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

ADELA YARBRO COLLINS 243
of Jehoshaphat (2 Chr 20:5). 56 As with the tabernacle and its court, the
whole interior of the first temple was held to be more sacred than the area
of the court. The common people were barred from the whole area set
aside for rituals performed by the priests, including the court. 57
The temple complex of Ezekiel 40–48 has an outer court and an inner
court (Ezek 40:17–47). The inner court was to have a higher degree of
holiness, and only the sons of Zadok were to be allowed to enter it. The
common people and the other sons of Levi could enter only the outer
court. 58 Furthermore, emphatic instructions are given that no foreigner
may enter the temple-complex (Ezek 44:5–9).
The second temple at first had only one court, like the first temple. At
some point during the third century B.C.E., an outer courtyard was
added. It is possible that the plan of Ezekiel inspired this addition. But
unlike the design and norms of Ezekiel, the custom in the second temple
was to allow Gentiles to enter the outer courtyard. 59
The Temple Scroll envisages a temple with three courtyards. Only the
priests are to have access to the inner courtyard. 60 Apparently only men
of Israel over the age of twenty are to have access to the second or middle
courtyard (11Q19 38.12–39.11). The third courtyard is intended for
the women of Israel and a certain category of foreigners (11Q19
40.5–6). 61 The temple is to have a terrace or platform around it, outside
the third, outer courtyard, with twelve steps leading up to it. Finally, a
ditch or trench, more than seven times wider than the terrace, is to separate
the temple complex from the city so that no one can rush into the
56. On the courts of Solomon’s temple see Theodor A. Busink, Der Tempel von
Jerusalem von Salomo bis Herodes, vol. 1, Der Tempel Salomos (Leiden: Brill, 1970), 143–49
and 160 with Abb. (illustration) 47. See also Maier, “Architectural History,” 29.
57. Haran, Temples and Temple-Service, 205–6.
58. Ezek 40:44–47; 42:1–14; 43:18–27; 44:10–14, 15–31; 46:1–3, 19–20.
59. The Mishnaic tractate Middot, like Ezekiel 40–48, envisages a temple complex
open to Jews only; Gentiles were allowed to enter the outer courtyard of the
Herodian temple, as was the case with the second temple of the third century B.C.E.
See Busink, Der Tempel von Jerusalem, 2:834–36.
60. This limitation seems to be implied by Temple Scroll 19.5–6; 32.10–12; 37.8–14.
61. Busink argued that the third, outer courtyard should be interpreted as the city
of Jerusalem, not as a courtyard. Its great size, as well as the fact that the middle courtyard
has the same measurements as Ezekiel’s outer courtyard, led him to this conclusion.
The outer courtyard in Ezekiel (42:20; 45:2) is 500 cubits by 500 cubits,
whereas the third, outer courtyard of the Temple Scroll (40.8) is 1600 by 1600 cubits,
measured inside the walls; Busink, Der Tempel von Jerusalem, 2. 1425. According to
Maier’s calculations (“Architectural History,” 24), followed by Wise (A Critical Study,
81–82), the outer wall of the third court was to be 1700 by 1700 cubits, measured on
the outside.