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orion Golb's article
From: Yirmiyahu Ben-David <yirmyahu@netzarim.co.il>
Subject: Golb's Article
At 21:07 01/09/97 -0400, Jim West wrote:
>I have been directed to a 1994 article by Professor Golb which is available
>at this URL
>http://www.uchicago.edu/u.scholarly/deadsea/Golb_AQ_1994
Thanks. I found it most enlightening. Familiarity with its content is a must.
I must say that my one inquiry to the Israel Antiquities Authority several
years ago resulted in a stonewalling and dismissive response from them
entirely consistent with Dr. Golb's descriptions. I don't buy all of Golb's
views, for example his positions vis-a-vis MMT and Qimron were based on
articles before Qimron's book which addressed Golb's criticisms -- most
adequately IMO. Also, unless I missed it somewhere Qimron doesn't attribute
MMT to the Moreh Tzeddeq, writing instead: "If MMT was composed -- or
believed to have been composed -- by the Teacher of Righteousness, this
would explain the great authority assigned to it among the Qumran
sectarians." (MMT can well be older than the extant copy.) Thus, I neither
reject nor embrace the Qumran Essene identification, nor side with or
against either set of scholars. I have no axe to grind except to dig down
to whatever solution may eventually unfold. But neither do I accept
authoritarian dismissiveness. It's unscientific and lends no credance, or
integrity, to their position. Certainly a scholar who publicly announces
equating the Qumranians with the Essenes will have a career interest
motivation to make it work, a bias that requires special effort to keep in
check clouding objective scientific method. On a different wave length,
stonewalling, including that which Golb has documented, tends to make me
suspicious of a hidden agenda (which I will discuss only privately by
individual request, not in this forum).
Due to a technical glitch, this message of 09/01 bounced, giving me the
opportunity now to add my second to Judith's messages -- which made explicit
the hidden agenda to which I referred.
Yirmiyahu Ben-David
Paqid 16, Qehilat Ha-Netzarim (Nazarene Jews)
www.netzarim.co.il
Ra'anana, Israel