Who do you think was the "Wicked Priest"?

Discussion about the Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, pseudepigrapha, Philo, Josephus, Talmud, Dead Sea Scrolls, archaeology, etc.
John2
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Re: Who do you think was the "Wicked Priest"?

Post by John2 »

I think in the big picture a good way to date the DSS that mention the Teacher of Righteousness and Wicked Priest is to consider Daniel.

As Flint notes in The Book of Daniel: Composition and Receptionn, Volume 2:
No less than seventeen of the scrolls found at Qumran are relevant for the study of Daniel, and present the reader with two surprises of unequal impact. The first surprise is the relatively high number of copies (eight) of the biblical book in the Qumran caves. Despite its relatively small size (twelve chapters), Daniel is outnumbered by only eight other compositions -counting both biblical and non-biblical- at Qumran ... The discoveries at Qumran have yielded several other writings that either mention Daniel or contain material that is in some related to, or of relevance to, the biblical book of Daniel. This new material, none of which was previously known to scholars, bears powerful testimony to several traditions related to "Daniel" among at least some Jews in the last century BCE and the first century CE.

https://books.google.com/books?id=NuZlN ... an&f=false
Flint goes on to note that of these eight manuscripts found at Qumran, half of them are dated to the Herodian era (up to c. 50 CE), and as VanderKam notes regarding DSS writings that cite Daniel in Religion in the Dead Sea Scrolls:
The Book of Daniel is cited in two places in texts that seem to be sectarian. It has, of course, always been of interest that Daniel is explicitly called a prophet in 4QFlorilegium .... 4QFlorilegium dates from the Herodian period and uses Daniel to clarify what the writer understands as an eschatological passage in Psalm 2 ...

[And] 11QMelch 2:18 (commenting on Isa 52:7): "And the messenger is [the ano]inted of the spirit about whom Dan[iel] spoke" (perhaps referring to something in Dan. 9:24-27, probably משיח נגיד [anointed prince] in 9:25).

https://books.google.com/books?id=2393T ... an&f=false
And regarding the dating of 11QMelch (11Q13), Roberts notes in The Dead Sea Scrolls: Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations ed. by Charlesworth:
The paleographic dating of the text has provoked some discussion. Van der Woude dated it to the Herodian period in the first half of the first century C.E., and Horton suggested an even slightly later date. Milik, however, argued for a date toward the middle of the first century B.C.E., ca. 75-50 B.C.E., and both Kobelski and Puech follow him with slight variations. A date for the manuscript in the middle of the first century B.C.E. seems likely, but the evidence makes greater precision than that problematic.

https://books.google.com/books?id=ROama ... ng&f=false
And regarding the pesharim (which mention the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest), Flint goes on to suggest that the art of pesher interpretation itself was derived from Daniel, to which Ben responded in another thread, "The Aramaic portion of Daniel (2.4-7.28) contains instances of the Aramaic word peshar ("interpretation") in the following verses: Daniel 2.4-6, 9, 16, 24-26, 30, 36, 45; 4:6-7, 9, 18-19, 24; 5.7-8, 12, 15-17, 26; 7.16. That is pretty impressive."
It is possible but not demonstrable that the Qumran covenanters took the art of pesher interpretation of mysterious messages from Daniel 2, 4, 5, and 7. At least we may say that the term and such interpretations are amply attested in Daniel's handling of dreams and the inscription on the wall in Belshazzar's palace. As John Collins puts it: "Here again Qumran draws important terminology from the Book of Daniel but uses it freely to express its developing worldview." That is, even if pesher interpretation is derived from Daniel, it is obvious the covenanters use it not only to interpret difficult texts and relate them to world powers but also to unlock the history of their own group in the last times.
I don't know about you, but I am in the camp that sees Daniel as having been written during or shortly after the reign of Antiochus, c. 160 BCE. So if we go by the idea that the Wicked Priest was Jonathan (or anyone else who lived c. 160), that doesn't give much time for the circulation and reception of Daniel, though I suppose it could be argued that Daniel and the Daniel-related DSS and the possibly Daniel-inspired pesharim were written by the same people and/or around the same time as whoever wrote Daniel, but if so then Daniel was accepted and drawn and expanded upon in various ways fairly soon after its composition.
Last edited by John2 on Thu Mar 15, 2018 10:26 am, edited 1 time in total.
You know in spite of all you gained, you still have to stand out in the pouring rain.
John2
Posts: 4309
Joined: Fri May 16, 2014 4:42 pm

Re: Who do you think was the "Wicked Priest"?

Post by John2 »

By the 2 + 2 = 4 reckoning, 390 years after the exile of Judah would be c. 196 BCE, before Daniel was even written (in my view). Maybe one could argue that Daniel was written before this, or that the pesharim pioneered the art of pesher interpretation before the Maccabean era and then this influenced the author of Daniel, but the DSS cite Daniel and call him a prophet, so I prefer to think that a) Daniel was written first, c. 160 BCE, and b) this influenced the later writers of the DSS.
You know in spite of all you gained, you still have to stand out in the pouring rain.
StephenGoranson
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Re: Who do you think was the "Wicked Priest"?

Post by StephenGoranson »

If I may suggest, in seeking to identify the Wicked Priest--and/or the contemporary Teacher of Righteousness--take into account many factors, and ask which are more important. The 390 + 20 years is not, I repeat, imo, one of the most important factors. Relying on one relatively weak factor overmuch can mislead. For example, some scholars suppose that the Teacher of Righteousness had served as High Priest and was deposed, but the evidence for such an assumption or presupposition is weak, as J. C. VanderKam (as cited in "Jannaeus..." pages 2-3 and note 5) and others have shown. That unwarranted presupposition can lead to *Teacher of Righteousness* or Wicked Priest candidates that are too early, such as the priest(s) before 152 BCE, and too late, such as Hyrcanus II *(oddly proposed, by different proponents, as both)*, to accord with other factors, imo.

Edited 18 March. Additions between **s
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