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Also known as 4QPseudo-Ezekiel, and referred to in older reference sources as 4QSecond Ezekiel, Pseudo-Ezekiel is a fragmentary, pseudepigraphic, Hebrew text found in Cave 4 at Qumran, and belongs to the cache of manuscripts popularly known as the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is also classified as "parabiblical" and considered, in some accounts, as "apocalyptic" as well. Not known even in the scholarly world until the late 1980s, and not published until 2001, [1] Pseudo-Ezekiel has emerged as one of the most controversial texts among Qumran finds in the early years of the twenty-first century.
At first, all of the Cave 4 fragments from 4Q385-4Q391 were identified as belonging to Pseudo-Ezekiel, but ultimately this was revised, separating out 4Q385a, 4Q387a, 4Q388a and 4Q389 as belonging to a "Pseudo-Moses", 4Q390 as a "Pseudo-Moses Apocalypse" with 4Q385b and 4Q387b identified as sections "C" and "D" of an Apocryphon of Jeremiah (also partly preserved in 4Q383). Later, this was revised once again, reassigning most of the proposed Mosaic fragments to the Jeremiah Apocryphon. That leaves six fragments—4Q385, 4Q385b, 4Q385c, 4Q386, 4Q388 and 4Q391—as belonging definitively to Pseudo-Ezekiel. 4Q391 is different from the others in that it is a papyrus dating from the end of the second century BCE, at least a hundred years older than the others, which appear to be copies.
4Q385c is illegible, and the remaining text is described as being "in poor condition", but all told the fragments yield four to six columns of text, with some measure of overlap among the various fragments. Other than the obvious flow of the text from Column 1 to Column 2, it is not known how they rightly fit together, although editor Devorah Dimant, who published the text in 2001, has suggested that the sequence of events in the canonical Book of Ezekiel provides a basis for the order currently observed. [1]
The text as a whole appears to be a discussion between Ezekiel and YHWH, beginning with YHWH promising to Ezekiel that the dry bones will be raised and knitted together again to resurrect the kingdom of Israel. The author has taken the biblical account of Ezekiel 37 as his source, but whereas the resurrection of Israel in Ezekiel 37 is a metaphor for national restoration, Pseudo-Ezekiel describes the resurrection of the righteous dead of Israel. Pseudo-Ezekiel therefore takes its place alongside 4Q521 as one of the only two texts found at Qumran which clearly refer to resurrection. This is followed by a prophecy that a "son of Belial" will come to oppress the Israelites, but he will be defeated and "his dominion will not exist". In remaining fragments, Ezekiel asks YHWH if time itself could be made to accelerate so that Israel may reclaim the promised land sooner rather than later. There is a stray segment which redresses the theme of resurrection, followed by a final evocation of the Merkabah, the chariot of YHWH mentioned in Ezekiel 1.
Although a very small minority of scholars do not concur with this view, the general consensus on Pseudo-Ezekiel is that it is a non-sectarian work that did not originate with the community at Qumran. The early date of 4Q391 indicates that the text existed before the establishment of the Qumran library held in Cave 4. Barry Smith has suggested that if Pseudo-Ezekiel can be dated back fifty years prior that the "son of Belial" indicated in the text may be identified as Antiochus IV Epiphanes (215-164 BCE). However, Dimant has suggested the late second century BCE date of 4Q391 indicates a terminus ante quem for the composition of the work itself, in addition to that of its source.
In his 1930 book, Pseudo-Ezekiel and the Original Prophecy, Charles Cutler Torrey coined the term "Pseudo-Ezekiel" to describe a proposed predecessor to the canonical Book of Ezekiel. In Torrey's claim, he stated that the Book of Ezekiel derived much of its prophecy from a pseudipigraphic work dating from about 230 BCE which was then edited around 200 into the canonical book that we know. Torrey also proposed that elements regarding the Exilic Period in which the historical Ezekiel lived (ca. 623 BCE - ca. 571 BCE) were added in the second round of editing to make the text appear as though it belonged to the Sixth century, rather than the Third. This view was vehemently disputed by most Rabbinic scholars and has not taken hold; however, if such a book as Torrey describes did exist, 4QPseudo-Ezekiel is certainly not that, as the line of derivation runs from the Book of Ezekiel to it, not the other way around.
The Book of Ezekiel is the third of the Latter Prophets in the Tanakh and one of the major prophetic books, following Isaiah and Jeremiah. According to the book itself, it records six visions of the prophet Ezekiel, exiled in Babylon, during the 22 years from 593 to 571 BCE, although it is the product of a long and complex history and does not necessarily preserve the very words of the prophet.
The Dead Sea Scrolls are ancient Jewish and Hebrew religious manuscripts discovered between 1946 and 1956 at the Qumran Caves in what was then Mandatory Palestine, near Ein Feshkha in the West Bank, on the northern shore of the Dead Sea. Dating from the 3rd century BCE to the 1st century CE, the Dead Sea Scrolls are considered to be a keystone in the history of archaeology with great historical, religious, and linguistic significance because they include the oldest surviving manuscripts of entire books later included in the biblical canons, along with deuterocanonical and extra-biblical manuscripts which preserve evidence of the diversity of religious thought in late Second Temple Judaism. At the same time they cast new light on the emergence of Christianity and of Rabbinic Judaism. Most of the scrolls are held by Israel in the Shrine of the Book at the Israel Museum, but their ownership is disputed by Jordan due to the Qumran Caves' history: following the End of the British Mandate for Palestine in 1947, Jordan occupied the area in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and Israel captured both the area and several Scrolls from Jordan in the 1967 Six Day War. However, some of the scrolls are still in Jordan and are now displayed at The Jordan Museum in Amman. Ownership of the scrolls is also contested by the State of Palestine.
In the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible, New Jerusalem is Ezekiel's prophetic vision of a city centered on the rebuilt Holy Temple, the Third Temple, to be established in Jerusalem, which would be the capital of the Messianic Kingdom, the meeting place of the twelve tribes of Israel, during the Messianic era. The prophecy is recorded by Ezekiel as having been received on Yom Kippur of the year 3372 of the Hebrew calendar.
The Apocryphon of Ezekiel is an apocryphal book, written in the style of the Old Testament, as revelations of Ezekiel. It survives only in five fragments including quotations in writings by Epiphanius, Clement of Rome and Clement of Alexandria, and the Chester Beatty Papyri 185. It is likely to have been composed c. 50 BC – 50 AD, although some scholars suggest a date closer to 7 AD.
Apocryphon, plural apocrypha, was a Greek term for a genre of Jewish and Early Christian writings that were meant to impart "secret teachings" or gnosis (knowledge) that could not be publicly taught. Jesus briefly withheld his messianic identity from the public. Based on that fact, some hypothesize without support that he also gave private instruction to the apostles, figures in the canonical Gospels of the New Testament and furnishes the material of the "sayings" Gospel of Thomas and part of the material of the Gospel of Mary. It is purportedly a secret teaching supposedly committed to a trusted disciple by Christ after his resurrection. The secret teaching in Gnostic literature refers to several things.
Emanuel Tov, is a Dutch–Israeli biblical scholar and linguist, emeritus J. L. Magnes Professor of Bible Studies in the Department of Bible at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He has been intimately involved with the Dead Sea Scrolls for many decades, and from 1991, he was appointed Editor-in-Chief of the Dead Sea Scrolls Publication Project.
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Carol A. Newsom is an American biblical scholar, historian of ancient Judaism, and literary critic. She is the Charles Howard Candler Professor Emerita of Old Testament at the Candler School of Theology and a former senior fellow at the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University. She is a leading expert on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Wisdom literature, and the Book of Daniel.
Discovered among the Dead Sea Scrolls near Qumran, Israel, were fragments of a scroll which describes New Jerusalem in minute detail. The New Jerusalem Scroll appears to contain an apocalyptic vision, an eschatological vision of the city and the temple, although, being fragmented, it is hard to categorize. Written in Aramaic, the text describes a vast city, rectangular in shape, with twelve gates and encircled by a long wall. Similar descriptions appear in Revelation 21–22 and comparison to the Temple Scroll shows many similarities despite no direct literary links between the two.
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Ezekiel 37 is the thirty-seventh chapter of the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. This book contains the prophecies attributed to the prophet/priest Ezekiel, and is one of the Nevi'im (Prophets). This chapter contains a vision of the resurrection of dry bones, widely known as the Vision of the Valley of Dry Bones, in which Ezekiel at last assures the captives in Babylon that they will return from exile.
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