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

262 THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS AND THE APOCALYPSE OF JOHN
Buchanan, 19 and J. Massyngberde Ford. 20 Buchanan’s commentary is
specifically an “intertextual” commentary.
A consensus seems to be emerging among scholars of the Apocalypse
and of the Dead Sea Scrolls that the two most fruitful points of contact
between the two literatures are (1) their understandings of the final eschatological
battle and (2) their understandings of the New Jerusalem. 21 Any
interpreter of Revelation wishing to address the rich traditions inherent
in these important themes of the Apocalypse would do well to pay close
attention to what the scrolls say. Nevertheless, scholars of the Apocalypse
do not always think about the scrolls in their work, and even those scrolls
scholars who work in New Testament studies do not always think about
the Apocalypse of John in their work. 22
Steve Moyise’s dissertation, The Old Testament in the Book of Revelation,
provides the most extensive comparison of the methods of biblical interpretation
in Revelation with those in the Dead Sea Scrolls. Although it is
significant that we see no parallel in Revelation to the formal pesher
method of interpretation as what we see in Habakkuk Pesher, there nevertheless
are significant parallels in method. Moyise discusses six: (1) identifying
an object or character metaphorically, (2) the use of catchwords,
(3) the use of abbreviation, (4) applying the attributes of one subject to
another, (5) correcting one text by means of another, and (6) the creative
reinterpretation of Hebrew roots. 23 Similarly, Jan Fekkes III keeps a close
eye on the scrolls when seeking quotations, parallels, and allusions to the
symbols in Revelation. 24
The pursuit of clarification regarding other elements in John’s Revelation
in light of the Dead Sea Scrolls continues with regard to specific
19. George Wesley Buchanan, The Book of Revelation: Its Introduction and Prophecy
(Mellen Biblical Commentary 22; Lewiston, NY: Mellen Biblical Press, 1993).
20. Josephine Massyngberde Ford, Revelation (AB 38; Garden City, NY: Doubleday,
1975).
21. The identification of these two themes is common to David Aune, “Qumran
and the Book of Revelation”; Adela Yarbro Collins, “Book of Revelation,” EDSS
2:772–74; and Peter W. Flint, “The DSS and the Book of Revelation.”
22. Note, for example, that George J. Brooke can review the history of scholarship
on the scrolls and the study of the New Testament without even referring to the
Apocalypse of John! See “The Scrolls and the Study of the New Testament,” The Dead
Sea Scrolls at Fifty: Proceedings of the 1997 Society of Biblical Literature Qumran Sections
Meetings (ed. R. A. Kugler and E. M. Schuller; SBLEJL 15; Atlanta: Scholars Press,
1999), 61–76.
23. Steve Moyise, The Old Testament in the Book of Revelation (JSNTSup 115; Sheffield:
Sheffield Academic Press, 1995).
24. See Jan Fekkes III, Isaiah and Prophetic Traditions in the Book of Revelation: Visionary
Antecedents and Their Development (JSNTSup 93; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1994).