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

296 BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION AT QUMRAN
column 2. “Virtually the entirety of Mikra is used and reused by the writers
of the Qumran scrolls in order to author, reauthor, and—ultimately—
to authorize their practices and beliefs.” 27
In a brief second section Fishbane describes the chain of authority in
Qumran interpretation: God is the principal source of authority for the
community, and authoritative spokesmen make his purposes known with
respect to both the Law and the prophecies. In this respect the handling of
the Law at Qumran is especially intriguing: sometimes new rules can be
put alongside the Law; at other times new rules are presented as if they are
by Moses himself. In the third part of his survey Fishbane presents a classification
of biblical interpretation at Qumran in four kinds of exegesis:
scribal, legal, homiletical, and prophetic. However, Fishbane does not make
it clear that these are not mutually exclusive categories, since we can find
forms of scribal exegesis in the other three kinds. Nevertheless, his detailed
comments have widened the discussion of what constitutes biblical interpretation
at Qumran, have given pride of place to the interpretation of the
Law over the Prophets, and have provided the beginnings of a framework
into which all the material available since 1991 can be located. 28
In light of the increasing number of Qumran legal compositions that
are becoming available in preliminary editions, it is not surprising to find
that Johann Maier’s 1996 study on “Early Jewish Biblical Interpretation
in the Qumran Literature” 29 is mostly concerned with the interpretation
of the Law at Qumran. This has built suitably on the correct focus of
Fishbane’s survey, but Maier has also asked some hard questions of the
evidence. Whereas most scholars working on the Law at Qumran have
assumed that “Torah” was used virtually synonymously with the first
five scriptural books, 30 Maier has tried to tease out precisely what may
be referred to as Torah or Law in any instance. He has suggested that
it may not be appropriate always to think of Law and Pentateuch as
27. Fishbane, “Use, Authority and Interpretation of Mikra,” 359.
28. Trebolle Barrera’s brief study is suggestive of the new breadth of categories
needed for biblical interpretation at Qumran: Julio C. Trebolle Barrera, “Biblia e
interpretación bíblica en Qumrán,” in Los hombres de Qumrán: Literatura, estructura social
y concepciones religiosas (ed. Florentino García Martínez and Julio C. Trebolle Barrera;
Madrid: Editorial Trotta, 1993), 121–44; ET: “The Bible and Biblical Interpretation
in Qumran,” in The People of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Writings, Beliefs and Practices (ed. F. García
Martínez and J. C. Trebolle Barrera; trans. W. G. E. Watson; Leiden: Brill, 1995), 99–121.
29. Johann Maier, “Early Jewish Biblical Interpretation in the Qumran Literature,”
in Hebrew Bible/Old Testament: The History of Its Interpretation, vol. 1, From the Beginnings to
the Middle Ages (until 1300), part 1, Antiquity (ed. M. Sæbø; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck &
Ruprecht, 1996), 108–29.
30. Even though, of course, all would acknowledge that there are various textual
forms of all five books.