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osddso
Guest
does the catholic church recognize the dead sea scrolls? or did they give the scrolls the boot?
i tried doing a search on here, nothing came up
i tried doing a search on here, nothing came up
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patrick457
Guest
Course it does! Why in the world would you think the Church would “give the boot” on the earliest witnesses to the text of the Old Testament that we have, even to one valuable resource on Jewish thinking near and around the time of Jesus?
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peary1
Guest
THe Church recognizes the Dead Sea Scrolls for their historical value.
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thistle
Guest
And they show that scripture has been accurately copied over the millenia.
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spockrates
Guest
They contain a complete scroll of the book of Isaiah that was penned prior to Christ’s birth. This is important for at least two reasons:
- As mentioned already, no significant differences were found between it and the oldest copies of Isaiah, even though it was a good one thouand years older (thus, it is good evidence the Jewish scribes were very good at keeping errors out of the Old Testament)
- The predictions of Christ’s life, death and resurrection in Isaiah cannot be explained away as someone adding them to the text after the fact (example: the 53rd chapter of Isaiah)
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Fidelis
Guest
It should also be mentioned that, in *addition *to copies of inspired canonical Biblical books, the Dead Sea Scrolls also includes much additional literature that is particular to the Essene community at Qumran that is thought to have produced all these scrolls between around 200 BC to about AD 150 or so. These other scrolls contain disciplinary and prophetic texts which NO ONE considers inspired or canonical (unless there some ancient Essenes still hanging around).
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patrick457
Guest
Ah, the rather mysterious Qumranic community!It should also be mentioned that, in *addition *to copies of inspired canonical Biblical books, the Dead Sea Scrolls also includes much additional literature that is particular to the Essene community at Qumran that is thought to have produced all these scrolls between around 200 BC to about AD 150 or so. These other scrolls contain disciplinary and prophetic texts which NO ONE considers inspired or canonical (unless there some ancient Essenes still hanging around).
I remember reading about how there were a lot of conspiracy theories when some of the DSS were not yet published*, some of them centering on the theory that the rest of the scrolls contain something that would undermine the history of Christianity and thus the Vatican (it’s always the Vatican, isn’t it?
) suppressed publication of the scrolls so that the ‘ignorant and gullible masses’ - a permanent fixture of conspiracy theories - would never know the truth. Eventually, of course, the rest of the scrolls were finally published in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and the reality was not as dramatic as what people were expecting. Personally, I think the OP has been exposed to one of these pieces of hogwash, based on his question (whether the Church has “[given] the scrolls the boot”). He can now be rest assured that no, the Church did not do anything with them.
*To quote from this page:
Some of the documents were published in a prompt manner: all of the writing found in Cave 1 appeared in print between 1950 and 1956; the finds from 8 different caves were released in a single volume in 1963; and 1965 saw the publication of the Psalms Scroll from Cave 11. Translation of these materials quickly followed.
The exception to this speed was the documents from Cave 4, which represented 40% of the total material.
The publication of these materials had been entrusted to an international team led by Father Roland de Vaux, a member of the Dominican Order in Jerusalem. This group published the first volume of the materials entrusted to them in 1968, but spent much of their energies defending their theories of the material instead of publishing it.
Geza Vermes, who had been involved from the start in the editing and publication of these materials, blamed the delay - and eventual failure - on de Vaux’s selection of a team unsuited to the quality of work he had planned, as well as relying “on his personal, quasi-patriarchal authority” to control the completion of the work.
As a result, the finds from Cave 4 were not made public for many years. Access to the scrolls was governed by a “secrecy rule” that allowed only the original International Team or their designates to view the original materials.
After de Vaux’s death in 1971, his successors repeatedly refused to even allow the publication of photographs of these materials so that other scholars could at least make their judgments.
This rule was eventually broken: first by the publication in the fall of 1991 of 17 documents reconstructed from a concordance that had been made in 1988 and had come into the hands of scholars outside of the International Team; next, that same month, by the discovery and publication of a complete set of photographs of the Cave 4 materials at the Huntington Library in San Marino, California, that were not covered by the “secrecy rule”.
After some delays these photographs were published by Robert Eisenman and James Robinson (A Facsimile Edition of the Dead Sea Scrolls, two volumes, Washington, D.C., 1991). As a result, the “secrecy rule” was lifted, and publication of the Cave 4 documents soon commenced, with five volumes in print by 1995.
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NHInsider
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If the OP means by accept “adopt as canonical” the answer would be “no.” But then the Church did not Suppress books like the letters of Clement or the Protoevangelium of James, either, as some suggest. She just said they could not be proclaimed as “the Word of the Lord.”
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peary1
Guest
One of the more pronounced antiCatholic conspiracy theories of stupidity is that the Vatican was afraid to ‘release’ the dead sea scrolls because they constituted a direct threat to Christianity, and if they were to be released, Christianity and the Church would implode.
Prior to 1968, most of the known scrolls and fragments were housed in the Rockefeller Museum (formerly known as the Palestine Archaeological Museum) in Jerusalem. After the Six Day War, these scrolls and fragments were moved to the Shrine of the Book, at the Israel Museum. Others are housed in the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute, Princeton Theological Seminary, Azusa Pacific University, and in the hands of private collectors. **Very few **are in the hands of the Vatican Museum.
Prior to 1968, most of the known scrolls and fragments were housed in the Rockefeller Museum (formerly known as the Palestine Archaeological Museum) in Jerusalem. After the Six Day War, these scrolls and fragments were moved to the Shrine of the Book, at the Israel Museum. Others are housed in the University of Chicago’s Oriental Institute, Princeton Theological Seminary, Azusa Pacific University, and in the hands of private collectors. **Very few **are in the hands of the Vatican Museum.
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Fidelis
Guest
Conspiracy Theories are generally kooky, and this particular CT has no legs at all.
It’s pretty well established around the academic community that the delay in the translation and publication of the DSS was not due to a sinister conspiracy by anyone (let alone the Vatican –sheesh!
), but rather to a small group of scholars who were given charge of the manuscripts and proceded to work v-e-e-r-r-y-y slowly (over several decades, in fact) on some manuscripts while letting others languish, not making them unavailable to other scholars.
The lid kind of got blown off when someone finally got fed up and published photographs on the internet so that now they are accessable to everyone.
It’s pretty well established around the academic community that the delay in the translation and publication of the DSS was not due to a sinister conspiracy by anyone (let alone the Vatican –sheesh!
), but rather to a small group of scholars who were given charge of the manuscripts and proceded to work v-e-e-r-r-y-y slowly (over several decades, in fact) on some manuscripts while letting others languish, not making them unavailable to other scholars.The lid kind of got blown off when someone finally got fed up and published photographs on the internet so that now they are accessable to everyone.
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patrick457
Guest
It’s always the same story, isn’t it? I think that 99% of anti-Christian conspiracy theories involve the following elements:
1.) The masses are so gullible and stupid enough to be deceived for millenia.
2.) Christianity is evil.
3.) The masses are a bunch of dumb folk.
4) Christianity hides the truth, which are a direct threat to them.
5.) The very evil Christians - more specifically, the Catholics in the form of the Vatican - hides some potential threat to the faith to (1) keep the masses dumb and gullible and (2) so the reality that they are a bunch of evil liars will never ever be discovered.
6.) Those who ‘know the truth’ are obviously smarter than the brainwashed common man.
7.) Did I mention that the masses are so stupid and gullible?
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