Report on the Lecture by Edwin M. Yamauchi (Miami of Ohio),
"Implications of the DSS: an Update" (5 April 1995), 
by Robert Kraft.

After a brief sketch of the history of the discoveries and of 
recent revived interest spurred by the recreated text editions by 
Wacholder and Abegg, the release of the photographs, theories 
about "pierced Messiah" and Catholic conspiracy, and challenges 
to the claim of Essene origins (especially Schiffman), Yamauchi 
commented on some of the main texts and their importance:

Bible texts push us centuries earlier than previously possible, 
with interesting results. No texts of Nehemiah or Esther have 
been found to date among the DSS.

The Temple Scroll is thought by some (e.g. Yadin, Wacholder) to 
come from the Teacher of Righteousness himself, and reveals a 
great deal about the community's ideals.

Various "Pseudepigrapha" show connections of the DSS people with 
a wider corpus of Jewish literature.

A wide range of other materials include tefillin, a "horoscope" 
text now thought to refer to Noah rather than Messiah [4Q534], 
the War Scroll, the Copper Scroll of treasure locations, etc.

Yamauchi then addressed the following claims that have been made 
about the Scrolls, especially in relation to early Christianity:

-The Teacher of Righteousness is a precursor of Jesus, with death 
and resurrection associated with him (Dupont-Sommer, taken up by 
Wilson in 1955, and by Allegro, who also moved off into other 
strange directions).

-The "farfetched scenario" of Barbara Thiering, who finds all 
sorts of cryptic references to Christianity in the DSS.

-The "pierced Messiah" text publicized by Robert Eisenman and 
Michael Wise (4Q285, now considered part of the War Scroll), who 
read the unvocalized Hebrew as "they killed" (Messiah) where most 
other scholars would read "he killed him," probably with the 
Messiah figure as the subject.

-The claim of J. O'Callaghan to find Greek fragments of the 
Christian New Testament in cave 7 -- a highly unlikely 
hypothesis, now being championed by Tiede in Germany.

-The 4Q534Messiah Aramaic "horoscope" text mentioned above, which 
is now viewed as dealing with Noah (red headed!).

-The 4Q"Son of God" text (4Q246), with similarities to Danielic 
literature and a variety of interpretations including honorific 
for Alexander Balas (Milik), the anti-Christ figure (Flusser), a 
Davidic Messiah (Fitzmyer), and Melchizedek or Michael (Garcia 
Martinez).

-The passages in the Hymn Scroll from 1Q that parallel Luke 2.14 
with "men of good will" phraseology (Fitzmyer).

-The problems of trying to identify the "Teacher of 
Righteousness" and locate him chronologically. H. Stegemann has 
recently suggested around the year 150 bce, a high priest leading 
a splinter group. At this point reference was made to James H. 
Charlesworth's book on Jesus and the DSS, which lists about 24 
similarities between the Teacher of Righteousness and Jesus, but 
also about 27 differences. The lecture closed with the 
observation that the Teacher, unlike Jesus, has disappeared from 
the scene of history as a significant force.

The subsequent discussion included questions and clarifications 
concerning:

-The lawsuit won by E. Qimron in Israel preserving his right to a 
reconstructed textual edition of 4QMMT (a countersuit has been 
entered in US courts).

-The possible connections between Jesus and the Essenes.

-The problematic nature of Charlesworth's attempt to enumerate 
differences between a little known historical Jesus and a less 
known Teacher of Righteousness. 

-The dating of the DSS and of other biblical manuscripts, where 
our knowledge of actual biblical materials is pushed back about a 
thousand years.

-Further on the Catholic conspiracy theories, which have no 
basis.

-The light thrown by the DSS on early Christian eschatology and 
apocalyptic interests.

-What to read to learn more: Yamauchi recommended the paperback 
by E. Cook, Solving the Mysteries of the DSS: New Light on the 
Bible (Zondervan 1994).

/end/