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Re: document uniformity



>The documents hardly demonstrate any uniformity of doctrine. Consider
>that they include a brontologion, a horoscope, and a single text of
>physiognomical omen lore. Deut 18,9-22 expressly forbids various
>forms of magic and divination, and Deuteronomy was the runaway
>"bestseller" of Qumran, with fragments of 29 mss. The conclusion
>seems obvious that the collection included materials the collectors
>did not expressly approve of, but which they felt they should have
>some knowledge of. This is in stark contrast with Mesopotamian
>collections, in which divinatory and other magical material in fact
>*predominates* in many contexts.

Fred, I am quite puzzeled. This type of variation of textual content would not
seem unusualy to Jewish liturature like the Mishnah, which deals in all
manner of subjects (even outside of the legal content). Any of the classical
Midrashim would show not only this type of variance that I have seen in the
DSS, but also the 'contradictory' viewpoints. 

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   |        \/ /  \/ /       |     Moshe Shulman       |
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