[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: orion-list probably not Maccabees; etc.



Dear Russell Gmirkin,

1) Good; I welcome agreement on "hasidim" in 4Q521.

2) While you may be persuaded that M (which you call "the Maccabean war
manual") and part of Enoch were written in summer 163 by "Hasidim," there
are other views. Your proposed justification for absence of 1 Maccabees at
Qumran requires acceptance of some of your assumptions about Hasidim
vis-a-vis Qumran, for example, that Qumran was a "predominantly Hasidic
library." I see no reason to accept such assumptions, nor the proposed
justification.

3) If Qumranites had observed Hanukkah--however you prefer or propose to
describe Hanukkah--they would, with great probability, have written about
it. It would appear in the circa 900 mss many of which focus on calendar.
Your offered imposed distinction apparently misses the condition that
Qumranites would not accept new holy days from that government. There was
not a concensus on orion about your proposal. I did not agree. And others,
silent on list, cannot be assumed to have agreed.
	No Hanukkah at Qumran is an historical datum. Historians would do
well not to try to dismiss it.

Best wishes,
Stephen Goranson


For private reply, e-mail to Stephen Goranson <goranson@duke.edu>
----------------------------------------------------------------
To unsubscribe from Orion, e-mail to majordomo@panda.mscc.huji.ac.il with
the message: "unsubscribe Orion." For more information on the Orion Center
or for Orion archives, visit our web site http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il.