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Essene name
It appears that Brad Harrison may have misunderstood part of my post
on the Essene name. I did not claim that outsiders never give names to
others. I did write that *this* particular name, the Hebrew name 'ose
hatorah (and, I would add, its variants, e.g. 'ose hayahad 4Q177 1.16)
was unlikely to be a name given by non-member Jews. naturally, the later
Greek versions of the name were used by outsiders. And it does appear as a
self-designation in the Qumran mss. group names from outsiders tend to be
negative. Compare, e.g., the self-designation Society of Friends with the
(originally) outsider name Quakers. Incidentally, though Harrison
repeated a common view that Christianoi was an outsider name, Elias
Bickerman HTR 42, 1949, 109f made a good case that the name was a self-
designation. Also, if I remember correctly, A.I. baumgarten in his 1983 JBL
article on Pharisees observed that most ancient heresy names were self-
designations (exception: cynics).
When the Qumran mss were found, the two most popular guesses for
Essene etymology (out of at least sixty proposals so far) drew on the
Aramaic roots for "holy" (het-samek-yod) and "heal" (aleph-samek-yod). F.M.
Cross declared that the former was "thoroughly suitable", and G. Vermes is
the most prominent defender of the latter (though both proposals go back to
the 16th century). In the latest ed. of his Ancient Library of Qumran Cross
admits that there was one "serious objection." (How then was it "thoroughly
suitable" before?) Cross proposes to dismiss the objection that the root in
this meaning appears only in Syriac with the claim by Michaelstone
Stone and the
dear, departed Jonas that it appears in 4QTestLevi. Robert Kugler flatly
dismisses that possibility (and is apparently backed by the concordance-
makers and others). I admit I cannot tell from the photos I've seen. In
either case it does not appear to be used as a self-designation. Also,
supporters of the Scaliger/Schurer/Cross view differ on how much they
lump the Eastern Aramaic term with ideas of Essene origins from Hebrew
Hasidim. (And Scaliger abandoned this etymology.)
The assumption that outsiders named Essenes became prominent (and
repeated as a truism) only after proponents of these two Aramaic roots
failed to find them in Qumran mss. (More precisely: find them used as self-
designations; e.g. 1QGenApoc has physicians who fail to heal pharaoh.)
If one drops that false assumption,
other options appear. Is it plausible that some ancients saw Essenes as
Jews par excellence? (As the Qumranites thought of themselves). Consider
one sentence from Philo which is often overlooked, from his Apology for
the Jews, in Eusebius, Praep. Evang. 8.11.1:
"Our lawgiver"--i.e. Moses--brought (literally, rubbed with oil or annointed
[the former translation suggested by L. Feldman]) to community
"myriads" of disciples "called Essenes."