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

40 WHAT’S INACALENDAR?
The chronological system of this book is most perplexing. It does not in its
present form present a consistent whole, and probably never did. We are
not to regard it as anything more than an attempt of an individual to establish
an essentially Hebrew calendar over against the heathen calendars in
vogue around. In itself this calendar cannot be said to have any value. 32
In distinction, the Covenanters’ ephemeris is wholly consistent. Although
not one Qumran document exhibits all facets of their calendar, it can be
fully reconstructed by combining its distinctive features collated from
diverse documents. The year comprises 364 days and subdivides into
eight months of 30 days, and four months—the third, sixth, ninth, and
twelfth—which have an added day ( yôm nôsa4p) of special importance, and
thus number 31 days each. Months are consistently indicated by ordinal
numbers, like in the ancient Israelite tradition (e.g., Gen 8:4, 13, 14;
Exod 12:2; Leviticus 23 passim; Hag 1:1; Zech 1:1) and occasionally in
the Books of Maccabees. Only seldom are found Babylonian month
names, 33 which predominate in post-exilic books (e.g., Zech 1:7; Esth 3:7,
13; Neh 2:1) and in the rabbinic vocabulary, which the returners from
the exile are said to have brought back with them (y. Ros . ] Has . ] 1.56d). In
several documents the number of days in each of the recorded months is
also given. At times, these details are combined with a summary reference
to the number of days in an annual quarter (see below). The twelve
months of the year are arranged in four triads, designated teqûpâ, 34 each
comprising 91 days, which make up exactly thirteen weeks.
The sequence of the four annual quarters parallels the progression of
the major agricultural seasons: “the season of reaping to (that of) summer
(fruits), the season of sowing to the season of (cutting) green fodder”
(mô(êd qas[ir leqayis[ wmô(êd zera) lemô(êd des ]e) 1QS 10. 7). The terms
employed echo the appellatives of the same seasons in Amos 7:1–3; 8:1–2
and the Gezer Calendar (ca. 900 B.C.E.). 35 The beginnings of the
32. Robert H. Charles, “The Book of the Courses of the Heavenly Luminaries,” in
The Book of Enoch or 1 Enoch (Oxford: Clarendon, 1912), 149.
33. The month names tis ]rê, s ]ebat, and )ada¯r turn up in a fragmentary astrological text:
Zodiology and Brontology ar (4Q318 4.9; 7.4; 8.1). The term s ]ebat is also mentioned in a
fragment of a historical text: see Joseph A. Fitzmyer, “4QHistorical Text D, 4Q332,
Frag. 2.2,” in Qumran Cave 4.XXVI: Cryptic Texts and Miscellanea, Part 1 (ed. S. J. Pfann and
P. Alexander; DJD 36; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 2000), 283. The month name
marh[es ]wan (Nw#xrm turns up once. See Eibert J. C. Tigchelaar, “4QHistorical Text H?”
in Wadi Daliyeh II: The Samaria Papyri from Wadi Daliyeh and Qumran Cave 4.XXVIII:
Miscellanea, Part 2 [ed. D. M. Gropp et al.; DJD 28; Oxford: Clarendon, 2001], 127).
34. This calendrical term is also known from rabbinic sources.
35. See Shemaryahu Talmon, “The Gezer Calendar and the Seasonal Cycle of
Ancient Canaan,” JAOS 83 (1963): 177–87; repr. in King Cult and Calendar in Ancient
Israel (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1986), 89–112.