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

BRENT A. STRAWN 109
However, as early as 1954, Patrick W. Skehan suspected that 4QDeut q
(4Q44) 9 contained only the Song of Moses (Deut 32:1–43) and was thus
an excerpted or abbreviated manuscript of sorts. 10 More recently, Sidnie
A. White Crawford and Julia A. Duncan identified three additional
Deuteronomy manuscripts (4QDeut j [4Q37], 4QDeut k1 [4Q38], and
4QDeut n [4Q41]) as excerpted texts, with Duncan noting that other
Pentateuchal manuscripts (4QExod d [4Q15] and 4QExod e [4Q16]) might
also be excerpted. 11 In 1995, these documents and several others like
them were the subject of a thorough review article by Emanuel Tov. 12
The present study investigates these fascinating documents yet again;
in so doing, I attempt three distinct but somewhat interrelated tasks. First,
I delineate a taxonomy that catalogues characteristics of these texts so as
to determine, if at all possible, whether or not they constitute a distinct
literary subtype or genre at Qumran (see §2). Second, I assess what the
nature and form of these manuscripts means for their usefulness (or lack
thereof) for textual criticism (see §3). Third, I explore what the practice of
excerption means for the notion of authoritative or “canonical” literature
at Qumran (see §4).
9. Citations of Dead Sea Scrolls texts in this chapter conform to the SBL standard
numbering and naming system, rather than to the PTSDSSP numbering and naming
system adopted for the present publication.
10. Patrick W. Skehan, “A Fragment of the ‘Song of Moses’ (Deut. 32) from
Qumran,” BASOR 136 (1954): 12–15. Perhaps one should compare 4Q141 (4QPhyl
N), which includes only Deut 32:14–20, 32–33. See Emanuel Tov, “Tefillin of
Different Origin from Qumran?” in A Light for Jacob: Studies in the Bible and the Dead
Sea Scrolls in Memory of Jacob Shalom Licht (ed. Y. Hoffman and F. H. Polak; Jerusalem:
Bialik Institute, 1997), 46*.
11. See, e.g., Sidnie A. White (Crawford), “4QDt n : Biblical Manuscript or
Excerpted Text?” in Of Scribes and Scrolls: Studies on the Hebrew Bible, Intertestamental
Judaism, and Christian Origins Presented to John Strugnell on the Occasion of His Sixtieth
Birthday (ed. H. W. Attridge, J. J. Collins, and T. H. Tobin; Lanham, MD: University
Press of America, 1990), 13–20; idem, “The All Souls Deuteronomy,” 193–206; and
Julie A. Duncan, “Considerations of 4QDt j in Light of the ‘All Souls Deuteronomy’
and Cave 4 Phylactery Texts,” in The Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the
International Congress on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Madrid 18–21 March 1991 (ed. J.C. Trebolle
Barrera and L. Vegas Montaner; 2 vols.; STDJ 11; Madrid: Editorial Complutense;
Leiden: Brill, 1992), 1:199–215; idem, “Excerpted Texts,” 43–62. For additional texts
with bibliography, see Table 1. Note also George J. Brooke, “Torah in the Qumran
Scrolls,” in Bibel in jüdischer und christlicher Tradition: Festschrift für Johann Maier zum 60.
Geburtstag (ed. H. Merklein et al.; Athenäums Monografien Theologie 88; Frankfurt
am Main: Anton Hain, 1993), 97–120; Annette Steudel, Der Midrasch zur Eschatologie
aus der Qumrangemeinde (4QMidrEschat a,b ): Materielle Rekonstruktion, Textbestand, Gattung
und traditionsgeschichtliche Einordnung des durch 4Q174 (“Florilegium”) und 4Q177 (“Catena
A”) repräsentierten Werkes aus den Qumranfunden (STDJ 13; Leiden: Brill, 1994), 179–81;
and esp. Tov, “Excerpted and Abbreviated,” 581–600.
12. Tov, “Excerpted and Abbreviated,” 581–600.