices performed by group members. See the discussion on the priestly function of the sect in chapter 4.

364 A similar list of restrictions appears in 1QS VI—VII and regards those who may participate in the pure meal of the congregation.

124 performers. For members of the sect, then, certain expectations associated with the new age are experienced as present realities. Conceptualized in this way, the new age is not distinguished by temporal distance – as a future, eschatological period still awaited and hoped for – but is rather a realm encroaching on the present that is continually made manifest through the actions of those who lead lives of purity befitting this otherworldly reality.

This belief that elements of the new age are already existent in the experience of the sectarians is asserted the liturgical section, 1QM X—XIV. Here, the language shifts to direct speech in which the ritual performer addresses God in expressions of prayer and worship; this includes the recitation of Scripture, along with the pronouncement of blessings and curses. The tone of the text is affirmative, expressing confidence in God’s control and certainty in a victorious outcome. It also assumes a close proximity between the worshiper and God and his realm.

Who is like You, O God of Israel, in h[eave]n and on earth, that he can perform in accordance with Your great works and Your great strength. Who is like Your people Israel, whom You have chosen for Yourself from all the peoples of the lands; the people of the saints of the covenant, learned in the statutes, enlightened in understand[ding ] ושומעי קול נכבד ורואי מלאכי ) those who hear the glorious voice and see the holy angels (whose ears are open; hearing deep things. (1QM X, 8-11 ,(קודש

In this passage, the members of the sect are identified as those who presently hear God’s voice and see the angels. Such language indicates a belief that contact exists between the human worshiper and divine beings in the expression of worship. On account of his temporal-spatial location in the last days and membership in the sect, sharing in its eternal nature, the sectarian gains the ability to hear and see things belonging to the otherworldly realm. This contiguity with divine space, which is a feature of the new age, implies an overlap of spaces in the experience of the sectarian worshiper. He is at once a participant in two spheres – the heavenly/divine and the earthly/human. Another passage in the liturgical section (1QM XII) suggests a certain permeability of heavenly and earthly spaces for those qualified to enter heavenly spaces and fit to dwell among divine beings.

For a multitude of the[se] holy ones in the heavens and hosts of angels in Your exalted dwelling to pr[aise] Your [truth]. The chosen ones of the holy people You have established for Yourself in [ ] of the names of all their host is with You in Your holy dwelling, and [ ] is in the abode of Your glory. (1QM XII, 1-2)

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And You, O God, are [ ] in the glory of Your dominion, and the company of Your 1QM) .(ועדת קדושיכה בתוכנו לעזר עולמי]ם[) holy ones is in our midst for etern[al] support XII, 7) The liturgical section provides affirmation of God’s control over the outcome of the war, reaching back to its purpose in I, 11 (to show God’s power), and confirms the presence of angels amidst the sectarian worshipers. They are present for “eternal support,” indicating that the sectarians themselves are enduring on account of their initiation into the sect and incorporation into its eternal structure. This, in combination with the 1QM XII, 1-2 reference to the chosen ones’ establishment in God’s holy dwelling points to a belief that members of the sect are already gaining some degree of incorporation into the eternal realm.365 Through membership in the sect, initiates acquire a present means of access to God and His realm. However, it is only through specific acts of worship, performed properly by the chosen people in the ordained times, that such access moves beyond the realm of conceptual space and becomes part of the individual’s lived experience.

In the final columns of the War Scroll (or the final portion of the preserved text), the subject of time becomes a matter of heightened importance as the realities described in the text are brought into alignment with the “today” or “now” of the audience. 1QM XV, 5 identifies a The Rule of His ,סרך עתו) book of prayers to be read at the time of battle – the book, Serekh Itto

Time). Some have speculated that the text mentioned here may refer to the liturgical material in 1QM X—XIV.366 Whether the text in question is the earlier material or not, the reference in XV, 4-5 to the reading aloud of this prayer text provides a strong indication that some of the contents of the scroll were intended for performance. Furthermore, in this last section the proclamation that “today” is the time for the final defeat of the Kittim, the annihilation of wickedness, and the vindication of the redeemed (XVII—XVIII), functions as a powerful speech act intended to bring about the realities described in the text.

365 This line breaks off at a few key places, leaving the identification of the referent unsettled. We do not know for certain whether it is “the chosen ones of the holy people” or the “hosts of heaven” (XII, 1) who are thought to exist in God’s holy dwelling. However, if line 2 is composed in parallel to line 1, then it would seem that the members of the group are granted the same access as divine beings to the holy dwelling spaces.

366 Jean Duhaime notes “the material found in 1QM 10—14 (or perhaps only in 10—12) may be the liturgical book to which 1QM 15.5 referred as containing the ‘prayer of the appointed time for wa[r]’.” Duhaime, The War Texts, 49.

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to subdue and to humiliate the prince of the (היום מועדו) Today is his appointed time realm of wickedness. (1QM XVII, 5)

has shined forth for us, [ ] us the hand of Your mercies with us in [ ] (והיום) Today eternal redemption, in order to remove the domi[n]ion of the enemy, that it might be no more; the hand of Your strength. In bat[tle ] our enemies for an absolute slaughter. ,is pressing upon us [to] pursue their multitude. (1QM XVIII (ועתה היום) Now the day 10b-12) The final section of text (XV—XIX) reiterates battle imagery from previous sections with the emphasis on “today” as the appointed time for the final war and the annihilation of wickedness. Though the reality of eschatological warfare might have remained on the horizon during the time this text was in use, enactment of it allowed the conceived world of the text to become part of the lived experience of the group. Through the performance of powerful speech acts, ritual participants might construct a social space in which the eschatological destruction of wickedness and triumph of the chosen moves beyond the realm of conceptualization and becomes part of the experiential reality. The declaration that “today” is the appointed time adds even greater force to the speech act, calling for the realization of these events in the time and place of the ritual enactment.

If large portions of the War Scroll were performed liturgically, the enactment would have taken place over a longer period of time, keeping participants continuously in a time out of time experience. In this state, the otherworldly becomes a more enduring reality as the experience of present communion with the divine in liturgical time expands into a sense of more permanent participation in the eternal realm.367 Divine and human spaces converge in the performance of the liturgy, enabling the human worshiper to participate in both spheres simultaneously. The act of worship makes present these otherworldly realities in the “now” moment of the performance. Longer liturgical orders, such as the Songs and probably the War Scroll as well, draw out this experience over the duration of the performance, facilitating a sense of continued participation in otherworldly. Through the enactment of these longer rituals, performers make present this

367 Roy Rappaport contends that longer liturgical orders create the experience of already being in the otherworldly sphere; through the performance of these rituals participants aim to realize states of affairs. Rappaport, Ritual and Religion, pp. 19-24; 132-133. The difference, for Rappaport, between shorter, more frequent rituals and the performance of longer liturgical orders is that short, frequent practices provide regular points of contact or communion with the otherworldly, while longer liturgical orders facilitate a sustained experience of the otherworldly so the ritual performer experiences it as a more permanent state of existence.

127 otherworldly reality in which the human participants share in a common lot with angels while at the same time they seek to join the angelic entourage and become permanent participants in the heavenly worship of the eternal realm.

HASTENING THE ARRIVAL OF THE END Along with the goal of actuation, some Qumran texts convey an additional sense of urgency, calling for a hastening of time to more quickly bring about the expected events of the end – in particular, eschatological judgment. However, the focus is not so much on hastening the speed of time, per se, but rather on hastening the arrival of events that must occur before certain eschatological events can take place. As noted previously, time in the ancient world was shaped by events; it was not construed as an overarching entity, separate from the content that filled it. Time was in the events, not vice versa, so a hastening of time was really a hastening of events expected to occur within a particular time, or period. Before the times could change, certain, predetermined events had to take place.

Two ideas are central to understanding how the sectarians sought to hasten the arrival of the Eschaton through ritual practice. First is the notion that the duration of the age is fixed. Both the sectarian literature and earlier literary works preserved by the group attest to a belief that the present age consists of a series of predetermined periods that must transpire before the arrival of the end. The second notion is that time can be manipulated through ritual enactments intended to realize events. Times are multiple and when ritual or liturgical time becomes the dominant time in a society, other times are brought into alignment with the pace and goals of the ritual or liturgical time. In this way, the events of other, more mundane, times may be hastened in order to fit with the goals and timing of the dominant, ritual-liturgical time.

Periodization and Predetermined Times Predetermination368 and the periodization of time are related concepts in the Qumran sectarian texts.369 Predetermination refers to God’s selection of certain individuals (in this context,

368 Also called “predestination.”

369 Henry Rietz points out this interrelatedness, noting that God makes and orders the periods and predetermines the events to occur in each. Henry W. Morisada Rietz, “The Qumran Concept of Time,” in The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The Princeton Symposium on the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. James Charlesworth; Waco, TX: Baylor University Press, 2006), 217-220.

128 members of the sect) as His chosen ones who will inherit salvation, survive eschatological destruction, and dwell with angels in the new era. It also includes the notion that certain events are predetermined by God to occur at particular times. Periodization, on the other hand, is the organization of historical events into a sequence of periods defined by content and duration.370 It gives order to these predetermined events and allows them to be viewed through a particular lens that attempts to make sense of history – or, more precisely, to make sense of the present in light of history both past and future.371 Devorah Dimant provides a helpful explanation in her work on exegesis and time in the Qumran Pesharim:

According to the apocalyptic literature, as well as to the Qumran sectarian literature, the in the קצים ,temporal sequence of history consists of a string of well defined periods sectarian nomenclature. Each period is determined by a precise duration, by the events taking place during its course, and by its position within the entire temporal chain. Implied in this view is the idea that the temporal sequence is finite and may be calculated with precision.372 The belief that the duration of the age is fixed, even down to the length and content of each period, is somewhat of a sharp contrast to the notion that ritual acts can effect changes in time. However, these notions are not as contradictory as they may seem at first glance. Belief in the periodization of time and the fixed nature of its contents provided the framework through which time could be influenced in ritual activity. The sectarian authors regularly portray events and periods as organized according to a predetermined plan.

Amidst instructions for initiation into the congregation, the Community Rule includes a The passage is addressed to the Instructor .(קץ) brief discourse on God’s ordering of the times

370 In periodization schemes, the content of the period is almost always a defining criterion. References to duration, however, may or may not be included. See, for example, the periodization in 2 Baruch, structured according to a series of dark and light waters (2 Bar 56:5—74:4), the review of history in Enoch’s second dream vision (1 En 85— 90), and the historical review in the Damascus Document (CD II, 14—VI, 4).

371 Allen Bluedorn argues that the degree to which a culture can conceptualize future time is directly related to its perception of history. Future distance is tied to the depth of past historical reference. Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time, 123-124.

372 Devorah Dimant, “Exegesis and Time in the Pesharim from Qumran,” 377-378. To this, I would add that the literature is concerned only with establishing a sequence for the present age. The new age, by contrast, is portrayed as limitless and eternal, though not necessarily atemporal. It is the temporal sequence of the present age that is considered finite in sectarian thought.

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of (תולדות) for the purpose of teaching the Sons of Light about the generations (משכיל) humankind.373

All that is now and ever shall be originates with the God of knowledge. Before things come to be, He has ordered all their designs, so that when they do come to exist—at their appointed times as ordained by His glorious plan—they fulfill their destiny, a destiny impossible to change. (1QS III, 15-16)

מאל הדעות כול הויה ונהייה ולפני היותם הכין כול מחשבתם ובהיותם לתעודותם כמחשבת כבודו ימלאו פעולתם ואין להשנות

(1QS III, 15-16) This passage, like others among the sectarian manuscripts, affirms that God has established all things that exist and causes them to appear at specific times.374 The creation of people and the is directly tied to the destiny, or work (תעודה) occurrence of events at their appointed times

God has established for them. Consequently, once such things are determined, they are ,(פעלה)

The view expressed here indicates that the events of .(אין להשנות) not subject to change history375 are predetermined by God and must take place accordingly.

A complementary example of sectarian beliefs regarding God’s predetermination of time is evident in the historical review presented in the Damascus Document (CD II—VI). The author(s) of this text engages in a style of writing common to apocalyptic literature, in which the periods of history unfold according to a predetermined order, yet the significance of each is only discernible from the present vantage point.376 The entire historical review, beginning with the Watchers and concluding with the present generation, is introduced with an acknowledgment of God’s all-knowingness regarding the times and existence of everything.

373 1QS III, 13-14.

374 Cf. CD II, 9-10; XVI, 2; 1QS IV, 13-16; 1QHa V, 4-19a; IX, 7-20; 4Q180.

375 The content of this passage is described in the introduction (1QS III, 13-14) as instruction regarding the .(מעשיהם בדורותם) and their works by generation (תולדות כול בנו איש) generations of humankind

376 Cf. Daniel 7; 1 Enoch 85—90. Michael Stone addresses this phenomenon in his chapter, “Apocalyptic Historiography,” in Ancient Judaism: New Visions and Views (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2011), 59-89.

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He knows the times of appearance and the number and exact times of everything that has ever existed and ever will exist before it happens in the proper time, for all eternity. (CD II, 9-10)

וידע את שני מעמד ומספר ופרוש קציהם לכל הוי עולמים ונהיית עד מה יבוא בקציהם לכל שני עולם

(CD II, 9-10) In the historical review that follows, each period is defined by its notable individuals and overarching character. The content of the periods, rather than their duration, give shape to the narrative. While timing and sequence are significant, insofar as they attest to God’s superior knowledge of all things related to human experience, it is the occurrence of events and the presence of certain figures that constitute a period.

When the sectarian authors concern themselves with events past and expectations for the future, the focus is on the occurrence of certain events. The length of the period is only a secondary concern as the use of symbolic numbers indicates.377 A certain period may reach its completion when all the events ordained for it have occurred. With this view in mind, it is perhaps a little easier to consider how sectarian authors might have understood the length of the final period as something that could be influenced. If the events established for a period are known because its predetermined contents have been revealed, then the duration of the period may be manipulated by hastening the occurrence of certain events. Ritual-liturgical activity then provides the means by which anticipated events might be enacted and the arrival of the Eschaton brought nearer to the sectarian worshiper’s own place and time.

Entrainment and Changing Times Although the times were fixed in sectarian thought, the pace of the times was not necessarily determined by length or clock/calendar time, but by the completion of certain events. Content

377 For instance, the 390 year period from the exile to the rise of the sect (CD I, 3-11) is a symbolic number related to the length of time allotted for the punishment of Israel according to Ezekiel 4:5. John Collins discusses the symbolic use of 390 years in the Damascus Document. He notes, “The Damascus Document is not concerned with chronology . . . . Rather, it is concerned to illustrate the ways in which God worked in history, and to suggest that the author’s group represented the elect of the last days.” Collins, Scriptures and Sectarianism, p. 120. For more on the use of history in the Damascus Document, see Albert I. Baumgarten, “The Perception of the Past in the Damascus Document,” in The Damascus Document: A Centennial of Discovery. Proceedings of the Third International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Associated Literature, 4—8 February, 1998 (ed. J. M. Baumgarten, E. G. Chazon, and A. Pinnick; STDJ 34; Leiden: Brill, 2000), 1-15.

131 determined the changing of times, not a set duration. Related to this notion is the view that ritual activity can influence the experience of time by hastening the occurrence of certain events expected to take place in a particular time. Through the performance of rituals aimed to elicit predetermined events, sectarian worshipers sought to hasten the arrival of these events, drawing them into the present at the time of the ritual enactment.

In his work on the organization of time, Allen Bluedorn develops a theory of entrainment that helps to explain the convergence or alignment of multiple times. According to this theory, “entrainment is about rhythmic phenomena and the possibility that rhythms may converge . . . the less powerful rhythm is captured and adjusts to the rhythm of the more powerful.”378 To explain how this phenomena works, Bluedorn draws on the example of the convergence of a shift schedule with the local transportation schedule. He recounts: “For decades, the guards at Trenton State Prison, New Jersey, began their eight-hour shifts at 6:20 a.m., 2:20 p.m., and 10:20 p.m. They did so because the trolley would stop near the prison at about these same times.”379 In this example, the trolley schedule is the dominant time and the prison adjusts its shift schedule accordingly. The convergence of these separate schedules demonstrates the process of entrainment, whereby one time adjusts to meet the criteria or pattern established by the more dominant time.

Another culturally conditioned example might include the practice in the United States of school children taking the summers off from school. Originally, this practice was attached to the need for children to assist their families in harvesting crops during the summer months in agrarian-based societies. Now that agricultural practices have changed and the vast majority of school children are not involved in this type of work, there is no longer a need to attach the school calendar to the agricultural calendar. However, since the two cycles became entrained many decades ago, the school schedule with summers off has persisted in most parts of the United States, even though the previous force which brought the school calendar into alignment with the then more dominant agricultural time is no longer a factor.

378 Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time, 147.

379 Bluedorn, The Human Organization of Time, 146. Here, Bluedorn draws on an example originally offered by James S. Hirsch, Hurricane: The Miraculous Journey of Rubin Carter (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2000), 87.

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One final, more universal example of how entrainment works may be taken from the day/night cycle. In most places and throughout history, the majority of people tend to be active during the day and sleep during the nighttime hours.380 In this example, the day/night cycle functions as the dominant rhythm to which most patterns of human activity converge. Entrainment explains the process whereby multiple times may converge and become aligned with a dominant time.

For the group behind the sectarian manuscripts, liturgical time was of utmost importance. The Songs prescribe specific liturgical activity for each of the first thirteen Sabbaths of the year, while the Community Rule legislates that initiates should spend a third of each night reading, praying and blessing together (1QS VI, 6-7). The vast number of blessing and prayer texts preserved by the group further attests to the attention given to this type of activity. In a society obsessed with ritual and liturgical activity, sacred time takes precedence over mundane time and over natural rhythms as well.381

While the practice of distinguishing mundane times from sacred times may have its roots in the literature of the Hebrew Bible,382 the members of the sect took it to a new level. According to the literature of the group and the ritual practices implied therein, liturgical time took precedence over mundane time for those who belonged to the sect and practiced its rituals.383 That is to say, liturgical time functioned as the dominant time, not vice versa. When liturgical time becomes the dominant time in a group or society, two significant things take place: 1) other, more mundane activities must become aligned with the schedule of sacred activities, and 2) members of the society are kept more consistently in a state of awareness of and communion with the divine.

380 Of course, exceptions to this include certain professionals, such as hospital employees, or shift workers who may have to work through the night.

381 A contemporary example of this might be the daily worship and prayer times observed in cloistered communities, such as monasteries and nunneries, or the five daily prayers and additional Friday prayer (Salah times) practiced in Islam.

382 Cf. Gen 2:3; Lev 23; Deut 16.

383 Examples of this priority may be seen in passages like 1QS I, 14: “They are neither to advance their holy times nor to postpone any of their prescribed festivals.” The rule requiring that at least one individual must be engaged in the study of the Law, both day and night, is another fitting example of the priority of liturgical time for members of the sect (cf. 1QS VI, 6-7a).

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As noted previously, ritual or liturgical time is time out of time. The performance of liturgy enables the ritual performer to step out of mundane time and cultivate a sense of otherworldliness – of communing with the divine and being caught up in the world of angels and eternal beings. This was a regular practice for the members of the sect for whom liturgical time functioned as the dominant order. With a high priority given to liturgical time, members regularly sought the realization of events enacted in the liturgy in order to bring the predetermined events of history into alignment with the realities performed in liturgical time. The prioritization of liturgical time as the dominant time in the practices of the group provided a way for the sectarians to assert some level of influence over the occurrence of these events. Through powerful speech acts and the performance of rituals in liturgical time, ritual enactors might influence the rate at which predetermined events take place with the overall goal of hastening the completion of the final period.

Hastening Time through Ritual Enactment The liturgy of the sect, enacted through speech and ritual performances, facilitated the experience of present communion with the divine with a view toward the individual’s future incorporation in the eternal realm. Additionally, the enactment of some of these rituals might have included the goal of hastening the arrival of the End. The predetermination of events and their organization into periods provide the structure through which the pace of time might be manipulated. When events are known, they can be enacted and made present in the performance as a way of speeding up their occurrence and hastening the consummation of the period. Devorah Dimant brought attention to another form of hastening time that appears in 4Q521 and Pseudo-Ezekiel, and then in subsequent Jewish and Christian writings. She refers to the phenomenon that appears in these texts as “time curtailing.” In Pseudo-Ezekiel, the shortening or compression of time is part of the divine response to Ezekiel’s query regarding Israel’s restoration.384 Ritual performance likewise hastens the experience of time when it enacts anticipated realities, drawing them into the present, and sets the pace for the experience of other times (entrainment). Through the process of entrainment, the dominant liturgical time of the sect

384 Dimant points to 4Q385 4 as an example; here, Ezekiel asks God to hasten the time to speed the arrival of Israel’s inheritance. Devorah Dimant, “Resurrection, Restoration, and Time-Curtailing in Qumran, Early Judaism, and Christianity,” in RevQ 19/4 (December, 2000): 527-548.

134 sets the pace for all other times and experiences. Events still anticipated might be brought into alignment with liturgical time through their ritual enactment in the present.385

Some of the texts, mentioned earlier in the chapter, include eschatological expectations the group anticipated to occur in its own time. For instance, the instructions for the banquet in the Rule of the Congregation are intended for the time “when [God] has fathered the Messiah 1QSa II, 11-12a).386 Acting out the scene is one ;אם יוליד ]אל [א]ת [המשיח אתם ) ”among them way the group might make present the event anticipated – the arrival of the Messiah. Accordingly, the ritual action aims to draw the event into the present by setting the stage for its occurrence. Time then may hasten through the actions of the ritual actors who proactively establish the conditions necessary for the event to take place, causing it to occur earlier than it otherwise would have.

The Songs of the Sabbath Sacrifice, which are concerned with otherworldly realities already existent in the present, include an emphasis on the future fate of the sectarian worshiper as well – namely, his full incorporation into the celestial realm and its worship. Though the angelic worship depicted in the text is portrayed as a present reality already accessible to members of the sect through participation in the liturgy, it is not yet a permanent reality. Access to the otherworldly is available in the time of the ritual performance. However, the ultimate goal of the sect, to achieve permanent incorporation into the heavenly priesthood and its structure, was sought through the performance of the liturgy. Through the regular performance of the liturgy, members might do more than secure their permanent incorporation into this realm; they might actually hasten its arrival.

The enactment of this long liturgical order enabled members to experience a sense that they were already participating in the otherworldly realm. Engaging in the ritual offered the benefit of present communion with divine beings and the experience of worship in the heavenly

385 In this way, past, present, and future may be seen to converge in certain ritual performances of the sect, since knowledge of the past shaped future expectations and future expectations might be made present in the time of their ritual enactment.

386 This text mentions only one Messiah, the Messiah of Israel, whereas 1QS mentions “the Messiahs of Aaron and Israel” (1QS IX, 11) and the Damascus Document has “the Messiah of Aaron and Israel” (CD XIX, 10; XXI, 1) possibly indicating one or two messiahs. Sometimes other eschatological figures are mentioned as well, such as the Prophet whose arrival is anticipated along with the Messiahs in 1QS IX, 11.

135 realm, and also aimed to make that experience permanent by establishing the sectarian worshiper’s fit-ness for that realm and modeling his potential for service in the otherworldly priesthood. The sectarians who actively engaged in such rituals were already leaning into another reality. While the present age persisted, they concerned themselves with matters of eternal consequence and enacted future or otherworldly realities with the intent that the performance itself might hasten the permanent establishment of the otherworldly reality in their own time.

The War Scroll likewise addresses events that are both future and otherworldly, providing the sectarian worshiper a means of drawing these events into the present through the performance of the liturgy. Anticipated events of the War Scroll include an eschatological war that results in the final defeat of the Kittim, the annihilation of the wicked, and the elevation of the Sons of Light along with their permanent incorporation into the lot of the eternal holy ones. The question of whether the entire text or only portions of it were used liturgically determines the purpose of the enactment. If battle scenes described in the text were ritually enacted, the performance might have aimed to set those events in motion. However, if only the more overtly liturgical material was a subject of performance (such as 1QM X—XIV), then the goal may have been more hortatory and focused on the performers’ beliefs regarding their status and destiny. The actual use of the text by the group probably lies somewhere in the middle.

Even if battle scenes were not acted out, much of the text lends itself to ritual enactment either in the form of speech acts or performance.387 While the beginning of the text identifies participants in the war and sets up battle scenes, the majority of the text deals with preparations for war and its predetermined outcome, both of which affirm the anticipated victory of the Sons of Light. Right at the outset, the outcome of the eschatological judgment, which coincides with the war, is laid out. The defeat of the forces of Belial results in the eternal annihilation of wickedness (1QM I, 5-6), followed by an eschatological takeover of the forces of light (1QM I, 8-9a) and eternal redemption for those chosen by God. The purpose of the war and its outcome are summarized in the following two lines:

387 As noted in the previous section, the writing on banners and implements of war might function as powerful speech acts intended to realize the titles and declarations of the writing (cf. 1QM III—VI).

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The Sons of Light and the forces of Darkness shall fight together to show the strength of God with the roar of a great multitude and the shout of gods and men; a day of disaster. It is a time of distress fo[r al]l the people who are redeemed by God. In all their afflictions none exists that is like it, hastening to its completion as an eternal redemption (1QM I, 11-12) .(מחושה עד תומה לפדות עולמים)

These lines reiterate the dual purpose of the war388 – to show the strength of God and to hasten to completion the final eschatological events depicted in the text.389 Through the ritual enactment of the text, or portions of it, the sectarians might lean into the reality of war in an effort to elicit the final battle that would result in their eternal redemption. The war itself was not the thing sought, but the completion of the events predetermined for the final period. For a group that might have felt marginalized on account of their intentional separation from other populations and institutions, the eschatological war was likely a welcome event, as they believed it was the last event standing between a present time full of distress and their eternal redemption and inheritance. Hastening the arrival of the war through performative acts and speech might more quickly bring about the end of the period, and in this case, the end of the age as well.

CONCLUSION Members of the sect operated in two spheres simultaneously. They were at once residents of earth, not yet fully incorporated into the eternal life, and already co-participants in heavenly/otherworldly activities alongside angels. Identification with the sect and participation in its rituals provided the locus from which these individuals might gain present access to the otherworldly. This distinctly sectarian social space, carved out through particular constructions of time and space, separated group members (the righteous, Sons of Light) from the rest of the wicked age and provided the context for divine-human communion in the present. It was a liminal space in which new possibilities of access were already in effect for these chosen individuals. While present communion was not the ultimate goal, it did demonstrate an individual’s degree of fit-ness for participation in the otherworldly and served as an important step in the ultimate goal of incorporation into the eternal realm.

388 The purpose of the war is first mentioned in 1QM I, 8-9. See the discussion in the previous section.

.in the Dead Sea Scrolls corpus מחושה As far as I can tell, it appears that this is the only occurrence of 389

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In this liminal space, ritual practice served as the means through which the future- otherworldly might be ushered into the present, lived experience of group members. Such realization was possible in a culture that measured time according to the events that filled it and believed that periods (past, present, and future) were arranged according to a predetermined plan. Through the performance of certain rituals and speech acts, members of the sect sought to actuate anticipated events and otherworldly realities with the goal of making the otherworldly reality part of the sectarian’s permanent experience. Knowledge of the content and arrangement of periods provided an additional level of influence over the course of time, making it possible for the sectarians to ritually enact anticipated events with the expectation that doing so might hasten their full incorporation into the ranks of eternal beings.

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Chapter 7

Conclusion

In a time in Jewish history marked by political unrest and social and religious diversity, the group behind the Qumran sectarian literature sought a level of peace and security that could only be found somewhere beyond the present, earthly scene. The present time, in the hands of the sectarian authors, became a place full of possibility for the properly-aligned individual. Constructions of time and space created the proper context, while the self-identity of the group provided the proper association for present communion with the divine with the goal that this present communion would also secure the individual’s full incorporation into the eternal realm at the turn of the age.

For members of the sect, the ability to participate with the divine was, in part, an issue of proximity, defined by temporal-spatial frames as well as by social boundaries. Constructing the present period as the last days, a period on the cusp of transition to a new age, opened up a range of possibilities for human-divine communion that was not previously available. The present was understood as a liminal state with overlapping connections to both the human and the divine realms. Participation in the group offered an alternative to living in the wicked age. Because the periods overlapped – the age of wickedness and the “last days” – the sect provided a safe space apart from the age of wickedness. From this particular social space, members of the sect considered themselves to be the vanguard moving toward eschatological salvation. In this way, the sectarian authors claimed the temporal-spatial location of the group established the proper context for present participation with the divine and incorporation into the ranks of eternal beings.

Beyond its role in offering the proper social context for present communion with the divine, the sect provided the social identity necessary for an individual’s anticipated incorporation into the eternal realm at the end of the age. Membership in the group allowed the individual to enter into the liminal time-space with its greater degrees of openness and accessibility to divine spaces. Through the initiation process, the individual donned an eternal

139 nature by virtue of his incorporation into the group and identification with its eternal nature. On one level, entry into the sect can be understood as an event that foreshadows the successful initiate’s future incorporation into the divine realm. On another level, initiation into the group is itself a type of performative act aimed at realizing the individual’s anticipated incorporation. Joining the sect was the first port of entry on a route intended to lead the initiate to permanent assimilation into the eternal realm. Yet, although membership in the sect was considered a necessary step in the process, it alone did not guarantee the successful completion of the process. A tension remained between the initiate’s corporate and individual identities. By virtue of joining the group, the initiate became grafted into an eternal entity and assumed a corporate identity that allowed him to participate in aspects of the divine realm, such as worship with angelic beings. However, his individual nature was not lost in the process, but remained central to determining his status and rank in the governance of the sect and perhaps anticipated his place in the eternal realm as well.

The main event anticipated in the writings and liturgy of the group – permanent incorporation into the eternal realm – hinged on the first two steps: living in the proper temporal- spatial context and belonging to the sect. Once these factors were in place, the stage was set for the individual’s participation in the divine through the ritual-liturgical activities of the group, with the goal that this participation would lead to his permanent incorporation into the eternal realm. Regular liturgical cycles established the time and space in which ritual participants might experience present communion with the divine, cultivating the conditions necessary for the worshiper’s elevation to heavenly spaces and anticipating his full incorporation into this realm at the turn of the age.

For members of the group, the present was a time in which those individuals who belonged to the proper temporal-spatial and social contexts might participate in worship with the divine while still awaiting the day that they would become fully grafted into its order. The gestational period leading up to the birth of the new age was not yet complete, leaving the sectarian to navigate the dangerous waters of the liminal state. Membership in the sect provided the individual access to the knowledge and rituals that, like a beacon, would guide him safely into the new age where he would share in a common lot with angels.

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Although the Qumran movement eventually melted into the diverse religious landscape of first century Judea, its beliefs about the nature of the present emerged in other religious movements appearing in its wake. In the New Testament, the Kingdom of God functions as a social space with connections to the human-earthly and divine-otherworldly. Members of this realm exist in both spheres simultaneously while anticipating the time when the kingdom will become fully manifest on earth and its citizens don its eternal nature. The late first-century Jewish apocalypse, 2 Baruch, shares with Qumran ideology the notion that certain righteous individuals join the ranks of divine beings at the dawn of the new era, becoming eternal like them and sharing in their spaces in the divine economy. Conceptualizing the present as a type of liminal state on the cusp of a transition to a new and brighter future offered hope and assurance for those navigating the treacherous waters of social, political, and religious conflict in the latter part of the Second Temple period.

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Appendix:

The Kingdom of God: a Liminal Social Space

INTRODUCTION In the latter part of the twentieth century, scholars of early Christianity began to draw connections between early Christian representations of the present and early Jewish notions of time.390 While this marked a departure from earlier scholarship, which showed little interest in locating early Christian conceptions of time within the matrix of early Jewish thought,391 certain assumptions have persisted, influencing the ways in which scholars tend to think about notions of time in New Testament literature. Loren Stuckenbruck points out that Pauline scholars have generally assumed a “‘doctrine of two ages’, in which one age follows or succeeds upon the

390 Though this discussion garnered significantly more interest in the latter part of the twentieth century, the seeds of these ideas may go back to the works of Albert Schweitzer and R. H. Charles. Albert Schweitzer, The Quest of the Historical Jesus: a Critical Study of its Progress from Reimarus to Wrede (trans. W. Montgomery; London: A & C Black, 1910). R. H. Charles, A Critical History of the Doctrine of a Future Life: in Israel, in Judaism, and in Christianity (2d ed., rev. and enl.; London: A & C Black, 1913). For later examples, see Christopher Rowland, The Open Heaven. In this work, Rowland aims to expand the notion of what might be considered apocalyptic; Alan F. Segal, Rebecca’s Children, Judaism and Christianity in the Roman World (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1986); Bart D. Ehrman, Jesus: Apocalyptic Prophet of the New Millennium (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999); and April D. Deconick, The Gnostic New Age: How a Countercultural Spirituality Revolutionized Religion from Antiquity to Today (New York: Columbia University Press, 2016). While these and other scholars of early Christianity have made important strides in drawing our attention to the Jewish context of early Christian beliefs about time, what remains lacking is a particular focus on notions of time (not just eschatology) as they relate to an apocalyptic worldview. Cf. Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “Divine Activity in Jewish Apocalyptic Literature: Focusing on the Formative Past,” n.p. [cited 3 April, 2019]. Online: https://lmu- munich.academia.edu/LorenStuckenbruck

391 In 1946, Oscar Cullmann wrote a highly influential book on the early Christian view of time, in which he argued that early Christians viewed time as linear, with Christ at the midpoint of history. Oscar Cullmann, Christ and Time: The Primitive Christian Conception of Time and History (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1964. Deutsch: Christus und die Zeit), 1946. Though Cullmann tended toward reductionism, collapsing the views of multiple authors in order to present a single, New Testament perspective, he put his finger on something important in the recognition that Jesus’ death and resurrection holds a pivotal place in early Christian views of history. However, what Cullmann and others in his generation failed to recognize is that for some of the earliest Christians the Christ event did not divide two linear, temporal ages, but instituted a change in the cosmos that was both qualitative and spatial, and had direct implications for the way early Christ-followers experienced the present. See also, John Marsh, The Fullness of Time (New York: Harper, 1952). Marsh recognizes the central importance of the Christ event for inaugurating “the last period of time,” but sees this as a sequential continuation more than a major qualitative or cosmic shift. More than Cullmann, Marsh identifies a significant change in the relationship between the earthly and heavenly domains in the early Christian view of the period immediately following the Christ event. Still, early Christian views of time, far from monolithic, were much more nuanced than Cullmann or Marsh realized.

142 other.”392 The result is a binary view of time that pictures the present in contrast to the future, eschatological age. However, early Christian and Jewish conceptions of time are much more nuanced than this. Early Christian representations tend to portray the present as a liminal time- space that belongs to an eschatological process already underway, the beginning of which is inaugurated by the Christ event. The end of the liminal present is then anticipated in various configurations of eschatological expectations. This understanding of the present, which reflects ideas discussed here in previous chapters, is also apparent in many New Testament depictions of the Kingdom of God.

In Paul and the New Testament gospel literature, the Kingdom of God is depicted as a present reality that is already accessible to certain individuals. This kingdom is sometimes referred to as the Kingdom of Heaven,393 the Father’s Kingdom,394 the Kingdom of the Son of Man,395 and Jesus’ Kingdom.396 While the concept is tied in to earlier notions in the Hebrew Bible of God’s rule over Israel, New Testament representations of the kingdom include an eschatological dimension not fully developed in these earlier texts.397 It is a space, or territory, that can be entered into in the immediate post-resurrection era, while its reach encompasses eschatological realities still anticipated. This space more closely resembles images of the present found in the Qumran sectarian literature. However, a number of scholars question whether or not the Kingdom (βασιλεία) of God should be understood as a type of space.

Many years ago, prominent scholar and theologian, Gustaf Dalman, postulated that βασιλεία, when it appears in the New Testament in relation to God’s domain, should always be

392 Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “Overlapping Ages at Qumran and ‘Apocalyptic’ in Pauline Theology,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls and Pauline Literature (STDJ 102; ed. Jean-Sébastien Rey; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2014), 312.

393 Matt 3:2; 4:17; 5:3, 10; 10:7; 11:12; 13:24, 31, 33, 44, 45, 47; 18:23; 19:14; 20:1; 22:2; 25:1. The Kingdom of Heaven (ἡ βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν) is Matthew’s preferred term.

394 Matt 6:10; Luke 11:2.

395 Matt 13:41; Luke 1:32-33.

396 Matt 20:17-21; cf. Mark 10:35-37. Matthew uses the term βασιλεία (ἐν τῇ βασιλείᾳ σου), whereas Mark has “glory” (ἐν τῇ δόξῃ σου).

397 John Bright traces the origins of the notion of the Kingdom of God to Exodus 19—20. John Bright, The Kingdom of God (Nashville: Abingdon, 1953), 28.

143 conceptualized as the “rule” or “reign” of God rather than a physical or territorial kingdom.398 Dalman’s theory gained instant popularity, providing a ready solution for a problem that had persisted in New Testament scholarship. How should one understand βασιλεία in relation to

God’s domain if it is not physical, political, or geographical like the βασιλείας of the world?399 Since Dalman, scholars have generally followed this view, interpreting βασιλεία as “rule” or “reign”, consciously or unconsciously emptying it of any spatial sense typically associated with the term.400 While this understanding of βασιλεία addresses the concern to indicate that the Kingdom of God (βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ) is unlike other kingdoms, it does not adequately communicate the nature of the Kingdom of God as it is represented in New Testament literature. Against the backdrop of scholarly treatments of the Kingdom of God as primarily a rule or reign, Loren Stuckenbruck has begun to chart new paths for thinking about New Testament and early Christian conceptions of the present as a type of space. In an article that appeared in 2014, “Overlapping Ages at Qumran and ‘Apocalyptic’ in Pauline Theology,” Stuckenbruck argues that early Christian notions of time are rooted in Second Temple Jewish apocalyptic thought.401 The Christ event, for Paul and other New Testament writers, is the definitive mark of God’s breaking into the world and changing perceptions of reality.402 Its influence is both present and future-oriented, impacting the way in which individuals negotiate the present, evil age and look forward to the final annihilation of evil. In Stuckenbruck’s model, the present for Paul is the place in which the two ages overlap. While the Christ event inaugurates the beginning of the new age and provides some access to its realities, the lingering existence of the old age limits the degree to which individuals may live into and experience the new age, making

398 Gustaf Dalman, The Words of Jesus (trans. D. M. Kay; Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1902).

399 Cf. Matt 4:8 and Rev 11:15 (ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ κόσμου); Luke 4:5 (τὰς βασιλείας τῆς οἰκουμένης); Dan 2:44 (LXX: τὰς βασιλείας ταύτας).

400 More recent scholarship that follows this line of thought includes Joshua W. Jipp, Christ is King: Paul’s Royal Ideology (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2015) and Nijay K. Gupta, The Lord’s Prayer (Macon, GA: Smyth & Helwys, 2017).

401 Stuckenbruck, “Overlapping Ages,” 323-324. Stuckenbruck makes no claims to direct influence, but rather locates the development of the Pauline construction of time within the matrix of early Jewish apocalyptic thought.

402 Stuckenbruck, “Overlapping Ages,” 321.

144 the present a type of liminal space that encompasses realities belonging to both spheres, but belongs fully to neither.403 Stuckenbruck’s understanding of the present in “Overlapping Ages” reveals the need for a reevaluation of New Testament notions of the Kingdom of God from a spatial perspective. A few New Testament scholars have broached the subject in recent years: Jonathan Pennington, in his work, Heaven and Earth in the Gospel of Matthew,404 and Karen Wenell, who has written rather extensively on the idea of the Kingdom of God as a social space.405 Pennington argues, contra the majority in Matthean scholarship, that “heaven(s)” is not just a circumlocution for “God” in Matthew’s phrase, the Kingdom of Heaven (βασιλεία τῶν οὐρανῶν)406, but indicates a spatial sense.407 He observes that in the New Testament Gospels “the uses of kingdom language are too variegated and nuanced to force upon all of them the monolithic conception of kingly rule” – that “βασιλεία is a multivalent term whose semantic range at times includes spatial notions.”408 Wenell also counters long-standing beliefs and language that limit perceptions of the kingdom as a space. She argues that the Kingdom of God in the New Testament Gospels is portrayed as a social or community space that is sacred and has boundaries. For Wenell, failure

403 Stuckenbruck further develops this argument in subsequent work on the understanding of the present in the New Testament Gospels as it relates to the person and work of Jesus. Loren T. Stuckenbruck, “Jesus and Eschatology: the Notion of God’s Presence in the Second Temple Period” (paper presented at the It’s About Time conference, Toronto, Ontario, 10 June 2016). In this paper, Stuckenbruck demonstrates how Jesus’ authority over demonic powers in the gospel literature falls in line with other Second Temple period Jewish writers who understood the present as a time of transition between two drastically different experiences of the world. The defeat of evil in the past is conceptualized as the basis upon which certain individuals may take authority over it in the present and be certain of its future annihilation.

404 Jonathan T. Pennington, Heaven and Earth in the Gospel of Matthew (Supplements to Novum Testamentum 126; Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2007).

405 Karen J. Wenell, “Kingdom, not Kingly Rule: Assessing the Kingdom of God as Sacred Space,” Biblical Interpretation 25 (2017): 1-28; “The Kingdom of God as ‘Space in Motion’: Towards a More Architectural Architectural Approach,” in Constructions of Space III: Biblical Spatiality and the Sacred (eds. J. Økland, J. C. de Vos and K. J. Wenell; London: Bloomsbury, 2016): 135-150; “A Markan ‘Context’ Kingdom? Examining Biblical and Social Models in Spatial Interpretation,” Biblical Theology Bulletin 44/3 (2014): 123-132; Jesus and Land: Sacred and Social Space in Second Temple Judaism (Library of New Testament Studies 334; London: T&T Clark International, 2007); “Contested Temple Space and Visionary Space in Mark 11—12,” Biblical Interpretation 15 (2007): 323-337.

406 Cf. Matt 3:2; 4:17; 5:3, 10, 19; 8:11; 10:7; 11:11-12; 13:24, 31, 33, 44-45.

407 Pennington, Heaven and Earth in the Gospel of Matthew, 279-330.

408 Pennington, Heaven and Earth in the Gospel of Matthew, 282.

145 to acknowledge the spatial aspects of the kingdom has implications for the way in which we understand the relationship among God, people, and space. Wenell, along with Pennington, draws attention to those aspects of the Kingdom of God that portray it as a present reality that is distinctly spatial in a manner reminiscent of Qumran conceptions of the present. When considered alongside the temporally conditioned perspective of the Kingdom of God as a reality that is already present, but not yet fully manifest, a spatial perspective illuminates those aspects of the kingdom that relate to its form and function. It is a reality that can be “entered into”409 and a territory that is expanded through the activities of its citizens.410 Considering the Kingdom of God from a spatial perspective can help us more fully understand early Christian beliefs about the nature of the present as a liminal space, and even point us to potential origins of this line of thought. In the pages that follow, I hope to draw attention to some of the ways in which New Testament depictions of the Kingdom of God reflect Qumran notions of the present. First, the Kingdom of God is constructed as a type of social space that is presently accessible and has discernible temporal and spatial boundaries. In New Testament literature, writers describe the present as a liminal space that hangs on the cusp of a transition from the present age to a new age that is marked by the full manifestation of the heavenly kingdom on earth. Second, membership in this kingdom serves as a decisive factor in determining who gains access to the otherworldly realities of the kingdom. Third, participation in the Kingdom of God facilitates the experience of communion or engagement with divine beings in the present, while at the same time it anticipates the manifestation of certain events still expected to occur.

CONSTRUCTING THE KINGDOM For New Testament writers, the Kingdom of God is a social space constructed around the reign of Christ. As such, it has discernible temporal and spatial boundaries. Yet despite the consistent inclusion of temporal and spatial language in New Testament depictions of this kingdom, the majority of New Testament scholarship on the Kingdom of God has tended toward a focus on its temporal aspects, with less attention given to spatial representations associated with the

409 Cf. John 3:5; Mark 9:47; 10:15; Matt 7:21-23; 18:13; Acts 14:22.

410 Luke 10:1-11; Matt 10:18-20; Acts 1:8.

146 kingdom. New Testament writers consistently point to the “Christ event” (Jesus life, death, and resurrection) as the significant event that signals a shift in the cosmos and the inauguration of something new. It is the already inauguration of a kingdom that is not yet fully manifest. This event establishes the reign of God on earth through the activity of his messiah, extending the reach of God’s heavenly rule to earthly territories through the person and ministry of Jesus.

Notions of time and space are bound up together in New Testament representations of the Kingdom of God. Although the Kingdom of God is pictured as a reality whose limits exceed earthly boundaries, New Testament writers conceptualize an earthly dimension of the kingdom that is made present in the time and place of certain figures. On one end of the frame, the Incarnation inaugurates and establishes the Kingdom of God on earth. This is represented in the Synoptic Gospels through the birth narratives and in John through the idea that the Word became flesh.411 On the other end, the full manifestation of the kingdom is anticipated in the Parousia – an event that marks the full transition into the new age. This earthly manifestation of the Kingdom of God in human time revolves initially around the person and ministry of Jesus and then around the activities of his disciples. In contrast to other types of socio-political structures defined by geographical boundaries, the Kingdom of God is a space that is defined by the presence and activity of certain individuals.

A key concept in New Testament thought about the kingdom is the idea that the Kingdom of God can be entered into. The idea that a person is either “inside” or “outside” the kingdom attributes to it a sense of spatiality. It is a space that is already accessible to those individuals who choose to enter:

“Woe to you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the Kingdom of Heaven from people. For you neither enter yourselves nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.” (Matt 23:13)412 The image of the Kingdom of God in the Gospel of Matthew is intentionally spatially, indicated by Matthew’s preference for the term Kingdom of Heaven over Kingdom of God. Many have

411 Cf. Matt 1; Luke 1—2:20; John 1. In Mark, the Incarnation is introduced through Jesus’ baptism rather than a birth narrative (Mark 1: 1-3).

412 All translations from the Greek New Testament are mine unless otherwise noted. Cf. Matt 5:19-20; 7:21; 18:3; 21:31; Mark 10:15; Luke 11:52; 18:17; John 3:5.

147 treated Matthew’s phrase, Kingdom of Heaven, as a circumlocution, appealing to the belief that Matthew’s audience was primarily Jewish and would have found the phrase more appropriate. However, Jonathan Pennington convincingly argues that “Kingdom of Heaven” in Matthew is not a circumlocution, but rather a term chosen by the author because it conveys something specific about the nature of this kingdom – it is from heaven and it is heavenly.413

In other passages, like Mark 12:34, the spatial nature of the kingdom is implied in the belief that an individual’s place in time and space may be conceptualized in relation to his or her proximity to the Kingdom of God:

“And Jesus, seeing that he answered wisely, said to him, ‘You are not far from the Kingdom of God’ (οὐ μακρὰν εἶ ἀπὸ τῆς βασιλείας τοῦ θεοῦ). Then no one dared to ask him any more questions.” (Mark 12:34)414 The Kingdom of God is here portrayed as a reality that is near to those who embrace its ethos. Similar to the way in which the Qumran sectarian writers envision the “last days” of the sect as a place of access, New Testament authors conceptualize the present as a time in which the Kingdom of God is already accessible to certain individuals. The earthly manifestation of this kingdom in the Incarnation of Jesus is reminiscent of the Qumran movement’s identification of the last days with the rise of its founding figure, the Teacher. For both movements, the present is a place of special access because it hangs on the cusp of a transition between ages. By entering into the liminal space – the wilderness communities of the Qumran movement or the Kingdom of God in early Christianity – individuals gain some degree of access to otherworldly realities while they anticipate the full earthly manifestation of those realities with the arrival of the new age.

The transition to the new age, as it is conceptualized by Qumran and New Testament authors, is a process that begins with the activity of certain, foundational figures and extends into the future until eschatological events still anticipated are complete. Some events often associated with the Eschaton, such as the arrival or return of a messiah or the final judgment, remain future- oriented at the time of writing so that the bigger picture that emerges from these bodies of literature points to an eschatological process rather than an eschatological event. The process

413 Pennington, Heaven and Earth in the Gospel of Matthew, 297-298.

414 Cf. Luke 10:10-11; Matt 3:1-2; 4:17.

148 begins with the inaugural activity of a significant figure and encompasses the present time of the Qumran and early Christian movements. For both groups, failed or delayed eschatological expectations likely contributed to the portrayal of the present as part of an ongoing process of transition. Rather than abandon hope in their beliefs, these authors cultivated eschatological expectation by creatively envisioning time in such a way that the present belonged to a period of ongoing revelation and eschatological activity. The Kingdom of God as a social space then functioned as the site of present communion with God in the transitional period for those who became citizens through participation with Christ. Jesus’ advent extends the boundaries of the heavenly kingdom to earth and makes it possible for humans to enter by becoming one with him.

RIGHTS/RITES OF ACCESS In Qumran and New Testament thought, identification with an individual or group is a decisive factor in determining who gains present access to the otherworldly realities of God’s kingdom. An individual’s right of access to the divine is determined, according to both groups, through rites of initiation into the group. For Paul and the New Testament Gospel writers, membership in the community and access to otherworldly realities is gained through a person while at Qumran it is achieved through unification with the group. Paul’s understanding of participation in the kingdom is wrapped up in the idea of what it means for the believer to be “in Christ” and share in his rule.415 Jesus, as God’s Messiah, shares in his divine kingship and serves as his embodied representative.416 God’s people then participate in the Kingdom of God through their incorporation into the Messiah.

In the New Testament Gospels, the experience of otherworldly realities revolves around the person of Jesus. Those who follow Jesus and place themselves in close spatial proximity to him regularly experience the presence of the Kingdom of God in the form miracles, healings, and exorcisms. Through these demonstrations of power, the presence of the kingdom is experienced

415 A number of New Testament, particularly Pauline, scholars understand Jesus’ identity in the New Testament as that of king and co-regent with God. See, for example, Jipp, Christ is King: Paul’s Royal Ideology and N. T. Wright, How God Became King: the Forgotten Story of the Gospels (New York: Harper Collins, 2012). Karen Wenell, on the other hand, claims that the Gospels are rather ambiguous “in terms of affirming the identity of Jesus as king or the kingdom as Davidic.” Wenell, “Kingdom, Not Kingly Rule: Assessing the Kingdom of God as Sacred Space,” 214.

416 See Jipp, Christ is King: Paul’s Royal Ideology, 166.

149 in a way that was not previously possible. In the Incarnation, the Kingdom of God becomes manifest on earth in a way that allows people to experience the realities of the kingdom in the presence of God’s Messiah. Paul takes this a step further in his idea of the believer’s union with Christ’s spirit. For Paul, access to divine realities remains possible in the post-resurrection era through the believer’s unification with Christ’s spirit.

Paul describes the effect of the mystical union of the human spirit with the spirit of Christ in the language of new creation and through the image of a body.

Therefore, from now on we regard no one according to the flesh, even if we knew Christ according to the flesh, but now we no longer know. Therefore, if someone is in Christ he is a new creation; the old passed away; see, he has become new. (2 Cor 5:16-17)417 For just as we have many members in one body, and all the members do not have the same function, so we who are many are one in Christ and each member belongs to one another. (Rom 12:4-5)418 Through these images, Paul emphasizes the permanent condition of the believer’s transformed state. The person who joins with Christ in this mystical union becomes something entirely new.419 No longer merely a flesh-and-blood creature, the individual united with Christ participates in the spirit nature of Christ and becomes part of a spirit organism that includes all who have similarly come to salvation through this oneness.420 In the era immediately following the resurrection of Christ, as Paul understands it, certain chosen individuals have direct access to

417 Ὥστε ἡμεῖς ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν οὐδένα οἴδαμεν κατὰ σάρκα· εἰ καὶ ἐγνώκαμεν κατὰ σάρκα Χριστόν, ἀλλὰ νῦν οὐκέτι γινώσκομεν. ὥστε εἴ τις ἐν Χριστῷ, καινὴ κτίσις· τὰ ἀρχαῖα παρῆλθεν, ἰδοὺ γέγονεν καινά. (2 Cor. 5:16-17 NA28) See also Gal 6:15.

418 καθάπερ γὰρ ἐν ἑνὶ σώματι πολλὰ μέλη ἔχομεν, τὰ δὲ μέλη πάντα οὐ τὴν αὐτὴν ἔχει πρᾶξιν, οὕτως οἱ πολλοὶ ἓν σῶμά ἐσμεν ἐν Χριστῷ, τὸ δὲ καθ᾽ εἷς ἀλλήλων μέλη. (Rom. 12:4-5 NA28) See also 1 Cor 12:12-26.

419 April DeConick describes union with Christ as a possession by his spirit, so that everything Christ experienced, including his death and resurrection, is also experienced by the believer who is baptized in his name. April D. DeConick, “Jesus Revealed: The Dynamics of Early Christian Mysticism,” in With Letters of Light: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Early Jewish Apocalypticism, Magic and Mysticism (ed. D. V. Arbel and A. A. Orlov; Ekstasis 2; Berlin: DeGruyter, 2010), 317.

420 Paul makes a firm distinction between the heavenly Christ and the earthly Jesus. In his view, Jesus represents “the cosmic, preexistent Christ” who is born of a woman as a mortal human, but is transformed into a life-giving spirit. Paul identifies Christ with the God of Israel (Isa 45:22-23; Phil 2:10-11; 1 Cor 10:4) and maintains that Christ existed from the beginning, not the human Jesus (Phil 2:6-7). Jesus’ death facilitated the shedding of his fleshly form so he could be resurrected into a glorified form as Christ. James D. Tabor, Paul and Jesus: How the Apostle Transformed Christianity (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2012), 135.

150

God through their mystical union with the spirit of the resurrected Christ. On account of this union, the believer now has access to the heavenly sphere: “But God . . . made us alive with Christ . . . and raised us up and seated us together in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus” (Eph 2:4-6).421 Union with Christ is the means through which believers become members of an organism with eternal qualities and gain the assurance of a future resurrection in which they will take on a heavenly form (1 Cor 15:47-49).422 In Paul’s view, Christ’s resurrection institutes a new reality that is fully operative in the present, though not yet outwardly visible.

Both the New Testament and the Qumran sectarian authors share in common the view that the individual who joins the movement gains special, present access to otherworldly realities and may participate in some way with divine beings. Initiation into the group is a determinative factor that in the New Testament is gained through a person. The early Christian practice of baptism was the means through which an individual identified with Christ in his death, burial, and resurrection, and became joined to the group.423 Ritual washing also served an important function at Qumran. Though it is unclear whether or not some form of baptism was part of the ceremonial initiation into the Qumran movement, it appears to have served an important maintenance function – maintaining the individual’s ritual purity and standing within the group.424 Through initiation, members of both groups became incorporated into a special, group

421 ὁ δὲ θεὸς πλούσιος ὢν ἐν ἐλέει, διὰ τὴν πολλὴν ἀγάπην αὐτοῦ ἣν ἠγάπησεν ἡμᾶς, καὶ ὄντας ἡμᾶς νεκροὺς τοῖς παραπτώμασιν συνεζωοποίησεν τῷ Χριστῷ,- χάριτί ἐστε σεσῳσμένοι- καὶ συνήγειρεν καὶ συνεκάθισεν ἐν τοῖς ἐπουρανίοις ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ, (Eph. 2:4-6 NA28)

422 Regarding the relationship between Jesus’ resurrection and the general, eschatological resurrection, Joost Holleman argues that the connection of these two events is Paul’s own invention. He contends that “Jesus’ resurrection did not stem from the tradition of the eschatological resurrection, but from the tradition of the heavenly vindication of the martyr.” Since Jesus was the representative of emerging Christianity, his resurrection “became the prototype of the eschatological resurrection, and the eschatological resurrection came to be seen as participation in the resurrection of Jesus.” Holleman, Resurrection and Parousia, 131, 187.

423 The purpose of baptism is twofold. Through water baptism, a person is cleansed from sin (Rom 6:4) and raised to new life in which he/she becomes united with Christ and the body of believers (1 Cor 12:13). Paul regularly describes baptism as an act in which the initiate participates in the death and resurrection of Christ. Though the individual does not physically die in the baptism ritual, the act is more than merely symbolic for Paul. April DeConick describes union with Christ as a possession by his spirit, so that everything Christ experienced, including his death and resurrection, is also experienced by the believer who is baptized in his name. April D. DeConick, “Jesus Revealed: The Dynamics of Early Christian Mysticism,” in With Letters of Light: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Early Jewish Apocalypticism, Magic and Mysticism (ed. D. V. Arbel and A. A. Orlov; Ekstasis 2; Berlin: DeGruyter, 2010), 317.

424 In her book-length study on the concept of washing away sin in the Bible, Lesley DiFransico demonstrates that the while the idea of washing away sins appears as a metaphor in the Hebrew Bible, it later becomes a symbolic

151 identity with ties to the eternal. The body of Christ425 metaphor in the New Testament and eternal plant/fountain426 metaphor prominent in Qumran literature allude to the eternal nature that is gained through membership – a nature that ostensibly grants the individual present access to divine realities that otherwise remain inaccessible.

EXPERIENCING THE KINGDOM As it is represented in the New Testament, the Kingdom of God is a space that is experienced through action. In the Gospels, the locus of kingdom activity revolves around the presence and ministry of Jesus and his followers. Jesus’ presence is a catalyst for conflict with opposing spirits and his earthly ministry demonstrates how the effects of evil may be managed during the interim period between its defeat and total annihilation. The miracles and power displayed in Jesus’ actions are then embodied in his disciples and followers as they go out from him and perform signs and wonders in his name. Through this progression of kingdom activity, the social space of the kingdom expands corresponding to its increasing citizenry.

Apotropaic prayers427 and ritual activity at Qumran that seek to curtail the effects of evil provide a frame of reference for considering the New Testament Gospels’ depictions of Jesus’ confrontations with evil spirits and authority over sickness and death. God’s decisive defeat of evil in the past serves as the bedrock of belief in the idea that its effects could be managed in the present.428 In the Damascus Document, an individual’s conversion to the teachings of the sect

ritual action. This practice of ritual washing as a solution for sin and impurity appears first in the Qumran sectarian texts and continues into the New Testament literature. Lesley DiFransico, Washing Away Sin: An Analysis of the Metaphor in the Hebrew Bible and its Influence (Leuven; Paris; Bristol: Peeters, 2016), 145-146, 200.

425 1 Cor 12:12-20. Cf. 1 Cor 10:17; Rom 12:4-5; Eph 4:11-12.

426 Cf. 1QS VIII, 5; XI, 8; 1QHa VI, 15; VIII, 6 (plant) and 1QHa XIV, 17; XVIII, 31; 1QSb I, 3, 6; 4Q418 81+81a, 1 (fountain)

427 Cf. Aramaic Levi (4QLevb ar = 4Q213a); Plea for Deliverance (11QPsa = 11Q5); 11QApocryphal Psalms (11Q11).

428 A case may be made that the flood, which symbolizes God’s definitive victory over evil in the Enochic literature, which was highly regarded within Qumran circles, served as the basis for the group’s understanding of the present as a time in which evil was already defeated but not yet entirely eradicated. See Jub 10; 1 En 84:2-6; also CD II, 17— III, 1, which references the fallen angel story within the review of history. For more on the origins and defeat of evil within this tradition, see Archie T. Wright, The Origins of Evil Spirits: The Reception of Genesis 6:1-4 in Early Jewish Literature (rev. ed.; Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2015) and Loren T. Stuckenbruck, The Myth of Rebellious Angels (WUNT 335; Tübingen, Mohr Siebeck, 2014).

152 secures his freedom from Mastema.429 However, conversion alone did not safeguard the initiate from the effects of evil. The existence of apotropaic prayers and incantations in some of the Qumran scrolls indicates a belief in the necessity of prayer for warding off evil spirits and keeping the effects of evil at bay. Esther Eshel understands apotropaic prayers as requests for God’s protection from evil spirits and distinguishes them from incantations. Incantations, according to Eshel, are concerned with the permanent eradication of harm and address the forces of evil, whereas apotropaic prayers aim to limit the damage caused by evil spirits in the present.430

In the New Testament Gospels, the activities of Jesus and his disciples are directed at curtailing or managing the effects of evil in the present. Jesus’ presence signals the arrival of God’s kingdom on earth – a reality that is made visible in demonstrations of power over evil spirits and their effects.431 Through powerful utterances and performative acts, Jesus opposes evil and models for his disciples the way of effective resistance to evil forces in the present.

Jesus’ confrontation with Satan in Matthew 4:1-11 exhibits a pattern of resisting demonic forces that is already exemplified in the apotropaic prayers known in Second Temple Jewish literature, including those found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Benjamin Wold points out that Jesus’ turning Satan away in the Temptation scene reflects the way in which Mastema is turned away in the Damascus Document by the individual’s return to torah.432 In the Temptation scene, Satan challenges Jesus by using and inverting Scripture to suit his purpose and Jesus resists Satan with his own, more excellent knowledge of Scripture.433 The end of the Lord’s Prayer –

429 Cf. CD XVI, 4-5.

430 Esther Eshel, “Genres of Magical Texts in the Dead Sea Scrolls,” in Die Dämonen – Demons (eds. H. Lichtenberger, A. Lange, K. F. Diethard Rӧmheld; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2003), 396, 413. Also idem, “Apotropaic Prayers in the Second Temple Period,” in Liturgical Perspectives: Prayer and Poetry in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. E. G. Chazon; STDJ 48; Leiden: Brill, 2003): 69-88.

431 Loren Stuckenbruck develops this idea in “Jesus and Eschatology: the Notion of God’s Presence in the Second Temple Period” (paper presented at the It’s About Time conference, Toronto, Ontario, 10 June 2016).

432 Benjamin Wold, “Apotropaic Prayer and the Matthean Lord’s Prayer,” in Das Bӧse, der Teufel, und Dämonen – Evil, the Devil, and Demons (eds. Jan Dochorn, Susanne Rudnig-Zelt, and Benjamin Wold; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2016), 109.

433 Psalm 91 appears among exorcism hymns in 11QApocryphal Psalms, indicating that by the time of Qumran, this psalm belonged to a rich tradition of anti-demonic liturgy. Matthias Henze offers a helpful study of the reception history of Psalm 91, in which he proposes that in Luke’s temptation scene, “the demon par excellence inverts the

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“deliver us from the Evil One” (Matt 6:13) – may function in a similar capacity, as a performative act aimed at resisting the attacks of the Evil One.434 In the Temptation scene and the Lord’s Prayer, speech functions powerfully as an effective means of resisting evil.

According to the Gospel narratives, Jesus regularly comes into direct opposition to evil forces and reverses their effects. Through exorcisms and miracles, the Gospel writers not only demonstrate Jesus’ authority over evil, but also establish the presentness of the kingdom in his presence, making the realities of the kingdom visible and tangible by his actions. To some extent, the Kingdom of God in the New Testament appears as a space that is shaped by Jesus’ location and ministry. It is present where he is present. However, this is only the starting point for the Gospel writers who envision an expansion of the kingdom through the ministry of Jesus’ disciples.

Similar to the way in which the images of Damascus and the wilderness in Qumran literature belong to and are shaped by the people who inhabit it, the Kingdom of God in the New Testament is defined by its citizens. As Jesus’ disciples go out from him, the kingdom expands to accommodate those people and spaces who receive the message of its presence. This is the image of the kingdom portrayed in Luke 10:1-24, when Jesus sends out the seventy.435 He instructs them:

And whenever you enter into a town and they receive you, eat what is set before you and heal those in it who are sick and say to them, “The kingdom of God has come near to you” (ἤγγικεν ἐφ᾽ ὑμᾶς ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεοῦ). Whenever you enter into a town and they do not receive you, go out into its streets and say, “Even the dust of your town that clings to our feet, we wipe off against you; yet know this, that the kingdom of God has come near” (ὅτι ἤγγικεν ἡ βασιλεία τοῦ θεου). (Luke 10:8-12)

intention of the dictum, originally spoken to console those haunted by evil spirits, and turns it into a tool for temptation.” The point, according to Henze, is not that Satan uses Scripture out of context, but that he turns an anti- demonic text on its head, twisting it in support of demonic purposes. Matthias Henze, “Psalm 91 in Premodern Interpretation and at Qumran,” in Biblical Interpretation at Qumran (ed. Matthias Henze; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 2005), 185-186.

434 Regarding the ambiguity of τοῦ πονηροῦ in Matthew 6:13, see the discussion in Wold, “Apotropaic Prayer and the Matthean Lord’s Prayer,” 110.

435 Some manuscripts read seventy-two in Luke 10:1, 17.

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The Kingdom of God is here portrayed as a territory that expands to include all who receive it. As Karen Wenell puts it, the kingdom can be anywhere, but it is not everywhere.436 Because it is present in and through people, the territory of the kingdom is shaped by those who inhabit it. In this text, the disciples’ actions – healing and proclaiming the kingdom’s nearness, on the one hand, and shaking off the dust of the town, on the other – function as performative acts that either confirm the peoples’ inclusion in the kingdom or seal their exclusion. Though the decision to receive or reject the kingdom is made by the people, the choice is finalized in a performative act by the disciples.

This image of the Kingdom of God as a territory defined by people reflects the Qumran notion of the present as a time in which members of the movement form a distinct social space that exists in opposition to other spaces. The period, the last days, is envisioned as a time of separation from the age of wickedness; as such, it constitutes a distinct social space – one that is shaped and embodied by its members. Within this social space, otherworldly realities are present and accessible since the events of the Eschaton have already been set in motion, inaugurated in the rise of the Teacher and the formation of the group in the Qumran literature and in the New Testament in the Christ event. Luke further articulates this type of process-based eschatology, in which the present belongs to a period of unfolding eschatological activity, in Jesus’ emphatic response to the seventy upon their return. The disciples express their joy over the realization that even the demons submit to them in the name of Jesus. Then Jesus replies,

“I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven! See!? I have given you the authority to tread upon serpents and scorpions, and upon all the power of the enemy, and nothing will harm you.” (Luke 10:18-19) The image of the kingdom reflected in Luke 10 is that of an apocalyptic, eschatological kingdom that is already infringing upon the present through the activity of Jesus and his disciples.

CONCLUSION Though it was only possible here to offer a brief sketch of some prominent points of connection between Qumran sectarian notions of the present and New Testament depictions of the present in the image of Kingdom of God, I hope to have raised some considerations worthy of further inquiry. One point of reflection that would benefit from additional discussion is the

436 Wenell, “Kingdom, Not Kingly Rule,” 224.

155 way in which spatial perspectives might sharpen our understanding of the Kingdom of God in New Testament literature. Such perspectives, far from taking away from reflection on the temporal aspects of the Kingdom of God or Qumran notions of time, add another dimension to the conversation that can help us better understand the ways in which time and space are interconnected in these paradigms. Additionally, the significance of action and performance for giving shape to and expanding the territories of social spaces deserves greater exploration. This might include studies, informed by spatial perspectives and performance theories, of the Great Commission, the disciples’ ministry in Luke-Acts, and the Qumran War Texts. Considering the sources through these lenses has the potential to open up new ways of thinking about how early Jewish and Christian communities negotiated the present as a type of liminal space with its own set of rules of engagement.

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