מגילות מדבר יהודה ארבעים שנות מחקר [The Scrolls of the Judaean Desert, Forty Years of Research] (review)

Hebrew Studies 36 (1995) 215 Reviews religious situation during the time in question and has re-confirmed the conclusion that the roots of Samaritanism do not lie in a syncretistic cuIt of the province of Samaria of the eighth century B.C.E., but in a much later form of post-exilic Judaism. Reinhard Pummer University ofOttawa Ottawa. Ontario CANADA ,pno nmD C'j):J'~ n"n' ':J'O n''''lO [THE SCROLLS OF THE JUDAEAN DESERT, FORTY YEARS OF RESEARCH] [Hebrew]. Magen Broshi, Sarah Japhet, Daniel Schwartz, and Shemaryahu Talmon, eds. Pp. xii + 204. Jerusalem: The Bialik Institute and the Israel Exploration Society, 1992. Cloth. With the flood of collected works devoted to Qumran studies and a limited supply of title possibilities, it must be noted that this book is not the same as the E. J. Brill/Magnes Press volume of similar name (The Dead Sea Scrolls. Forty Years ofResearch. 1992). The Brill edition contains the papers read at the symposium hosted by University of Haifa and Tel Aviv University, March 20-24, 1988. The book reviewed here contains the papers from the Jerusalem Symposium, June 23-24, 1987. Shemaryahu Talmon's contribution "Between the Bible and the Mishna-the World of Qumran from Within," is available in English. with minor additions, in The World of Qumran From Within (Jerusalem: Magnes Press; Leiden: E. J. Brill. 1989) pages 11-52. His rather pessimistic introduction, in which he reports that after forty years of research on the scrolls the initial hopes of new light on a dark age "did not materialize" (p. 14). now seems a bit dated as a new generation of scholars armed with a virtual flood of materials has recaptured the initial enthusiasm of discovery . A real contribution is made in his stated purpose. demonstrating "that the Qumran Covenanters were poised between an ideational attachment to the world of the Hebrew Bible and the emerging world of the Mishna" (p. 19). The remainder of the article develops the thesis that the rabbinic view of the biblical era was as a "closed chapter" (p. 23) while the Qumran Covenanters saw themselves as "standing within the orbit" (p. 23). Magen Broshi briefly addresses items of continuing debate in "The Archeology of Qumran-A Reconsideration." The article is concerned Hebrew Studies 36 (1995) 216 Reviews with some of the more important aspects of Qumran archeology: the caves, the building known as the "Community Center," chronology, the cemetery, and the number of inhabitants. He concludes with a short consideration of the suggestion that 'Ein el-Ghuweir is yet another site inhabited by the same sect. An English translation of this article is available in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Forty Years ofResearch (Jerusalem: Magnes Press; Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992) pages 103-115. Emanuel Tov's article, "The Biblical Scrolls from the Judaean Desert and their Contribution to Textual Criticism," has a tripartite purpose: to examine the scrolls' contribution to our understanding of the transmission of the biblical text, their text critical importance, and even their importance to the field of literary criticism. Although this study has to a great degree been superseded by his own Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible (Philadelphia: Fortress; Assen: Van Gorcum, 1992), it is perhaps the best and latest example of his studies which concentrate on the value of the Qumran biblical texts. Yaakob Sussmann's article, "The History of Halakha and the Dead Sea Scrolls," has appeared in two additional publications. First, again in Hebrew, it was published in Tarbi; 59 (1989/90) pages 11-76 with greatly expanded footnotes. In English, it has appeared as Appendix 1 of Discoveries in the Judaean Desert X [MMT], by Elisha Qimron and John Strugnell (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994) pages 179-200. Regarding the results of his study of the document known as MMT (n"nn ,~»c n~pc), Sussmann is in concert with expectations when he reports that the halakhot recorded in MMT are "invariably stringent" (p. 112) and that "the halakha which the sect challenges is Pharisaic" (p. 112). More worrisome to the thinking of most Qumran researchers is his conclusion that "the halakha of the scroll is identical to that which the talmudic rabbis...