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Re: orion present-tense Essenes
Stephen,
> Please let me find out if I understand your post (17 July Re: orion
> present tense Essenes) correctly. I'm not sure how your metaphor "to
> stretch Occam's razor to the max" applies, but I'll focus elsewhere.
See under B).
> I think you hold that:
> A) Pliny located Essenes near Ein Gedi.
That seems to be the most natural reading.
> B) Pliny described their post-70 CE status.
That seems the simplest way of explaining his statement that accounts
for all the known facts. Hence Occam's razor.
> C) Pliny described them in present tense.
Yes.
> D) Pliny said they were at that location for a long time.
That I didn't actually say. I don't know this for sure, because I
haven't been able to read the context of his statement yet.
> Of course, I disagree with (A) and (B), but, if these are your views, I
> have questions. How did an Essene group manage to continue their long-term
> settlement (i.e., one which must have at least started before 70) through
> the war with Rome? Wasn't there destruction at Ein Gedi as well as at
> Qumran? Why have archaeologists and bedouin not found a suitable long-term
> site near Ein Gedi--or have they?
I'll defer to the archaeologists among us on these questions. And
I'm going to have to do something I don't often do in this kind of
situation: I'm going to have to back out of the discussion as much as
possible. The reason is as simple as it is frustrating: my sources,
i.e. my library, are not currently available to me. It will likely
be another month before I can go any deeper into this kind of
discussion than I already have, simply because I don't have the
resources to check a lot of things out right now. It's quite
irritating, because I'm really enjoying this exchange with you.
However, we're crossing into realms now where I need to look things
up, double-check quotes and references, and all that good stuff, and
I am not able to at the moment. I suspect a good, healthy "AAAARGH!"
would feel pretty good right about now...
Dave Washburn
dwashbur@nyx.net
http://www.nyx.net/~dwashbur/home.html