Christianity
The Messianic Rule Prescribes Essene Evangelizing, Explaining Jesus’s Mission
Abstract
© Dr M D Magee
Contents Updated: Monday, November 30, 1998
The Essenes
We have seen that each year, at the annual renewal of the covenant held at Pentacost, the chaste wilderness Essenic brotherhood (called priests and levites) and the village Essenes (called people and Israelites) congregated in the desert for a covenant renewal ceremony. New members were admitted to be instructed by the Master, when they would hear the Essene interpretation of the law of Moses (The Book of Meditations) and commit themselves to it. They were taught they were living in the “Last Days” or “End Time” and that strict adherence to the law was essential if they were to enter God’s kingdom or, as the Scrolls more often called it, “house” or “sanctuary”. Those who were saved were those who held fast to the community’s rules, followed the law, listened to the righteous teacher and confessed before God.
One of the Dead Sea Scrolls is particularly important in understanding the evangelical missions of John the Baptist and then Jesus, and why all those Christians determined to believe Christ was uniquely sent by God simply deny that the Essenes are at all relevant to the origins of Christianity. It is the Messianic Rule[†]Main Sources
G Vermes, The Dead Sea Scrolls in English, 4th ed (1995)
M Wise, M Abegg jr, E Cook, The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation, part of the same scroll as the Community Rule. D Barthélemy who first published it, called it the Rule of the Congregation, the name by which it is known to many, but Geza Vermes renamed it The Messianic Rule because it…
- was intended for “all the congregation in the last days” preceding God’s Visitation and the coming of the Messiah
- is a rule for a Community (Yahad) preparing for a cosmic war between righteous Jews and the nations of the world
- refers to the presence of the priest and the messiah of Israel at the Council, and at the meal described in Column II.
The Rule of the Congregation is inscribed in two columns, denoted I and II. It suggests the messianic expectation among Jews at the end of the first century BC, and the atmosphere in which the Jewish revolts arose in the first two centuries AD. The author imagines that, in the “Last Days”, the Yahad will lead the final war of Jews against the gentiles. All Israel—including here women and children—will be aroused and—now realizing their error in not earlier accepting the Yahad’s views—approach the Yahad to join it for the coming cosmic battle. So, this work reflects hopes for the community’s military organization in the coming war. In language and concept it is related to The War Scroll, yet this text is most relevant to the Essenic origin of Christianity.
Essene Evangelism in the Last Days
(I) This is the rule for all the congregation of Israel in the last days, when they are aroused to join the Yahad (Community) to live by the law of the sons of Zadok, the priests, and of the men of their Covenant who ceased to walk in the way of the people, the men of His Council who keep His Covenant in the midst of iniquity, atoning for the Land.
They shall summon them all on their arrival, little children and women too, to read into their ears the commandments of the Covenant, and instill in them all their rules that they may no longer stray in their errors.
These initial two paragraphs are the key to understanding how Jesus and John the Baptist were simply doing their duty as Essene leaders in the End Time. Christian apologists always contrast the life of the Essenic Yahad from the everyday rules offered in the Community Rule and the Damascus Document which tell members of the Essenes how they should live while participating in the segregated camps solely of celibate Essenes, and how they should live while participating in the civil life of their city or village. At the End Time an urgency arose that meant the everyday rules had to be modified, and that is being described here in the Messianic Rule.
Essenes were usually meticulous not to be polluted by unclean and unrighteous people, whence their elaborate rules. Senior Essenes were even concerned not to touch lesser members in the hierarchy because they imagined as they progressed up the ladder, they were approaching closer to an angelic state, and so were closer to God. But God had chosen all Jews as His people, and here we see that when the end of time was near, they had to try to save as many backsliding Jews as they could. Because the signs of the time will have been alarming the people, they themselves would have been growing conscious of the need to repent. Essenes had “ceased to walk in the way of the people”, and had kept God’s covenant in the midst of the iniquity of the ordinary Jews, but now in the last days, they had to summon ordinary, hitherto unrighteous Jews, women and children too, to be converted to righteousness. There was no time for the customary period of tuition as novices, simply reading the rules to them had to suffice.
So, the sinful world being about to end, changing the circumstances utterly, the normal rules had to be amended. The first—the senior, most holy Essenes, those called “men of renown”—had to be last, had the duty of taking the message to the common herd of unrighteous but nevertheless chosen Jews, to persuade them they had little time to repent. Time was nearly up and any who wanted to enter God’s kingdom had to take their last chance to do so. The leading Essenes were sent out into the community with an evangelical duty! It was the very duty that John the Baptist and Jesus undertook.
Here then is the passage of the Dead Sea Scrolls that explains why the behavior of Jesus does not match the behavior of the Essenes as described in their usual manuals of rules. These were extraordinary times, and required the first among the Essene hierarchy to reduce themselves to the level of the least so as to do God’s work. They had to summon all Israel, men, women, and children, not just men. They had to read them the rules in an exhortation that must have been curiously like the Sermon on the Mount, and reflected the exhortation given annually at the Renewal of the Covenant ceremony.
A Son of God
This shall be the assembly of the men of renown called to the meeting of the Council of the Yahad when God has begotten the Messiah among them. The priest shall come as the head of the whole congregation of Israel with all his brethren, the sons of Aaron, the Priests, those called to the assembly, the men of renown. They shall sit before him, each man in the order of his dignity. And then the Messiah of Israel shall come, and the chiefs of the clans of Israel shall sit before him, each in the order of his dignity, according to his place in their camps and marches. And before them shall sit all the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation, with the wise men of the holy congregation, each in the order of his dignity.
This begins a description of a banquet or feast associated with the arrival of the “messiah of Israel” in the last days, in which all Israel will take part, but this mythical meal presumably meant to be in God’s kingdom after the victory served as the etiquette for all Essenic meals. Or this future banquet was an idealization of the Yahad’s ordinary practice. According to The Community Rule, it regularly held less exalted communal meals according to this pattern. The connexion of the meal here to the arrival of the messiah further recalls Christian imagery of “the marriage supper of the Lamb”, the great banquet where believers are said to join Jesus after all evil has been vanquished (Rev 19:6-9).
What is interesting in the context of Christian history is its apparent reference to God’s “begetting” of the Messiah of Israel. The Hebrew verb used here is holid, the same verb used in the biblical “begetting” passages, but this passage of the text has long been controversial, because it is damaged. Biblicists, including Frank M Cross, Yigael Yadin, and Emile Puech, reject holid as a transliteration of the characters. The reading of the letters admittedly is now difficult, but the scholars who saw the manuscript when it was first discovered—when it was more legible than it is today, the texts have deteriorated—agreed on this reading. Geza Vermes of Oxford wrote in 1994:
This reading, which has been queried by many, including myself, in the past, seems to be confirmed by computer image enhancement.
It was the same year that Puech, a Catholic priest, also using enhancement technology, concluded that the difficult letters should be read as another verb, curiously meaning “be revealed”! If the traditional reading is correct, then this Qumran text is describing a messianic figure who is “a son of God”, a man fathered in some way by God, now a dogma of Christianity. Jews and now Christians think of themselves as all children of God, and Essenes thought of themselves in that way particularly, as being God's family—a brotherhood—but being begat by God is obviously a direct involvement of God in a special act of creation—a special procreation.
The Messianic Meal
And when they gather at the communal table, to eat and to drink new wine, the communal table having been set for eating, and for drinking the new wine, no one may extend his hand for the first fruit of bread and wine before the Priest, for he shall be the first to extend his hand over the bread, to bless the first fruit of bread and wine. Then, the Messiah of Israel shall extend his hand over the bread, then all the congregation of the Yahad shall utter a blessing, each man in the order of his dignity. According to this rule they shall proceed at every meal at which at least ten men are gathered together.
The priest has precedence over the messiah in breaking the bread, but all Essenes were priests as Zadokite sons of Aaron. The suggestion here seems to be that the messiah is not the highest in the Essenic hierarchy. One of the men of renown is senior to the messianic figure.
Most likely, in normal life, the practical leader or Nasi of the Yahad had the messianic role, and the priest was an older man, probably an earlier Nasi promoted to a titular role “the Priest”. The priest is, so to speak, the chairman while the Nasi is the CEO. Of course, the Nasi rarely expected to become the messiah, though that seemed to be the implication, given the right circumstances. The Nasi of the Essenes in the last days would become the messiah. That was Jesus. John the Baptist was apparently his predecessor, and was titular leader when imprisoned.
The Essene messianic banquet is the precursor of the Christian eucharist, first becoming the early Christian agape, or “love”, feast described by ancient writers like Hippolytus. The Essenes, it seems, had a formal ritual meal representing the expected messianic meal, and it is described in the gospels as the feeding miracles. Just like the eucharist, the morsals consumed in these miracles were never meant as material sustenance but as spiritual sustenance, an anticipation of the victory banquet. The New Testament and other early Christian literature describes disorderly behavior accompanying early love feasts, and Paul had to remind his converts that they were not a booze up and an orgy, but a respectful ritual. He it was who changed the ritual from a ritual anticipation of victory to a ritual omophagic remembrance of the new God he was promoting, Jesus Christ.
Stages of Life, and Marriage
The central passages lay out some rules pertaining to the responsibilities of Essene males in relationship with their maturity. Various stages of life are described for all male members of the community from childhood until about sixty. These paragraphs, although relevant to duties allocated in the cosmic battle, seem to have been extracted from the general rules regarding what is fitting for Essenes at different stages of their lives. Thus here is mention of the age when a man can lay with a woman in a sexual relationship—the age of marriage in other words. It hardly seems necessary when the End is imminent, whence a suggestion that this part has simply been copied from elsewhere, and inadequately edited.
And this is the Rule for all the hosts of the congregation, for every man born in Israel. From his youth they shall instruct him in the Book of Meditation and shall teach him, according to his age, the precepts of the Covenant. He shall be educated in their statutes for ten years…
The mysterious Book of Meditation, also mentioned in the Damascus Document and in the Secret of the Way Things Are (4Q410 etc), is probably The Torah.
At the age of twenty years he shall be enrolled, to enter upon his allotted duties among his family, to join the holy congregation. He shall not approach a woman to know her by lying with her before he is fully twenty years old, when he shall know right from wrong. And thereafter, he may bear witness to the the judgements of the Law, and assist at the hearing of judgements.
This Essene community allowed for marriage, specifying rules for it. In the Rule of the Congregation, women and children are clearly recognized as members of the community, and twenty is given as the minimum age for sexual relations and so for marriage. Apologists point out that the reference here to marriage differs from those in classical sources, often baldly claiming that Josephus and Philo say Essenes did not marry. In fact, Josephus is clear that there are two types of Essene, those that eschew marriage, and those that permit it, albeit in a regulated way. The latter may be the village Essenes who live a life in the normal civil community of Jews and Greeks, albeit again carefully regulated to prevent contamination. In Hypothetica, Philo says no Essene takes a wife. The rabbinic tradition is believed to be that of the Pharisees and it prescribes an age of twelve years for females and thirteen years of age for males—puberty—as the minimum age for marriage, while twenty, considered the start of adulthood, is the maximum.
Pillars, Pillar Apostles—Hierarchy
At the age of twenty five years he may take his place among the pillars of the holy congregation and serve in the congregation.
Jewish scholar, Lawrence H Schiffman, in view of the next paragraph, thinks this means 25 is the minimum age for military service. References to preparation for warfare like this appear in passages of the War Scroll. The choice of the expression “pillars of the congregation” is interesting but avoided by other translators, being remarkably redolent of the use of the expression “pillar apostles” by Paul.
At the age of thirty years he may approach to participate in lawsuits and judgements, and may take his place among the chiefs of the thousands of Israel, the chiefs of the hundreds, fifties, and tens, the judges and the officers of their tribes, in all their families, under the authority of the sons of Aaron the Priests. And every head of family in the congregation chosen to hold office, to go and come before the congregation, shall strengthen his loins that he may perform his tasks among his brethren in accordance with his understanding and the perfection of his way. According to whether this is great or little, so shall one man be honoured more than another.
Thirty is the minimum age of leadership, again an interesting age to compare with the reference to the age of Jesus in Luke 3:23 as “beginning to be about thirty” at his baptism, a sort of right of passage, initiation or coronation to a high position, it seems. The squad numbers given echo those of the mass feedings in the gospels, and they stem from the instructions of Moses in Exodus 18:21,25 and Deuteronomy 1:15, no doubt essential parts of the Zadokite tradition being emphasized here. Here is references to precedence based on understanding, perfection of one’s way, and honor, and an hierarchy, reminding us of the first and last passages of the gospels, and the keenness of James and John to have precedence.
Here too is the mention of an organization into families led by a Father, curiously like the medieval Catholic monasteries, that Christians simply refuse to believe could have been at the very start of Christianity in the Essenes. Yet the earliest Christians remembered in Christian history are called Church Fathers. Barabbas was Jesus Barabbas, as bibles now admit, and bar abba means “son of a father”. These Essenes were all brothers, sons of their father, the head of their family, and all of them were sons of God. Essenes and Christians referred to themselves as brethren, they were a fellowship or communion—a yahad.
When a man is advanced in years, let him be given a duty in the service of the congregation commensurate with his strength.
No dull witted man is to be ordained to office in the congregation of Israel, nor with regard to lawsuits or judgement, nor carry any responsibility in the congregation. Nor shall he hold any office in the war destined to vanquish the nations. His family shall merely enter him into the army register, and he shall serve such work as his capacity permits.
Elsewhere Essenes are restricted in the duties they can have as they advance in years. In John 8:57, the critics of Jesus knew he was less than fifty, evidently because a man in his position could not be older.
The further passage emphasises most clearly the expectation of the cosmic war. The Just Men, the Essenes, who aspired to be angels expected to be leaders of the hosts of the righteous Jews on earth fighting the wicked nations. When they began their task, Michael the Angel would rupture the Mount of Olives and the hosts of heaven would join the saints in their battle.
The sons of Levi shall hold office, each in his place, overseen by the sons of Aaron, to bring in and lead out the whole congregation, each man in his rank, under the direction of the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation—the leaders, judges, and officers, according to the number of all their hosts—overseen by the sons of Zadok, the Priests, and by all the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation. And when the whole assembly is summoned for judgement, or for a Council of the Yahad, or for war, the sons of Levi shall sanctify them for three days that everyone of its members may be prepared.
These are the men who shall be called to the Council of the Yahad… All the wise men of the congregation, the learned and the intelligent, men walking in perfection and ability, together with the tribal chiefs and all the judges and officers, and the captains of the Thousands, Hundreds,
(II) Fifties, and Tens, and the Levites, each man in the class of his respoinsibility. These are the men of renown, the members of the assembly called to the Council of the Yahad in Israel before the sons of Zadok, the priests.
Yet more about the hierarchy. Apologists make a lot of the enthusiasm of the Essenes for orders and levels, claiming that Jesus had no such interests, and taught “the last shall be first”, dispelling such pretensions, and leading modern Christians to think they need do nothing to be saved. The reason that Jesus is evangelizing among the publicans and sinners is that his duty as an Essene leader in the End time demanded it. The slogan “the last shall be first, and the first last” just cannot be read to mean that perfectly good men and women will be last in the queue to enter God’s kingdom, and so might find its Pearly Gates closed when they get there. The slogan reflects two things:
- Essenes had to be humble however righteous and angelic they might be. Humility was an angelic quality, so to imagine that one’s perfection meant one had to be first through the gates of the kingdom automatically disqualified you. Christians also have to be humble.
- As we saw above, with the End imminent, the leading Essenes had to follow their calling to help transgressing Jews, the publicans and sinners, to change their ways while there was yet time to do it. It may seem to transgress Leviticus 21:4 that “a leader shall not defile himself among his people, to pollute himself”, but the earlier commandments of Leviticus 21 allow a leader to suffer such defilement for members of his family. Essenes considered themselves a holy family. Their leader should defile himself to help his father, mother, sons, daughters, unmarried virgin sister, and brother. The leaders referred to in Leviticus 21 were the Zadokite priests, sons of Aaron, whom all Essenes believed they were.
The leader’s very elevation in the ranks of the Yahad meant he had to descend to the least of the ranks, that of the sinner, to persuade them to repent and adopt righteousness while there was yet time. By so doing, these top Essenes took the ultimate step towards God. Like His faithful angelic servants who had to descend to earth with His messages for humanity, the Essene chiefs had to go out among the people evangelizing! That way, they would be last into the kingdom of heaven perhaps, but, as saints, their place was reserved.
Here are mentioned the “Men of Renown” or Reputation, the Council of the Yahad, men like Jesus, John the Baptist and James the Brother of the Lord, whose reputation was such that it is remembered still.
Afflictions
And no man smitten with any human uncleanness shall enter the assembly of God. No man smitten with any of them shall be confirmed in his office in the congregation. No man smitten in his flesh, or paralysed in his feet or hands, or lame, or blind, or deaf, or dumb, or smitten in his flesh with a visible blemish, no old and doddery man unable to stay still among the congregation, none of them shall enter into office among the congregation of the men of renown, for the Holy Angels are in their congregation. Should any one of them have something to say to the Council of Holiness, let him be questioned privately, but let him not enter among the congregation for he is smitten.
Here the perfect requirements of God for entry into His kingdom are emphasized. Just as the sacrificial animal had to be without blemish, those aspiring to be angels had to be without blemish. These are rules for leadership, though. They did not preclude people from being members of the congregation, they prevented them from being leaders of it. They are not allowed into the assembly or to be confirmed in office in it. For men who may have to be practical soldiers, the rules make sense. There is little sense in fighting a battle with unfit soldiers.
Even so, this has to be read more subtly too, because these afflictions were metaphors or code for what might be called spiritual sicknesses—political positions of opposition to the Essenes. The cures Jesus effected were not cures of physical sickness. He tells people to tear out an eye rather than let it lead you back into sin. The physical blemish would not preclude a righteous man from entry into God’s kingdom, but the sin would! Moreover, if Jesus were an Essene leader and could effect such cures, rules like this one above would have been redundant. People with these blemishes need not be proscribed from the assembly, they could be admitted and simply cured. No such easy cures were possible even for Jesus.
The cures that were possible were cures of metaphorical sicknesses, and they were his reason d’etre at this stage of the world. Paralysis, blindness, lameness, dumbness, deafness, and so on, were code words for various types of Jewish apostasy in Essene eyes. If a man was blind because he had refused to see the correctness of the Essene way, but converted, then he was cured of his blindness. Of course, we do not know what these words meant in terms of sin, but they make Jesus’s miracles entirely understandable.
The Messianic Rule in Full
Column I
This is the rule for all the congregation of Israel in the last days, when they are aroused to join the Yahad (Community) to live by the law of the sons of Zadok, the priests, and of the men of their Covenant who ceased to walk in the way of the people, the men of His Council who keep His Covenant in the midst of iniquity, atoning for the Land.
They shall summon them all on their arrival, little children and women too, to read into their ears the commandments of the Covenant, and instill in them all their rules that they may no longer stray in their errors.
And this is the Rule for all the hosts of the congregation, for every man born in Israel. From his youth they shall instruct him in the Book of Meditation and shall teach him, according to his age, the precepts of the Covenant. He shall be educated in their statutes for ten years…
At the age of twenty years he shall be enrolled, to enter upon his allotted duties among his family, to join the holy congregation. He shall not approach a woman to know her by lying with her before he is fully twenty years old, when he shall know right from wrong. And thereafter, he may bear witness to the the judgements of the Law, and assist at the hearing of judgements.
At the age of twenty-five years he may take his place among the pillars of the holy congregation and serve in the congregation.
At the age of thirty years he may approach to participate in lawsuits and judgements, and may take his place among the chiefs of the thousands of Israel, the chiefs of the hundreds, fifties, and tens, the judges and the officers of their tribes, in all their families, under the authority] of the sons of Aaron the Priests. And every head of family in the congregation chosen to hold office, to go and come before the congregation, shall strengthen his loins that he may perform his tasks among his brethren in accordance with his understanding and the perfection of his way. According to whether this is great or little, so shall one man be honoured more than another.
When a man is advanced in years, let him be given a duty in the service of the congregation commensurate with his strength.
No dull witted man is to be ordained to office in the congregation of Israel, nor with regard to lawsuits or judgement, nor carry any responsibility in the congregation. Nor shall he hold any office in the war destined to vanquish the nations. His family shall merely enter him into the army register, and he shall serve such work as his capacity permits.
The sons of Levi shall hold office, each in his place, overseen by the sons of Aaron, to bring in and lead out the whole congregation, each man in his rank, under the direction of the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation—the leaders, judges, and officers, according to the number of all their hosts—overseen by the sons of Zadok, the Priests, and by all the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation. And when the whole assembly is summoned for judgement, or for a Council of the Yahad, or for war, the sons of Levi shall sanctify them for three days that everyone of its members may be prepared.
These are the men who shall be called to the Council of the Yahad… All the wise men of the congregation, the learned and the intelligent, men walking in perfection and ability, together with the tribal chiefs and all the judges and officers, and the captains of the Thousands, Hundreds, …
Column II
… Fifties, and Tens, and the Levites, each man in the class of his respoinsibility. These are the men of renown, the members of the assembly called to the Council of the Yahad in Israel before the sons of Zadok, the priests.
And no man smitten with any human uncleanness shall enter the assembly of God. No man smitten with any of them shall be confirmed in his office in the congregation. No man smitten in his flesh, or paralysed in his feet or hands, or lame, or blind, or deaf, or dumb, or smitten in his flesh with a visible blemish, no old and doddery man unable to stay still among the congregation, none of them shall enter into office among the congregation of the men of renown, for the Holy Angels are in their congregation. Should any one of them have something to say to the Council of Holiness, let him be questioned privately, but let him not enter among the congregation for he is smitten.
This shall be the assembly of the men of renown called to the meeting of the Council of the Yahad when God has begotten the Messiah among them. The priest shall come as the head of the whole congregation of Israel with all his brethren, the sons of Aaron, the Priests, those called to the assembly, the men of renown. They shall sit before him, each man in the order of his dignity. And then the Messiah of Israel shall come, and the chiefs of the clans of Israel shall sit before him, each in the order of his dignity, according to his place in their camps and marches. And before them shall sit all the heads of families (Fathers) of the congregation, with the wise men of the holy congregation, each in the order of his dignity.
And when they gather at the communal table, to eat and to drink new wine, the communal table having been set for eating, and for drinking the new wine, no one may extend his hand for the first fruit of bread and wine before the Priest, for he shall be the first to extend his hand over the bread, to bless the first fruit of bread and wine. Then, the Messiah of Israel shall extend his hand over the bread, then all the congregation of the Yahad shall utter a blessing, each man in the order of his dignity. According to this rule they shall proceed at every meal at which at least ten men are gathered together.
