>Annysa Johnson of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel has written a good article on the timeless teachings of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The following is an excerpt from the article:

They speak of a Teacher of Righteousness and a pierced messiah, of cleansing through water and a battle of light against darkness.

But anyone looking to the Dead Sea Scrolls in search of proof, say, that Jesus of Nazareth was the messiah presaged by the prophets, or that John the Baptist lived among the scroll’s authors, will be disappointed.

What the scrolls provide instead, scholars say, is a window into a world of religious ferment 2,000 years ago that gave rise to Judaism and Christianity as we know them today.

“It is an entire library from this crucial period that opens up to us the interreligious debate that is the background for everything that happened after,” said Lawrence H. Schiffman, chairman of New York University’s Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies, who has written extensively on the scrolls.

Read the article in its entirety here.

Claude Mariottini
Professor of Old Testament
Northern Baptist Seminary

Tags: Archaeology, Dead Sea Scrolls

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