| Evidence from Primary Sources: Evidence from primary sources that supports the identification of the Qumran community as an Essene center is of two types: classical sources that explicitly place Essenes on the western shore of the Dead Sea approximately near the site of Qumran, and descriptions in classical writings of the beliefs and practices of the Essenes that match those of the Qumran community as depicted in their own texts and by their artifacts.
Pliny the Elder The ancient Roman historian Pliny the Elder compiled a detailed list of places and curiosities throughout the Roman world from Spain to India. When describing the Dead Sea, one of the earth’s marvels because it is both the lowest point on land and the saltiest body of water on the planet, he made the following observation: On the west side of the Dead Sea, but out of range of the noxious exhalations of the coast, is the solitary tribe of the Essenes [Esseni], which is remarkable beyond all other tribes in the whole world, as it has renounced all sexual desire, has no money, and has only palm-trees for company. Day by day the throng of refugees is recruited to an equal number by numerous accessions of persons tired of life and driven thither by waves of fortune to adopt their manners. Thus through thousands of ages (incredible to relate) a race in which no one is born lives on for ever; so prolific for their advantage is other men’s weariness of life! Lying below the Essenes [literally: these] was formerly the town of Engedi, second only to Jerusalem in the fertility of its land and in its groves of palm-trees but now like Jerusalem a heap of ashes. 39Though a few discrepancies arise when one matches the details of Pliny’s description with the actual site of Khirbet Qumran, 40 resolutions of the difficulties have been presented, and his text remains one of the pillars on which the widely accepted notions of both Essene habitation of Qumran and Essene authorship of the scrolls rest.41
Dio Chrysostom’s Writings The classical writer Dio Chrysostom (ca. a.d. 40–112) is also reported to have written that the Essenes were located near the Dead Sea. Chrysostom’s biographer, Synesius of Cyrene (ca. a.d. 400), commented concerning some lost writings on this subject: "Also somewhere he praises the Essenes, who form an entire and prosperous city near the Dead Sea, in the centre of Palestine, not far from Sodom." 42 The significance of this comment lies in the fact that it provides us with another independent historical source that definitely identifies a Dead Sea community in the middle of Palestine as being Essene.
Descriptions of Distinctive Beliefs and Practices If we had only the evidence of Pliny and Dio Chrysostom at our disposal, alternate theories regarding the identity of the Qumran community would still seem inferior. In truth, however, we have much more. The second body of evidence helping to identify the Qumranites as Essenes comes from comparisons between classical sources that describe Essene theology and the Dead Sea Scrolls themselves. The ancient writers Josephus (a.d. 38–100), Pliny (a.d. 23–79), Philo Judaeus (ca. 20 b.c.–a.d. 50), and Hippolytus (a.d. 170–235) complement and agree with the Qumran texts to an impressive degree. One scholar compared descriptions of beliefs and practices from Josephus and from the scrolls and concluded that there are twenty-seven definite parallels between Josephus and the scrolls; twenty-one probable parallels; ten concepts in Josephus that have no known parallels in the scrolls; and six apparent discrepancies between the two sources regarding beliefs or practices of the Essenes versus Qumranites. 43 This impressive tally has been increased by other experts who have explained and harmonized many of the difficulties between Josephus and the scrolls.44Following are the most significant parallels documented by both the major classical authors and the scrolls that help identify the ancient people of Qumran as Essenes.
Common Ownership of Property A seminal point on which the scrolls and classical descriptions of the Essenes coincide regards the individual ownership of property. Both the Jewish philosopher Philo and the Jewish historian Josephus speak in admiring tones about common ownership of property among the Essenes. From Josephus’s Jewish War we read: Riches they despise, and their community of goods is truly admirable; you will not find one among them distinguished by greater opulence than another. They have a law that new members on admission to the sect shall confiscate their property to the order, with the result that you will nowhere see either abject poverty or inordinate wealth; the individual’s possessions join the common stock and all, like brothers, enjoy a single patrimony. 45The Qumran text entitled the Rule of the Community lays out the legal principles by which property is regulated among members of the covenant community: Then when he has completed one year within the Community, the Congregation shall deliberate his case with regard to his understanding and observance of the Law. And if it be his destiny, according to the judgement of the Priests and the multitude of the men of their Covenant, to enter the company of the Community, his property and earnings shall be handed over to the Bursar of the Congregation who shall register it to his account and shall not spend it for the Congregation. . . . But when the second year has passed, he shall be examined, and if it be his destiny, according to the judgement of the Congregation, to enter the Community, then he shall be inscribed among his brethren in the order of his rank for the Law, and for justice, and for the pure Meal; his property shall be merged and he shall offer his counsel and judgement to the Community. 46
Predestination Another important identifying parallel centers on the theological concept described variously as predestination, predeterminism, or the doctrine of fate. Josephus describes the differences between the major sects of Judaism regarding this idea:
A parallel belief at Qumran is articulated in a number of texts, including different copies of the Thanksgiving Scroll, the War Rule, the Damascus Document, and the Rule of the Community. This quote from the Rule of the Community shows the Qumran parallel with Josephus’s description of the Essenes. Keep in mind that Josephus wrote for gentile readers, and that members of the Jewish sects would have discussed the notion of God’s predetermined plan instead of "Fate": From the God of Knowledge comes all that is and shall be. Before ever they existed He established their whole design, and when, as ordained for them, they come into being, it is in accord with His glorious design that they accomplish their task without change. 48Also instructive are a few lines from a Qumran text called the Ages of the Creation (4Q180): 49 "Interpretation concerning the ages made by God, all the ages for the accomplishment [of all the events, past] and future. Before ever He created them, He determined the works of . . . age by age."50
The Afterlife The few Old Testament references to an afterlife are expanded in nonbiblical texts found at Qumran. The book of Jubilees (not original to Qumran but probably regarded as canonical scripture there) 51 gives perhaps the best representation of the Qumran idea of life beyond mortality:Then the Lord will heal his servants. They will rise and see great peace. He will expel their enemies. The righteous will see (this), offer praise, and be very happy forever and ever. They will see all their punishments and curses on their enemies. Their bones will rest in the earth and their spirits will be very happy. They will know that the Lord is the one who executes judgment but shows kindness to hundreds and thousands and to all who love him. 52This text indicates that a fundamental aspect of the belief in an afterlife at Qumran was centered on an assurance of the immortality of the soul and continued existence with the angels of heaven, but without benefit of a bodily resurrection. The nature of the afterlife described in texts from Qumran matches closely Josephus’s understanding of the basic Essene belief in the immortality of the soul. In fact, Josephus draws important distinctions between the Essenes and the Pharisees, as well as between the Essenes and the Sadducees. The Pharisees believed in a bodily resurrection in addition to believing in the everlasting nature of the soul. The Sadducees denied the idea of the immortality of both body and soul. Of the Essenes Josephus says: It is a fixed belief of theirs that the body is corruptible and its constituent matter impermanent, but that the soul is immortal and imperishable. Emanating from the finest ether, these souls become entangled, as it were, in the prison-house of the body to which they are dragged down by a sort of natural spell; but once they are released from the bonds of the flesh, then, as though liberated from a long servitude, they rejoice and are borne aloft. Sharing the belief of the sons of Greece, they maintain that for virtuous souls there is reserved an abode beyond the ocean. 53Analysis of a messianic text from Qumran entitled Messianic Apocalypse (4Q521) indicates that at least one person associated with the community may have also believed in a bodily resurrection. It is not clear from the document who is acting—God or the Messiah—but this description seems to be a direct reference to bodily resurrection: "He will heal the slain, and the dead he will cause to live." 54 Since most of the Qumran texts support Josephus’s assertion that bodily resurrection was not taught at Qumran, this reference does not call into question an Essene identification of the Qumran community. It may, however, give some credence to the description of Hippolytus who, writing in the second century a.d., long after the physical demise of the Qumran community, said that the Essenes did believe in resurrection. It is possible that the perspectives presented by both Josephus and Hippolytus are valid, even though they seem to contradict one another, because their information could have come from different sources. Josephus may have presented the doctrine held by the majority, while Hippolytus’s perspective might have been based on doctrines held by a few individuals.
The Communal Meal One of the distinctive practices of the community involved a ritual cleansing followed by the partaking of a communal meal. As noted above, archaeological evidence testifies of the importance attached to an abundant supply of fresh water at Qumran. Several passages from the Rule of the Community describe the meal and cleansing activity of the regular members of the covenant community: They shall eat in common and pray in common and deliberate in common. Wherever there are ten men of the Council of the Community there shall not lack a Priest among them. And they shall sit before him according to their rank and shall be asked their counsel in all things in that order. And when the table has been prepared for eating, and the new wine for drinking, the Priest shall be the first to stretch out his hand to bless the first-fruits of the bread and new wine. 55They shall not enter the water to partake of the pure Meal of the Saints, for they shall not be cleansed unless they turn from their wickedness: for all who transgress His word are unclean. 56After he [anyone] has entered the Council of the Community he shall not touch the pure Meal of the Congregation until one full year is completed, and until he has been examined concerning his spirit and deeds. 57Josephus describes similar activities among the Essenes in language that strongly links those activities to the practices of the Qumran covenanters. He says the Essenes work until the fifth hour of the day, then they again assemble in one place and, after girding their loins with linen clothes, bathe their bodies in cold water. After this purification, they assemble in a private apartment which none of the uninitiated is permitted to enter; pure now themselves, they repair to the refectory, as to some sacred shrine. When they have taken their seats in silence, the baker serves out the loaves to them in order, and the cook sets before each one plate with a single course. Before meat the priest says grace, and none may partake until after the prayer. 58The fact that the Rule of the Community and Josephus agree on specific aspects of the communal meal—including practices not found among the members of any other known groups in the ancient world—makes identification of Qumran with the Essenes virtually certain. Both Josephus and the Rule of the Community describe premeal ritual bathing, the observance of a specific ranking among participants, and prohibitions against initiates partaking of the pure meal (the Qumran covenanters enforced a strict initiation procedure, requiring a mandatory two-year probationary period before applicants could become full-fledged members of the covenant community). Such evidence for Essene identification of the Qumran settlement is impressive.
Non-Use of Oil The curious practice among Essenes of avoiding the use of oil is described by Josephus: "Oil they consider defiling, and anyone who accidentally comes in contact with it scours his person; for they make a point of keeping a dry skin and of always being dressed in white." 59 The Qumran texts not only speak of the same practice, but actually explain why it was observed. In a text entitled Miqsat Ma>aseh ha-Torah (4QMMT) we learn that Qumranites believed that liquids were superconductors of ritual impurity, particularly when oil held in one container came in contact with another vessel. Hence, oil on the skin increased the danger of being contaminated by other objects carrying ritual uncleanness.60
Toilet Habits As one scholar notes, the parallels between classical sources and Qumran texts run the gamut from the lofty and sublime to the lowliest and mundane. 61 This is nowhere better demonstrated than by discussions of ancient toilet practices. Josephus reports that the Essenes did not defecate on the Sabbath:On other days they dig a trench a foot deep with a mattock—such is the nature of the hatchet which they present to the neophytes—and wrapping their mantle about them, that they may not offend the rays of the deity, sit above it. They then replace the excavated soil in the trench. For this purpose they select the more retired spots. And though this discharge of the excrements is a natural function, they make it a rule to wash themselves after it, as if defiled. 62From the War Rule at Qumran, a text describing regulations for the conduct of a holy war against evil in the last days, we have an exact parallel to Josephus regarding the ritually contaminating properties of bodily discharges as well as the offensiveness of nudity associated with defecation: "No man shall go down with them on the day of battle who is impure because of his ‘founts,’ for the holy angels shall be their hosts. And there shall be a space of about two thousand cubits between all their camps for the place serving as a latrine, so that no indecent nakedness may be seen in the surroundings of their camps." 63Two other bits of information are instructive. A hatchet of the type described by Josephus has apparently been found in Cave 11. And the Temple Scroll, also from Cave 11, offers legislation on proper toilet procedures that links the Essenes of Jerusalem with the Qumran covenanters. The Temple Scroll, which describes God’s ideal, pure temple in the holy city of Jerusalem, states. "And you shall make them a place for a hand [latrines] outside the city to which they shall go out, to the north-west of the city—roofed houses with pits within them, into which the excrement will descend, so that it will not be visible at any distance from the city." 64Jacob Milgrom, an authority on ancient Israelite concepts of purity and holiness, offers this comment: Because of the Temple Scroll, we have the support of an outside source that, indeed, the Qumran sect was part of the Essene movement. For the law of Qumran was practiced by the Essenes of Jerusalem [toilet regulations]. Moreover, Josephus tells us that one of Jerusalem’s gates was called the Essene Gate. Heretofore it has never been identified. Josephus locates it near a place called Bethso. That name too has never been identified. But thanks to the Temple Scroll, both problems have been solved. Bethso, it turns out, is not a place name. It is Hebrew beth so’ah or "toilet." Thus the Essene gate [sic] was not a real gate but an opening in the city wall at the nearest point to their toilets, a wicket which they could squeeze through one at a time. 65The Essene Gate has now been found in what was the northwest section of ancient Jerusalem.
Spitting The last bit of evidence we shall cite is important precisely because it is such a curious little detail. Both Josephus and the Rule of the Community report that spitting was prohibited among the Essenes and at Qumran. The Rule of the Community declares that "whosoever has spat in an Assembly of the Congregation shall do penance for thirty days." 66 Similarly, Josephus says of the Essenes, "They are careful not to spit into the midst of the company or to the right."67More detailed parallels could be drawn and intricate arguments constructed. But enough of the salient features of the Qumran community have been outlined to demonstrate the weighty evidence in favor of definitively identifying the Qumran sectaries as Essenes. Let us now briefly round out our picture of life and institutions at Qumran.
Introduction | Section 1 | Section 2 | Section 3 | Section 4 | Section 5 | Section 6 | Summary and Notes |