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The Temple Scroll, all 26 feet of it, is the longest Qumran manuscript. It is a fresh composition mostly made up of rearranged long excerpts from the Pentateuch. One of its chief characteristics is the author's switch: he replaces the biblical revelation of the Torah by the Deity to Moses with a direct presentation of the commandments by God in the first person to the people of Israel. 

See for example Deuteronomy 21:5 set against Temple Scroll 63:3.

Deuteronomy       Temple Scroll 

And the priests, And the priests,

the sons of Levi, the sons of Levi,

shall come forward, shall come forward,

for YHWH your God for I

has chosen them have chosen them

to minister to him to minister to me

and to bless and to bless

in the name of YHWH. in my name.

Moreover, the author of the scroll eliminates duplicate commandments, reorders the biblical laws by topic, as do the later rabbis in the Mishnah (c.200 CE), and introduces new laws such as that regarding the festival of the new oil. The compulsory monogamy imposed on the Jewish king and the introduction of "hanging" (probably crucifixion) as a Jewish death penalty are also novelties of the Temple Scroll. 

There are four types of scripture exegesis among the Qumran writings. The first takes the form of an interpretative synopsis of biblical books. It allows the reader a quick grasp of Genesis and Exodus with regard to the creation, the flood, Pharaoh's attempt to exterminate the newborn Jewish boys, Moses at the burning bush, the encounter of Moses and Aaron with Pharaoh and the ten plagues of Egypt. 

The Qumran pesher (fulfilment interpretation) belongs to the second type. It is construed with a scripture quotation followed by an introductory formula and an interpretation usually associating the biblical prediction with its realisation in a recent event of the history of the Dead Sea community. We have such exegetical works on Genesis, Isaiah, Hosea, Micah, Nahum, Zephaniah, Malachi and Psalms as well as 13 columns of the almost complete commentary on Habakkuk. Such fulfilment interpretation is occasionally found in rabbinic literature too, but it is more common in the New Testament.

Legal exegesis constitutes the third type. It reinterprets various biblical commandments, as does also frequently the Temple Scroll. 

Fourthly, selections of scripture passages are employed to develop messianic and eschatological doctrines.  

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Jose Garcia
March 28th, 2013
4:03 PM
Why insisting on Aramaic as the language of Jesus when the inmense majority of the archeological records from that period in Judea favor Galilean Hebrew

Eliyahu Konn
December 22nd, 2012
5:12 AM
The articles use of the terms "Je-sus," and "Old Testament," are inaccurate. In an historically accurate study of the 1st Century, Y'shua is the accurate term, confirmed by 1st century ossuary inscriptions. The term "Old Testament," is clearly a Christian term sadly accepted by even those of Jewish descent. The Christian old and new designations reveal their displacement strategy. But within accurate dates the scrolls found at Qumran are a wealth of information. One needs to compare the data objectively and not use it to prove one's own theology. By the way, it is Yam HaMelakh, the Salt Sea, not the Dead Sea.

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