Regarding Vermes, I have often mentioned my issues with his translations, including in this thread when I wrote that "I must resort to [it] at the moment" and that his "'the Levites are' (in parenthesis) is not in the Hebrew, only nilvim, or joiners, which is a word play on Levites."
I used to have Wise, Abegg and Cook's translations (and their DSS Bible) but gave them away when I downsized my books when I stopped observing Judaism fifteen years ago. I tend to use Vermes because I'm used to him and he is available online and the Wise, Abegg, Cook translation is not viewable enough on Google books to be useful to me. In any event, I don't see what difference other translations or the Hebrew could have on the passage I cited from 4Q174 regarding the sons of Zadok, since this reference appears to be uncontested, and I cited Oegema earlier to support it:
Regarding the inconsistency of the use of sons of Zadok in 4Q174 and the other DSS, I don't see it as an issue since I don't take the meaning of sons of Zadok literally and cited Schofield to support this (who also has an interesting chart of all the references to sons of Zadok in the DSS):
But were there literal, lineal Zadokites left by the late Second Temple period, some of which formed part of the Yahad? ... In the Scrolls alone, the terms "Sons of Zadok" and "Sons of Aaron" do not appear to have been used interchangeably, but rather reflect two separate groups ...
https://books.google.com/books?id=7qVTO ... ok&f=false
And as Eisenman notes regarding the DSS in general, "The same ideology, nomenclature, and dramatis personae move from document to document regardless of style or authorship," and this is reflected in the appearance of the Interpreter of the Law (in tandem with the Messiah) in 4Q174 and the Damascus Document in interpretations of OT passages that are also applied to Jesus in Christianity.
4Q174: "This passage [2 Sam. 7:11-14] refers to the Shoot of David, who is to arise with the Interpreter of the Law, and who will [arise] in Zi[on in the Las]t Days, as it is written, 'And I shall raise up the booth of David that is fallen' (Amos 9:11). This passage describes the fallen booth of David, [w]hom He shall raise up to deliver Israel."
CD 7: "The star is the Interpreter of the Law who shall come to Damascus; as it is written, A star shall come forth out of Jacob and a sceptre shall rise out of Israel [Num. 24:17]. The sceptre is the Prince of the whole congregation, and when he comes he shall smite all the children of Seth."
So here we have the Interpreter of the Law being mentioned in tandem with the Messiah in both of these texts (and these are the only times this term is used in the DSS), and as I pointed out above, Charlesworth notes that, "Paleographically, the manuscript of 4Q174 is dated early in the first century C.E."
Regarding my impression that the OT is revered in the Damascus Document despite the use of apparently altered texts, this is based on what it says in an interpretation of Amos 9:11 (right before the reference to the Interpreter of the Law):
The Books of the Law are the tabernacle of the king; as God said, I will raise up the tabernacle of David which is fallen. The king is the congregation; and the bases of the statues are the Books of the Prophets whose sayings Israel despised.
This tells me that the DSS "sect" did
not despise the Books of the Prophets, which is what we are talking about here (i.e., the arguably altered Ezek. 44:15 and Amos 5:27 -not 9:27 as I wrote earlier, my bad).
Regarding the reference to Amos 5:27 in the Damascus Document, Bar-Asher notes:
We are not dealing here with a corrupt text, but rather with a
pesher that interprets the biblical מהלאה as מאהלי in accordance with the aims of the
darshan, the interpretation being based on the shared letters
he, aleph, and
lamed: הלא (in the explained word מהלאה) and אהל (in the explanatory word מאהלי). In the present case, the formulation of the
pesher is employed in the text in place of the original formulation of the verse.
https://books.google.com/books?id=-fmZA ... 27&f=false
I only had time to read the last comments on this thread last night and couldn't respond to them because I was leaving work, but I noticed Stephan's comment about this possibly being based on a variant text because I wasn't signed in at the time, so I wanted to address his comment. I'm unaware of anyone who thinks this could be the case, but as far as I can tell presently, Amos 5:27 is not in the DSS "bible" (nor is Ezekiel 44:15), so I suppose it's a possibility.
http://dssenglishbible.com/amos%205.htm
http://dssenglishbible.com/ezekiel.htm
However, my understanding is that, while there are variant DSS biblical texts, most of them are in agreement with the Masoretic text, as noted here:
Many biblical manuscripts closely resemble the Masoretic Text, the accepted text of the Hebrew Bible from the second half of the first millennium ce until today. This similarity is quite remarkable, considering that the Qumran Scrolls are over a thousand years older than previously identified biblical manuscripts.
http://www.deadseascrolls.org.il/learn- ... cale=en_US