Until 1946 there was little assumption that additional knowledge could be uncovered regarding the Holy Scriptures however through the discovery of ancient scrolls excavated in a settlement located near the Dead Sea, more details have become available to historians regarding both the first century Jewish and Christian communities. Uncovered were several hundred scrolls that have now become known as the Dead Sea Scrolls. The settlement, known as Qumran, located along the West Bank, South of Jericho, from which the discoveries were made, existed during the Hellenistic Period under the reign of John Hyrcanus from 134 -104 B.C.E., up until its destruction by the Roman Empire approximately 68 C.E. These scrolls, totaling nine hundred found within eleven excavated sites, give insight to the beliefs, cultural practices and communal traditions of this monastic community. From the documents, it seems evident that the Essene community sought to preserve both their holiness and obedience to God. Therefore, what is learned suggests that the Essenes lived and devoted their lives with strict adherence to the priestly order; in so doing, it was especially important for those who submitted themselves to this way of life, do so completely separated from the general communities around them. Additionally, it was their belief that those who lived outside of the sectarian way of life, did so by a manner contradictory to God’s will. Consequently, the intent of this paper will critique both the theological convictions and practices of the Qumran culture through the observation of five distinct groupings: The Demascus Document, Thanksgiving Hymns, The Community Rule, and the Commentaries. The Community Rule Documents ... ... middle of paper ... ...h the Hymns were fragments of Wisdom literature, Barki nafshi or “Bless My Soul”, and were probably grouped together due to their similarities in translation. In them there is a sense of God’s longing for, and care for man; His intentional desire to be in relationship with mankind. An example of this can be found in fr. i (4Q434), “ He has been gracious to the humble by His great kindness, and has opened their eyes to see His ways, and [thei]r e[ar]s to hear His teachings. He has circumcised the foreskin of their heart, and has delivered them because of His kindness, and directed their feet towards the way.” In reading both the Hymns and Wisdom literature I could not help but wonder the extent to which the author spent studying the books of Moses to consecrate Himself and maintain a purity with what was originally required of those exiting Egypt influence.
Anson Rainey and R. Steven Notley are the authors of The Sacred Land Bridge, which is an Atlas of the biblical world and includes maps, pictures, and historical cementation as to the significance of this region. The biblical world that this atlas focuses on is defined as the eastern Mediterranean littoral, or more commonly called the Levant in modern archeological discussions. In my critique of this book I will be focusing on pages 30-34 which will define the boundaries and explain the importance of the Levant.
Oxtoby, Willard Gurdon. "Jewish Traditions." World religions: western traditions. 1996. Reprint. Toronto: Oxford University Press, 2011. 127-157. Print.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are a series of complete and incomplete scrolls containing biblical literature, as well as some other writings that have not been identified as parallels to any biblical books. Found in Qumran, located in the Judean Desert, these scrolls have been a controversial topic in an archeological sense as well as in a religious aspect. Apparently, the scrolls were copied from other scrolls and then stored in caves near the place that they are assumed to have been written. There’s been a lot of speculation as to the true origin of the scrolls, but common opinion has it that they were copied at Qumran, a settlement near the site that they were found, and then were stored in nearby caves surrounding the settlement.
There are several Egyptian documents that not only mention the Israelites in their texts, but also tie the Bible to historical facts. Egyptian documents such as the Tell el-Amarna letters, a large “stele” of the Menephtah, and the Elephantine papyri not only tell the history of Egypt, they also coincide with biblical scripture. The documents confirm not only dates, certain numbers, and rituals, such as circumcision, but places and event, e.g. The Exodus, of biblical stories.
The Old Testament and the Bible itself has been studied extensively for centuries. Archeologists and Scholars have labored and pondered over texts trying to decipher its clues. It does not matter how many times the Old Testament has been studied there will always be something new to learn about it or the history surrounding it. In the book Reading the Old Testament: an Introduction, the author Lawrence Boadt presents us with a few different authors of the Old Testament that used different names for God and had a unique insight into the texts. These four sources are titled P for priests, E for Elohim, J for Jehovah, and Y for Yahweh (95). These four unique sources help us realize that there is more than one author of the Pentateuch. These authors took the text and adapted for their culture. This independent source is used by scholars to help gain insight into what was behind the texts of the bible so we are not left with an incomplete picture of what went into the creation of the bible. Julius Wellhausen used these four sources to publish a book to able us to better understand the sources and to give it credibility with the Protestant scholars at the time (Boadt 94). These sources that is independent of the bible as in the DVD Who Wrote the Bible? and the Nova website aide in shedding light on the history that surrounded the writers who wrote the text and what inspired them to write it in the first place. The DVD shows the discovery of The Dead Sea Scrolls and the extensive history of the texts and all its sources in an effort to try to find exactly who wrote the bible (Who Wrote). These scrolls have aided scholars immensely by giving us some of the oldest known manuscripts of the bible in the world today. It shows that the bible w...
...es.” Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. 2nd ed. Vol. 4. New York: Macmilla Reference USA, 2005. 2845-8. Print.
Smart, Ninian. "Blackboard, Religion 100." 6 March 2014. Seven Dimensions of Religion. Electronic Document. 6 March 2014.
The essentials are explained in the next few sentences. On their journey, Moses gets to Mount Sinai and is told by the holy one to climb the mountain. At this time, both he and G-d are supposedly writing the five books. Moses is also given the Ten Commandments. Now, to examine exactly what Moses and G-d did collaboratively is simple. The Torah is simply the account of the Jewish people and imbedded inside of it are six hundred and thirteen laws. Now, if you think of what the ten commandments are, they are the ten golden rules, the "critical ones" perhaps that we are taught to drive into the ground and into our minds what we must do in order to obey the Holy one.
Judaism is one of the main religions in the world today along with Christianity and Islam. The three religious beliefs share similar patriarchs and origins that have roots to Abraham. The differences that exist between Islam and Judaism are apparent, however, these are less distinct when a comparison is made between Christianity and Judaism. Regardless of the similarities that exist in the two religions, Judaism has many interesting and sometimes puzzling features. The paper will illustrate the features that I found interesting in Judaism and those that are more difficult to grasp and understand.
For the layman, familiarity with the major religions stems from the stories that are associated with them. Using the narratives that are derived from the sacred texts is the most prominent way in which our society identifies the Western religions. The Jewish tradition is best correlated to stories like the Exodus and the parting of the Red Seas, for example, as are the many tales of the miracles of Jesus connected to Christianity. This essay will present narratives as an easy method of providing the basic groundwork for the Western religious traditions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam because of their simplicity and easily transmittable nature. Furthermore, narratives impart many of the rules, laws, and moral fundamentals for these faiths, and are used by religious writers as a novel method of initiating discussion or providing a parallel for other narratives.
Eastman, Roger. The Ways of Religion: An Introduction to the Major Traditions. Third Edition. Oxford University Press. N.Y. 1999
For centuries now Christians have claimed to possess the special revelation of an omnipotent, loving Deity who is sovereign over all of His creation. This special revelation is in written form and is what has come to be known as The Bible which consists of two books. The first book is the Hebrew Scriptures, written by prophets in a time that was before Christ, and the second book is the New Testament, which was written by Apostles and disciples of the risen Lord after His ascension. It is well documented that Christians in the context of the early first century were used to viewing a set of writings as being not only authoritative, but divinely inspired. The fact that there were certain books out in the public that were written by followers of Jesus and recognized as being just as authoritative as the Hebrew Scriptures was never under debate. The disagreement between some groups of Christians and Gnostics centered on which exact group of books were divinely inspired and which were not. The debate also took place over the way we can know for sure what God would have us include in a book of divinely inspired writings. This ultimately led to the formation of the Biblical canon in the next centuries. Some may ask, “Isn’t Jesus really the only thing that we can and should call God’s Word?” and “Isn’t the Bible just a man made collection of writings all centered on the same thing, Jesus Christ?” This paper summarizes some of the evidences for the Old and New Testament canon’s accuracy in choosing God breathed, authoritative writings and then reflects on the wide ranging
However much Islam and Christianity would seem to share common ground, the discussion is not complete without noting the parallels between this two that have taken center stage. Some of the remarkable differences as they try to answer deep life complexities arise in the areas of religious practices by both their adherents and the clergy (Dorothy 13-28). “There is also a stark contrast to the belief system subscribed to, means of salvation, scriptures”. The most prominent difference present concerns the belief of life after death and practices of depicting the metaphysical
The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls has been hailed by people of many religious and cultural backgrounds as the greatest discovery of manuscripts to be made available to modern scholars in our time and has dramatically altered our understanding of the origins of Christianity. Perhaps the most fundamental reexamination brought about by the Scrolls is that of the Gospel of John. The Fourth Gospel originally accepted as a product of second century Hellenistic composition is now widely accepted as a later first century Jewish writing that may even contain some of the oldest traditions of the Gospels . The discovery of the scrolls has led to the discussion of undeniable and distinct parallels between the ideas of the society at Qumran and those present in the Gospel of John.
The Bible is the holy, inspired, infallible Word of God. Within the Bible, there are different stories and principles that the Lord gave us through special revelation. In the New Testament there were Jewish or religious groups that began teaching unbiblical doctrines. Two of those sects were the Pharisees and the Essenes. The importance of learning about these groups is so that we can see how they were wrong and to make sure we don’t mirror their actions. In this paper I will be comparing the Pharisees’ views on God and Jesus with that of the Essenes’.