The texts are written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Nabataean, mostly on parchment but with some written on papyrus and bronze.[2] The manuscripts have been dated to various ranges between 408 BCE and 318 CE.[3] Bronze coins found on the site form a series beginning with John Hyrcanus (135-104 BCE) and continuing until the First Jewish-Roman War (66–73 CE).[4]
The scrolls have traditionally been identified with the ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes, although some recent interpretations have challenged this association and argue that the scrolls were penned by priests in Jerusalem, Zadokites, or other unknown Jewish groups.[5][6]
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a collection of 972 texts discovered between 1946 and 1956 at Khirbet Qumran in what was then British Mandate Palestine, and since 1947 known as the West Bank. They were found on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, from which they derive their name.[1] The texts are of great historical, religious and linguistic significance because they include the earliest known surviving manuscripts of works later included in the Hebrew Bible canon, along with extra-biblical manuscripts which preserve evidence of the diversity of religious thought in late Second Temple Judaism.
The texts are written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Nabataean, mostly on parchment but with some written on papyrus and bronze.[2] The manuscripts have been dated to various ranges between 408 BCE and 318 CE.[3] Bronze coins found on the site form a series beginning with John Hyrcanus (135-104 BCE) and continuing until the First Jewish-Roman War (66–73 CE).[4]
ReplyDeleteThe scrolls have traditionally been identified with the ancient Jewish sect called the Essenes, although some recent interpretations have challenged this association and argue that the scrolls were penned by priests in Jerusalem, Zadokites, or other unknown Jewish groups.[5][6]
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a collection of 972 texts discovered between 1946 and 1956 at Khirbet Qumran in what was then British Mandate Palestine, and since 1947 known as the West Bank. They were found on the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, from which they derive their name.[1] The texts are of great historical, religious and linguistic significance because they include the earliest known surviving manuscripts of works later included in the Hebrew Bible canon, along with extra-biblical manuscripts which preserve evidence of the diversity of religious thought in late Second Temple Judaism.
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