The Dead Sea Scrolls

The Dead Sea Scrolls were recovered from eleven caves in the hills behind Qumran, on the north west corner of the Dead Sea, between 1947 and 1967, in an area that is now part of Israel. (The term is sometimes wrongly used to include any ancient scrolls found along the shores of the Dead Sea.)

The texts, mainly written in ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek also exhibit examples of texts influenced by Arabic, Nabatean, and Egyptian writing, as well as some passages containing cryptic symbols. They are considered to have been composed or copied between the fourth century BCE and the first century CE and comprise biblical, sectarian, as well as apocryphal and pseudepigraphic texts. The biblical material includes examples from every book of the Hebrew Scriptures except Esther.

The more important and larger items are kept in the Shrine of the Book, Israel Museum, Jerusalem; Rockefeller Museum, Jerusalem; and Archaeological Museum, Amman, Jordan. Smaller items are at various universities (Chicago, Manchester, Heidelberg); and at the Bibliotheque National, Paris; with the Syrian community in New Jersey; and in private collections.

They are generally thought to have belonged to a community of Essenes who lived at Qumran between around 150 BCE and 68 CE.To date some 95 percent of the material has now been translated and published; this includes all the major biblical works and virtually all the material found in caves other than cave four, which lies closest to the Qumran settlement site.

The texts were written on parchment, papyrus, ceramic material, and most unusually, one scroll was inscribed on extremely pure copper....

The Copper Scroll

Robert Feather, combining his background as a metallurgist with his journalistic expertise, has unraveled the enigma of the Copper Scroll in a fascinating study that takes the reader on a journey from ancient Mesopotamia, through Canaan, into Egypt, and back to the shores of the Dead Sea.

His exploration links the scroll to the ancient Egyptian king Akhenaten, confirming a long suspected influence of this pharaoh's religious beliefs on those of the Hebrews. Robert Feather's findings not only reveal the locations of most of the treasures listed on the Copper Scroll, but they also point to a radical new understanding of the origins of monotheism-the basis of the three great religions of Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.