The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (14 page)

Supported in this way by the infallible teaching of the Community, the sectary believed himself to be living in the true city of God, the city of the Covenant built on the Law and the Prophets (cf. CD VII, 13-18). Again and again, the architectural metaphors used in the Scrolls suggest security and protection. The sect is a ‘House of Holiness', a ‘House of Perfection and Truth' (IQS VIII, 5, 9), a ‘House of the Law' (CD XIX (B2), 10, 13); it is a ‘sure House' (CD III, 19) constructed on solid foundations. Indeed the language used is reminiscent of Isaiah xxviii, 16, and of Jesus' simile about the Church built not on sand but on rock (Matth. vii, 24-7; xvi, 18):

Fortified by his membership of the brotherhood, the sectary could even carry his notions of solidity and firmness over into his own self so that he too became a ‘strong tower':

In the ideology of the Old Testament, to be a member of the chosen people is synonymous with being party to the Covenant. Israel willingly accepts the yoke of the Law given on Sinai, and God in his turn acknowledges her as His ‘special possession' (Exod. xix, 5):

Theoretically, there is no distinction between election
de jure
and election
de facto
: every Jew is chosen. But already in biblical times a deep gulf is in fact seen to divide righteous observers of the Covenant from the wicked of Israel. Though not deprived of their birthright, the unfaithful are viewed as burdened with guilt and as such excluded, provisionally at least, from the congregation of the children of God. The fully developed concept of election is summarized in the Palestinian Talmud by the third-century CE Galilean Rabbi Lazar. Expounding the words of Deuteronomy quoted above, he comments:

Inevitably, for the Qumran Essenes such a notion of Covenant membership was far too elastic. Consistent with their approach to legal matters, their attitude in regard to the Covenant was that only the initiates of their own ‘new Covenant' were to be reckoned among God's elect and, as such, united already on earth with the angels of heaven.

They insisted, moreover, on the individual election of each sectary. The ordinary Jew envisaged entry into the congregation of the chosen primarily through birth, and secondly through the symbolical initiation of an eight-day-old male infant submitted to circumcision. An Essene became a member of either branch of his sect by virtue of the deliberate and personal adult commitment of himself. For this reason, as will be remembered, even children born to married members and brought up in their schools had to wait until their twentieth birthday before they were allowed to make their solemn vows of entry into the Covenant. Also, believing in divine foreknowledge, they considered their adherence to the ‘lot of God' as the effect of grace, as having been planned for each of them in heaven from all eternity. They, the elect, were guided by the spirit of truth in the ways of light, while the unprivileged, Jew and Gentile alike, were doomed to wander along paths of darkness. The section of the Community Rule known as the Instruction on the Two Spirits gives a fascinating description of these two human groups, the chosen and the unchosen.

 

The Master shall instruct all the sons of light and shall teach them the nature of all the children of men according to the kind of spirit which they possess ...

From the God of Knowledge comes all that is and shall be. Before ever they existed He established their whole design, and when, as ordained for them, they come into being, it is in accord with His glorious design that they accomplish their task without change ...

He has created man to govern the world, and has appointed for him two spirits in which to walk until the time of His visitation: the spirits of truth and injustice. Those born of truth spring from a fountain of light, but those born of injustice spring from a source of darkness. All the children of righteousness are ruled by the Prince of Light and walk in the ways of light, but all the children of injustice are ruled by the Angel of Darkness and walk in the ways of darkness. The Angel of Darkness leads all the children of righteousness astray, and until his end, all their sins, iniquities, wickedness, and all their unlawful deeds are caused by his dominion in accordance with the mysteries of God...

But the God of Israel and His Angel of Truth will succour all the sons of light. For it is He who created the spirits of Light and Darkness and founded every action upon them and established every deed [upon] their [ways]. And He loves the one everlastingly and delights in its works for ever; but the counsel of the other He loathes and for ever hates its ways.

(IQS III, 13-IV I)

 

Convictions of this kind, with their theories of individual election and predestination, coupled with a precise knowledge of the boundary dividing right from wrong, can lead to self-righteousness and arrogant intolerance of the masses thought to be rejected by God. The Essenes, however, appear to have concentrated more on the blessedness of the chosen than on the damnation of the unpredestined. Besides, they could always argue that Jews who refused to repent and remained outside the new Covenant were responsible for their own doom.

But the spiritual masters of the Community were doubtless aware of the danger of the sin of pride to which their less enlightened brothers were exposed and attacked it on three fronts. The Qumran Hymns, unlike certain biblical Psalms (e.g. Psalm xxvi) which testify to an acute form of sanctimoniousness, never cease to emphasize the sectary's frailty, unworthiness and total dependence on God.

Not only is election itself owed to God's grace, but perseverance in the way of holiness cannot be counted on unless he offers his continuous help and support.

Another theme constantly stressed in Essene teaching is that not only is God's assistance necessary in order to remain faithful to his Law; the very knowledge of that Law is a gift from heaven. All their special understanding and wisdom comes from God.

The sentiments expressed in the Hymns, of love and gratitude and awareness of God's presence, represent a true religiousness and must have helped the sectary not to allow his life - governed as it was by laws and precepts-to slide into one of mere religious formalism.

Whether the average Essene actually succeeded in fulfilling his high ideals, we cannot of course know: experience past and present has shown that paths to sanctity devised by organized religion are beset with snares. As has been noted earlier (pp. 31-2 on 4Q477)
,
in some individual cases, moral shortcomings were actually recorded. But there can be no doubt of the sectaries' intention. The aim of a holy life lived within the Covenant was to penetrate the secrets of heaven in this world and to stand before God for ever in the next. Like Isaiah, who beheld the seraphim proclaiming ‘Holy, holy, holy', and like Ezekiel, who in a trance watched the winged cherubim drawing the divine throne-chariot, and like the ancient Jewish mystics who consecrated themselves, despite official disapproval by the rabbis, to the contemplation of the same throne-chariot and the heavenly Palaces, the Essenes, too, strove for a similar mystical knowledge, as one of their number testifies in a description of his own vision of the ministers of the ‘Glorious Face'.

In addition to the worship of God offered through a life of holiness, the Qumran sectary had more particularly to perform the ritual acts prescribed by Moses in the correct manner and at the right times. The earthly liturgy was intended to be a replica of that sung by the choirs of angels in the celestial Temple.

To judge from the many references to it, the time element both calendric and horary was crucial. The Community Rule lays down that the Community was not to ‘depart from any command of God concerning their times; they shall be neither early nor late for any of their appointed times, they shall stray neither to the right nor to the left of any of His true precepts' (IQS 1, 13-15). This injunction asks for exact punctuality in regard to the two daily moments of prayer meant to coincide with and replace the perpetual burnt-offering sacrificed in the Temple at sunrise and sunset (Exod. xxix, 30; Num. xxviii, 4), but it demands in addition a strict observance of the sect's own liturgical calendar.

To understand the peculiarity of Essenism in this respect, a few words need to be said about the calendar followed by non-sectarian Judaism. Essentially, this was regulated by the movements of the moon; months varied in duration from twenty-nine to thirty days and the year consisted of twelve months of 354 days. Needless to say, such a lunar year does not correspond to the four seasons determined by the movements of the sun in terms of solstices and equinoxes. The shortfall of about ten days between the lunar and the solar years was therefore compensated for by means of ‘intercalation', i.e. by inserting after Adar (February/March), the twelfth month of the year, a supplementary ‘Second Adar' at the end of every thirty-six lunar months.