Tag Archives: Essenes

Dead Sea Scrolls Not Written by Essenes?

Hebrew University scholar Rachel Elior (author of The Three Temples), has recently made news for declaring that the Dead Sea Scrolls were not written by Essenes. In fact, according to Elior, there never were any Essenes at all. Josephus (and a number of ancient writers) made them up in order to create a mystique of [...]
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Christmas: The Original Story, Part 2

In my last post, I commented on how Margaret Barker, in her new book, Christmas: The Original Story, successfully portrays the temple and its traditions as the background for understanding the Christmas story.  Jews/Early Christians who held on to the ancient traditions of the Temple of Solomon saw in the birth of Christ the fulfillment [...]
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