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orion Re: perspectives, Essenes
I will try again. Since:
Pliny's source clearly referred to Qumran/En Feshkah. The scrolls
embody the views of Essenes with as much fidelity (or more) as one can
reasonably expect of ancient historians. The new Qumran ostracon, even with
various letters which reasonable people can question, is clearly a act of
conveyance whose closest parallel is surely Serek hayahad which is surely
Essene. The scrolls include the Hebrew self-designation 'osey hatorah
which led to the name "Essenes."
Aside. Lena Cansdale, despite questioning many views, repeats
(p.22) the near-ubiquitous mistake (popularized in part by Rengstorf): "It
is interesting to note that nowhere in the scrolls so far deciphered does
the name "Essene" appear." That conclusion is really a "fiction of
scholarship." A.D. Crown (p. 59) is cited as offering an etymological
proposal: sin-nun-aleph, "to hate." (That makes about sixty different
proposals so far; but the presence of the nun is problematic for Essaioi.)
Interesting that Crown associates Essenes with "hate." In his summer
abstract Crown wrote the following. Please interpret it for yourself: "If
one ignores the Essene identification one could make a case if one tried
for the scrolls to represent the the Samaritan point of view..."
The real question for open-minded historians is not whether Qumran
and Essenes are related, though anyone is free to try to keep the two
hermetically separated, if they wish.
Relevant questions include:
To what extent were the ancient historians inadequately informed or
did they select or color their presentations for certain audiences or
rhetorical intentions? What differences and developments occurred within
the Essene movement?
What role was played in history writing by non-Essenes who, in some
cases, either admired or hated the Essenes? What can we learn about the
history of Judaism and Christianity which influenced the various ways
Qumran study has been approached (not surprisingly) with some
presuppositions? For example, consider, if you will, whether events of the
Sixteenth Century still influence us: the way in which Azariah de' Rossi
brought Philo back to the awareness of Rabbinic scholarship; the
Protestants and Catholics arguing about Therapeutae and Eusebius and
monasticism; J.J. Scaliger sowing the seeds of "the Maccabean hypothesis"
of Essene origins. These and other questions, not to mention politics and
academic politics. Not to mention Rabbinic Jewish responses and reactions
to Essenes. Not to mention possible influences of Essenes on some varieties
of Christianity, varieties which do not survive in any continuous tradition
till today. This history has not been adequately written. We do have
opportunities.
Submitted by Stephen Goranson goranson@duke.edu