This essay presents a preliminary analysis of 4Q216 from the perspective of material philology, a... more This essay presents a preliminary analysis of 4Q216 from the perspective of material philology, and comments on the implications of reading the Qumran Jubilees fragments from a material perspective. By taking seriously the materiality of the Qumran Jubilees manuscripts, it is argued that there were likely not 14 complete manuscripts of Jubilees at Qumran. In addition, this analysis calls into question the commonly held view that there is a high level of literary and textual stability connecting the hebrew manuscripts from Qumran to ethiopic manuscripts dating from the late fourteenth century C.e. and later. In light of the material composition of 4Q216, it is suggested that the manuscript may show evidence of the literary development of Jubilees during the Qumran period. In addition, a number of variants between the 4Q216 and ethiopic Jubilees point toward the development of diverging trajectories within the Jubilees tradition post-Qumran.
This article argues that there are matenal and literary reasons to view Jub. 1.15b-25 as a redact... more This article argues that there are matenal and literary reasons to view Jub. 1.15b-25 as a redactional addition to the text of Jubilees 1. The matenal arguments build upon a new matenal reconstruction of the 4Q216, which suggests that there was not space in the manuscript for this section of text. With this in mind, literary arguments for viewing this section as an addition are explored, and the late Second Temple period context of the addition of this text is made clear through connections with literature only known through the Dead Sea Scrolls. There are important implications of this analysis for the understanding of the composition and literary growth of Jubilees—which must have been subjugated to some degree of redaction.
The diverse collection of material related to Jubilees found at Qumran suggests that the work did... more The diverse collection of material related to Jubilees found at Qumran suggests that the work did not have a single textual or literary form in the late Second Temple period. Fragments of manuscripts of a variety of sizes and styles are preserved at Qumran, and from this cluster of Jubilees-related manuscripts, there are several parallels that can be seen in the later lines of transmission. One line of transmission is a coherent book that narrates the events from creation to the Exodus, mostly known through the Ethiopic Jubilees manuscripts. Other lines of transmission, however, do not include the whole book, but only select passages. This paper is an initial attempt to formulate a theory of these different lines of transmission into the various contexts in which they are found today, and further explain the abundance of smaller manuscripts containing text from Jubilees found at Qumran.
New Vistas on Early Judaism and Christianity : From Enoch to Montreal and Back.Edited by Lorenzo DiTommaso and Gerbern S. Oegema. London: T&T Clark, 2016
Textual History of the Bible: Volume 2: The Deuterocanonical Scriptures : 2B : Baruch/Jeremiah, Daniel (Additions), Ecclesiasticus/Ben Sira, Enoch, Esther (Additions), Ezra. , 2019
Entry in the Textual History of the Bible: Volume 2 on Syriac 4 Ezra.
The Embroidered Bible: Studies in Biblical Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in Honour of Michael E. Stone , 2018
In this essay we trace some new and some almost forgotten lines of the history of transmission an... more In this essay we trace some new and some almost forgotten lines of the history of transmission and use of 4 Ezra in the Christian East.
This essay presents a preliminary analysis of 4Q216 from the perspective of material philology, a... more This essay presents a preliminary analysis of 4Q216 from the perspective of material philology, and comments on the implications of reading the Qumran Jubilees fragments from a material perspective. By taking seriously the materiality of the Qumran Jubilees manuscripts, it is argued that there were likely not 14 complete manuscripts of Jubilees at Qumran. In addition, this analysis calls into question the commonly held view that there is a high level of literary and textual stability connecting the hebrew manuscripts from Qumran to ethiopic manuscripts dating from the late fourteenth century C.e. and later. In light of the material composition of 4Q216, it is suggested that the manuscript may show evidence of the literary development of Jubilees during the Qumran period. In addition, a number of variants between the 4Q216 and ethiopic Jubilees point toward the development of diverging trajectories within the Jubilees tradition post-Qumran.
This article argues that there are matenal and literary reasons to view Jub. 1.15b-25 as a redact... more This article argues that there are matenal and literary reasons to view Jub. 1.15b-25 as a redactional addition to the text of Jubilees 1. The matenal arguments build upon a new matenal reconstruction of the 4Q216, which suggests that there was not space in the manuscript for this section of text. With this in mind, literary arguments for viewing this section as an addition are explored, and the late Second Temple period context of the addition of this text is made clear through connections with literature only known through the Dead Sea Scrolls. There are important implications of this analysis for the understanding of the composition and literary growth of Jubilees—which must have been subjugated to some degree of redaction.
The diverse collection of material related to Jubilees found at Qumran suggests that the work did... more The diverse collection of material related to Jubilees found at Qumran suggests that the work did not have a single textual or literary form in the late Second Temple period. Fragments of manuscripts of a variety of sizes and styles are preserved at Qumran, and from this cluster of Jubilees-related manuscripts, there are several parallels that can be seen in the later lines of transmission. One line of transmission is a coherent book that narrates the events from creation to the Exodus, mostly known through the Ethiopic Jubilees manuscripts. Other lines of transmission, however, do not include the whole book, but only select passages. This paper is an initial attempt to formulate a theory of these different lines of transmission into the various contexts in which they are found today, and further explain the abundance of smaller manuscripts containing text from Jubilees found at Qumran.
New Vistas on Early Judaism and Christianity : From Enoch to Montreal and Back.Edited by Lorenzo DiTommaso and Gerbern S. Oegema. London: T&T Clark, 2016
Textual History of the Bible: Volume 2: The Deuterocanonical Scriptures : 2B : Baruch/Jeremiah, Daniel (Additions), Ecclesiasticus/Ben Sira, Enoch, Esther (Additions), Ezra. , 2019
Entry in the Textual History of the Bible: Volume 2 on Syriac 4 Ezra.
The Embroidered Bible: Studies in Biblical Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha in Honour of Michael E. Stone , 2018
In this essay we trace some new and some almost forgotten lines of the history of transmission an... more In this essay we trace some new and some almost forgotten lines of the history of transmission and use of 4 Ezra in the Christian East.
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