The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The ... - josephprestonkirk

JAMES H. CHARLESWORTH 139
use a term that means “living water.” In both, in contrast to other literature,
this term signifies salvific and eschatological sustenance that is necessary
for “life” and “eternal life.”
The noun “water” occurs with unusual frequency in the scrolls, and
the provisions for purification at Qumran are exceptional. A shared preoccupation
with water distinguishes the Fourth Gospel from the first
three canonical Gospels: u3dwr appears 21 times in the Fourth Gospel but
only a total of 18 times in the Synoptics (7 times in Matthew, 5 in Mark,
and 6 in Luke). Here, surely, one should be open to some Essene influence
on the Fourth Evangelist.
8. United community. The Hebrew noun Yah[ad (dxy) is well-known in
biblical Hebrew; but in the Dead Sea Scrolls it obtains a unique meaning.
It is usually translated “community,” which reflects the concept of oneness.
135 This technical term Yah[ad is pervasive in the Rule, shaping and
uniting the disparate works collected into it. 136
The Greek term hen (e3n) appears 36 times in the Fourth Gospel; as
Johan Ferreira states, “the mere frequency of the term and its centrality
in the narrative underscores its importance for Johannine theology.” 137
After or just before the schism that devastated the Johannine community,
the Evangelist, or one of his students, enlarged the first edition of this
Gospel, adding chapters 15–17. It is impressive to observe therein the
repetitive emphasis placed on the concept of unity, expressed through
the word “one.” The author depicts Jesus praying to the Father, beseeching
that his followers be united into one:
I do not pray for these only, but also for those who believe in me through
their word, that they may be one (hen), even as you, O Father, are in me,
and I in you.…The glory that you gave me I have given to them, so that
135. Long ago Preben Wernberg-Møller warned against thinking that the dxy, indicated
“a monastically organized society of Jewish ascetics.” He rightly stressed that
the community was “open for membership to any pious Jew of the required intellectual
and moral standard.” See his “The Nature of the Yah[ad according to the Manual
of Discipline and Related Documents,” in Dead Sea Scroll Studies 1969 (ed. J.
MacDonald; ALUOS 6; Leiden: Brill, 1969), 56—81; quotations are on 61. See also
Shemaryahu Talmon, “Sectarian dxy—A Biblical Noun,” VT 3 (1953): 133—40; repr.
as “The Qumran dxy—A Biblical Noun,” in idem, The World of Qumran from Within:
Collected Studies (Jerusalem: Magnes; Leiden: Brill, 1989), 53—60; Johann Maier, “Zum
Begriff dxyh in den Texten von Qumran,” in Qumran (ed. K.-E. Grözinger; Wege der
Forschung 410; Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1981), 225—48.
136. For the frequency of the use of dxy, see James H. Charlesworth et al., eds., Graphic
Concordance to the Dead Sea Scrolls (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck; Louisville: Westminster John
Knox Press, 1991), 275 (this form without a preformative appears ten times in 1QS).
137. Johan Fer reira, Johannine Ecclesiology ( JSNTS 160; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic,
1998), 132.