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This paper analyzes the citation from Exod 34:11–24 in the Qumran scroll 4Q368 2. It explores the variant readings preserved in this quotation and demonstrates that some of them have been influenced by the parallel passages from the book of Deuteronomy.
Abstract
This contribution is the first attempt at deciphering a miniature opistograph 4Q148 included in Józef T. Milik’s DJD 6 edition of tefillin and mezuzot from Qumran Cave 4. It proposes that the partially folded recto of this tiny fragment contains a non- scriptural text. A handful of legible words may suggest a prayer. Its verso, inscribed by a different hand, appears to be a legal text, evoking monetary amounts, perhaps related to inheritance. Folded and fastened similarly to tefillin, 4Q148 might have been a legal document re-used to produce an amulet.
Abstract
This note suggests a new reading and reconstruction of the oft-cited 11QMelchizedek 2:6–8. This passage is a part of the “pesher for the last days” expounding on Lev 25:13 and Deut 15:2. Its vision of future liberation from spiritual captivity to Belial relies on the language and conceptual framework of the Jubilee Year. Moreover, the pesher refers to a temporal scheme of ten Jubilees. The new reading helps clarify the precise timing of the eschatological redemption, “the beginning of the first Jubilee after [the] te[n] Jubilees,” and its implication for the scroll’s scriptural exegesis.
Fragment 5 of the scroll 4Q464 proved to be difficult to decipher. It is exceedingly dark and can only be read with the help of infra-red photographs. Recently, a new such image of this fragment became available. This note demonstrates that this photograph helps clarify much of the fragment’s diffi¬cult wording. While previous scholarship on 4Q464 assumed that fragment 5 deals with the Genesis Flood, this brief study suggests that it contains an admonition alluding to the events of Israel’s past. This new interpretation of fragment 5 supports an earlier proposal that it does not belong to 4Q464, but constitutes a fragment of a now lost text.