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

312 BIBLICAL INTERPRETATION AT QUMRAN
second part of the hymn as the poet begins to describe a sense of being
able to stand and rise with some measure of confidence despite all his persecutions.
This structural observation enhances the likelihood that the
many other allusions in the hymn as a whole are hung on the structure
that is derived at least in part from the model of this servant poem of
Isaiah. 68 The poetic and liturgical interpretation of Scripture in the
Qumran sectarian literature, as elsewhere in early Jewish hymnic and
poetic texts, is allusive and anthological.
5. Prophetic Interpretation
As stated, scholars have often considered biblical interpretation in the sectarian
texts from Qumran to be synonymous with the pesharim. We now
turn to prophetic interpretation. We can indeed see much of the particularism
of the Qumran worldview in the way the Qumran scribes handle
legal texts from the Scriptures and often extend them to bring out the
strictest possible meanings. Nevertheless, in the pesharim we can best see
the eschatological outlook of the Qumran community and the movement
of which it was a part. No longer should we restrict prophetic interpretation
to the commentaries that contain continuous or thematic interpretations
of the texts of Isaiah, some of the Twelve Minor Prophets, and the
Psalms. Alongside all those texts we must also put all unfulfilled promises,
blessings, and curses. The Qumran community considered that the
prophecies, promises, and blessings were being completed in their own
experiences, and as such, those experiences form a major part of the starting
point for the interpretation of the texts. 69
To make this point, the first example of pesherite exegesis comes from
4Q252, the Commentary on Genesis A:
The blessings of Jacob: ‘Reuben, you are my firstborn and the firstfruits of my
strength, excelling in destruction and excelling in power. Unstable as water, you shall no
longer excel. You went up onto your father’s bed. Then you defiled it (Gen 49:3–4a).
On his bed he went up!’ vacat Its interpretation is that he reproved him for
68. For a recent summary survey of the use of the Isaianic servant in the Qumran
literature, especially the hymns, see Otto Betz, “The Servant Tradition of Isaiah in the
Dead Sea Scrolls,” JSem 7 (1995): 40–56; on the Isaianic servant tradition behind an
Aramaic text, see George J. Brooke, “4QTestament of Levi d (?) and the Messianic
Servant High Priest,” in From Jesus to John: Essays on Jesus and New Testament Christology
in Honour of Marinus de Jonge (ed. M. C. de Boer; JSNTSup 84; Sheffield: Sheffield
Academic Press, 1993), 83–100.
69. Similarly, the experience of the continuing presence of Jesus in the early
Christian communities was the basic starting point for much New Testament interpretation
of the Old Testament.