Content area
Full text
DAVID flusser, Judaism of the Second Temple Period, Volume 1 , Qumran and Apocalypticism (trans. Azzan Yadin; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans; Jerusalem: Hebrew University Press, 2007). Pp. xiii + 356. $36.
The essays in this collection were written by David Flusser (191 7-2000), professor of early Christianity and Second Temple Judaism at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Since much of his work appeared in Hebrew, the translations of these essays make it more accessible to the English-speaking world.
In "The Dead Sea Sect and Its Worldview" (pp. 1-24) and "The Essene Worldview" (pp. 25-3 1 ), F. attempts to trace developments in the thought world of the Dead Sea sect, which F. assumes was Essene. The sect's dualism, which shaped its negative attitude toward the wider society, is a focal point in these essays. In "The Economic Ideology of Qumran" (pp. 32-37), F. proposes that the dualism also informed the sect's practice of sharing possessions, which helped the group maintain a distinctive identity. In "Medicine and Qumran" (pp. 38-39) and "A Pre-Gnostic Concept in the Dead Sea Scrolls" (pp. 40-49), F. takes up other elements of belief and practice at Qumran.
Linking the scrolls to later Jewish sources in "In the Image of the Likeness of His Form" (pp. 50-60), F. notes that the scrolls contain language found in later matrimonial ceremonies. "Not by an Angel . . ." (pp. 61-65) makes connections with the Passover Haggadah. In "A Qumran Fragment and the Second Blessing of the Amidah" (pp. 66-69), F. finds...