Women, Children, and Celibate Men in the Serekh Texts1

Joan E. Taylor

King’s College London

The Serekh or “Community Rule” (in all its variant manuscript forms) is one of the

most famous of all the Dead Sea scrolls. It is commonplace to see it as referring to a sect of

celibate men; the assumption is that it “contains no allusions to the presence of women in the

group which it regulates.”2 However, in an important study, Eyal Regev has recently

challenged the notion that celibate men are the focus of the Serekh texts, or of any manuscript

in the scrolls corpus, by stressing that there are no explicit statements that deal with the issue of

sexual asceticism, unlike what is found in monastic rules, or among the Shakers. Rather, other

yaḥad documents (e.g., 4Q502 Ritual of Marriage or 1QSa Rule of the Congregation) refer to

marriage, reproduction, and children.3 If this is so, why assume that the Serekh can only refer

to a group of celibate men, even without explicit mention of women and children? This has

essentially been the position of Lawrence Schiffman for many years, given the numerous

references to issues of women and family in the halakhic texts of the scrolls corpus.4

1
I would like to thank Charlotte Hempel and Maxine Grossman for generously reading
over versions of this paper and for discussing many points with me. The opinions
expressed and any errors are of course my own.
2
Moshe J. Bernstein, “Women and Children in Legal and Liturgical Texts from Qumran,”
DSD 11 (2004) 191–211, at 195; see also, e.g., Eileen M. Schuller, “Women in the Dead Sea
Scrolls,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls after Fifty Years: A Comprehensive Assessment (ed. Peter W.
Flint and James C. VanderKam; 2 vols.; Leiden: Brill, 1998) 2:117–44, at 117–18.
3
Eyal Regev, “Cherchez les femmes: Were the Yahad Celibates?” DSD 15 (2008) 253–84.
4
Lawrence Schiffman, Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls: The History of Judaism, the
Background of Christianity, the Lost Library of Qumran (Philadelphia:
Jewish Publication Society, 1994).

1
 The recognition that there are women and children in numerous documents relating to

the scrolls communities has of course long been known, and these have been much discussed

among those considering issues of women and gender.5 However, Regev, like others, also

assumes that “women, marriage, and families are not mentioned in the Community Rule.”6 I

would like to problematize this assumption and consider here whether women and family

groups are implied in any part of 1QS,7 with reference also to the Serekh versions 4Q255–

264/4QSa–j and 5QS.8 I will also consider models of male celibacy.

Method

The only explicit reference in the Serekh texts to a woman is in the formulaic phrases

“one born of woman” in 1QS 11:21 (= 4Q264/4QSj 8) and “son of your handmaid” a few lines

5
The bibliography on this topic is vast, but for a good recent overview of the field see Sidnie
White Crawford, “Not According to Rule: Women, the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran,” in
Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov
(ed. Shalom M. Paul, Robert A. Kraft, Lawrence H. Schiffman and Weston W. Fields, with
Eva Ben-David; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 127–50. See also Cecilia Wassen, Women in the
Damascus Document (Atlanta: SBL, 2005), and the unpublished Ph.D. thesis by Christine
Barholt Jensen, “Kvinder i Qumran [Women in Qumran],” (Ph.D. diss,, Københavns
Universitet, 2004). In the recent conference in Jerusalem, The Dead Sea Scrolls and
Contemporary Culture: Celebrating Sixty Years of Discovery (6–8 July 2008), numerous
papers were presented on this topic.
6
Regev, “Cherchez les femmes,” 265.
7
For the text of 1QS, I use the reading established by Elisha Qimron in Dead Sea Scrolls:
Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek Texts with English Translations. Volume 1. Rule of the
Community and Related Documents (ed. and trans. James H. Charlesworth; Tübingen: J.C.B.
Mohr, 1994), with reference also to William H. Brownlee, The Dead Sea Manual of
Discipline: Translations and Notes (BASOR Suppl. Studies 10–12; New Haven, Conn.: Yale,
1951) and Preben Wernberg-Møller, The Manual of Discipline (Leiden: Brill, 1957).
8
For the Cave 4 material, see Philip Alexander and Geza Vermes, Qumran Cave 4 XIX Serekh
Ha-Yahad and Two Related Texts (Discoveries in the Judaean Desert 26; Oxford: OUP, 1998)
and the commentary by Sarianna Metso, The Serekh Texts (Edinburgh, T.&T. Clark, 2007).

2
earlier (1QS 11:19). However, gender-focused strategies of reading texts can adopt an

approach that looks for implied women even when they are not directly mentioned.9

Firstly, it is standard in gender-focused approaches to note androcentric language and

work against this as assuming necessarily an entirely masculine reality: textual androcentrism

need not accurately represent social androcentrism or masculine exclusivism. In English, for

example, having no exact equivalent to German “Mensch,” the word “man” traditionally can

mean “human,” as well as someone of male gender, as with Hebrew Adam (e.g., Gen 1:27;

5:1–2).10 It is therefore not clear from this term whether males alone are being referred to

unless there are other indicators. Maxine Grossman, in her exploration of facets of

androcentrism and gendered language in the scrolls literature, notes that “[r]eferences to

women in an androcentric text are clearly identifiable—they appear on those occasions when

women are explicitly not men . . . clustered around particular concerns, including control of

sexuality, reproduction, ritual purity, and social structure.”11 This does not necessarily indicate

that they are not included in generic masculine references. With the Serekh texts, we do not

then necessarily need to assume that masculine references only indicate males, and, according

to Grossman, “[w]here once we might have imagined a celibate community of males, this

perspective pushes us instead to think in terms of a sexually-controlled community of ‘men’,

9
This method is in particular adopted by Elisabeth Schüssler Fiorenza in her many studies of
New Testament material, most particularly in But She Said: Feminist Practices of Biblical
Interpretation (Boston: Beacon, 1992). For a summary, see Esther Fuchs, “Points of
Resonance,” in On the Cutting Edge: The Study of Women in Biblical Worlds (ed. Jane
Schaberg, Alice Bach and Esther Fuchs; New York: Continuum, 2004) 1–20.
10
As noted by Maxine Grossman, “Rethinking Gender in the Community Rule,” in The Dead
Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Celebrating Sixty Years of Discovery (Jerusalem, 6–8
July 2008), forthcoming in the conference volume edited by Adolfo Roitman and Larry
Schiffman.
11
Maxine Grossman, “Gendered Sectarians: Envisioning Women (and Men) at Qumran,”
in the forthcoming Festschrift for Carol Meyers (ed. Charles Carter and Karla
Bohmback).

3
understood . . . to include any such persons as could conform to the proper social norms of the

androcentric discourse,” referring also to Sidnie White Crawford’s observation that post-

menopausal women may have satisfied the requirements for membership of the group, so that

“the gendering of ‘men’ . . . might easily have included among them some men who were

women.”12

Secondly, we can work against the grain of masculinist rhetoric in order to be alert to

words and phrases that imply an awareness of women in the world the text points to, even

when the presentation of the texts is indeed androcentric, not only in language but also in

emphasis, in that males alone are the objects of interest, the addressees and the protagonists.

The following discussion will employ this latter strategy.13 I will not here suggest that there is

gender inclusivism in terms of authorship or readership, and will begin with the assumption

that the most likely authors and readers are adult males. However, I will not assume that

everyone within the totality of the group evidenced in the texts is necessarily an adult male. In

order to define parameters, I will explore the world of the texts in order to determine whether

women and children appear alluded to in hidden ways, and, if so, where they appear in relation

to group identity.

I provide a fuller exploration of such a methodological approach, encompassing also

underlying theory, in my discussion of Philo of Alexandria’s De Vita Contemplativa, which,

for brevity, I do not repeat here. The fundamental difference between the approach adopted in

my gender analysis of Philo’s treatise and what follows in regard to the Serekh texts is that in

12
Grossman, “Gendered Sectarians.” See also Crawford, “Not According to Rule,” 148, where
she suggests post-menopausal women could have resided at Qumran, since they were not
subject to the impurities of menstruation and childbirth.
13
“On Method,” in Joan E. Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers of First-Century Alexandria:
Philo’s ‘Therapeutae’ Reconsidered (Oxford: OUP, 2003) 1–20.

4
the former case there is a recognition that Philo’s perspective is etic (even allowing for Philo’s

participation in the group under discussion), while in the Serekh texts the authorial perspective

is emic. That is to say, the group described in Philo’s treatise is presented and processed as an

ideal—by an outsider—in order to function within Philo’s wider rhetorical strategies designed

for an outside audience; the language and the purposes are Philo’s. However, in the case of the

Serekh texts, the actual group is defined by implication within its own legal proscriptions,

regulations, and other prescriptive devices, designed by insiders for the guidance of a group

leader, the ‘sage’ (‫ )משקיל‬who is to administer order and organize practice. There is no

explanation of insider terms that form key language components of the Serekh material, such as

‫ עצה‬,‫יחד‬, or ‫רבים‬, since these are assumed to be self-explanatory within the insider

dimensions of the group(s).

In terms of the Serekh texts I take the normative epistemological position within scrolls

scholarship that these legal and proscriptive texts are reflective of the historical actuality of

group(s), often termed the “Qumran community,” though I prefer to adopt the terminology of

“Serekh group(s)” since the connection between the group(s) evidenced in these particular texts

and the residents of the site of Qumran is unclear.14

14
An alternative epistemological position may hold that there is no correlation between the
texts and historical actuality, in that the authors may have been archaizing pre-actual
circumstances or eschatologizing post-actual scenarios (the latter position often being adopted
regarding 1QSa). However, the Serekh texts are concerned with real circumstances and issues,
such as the minutiae of order in assemblies. While texts formulating imaginary scenarios—
whether past, future, or remote—may have a textual “world” that is detached from reality, the
world of the text within regulatory discourse functioning within a group, and written within a
group for leaders of that group, would correspond to the actual world of the authors and
readers, unless it is specifically defined by the author(s) as applying to another scenario, for
example as a plan for an eschatological circumstance (as in the case of 1QM, War Scroll), or
circumstances of the past that may soon be replicated in the future (for example, operations of
the temple as defined in the Mishnah’s final redaction).

5
 The aim then in this discussion is to identify elements of the Serekh texts which

indicate the presence of women and children within the world of the text—that is, a

consciousness of women and families in the world of the text—even when they are not

specifically mentioned or addressed. Given that the perspective is emic, there will also be

consideration of whether women and children function as part of the world outside the group

(as “them”) or inside it (as “us”).

Lecherous Eyes

The most obvious place to find hidden women in the world of the text is in 1QS 1:6b:

those within the ‫ יחד‬must not look with lecherous eyes (‫)עיני זנות‬. This parallels a similar

proscription in CD 2:16 (= 4Q266/4QDa 2:2:16; 4Q270/4QDe 1:1) in which the phrase is used

in regard to male actions and illustrated by the story of the Watchers (1 Enoch 6-16 and see

Gen. 6) who lusted after women and procreated with them. At the very least, this would

suggest that the people indicated here cannot have lived an isolated existence far away from

people of the opposite sex, since in the Damascus texts this is clearly not the case. One might

suggest that the lechery concerned is same-sex in orientation; however, given the use of the

phrase ‫ עיני זנות‬in specific relation to men lusting after women in the Damascus texts, this

seems unlikely..

The word ‫זנות‬, “prostitution,” “unchastity,” “voluptuousness,” “fornication,” connected

semantically to the verb ‫“ זנה‬to run away/after,”15 is broad in meaning. In 4QMMT 81–91,

“fornications” are defined as a mingling of the sons of Aaron, the priests (who have “holy

seed”), with the people (i.e., with women who are not from priestly families). The Damascus

Marcus Jastrow, Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the
15

Midrashic Literature (New York: Title Publishing, 1943) 406.

6
Document defines ‫ זנות‬as one of the “nets of Belial,” here exemplified by the action of a man

taking two wives in his lifetime (CD 4:15–21). In 4Q269/4QDb 12:4–5 = 4Q270/4QDe 11:11–

12, a man who approaches his wife with ‫ זנות‬shall leave the congregation and never return.

This is not to be understood as a rejection of sex, but a ban on certain sexual conduct.

Inappropriate sexual connection—whether during a woman’s menstrual period or pregnancy or

for any other reason—was one specific case in which a woman could testify against her

husband in 1QSa 1:8–11.16 Importantly, it is the man who is responsible here.

While the Bible has images of Israel as the metaphorical “wife” of YHWH who

“whores” after other gods (e.g., Num 14:33 et al.), women’s “lechery” in these texts generally

consists in attracting rather than lustfully “eyeing” the object of her affections, as we see also

in 4Q184 Wiles of the Wicked Woman, where all the alluring parts of a woman’s body (mouth,

eyes, feet) as well as her clothes and lodging, are defined as defiled. Her eyes are not defined

as actively lustful but rather as manipulating: the eyes of a prostitute look around for a man she

can run after and trip up (4Q184:13–14).17 As Michael Satlow has explored, women are often

configured in contemporaneous Jewish literature as lacking the essentially masculine quality of

self-mastery.18 The identification of women being those who manipulate male lust is much

attested (e.g., Sir 25:21; 26:9; Pss. Sol. 16:7–8; T. Reu. 3:11–12; 5:1–5; 6:1; Josephus, J.W.

2.121; Ant. 7.130; b. Ta‘an 24a).19 Self-control is the required male response. The active agent
16
Philip R. Davies and Joan E. Taylor, “On the Testimony of Women in 1QSa,” DSD 3 (1996)
223–35. As an example of the ideal self-control of Jewish men, Josephus gives the rule that sex
is only allowed for procreation (C. Ap. 2.199, J.W. 2.161).
17
Melissa Aubin, “‘She is the beginning of all the ways of perversity’: Femininity and
Metaphor in 4Q184,” Women in Judaism: A Multidisciplinary Journal 2 (2001) 1–23;
Matthew Goff, “Hellish Females: The Strange Woman of Septuagint Proverbs and 4Q
Wiles of the Wicked Woman (4Q184),” JSJ 39 (2008) 20–45.
18
Michael L. Satlow, “‘Try to Be a Man’: The Rabbinic Construction of Masculinity,” HTR 89
(1996) 19–40, at 22–24.
19
See Craig Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Eerdmans, 1999) 187.

7
in sex was understood to be the adult male,20 and therefore he is usually responsible for sexual

misconduct. The masculine focus—a proscription against men’s practices—is also made clear

in the Damascus texts, as noted above, where examples of those with ‫ עיני זנות‬are masculine:

brave heroes and Watchers, with terrible consequences for the earth and for humanity (CD

2:17–21 = 4QDa 2:2:16–22; 4QDe 1:1–3).

This is then androcentric language. The rejection of certain conduct here does not imply

a man’s separation from women or the rest of society; the emphasis is simply on self-control. A

man has turned away from the practice of looking at women in a certain way. There is no

suggestion that, in order to avoid this, a man must leave the company of women and live a

celibate lifestyle together with other men. There is much in the Serekh rules that focuses on

Greek concepts of self-mastery (ἐγκράτεια), in line with concepts of “manliness”—ἀνδρεία

(often translated as “courage”)—well-known in the wider Mediterranean world,21 and found

evidenced in post-exilic Jewish literature (e.g., Sir 18:30; Prov 16:32; 4 Maccabees or

Jubilees).22 The proscription fits well with this.

In many ways the prohibition parallels a teaching tradition of Jesus which holds that

any man who looks after a woman with lust has already committed adultery with her in his

heart (Matt 5:28). The emphasis here is very much on the eye of the “one seeing” (ὁ βλέπων)

and in Matthew’s Gospel this is directly linked with the challenging instruction that if an eye

20
See, for example, Bernadette Brooten, Love between Women: Early Christian Responses to
Female Homoeroticism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996) 1–2; therefore, women
cast “inviting” glances rather than lecherous ones.
21
Michel Foucault, The History of Sexuality (trans. Robert Hurley; 3 vols.; New York: Random
House, 1988) 3:39–68; Satlow, “Rabbinic Construction,” 21–22; Grossman, “Rethinking
Gender.”
22
See Satlow, “Rabbinic Construction”; Stephen D. Moore and Janice Capel Anderson,
“Taking It Like a Man: Masculinity in 4 Maccabees,” JBL 117 (1998) 249–73; Maxine
Grossman, “Affective Masculinity: The Gender of the Patriarchs in Jubilees,” Henoch 31
(2009) 91–97.

8
causes you to sin, you should pluck it out (Matt 5:29, from Mark 9:47–48, repeated in Matt

18:9). But such (likewise androcentric) statements do not lead at all to the conclusion that

Jesus’ male followers had to separate themselves from women; women appear frequently in the

New Testament and early Christian literature as key role models and disciples working with

men, for example Priscilla (Acts 18:1–3, 18, 26; Rom 16:3–4; 1 Cor 16:19; 2 Tim 4:19), or

Thecla (The Acts of Paul and Thecla). The ideal masculine state might be defined as a

“eunuch” for the sake of the Kingdom of Heaven (Matt 19:10–12), an asexual condition

supposedly like the angels (Matt 22:30; Luke 20:34–36; Rev 14:1–15),23 but here the issue is a

man’s self-control alongside women outside the normative household, within the wider

community of Jesus’ disciples.24

The plain meaning of the text of 1QS 1:6b then is an exhortation for men not to look at

women with desire. Women clearly exist in the world of the text as the recipients of lecherous

looks, or inappropriate sexual connection. Whether they are in the category of “us” or “them”

in terms of group identity (as distinguished from author[s] or addressee[s]) is unspecified, but

since ‫ זנות‬affects wives of male insiders in the Damascus texts, as well as in 1QSa, and within

Israel in 4QMMT, it is unnecessary to assume that the women must be outsiders in the Serekh

texts.

Fruitful Seed

23
Halvor Moxnes, Putting Jesus in His Place: A Radical Vision of Household and Kingdom
(Louisville, Ky.: Westminster John Knox Press, 2003) 92–94.
24
Less extremely, rabbinic literature stresses that men who are truly men should control their
sexual desires, as has been explored in Satlow, “Rabbinic Construction.”

9
 Within the Two Spirits treatise (1QS 3:13–4:26), there is the specific blessing of

“fruitful seed” (1 ‫פרות זרע‬QS 4:7). This kind of androcentric language is attested frequently in

the Hebrew Bible (e.g., Gen 48:4) as indicating numerous physical children and descendants

since ‫ זרע‬is both the word for “semen” and also its realization in physical progeny in terms of

the male line.25 Fruitfulness is given as a commandment from God to the creatures of the world

(Gen 1:22) including humanity (1:28) and blessings of fruitfulness are granted to those doing

the will of God. Most particularly, the blessing of fruitfulness is included in the blessings to

Israel in Lev 26:9: “I shall turn towards you. I shall make you fruitful and make your numbers

grow, and I shall uphold my covenant with you.”

If a multitude of descendants is a blessing to the Serekh group(s) specifically, as in the

Two Spirits treatise, then it would be inconsistent for the people who used these texts to put

themselves in a position in which it is impossible for them to enjoy this blessing, by being a

separated, celibate community of men who had joined without ever reproducing. There is no

indication at all that there was a metaphorical interpretation of this reward.

It is important to note here the universalist language:26 God created “humanity” ‫))אנוש‬

for the dominion of the world, “making for it/him two spirits to walk with it/him until the time

of its/his visitation” (1QS 3:18). This universalism is found already in 1QS 3:14 where the

‫( משכיל‬sage) is to “teach all the children of light about the nature of all the children of man” (

‫)בני איש‬.27 This is a wide view of the order of creation, as in 1 Enoch 41:8. The rewards for the
25
The same terminology of the “fruitful seed” is found also in Greek sources, for example in
Lucretius, On the Nature of the Universe 1230–35.
26
I am grateful to Charlotte Hempel for pointing this out in her paper, “The Teaching on the
Two Spirits and the Literary History of the Community Rule” at The Hebrew Bible and the
Dead Sea Scrolls Day Conference at King’s College London, 14 May 2009.
27
Note the more strongly androcentric character of the language here than above: ‫ איש‬as
opposed to ‫אנוש‬.

10
“children of truth” in 1QS are healing, peace and a long life, fruitful seed, joy in eternal life

and a crown of glory with bright attire in eternal light (i.e., the life of angels) (1QS 4:6–8). The

language very much picks up on the themes of Leviticus 26 overall, while avoiding specific

illustrative examples.

As in Leviticus 26, so here: This blessing is contrasted with the curse on the wicked.

Those who walk in the spirit of deceit will find all kinds of “chastisements at the hands of all

the angels of destruction” and ultimately their own destruction (1QS 4:12–14); they have no

“remnant or survivor” (4:14). The curses of Lev 26:14–43 against those who reject God’s laws

and break the covenant are graphic about the horrors of destruction, including illness, plague,

failed crops, destroyed cattle, and utter annihilation and desolation through war. The curses

include wild animals who kill children (Lev 26:22), starvation that leads people to eat their

children (Lev 26:29), and general perishing in the lands of the enemies (Lev 26:38), though

here God does not totally forget the covenant he made with the first generations brought out of

Egypt (Lev 26:44–45). There is no metaphorical dimension to this passage either.

The Two Spirits treatise appears to reflect on the importance of Israel as a whole

keeping the covenant. It links also with other manuscripts on blessings (e.g., 4QBerakot:

4Q280, 286, 287), particularly to 1QSb Rule of Blessings, addressed to the maskil, in which

those who keep the will of God and walk with perfection constitute a congregation of holy

ones in which “all their seed” (3:1) will be blessed, since God will “make your seed holy with

eternal glory” (3:4).

While the language is androcentric, the theme concerns all humanity, with not only

earthly but also eschatological consequences for everyone following the path of truth or

falsehood. Those who follow truth are implicitly the true Israel, who have “fruitful seed” (a

11
generic reference) which is also part of Israel, the production of which assumes mothers and

fathers. Therefore, women are included with the category of “us,” as being part of Israel.

Israel and the Covenant Renewal Ceremony

This point requires further exploration. It has long been noted that 1QS refers to a

covenant renewal ceremony (1:16–3:12). This would suggest the presence of women and

children, as we find explicitly stated in 1QSa 1:4.28 Here “little children and women” are within

the congregation who hear the law, assembled “in thousands, hundreds, fifties and tens” under

the authority of various chiefs (1QSa 1:14–15). In the Serekh, the language is very similar to

that of 1QSa: The manner of entering the covenant is to be enacted “year after year” (1QS

2:19). God’s “acts of love” towards Israel are recalled (1QS 1:22) and Israel confesses sins

collectively every year (1QS 1:23–26).29 The priests are to “enter the rule” first, followed by

Levites, and then all the people (‫—)כול העם‬a strongly inclusive term—“in thousands,

hundreds, fifties and tens” (as in 1QSa), so that “all the children of Israel may know their place

in the ‫ יחד‬of God” (1QS 2:19–22). This covenant renewal ceremony has its precedent in Deut

5–6 and 31, in which the law is proclaimed every seven years “in the hearing of all Israel. Call

the people together, men, women and children and the foreigner dwelling with you” (Deut

31:12) as well as the renewal ceremony of Nehemiah (Neh 8:2–12).30

28
The tendency to see this as irrelevant to the actual “Qumran community,” since it is
eschatological in tenor, seems unwarranted; rather, there is an integration of traditional
communal legislation into an eschatological setting. See Charlotte Hempel, “The Early Essene
Nucleus of 1QSa,” DSD 3 (1996) 254–69. Crawford, “Not According to Rule,” 139, endorses
this reading of the actual; as well, see the public liturgy of 4Q502.
29
The root ‫ יחד‬means “unite, join together”; in Jer 48:7 princes and priests are literally joined
together in chains going into captivity.
30
This is explored in Thomas R. Blanton, Constructing a New Covenant: Discursive Strategies
in the Damascus Document and Second Corinthians (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2007) 28–38.

12
 The formulaic numbers themselves indicate organization in terms of administering

covenantal law. In Exodus 18, Moses is urged by his father-in-law to “choose capable and

God-fearing men” who will be put in charge of administering the law as heads of “thousands,

hundreds, fifties and tens” (Exod 18:19–22; see also 18:25).31 This is referred back to in Deut

1, where Moses addresses “all Israel” (1:1): Tribal leaders are in charge of “thousands,

hundreds, fifties and tens” (Deut 1:15).

In the books of Ezra and Nehemiah only “the community of the exiles” (Neh 10:8) are

permitted to eat consecrated food, though they must prove themselves worthy (Neh 7:61–65;

Ezra 2:63), and there is an emphasis on separation from the “filthy practices of the people of

the land” (Ezra 6:21, 9:11) under the guidance of Ezra who—as a scribe—was devoted to

“studying the law of YHWH in order to put it into practice and teach its statutes and rulings”

(Ezra 7:10). All the people are gathered together within households, in assembly (Neh 8:2–3),

as in the annual covenant renewal ceremony of 1QS 2:19, after which they eat and drink (Neh

8:12).32 In fact, the lowest gathering number of ten in 1QSa and 1QS may well indicate the

smallest household unit, as in Exodus and Deuteronomy.

This covenant renewal ceremony appears also in 4QDa 11:16–18 where there is a

reference to a gathering of all the inhabitants of the camps in the “third month,” which relates

directly to the Jubilees calendar, in which both Pentecost (Shavuot) and the Renewal of the

Covenant take place on the fifteenth day of the third month (Jub. 6:17–19).33

31
See also Sarianna Metso, “Qumran Community Structure and Terminology as Theological
Statement,” RQ 20 (2002) 429–44, at 437.
32
Alexei Sivertsev, “Sects and Households: Social Structure of the Proto-Sectarian Movement
of Nehemiah 10 and the Dead Sea Sect,” CBQ 67 (2005) 59–78.
33
Brownlee, Dead Sea Manual of Discipline, 53 n. 3, appendix G; see also 4Q275, frag. 2,
where there are the words “in the third month” with some kind of ceremony.

13
 The pan-Israel inclusivity of the covenant renewal ceremony then extends out to the

Two Spirits treatise (3:13–4:26), in which all humanity is considered. It is stated that the

rewards for those who follow light rather than darkness, truth rather than falsehood, are for

those who keep the covenant (4:22). The Two Spirits treatise is not only a kind of extrapolation

designed for the maskil (3:13); it frames the entire covenant renewal ceremony. The treatise is

introduced at the very beginning, in 1QS 1:8–10, where one must submit to the ‫אל עצת‬,

“counsel/authority of God”34; one is “joined to the counsel/authority of God, to walk perfectly

before him in all that is revealed at their appointed times, and in order to love all the children

of light each according to his lot by the counsel/authority of God, and to hate all the children of

darkness, each according to his guilt at the vengeance of God.” God sets both the laws of the

covenant and also the laws that govern all humanity. This blending of language concerning the

two spirits, blessings, curses, and covenant is precisely what we find in the 4QBerakot texts.

The word ‫ יחד‬is probably best translated as “united totality” as in Deut 33:5, where is refers to

all the tribes of Israel, not just one small group. Given its usage throughout 1QS columns 1 to

4, it would actually indicate (true) Israel, inclusive of women and children (i.e., whole

families).35
34
‫ עצה‬is usually translated as “counsel” or “council”. Charlesworth, Rule of the Community, 7
n. 10. In adding a corresponding term, “authority,” I aim to preserve more of the ambiguity
inherent in the Hebrew word. Here note that ‫ עצה‬is an attribute or action of God,
counterpointed by the “vengeance of God” in line 11.
35
This is not to say that ‫ יחד‬here is as expansive as defined by Hartmut Stegemann, “The
Qumran Essenes: Local Members of the Main Jewish Union of Second Temple Times,” in The
Madrid Qumran Congress: Proceedings of the International Congress on the Dead Sea
Scrolls, Madrid 18–21 March, 1991 (ed. J. Trebolle Barrera and L. Vegas Montaner; 2 vols.;
Leiden: Brill, 1992) 1:83–166. What exactly ‫ יחד‬signifies has been much discussed, with John
J. Collins rightly emphasizing that 1QS 6 points to an umbrella organization: “Forms of
Community in the Dead Sea Scrolls” in Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and
Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov (ed. S. M. Paul, Robert A. Kraft, Lawrence H.
Schiffman, and W. W. Fields; VT Suppl. 94; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 97–111, and idem, “The
Yaḥad and ‘The Qumran Community,’” in Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in

14
 This conclusion seems necessary also in order to avoid a logical absurdity. If the Two

Spirits treatise relates only to an exclusive group of adult males living in separated, sectarian

communities, who are only interested in legislation for themselves, who alone consider

themselves to be defined by the “sons/children of light” designation (1QS 1:9 etc), and who

consign to destruction all those outside their group, then they consign to destruction all women

and children, as “them,” over against the group “us.” This would include their mothers,

daughters, sisters, aunts, and any children (male or female) they may have had. However, in

the Serekh texts, the ‫ יחד‬- the united totality - greatly esteems Moses and Torah (1QS 1:3), in

which women and children are part of Israel and are included in regulations governing Israel,

as we see elsewhere in the scrolls. An adult, all-male, celibate Israel is inconsistent with the

Law and the Prophets, and does not allow for fruitful seed, or for the universalizing scope of

the Two Spirits treatise, which ultimately harks back to Leviticus 26.36 The beginning of 1QS

thus presumes a normative Israel in its covenant renewal ceremony in which men, women and

children are governed by covenantal law. This is the ceremony that binds “us.”

The ‫עצה‬

The word ‫ עצה‬is ambiguous, in referring either to the “counsel/authority” of God, as

above, or the “unity of his counsel” in some sections of 1QS (1:8, 10, 3:2, 6, etc.), or to a

“council/authority” that appears to be a legal and deliberative body within the ‫יחד‬, though in

Honour of Michael A. Knibb (ed. Charlotte Hempel and Judith Lieu; Leiden: Brill, 2006) 81–
96; though cf. Eyal Regev, “The Yaḥad and the Damascus Covenant: Structure, Organization
and Relationship,” RQ 21/82 (2003) 133–62, and Sarianna Metso, “Whom Does the Term
Yaḥad Identify?” in Biblical Traditions in Transmission, 213–35.
36
Note also that in 1QS 11:16 the writer calls himself “son of your handmaid”; in doing so, he
calls his mother a servant of God, which indicates her inclusion in the category of those within
true Israel.

15
1QS 5–9 it can also apparently be defined by the term ‫ יחד‬itself, since here a select group join

together for a particular purpose. In other words, the meanings of both ‫ עצה‬and ‫ יחד‬shift in

different segments of the Serekh texts, depending on the subject matter, which may point to

historically older or newer sections.37 In 1QS 5–9 the ‫ עצה‬is focused on law, and the members

of this body are required to eat, bless, and give counsel/deliberate together (1QS 6:2–3), with a

third of every night spent reading, studying judgment and saying benedictions (1QS 6:7–8),

and with someone always studying the law (1QS 6:6–7). This grouping could have developed

from the kind of body defined in Ezra and Nehemiah as being constituted by priests, Levites

and “[male] heads of families” (Neh 8:13; see also Ezra 1:5; 2:68; 3:12; 4:3; 8:1) who

“gathered around the scribe Ezra to study the words of the law,” as found also in CD 14:3–6.38

There is no celibacy requirement here, but there seems to be a requirement of maleness. The

text of 1QSa clearly shows that heads of households, sometimes translated as “chiefs of clans,”

are key members of this ‘united totality’ (‫)יחד‬.

John J. Collins has pointed out that in 1QS 8–9 there is a repetition of the phrase “when

these are in Israel” (8:4, 12 and 9:3) in relation to the ‫ עצה‬of the ‫יחד‬, and therefore this

appears to comprise an elite group integral to the existence of the ‫יחד‬.39 “Israel” is not co-

terminal with this body, since in 1QS 6:13 the heading concerns “one who willingly offers
37
Charlotte Hempel suggests that the “council of the community” here indicates an incipient
stage of the community: “Emerging Communal Life and Ideology in the S Tradition,” in
Defining Identities: We, You and the Other in the Dead Sea Scrolls: Proceedings of the Fifth
Meeting of the IOQS in Groningen (ed. Florentino García Martínez and Mladen Popović;
Leiden: Brill, 2008) 43–62.
38
Heads of households, in charge of property and the welfare of extended families, would also
lead in terms of religious decisions, as we see in the early church with Cornelius and his
household (“you and all your house”: Acts 11:15), the jailer of Philippi (“you and your
household”: Acts 16:31–5), or Crispus (“and his whole household”: Acts 18:8). Note that in
Acts there is also recognition of a female head of house: Lydia (Acts 16:15).
39
Collins, “The Yahad and ‘The Qumran Community,’” 88–91.

16
himself from Israel to join the ‫ עצה‬of the ‫יחד‬.” The ‫ יחד‬is constituted by Israelites (2:19–22),

but not all Israel is in the ‫עצה‬.

It would seem that the ‫ עצה‬is then the holy center, a virtual temple, “a house of truth in

Israel,” designed to “lay a foundation of truth for Israel” (1QS 5:5–6, 4QSb 5:5, 4QSd 1:4; see

also 1QS 8:5), “the tested wall, the costly cornerstone . . . a most holy dwelling for Aaron . . . a

house of perfection and truth in Israel” (1QS 8:7–9, 4QSb 5:5–6, 4QSe 2:12–16; see also 1QS

9:6), but it is not Israel in its entirety any more than the temple (with its all male priesthood)

constitutes Israel in its entirety. Like the priesthood, this particular ‫ יחד‬within the wider ‫יחד‬

atones for Israel (1QS 5:6–7), making “expiation for the land” (1QS 8:10, 4QSd 2:1:1; 4QSe

2:13; see also Jub. 6:2). But a constituted ‫ עצה‬seems to be small: ten men including at least one

priest (1QS 6:3–4, 6), or else twelve men and three priests (1QS 8:1), men who—to be allowed

into this body—had to be “perfect in everything” (1QS 8:1).

While the evolution of the Serekh texts is not a concern in this discussion,40 it is

interesting that 4QSd clearly begins at a point corresponding to 1QS 5:1 with a focus on the

“people of the law” (4QS b, d; compare “people of the ‫ ” יחד‬in 1QS 5:1), who hold fast to all

that God commanded and separate themselves from the congregation of people of deceit. This

40
On this topic instead see Philip Alexander, “The Redaction-History of the Serekh ha-Yahad:
A Proposal,” RQ 77 (1996) 437–53, who proposes that the long version inclusive of 1QS 1–4
is earlier than the shorter version. Sarianna Metso presents the opposite thesis, with a complex
redactional history, in The Textual Development of the Qumran Community Rule (Leiden:
Brill, 1997) and The Serekh Texts (London: T&T Clark, 2007). See also Charlotte Hempel,
“The Literary Development of the S Tradition—A New Paradigm,” RQ 22/87 (2006) 389–402;
Alison Schofield, “Rereading S: A New Model of Textual Development in Light of the Cave 4
Serekh Copies,” DSD 15 (2008) 96–120; eadem, From Qumran to the Yahad: A New
Paradigm of Textual Development for The Community Rule (STDJ; Leiden: Brill, 2008); and
the earlier studies by Jerome Murphy-O’Connor, “La genèse littéraire de la Régle de la
Communauté,” RB 76 (1969) 528–49, and J. Pouilly, La Régle de la Communauté de Qumrân.
Son évolution littéraire (Cahiers de la Revue Biblique 17; Paris: Gabalda, 1976).

17
fits well conceptually with notions of the ‫ יחד‬found in 1QS columns 1 through 4, whereby this

term is synonymous with (true) Israel. The people form a ‫ יחד‬in terms of law and property. If

this was indeed the first version of the Serekh texts, then a covenant renewal ceremony, added

to that, would be a method of recognizing and expanding on this awareness of the whole, wider

community of men, women and children for which the ‫ עצה‬acted as a holy center.

We may also recognize the gender ramifications of 4QSe, which has the Otot instead of

the final hymn of 1QS 9:26b–11:22, indicating at face value a practical temple-oriented focus.

Otot, “signs,” is a calendar governing the twenty-four priestly courses in the temple. It

correlates jubilee periods of forty-nine years, conjunctions of the beginning of the lunar month

and solar year (which happened every three years), and the priestly courses that would be on

duty on this date (i.e., Gamul and Shecaniah), in accordance with a lunisolar calendar which

combined a 364-day solar calendar with the 354-day lunar calendar. This puts us clearly in the

masculine conceptual world of temple organization.

There is an overlap between the language of the ‫ עצה‬and the ‫רבים‬: a word that is

usually translated as “many.” However, ‫ עצה‬clearly refers only to the council in 1QS 6:7–23

(4QSb 11:5–13 = 4QSd 3:1–3 = 4QSg 3:1) and elsewhere.41 In 1QS 6:1a it is a judicial body

before which a man may accuse his fellow. The text of 1QS 6:1b–8a concerns meetings of the

)6:3( ‫עצה‬, and is followed in 1QS 6:8b–13a by an explanation of the rule for a session of these

‫רבים‬. In 4QSb 9:2–4 and 4QSd 1:9–12 the authority of the priestly hierarchy of the “sons of

Zadok” (1QS 5:2) is not found, but rather that of the ‫רבים‬.

41
As noted by Charlotte Hempel, “Literary Development,” 398–400.

18
 In terms of biblical precedents, in Job 32:9 the word ‫ רבים‬is paralleled with ‫ זקנים‬,

“elders”: “‫ רבים‬will not give wisdom; and ‫ זקנים‬will not be intelligent in judgment.”42 Within

contemporaneous Judaism, the term ‫ רב‬was honorific when applied to a teacher or elder with

religious or judicial authority (e.g., Matt 23:7–8).43 In Mishnaic Hebrew this word, used in this

honorific sense, has a feminine plural ending (‫)רבות‬, but in fact it has a masculine plural

ending in biblical Hebrew (so Job 32:9). The term ‫ רב‬is found quite often in the Bible as

referring to individual chiefs/judges (2 Kings 18:17, etc.) with a construct plural of ‫ רבי‬attested

in Jer 39:13 and 41:1, which indicates a masculine plural form ‫רבים‬.44 Given this, the term here

in Serekh is not necessarily to be translated as “many,” but rather would most obviously mean

“honored authorities.”45 It could then at times refer to the “sons of Zadok,” and at times to

“elders,” or at times to collective members of the ‫עצה‬, without necessarily indicating total

equations between these terms. The key point here is that leadership by the ‫ רבים‬implies a

wider community led by those so designated, just as the term “elders” presuppose others who

are junior, and a wider community of people who are led by them.

42
In Dan 12:3 the term ‫משקיל‬, “sage,” is associated with ‫רבים‬, possibly indicating a group
obedient to the ‫משקיל‬, which would be a very significant precursor of the terminology of the
Serekh: “The ‫( משקילים‬wise teachers) will shine like the shine of the firmament and those who
provide righteousness to the ‫ רבים‬like the stars for ever and ever.” See Charlotte Hempel,
“Maskil(im) and Rabbim: From Daniel to Qumran,” in Charlotte Hempel and Judith M. Lieu,
Biblical Traditions in Transmission: Essays in Honour of Michael A. Knibb (JSJ Supl. 111;
Leiden: Brill, 2006) 133–56.
43
It also occurs in the ossuary inscription CIJ 2:337, 1410.
44
In biblical Hebrew the feminine plural is related only to the feminine adjective ‫רבה‬.
45
This would make it equivalent in many ways to the Greek ἄρχοντες. Both Metso, Textual
Development, 77, and Hempel, “Literary Development,” 396-8, note that ‫ רבים‬has an
administrative meaning.

19
 As for the ‫ עצה‬as a council, historical clues for some form of communal living of a

male group without women may be provided by the fact that these men set their minds on

studying and walking in perfection for the “atonement” of Israel as priests, even when they

were not.

As E. P. Sanders has pointed out, priests on duty at the temple had periods of separation

from their families and communal living in the temple precincts.46 Priests ate some meals in

purity—food from sacrifices—when on duty at the temple two weeks out of every year and

during their extra service for the festivals (Num 18:8–10), meals that would have been

consumed when they resided together in the priests’ court of the temple. At this time they did

not have sexual relations, and in fact having sexual relations would make it difficult to eat

meals in purity, since most purifications required not only washing but the setting of the sun

(Lev 15). So if a man and woman had sexual relations after sunset they would be impure all the

next day until sunset. The Serekh texts related to the ‫ עצה‬do not refer to a circumstance of

communal living, but rather the “purity,” the occasion of a pure meal. Members of the council

eat together in a state of purity, having immersed. Nevertheless, if the foundational concept of

this pure meal was in fact the pure meals eaten by priests in the temple, then the Serekh texts

may imply a communal living arrangement also, since this was the situation of the priests

during their temple service. Added to this are proscriptions in other texts that indicate there

was a ban on sex in the city of Jerusalem, which seems to expand a ban on sex among serving

priests (11QTemple 45:11–12 and CD 12:1–2). The ‫ עצה‬is then conceptually a body of priests,

Levites, and non-priests (in contradistinction to a priest-only hierarchy) engaged in a task of

E. P. Sanders, “The Dead Sea Sect and Other Jews,” in The Dead Sea Scrolls in Their
46

Historical Context (ed. Timothy H. Lim with Larry Hurtado, A. Graeme Auld and Alison Jack;
Edinburgh, T&T Clark, 2000) 7–44, at 20–26.

20
administering, deliberating and interpreting the law, a task that is itself a counterpoint to—but

not necessarily a substitution for—the temple operations of the priests and Levites.

This body was not entirely self-focused. The notion that the ‫ עצה‬was only concerned

with its own internal business seems overturned by yaḥad texts with a family-inclusive

scenario, especially 4Q502, which includes mention of “female elders.”47

Another text, 4Q265 SerekhDamascus Rule, blends aspects of Serekh and Damascus

language.48 The links are particularly strong in relation to the middle section of 1QS

concerning the council (‫ )עצה‬penal code. 4Q265 SerekhDamascus Rule begins with rules

appropriate to the Serekh about a man being punished for misdemeanors like falling asleep in a

session, but its punishments are more severe. He is punished by losing half his bread (cf. 1QS

6:25, where it is a quarter). Then in Fragment 1:11 the focus moves from the entrance

procedure to rules about the Sabbath day, atonement for the land and—extraordinarily—to

Jubilees 3, where the Garden of Eden is mentioned along with rules after childbirth, on the

basis of Lev 12. In Jubilees 3 Adam and Eve have a period of purification prior to entering the

Garden of Eden, which ultimately defines laws of purity in terms of childbirth.49 This would

suggest that, despite strict entrance procedures and a penal code governing the adult men of the

‫עצה‬, they were also concerned with legislation governing women, who are then part of the “us”

in terms of the wider legal embrace of their rulings.

47
This latter attestation in fact raises the question of whether these may be sometimes included
among the ‫רבים‬, if we assume this to be a honorific way of referring to elders and leaders, even
if women were not included in the ‫עצה‬.
48
See Charlotte Hempel, The Damascus Texts (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000) 98–
104. Here there are fifteen in the council (as opposed to twelve).
49
4Q265 also relates to 4QPurification Rules (4Q274), which discusses a woman with an issue
of blood having impurity for seven days (and see 4QDa 9:2:2–6).

21
The “Hand”

In terms of precise laws regarding what should happen with women at times they are

particularly impure, during menstruation and following childbirth, there is nothing specifically

stated in 1QS or other Serekh texts. But there is also nothing about male bodily functions that

may cause impurity, presumably because these were not a key issue for the circumstances of

the council (‫ )עצה‬sessions or the covenant renewal ceremony, and rules of purification are

otherwise defined in separate interpretative texts (e.g., 4Q265, 4Q274, 4Q512–514, etc.). The

Serekh texts are by no means a holistic code of conduct covering all aspects of life.

The only reference that may specifically refer to a male bodily part is found in 1QS

7:13 (= 4QSe 1:8–9 = 4QSg 3:7–8) where the word ‫יד‬, “hand,” is sometimes translated as

“penis.”50 The sentence is slightly curious in terms of its spelling; for example, the word ‫ פוח‬is

usually corrected to ‫פוחח‬, as Brownlee originally suggested.51 Jastrow gives the meaning of

‫ פוחח‬as “he whose knees are exposed, whose garments are torn, or whose head is uncovered,”

(i.e., “an exposed person”).52 It does not refer to the garment but to the person who is clad in

such a way that he or she is not properly covered up. The unclear word before this one was

read by Brownlee (followed by others) as ‫והואה‬, an unusual spelling of ‫והוא‬, which relates to

the person—“he”—who is exposed. At any rate, on the present reading, the sentence should be

translated: “Whoever brings out his hand (‫ )יד‬from under his garment, and he is exposed, and

he allows his nakedness to be seen, will be punished thirty days.”

50
In Charlesworth, Rule of the Community, 33 (see in particular n. 185) it is translated as such:
“Whoever causes his penis to come out from under his garment . . . .”
51
Brownlee, Dead Sea Manual of Discipline, 31.
52
Jastrow, Dictionary, 1152. The term is related to the noun ‫ פחחא‬, “nakedness, poverty.”

22
 This reading is based partly on considering the context. As noted, the penal code of the

Serekh texts concern only very limited circumstances, all of which appear related to specific

group activities of the ‫עצה‬/ ‫רבים‬: interpersonal behavior in a council session (1QS 6:25–27;

7:2–6; 10-13, etc.); reading aloud or blessing (6:27–7:2); handling group possessions (1QS

6:25; 7:6–10) with consequences for purity [pure food] (1QS 6:25; 7:3, etc.). This can be

related back to the sessions being defined in 1QS 6:2–3: “And joined together they shall eat,

together they shall pray, and joined together they shall deliberate.” Prior to the “hand”

references, there is a specific rule against someone who “goes naked in front of his fellow and

it is accidental” (1QS 7:14),53 which follows a series of proscriptions against conduct in a

session and is followed by another proscription regarding spitting in a meeting of the ‫רבים‬

(1QS 7:15). Following the rule concerning the “hand,” there is the proscription against

laughing stupidly and bringing out the left hand in order to sink down (‫ )לשוח‬on it, both of

which also most obviously relate to group meetings (7:16–17) in which sitting upright with

proper comportment and grave concentration are extremely important, even if sessions go on

late at night. The normal mode in sessions is for people to sit: One only stands when one has

something to say (6:11–13). From the reference to accidental nakedness there appears to be an

implied initial purification54 prior to the eating of a pure meal (6:4–6).

53
In regard to this translation, the word ‫ אנוש‬is to be corrected, on the basis of 4QSg, to ‫אנוס‬,
which means, strictly speaking, one who is “the victim of an accident, unavoidably prevented”;
so in b. Ned. 27a: “the Merciful acquits from responsibility him who is the victim of an
unavoidable accident.” Jastrow, Dictionary, 86. A translation such as Charlesworth, Rule of the
Community, 31, “without being forced,” implies some element of coercion not present in the
Hebrew.
54
If a garment were not arranged properly after immersion this could perhaps occur. It is likely
that Jews immersed wearing loincloths or wraps (see Joan E. Taylor, The Immerser: John the
Baptist within Second Temple Judaism [Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1997] 556), as
Josephus specifically indicates in regard to the Essenes (J.W. 2.161), but people would then
remove these and put on clean, dry clothing afterwards.

23
 In addition, given the parallel with “left hand” (with the same verb used55) in 7:16, it

seems quite possible that the “hand” being brought out in 7:13 only relates to the right hand. It

has been suggested that the reading of “hand” cannot be correct given that in antiquity the right

hand was usually left free, with the ἱμάτιον draped over the left shoulder.56 This is true for

people engaged in movement, but it was not always the case. To understand the modest

comportment required, we need to consider the ancient interest in the practice of sitting with

decorum. By way of comparison, it can be noted that the Therapeutae of Philo’s De Vita

Contemplativa are described as “having the hands inside, the right hand between chest and

chin, and the left lowered along the thighs” (Contempl. 30) while listening intently in group

meetings. This deportment is remarked upon elsewhere by Philo as being characteristic of the

way Jews sit in a synagogue, in that an imaginary bad ruler remarks to the Jews, “will you go

out and assemble according to the customary figure, with the right hand inside and the other

one from under the outerwear fixed along the thighs?” (Philo, Somn. 2.126). Porphyry

mentions that Egyptian priests keep their hands inside the figure also (Abst. 4.6). As I have

explored in regard to the Therapeutae, in antiquity there was a concept of philosophically-

minded, attentive deportment, represented also in statuary.57 The himation was wrapped around

the body with the right hand underneath the fabric in a kind of sling. Given that a large ἱμάτιον

—the outer garment referred to in 1QS as the ‫—בגד‬could be all that was worn on certain

55
The word ‫ יוציא‬in 7:13 is the Hiphil imperfect form which may be rendered as “bring forth”
or “produce” (see Gen 1:12; Isa 54:16); the participle is found in 7:15.
56
Jodi Magness, The Archaeology of Qumran and the Dead Sea Scrolls (Grand Rapids, Mich.:
Eerdmans, 2002) 194.
57
For the modest wearing of this garment, see Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers, 292–93.
The Graeco-Roman Museum in Alexandria has a statue of a barefoot man dressed in a
himation, with his hand inside the clothing in this way (G532). It is possible that for Jews this
deportment was designed to preserve the purity of the right hand.

24
occasions (as a kind of wrap, περιβόλαιον),58 to bring the right hand out from inside the

clothing would unloose the arrangement, making immodest exposure a risk.

There is a clear sequence stated here. Firstly, someone takes out his (right) hand, and

then there is an emphatic parallel repetition of the result: He is exposed = his nakedness is

seen. The result is a consequence of a certain action.

The word ‫ערון‬, “nakedness,” is ambiguous. It can be used as a euphemism for genitals

in biblical Hebrew, so that to uncover someone’s “nakedness” is to have sexual relations with

them (Lev 20:29, etc). But “nakedness” can also mean being in some unspecified state of

bodily exposure, because one is wearing threadbare clothing on account of one’s destitution

(Isa 58:7; Ezek 18:7; see also James 2:15). In 1QS 7:13 it is not the condition of the clothing

itself that is the issue; it is the movement of the hand outside the clothing which results in

exposure that is deemed unacceptable by the group in question. Whereas the text indicates that

accidental exposure is not liable to punishment (7:12), if one does something intentional that

could result in perceived bareness, however defined, then one is liable to punishment.

It seems likely to me that “nakedness” here was broadly rather than specifically

defined, given the sensitivity of Jews to the public nakedness of the Greek gymnasia (1 Macc

1:14–15; 2 Macc 4:12–15; see also Josephus, Ant. 12.241), and given the qualifications noted

by Jastrow in the definition of a ‫פוחח‬.59 In other words, the noun ‫ יד‬is not here a euphemism for

“penis” at all, and even “nakedness” may not be. The proscription should be read in the context

of the session of the ‫ עצה‬of the ‫יחד‬. In terms of this context, we may well expect men only, but

they were not intentionally exposing their genitalia in the meeting.

58
Ibid.
59
See above.

25
Essenes

As a final note, it seems important to mention that in exploring the presence of women

and children within the world of the Serekh texts—insofar as women and children are part of

Israel (the wider “us”) that is the ‘united totality’ in its broad terms—it is not in any way my

purpose to object to the Essene hypothesis as the most likely paradigm for interpretation. The

Serekh in its variant forms can indeed provide a better perspective for reading our classical

sources on the Essenes. The Serekh texts were probably first composed in the mid-second

century B.C.E,60 while the classical sources, however, date from about 40 C.E. onwards, some

200 years later.61 We may explore correspondences between the Serekh manuscripts and the

classical sources on the Essenes without a requirement for absolute exactitude, since there

would have been developments within the school in question, and all our classical sources are

shaped by the rhetoric of the authors.

Most importantly, Josephus tells us that there were married Essenes (J.W. 2.160). It is

important to remember that Josephus does not indicate that there were any differences

whatsoever in lifestyle in terms of married and non-married Essenes (“they are likeminded in

lifestyle, customs and laws”), so that everything he has stated concerning his celibate Essenes

applies to them. During women’s pregnancy, the “married Essenes” of Josephus too—if
60
Charlesworth, Rule of the Community, 2. The text of 1QS is palaeographically dated to 100–
75 B.C.E., but, given the textual errors, it is clearly a copy of another, earlier manuscript. This,
along with the evidence of earlier variant forms, leads to an assumption that the first shaping of
the Serekh took place in the middle of the second cent. B.C.E.
61
With dates: c. 40 C.E., Philo of Alexandria, Quod omnis probus liber sit (“Every Good Man
is Free”) 75–91; c. 41 C.E., Philo of Alexandria, Apologia pro Iudaeis (“Apology for the Jews”)
or Hypothetica (in Eusebius’s Praeparatio evangelica 8.11, 1–18); c. 75 C.E., Josephus, Jewish
War 2.118–161, also J.W. 1.78–80, 2.112–113, 2.567, 5.145; c. 78 C.E., Pliny the Elder,
Naturalis historia 5.15, 4/73; c. 90 C.E., Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 18.18–22; also Ant.
13.171–172, 13.310–314, 15.371–379, 17.345–348; c. 90 C.E., Dio Chrysostom, in a lost
treatise evidenced in Synesius, Dio, sive de suo ipsius instituto 3,2. See Joan E. Taylor, “The
Classical Sources on the Essenes and the Scrolls Communities,” in The Oxford Handbook of
the Dead Sea Scrolls (ed. John J. Collins and Timothy Lim; Oxford: OUP) 173-99.

26
obedient—would have been celibate, since sexual relations were thought appropriate only for

procreation. Importantly, the fact that Josephus describes women as wearing a linen wrap in

the bath, given that Josephus only describes the bath in terms of preparation for meals (J.W.

2.129), could imply that the women among “married Essenes” also participated in pure meals,

though separately, since gender-separated dining was common in the Hellenistic world.62

Josephus does not indicate that married Essenes would not eat with celibate Essenes and vice

versa; whether married or celibate we may in fact picture all Essene men gathering together for

common meals, in accordance with what Josephus states (J.W. 2.129–133). Josephus’s

description indicates that—as everyone did—the Essenes had two meals a day, but he does not

describe the procedures for the evening meal; for the Serekh texts it is this evening meal (after

the working day is ended), and the associated deliberations and judgments, reading and study,

through the evening, that is absolutely critical.

Josephus sets up the Essenes as paradigms of perfect Judaean men in terms of their

exceptional lifestyle, which manifests the kind of exemplary manly virtue (ἀνδρεία) one might

associate with the Spartans of old (Ag. Ap. 2.225–235).63 Women are married not because this

includes them in Essene group identity, but because this enables Essenes (who, like Pharisees

and Sadducees, Josephus only configures as men) to reproduce. But Josephus is quite clear

about the place of women and children within Israel, however androcentric his language may

be. He writes: “Indeed, concerning the occupations of life, that everything done must have as

62
Taylor, Jewish Women Philosophers, 282–86; see also Kathleen Corley, Private
Women, Public Meals: Social Conflict in the Synoptic Tradition (Peabody, Mass.:
Hendrickson, 1993) 25–28.
63
See Steve Mason, “Essenes and Lurking Spartans in Josephus’ Judean War: From
Story to History,” in Making History: Joseph and Historical Method (ed. Zuleika
Rodgers; Leiden: Brill, 2007) 219–61.

27
its purpose piety, is something to be heard also by women and anyone of the household” (Ag.

Ap. 2.181).

Often, Josephus’s “married Essenes” are equated with the Damascus group.64 However,

CD has no pure meal. Taken separately, there is nothing distinctive to connect the community

of the Damascus texts with the classical descriptions of Essenes, and it is not surprising that no

one thought to link this group to the Essenes prior to the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls.65

Here there are clearly families, living as was usual, constituting the remnant of Israel (CD

3:19), founded after the exile when the covenant was renewed (CD 6:2; see also 3:13), in

accordance with the historic authority of the Teacher of Righteousness. This does indeed

appear to indicate a stage in growth towards what appears in the Serekh texts.66 However, the

Serekh texts may themselves also be indicators of stages somewhat prior to that which

Josephus and Philo represent in terms of the Essenes.

As I have explored in detail elsewhere, Philo’s description of the Εσσαῖοι, while

portraying these men as entirely celibate and removed from women, indicates mature, rather

elderly men who would have already raised children within a normal household, and who join

the Essene community later in life (e.g., Hypoth. 11.3, 7).67 This too presumes a wider Israel

for which the Essene male community would have functioned as a kind of elite or center. Philo

does not imagine that these men rejected their wives and families as being not part of true

64
Geza Vermes, The Complete Dead Sea Scrolls in English (rev. ed.; New York: Penguin,
2004) 26–48.
65
They were simply an unknown Jewish group; see Louis Ginzberg, Eine unbekannte jüdische
Sekte (Hildesheim: Georg Olms Verlag, 1922); Eng. transl., An Unknown Jewish Sect (New
York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1976).
66
See Philip R. Davies, The Damascus Covenant: An Interpretation of the Damascus
Document (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1983) 173–201.
67
Taylor, “Philo of Alexandria on the Essenes: A Case Study on the Use of Classical Sources
in Discussions of the Qumran-Essene Hypothesis,” Studia Philonica Annual 19: 1-28 at 21–23.

28
Israel. The issue here is simply a lifestyle for older men who wished to live a particularly

devout life of exceptional self-control and community.68

In other words, a simple dichotomy between “married” and “celibate” may be a false

one. A man may be married and periodically celibate (for priestly duty, during his wife’s

pregnancy, or for a number of other reasons), and entirely celibate once his wife passed the age

of childbearing, at which point he might join a community of other men focusing on the study

of law. The model of men who chose to adopt a wholly celibate life was clearly known, and

much wondered at in antiquity, but it was not necessarily an absolute standard. In terms of the

Serekh texts, it is possible to read the ‫ עצה‬as being comprised by either married or single men,

as long as they managed to satisfy the requirements of purity and property. However, in finding

the conceptual precedent of men serving as priests, living together for that service period in the

temple, celibacy may well have been assumed. These men may have been both married and

celibate while serving within the ‫עצה‬. They would have remained heads of households,

connected with the wider community of Israel, even if they were living separately, just as

serving priests were. Israel remains, normatively, Israel—even if defined narrowly—in terms

of gender inclusivity.

Conclusion

There are hidden women and children in the first part of 1QS, from columns 1 to 4,

where emphasis is placed on the covenant renewal ceremony of the whole of (true) Israel. In

the related Two Spirits treatise the rewards to the sons of light include “fruitful offspring”

(1QS 4:7; 1QSb 3:3–4), while, in contrast, the wicked will be destroyed, “and there is not a

68
One may also note the curious similar sound of the words ‫ עצה‬and Εσσαῖοι.

29
remnant or survivor to him” (4:14). Here the term ‫ יחד‬indicates Israel as a “united totality”. In

columns 5–9, however, the perspective and language shift to focus on an elite body, the ‫עצה‬, a

council which constitutes a kind of ‫ יחד‬within the wider ‫יחד‬. This body has a regular evening

communal session, pure meals and drink, and common property. It meets to deliberate on legal

issues, some of which affect women, as appears evidenced by other texts. In passages where

there is a group conceptually defining itself in terms of the model of serving priests, it may

well be that celibacy was assumed, as was also maleness. The ‫עצה‬, as the council/authority of

the ‫יחד‬, would not have included women if it conformed to a concept of itself as being a

counterpoint to the temple priesthood and a council of law. The term ‫רבים‬, normally

understood as “many,” is better translated as “honored authorities,” with at times different

applications. The term ‫ יד‬in 1QS 7:13 is not to be understood as “penis,” but simply as “hand”;

the emphasis is on preserving extremely modest deportment in a session of the ‫עצה‬.

It is then very unlikely indeed that the people who used the Serekh texts imagined that

true Israel was comprised only of males, and that all females and children were destined for

eschatological doom. That women and children are included in the eschatological rewards is

shown clearly in 1QSa, and therefore we would expect them to appear in legal rulings for the

wider ‫יחד‬. They are therefore, in terms of the emic group discourse of the Serekh texts, part of

“us” in the widest sense. This is “Israel”: an entity governed by Mosaic law as interpreted by

the group leaders. This conclusion correlates with the explicit mention of the hymn-composer’s

mother as a “handmaid” of God in 1QS 11:16.

30
 Nothing in this discussion invalidates the paradigm of the Essene hypothesis in terms of

understanding the identity of the group in question, but rather enables a more expansive

understanding of the classical sources on the Essenes.

31