The Mystery of the Copper Scroll of Qumran

by Robert Feather

  This same historiographical issue has bedevilled Qumran scholarship of late. Some voices have shouted loudly that the scrolls found in the caves have nothing to do with the people who lived at Qumran, but were placed there by others from another place. Others have highlighted the differences between the classical descriptions of the Essenes in the writings of Philo, Pliny and Josephus and the descriptions in the scrolls of the community and the wider movement of which it was a part. All the evidence is split up and emphasis put upon how little can be known. Other scholars have argued forcefully that what the site of Qumran, the manuscripts in the caves and the descriptions of the Essenes in the classical sources have in common, far outweigh some few discrepancies that can be accounted for relatively simply. Neither side has yet won the argument.

  Here is a book that spans times and places in its own challenging, historiographical way. We are forced to ask many questions. Was the treasure real? Has some of it been found? Is there still some located in the places suggested? Are the scrolls pointing us to temples and priests further away from Qumran in time and place than previously imagined? Should we view not only the Judaism of the late Second Temple differently, but even the very origins of Israelite monotheism? Is this synthetic reading of such varied evidence more fabulous than the enigmatic Copper Scroll itself? Let the reader decide.

  GEORGE J. BROOKE

  Rylands Professor of Biblical Criticism and Exegesis

  The University of Manchester

  CHAPTER ONE

  THE COPPER SCROLL – TWO THOUSAND YEARS IN HIDING

  Three-and-a-half hours of bumping across the rolling sandy hills of the Judaean Desert is not the easiest way to approach Qumran from Jerusalem. Passing picture-book monasteries in a bleak landscape dotted with rock-strewn mounds and occasional makeshift shelters, you see scenery that has not changed for thousands of years. Stopping on a high point of Mount Muntar to view the pastel shades of Mar Saba Monastery, you turn to find two small, dusky, Arab children and a donkey, who have appeared from nowhere to beg alms and stare wide-eyed at these invaders of their lonely land. When your open truck finally shudders to a halt, perched high on a cliff overlooking the Dead Sea, the heat is oppressive, your back is aching, and you wonder if it was really all worthwhile. The breath-taking view that meets your eyes soon dispels all doubts! (see Plate 1.)

  Below lies a vast beige-hued, flat coastal plain, cut by a dark strip of road, and patched by green rectangles of cultivation, sparse outcrops of boulders and scraggy trees. Beyond, in the far distance, you can almost taste the salty indigo thickness of the Dead Sea as it merges from violets and mauves into soft blue skies.

  Here is where my story begins, and where I saw for the first time the ruins left by a mysterious lost ‘community’ of pious, frugal, religious ascetics – the ‘Qumran-Essenes’ – who lived on the shores of the Dead Sea in the Biblical land of Judaea. The famous Dead Sea Scrolls, concealed in caves overlooking the Dead Sea, comprise the oldest collection of Biblical documents ever discovered.1 Documents of immense importance to biblical scholars, and with profound implications for all the major western religions.

  It was the start of a journey of enquiry that would take me back to the time when many of the Scrolls were written down and copied out – the era of Jesus. Back a further 1,500 years to the time of Abraham and Sarah and their encounter with an Egyptian pharaoh, to the time of Jacob and Joseph and their meeting with the most enigmatic of pharaohs, and to the time of Moses, Prince of Egypt, as he led his people to the promised land of Canaan.

  As I scrambled about the rock-strewn wadis and rolling foothills behind Qumran, my guide, Avner Goren, pointed out two low-lying caves, one of which he referred to as ‘Cave 3’, where the Copper Scroll of the Essenes had been found back in 1952. I had read about this strange artefact, but now saw for the first time the place where the Qumran-Essenes had hidden perhaps their most precious of scrolls, some 2,000 years earlier.

  As a metallurgist, with a Jewish background and knowledge of Hebrew, I found the Copper Scroll of special interest and was, quite naturally, intrigued by the unusual use of this material as a means of record. Even more tantalizing was the fact that this scroll contains a list of hidden treasure, none of which had previously been found. Conventional translations of the Copper Scroll seemed to me to give totally unrealistic numerical values and weights relating to the treasure, contrary to all my knowledge of metallurgy and experience in the refining of precious metals. So I began to question these traditional interpretations.

  I had studied metallurgy at university, almost as a random choice. Several of us at Marylebone Grammar School had decided to go to London University simply because we were friends, and I spent many happy hours in the warm basement of Sir John Cass College trying to extract metals from their ores, or purifying gold by scorification.2 I eventually qualified as a professional metallurgist and subsequently became a Chartered Engineer, working initially on the refining and assaying of precious metals, and later for the then British Iron and Steel Corporation. When the call of clattering typewriter keys called me to journalism, I joined Steel Times as Assistant Editor, and then edited The British Foundryman. Later I launched a journal for the Institution of Metallurgists, and a magazine on metrology.3

  COINCIDENCE OR MIRACLE?

  There are conflicting accounts of the finding of the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls, but what we can be certain about is that they were found by Arab Bedouin,4 and that the date was early 1947.

  The story of how the original seven major scrolls*1 found by Mohammed edh-Dhib and his brother in what became known as Cave 1, and were bought on behalf of the State of Israel, prior to 1967, is strange in itself. After passing through the hands of various intermediaries, three of the scrolls found by the Bedouin were finally acquired by Professor E.L. Sukenik, of the Hebrew University of West Jerusalem, on the very day the United Nations voted for the re-creation of the State of Israel – 29 November 1947. The recovery into Jewish hands of this first ‘treasury’ of lost documents has about it an almost miraculous co-incidentality after they had lain hidden for almost 2,000 years in a dusty cave. It is almost as if God said, ‘Let’s start again and here is a reminder of My words and some of My words that you have never seen. Also I will give you back your Promised Land this very same day!’ The other four major scrolls from Cave 1 were recovered by Professor Sukenik’s son, Yigael Yadin, in 1954.

  At the time of the finding of Cave 1 the territory was part of the British Mandate of Palestine, but after Israel’s War of Independence in 1948–49, it became part of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Between 1949 and 1967, Bedouin and archaeologists under the jurisdiction of the Jordanian Antiquities Department (led by Father Roland de Vaux, Head of the Dominican École Biblique et Archéologique Française, in Jerusalem), between them recovered all the known contents of the remaining ten caves, except for one major scroll from Cave 11. This latter ‘Temple Scroll’ was recovered by the Israelis during the 1967 Six-Day War.

  DATING THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS

  The general consensus of opinion amongst historians is that the Dead Sea Scrolls from Qumran were written or copied between 350 BCE**2 and 68 CE. These conclusions are based on archaeological studies of associated artefacts, palaeological comparisons of ancient writing, and scientific analysis using radiocarbon dating and Accelerator Mass Spectroscopy (AMS).5

  Radiocarbon analysis is a particularly useful tool in dating carbonaceous materials and, with modern techniques, can provide dates accurate to within tens of years. The principle on which it works is based on the presence of the Carbon 14 isotope in all organic materials, such as parchment, papyrus, leather, or linen. When a living organism dies it stops taking in Carbon 14 from the atmosphere; the radioactivity bound in the isotope decays at a precisely measurable rate, with a predictable half-life of 5,730 years. (See Glossary, Carbon Dating.) Given this predictable rate of decay, scientists are thus able to calculate the age of the material being tested.

&nbs
p; Until the early 1990s radiocarbon dating required several grams of organic material for a measurement, but AMS has reduced the sample requirement to under 2mg, and much more use is now being made of the technique. A recent sample test, for example, at the AMS facility of the Institute für Mittelenergiephysik, Zurich, Switzerland,6 dated the Isaiah Scroll to 205–200 BCE. Other tests done in 1994 at the Arizona AMS Laboratory, University of Arizona, in Tucson,7 gave results of between 400–200 BCE for the Testament of Kohath Scroll, 100–0 BCE for the Temple Scroll, 80–0 BCE for the Genesis Apocryphon Scroll and 75 BCE–60 CE for the Thanksgiving Psalms Scroll.

  In theory, radiocarbon dating is more accurate than any other form of dating (with its accuracy being confirmed by correlation with palaeographic studies, which are, to some extent, subjective). The Standard Deviation (SD) for radiocarbon dating for the period of the Scrolls is ±40 years, with a best achievable result of ±25 years. Radiocarbon dating’s main weakness is that it does not determine when the text was actually written, but only the earliest date the writing base material was made. Analyses of ink media can, however, give additional information, and this is a subject we will return to later.

  In their entirety, the Dead Sea Scroll collection comprises many almost complete scrolls, together with some 80,000 individual scroll fragments, that form part of about 830 different documents. They are generally attributed as being part of a library kept by a small, secretive, monastic sect, the Qumran-Essenes, who are known from archaeological evidence and historical records to have inhabited the area between 150 BCE and 68 CE. Many of these documents are now thought to have been copied, or originally written, by the Essenes.

  THE CONTENTS OF THE SCROLLS

  The scrolls include extracts of writings from all the Books of the Old Testament (except the Book of Esther), apocryphal and pseudepigraphic texts, Biblical commentaries and expansions, and sectarian writings of the Qumran-Essenes describing activities peculiar to them – such as descriptions of their ritual immersion in water and initiation ceremonies (See Glossary – Dead Sea Scrolls.)

  The scrolls constitute a definitive record of early Jewish life and religious beliefs, untrammelled by the subsequent editing and mistranslations of later copied documents. Nor have the contents of the scrolls been subjected to the Rabbinic and Christian censorship of later mediaeval documents. They have, however, been subjected to modern partisan interpretation and delays in publication, mainly for reasons of personal aggrandisement, which means that 30% of the texts still await official publication.8 I am not going to open that particular cupboard of ‘skeletons’ at the moment, but we will look in later on, when it is germane to the story.

  From what has been published, it is clear that the scrolls throw new light on the early days of Judaism and Christianity, on the surrounding culture, and on the strange activities that took place at Qumran.

  The excitement these finds generated, both in the public and in academic circles, was unprecedented and, if anything, has increased with the passing of time. As the oldest known collection of Biblical texts ever discovered, they predate all previous Hebrew written texts by almost 900 years.

  There are very different views as to the origins of those of the Dead Sea Scrolls that are thought to be original works of the Qumran-Essenes, like the War Scroll. Some scholars take the view that they are rooted in the post-First Temple*3 period of the prophets Ezekiel and Habakkuk, around 600 BCE. Others consider the texts to have been based on second or first century BCE experience. All are convinced that they are of immense importance in evaluating the early beliefs of the Jewish and Christian faiths and, subsequently, the Muslim faith.

  WHO WERE THE QUMRAN-ESSENES?

  Although the affiliations of the people that lived at Qumran are mentioned by contemporary commentators, such as Josephus, Pliny the Elder and Philo,9 their ‘eye-witness’ reports vary in important details and are quite sketchy. These commentators are assumed to be talking about a sect of the Essene movement that existed in Judaea at the time of the Second Temple, around the second century BCE, and who survived into the first century CE. As Josephus describes:

  Map by R. Feather and B. J. Weitz

  Figure 1: Relational map of the Ancient Middle East.

  They assemble themselves together again into one place; and when they have clothed themselves in white veils, they then bathe their bodies in cold water.10

  Pliny the Elder has the ‘Esseni’ living in the Judaean desert above En-Gedi and following a celibate lifestyle,11 whilst Philo says of them:

  They have shown themselves especially devout in the service of God, not by sacrificing living animals, but by deeming it proper to prepare their own minds as befits their sacred calling.12

  Recent excavations at Qumran, conducted in late 2001 and early 2002, under the direction of the Israel Antiquities Authority, coordinated by Yuval Peleg and Itzhak Magen, have uncovered evidence of a perfume or oil manufacturing operation immediately adjacent to the ruins and extending some 10m in the direction of the main cemetery area. This find seems to confirm the external description by the contemporary historian Pliny that the Essenes were engaged in some kind of perfume making at their locations by the Dead Sea. It is firm evidence that further excludes any possibilty that the site at Qumran was occupied by any group other than the Essenes.

  Excavations have so far included discovery of fourteen large white sealed storage vessels, and a large three-hole basin of unknown usage. Contents of the storage jars that have been opened show that they contain a red stained earthy material. Analysis of the contents is currently underway at the Weitzman Institute. It would be interesting if traces of madder are found in the residues as this medicinal vegetable extract has been detected in the bones of several of the skeletons excavated in the main cemetery and is displayed in the form of red stains on the skulls. One conduit running from the work site comes up inside the south-east corner of a mikvah (ritual washing basin) nearest the works, indicating some kind of ritual usage of the manufactured product.

  The Qumran-Essenes practised a form of Judaism quite different from that of the rest of the people. They eschewed personal wealth, living a very simple life, and devoted themselves to religious observance. They disapproved of the Temple in Jerusalem – the very heart of Jewish worship – believing it to be wrongly constructed, its priests to be ‘sons of darkness’ and the festivals the priests celebrated to be held at the wrong times of the year! This last point was based on the fact that the Essenes used their own solar-based calendar, rather than the more usual lunar calendar. They believed in a final apocalypse when two good Messiahs would come to save the world at the end of time. Their dead were buried naked, without adornments, in simple unmarked graves. They believed in the immortality of the soul and in some form of afterlife, but not in their own physical resurrection.

  Modern historians disagree on the origins of the Qumran-Essenes and aren’t even sure as to what they were really doing at Qumran. Their arrival and departure are shrouded in mystery. Archaeological evidence indicates that they were settled on the shores of the Dead Sea at least by 150 BCE. Their tranquil way of life was abruptly shattered by an earthquake in 31 BCE, and they temporarily left the area. They returned in 4 BCE13 – interestingly, in the year accepted by most scholars as that of the birth of Jesus – or am I just letting my fondness for coincidences run away with me! By 68 CE they were gone, no-one knows where, although a few seem to have turned up defending the last stronghold against the Romans, at Masada.

  As I explored the ruins of Qumran I could still see the remains of a large room with low ledges around the walls. This is known as the ‘scriptorium’, where twenty or so scribes must have laboured at their work of copying and writing the Dead Sea Scrolls.14 The materials they wrote on were parchment, papyrus, leather and clay. However, on 20 March 1952,15 a very strange scroll was unearthed, one which was engraved on almost pure copper – the so-called Copper Scroll.

  The Copper Scroll was discovered in a cave, some
2km north of Qumran, by an archaeological group led by Henri de Contenson working for the American School of Oriental Research, the École Biblique et Archéologique Française de Jerusalem and the Palestine Archaeological Museum. The roof of the 10m-deep cave had collapsed, sealing it with a large boulder. Within the 3m-deep chamber that remained, lying against the northern wall, were two pieces of copper scroll – one on top of the other (see Plate 3.)

  Why on earth would the Qumran-Essenes have had a scroll of copper?

  Its contents and nature have never been fully explained and, to this day, over fifty years after its discovery, they remain an enigma for conventional historians. Experts in the field do not agree about the scroll’s origins, its dating, its translation, or even its reason for existing, and they remain baffled by its confusing contents. As I set about unravelling its mysteries it became increasingly clear that this apparently incongruous scroll is not only a catalogue of fabulous ancient treasures, but also an historical document with momentous implications for our understanding of modern religions and beliefs.

  CHAPTER TWO

  BULLION BY THE BILLION

  My increasing interest in the Dead Sea Scrolls was further sparked in 1996, when I visited the ‘Genizah’ collection of arcane texts held at the University of Cambridge and heard that some of these manuscripts, found in Cairo at the end of the 19th century, were common to the much earlier texts of the Qumran-Essenes. I also learned that a three-day international conference, specifically devoted to the Copper Scroll, was due to be held at Manchester in September. I could not resist attending as my metallurgical curiosity was aroused by the idea that copper was used as a writing medium 2,000 years ago.