HOW TEXTS FROM THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS ARE CLASSIFIED
DeSALVO in his book tells us on page 58 how the Dead Sea scrolls are classified:
Hartmur Stegmann - a scroll researcher from Germany put forth the method in the 1990s.
HE built 4 classifications:
And so with it we have these classifications:
BIBLICAL - 223 texts 29 percent
NONSECTARIAN - 192 texts 25 percent
SECTARIAN - 249 texts 33 percent
UNIDENTIFIED - 96 texts 13 percent
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EXAMPLE say in the Biblical class: the book of Isaiah is one of the most represented books in the scrolls - 19 copies have been identified. The psalms are represented in a great number - 39 copies have been found. 20 copies of Deuteronomy have been found. They are 1,000 years older than anything we had before. But not all are identical to the Bible books in our KJV Bible. The book of
Isaiah is pretty well identical to our current Bibles. Two versions of the book of Jeremiah were found, one very close to what we have in our present Bible, the other is different in length and order. Many of the psalms are also different, and in different order.
The Temple Scroll is a non-sectarian example and TWO copies were found. Its concern is with the temple, its construction, and its ritual sacrifices.
There is a non-sectarian texts relating to angels. A collection of hymns and prayers, which the angels offer to God. A main focus in the topics of prayers is towards the temple in heaven, which they believed as our KJV Bible gives, the temple on earth was a reflection of the temple in heaven.
The "sectarian" scrolls are the ones that give us the understanding of the beliefs, practices, and rituals of the community who wrote these scrolls. Cave 1 gave us the most important scroll under this classification - called "Rule of Community." It is the way of life that members should live, details for new members, vows, feast days, etc.
It has a section on the teaching of the "two spirits" - man is composed of both good and evil. They taught that it was God who created the amount of good and evil in a person, the person had no choice, and it could not be changed or modified. Each person had a total of 9 parts. Some were good and some were evil. The highest level you could be born with was 8 parts good and 1 part evil. The worst you could be born with was 8 parts evil and 1 part good. The community would try and determine this level as they did not want to admit into their community someone who was mainly evil. The practiced astrology and certain divination techniques to determine the amount of good and evil in a person. They believed in "physiognomy" - the physical appearance determined inner traits and characteristics.
We see from what DeSalvo is telling us that these people were way off in many points from the target of the truths of God.
They had a section called the "Manual of Discipline." And as it implies a text of disciplinary procedures.
The community had a "master" - under him "priests" - this section contains how the community was formed, how to join, rules and regulation, and the penalties for violation of any of the rules - different degrees of penalty for different violations. Could go from decreasing the amount of food given at meal times to expelling from the community. There was the "Congregational Rule" - rules to follow when the Messiah appeared - be prepared militarily for the end times. There is a section of "blessing" probably used in community services. There is a section for Sabbath rules, legal aspects, and a section for the rules of women and children, applied to the part of the community not ascetic or celibate. There is a section called the "War Scroll." People are not sure if it was literal or figurative, as they believed an overall view of "as above, so below." As the battles on earth is the sons of light against sons of darkness, so the battle raged in heaven between good and bad angels. They believed there would be a 6 year end time war, in which the good would win, Jerusalem retaken and proper worship in the temple restored. They taught there would be another 33 years of war until the destruction of all other rebellious nations was completed.
So again we see this community as DeSalvo is describing to us had some truths, mixed with error. So it is of course with most religious groups apart from the true spiritual body of Christ - there is truth mixed with much error. The Roman Catholic church has truths, but the error is way more than the truth it holds.
The "unidentified" class of scrolls, about 96, the experts are still working on deciphering these.
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NEXT WE WILL LET DeSALVO EXPLAIN TO US "WORKING WITH AND DATING THE SCROLLS."
Isaiah is
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