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Re: ritual in DSS.



Ritual abounds in the Scrolls; the most elaborate are Shirot Hashabbat
(4Q400-407 and 11Q5-6) and the Marriage Ritual (4Q502); the first dealing
with male-angel dedication (may be circumcision as per Newsom; maybe
castration as per Sheres and Blau); the second seems to be a marriage ritual
of sorts.  Other less "grandiose" rituals can be found interspersed in The
Temple Scroll as well as in some fragments that deal with formulae that one
uses against evil spirits (e.g. 4Q560).  Purification rituals are also
widely used (e.g. 4Q512).

Ita Sheres
and
Anne K. Blau.