The Dead Sea Scrolls from the Qumran Caves

The first scrolls were found by a Bedouin shepherd in 1947 in a cave north of Wadi Qumran. Over the next nine years Bedouin and archaeologists found written remains in eleven caves along the cliffs. A few scrolls are nearly complete. Most of the collection is thousands of fragments of parchment and papyrus.

The Israel Antiquities Authority, which holds most of them, dates the scrolls from the third century BC to the first century AD. About 230 are copies of books now in the Hebrew Bible, and every book is represented except Esther. The rest are other Jewish religious writings of the time. About a quarter of these are called “sectarian”, because they set out the beliefs and rules of one particular community. The Authority notes that scholars first assigned all the scrolls to the Essenes, that this view has since been challenged and modified, and that many scholars still link the Essenes and the scrolls. The Authority states that no rabbinic or Christian texts were found among them. See the Community of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Dead Sea Scrolls Are Discovered.