Another thing worth mentioning is that in addition to the other parallels between the Dead Sea Scrolls that mention the Teacher of Righteousness and Christianity (like the New Covenant in a place called Damascus), the former also use the word "ebionites," such as in the Psalms Pesher.
Interpreted, this concerns the congregation of the Poor ...
And while it is capitalized in this translation by Vermes, in my view (since this is pre-70 CE, and given what Epiphanius, who knew Jewish Christians and Ebionite writings in his time, says about the Ebionite faction of Jewish Christianity emerging sometime after 70 CE, as opposed to the Nazarenes, who he says emerged pre-70 CE), I'm inclined to view writers of the DSS that mention the Teacher of Righteousness as being little "e" ebionites (before the term became a title after 70 CE), since they call themselves other things too (such as the "elect of God," the "simple of Judah doing Torah" and "doers of the Torah," cf. James 4:11, which uses the same expression "doer of the Law"). In other words, I'm thinking that the writers of the DSS that mention the Teacher are
proto-Ebionites, the kind of people who hated Paul and became big "E" Ebionites and continued to hate Paul
after 70 CE. And in my view, they would be the kind of pre-70 CE Jewish Christians who attacked Paul and rioted in Jerusalem in Acts 21:20-36 and 23:12-15:
Then they said to Paul, “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law. But they are under the impression that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or observe our customs. What then should we do? They will certainly hear that you have come.
Therefore do what we advise you. There are four men with us who have taken a vow. Take these men, purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so they can have their heads shaved. Then everyone will know that there is no truth to these rumors about you, but that you also live in obedience to the law ...
So the next day Paul took the men and purified himself along with them. Then he entered the temple to give notice of the date their purification would be complete and the offering would be made for each of them.
When the seven days were almost over, some Jews from the province of Asia saw Paul at the temple. They stirred up the whole crowd and seized him, crying out, “Men of Israel, help us! This is the man who teaches all men everywhere against our people and against our law and against this place. Furthermore, he has brought Greeks into the temple and defiled this holy place” ...
The whole city was stirred up, and the people rushed together. They seized Paul and dragged him out of the temple, and at once the gates were shut. While they were trying to kill him, the commander of the Roman regiment received a report that all Jerusalem was in turmoil. Immediately he took some soldiers and centurions and ran down to the crowd. When the people saw the commander and the soldiers, they stopped beating Paul ...
Some in the crowd were shouting one thing, and some another. And since the commander could not confirm the facts because of the uproar, he ordered that Paul be brought into the barracks. When Paul reached the steps, he had to be carried by the soldiers because of the violence of the mob. For the crowd that followed him kept shouting, “Away with him!”
When daylight came, the Jews formed a conspiracy and bound themselves with an oath not to eat or drink until they had killed Paul. More than forty of them were involved in this plot. They went to the chief priests and elders and said, “We have bound ourselves with a solemn oath not to eat anything until we have killed Paul. Now then, you and the Sanhedrin petition the commander to bring him down to you on the pretext of examining his case more carefully. We are ready to kill him on the way.”
These are the kind of Jewish Christians I think wrote the DSS that mention the Teacher of Righteousness. James (to judge from Acts and his letter) and Peter (to judge from 1 Peter, which I think is genuine) appear to have not shared this same level of hatred towards Paul. I get the impression that James had some trouble controlling these anti-Pauline Jewish Christians -and understandably so given how many of them there were- and was more willing to cut Paul some slack if he observed the Torah and did not teach Jews to not observe the Torah.
And the big issue seems clear to me now. It's not that James and other Jewish Christian leaders had a problem with Paul telling Gentiles about Jesus or teaching Gentiles to not observe the Torah, it's that he appeared to teach
Jews to not observe the Torah. See what James says in Acts 21:21-24 above (which is in keeping with Paul's stated MO in 1 Cor. 9:20: "To the Jews I became like a Jew, to win the Jews. To those under the law I became like one under the law, though I myself am not under the law, to win those under the law"):
... they are under the impression that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or observe our customs ... Therefore do what we advise you. There are four men with us who have taken a vow. Take these men, purify yourself along with them, and pay their expenses so they can have their heads shaved. Then everyone will know that there is no truth to these rumors about you, but that you also live in obedience to the law.
This is why James and the other pillars had no problem with Paul telling Gentiles about Jesus in Gal. 2:9:
And recognizing the grace that I had been given, James, Cephas, and John—those reputed to be pillars—gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, so that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the Jews.
But in my view Paul clearly overstepped his bounds and taught Jews to not observe the Torah, hence the rumors that James mentions in Acts and James sending people to check up on him in Antioch in Gal. 2:11-16:
When Cephas came to Antioch, however, I opposed him to his face, because he stood to be condemned. For before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself, for fear of those in the circumcision group. The other Jews joined in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.
When I saw that they were not walking in line with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas in front of them all, “If you, who are a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews? We who are Jews by birth and not Gentile ‘sinners’ know that a man is not justified by works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ. So we, too, have believed in Christ Jesus, that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
This is why I think James institutes special rules for Gentiles in Acts 15:5-21:
But some believers from the party of the Pharisees stood up and declared, “The Gentiles must be circumcised and required to obey the law of Moses.” So the apostles and elders met to look into this matter ... "It is my [James'] judgment, therefore, that we should not cause trouble for the Gentiles who are turning to God. Instead, we should write and tell them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals, and from blood. For Moses has been proclaimed in every city from ancient times and is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath.”
So if Gentiles want to learn about and observe more of the Torah, they can, since "Moses ... is read in the synagogues on every Sabbath." But if they don't want to, they should at least abstain from 1.) food polluted by idols; 2.) sexual immorality; 3.) meat from strangled (i.e., improperly slaughtered) animals; and 4.) blood. That this is accurate is clear from Paul, who discusses the first two of these rules in 1 Cor. 7 and 8 (though he appears to have an issue with rule number 1, in contrast with the Didache, which is a Jewish Christian writing directed at Gentiles).
1 Cor. 8:4-8:
So about eating food sacrificed to idols: We know that an idol is nothing at all in the world, and that there is no God but one. For even if there are so-called gods, whether in heaven or on earth (as there are many so-called gods and lords), yet for us there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we exist. And there is but one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things came and through whom we exist.
But not everyone has this knowledge. Some people are still so accustomed to idols that they eat such food as if it were sacrificed to an idol. And since their conscience is weak, it is defiled. But food does not bring us closer to God: We are no worse if we do not eat, and no better if we do.
Did. 6:1-3:
See that no one make thee to err from this Way of the teaching, for he teaches thee without God. For if thou canst bear the whole yoke of the Lord, thou wilt be perfect, but if thou canst not, do what thou canst. And concerning food, bear what thou canst, but keep strictly from that which is offered to idols, for it is the worship of dead gods.
You know in spite of all you gained, you still have to stand out in the pouring rain.