TIME TO FINISH THIS SERIES ON THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS.
As John DeSalvo says in his book, most are familiar with the end time scenario in the book of Revelation. It is about the time when the evil ones reign over the earth, the coming of the Messiah to destroy them and vindicate the righteous; the dawning of a new age and the final new earth and new heaven.
The Dead Sea Scrolls have a similar scenario, with the Temple in Jerusalem rebuilt, and even more spectacular, that a heavenly Jerusalem will come down to earth from heaven.
Some have thought DeSalvo goes on to say that it was only through Christianity, the NT church that all this was revealed, but the Dead Sea Scrolls would prove otherwise. Such a belief must have been from old times.
My thoughts: it should not be surprising really, we read in Jude: "And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these things, saying, Behold the Lord comes with ten thousands of his saints" (verse 14). I'm sure from ages past the BASIS outline of prophecy was known, the book of Revelation just fills in the details.
In the Dead Sea Scrolls there is mention of a prophet who preceeds the Messiah and heralds his coming. As DeSalvo says, we had John the Baptist doing this job before the coming of Jesus in his public ministry began. It will again be repeated before Jesus comes again as Micah 4 shows and as I prove in my study on my website called "The Elijah to Come."
My thoughts: the community at Qumran must have known about John the Baptist, but how serious they took him as the forerunner of the Messiah is probably little, or they would have accepted Jesus as the Messiah, and wanted to be a part of his team and the NT Church of God; but that does not seem to be the case, as there is not one word in the NT that the Essenes or those at Qumran ever came over into the Church of Jesus Christ.
Some claim that in Cave 7 there were found fragments that in Greek that are from the Gospel of Mark and other NT texts. Other scholars disagree.
Some scholars believe the Qumran community did come over into the NT church, others disagree. I would be with those that disagree. It could hardly have been overlooked by the NT writers, especially Paul, if such a thing happened; Paul or someone would have written about it.
DeSalvo goes on to list some of the similarities between Christianity of the NT and the Dead Sea Scrolls. We have already seem them. He gives last the seemingly similarity of the "communal table" and the NT Church of God, or more correctly the way the Roman Catholic Christianity practice it. And there is the huge difference. The Qumran community around the communion table do sound like it is the Roman Catholic church. The truth of the observance of the Lord's death is all expounded fully and in detail on my website, and it ain't a Roman Catholic communal service.
AS TO THE MESSIAH
The scrolls prove whoever wrote them did NOT understand the basic truth of the Messiah at the end times. The Scrolls teach the coming of not One Messiah but TWO Messiah's at the end time. In the Scrolls you have the "priestly" Messiah, and you have the "Lay Messiah." The Lay Messiah would be the descendant of king David. The two Messiah's in Scroll teaching would unite and work together. The "teacher of righteousness" (The Scrolls claim their community was founded by the "teacher of righteousness" - hence a possible teaching that this person will be resurrected at the end time), would wield the spiritual powers and the lay Messiah would wield the secular powers. The Lay Messiah would be the warrior messiah as he would lead the battle against evil and restore the Kingdom of God on earth.
DeSalvo says the two messiah's of the Qumran community seem to some extent, to be combined in the person of the Christian One Messiah at the end time.
My thoughts: well maybe you can try and make some connection, but the bottom line is the Qumran community had it wrong, which proves they were not listening to John the Baptist or to Jesus Christ, or the Apostles of Christ, in any serious way. They had some truths here and there but were out in left field, they were NOT the true disciples of Christ, they were not a part of the New Testament Church of God.
As DeSalvo finally says, there were some similarities between the Qumran sect and the NT Church of God, BUT THERE WERE MAJOR DIFFERENCES, some we have already seen.
Some of the final words of John DeSalvo:
"This would lead to the conclusion that there was NO interaction or contact between the two groups (Qumran and Christianity). However it is important to bear in mind that the C14 dating was done on only a few selected scroll fragments. The results indicate that the date of the scrolls that were tested was between 200 B.C. and AD. 100. But it is accepted that there is a margin or error of 50-100 years and also, it is only an indication of when the animals whose skins were used actually died: that is, stopped breathing and had no more intake of C14, and not WHEN the scrolls were actually written. It is possible that the scribes used skins of animals that had died many years before; just as we may have a stock of paper, they may have had a stock of animal skins...... So, carbon dating cannot rule out the possibility that some of the scrolls were written at the time of Jesus or John the Baptist, or even later....."
THE SUM OF IT ALL - MY ANSWER
Someone wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls obviously. They prove from the scroll of the book of Isaiah, they had access to the Hebrew that the main body of the religious Jews (scribes and Pharisees) had, because the Scrolls are identical for the book of Isaiah. No big deal per se.
The writers of the Scrolls had some knowledge of the basics of end time events - evil verse good, and good finally winning; the Kingdom of God set up on earth; the religious Jews of the Pharisees taught that also.
The writers of the Scrolls had some MAJOR difference with NT Christianity.
There is no record of Jesus or the Apostles having anything to do with the sect of Judaism that lived by the Dead Sea. None of the Apostles mention them, which would be very unlikely if they as a group came into the NT Church of God.
The Dead Sea Scrolls mean nothing for true Christianity and those who are the end time followers of Jesus Christ and the inspired writing of the New Testament. For Jesus' true end time followers the Dead Sea Scrolls could have remained in the caves for all they are worth; in other words they are worthless, they add nothing for the life and belief of those who study and follow the God breathed Scriptures of the NT as preserved in the thousands of Greek MSS, which was the basis of the KJV Bible, and the Hebrew OT as preserved by the Jews.
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