The Poetry of the Damascus Document
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The Poetry of the Damascus Document by Mark Boyce Ph.D. University of Edinburgh 1988 For Carole. I hereby declare that the research undertaken in this thesis is the result of my own investigation and that it has been composed by myself. No part of it has been previously published in any other work. ýzýa Get Acknowledgements I should begin by thanking my financial benefactors without whom I would not have been able to produce this thesis - firstly Edinburgh University who initially awarded me a one year postgraduate scholarship, and secondly the British Academy who awarded me a further two full year's scholarship and in addition have covered my expenses for important study trips. I should like to thank the Geniza Unit of the Cambridge University Library who gave me access to the original Cairo Document fragments: T-S 10 K6 and T-S 16-311. On the academic side I must first and foremost acknowledge the great assistance and time given to me by my supervisor Prof. J. C.L. Gibson. In addition I would like to thank two other members of the Divinity Faculty, Dr. B.Capper who acted for a time as my second supervisor, and Dr. P.Hayman, who allowed me to consult him on several matters. I would also like to thank those scholars who have replied to my letters. Sa.. Finally I must acknowledge the use of the IM"IF-LinSual 10r package which is responsible for the interleaved pages of Hebrew, and I would also like to thank the Edinburgh Regional Computing Centre who have answered all my computing queries over the last three years and so helped in the word-processing of this thesis. (L) Aim The central aim of this thesis is to analyse the text of the Damascus Document, plates I-Vill and XIX-XX, with a view to separating out the original underlying poetical passages. The germ of this idea came from Soloff's article Ors uul Texl'e L% Towards uncovering Zadokite Documents' (NTS, 5, he Athe p62-67) where reconstructed the underlying poetry of CD 11-21 and suggested that further poetry existed in the following columns. I have therefore tried to demonstrate the full extent of this poetry and have brought in parallel passages from the Manual of Discipline where relevant. Having identified the poetry, I have subsequently shown in the second chapter that three basic strands exist in the Damascus Document, poetical, redactional, and midrashic, all of which can help determine the Sitz im Leben and the date of both the individual components and the overall document. Finally in a chapter of corollaries, I have briefly considered the wider context in order to demonstrate how these conclusions help to clarify our understanding of Qumran theology and history. Mark Boyce - July 1988. Total text - 93,000 words. («) Table of Contents. Abbreviations. Chapter 1: An analysis of the Hebrew Text of the Damascus Document, I-Vill and XIX-XX. 1 Preface: The Facets of Poetry. 1 1.1: The First Poem: 11-21.14 1.2: The Second Poem: 22-13.50 Appendix I: The Two Spirits Passage: 1QS.313-426.67 1.3: The Third Poem: 214-320.86 1.3.1: The Ezekiel 4415 Midrash: 320-46.128 1.3.2: The semi-poetic redactional passage: 46"12.138 1.4: The Nets of Belial and the Builders of the Wall: 412-511.14111 1.4.1 The Midrash on the Nets of Belial: 412b-19a 151 1.4.2 The two nets that have ensnared the Builders of the Wall: 419-511.155 1.5: The Fourth Poem: 511-63.168 1.5.1 The Well Midrash: 63-1'. 185 1.6: The Twelve Duties for those who have entered the Covenant: 611-710 = 191-6.195 Appendix I: A parallel credal passage in 1QS. 11-15.225 1.7: The Warnings: 710-821 and 196-2034.231 1.7.1 The 'Parallel' Passages of 710-82 and 196-14.233 1.7.2 The Textual Problems of Manuscript A: 7 10-21 242 1.7.3 The Textual Problems of Manuscript B: 197-13.248 1.7.4 The leaders of Judah: 83-19 3 1915-33.252 1.7.5 The Redactor's Warnings: 1933-2027.275 1.7.6 The Second Promise: 20-3427 294- . Chapter 2: The Literary Genres of the Damascus Document and their bearing on the wider field of Qumran Studies. 300 2.1: An examination of the literary genres found within CD. 300 (4 2.2: The Damascus Document in its wider environment. 310 2.2.1 The poetry of the Damascus Document in the wider context of the Scrolls and contemporary literature. 310 2.2.2 The Redactor(s) of the Damascus Document and the Pesharim. 315 2.2.3 The Author of the four Midrashim and 4QFlorilegium. 319 2.3: The Sitz im Leben of the Damascus Document. 323 2.3.1 The Babylonian Theory. 324 2.3.2 The Annual Covenant Festival Theory. 326 2.3.3 The non-Qumran Essene Theory. 329 2.4: The date of the Damascus Document. 330 2.4.1 Palaeography and the Qumran manuscripts of CD. 330 2.4.2 The dating of the poetical sections of the Damascus Document. 332 2.4.3 The dating of the Redactor of the Damascus Document. 333 2.4.4 The dating of the four Midrashim of the Damascus Document. 335 Appendix 1: The Laws of CD IX-XVI. 337 I.I. The Composite Nature of the Laws. 337 1.11.The relative dating of the Laws (IX-XVI) to the other Scrolls. 342 Chapter 3: Corollaries. 348 3.1: Corollaries regarding the Theology of Qumran. 348 3.1.1 Messianism. 348 3.1.2 Temple. 357 3.1.3 Law. 370 3.1.4 Covenant. 382 3.2: Corollaries regarding the History of Qumran. 387 3.2.1 The External Evidence of the Scrolls: Archaeology and the Historical record. 387 3.2.2 The Internal Evidence of the Scrolls: The Identity of the Wicked Priest. 393 Bibliography of Books. 401 Bibliography of Articles. 409 (w) Abbreviations. Charles = Charles, R.H. The Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament, Volume 2, p785-834, Oxford 1913. Charlesworth Charlesworth, J. H. The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha, London, Volume 1 1983, Volume 2 1985. Davies = Davies, P.R. The Damascus Covenant; an interpretation of the Damascus Document, Sheffield 1983. Dupont-Sommer, = Dupont-Sommer, A. The Essene Writings from Qumran, Oxford 1961. Fitzmyer refers to the 'Prolegomenon' by J. A. Fitzmyer in the reprinted 1970 edition of S. Schechter's Documents of the Jewish Sectaries, p9-24. Ginzberg = Ginzberg, L An Unknown Jewish Sect, 1976 - revised and updated translation of Eine unbekannte judische Sekte, 1922. Knibb = Knibb, M. A. The Qumran Community, (Cambridge Commentary on Writings of the Jewish and Christian World 200B. C. to A. D. 200, volume 2), Cambridge 1987. Kuhn = Kuhn, K.G. Konkordanz zu den Qumrantexten, Göttingen 1960. (Supplement in RQ, 4 (1963/64), p163-234. ) Kutscher, 1Qlsa = Kutscher, E.Y. The Language and Linguistic Background to the Isaiah Scroll (1QIsa), (Studies in the Texts of the Desert of Qumran, Vol. VI), Leiden 1974, (with corrections by E.Qimron, Leiden 1979). Lohse = Lohse, E. Die Texte aus Qumran hebräisch und deutsch, München 1964, second edition 1971. Maier = Maier, J. The Temple Scroll: an introduction, translation and commentary, Sheffield 1985. Qimron = Qimron, E. The Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls, Atlanta Georgia 1986. Rabin = Rabin, Ch. The Zadokite Documents, Oxford 1954. (v) Schechter = Schechter, S. Documents of the Jewish Sectaries, Cambridge 1910; reprinted in New York 1970 with a Prolegomenon by J. A. Fitzmyer. Schürer = Schürer, E. The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ, 3 volumes; revised by Goodman, H., Millar, F., and Vermes, G. in 1980-1987. Stegemann = Stegemann, H. Die Entstehung der Qumrangemeinde, Bonn 1971. De Vaux = Vaux, R.de Archaeology and the Dead Sea Scrolls, London 1962, revised edition 1973. Vermes = Vermes, G. The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, Harmondsworth 1962, third edition 1987; second edition indicated by 'DSSE2'. Watson = Watson, G. E.W. Classical Hebrew Poetry -A Guide to its techniques, Sheffield 1984. Articles are referred to in full the first time they are mentioned, after which only the initials of the Journal followed by the volume and page number is given. The normal abbreviations are used for biblical books (Gen., Ex., etc. ), pseudepigraphical works (Jub., etc. ), and Qumran texts (1QS, 1QM, etc. ). In presenting Hebrew text, Hebrew transliterated text, or the English translation, the following brackets have been used as indicated: <>= text which constitutes a gloss or secondary addition of some kind. {}= restored text which has been accidentally omitted by the scribe. ]= text which is illegible in the original Hebrew manuscript. = words supplied in the English translation which have no equivalent in the Hebrew text. (Y ;) CHAPTER 1 AN ANALYSIS OF THE HEBREW TEXT OF THE DAMASCUS DOCUMENT. 1-VIII AND XIX-XX. Preface: The Facets of Poetry. Before embarking on the reconstruction of the Hebrew text of the Damascus Document in an attempt to recover the original underlying poetry, there are a number of important methodological considerations which need to be examined. The first is to consider what actually constitutes poetry, or to put it another way, how we are to distinguish between prose and poetry. A decade ago Freedman' devised a mechanical test to separate prose from poetry, for he found that statistically the particles 't (the accusative) 'sr (the relative pronoun) and h- (the definite article) occur six to eight times more frequently in prose passages than in poetic ones.