THEO7065 · Theology

The Dead Sea Scrolls and Early Christian Literature

Morrissey College of Arts & Sciences

This graduate seminar introduces the library of the Dead Sea Scrolls and explores ways in which the discovery of these texts 75 years ago continues to improve historical understanding of Christianity. We will review how the DSS improved understanding of the Early Judaism within which the Christian movement arose, and how scholars recovered the ability to recognize the Jewish nature of ancient Christian ideas, practices, and concerns, particularly those in the New Testament. Each seminar will devote its final several weeks to comparing specific texts from New Testament and Early Christian literature with related texts in the DSS. Students who complete this seminar will be familiar with the corpus of the DSS, will understand how their discovery improves our understanding of Early Judaism and Christian origins, and will have first-hand familiarity with the historical evidence for this period and with tools for its interpretation. Those who complete the seminar will also have fairly extensive experience in traditional exegesis of ancient Jewish and Christian texts, both in translation and in original languages.Students will read the entire corpus of non-biblical manuscripts in translation, along with recent and classic scholarship. Students with relevant language skills will be invited to participate in an enrichment hour in which we read and translate texts in the original languages. Course grades will be based on preparation and participation in the seminar, and a 15-20 page research essay.