The Dead Sea Scrolls, Scrolls of Jerusalem.

The Dead Sea Scrolls Aren’t The Dead Sea Scrolls; Jeremiah 32 and The God of Faith

My secondary title exaggerates. Of course, scrolls were found in the Dead Sea region. At the time of this writing more than a thousand scrolls have been found, scrolls from the pens of hundreds of different scribes. But other scrolls have also been found in other regions. In or near Jericho, Origen is said to have discovered a cache of scrolls, found a jar like those at Qumran. (1) At Masada, scrolls very like those at the Dead Sea have also been found. (2) Norman Golb in his book, "Who Wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls?" makes a very persuasive case that prior to the fall of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, libraries from Jerusalem were spirited away from Jerusalem in order to save them from the oncoming Roman armies. At their destinations the books were enclosed in jars and hidden away. 

As I think on these things who could help but remember Jeremiah 32? Jeremiah had been prophesying (correctly) that Jerusalem would be taken by Nebuchadnezzar but now in chapter 32, another word comes to the prophet. God tells him to buy a field and get the deed. Now, this word from God is very surprising. It’s as if God is saying in April of 1979, “go buy some land on Three Mile Island. Invest!” And the Lord continues “Take these deeds, both the sealed deed of purchase and this open deed and put them in an earthenware vessel. For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Houses and fields and vineyards shall again be bought in this land.” (3) the promise continues “For thus says the Lord: Just as I have brought all this great evil upon this people, so I will bring upon them all the good that I promise them. Fields shall be brought in this land of which you are are saying, It is a desolation, without man or beast; it is given into the hands of the Chaldeans.” And in Chapter 33, “Thus says the Lord of Hosts: In this place which is waste, without man or beast, and in all of its cities, there shall again be habitations of shepherds resting their flocks. In the cities of the hill country, the cities of the Shephelah, and in the cities of the Negeb, in the land of Benjamin, the places about Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, flocks shall again pass under the hands of the one who counts them.” (4)

Now let’s fast forward to the first century. The Romans are coming and the elders of Jerusalem know that the city is doomed. They decide to hide their libraries, learning from Jeremiah they decide to hide their books in jars and in the earth itself. They hide away their books to preserve them, yes, but also to remind God (because they have been reminded by him!) that one day the land would again be inhabited, that one day there would again be heard, “the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, and the voices of those who sings, as they bring thank offerings to the house of the Lord.” Now fast forward once again to 1948 and to the discovery of the young Bedouin boy. Driven from Europe and the United States the refugees and survivors of the Shoah have returned to the one place that seemed open to them, to the Holy Land, to Israel. Could it have been the Lord who directed the play of the Bedouin boy that day? Could it have been God reminding us in his humble way of who he is? He is the God of faith. He made a promise to Israel and he keeps that promise, but even more he sticks by Jerusalem and Israel, come hell or high water. And what a lesson that is, for the Jews certainly, but even more for the nations. Do we see yet, the goodness of God? The Jews are God’s people but also an object lesson, showing us the character of the God who is great and good.

  The promise to Jeremiah came true in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah and it came true again in the time following the Holocaust. How many times can God fulfill his promises? Let me answer that question with a question. What are the limits of the goodness of God? The so-called “Dead Scrolls” are a witness to the God of Faith, who doesn’t forget, who walks along side us, whose glory is to make both Jew and Gentile into conquerors, conquerors to the nth degree. And why does he do this? Here, I will let the reader do his own exploration. Open the Bible with me and see why.

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 1.Golb, Norman, Who Wrote The Dead Sea Scrolls (New York, NY: Scribner, 1995). p.105-109

 2. Ibid., 132.

 3.Revised Standard Version of the Bible (New York, NY: Oxford University, 1973).

 4.Ibid.

 Ibid.