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3rd century BCE-1st century CE (discovered 1946/1947 CE)Primary source · 2 sourcesWell documented

A Desert Sect Writes the Dead Sea Scrolls

Discovered by a Bedouin shepherd two thousand years later, the scrolls preserve the oldest known Hebrew Bible manuscripts

On the timeline · around 3rd century BCE-1st century CE (discovered 1946/1947 CE) · Second Temple and ExileSecond Temple and ExileRabbinic and Medieval JudaismA Desert Sect Writes the Dead Sea Scrolls300 BCE200 BCE100 BCE1 CE100 CE200 CE

Quick facts

Composed
3rd century BCE to 1st century CE
Discovered
1946/1947 CE, by a Bedouin shepherd
Manuscripts recovered
c. 900-930, from 11 caves
Associated community
Essenes, at Qumran

What happened

Second Temple Judaism was not a single, unified religion: it included competing groups such as the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes. One community, generally identified with the Essenes, settled at Qumran near the Dead Sea and produced or collected the texts known today as the Dead Sea Scrolls, composed between the 3rd century BCE and the 1st century CE. The scrolls remained hidden in nearby caves until, according to the official account of Israel's Dead Sea Scrolls project, a Bedouin shepherd searching for a stray goat in 1947 found a cave containing ancient jars and, inside them, some of the oldest surviving biblical manuscripts, including a nearly complete Isaiah scroll. Further searching over the following decade recovered roughly 930 to 900-plus manuscripts from 11 caves, written in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, including biblical texts, community rules, and commentary.

Why it matters

The Dead Sea Scrolls pushed the physical evidence for the text of the Hebrew Bible back roughly a thousand years earlier than any manuscript previously known, and they gave historians a direct, unfiltered look at the diversity and internal argument within Second Temple Judaism that later rabbinic and Christian traditions would each interpret differently.

How we know

The scrolls are physical manuscripts, radiocarbon-dated and studied by paleographers and textual scholars since their discovery, and their find history is documented by the Israel Antiquities Authority, which now curates and publishes them.

Sources

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Part of a timelineHistory of Judaism26 events · A small highland people, a book that outlasted every empire that tried to erase it, and a faith that survived exile twice and built a state a third timeView all →
A Desert Sect Writes the Dead Sea Scrolls · History of Judaism · SourcedStory