House of Peleg, Heliopolis, Elephantine, Qumran

[StephenGoranson]

"The House of Peleg in the Dead Sea Scrolls," Richard T. White, A Tribute to Geza Vermes (Sheffield, 1990) 67-98 proposed that the House of Peleg was the Heliopolis temple, disapproved in the scrolls.
Jodi Magness has proposed recently that some (not all) sacrifices were performed at Qumran, similar to the Tabernacle, but not full Temple replacement.
Which sacrifices were and were not performed at Elephantine may be worth considering: "... the temple in Elephantine does not attest to non-existence of written Torah then, any more than does the later temple at Leontopolis. In fact, the Elephantine papyri, Cowley 33 and 32, may well attest to Deuteronomy 12, and possibly the Pentateuch as well, by promising to the governor of Yehud to comply with its explicit law limiting the burnt sacrifice, the 'olah, to one place only."

[John2]

I just finished reading what I can see of White's article here and will give it some thought.

https://books.google.com/books?id=N3OtA ... te&f=false

It looks like it's the go to article for discussions of the meaning of the House of Peleg, and Berrin also discusses it here:

We do not, however, accept White's conclusion that the epithet is a label for the followers of Onias IV who built a temple in Leontopolis. We incline more to the view of Stegemann and Murphy O'Conner, who perceive the "House of Peleg" as an epithet for defectors from the Qumran community.

https://books.google.com/books?id=zRBHI ... ls&f=false

One thing that stood out to me on my initial reading of White's article was this statement:

Rabbinic interpretations often come to our aid for they are a development of the same exegetical tradition of which the Dead Sea Scrolls are an early offshoot. Despite the fact that the Rabbis and the sectarians differed in their immediate concerns and in the application of their biblical text there is a great deal of similarity between them. Not infrequently a comment in one of the scrolls is identical to a later rabbinic comment, even one made a millennium or more later.

This, incidentally, is in keeping with my suspicion that the DSS sect was the Fourth Philosophy, about which Josephus says, "These men agree in all other things with the Pharisaic notions; but they have an inviolable attachment to liberty, and say that God is to be their only Ruler and Lord" (Ant. 18.1.6) and that one of the founders was "Sadduc, a Pharisee" (Ant. 18.1.1).

[John2]

I want to look into Jodi Magness as well. The first thing I'm seeing is something that appears to be in agreement with what I was thinking when I read what you wrote about her above, that despite the presence of kosher animal bones at Qumran:

...we have no indication that the Jewish sect that inhabited Qumran rejected the biblical (Deuteronomic) injunction requiring all sacrifices to be offered in the Jerusalem temple ... There is also no archaeological evidence of an altar for animal sacrifices at Qumran.

https://books.google.com/books?id=I_ofA ... an&f=false

She expands on this more here though:

...just as the sectarians considered their communal meals to be a substitute for participation in the Temple cult, they treated the animals consumed at these meals in a manner analogous to the Temple sacrifices, although they were not technically sacrifices.

https://books.google.com/books?id=1P_Y9 ... an&f=false

This is in explanation of Josephus' statement regarding the Essenes, "They send offerings to the Temple, but perform their sacrifices using different customary purifications. For this reason, they are barred from entering into the common enclosure, but offer sacrifice among themselves."

I'm not sure how to take this statement. My first thought is that it could mean that they offered their sacrifices in another part of the temple, but Baumgarten addresses this and proposes that it refers rather to the sacrifice of the red heifer.

http://www.academia.edu/950457/Josephus ... _Sacrifice

Interesting issue, in any event.

[John2]

White's article is great. Overall I agree that the House of Peleg is "used to describe a real group" and that it is "related in some fashion to the Generation of the Separation" mentioned in later rabbinic texts. And I think he does a good job connecting this designation with various others that seem to describe a breakaway group in the DSS (the Wall-Builders, Ephraim, etc.).

But I don't agree with his identification of them as a group associated with Onias, but rather as the Pharisees (which is a fairly common opinion with respect to the other designations). I see the situation as being similar to the split between the Fourth Philosophy and the Pharisees and that the former are using the idea of the earlier Generation of the Separation against the latter (all the more potent since Pharisees means "separated ones"). This is also in keeping with the possible word play on halakhot regarding the latter being seekers of "halaqot" or "smooth things," and why the former are so obsessed with the latter. As a co-worker of mine once put it, maybe it's because they "used to work for the company."

https://books.google.com/books?id=UGt3S ... an&f=false

[Secret Alias]

A difficulty in reconciling the Onias temple with any form of Judaism is the implications that a temple anywhere outside of Egypt might have had on the Jewish (or Samaritan) community as a whole. The Pentateuch presents the Israelites as wandering in the desert with a mobile tabernacle. While there is nothing specific in the Pentateuch that denies the acceptability of a permanent temple. It seems to be at odds with the general direction of the narrative which suggests (in spite of it not being fulfilled) that Israel will ultimately return to the land promised by God to the Patriarchs. Of course anything is possible. The original temple expected in the Pentateuch is obviously located in or near Shechem. This is not an opinion of mine but the plain reading of the text (and supported by Jewish and Samaritan groups and texts from the beginning). Could this 're-interpretation' of the original plain sense of the Pentateuch have allowed for a situation where a permanent temple was located in Egypt? I find this difficult to get my head around.