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

302 DAILY AND FESTIVAL PRAYERS AT QUMRAN
reconstruction of the sequence and columns in which the fragments fall,
although several of the fragments are difficult to place. 2 B. Nitzan has
noted the recurring and regularized structure of the individual morning
and evening prayers. 3 The structure of the prayers is as follows:
1. Heading—specifies the time of the prayer (for example, “On the…of the
month in the evening” or “And when the sun rises to shine over the
earth”) and a liturgical direction, “they will bless and they will answer
and they will say.”
2. An initial series of blessings—”Blessed be the God of Israel who does/has
done…”
3. References to the night (“And the night…at the beginning…of the revolutions
of the vessels of light”) or to the day (“And this day he has
renewed…for us dominion…”).
4. A concluding blessing to God (“Blessed be you, God of Israel” or Blessed
be your name, God of Israel”).
5. Final benediction—”Peace (be) upon you, O Israel.”
6. A division between individual prayers is marked either by a line or a
blank space.
These fragmentary prayers are dated to 100–75 B.C.E., largely due to the
Hasmonean Hebrew script in which they are written. 4
4Q504–4Q506
The 182 fragments of prayers of 4Q504, 4Q505, and 4Q506 involve a
weekly cycle of daily prayers. They were first published by M. Baillet
with some changes in readings and interpretations by K. G. Kuhn and M.
R. Lehmann. 5 Scholars have been able to reconstruct a number of the
2. Baillet, ibid., 105. See the suggestion concerning col. 3 and the repositioning of
frags. 2 and 3 in Joseph M. Baumgarten, “4Q503 (Daily Prayers) and the Lunar
Calendar,” RevQ 12 (1987): 399–407.
3. Bilhah Nitzan, Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry (STDJ 12; Leiden: Brill, 1994),
esp. the summary on 70.
4. Baillet, ibid., 105. A similar dating is offered by Baumgarten, “4Q503 (Daily
Prayers),” 399, and by Lawrence H. Schiffman, “The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Early
History of the Jewish Liturgy,” in The Synagogue in Late Antiquity (ed. L. I. Levine;
Philadelphia: ASOR, 1987), 33.
5. Baillet’s initial research on 4Q504 was “Psaumes, hymnes, cantiques et prières
dans les manuscrits de Qumrân,” in Le Psautier: Ses orignes, Ses problèmes littéraires, Son
influence (Orientalia et Biblica Lovaniensia 4; Louvain: Université de Louvain, Institut
Orientaliste, 1962), 389–405. Baillet first published 4Q504 frags. 1–2 and frag. 8 with
extensive notes in “Un recueil liturgique de Qumrân, grotte 4: ‘Les Paroles des
Luminaires,’” RB 68 (1961): 195–250. Some changes in readings were offered by Karl