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252 RESURRECTION: THE BIBLE AND QUMRAN
Praise of the Fathers, a received belief from contemporary circles of
the pious, a resurrection of just Jews destined to benefit from the
blessings of the messianic times at the eschaton. 7
A short time later, and without a doubt under the influence of Daniel
12 and of Isa 26:19 among other ancient texts, when this belief was
largely accepted, the Greek translation of Sir 48:11 with respect to Elijah,
extends this hope to all the just:
Happy are those who will see you
and those who are asleep (are decorated) in love.
For we also assuredly, we shall be revived.
Daniel 12
If the original text of Sir 48:10–14; 46:12; and 49:10 could mark a restriction
with respect to the resurrection of all the just, which is affirmed in
Isa 26:19, Daniel 12 (circa 165–164 B.C.) takes up the formulation of
Isaiah 26, 53, and 66 to express its hope of a future life through the
resurrection of the dead in a personal sense and transformation into a
glorious existence in contrast to the fate of the wicked (cf. Isa 66:24).
This occurs, after the annihilation of the kings and the foreign peoples,
within the context of an eschatological salvation at the time of final distress.
Then will appear Michael, the protector of the people of God who
are being threatened by the enemy. Among the people the ones who will
be saved are “all those who are written in the Book” (Dan 12:1), which
is to be understood as the Book of Life. In contrast, all others will perish,
which is implied in Daniel 12, but explicit, for example, in Jub. 30:20–22,
which dates from the same period.
Exegetes have proposed diverse explanations of v. 2: the sense of “the
many” (Mybr), of the preposition Nm in “from those who sleep in the land
of dust” (rp( tmd) yn#ym), and above all of the “these” (hl)): is there
a universal resurrection or of a group of Israelites alone, both just and
sinners, or are the Israelites just and others sinners? Or again, does verse
12:2a include among the dead a group subdivided into two categories,
those (the “many” = Mybr) who rise and, implicitly, the others who
remain among the dead? In other words, are the two groups (vv. 1–2a)
divided, on the one hand, into those who in the final generation retain
7. For an up-to-date note, see part “III L’eschatologie” in my article, “Ben Sira et
Qumrân,” in Il Libro del Siracide: Tradizione, Redazione, Teologia, IV Convegno di Studi biblici,
Palermo 2–3 Áprile 2004 (ed. G. Bellia and A. Passaro; forthcoming).