From: hallam@zeus02.desy.de (Phill Hallam-Baker)
Subject: Re: Contents of the 'Death Sea Scrolls': claim by Australian
Reply-To: Hallam@zeus02.desy.de
Organization: Deutsches Elektronen Synchrotron, Experiment ZEUS bei HERA
Date: Fri, 4 Sep 1992 01:09:43 GMT

In article <1992Sep3.152946.4493@prodigy.bc.ca>, Steve Wart
<swart@prodigy.bc.ca> writes:
|>From: Tim O'Neill, Tim.ONeill@english.utas.edu.au
|>Subject: Re: Contents of the 'Death Sea Scrolls': claim by Australian
|>
|>In article <1992Sep2.020136.16606@newsroom.utas.edu.au>
|>Tim.ONeill@english.utas.edu.au (Tim O'Neill) wrote:
|>>In article <1992Aug31.202746.2788@prodigy.bc.ca>, Steve Wart
|><swart@prodigy.bc.ca> writes:
|>>
|>>> I find it quite interesting that the consensus position is considered
|>to 
|>>> be 'scientific' while an argument based on carbon dating is written
|>off by 
|>>> most of the respondents to this thread, simply because the poster is 
|>>> presenting an argument posited by (gasp!) a theologian.
|>>
|>>No Steve. The consensus opinion is based on a combination of
|>palaeographic 
|>>evidence, historical references in the scrolls in question and the carbon
|>>dating. Thiering's hypothesis depends on all of the arguments based on
|>these
|>>three sources of evidence being wrong.

If by the "consensus" position you mean the first guess of the bunch of
"schollars" of the international committee who have taken fifty years to perform
a tenth of the work achieved by the Israeli group then bear in mind the
following:- 

The Paleographic evidence is garbage. For religious materials paleographic
evidence can do no more than set the earliest date when a scroll was written.
Religious scripts are meticulously copied and thus the scripts change very
slowly, anyone claiming to date scrolls on the basis of such evidence needs
their head examined. 

The carbon dating was not carried out on more than a tiny fraction of the
scrolls and in any case the results do not rule out their being contemperaneous
with Christ, rather the reverse in fact.

The "historical" evidence is would be more convincing had the international
committee ever let other schollars near the material. As it is they have lost
any credibility through their complete inability to produce anything. Two pieces
of evidence which contradict the consensus dating are:-

1) The finding of a tract making a long denunciation of marriage to ones sister,
the language of the tract makes it clear that it is aimed at the ruling family
which would date it in Herodian times.

2) The description of Roman soldiers sacrificing to their standards. This only
makes sense in the context of the Jewish revolt and Masada rebellion since the
standard is the emblem of the emperor and sacrificing to the emperor only makes
sense after he has been declared a God. This puts us after old Julie C.

A team of schollars that has failed to publish after so long has no credibility.
It is a sad fact but every part of their work must now be considered worthless
and be repeated. It is not clear why they acted as they did but it is clear that
the either the suppression of the scrolls was deliberate raising suspision as to
their motives or they were so incompetent as to be unworthy of consideration.

As for the coup d'etat theory of the NT, this is a fairly well known theory and
is quite widely accepted as plausible in non-theological biblical study. 

>I would check your sources of that information. Dr Vermes is a jew, and

I will check my sources but as a Jew Dr Vermes would be more likely to figure in
the Israeli team which there are no complaints about. The International team was
set up by Jordan, then occupying Palestine where the scrolls were found. I
suspect that the person the poster was refering to was Farther Vaux, an
altogether more pope friendly character.

--

Phill Hallam-Baker