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

212 THE SCROLLS’ IMPACT ON SCHOLARSHIP ON HEBREWS
At one level, 41 the catena of the first chapter describes the process
whereby the Messiah achieves his heavenly status, with the designation
“Son” (Heb 1:5) and an eternal throne (1:8–9). The image of exaltation
and heavenly enthronement was an important way for the early
Christian movement to express its conviction that Jesus had triumphed
over death. 42 The Jewish roots of such notions in descriptions of ascents
to heaven 43 have become increasingly clear. Contributing to the picture,
4Q491 frag. 11 44 refers to
a throne of strength in the congregation of the gods above which one of the
kings of the East shall sit. (4Q491 frag. 11, 1.12)
It also contains the voice of the individual sitting on the throne:
University Press, 1987); James H. Charlesworth, ed., The Messiah: Developments in
Earliest Judaism and Christianity (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992); James C. VanderKam,
“Messianism in the Scrolls,” in The Community of the Renewed Covenant: The Notre Dame
Symposium on the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. E. C. Ulrich and J. C. VanderKam; Christianity
and Judaism in Antiquity Series 10; Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame
Press, 1994), 211–34; John J. Collins, The Scepter and the Star: The Messiahs of the Dead
Sea Scrolls and Other Ancient Literature (ABRL; New York: Doubleday, 1995); Joseph A.
Fitzmyer, “Qumran Messianism,” in his The Dead Sea Scrolls and Christian Origins
(Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related Literature 2; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans,
2000), 73–110; and Harold W. Attridge, “The Messiah and the Millennium: The
Roots of Two Jewish-Christian Symbols,” in Imagining the End: Visions of Apocalypse from
the Ancient Middle East to Modern America (ed. A. Amanat and M. T. Bernhardsson;
London: Tauris, 2002), 90–105.
41. There is a tension between the affirmation of the exordium (Heb 1:1–3) that
the Son is a primordial emanation from God, the instrument of creation, and the position
of the catena (1:5–13), which stresses his exaltation. The author may have reread
the catena in the light of the Christology of the exordium and then introduced elements
such as the introductory comment of v. 6 to allude to the incarnation. See
Attridge, Hebrews, 56–58.
42. Cf., e.g., Rom 1:4; Phil 2:6–11; Acts 2:29–36.
43. James D. Tabor, Things Unutterable: Paul’s Ascent to Paradise in Its Greco-Roman,
Judaic and Early Christian Contexts (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 1986);
John J. Collins, “A Throne in Heavens: Apotheosis in Pre-Christian Judaism,” in
Death, Ecstasy and Otherworldly Journeys (ed. J. J. Collins and M. A. Fishbane; Albany:
State University of New York Press, 1995). For a review of the primary texts, see
Collins, Scepter and Star, 136–53. Discussion of such encounters with the angelic world
has played a role in recent discussions of the origins of Christology. See Jarl E.
Fossum, The Name of God and the Angel of the Lord: Samaritan and Jewish Concepts of
Intermediation and the Origin of Gnosticism (WUNT 36; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1985);
idem, The Image of the Invisible God: Essays on the Influence of Jewish Mysticism on Early
Christology (NTOA 30; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1995); and Crispin H.
T. Fletcher-Louis, Luke-Acts: Angels, Christology and Soteriology (WUNT 94; Tübingen:
Mohr Siebeck, 1997), 11–17.
44. First published by Maurice Baillet in Qumrân Grotte 4.III (4Q482–4Q520) (DJD
7; Oxford: Clarendon, 1982), 26–30; translation in García Martínez, DSS Translated,
117–19. Another copy of the text appears at 4Q471b.