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‘To the Hebrews’ or ‘To the Essenes’?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 February 2009

F. F. Bruce
F. F. Bruce
Affiliation:
Buxton, Derbyshire, England
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Extract

The purpose of this paper1 is to survey most of the lines along which, in recent years, attempts have been made to establish a relationship between the addressees of the Epistle to the Hebrews and the Essene movement in general or the Qumran community in particular, and to suggest what, in fact, these attempts amount to.

Type
Articles
Information
New Testament Studies , Volume 9 , Issue 3 , April 1963 , pp. 217 - 232
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1963

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References

1 A paper read at the S.N.T.S. meeting at Münster, August 1962.

1 When this paper was read I had not yet seen Coppens's, J. important study Les affinités qumrâniennes de l'épître aux Hébreux (Bruges–Pari and Louvain, 1962); that is why no reference is made to it here.Google Scholar

2 Revue Biblique, LXII (1955), 37, in an article ‘L'arrière-fond judaīque du quatrième évangile et la Communauté de 1'Alliance’ (pp. 5–44).Google Scholar

3 The subordination of the ‘old world’ to angels is implied in what is probably the original text of Deut., xxxii. 8 (‘the Most High…fixed the bounds of the peoples according to the number of the sons of God.’)—a reading previously known from LXX, but now attested in Hebrew in 4Q Dt. 32.Google Scholar

4 Studies in the Gospels and Epistles (Manchester, 1962), pp. 242 ff.Google Scholar

1 Cf., IQS iii. 18 ff.; IQH i. 17 (the spirits of truth and falsehood).Google Scholar

2 Cf. τΟīς άγυΟΟũσιν (Heb., v. 2),Google Scholar τ⋯ν τΟũ λαΟũ άγνΟημάτων (Heb., ix. 7).Google Scholar

3 The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (Assen, 1953), pp. 46 ff.Google Scholar

4 Cf., IQM xii. 8 f., where the holy angels are associated with the elect of God in their war against the ungodly.Google Scholar

1 Cf., Rev. xii. 14, where the woman probably symbolizes the Church of Jerusalem, the embodiment of the true Israel.Google Scholar

2 Cf, e.g., Renan, E., Saint Paul (Paris, 1869), p. lxi.Google Scholar

3 Cf. Yadin, Y., The Scroll of the War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness (Oxford, 1962), pp. 19ff., with rabbinical references in p. 37 n. 1.Google Scholar

4 4QpPs37, fragment A, i. 6 ff.

5 CD xx. 14 f.

6 Heb., viii. 8ff., quoting Jer. xxxi. 31 ff.; cf. CD vi. 19 et passim.Google Scholar

1 Quoted in Acts, xv. 16 f. of the extension of the gospel to the Gentile world.Google Scholar

2 J. R. Harris drew attention to the use of Deut. xxxii by early Christian apologists as a quarry for testimonia contra ludacos drawn from the mouth of Moses himself (cf., Rom. x. 19);Google Scholar but its use as a source of testimonia is earlier and more widely ranging than he could have envisaged (‘A Factor of Old Testament Influence in the New Testament’, Exp. Times, XXXVII [1925–1926], 6 ff.;Google Scholar ‘Irenaeus and the Song of Moses’, Ibid. pp. 333 f.).

3 Cf., also p. 218 n.3.Google Scholar

4 IQH iv. 14.Google Scholar

5 CD viii. 9f.Google Scholar

6 An interesting comparison between the pesher method of exegesis at Qumran and the exegesis of our Epistle is made by Kistemaker, S. in The Psalm Citations in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Amsterdam, 1961), although the resemblance between the two is exaggerated.Google Scholar

1 CD ix. 50 f.Google Scholar

2 Hebrews and the Scriptures (London, 1959).Google Scholar

3 Current Issues in N. T. Interpretation, ed. Klassen, W. and Snyder, G. F. (New York, 1962), p. 58Google Scholar (in a study ‘The Old Testament in Hebrews: An Essay in Biblical Hermeneutics’, pp. 53 ff.).Google Scholar

4 Allen, Cf. E. L., ‘Jesus and Moses in the New Testament’, Exp. Times, LXVII (1955–1956), 104 ff.Google Scholar

5 Cf., Acts iii. 22 f.; vii. 37,Google Scholar and the implication of άºΟ͵τµ αÍτΟũ in Mark, ix. 7.Google Scholar

6 IQS ix. 11.Google Scholar

1 Lindars, Cf. B., N.T. Apologetic (London, 1961): ‘one man fulfils the roles of both Messiahs’.Google Scholar

2 Zech., vi. 13 might be adduced as an exception, for there R.V. says of ‘the Branch’ (the shoot of David), ‘he shall be a priest upon his throne’; but R.S.V. ‘there shall be a priest by his throne’ (cf. LXX: ‘there shall be a priest at his right hand’) is preferable, as appears from the next clause: ‘and the counsel of peace shall be between them both’.Google Scholar

3 This passage represents the opposite extreme from Test. Reuben vi. 7 ff.,Google Scholar where kingship as well as priesthood is granted to the tribe of Levi. de Jonge, Cf. M., op. cit. pp. 46, 88 f.Google Scholar

1 The Epistle of Priesthood (Edinburgh, 1913), p. 15.Google Scholar

2 Traces of it appear in the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs (Test. Judah xx. 1–5; Test. Asher i. 3-vi. 6) and in the Qumran texts.Google Scholar

3 It is ²άπτισμα that is regularly used in the N.T. to denote both John's baptism and Christian baptism; the two other indubitable N.T. occurrences of ²απτισμός (Mark, vii. 4;Google ScholarHeb., ix. 10) refer to Jewish purification. But in Col. ii. 12, where Christian baptism is in view, ²απτισμῷ has stronger textual attestation than ²απτίσματι.Google Scholar

1 Cf., Num. xix. 9 (ḥaṭṭā'th hî'); so in the Mishnah the mê niddāh is referred to repeatedly as mê ḥaṭṭā'th.Google Scholar

2 ‘Did the Qumran Sect burn the Red Heifer?’, Revue de Qumran, I (1958–1959), 73 ff.Google Scholar

3 Num., xix. 9, 13, 20, 21bis; cf., xxxi. 23.Google Scholar

4 Or ‘all the deeds of man’ (kol ma'aśê geber).

5 Or ‘cleanse for himself some of the sons of men’ (weziqqēq lô mibbenê'îsh).

1 Robinson, J. A. T., ‘The Baptism of John and the Qumran Community’, in Twelve New Testament Studies (London, 1962), pp. 11 ff., especially pp. 23 f.Google Scholar (reprinted from H.T.R. L [1957], 175 ff.).Google Scholar

2 Cf., Zech. xiii. 1, the ‘fountain opened for the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem leḥaṭṭā'th uleddāh'—language remarkably reminiscent of the Red Heifer ritual.Google Scholar

3 Lang, Cf. G. H., The Epistle to the Hebrews (London, 1951), p. 167.Google Scholar

1 Daniéou, Cf. J., ‘La communauté de Qumrân et I'organisation de l'église ancienne’, R.H.P.R. xxxv (1955), 104ff.Google Scholar

1 de Vaux, Cf. R., L'archéologie et les manuscrits de la Mer Morte (London, 1961), p. 11.Google Scholar

2 IQM ii. 5: ‘These [the priests and Levites] shall be appointed for the burnt offerings and sacrifices, to set in order the frαant incense to secure God's good pleasure, to make atonement for all his coνegation, and to feed before him continually at the table of glory.’Google Scholar

3 Spicq, C., L'épître aux Hébreux (Paris, 1952), I, 39 ff. (‘Le philonisme de l'épitre aux Hébreux’).Google Scholar

1 Black, Cf. M., The Scrolls and Christian Origins (London, 1961), pp. 42 f.Google Scholar

1 Cf., Rev. iv. 2 ff.; vii. 9 ff.; xi. 19 xv. 2 ff.; Test. Levi. v. 1, etc. The idea of the earthly temple as a copy of the heavenly dwelling-place of God was a commonplace in the ancient Near East.Google Scholar

2 Cf., Test. Dan v. 12; Apoc. Bar. iv. 3, and the rabbinical exegesis of Ps. cxxii. 3: ‘Jerusalem which is built like the city which is its fellow (she-ḥubberāh-lāh).’Google Scholar

3 Gal., iv. 26; Heb. xii. 22; Rev. iii. 12; xxi. 1 ff., 10 ff.Google Scholar

4 The fragments from Caves 1, 2 and 5 have been published: see Discoveries in the Judaean Desert (Oxford, 1955), I, pp. 134 f.,Google Scholar for IQ 32, and Ibid. III, Texte (Oxford,1962), pp. 84 ff., 184 ff., for 2Q 24 and 5Q 15.

5 Baillet, Cf. M., Discoveries in the Judaean Desert, III, Texte, p. 85:Google Scholar ‘il faut par ailleurs se rappeler que pour elle [la secte] le Temple est susceptible d'être identifié avec la communauté (cf., IQS viii. 5–9; ix. 5–6)Google Scholar et qu'il est une réplique du ciel: voir Revue Biblique, lxiii, 1956, p. 394.’Google Scholar

1 I.E.J. III (1953), 30 ff.Google Scholar

2 It is difficult to accept the suggestion of Synge, F. C. (Hebrews and the Scriptures, p. 44) that πρός 'µ²ραίΟυς means ‘against Hebrews’.Google Scholar

3 For the general use of E²ραīΟι to designate Jewish Christians Black, cf. M., op. cit. p. 78; it appears in the title of the Gospel according to the Hebrews and (as Dr A. A. T. Ehrhardt has reminded me in conversation) in the formula of the Paris magical papyrus 574, 11. 3018 f., όρºιзω σµ ºατά τΟũ θµΟũ τ⋯ν 'E²ραίων 'λησΟũ.Google Scholar

4 The Epistle to the Hebrews (London, 1951), p. 162.Google Scholar

5 Ibid. p. 44.

1 The members of the synagogue described in Acts, vi. 9 were surely Hellenists.Google Scholar

2 ‘The Significance of the Qumran Texts for Research into the Beginnings of Christianity’, in The Scrolls and the New Testament, ed. Stendahi, K. (London, 1958), pp. 18 ff.Google Scholar

3 Op. cit. p. 78.Google Scholar

4 Among the stronger arguments for Rome I do not include the presence in that city of a συναγωγή Aι²σήων (CIG 9909).