Vanderram, James C. - Mantic Wisdom in the Dead Sea Scrolls

Mantic Wisdom in the Dead Sea ScrollsAuthor(s): James C. VanderkamSource: Dead Sea Discoveries, Vol. 4, No. 3, Wisdom at Qumran (Nov., 1997), pp. 336-353Published by: BRILLStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4193068 .Accessed: 28/01/2014 16:26

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MANTIC WISDOM IN THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS

JAMES C. VANDERKAM University of Notre Dame

Introduction

In biblical studies and related areas the term wisdom calls to mind primarily the contents of books such as Proverbs, Job, Wisdom, and Sirach. One often gets the impression that wise sayings and extended discourses on practical and, at times, weighty themes were the essence of ancient wisdom in the biblical and post-biblical periods. If one sur- veys the entire ancient Near East, however, the picture is considerably different. There is widespread evidence from Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Syria that another form of wisdom-mantic wisdom or divination- was widely practiced. Its learned lore was deposited in a volurninous literature, a large amount of which has survived. There is extensive documentation for the mantic arts not only in the other cultural areas of the ancient Near East but also in Israel, as many passages in the Hebrew Bible show. F.H. Cryer concluded from his recent study of the subject that "Israelite divination corresponded broadly in the range of its uses to the utilisation of divination in Mesopotamia and elsewhere in the Near Eastern environment."' In his summary of the biblical passages that deal with divinatory techniques, Y. Kaufmann divided the evidence into two categories: the types of divination that are approved and the types rejected in the Hebrew Bible. The legal means for making inquiry of God were: the urim and tummim, the ephod, the lot, dreams, prophecy, and some temporary signs such as Gideon's fleece. Forbidden means or ones considered to be the ways of the nations were types that fell within the range of the cover terms Orr and COP; thus, the Bible forbids divining, practicing magic, and making inquiry of a medium, a soothsayer (wizard), or the dead. Kaufmann also noted the references to pagan forms of divination such as divining with a cup

I Divination in Ancient Israel and its Near Eastern Environment: A Socio-Historical Investigation (JSOTSup 142; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1994) 224.

? Koninklijke Brill, Leiden, 1997 Dead Sea Discoveries 4, 3


MANTIC WISDOM IN THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS 337

(using water and oil), teraphim, livers, heavenly signs, idols, movements of animals, rustling of trees, and divining by spring waters or the waters of rivers.2 The result is that while certain passages condemn divinatory practices in no uncertain terms (see Deut. 18:9-14; cf. Num. 23:23), elsewhere other types of mantic procedures were considered acceptable within the religion of Yahweh. As Kaufmann argued at length, however, the biblical view is that there is nothing above the one God, nothing to whose power he was subject, while a fundamental presupposition of divination was precisely that there was a mantic force to which the gods were also subject.

Although divination has probably not received as much attention as other types of ancient Near Eastern and biblical wisdom, one field of research in which it has figured prominently in recent decades is in the debate about the origins of apocalyptic thought. Prophecy has long been regarded as the chief source from which the apocalyptists drew their concepts, but no less a scholar than G. von Rad vigorously opposed this conclusion. In fact, he excluded prophecy as the primary source, ruling it "completely out of the question."3 He highlighted knowledge as the "nerve-centre of apocalyptic literature"4 and found its primary inspiration in the wisdom traditions of Israel. Later, he was to limit the kinds of wisdom that he considered the principal influences to the sciences of dream interpretation and the interpretation of oracles and signs.5 H.P. Muller further clarified matters by showing that mantic wisdom exercised a decisive influence on the development of apocalyptic ways of thinking. He argued that one could explain four non- prophetic features in the apocalypses on this basis: determinism, claims to inspiration, the use of symbolic imagery, and pseudonymity.6 As von Rad and others have noted, it must be significant that the earliest apocalyptic figures in Judaism-Enoch and Daniel-are pictured in vivid mantic colors. Enoch, who is a Jewish embodiment of Enmeduranki, the Mesopotamian founder of the baru'-diviners, studied the signs of the sky and learned lessons from them; he also comprehended the

2 y. Kaufmann, The History of the Religion of Israel, vol. 1, part 2 (Jerusalem: Bialikl Tel Aviv: Devir, 1964) 486-87 (Hebrew). See his entire presentation on 458-516.

3 Old Testament Theology (2 vols.; Edinburgh: Oliver and Boyd, 1962) 2.203. ' Old Testament Theology, 2.306. s Theologie des Alten Testaments (5th ed.; Einfuhrung in die evangelische Theo-

logie 1; M(inchen: Kaiser, 1968) 2.331. 6 H.P. M(lller, "Magisch-mantische Weisheit und die Gestalt Daniels," UF 1 (1969)

79-94; idem, "Mantische Weisheit and Apokalyptik," Congress Volume, Uppsala 1971 (VTSup 22; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1972) 268-93.


338 JAMES C. VANDERKAM

meanings of his symbolic dream-visions and is introduced to the reader with phrases drawn from descriptions of the diviner Balaam in Num- bers 22-24 (see 1 Enoch 1:1-3). Daniel, too, received symbolic dream- visions and decoded the cryptic meaning of dreams, inscriptions, and biblical texts.7

The debate about the roots or origins of apocalyptic teachings has also served to clarify the nature of prophecy vis-a-vis divination. The two are not as distinct as one might think; in fact, as noted above, Kaufmann included prophecy among the permitted methods through which to divine or make inquiry of God. There is evidence aplenty that ancient Jewish writers saw a considerable measure of overlap between the two. For example, both were based on revelation, dealt with the future, derived information from encoded media (in fact using some of the same media, e.g., dreams), and produced messages that addressed, among others, political and military matters.8 The similarity between the two also finds expression in the fact that a number of biblical passages juxtapose prophecy and divination. Deuteronomy 18, for instance, treats the two in successive paragraphs (divination in vv. 9-14, prophecy in vv. 15-22; see also Isa. 44:25-26). Moreover, in some places prophets are said to divine while diviners prophesy (Jer. 14:14; 27:9- 10; 29:8-9; Ezek. 13:6-7, 9, 17-23; Mic. 3:11).9 It seems, then, that in asking whether prophecy or wisdom contributed more to the apocalypses a false dichotomy is established; certain kinds of mantic wisdom and late prophecy were closely related phenomena, and both clearly contributed to the thinking of the apocalyptists.

The debate about the contribution that mantic wisdom may have made to Jewish apocalyptic thought in the second-temple period has, by necessity, focused on the apocalyptic literature. It is now possible, however, to pursue the investigation on a different front in view of the fuller publication of Qumran texts and the impressive evidence that they are related to the Qumran community-whether as texts read or as works written by members of the yahad. There is good reason for

I For a fuller treatment of these points especially in connection with the traditions about Enoch, see VanderKam, Enoch and the Growth of an Apocalyptic Tradition (CBQMS 16; Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association of America, 1984).

8 The list is drawn from VanderKam, "The Prophetic-Sapiential Origins of Apoca- lyptic Thought," A Word in Season: Essays in Honour of William McKane (ed. J.D. Martin and P.R. Davies; JSOTSup 42; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1986) 169-70. The point about deciphering messages from encoded media is especially true for later prophecy which interpreted earlier prophetic texts.

I VanderKam, "The Prophetic-Sapiential Origins of Apocalyptic Thought," 170-73.



believing that the residents of Qumran formed an apocalyptic community, although it seems likely that they wrote no apocalypses themselves.'0 They appear to have been content to read apocalypses written by others, such as the Enochic Apocalypse of Weeks (1 Enoch 93: 3-10; 91:11-17) and Animal Apocalypse (1 Enoch 85-90). If Qumran housed an apocalyptic community and if mantic wisdom is supposed to have made a significant contribution to apocalyptic thinking, one could reasonably expect to find some evidence of interest in mantic or divinatory matters within the Qumran corpus. One would think that the determinist theology formulated in works such as the Community Rule and the Hodayot would have provided a natural context for mantic activity which also presupposes that the future is set and knowable through revelation."I

In this context it is relevant to recall that, according to the ancient sources, the Essenes-still the most likely identification for the residents of Qumran-were adept at predicting accurately. In his writings, Josephus includes a few episodes that demonstrate the point. In War 1:78-80 (set in the time of Aristobulus I 1104-103 BCE]) he tells about Judas an Essene "who had never misled or lied in his prophecies [bpoawayyEXgaatv].`'2 Although it appeared to him and his disciples that he had incorrectly forecast the death of Antigonus at Strato's Tower on a certain day, the young man was in fact killed that day, not in the city Strato's Tower, but in an underground place in Jerusalem called by the same name. As Josephus says, the fact that there were two places with the same name "had confused the seer [TOv iavntv]." In the parallel passage in Ant. 13:311 the historian adds that Judas's disciples were sitting around him "receiving instruction in foretelling the future." Later, in War 2:113 Josephus mentions the dream in which Archelaus (4 BCE-6 CE) saw nine (ten according to Ant. 17:345) ears of corn being eaten by oxen. Simon the Essene provided the correct

10 See J.J. Collins, "Genre, Ideology and Social Movements in Jewish Apocalyp- ticism," Mysteries and Revelations: Apocalyptic Studies since the Uppsala Colloquium (ed. J.J. Collins and J.H. Charlesworth; JSPSup 9; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1991) 23-24.

11 See, most recently, P. Alexander, "Physiognomy, Initiation, and Rank in the Qumran Community," Geschichte-Tradition-Reflexion: Festschriftffir Martin Hengel zum 70. Geburtstag. Band 1: Judentum (ed. H. Cancik, H. Lichtenberger, and P. Schifer, Tilbingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1996) 390-93.

12 The translations and quotations of texts in this section are from G. Vermes and M.D. Goodman (ed.), The Essenes According to the Classical Sources (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1989).



explanation by saying that the ears indicated the number of years that Archelaus would reign. War 2:159, part of the lengthy description of the Essenes contained in 2:119-61, provides a more general statement: "There are some among them who, trained as they are in the study of the holy books and the different sorts of purifications, and the sayings of the prophets, become expert in foreseeing the future: they are rarely deceived in their predictions." In Ant. 15:371-79 Josephus traces Herod's favorable treatment of the group back to the Essene Menaemus who predicted, when Herod was just a boy, not only his royal future but also the type of character he would have. Of Menaemus Josephus says that he "bore witness to his virtue in the whole conduct of his life and especially in his possession from God of knowledge of the future" (373). His ability is explained by his knowledge of divine matters (379). Finally, Hippolytus, in his Refutation of All Heresies 27, says that among the Essenes "is cultivated also the practice of prophecy and the prediction of future events [6o npoqn1vetv Kait npoxytv TO6 ecooJeva].

If the scrolls community was apocalyptic in character and Essene, there would, then, be double reason to expect some mantic influence on its literature.'3 The remainder of this paper will offer an examination of the evidence for divinatoxy interest and practices at Qumran.'4 The study will begin with specific texts and then move to wider concerns.

Qumran Divinatory Texts 1. 4Q186: The official list of Qumran texts labels 4Q186 a horo-

scope."5 John Allegro published the text in DJD 5, after he had pre-

1 Cf. the comments of F. Garcia Martfnez, "4QMess ar and the Book of Noah" in his Qumran and Apocalyptic: Studies on the Aramaic Texts from Qumran (STDJ 9; Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1992) 1.

14 For an overview of the texts, see P. Alexander in Emil Schurer, The History of the Jewish People in the Age of Jesus Christ (3 vols.; revised and ed. G. Vermes, F. Millar, and M. Goodman; Edinburgh: Clark, 1973-87) 3.364-66. For the larger context in Jewish literature, see his entire contribution (pp. 342-79). The scrolls material is also treated briefly on pp. 464-66. M. Hengel included the Qumran astrological material in his study of astrology in the Hellenistic period; see his Judaism and Hellenism (2 vols.; Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1974) 1.236-39. Hengel is guilty here of contributing to the widespread misunderstanding that the 12 gates of I Enoch 72-82 are identical with the 12 signs of the zodiac. See also J. Charlesworth, "Jewish Astrology in the Talmud, Pseudepigrapha, the Dead Sea Scrolls and Early Palestinian Synagogues," HTR 70 (1977) 183-200; "Jewish Interest in Astrology during the Hellenistic and Roman Period," ANRW II 20.2.926-50.

'5 See E. Tov (ed.), Companion Volume to the Dead Sea Scrolls Microfiche Edition (2nd rev. ed.; Leiden/New York/Cologne: E.J. Brill, 1995) 35.



sented a preliminary version of it in a short article in 1964.16 The official edition is spare to a fault, with only the briefest notes about the nature of the text accompanying the transcriptions, translations, and photographic plate. Allegro drew attention to the fact that the text is written almost entirely in dextrograde fashion (only 1 ii 2 is copied in the expected right-to-left direction). Most words and lines are written in the familiar square characters, but a few others are in paleo-Hebrew or Greek letters. It is not clear why some parts are written one way and others in a different fashion. In fact one expression that appears twice in the text is handled differenfly in both cases. Twice one reads that someone has "a space in the house of light X and space in the pit of darkness Y" (the house of light and the pit of darkness are reversed in the two instances). In what Allegro numbers as 1 ii 7-8 the words from nnn through lpDrn are written with cryptic letters except for the numbers six and three and for the last two letters of jorm. However, in his col. iii 5-6 the same expression is entirely in square characters except for n-: and the last letters of nITn.'7 To help the reader deci- pher the text Allegro first presented a transcription of what the scribe wrote and next gave the text in the more familiar direction and script.

In his famous review of Allegro's volume, J. Strugnell called it "un texte de charactere physiognomonique et en partie astrologique. "18 He assigns the formal hand in which most of the letters are formed to an early or middle Herodian date. Strugnell also took the opportunity to detail the obvious flaws in Allegro's minimal publication, including his failure to refer to any bibliography on the text apart from his own short piece in JSS.

16 J.M. Allegro, "An Astrological Cryptic Document from Qumran," JSS 9 (1964) 291-94.

17 There has been disagreement about the implications of the fact that the text is written in a cryptic way. See the comments of K. von Stuckrad, Frommigkeit und Wis- senschaft: Astrologie in Tanach, Qumran undfruhrabbinischer Literature (Europaische Hochschulschriften, series 23 Theologie, vol. 572; Frankfurt: Lang, 1996) 123-24. M.R. Lehmann ("New Light on Astrology in Qumran and the Talmud," RevQ 8 [19751 599) thought it indicated that "astrology was not generally accepted, even in the Qumran community"; von Stuckrad rejects this as absurd and suggests it could rather point to the great significance of the contents or to the danger of the contents after Augustus's decree against such material in the year 11. For the view that the cryptic script is an indicator of the significance of the text, see Hengel, Judaism and Hellenism, 1.238; J. Charlesworth, "Jewish Interest in Astrology," ANRW II 20.2.939.

" "Notes en marge du volume V des 'Discoveries in the Judaean Desert of Jordan'," RevQ 7 (1967-71) 274 (his comments on 4Q186 are on pp. 274-76). Alexander ("Phy- siognomy," 385) notes that the text is more properly called, as Strugnell saw, a physiognomy, not a horoscope. For 4Q186 see also K. von Stuckrad, Fr6mmigkeit und Wissenschaft, 118-24; in this work the translation is accompanied by copious notes that incorporate the readings and proposals of other scholars.



In F. Garcia Martinez's translation the text of I ii (col. i is very poorly preserved) reads as follows:'9

1 [.. .] impure 2 [. ..] a granite stone 3 [...] a man of [.. .]4 [...]secrets. 5 And his thighs are long and slender, and the toes of his feet are 6 slender and long. And he is in the second position [MfD1 = Vault for Allegro]. 7 His spirit has six (parts) in the house of light and three in the pit of 8 darkness. And this is the sign in which he was born: the foot of Taurus ['I1]. He will be poor. And his animal is the bull [110].

The message is generally clear: some of a person's physical traits are mentioned, the position20 is given, the distribution of nine parts between light and darkness is specified, the zodiacal sign in which he was born is named, his economic status is given, and the animal of his zodiacal sign is noted. The same message emerges from the other relatively well preserved parts of the text, 1 iii: "I and. . . [. ..] 2 and his head [... .1 3 terrifying [ ...]. And his teeth are of different lengths (?). The fingers of 4 his hand are stumpy. His thighs are fat and each one covered in hair (5 and his toes are thick and short.)"2 His spirit has 6 eight (parts) in the house [of darkness] and one in the house of light."

The mostly completely preserved column is 2 i which may give a clue as to how the parts of light and darkness are tallied.

I rule. His eyes are of a colour between black and stripy. His beard is 2... t. . .1 and frizzy. The sound of his voice is simple. His teeth 3 are sharp and well aligned. He is neither tall 4 nor short, and like that from his birth. Then the fingers of his hands are slender 5 and long. His thighs are smooth and the soles of his feet 6 [...] are even. His spirit 7 has eight (parts) [in the house of light] in second position, and one 8 [in the house of darkness. J1 And this sign in which he was born is 9 [...] And his animal is [...] 10 1 ...] this [... ] 11 [.. . ..

Despite gaps here and there, the text, as it moves from head to toe, does enumerate eight positive qualities that presumably justify the assign- ment of eight units in the house of light; the nature of the negative trait is not specified.

While it is possible to understand the broken text fairly well, some terms remain puzzling. What is meant by "the second position" and

19 Unless otherwise noted, all quotations of the Qumran texts are from his The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated: The Qumran Texts in English (Leiden/New York/Cologne: E.J. Brill, 1994).

1 Alexander ("Physiognomy," 388-89) maintains that the term here means "column" or "list"; a first list would have enumerated the wicked, with the second naming the righteous. See n. 7 where he recognizes that this would be an early attestation of fl= in this sense.

21 Garcfa Martfnez has accidentally omitted the beginning of line 5 from his translation. Allegro's translation is supplied for the missing words (DJD 5, p. 90).



"the foot of Taurus" and why do the portions of each person total nine? Matthias Albani, in his forthcoming contribution "Horoscopes" for the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls, has pointed out the close parallels to features of 4Q186 in the Book of Hermes Tris- megistos. In this astrological work each sign of the zodiac is divided into light and dark parts, with the position of the sun, moon, and planets in these parts determining the fate of the individual. But he finds a fuller parallel in a Greek astrological text of Teukros Rhetoricos. In it the sign of Taurus is divided into nine parts, corresponding with parts of the body, beginning with the head and working down to the feet, tail, and claws. These rise in order over the eastern horizon. As Albani indicates, in this scheme the feet of Taurus are in the seventh position, which would mean that six portions had risen before the feet-a fea- ture that would explain the ratio of six parts in the light and three in the darkness for the first fragment quoted above. Since six parts had already risen above the horizon, they were in the house of light, while the remaining three parts remained beneath the horizon or in the darkness. Albani, following an earlier proposal by R. Gordis,22 also pro- poses that the term rnm in the ratio expressions is the segholate noun meaning "space, room," not the familiar word for "spirit." This notion too has parallels in astrological texts.23

2. 4Q561 Horoscope ar:24 Garcia Martinez identifies 4Q561 as a "[clopy in Aramaic of the horoscope 4Q186."'2 The wording of the text certainly suggests that it is the same kind of work, regardless of whether it is the same text. 4Q561, like 4Q186, lists physical traits of a person, but it differs in that the extant parts do not refer to the nine

"A Document in Code from Qumran," JSS 11 (1966) 38. 23 Albani, "Horoscopes" in the Oxford Encyclopedia of the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed.

L.H. Schiffman and J.C. VanderKam; New York: Oxford University Press, forthcoming). I thank Albani for permission to refer to his article. One should also consult his comments on 4Q186 in his "Der Zodiakos in 4Q318 und die Henoch-Astronomie," Theologische Fakultat Leipzig Forschungsstelle Judentum Mitteilungen und Beitrage 7 (1993) 7-8. For a sense of the context for such texts in Jewish and non-Jewish traditions, see J.C. Greenfield and M. Sokoloff, "Astrological and Related Omen Texts in Jewish Palestinian Aramaic," JNES 48 (1989) 201-14. They mention 4Q186 on p. 210.

24 For the text, see R.H. Eisenman and M. Wise, The Dead Sea Scrolls Uncovered (Shaftesbury, UK; Rockport, MA; Brisbane: Element, 1992) 264. K. Beyer (Die aramdischen Texte vom Toten Meer: Ergdnzungsband [Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1994] 125-27) includes 4Q561 with 4Q534-36, all of which he calls "Die Geburt Noahs des Erwihlten Gottes."

25 The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated, 508. Alexander ("Physiognomy," 393) finds even less reason for terning 4Q561 a horoscope than for 4Q186. It too is a physiognomy.



portions of a person and whether they are in the house of light or pit of darkness; nor is the fate of an individual mentioned. The best- preserved part is I i.

I [...] and they will be mixed and will not be numerous. His eyes (will be) 2 between clear and dark. His nose (will be) long 3 [and] handsome. And his teeth (will be) well aligned. And his beard 4 will be thin and not abundant. His limbs (will be) 5 smooth and be[tween ma]imed and fat. 6... -... 1 7 from the elbows (will be) prominent -...] 8 wide. And his thighs (will be) [between...] 9 and fat. [And] the sole of his feet [...]l 0 lo[ng .. .1 His foot (will be) [...I ....

Although it is not always clear which words belong together in broken contexts, it appears that the number of traits noted is nine, moving from head to toe (as in 4Q186 and the other fragments of 4Q561). If the nine-part scheme was used in this text, the ratio should have fol- lowed in the lost end of the fragmentary column.

3. 4Q318 Brontologion ar:26 The text in its best preserved portions (frags 1-2 ii 6) names the sign of the zodiac for certain days of the month. The pattern is that two days are for sign x, two for sign y, and three for sign z. In the extant sections the month names Shebat and Adar appear; this portion of the text ends with Adar, the twelfth month of the year. After a blank space the text resumes with a different type of statement in 2 ii 6:

If it thunders in the sign of Taurus, revolutions (in) the wor[ld ... .1 7 problems for the cities and destru[ction in the cour]t of the King and in the province of [... .] 8 there will be, and for the Arabs [ ... famine. And some will plunder others [...] 9 Blank If it thunders in the sign of Gemini, fear and distress of the foreigners and of [ ...1

Such predictions based on thunder in zodiacal signs are well attested elsewhere; the Qumran text demonstrates how early such works achieved written form.27 Albani shows that it is both a selenodromion, that is, it records the course of the moon through the zodiacal signs, and also marks the appearance of thunder in the same signs.28 In the recon- struction of the text in Eisenman and Wise's volume, two months are assigned 31 days, apparently on the grounds that the 364-day calendar known from Qumran and other sources underlies 4Q318; but Albani has refuted the claim and demonstrated that a schematic year of 360

16 For the text, see Eisenman and Wise, The Dead Sea Scrolls Uncovered, 261-62; Beyer, Erganzungsband, 128-29. Albani ("Der Zodiakos in 4Q318") offers the text and an extended analysis of the work within its ancient context

27 See Greenfield and Sokoloff, "Astrological and Related Omen Texts," 202, 210. 1

"Der Zodiakos in 4Q318," 13-17.



days (twelve 30-day months) is presupposed in it-a scheme attested in the Astronomical Book of Enoch (1 Enoch 72-82).29 This suggests that 4Q318 is not, as 4Q186 seems to be, a text expressing specifically Qumranic views.0

4. 4Q534 Elect of God ar (another name is 4QMess ar): The two columns of the text are rather different in content. The first describes first some physical marks and features (a mark, red hair, moles small marks on his thighs; lines 1-3) and then tums to the unusual knowledge that will be possessed by the individual in question:

4 During his youth he will be... 1... like] one who knows nothing, until the time when he 5 knows the three books. Blank 6 Then he will obtain prudence and will know 1 ... . . of the visions in order to reach the upper sphere. 7 And with his father and with his ancestors [...] life and old age. With him there will be advice and discretion 8 and he will know men's secrets. His wisdom will extend to all the peoples. He will know the secrets of all living things. 9 All their plans against him will fail, although the antagonism of all living things will be great. 10 [... . his plans, for he is the one chosen by God. His birth and the exhalation of his breath I [.I his plans will last for ever. Blank 12 l..1 lest 1. ..13 the plan [... ] 14-17 1- * *

The second column deals with evil people ("sons of the pit" in line 1) and with destruction by water (line 14). In line 16 the Watchers are mentioned ("His work will be like that of the Watchers"; see also line 18), and someone speaks against another in line 19. The fact that this material, which seems to deal with the flood and perhaps the descent of the Watchers, follows directly on the description of God's chosen one in col. 1 has led some scholars to identify the chosen one as Noah.3' There is no need to adjudicate that much-canvassed issue, although the case for the Noachic identification is not very compelling. The more important point is the interpretation of the description of the chosen one of God in the first column. J. Starcky, who first published

29 "Der Zodiakos in 4Q3 18," 20-35. 30 See "Der Zodiakos in 4Q318," 35-42 for suggestions regarding the role such a

text may have played at Qumran. 31 So J. Fitzmyer, "Te Aramaic 'Elect of God' Text from Qumrin Cave IV," CBQ

27 (1965) 348-72 (= his Essays on the Semitic Background of the New Testament [SBLSBS 5; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1974] 127-60); P. Grelot, "Henoch et ses dcri- tures," RB 82 (1975) 493-96. Although the parallels between 4Q534 and the accounts of Noah's birth are not close, Garcfa Martfnez, in his full presentation of the text, a translation and commentary, argues that the identification "rests on a series of indications. None of them is conclusive as such, but, if they are taken together, the cumula- tive evidence seems convincing" ("4AMess ar," 19). Yet the other accounts of Noah's birth credit him with white, nor red, hair.



4Q536, referred to it as "de caractbre A la fois astrologique et messianique"32 and thought that the reference to the person's birth in i 10 indicated it was a horoscope. Yet, a straightforward reading of what is preserved shows no evidence of the sorts of statements made in 4Q186. The text seems to be little more than a description of an extraordinary individual, one who obtains remarkable wisdom and is the subject of hostility from others. The three books mentioned in i 5 are very important; from them he apparently gained his wisdom although the text does not say how this occurred. The nearest one comes to anything mantic is the term rrtln (i 10) which can, of course, have an astrological sense, as it does in 4Q186. Fitzmyer rejects the astrological meaning in this context and argues that the term indicates only that the birth of the person here described is under divine influence.33 He does add, nevertheless, that there are probably parallels to it in Greco-Roman physiognomic literature and that "perhaps this would be a truer desig- nation of its literary form. For the text describes the temperament and character of the child from its outward appearance."34 Even this, however, may be saying too much because it is difficult to see how the text draws the descriptive statements into a mantic context.35

These four texts are the extent of the divinatory works in the Qumran corpus, and it is highly questionable whether one of them-4Q534 belongs in the category. There is no way of knowing what function such texts served at Qumran, if they served any at all, but at least their presence in cave 4 indicates that such topics were accessible to the residents of the site. The subject of divination at Qumran is, nevertheless, much larger than the four works presented above. In the next section, several other parts of the Qumran corpus will be surveyed for mantic content to check whether the phenomenon was more widespread that the three (four) texts would suggest.

32 "Un texte messianique aram6en de la grotte 4 de Qumrfin," Ecole des langues orientales anciennes de l'lnstitut Catholique de Paris: Memorial du cinquantenaire 1914-1964 (Travaux de l'Institut Catholique de Paris 10; Paris: Bloud et Gay, 1964) 51. Starcky later changed his view and accepted the Noah proposal ("Le Maitre de Justice et J6sus," Le Monde de la Bible 4 [1978) 53-55).

33 "The Aramaic 'Elect of God' Text," 154-55. 34 "The Aramaic 'Elect of God' Text," 158. 3S Von Stuckrad (Frommigkeit und Wissenschaft, 127), however, defends the astro-

logical or horoscopic interpretation of the text. "Mit Sicherheit kann zudem davon aus- gegangen werden, dass es sich um das Horoskop einer hochgestellten Persinlichkeit handelt, der die zukunftige k6rperliche und charakterliche Entwicklung auf Grund der Geburtszeit vorausgesagt wird."



Other Qumran Divinatory Phenomena 1. Dreams: Dream interpretation is among the more widely attested

forms of divination, and Josephus reported that an Essene named Simon cofrectly interpreted Archelaus's dream (see above). Is there evidence in the Qumran corpus that dream interpretation at least played a literary role at Qumran?

a. Inherited literature 1. The Enochic Literature: Four of the five parts of 1 Enoch have

been identified in cave 4 manuscripts (4Q201-202, 204-12) in sufficient number to show that they were among the best attested writings at the site. In 1 Enoch the patriarch receives many of his revelations through dreams or dream visions. At times these required no interpretation, as in 1 Enoch 13:7- 10 or in the entire Animal Apocalypse (1 Enoch 85-90). At other times, however, an explanation was supplied. This is the case for his dream vision about the flood in 83:2-9, where his grandfather Mahalalel offered the interpretation. It should be added that the Book of the Watchers (1 Enoch 1-36) con- tains a number of condemnations of types of divination, tracing them back to the teachings offered by the angels who sinned (e.g., 8:3). Dream interpretation is not among the banned arts while astrology is.

2. The Book of Giants: The booklets of I Enoch were not the only literature associated with the seventh patriarch that was available to readers at Qumran. The Aramaic Book of Giants, too, is related to him, and it too may have been a text that was written before the Qumran community was established on the northwest corner of the Dead Sea. In the book, Enoch is called upon to explain dreams. In 4QGiantsb ar (4Q530) 2:3-23 two giants, Hahyah and Ohyah, receive troubling symbolic dreams, tell them to an assembly of their fellow giants, and search for someone who is capable of unlocking their message. Their request is brought to Enoch by another giant named Mahaway, since it was known that Enoch had the requisite skill; the patriarch then offered the explanation of what they had seen. Per- haps the explanation of the cryptic message is found in col. 3.36

I See J. Reeves, Jewish Lore in Manichaean Cosmogony: Studies in the Book of Giants Traditions (Monographs of the Hebrew Union College 14; Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College Press, 1992) 57-107.



Here, as in Daniel and other works, forms of the term nm9 are used for the interpretation of dreams (e.g., 2:14-15).

3. Aramaic Levi: Levi saw a heavenly vision in which seven angels appeared to him and magnified him with an anointing of eternal peace (Supplement 20-27, 4-7).21

4. Jubilees: The book is one of the best attested works at Qumran. Although most of its contents derive from the scriptural text, there are some extra-biblical details about dreams in the book (none of the dreams it relates seems to require interpretation of symbols and other mysterious elements). For example, the Genesis 15 experience is said to have come to Abram in a dream (14:1); Rebecca learned of Esau's threats against Jacob in a dream (27:1); Jacob saw in a dream that he should return to Canaan (29:3), and through the same medium the Lord warned Laban not to harm him (29:6); Levi dreamed that he and his sons were ordained to an eternal priesthood (32:1); Jacob in a night vision saw and read seven tablets brought by an angel on which his family's future was described (32:21- 26); and Rebecca saw in a dream the day of her death (35:6).

b. Qumran texts: 1. The Genesis Apocryphon 19:14-20:38 As he tells of his and

Sarai's journey to Egypt, Abram reports in the first person about his dream in which a cedar tree and date palm play roles. In the dream, people came intending to dispatch the cedar and leave the date palm alone, but the latter spoke out and saved the fonner. In this case Abram is the one who gives the interpretation of the dream: he is the cedar and Sarai the date palm. The dream provides a justification for Sarai's subsequent claim about her relationship to Abram.

2. While words related to the root Odrr do not occur frequently in the scrolls, there are other instances or possible cases of dreams or visions that required deciphering. 4Q160 (4QVisions of Samuel) is based on 1 Samuel 3; in it Eli tells Samuel: "Let

37 See R. Kugler, From Patriarch to Priest: The Levi Priestly Tradition from Aramaic Levi to Testament of Levi (SBLEJL 9; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996) 77-87 for text, translation, and comments.

3 For evidence that the Genesis Apocryphon is a text that reflects the views of the Qumran group, see J. Reeves, "What Does Noah Offer in lQapGen X, 15?" RevQ 12 (1986) 415-19.



me know the vision of God" (1 5) and predictions may be present in frags. 3-5. In 4Q242 (4QPrayer of Nabonidus) frag. 4 1 someone has a dream but nothing can be gleaned about it from the context. 4Q246 (4QApocalypse ar) may be the interpretation of a dream because it resembles the predictions offered by Daniel in a passage such as Daniel 2. However, not enough of the text survives to divulge what the setting for the predictions is. In 4Q529 (4QWords of Michael) the text opens with: "Words of the book which Michael spoke to the angels of God." In the fifth line one reads: "and I explained to him his vision," The work entitled The Visions of Amram (4Q543-48) describes itself as visions (Visions of Amrama 1 1: "Copy of the writing of the words of the visions of 'Amram") and includes references to seeing and the content of the vision (frag. 6; Visions of Amramb 1 10; frag. 2; Visions of Amrame 1 8-9, where he reports that "it happened to me as he said: that is, a prediction was involved). Finally, in 4Q552 (4QFour Kingdomsa) someone explains something to a group "according to the interpretation" (1 i 10). In the second column someone sees trees and something is identified as Babel, from which fact a prediction is made (see 1 iii 10 which mentions a vision).

It could be argued that most of these texts are of a non-Qumran origin, as many of them are in Aramaic and some show no indications of Essene provenience. However, being written in Aramaic does not seem to be an adequate criterion for determining whether a work came from the Qumran group. Yet, whatever the origin of these texts, at least one can say that they were available at Qumran.

2. Decoding cryptic texts: The essence of the diviner's art consists in extracting a comprehensible meaning from encoded messages that could come through a variety of media such as sheeps' livers, the entrails of an animal, the flight of birds, the patterns of the heavenly bodies, and the movement of oil on water.

Among the many media for such messages in antiquity were mysterious or unusual words whose import remained opaque to all but expert or even inspired mantic specialists. The wall inscription in Daniel 5 is a famous biblical example of the phenomenon. A hand wrote the words on the wall, and although the reader learns later that they were known Aramaic terms they themselves were illegible and their meaning impenetrable to the experts summoned by King Belshazzar. The fright- ening way in which the message was inscribed aroused wonder and



alarm in the king. His initial response to the situation betrays its mantic character: he immediately summoned assorted diviners. "The king cried aloud to bring in the enchanters, the Chaldeans, and the diviners" (5:7; cf. v. II). Two of these groups figure in Dan. 2:2 where they were called upon to explain Nebuchadnezzar's dream (cf. 2:10, 27; see also 4:6-7). In both chaps. 2 and 5 "the wise men" is a cover term for all of these experts (2:12, 13, 14, 18, 24, 48; 4:6, 18; 5:7-8, 15). The message that God had sent could not be decoded by the king's professional diviners, but Daniel was able to elucidate it through the divine gift given to him.

The king requested that someone both read and tell him the meaning (K-n0 v. 8) of the inscription. The queen, in her wise counsel to King Belshazzar, explained Daniel's position and abilities in heavily sapiential terms: "In the days of your father he was found to have enlightenment, understanding, and wisdom like the wisdom of the gods. Your father, King Nebuchadnezzar, made him chief of the magicians, enchanters, Chaldeans, and diviners because an excellent spirit, knowledge, and understanding to interpret dreams, explain riddles, and solve problems were found in this Daniel...." (5:11-12; see v. 14) She was confident that he would be able to provide the needed interpretation (forms of mC0 are found in vv. 12, 15, 16, 17, and 26). Use of mC0 here reminds the reader of chaps. 2 and 4 where the same word recurs in connection with interpreting dreams (see 2:4, 5, 6, 7, 9, 16, 24, 25, 26, 36, 45; 4:6, 7, 9, 18, 19). Chap. 2 also stresses that the content of the dreams was considered a mystery until the secret was unlocked (2:18, 19 [cf. v. 22], 27, 28, 29, 30, 47).

The pesher literature at Qumran belongs to this world, although it deals with a somewhat different kind of medium for divine messages.39 The mantic associations of the word -m have been thoroughly documented by scholars. It was used in Akkadian with different nuances in connection with the divinatory handling of dreams,40 and the way in which it is employed in Daniel has been surveyed above. The Qumran pesharim contain the results of mantic manipulation of prophetic texts (understood broadly). That is, they are the result of the assumption that God has revealed the future in encoded form in the prophetic texts. What was required for accessing the inspired message of those texts was the work of an expert, in this case apparently the Teacher of

39 A. Finkel, "The Pesher of Dreams and Scripture," RevQ 4 (1963-64) 357-70. 40 See, for example, M. Horgan, Pesharim: Qumran Interpretations of Biblical Books

(CBQMS 8; Washington, DC: CBA of America, 1979) 231-34.



Righteousness who had been specially inspired to carry out this function. Several of the pesharim are fairly extensively preserved, but only Pesher Habakkuk offers definitive statements about most of the assump- tions that underlie the method. The remains of the other commentaries lack such statements, but the extant portions do make clear that the same kinds of interpretations were used by their authors.

A first point to be noticed is that the inspired prophetic text con- tains information that demands the skillful ministrations of an expert for unravelling the otherwise inaccessible meaning. It is obvious from reading the pesharim that the surface or literal level of the text is rarely of great interest to the expositor. Rather, the various words used in the text normally point to non-literal meanings, ones that the unpracticed reader would be unable to perceive. In some cases it is even claimed that that the prophet himself, the original recipient of the message, did not understand what was revealed to him. This point emerges from the explanation of Hab. 2:1-2, a biblical passage that distinguishes between the one who writes down the vision and the one who reads the report. The pesher reads: "God told Habakkuk to write down the things that are going to come upon the last generation, but the fulfillment of the end-time he did not make known to him" (7:1-2). The commentator does not claim that such ignorance was always the case; he asserts only that with regard to the end Habakkuk was not told the full story, although the keys to it were to be found in the revelation given to him. Once he has clarified the biblical command that Habakkuk record the vision in the lines just quoted, the expositor goes on to explain the words about the reader: "The interpretation of it concerns the Teacher of Righteousness, to whom God made known all the mysteries ["'f] of his servants the prophets" (7:4-5). A few lines farther along a related point is made about the prolongation of the end-time: "and it will be greater than anything of which the prophets spoke, for the mysteries of God are awesome" (7:7-8).

The claim that terms in the prophetic text point to a referent other than the literal one could be documented endlessly in the various pesharim. Thus in Pesher Habakkuk the Chaldeans become the Kittim, a wicked individual the Wicked Priest, a righteous individual the Teacher of Righteousness, and in Pesher Nahum the young lion is apparently explained as Alexander Jannaeus, etc. For the present purposes, however, it is more important to observe that the referents advanced by the commentator are contemporary or near contemporary persons, groups, or events, not referents from the ancient time of the prophet. As with divinatory messages elsewhere, the divine revelation that was encoded



addressed present realities by predicting what was going to happen. Divination is a form of prediction, and the pesharim also embody this aspect of the phenomenon. The future that interests the commentator is a large one-the last times and the end of days. The prophetic dis- closures are regularly understood to be dealing with eschatological matters.

The expert who stands behind at least some Qumran biblical interpretation and perhaps behind all the pesharim is the Teacher of Right- eousness. Pesher Habakkuk explains his status in the estimation of the person who wrote the text as it comments on the word "traitors" in Hab. 1:5: "Likewise, the interpretation of the passage [concerns the trai]- tors at the end of days. They are the ruthless [ones of the covenjant who will not believe when they hear all that is going to co[me up]on the last generation from the mouth of the priest into [whose heart] God put [understandi]ng to interpret all the words of his servants the prophets by [whose] hand God enumerated all that is going to come upon his people and up[on his congregation.]" (2:5-10). Earlier he had noted that these same traitors did not believe the words of the Teacher which were from the mouth of God (2:1-3). That is, to understand the message of God one had to accept what the Teacher said because his words, like those of the prophets, were inspired by God. In the pesharim one finds an inspired text interpreted by an inspired expositor.4' As M. Horgan summarizes the matter: "Thus, the picture that emerges from the texts themselves is that the pesher is an interpretation made known by God to a selected interpreter of a mystery revealed by God to the biblical prophet concerning history." 42

The Qumran literature, therefore, includes several divinatory works and evidences a number of other mantic interests. In this sense the texts found there bear out the claim advanced by a number of scholars that mantic wisdom was a significant influence on apocalyptic ways of thinking. While the scrolls show that astrological wisdom was not strange to those who read these texts, it is clear that the mantic concerns of the Qumran writers/readers differed in character in most cases from the kinds known from elsewhere. There was great interest in

41 On this point, see K. Elliger, Studien zum Habakuk-Kommentar vom Toten Meer (BHT 15; Tiibingen: J.C.B. Mohr [Siebeck], 1953) 154-55.

42 M. Horgan, Pesharim, 229. TMe quotations from the pesharim above are from her book. M. Fishbane (Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel [Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1985]) includes his consideration of the pesher literate from Qumran under the head- ing "Mantological Exegesis." See especially pp. 452-56.



astronomical data at Qumran, but few of the texts explicitly turn them to divinatory uses. In fact, the regular, unchanging movements of the heavenly bodies became a homiletical point according to which human disobedience to divine law could be contrasted with the lawfulness of nature (e.g., 1 Enoch 2-5). Rather, the emphasis has been relocated in the literature from the caves: the focus of mantic activity was the interpretation of what the group considered authoritative scripture. Passages such as lQS 6:6-7 demonstrate that biblical study was constant and important in the community, and Josephus claims that the Essenes had a remarkable interest in the writings of ancient authors (War 2:136). M. Hengel has written that ". . . eine neue, eschatologische Auslegung der 'heiligen Schriften' scheint die zentrale Aufgabe der Gemeinschaft der Qumran-Essener gewesen zu sein, die dieselbe als das wahre, end- zeitliche Israel uberhaupt erst konstituierte."43 This modified form of divinatory wisdom should thus be viewed as a central element in the life of the apocalyptic community that inhabited Khirbet Qumran.'

43 "'Schiftauslegung' und 'Schriftwerdung' in der Zeit des Zweiten Tempels," Schriftauslegung im antiken Judentum und im Urchristentum (ed. M. Hengel and H. Lihr, WUNT 73; Tubingen: J.C.B. Mohr, 1994) 51. He adds that investigating the scriptures was considered identical with seeking God (p. 53).

4 A few days before this essay was completed, Dr. Armin Lange sent me a copy of his essay "The Essene Position on Magic and Divination" which is forthcoming in the volume of papers from the second meeting of the IOQS. Lange covers many of the topics treated above, although he also includes the subject of magic (e.g., exorcisms and incan- tations). He carefully distinguishes between what he understands to be non-Essene and Essene works and devotes a large amount of space to a study of Essene rejection of many forms of divination. He also teats the Essene practice of magic and divination and the dualistic, eschatological context in which they were understood. According to him, the only mantic art presented positively in the Qumran legal texts is the oracle of the lot. Lange, too, draws attention to the mantic character of pesher exegesis. I am grateful to him for making his impressive essay available to me.


Article Contentsp. [336]p. 337p. 338p. 339p. 340p. 341p. 342p. 343p. 344p. 345p. 346p. 347p. 348p. 349p. 350p. 351p. 352p. 353

Issue Table of ContentsDead Sea Discoveries, Vol. 4, No. 3, Wisdom at Qumran (Nov., 1997), pp. 245-368Ten Reasons Why the Qumran Wisdom Texts Are Important [pp. 245-254]Scribal Wisdom and a Biblical Proverb at Qumran [pp. 255-264]Wisdom Reconsidered, in Light of the Scrolls [pp. 265-281]Physiognomie oder Gotteslob? 4Q301 3 [pp. 282-296]Wisdom Issues in Qumran: The Types and Status of the Figures in 4Q424 and the Phrases of Rationale in the Document [pp. 297-311]The "Eternal Planting" in the Dead Sea Scrolls [pp. 312-335]Mantic Wisdom in the Dead Sea Scrolls [pp. 336-353]Book ReviewsReview: untitled [pp. 354-356]Review: untitled [pp. 357-360]Review: untitled [pp. 360-362]Review: untitled [pp. 362-364]Review: untitled [pp. 364-367]

Vanderram, James C. - Mantic Wisdom in the Dead Sea Scrolls

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