What Are the Dead Sea Scrolls and Why Do They Matter?

The Dead Sea Scrolls matter because they are Hebrew copies of the biblical books from before the temple fell in 70, and many of them already look like the Masoretic text that later Judaism and the King James Version depend on. The Israel Antiquities Authority says the Qumran caves hold partial or complete copies of every book in the Hebrew Bible except Esther, and that those copies are more than a thousand years older than the biblical manuscripts identified before the discovery. They also differ in spelling, additions, and deletions. The scrolls show transmission. They do not show a text that was invented in the Middle Ages, and they do not by themselves prove that God inspired the books.

Key points

• The Leon Levy introduction says the best-known scrolls come from eleven caves near Qumran, and that the biblical manuscripts among them date from the third century BCE to the first century CE, before the temple’s destruction in 70. (1)
• About 230 manuscripts are called biblical scrolls. Every book of the Hebrew Bible is represented except Esther. Hebrew is the most common language. About 15 percent are Aramaic, and several are Greek. (1)
• Many of those copies closely resemble the Masoretic text. Some differ in language, spelling, additions, and deletions. The same page says a closed canon came later. (1)
• The Israel Museum says the Great Isaiah Scroll, 1QIsaª, was one of the seven scrolls discovered at Qumran in 1947. It has all 66 chapters of Isaiah, in the usual order, and the museum dates the copy from about 125 BCE. (2)
• The museum says the number of textual variants in that scroll is well over 2,600. Its example is Isaiah 2:9b–10, missing in this scroll and present in other Qumran copies and in the Septuagint. (2)
• Chapter 53 is inside those 66 chapters. The museum page does not treat it as a separate proof. Isaiah 53 on this site is the King James chapter.

Where they were found, and how old the copies are

The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital LibraryCloseAmong the Scrolls are partial or complete copies of every book in the Hebrew Bible (except the book of Esther).Dead Sea Scrolls, biblical manuscripts · Israel Antiquities AuthorityOpen source introduces the finds as ancient religious writings from eleven caves near Qumran. Discoveries from other sites are mostly documents and letters, including caves used by refugees. The Qumran group is the one that holds biblical books and other Second Temple religious writing. (1)

The same introduction dates the Qumran scrolls from the third century BCE to the first century CE, before the Second Temple was destroyed in 70. Hebrew is the usual language. About 15 percent of the scrolls are Aramaic, and several are Greek. Most are parchment. Some are papyrus. One text is engraved on copper. The page does not say “discovered in 1947” for the whole find. The Israel Museum’s Isaiah page does say the Great Isaiah Scroll was one of the original seven discovered in Qumran in 1947. (2) This page uses 1947 for that scroll, which is the sentence the museum prints, and does not invent a day for every cave.

Scrolls from Masada and from the Bar Kokhba caves are a separate group on the same introduction. The biblical scrolls from the refuge caves, the page says, match the Masoretic text and suggest the biblical text had stabilized by the second century CE. They are not the Qumran library.

How many biblical books

About 230 manuscripts are called biblical scrolls: copies of works now in the Hebrew Bible. The introduction says they already had a special status in the Second Temple period, and that the communities of that time did not share one closed list. A closed canon, it says, came later. Among the scrolls are partial or complete copies of every book in the Hebrew Bible except Esther. About a dozen copies of some books are in the older paleo-Hebrew script. (1)

Many biblical manuscripts closely resemble the Masoretic text, the accepted Hebrew Bible from the second half of the first millennium CE on. The page calls that resemblance remarkable, because the Qumran copies are over a thousand years older than previously identified biblical manuscripts. It also says some manuscripts differ in language and spelling, and that additions and deletions imply the copyists felt free to modify texts. Both sentences are on the page. Agreement and change are the finding. Is the Bible True? states that in shorter form. This page is the detail.

The Great Isaiah Scroll

The Israel Museum’s page describes 1QIsaª, from Qumran Cave 1, parchment, about 22 to 25 centimeters high and 734 centimeters long, accession HU 95.57/27. It is the largest and best preserved of the biblical scrolls, and the only one that is almost complete. Fifty-four columns contain all 66 chapters of the Hebrew Isaiah. The page dates it from about 125 BCE, about a thousand years older than the oldest Hebrew Bible manuscripts known before the discovery, and it also says that by the time the scroll was copied, in the last third of the second century BCE, Isaiah was already treated as one book. The catalog line at the top of the page says first century BCE. Those are the museum’s own formulations. This page does not collapse them into a single year. (2)

The text generally agrees with the Masoretic version in medieval codices such as the Aleppo Codex, and it contains many variant readings, alternative spellings, scribal errors, and corrections. The museum says that, strictly speaking, the number of textual variants is well over 2,600, from a single letter, to a word or words, to a whole verse or verses. The example it gives is the second half of Isaiah 2:9 and all of Isaiah 2:10, absent from this scroll and present in 4QIsaª, 4QIsaᵇ, and the Hebrew behind the Septuagint. The English the museum displays beside the Masoretic side is the Jewish Publication Society translation of 1917. (2)

The museum also reports the scholarly view that Isaiah is an anthology: chapters 1–39 from the prophet’s time, and chapters 40–66 from an anonymous prophet about a hundred and fifty years later. It says that when this scroll was copied, the book was already regarded as a single composition. Christians receive Isaiah as one book. The scroll is evidence of that single composition in the second century BCE, on the museum’s dating. It is not a vote this page casts on the anthology theory. The theory is what the museum’s page reports.

Around twenty other copies of Isaiah were found at Qumran, the page says, plus one farther south at Wadi Murabbaʿat, and six commentaries. Isaiah is also quoted in other scrolls.

Isaiah 53

Isaiah 53 is the chapter Christians read as the servant who is wounded for others. The Great Isaiah Scroll contains all 66 chapters in the same order as the Masoretic book, so chapter 53 is in the scroll. The museum page does not single that chapter out, and it does not give a separate variant count for it. This page does not invent one. The reader who wants the English of the chapter on this site opens the King James text. The reader who wants the scroll image opens the museum viewer. The JPS 1917 English is what the museum pairs with the Masoretic side. They are not the same translation, and this page does not paste either chapter in full.

What the scroll shows about Isaiah 53 is what it shows about the book: the chapter was already in the book, in place, a thousand years before the medieval codices, inside a copy that also has a large number of variants. Was the Bible corrupted? is the claim that the earlier scriptures were altered beyond use. A recognizable Isaiah with counted variants is the comparison that claim has to face. How Many New Testament Manuscripts Are There? is the Greek side of the same kind of fact.

What transmission means here

A copy from the second century BCE that still reads as Isaiah means the book was not created in the Middle Ages. A variant count well over 2,600 means the copy is not a photograph of the Aleppo Codex. The introduction says the writers sometimes modified what they copied, and that many other copies stay close to the text later called Masoretic. That is the honest pair. Who Wrote Genesis in the Bible? is a different question, about who composed the Torah. A scroll’s date is the date of a copy. The caves do not label an autograph.

The scrolls do not prove inspiration. Christians receive the books as God’s word, which Is the Bible True? states from 2 Timothy 3:16CloseAll scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:2 Timothy 3:16 · King James VersionOpen source. The scrolls are the Hebrew a reader can check. Does God exist? is whether there is a God who could inspire a book. What Do Atheists Believe? is the belief that often treats the variants as if the books had no text.

Frequently asked questions

Do the scrolls prove the Bible has never changed?

No. The Israel Antiquities Authority says some copies differ by additions and deletions. The Israel Museum counts well over 2,600 variants in the Great Isaiah Scroll alone, and gives Isaiah 2:9b–10 as a line this scroll lacks. The same pages say many copies, including this Isaiah, generally match the later standard text. Both are the finding.

Does the Great Isaiah Scroll contain Isaiah 53?

It contains all 66 chapters in the Masoretic order, so chapter 53 is in the book on that scroll. The museum page does not discuss chapter 53 by itself. This page does not add a variant list the museum did not print.

Were the scrolls found in 1947?

The Israel Museum says the Great Isaiah Scroll was one of the original seven discovered at Qumran in 1947. The Leon Levy introduction describes eleven caves and does not, on the page opened here, date every discovery to that year.

Do they include the New Testament?

The Qumran biblical manuscripts are copies of the Hebrew Bible. The Greek New Testament is a different set of copies, counted by the Münster Liste. How Many New Testament Manuscripts Are There? is that count. When Was the New Testament Written? is why those books are not “hundreds of years later.”

Keep reading

• Is the Bible True?
• How Many New Testament Manuscripts Are There?
• Was the Bible corrupted?
• Who Wrote Genesis in the Bible?
• Book of Isaiah
• Isaiah 53
• Does God exist?
• What Do Atheists Believe?