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

DENNIS T. OLSON 311
earth.” And it was so. God made the two great lights—the greater light to
rule the day and the lesser light to rule the night—and the stars (Gen
1:14–16).
The importance of these heavenly “lights” in regulating the patterns of
an ancient Jewish community’s liturgical and festival life is also suggested
by the title of the section in 1 Enoch 72–82, “The Book of the Itinerary of
the Luminaries of Heaven” (1 En. 72:1). Thus, the title of 4Q504 may
mean “The Liturgies (according to the Cycle of Heavenly) Lights.”
Still a third possibility for the meaning of the “Lights” is that they signify
the priests who function as intermediaries of the heavenly light from
God to the community. The high priest Aaron in Sir 45:17, for example,
is a vehicle of God’s light to the people of Israel. In the Testament of Levi,
the priest Levi (4:3) and the priest who is still to come (18:3–4) perform
this mediating role of the divine light to the community. Both of these
priests are compared to the sun. In the Qumran literature itself as in 1QS
2.3, the blessing of the priests upon the community includes the light of
wisdom. A Qumranic prayer in 1QSb 4.27 asks God to make the priest
“a great light for the world” through wisdom. A saying attributed to Jesus
in Matt 5:14 may also be suggestive in this regard as he instructs his disciples:
“You are the light of the world.” 31 One of the earlier biblical
sources for this image may be the priestly benediction in Num 6:22–27.
God instructs Aaron the priest and his sons to bless the people, using the
image of the light of the divine face to shine upon the people: “The Lord
make his face to shine upon you, and be gracious to you” (6:25). The
motif of Moses’ shining face after coming down from the encounter with
God on Mount Sinai may also be related (Exod 34:29–35). Moses’ face
reflects the divine radiance and glory as he mediates between God and
the people. Given this third possibility of associating the title “The Words
of the Lights” with the function of the priests, the title might be rendered,
“The Words/Prayers/Liturgies of the Lights.”
Certainty in the precise meaning of the superscription, “The Words of
the Lights,” may be difficult to attain. What seems certain is that the
prayers of 4Q504, 4Q505, and 4Q506 were daily prayers or liturgies
used in weekly cycles and led by priests from within the community. The
prayers clearly build upon and incorporate biblical phrases, images and
allusions as part of a larger phenomenon of what Judith Newman calls
“the scripturalization of prayer” in Second Temple Judaism. 32 Prayer
31. See Baillet, ibid., 138–39.
32. Judith Newman, Praying by the Book: The Scriptualization of Prayer in Second Temple
Judaism (SBLEJL 14; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1999).