George J. Brooke

This booklet is a fresh consideration of German-speaking scholarship on the Dead Sea Scrolls; it divides the scholarship into two phases corresponding with pre- and post 1989 Germany. In the first phase the dominant place given to how the scrolls inform the context of Jesus is analyzed as one of several means through which the study of Judaism was revitalized in post-war Germany. Overall it is argued that the study of the Scrolls has been part of the broader German tradition of the study of antiquity, rather than simply a matter of Biblical Studies. In addition the booklet stresses the many very fine German contributions to the provision of study resources, to the masterly techniques of manuscript reconstruction, to the analysis of the scrolls in relation to the New Testament and Early Judaism, and to the popularization of scholarship for a thirsty public. It concludes that German scholarship has had much that is distinctive in its study of the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Brooke illuminates the first-century world shared by the Qumran community and the writers of the New Testament. The Dead Sea Scrolls have provided Old Testament scholars with an enormous wealth of data for textual criticism as well as theology. But, as Brooke skillfully demonstrates, New Testament scholars can use the Scrolls to learn more about the linguistic, historical, religious, and social contexts of Palestine in the first century. A wide range of topics and themes is discussed, including Matthew's Beatitudes, the lost song of Miriam, Levi and the Levites, women's authority, and the use of scripture in the parable of the vineyard.

This book contains the papers delivered at the 1996 Copper Scroll Symposium which was organized by the Manchester-Sheffield Centre for Dead Sea Scrolls Research to mark the 40th Anniversary of the opening of this enigmatic scroll in Manchester. The papers cover the history of the Scroll's interpretation (P. Muchowski, P. Davies, B. Segal, M. Wise); how it should be conserved, restored and read (N. Cacoudre, M. Lundberg, E. Puech); how it was produced (P. Kyle McCarter); the meaning of its technical terms (J.F. Elwolde, A. Lange, J. Lefkovits, J. Lubbe, L. Schiffman); its genre (M. Bar-Ilan, R. Fidler, T. Lim); its geography (P.S. Alexander); its correlation with archaeological remains (H. Eshel); and not least who wrote it, when and why (S. Goranson, I Knohl, H. Stegemann, B. Thierine, A. Wolters) with an Introduction by G. Brooke. This is volume 40 in the Journal for the Study of Pseudepigrapha Supplement series.