James the Brother of Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls II (142 page)

For James 3:1–8, delineating its view of this ‘
Tongue
’ in the context of both who should or should not teach but also with reference to ‘
stumbling
’ and ‘
being driven by violent winds
’:

“
The Tongue is only a little member and boasts great things
.
But see how a little
fire can kindle a large forest and the Tongue is a fire
,
a world of Unrighteousness
.
So the Tongue is set among our members
,
yet the polluter of the whole body
,
both setting on fire in the course of nature and being set on fire in Hell
.
For every species
,
both of beasts and birds
,
creeping things and sea creatures
,
is tamable and has been tamed by mankind
,
but none among men is able to tame the Tongue
, (
which is
)
an uncontrollable Evil
,
full of deadly venom
.
”

Here, not only do we have the ‘
kindling
’, ‘
fire
’, and ‘
Wrath of God
’ imagery used in CD V–
VI
to condemn those who ‘
polluted their Holy Spirit and opened their mouth with a Tongue of blasphemies against the Laws of the Covenant of God
,
saying they were not sure
’, but also the ‘
venom
’ language it uses in Columns
VIII
and
XIX
thereafter.

This intense concern over ‘
the Tongue
’ in the Letter of James parallels a similar hatred of ‘
the Enemy
’ in Pseudoclementine
Recognitions
and ‘
the Parable of the Tares
’ in Matthew 13:24–44 – where, as we saw, the plants that he has planted would ‘
be gathered up
’ (or ‘
uprooted
’) and ‘
cast into a Furnace of Fire
’ – to say nothing of ‘
the Spouter of Lying
’ in the Qumran tradition. In fact, in CD VIII.13/XIX.25–26, the very same imagery of ‘
violent wind
’ is applied to ‘
the Spouter of Lying
’ as is applied to him here in James 3:4. There, too, we also heard about ‘
walking in wind
’ or ‘
Spirit
’ or ‘
pouring out wind
’ or ‘
being of confused Spirit
’, and it is this which ‘
kindled God
’
s Wrath on all his Assembly
’ or ‘
Church
’.
13
The imagery was based on Micah 2:6: ‘
they shall surely spout
’, which in 2:8 also refers to the ‘
Enemy
’, and Ezekiel 13:6–16 about ‘
the Builders of
’/‘
Daubers upon the wall
’, which also included allusion to Lying prophets ‘
deceiving the People
’, and the ‘
vanity
’ or ‘
wort
h
lessness of their Lying vision
’, not to mention ‘
making the heart of the Righteous sad
’
over Lying
, and ‘
strengthening the hand of the Wicked by promising him life
’ (13:22).

As we have also seen, these are ‘
the Daubers on the wall
’, referred to in both CD IV.19–20 and VIII.12–13/XIX.11–13, who followed ‘
Zaw Zaw
(‘
So-and-So
’),
the Spouter
’, as it is said, ‘
He shall surely spout
’, ‘
whose works God would visit
’ and ‘
upon whom Wrath would be poured
’ (in the unwillingness to utter the name of this inimical opponent there is clearly e
x
pressed the fear of powerful outside, secular forces).
The ‘
Lying visions
’ referred to in Micah 2:6–8 and Ezekiel 13:10–16 i
n
volved ‘
crying Peace when there is no peace
’, which is just the point Josephus emphasizes regarding ‘
Saulos
’’ role among ‘
all those desiring peace
’ and accommodation with Rome in Jerusalem and harmonizes perfectly with Paul’s approach, enunciated in Romans 13:1–8 on the Commandment ‘
to love your neighbor as yourself
’ (
thus
!).

Not only do these allusions in CD V
III
and
XIX
to ‘
the Lying Spouter
’’s ‘
pouring out wind
’ and ‘
spouting to them
’ begin with the allusion to ‘
the deadly Venom of Vipers and the cruel Poison of Asps
’, but they end with allusion to ‘
rejecting the Commandments of God
,
forsaking them and turning aside in the stubbornness of their heart
’, all prototypical of the behavior of ‘
the Lying Spouter
’ at Qumran. After comparison of this to Elisha’s rebuke of Gehazi, they move directly into evocation of ‘
the New Covenant in the Land of Damascus
’, reference to ‘
betraying
’ it and ‘
departing from
(
its
)
Fountain of Living Waters
’ and ‘
not being reckoned in the Foundation of the Peopl
e’.
14
Not only do we have here the possible play on Paul’s insistence in Galatians 3:21 about the Law ‘
being incapable of giving life
’ but, again, also the language of ‘
being reckoned
’, applied by both Paul and James to Abraham and in
MMT
to its ‘
Royal
’ addressee.

Here too there follows the typical expulsion from ‘
the Assembly of the Men of Perfect Holiness
’ because ‘
the manifest
a
tion of his works
’ were not in conformance with ‘
the precise letter of the teaching of the
Torah
’.
15
Once again, ‘
all the Holy Ones of the Most High have cursed him
’, nor is anyone ‘
to cooperate with him in purse
(‘
Riches
’)
or Mission
’ (‘
l
a
bor
’/‘
‘
Avodah
’).
16
Here too, the Letter of James, in raising the issue of ‘
blessing and cursing
’, notes the contradiction of the same ‘
Tongue
’, ‘ble
ssing God the Father
’, ‘
curses men made according to the likeness of God
’ (3:9–10).

In introducing the description of the Tongue’s ‘
boasting
’, ‘
uncontrollable Evil
’, ‘
pollution
’, and ‘
death-giving Poison
’ or ‘V
enom
’, we also hear about ‘
violent win
ds’ driven by a helmsman’s ‘
rudder
’ which is, in turn, also compared to ‘
the Tongue
’ (3:4). In James too is the parallel imagery of ‘
kindling fire
’. While somewhat obscure at this point, perhaps purposefully, it also contains the variation on this Qumran allusion to ‘
the Fountain
’ or ‘
Well
’, as well as these curious allusions to ‘
the Tongue
’ both ‘
cursing
’ and, in turn, ‘
being cursed
’.

It is at this point, too, ending its recitation on ‘
the Tongue
’, that it makes the charge that ‘
whoever makes himself a Friend of the World turns himself into an Enemy of God
’ (4:4). That Paul already knows he is being termed ‘
a Friend of the World
’ is made clear by his own statements about ‘
seeking to please men
’ and his rhetorical assertion about his Gospel ‘
not being a
c
cording to men
’ in Galatians 1:10–11. He is such ‘
a Friend
’ – or should we say ‘
Enemy
’ – that, according to his detractors, he makes things too easy for such ‘
men
’; and it is precisely at this point that Paul twice resorts to using the ‘
cursing
’ language of his opponents: ‘
If anyone teaches a gospel contrary to what you received
(‘
even if an Angel from Heaven
’),
he is to be accursed
’ (Galatians 1:8–9).

The First Description of ‘
the Man of Lies
’ in the Damascus Document

Before going on to see the further treatment in the Habakkuk
Pesher
of this
genus
of ‘
Liar' and
his differences with
the Righteous Teacher
, we should look at the additional notices regarding this subject at the beginning of the Damascus Doc
u
ment which start towards the end of the Column One and run on into the first line of Column Two where they end with the notice that ‘
the Anger of God was kindled against their Assembly
’ and ‘
their works were unclean
’ or ‘
polluted before Him’
.
1

Not only is this point about ‘
their works being unclean before Him
’ significant, but the Cairo Recension opens with the address to ‘
all the
Knowers of Righteousness
who seek to understand the works of God’
, paralleling Paul in Romans 10:3 about those whose ‘
zeal for God’
he admits, but which was ‘
not according to Knowledge’
. ‘
Being ignorant of God
’
s Righteousness’
, these
‘sought to establish their
’ own.

In CD I.3–4, these references to ‘
knowing Righteousness and understanding the works of God
’ also end up in allusion to God hiding his face ‘
from His Temple and delivering them up to the sword’
. This was at the time of ‘
the First Visitation
’ and ‘
the Era of the desolation of the Land
’ when they ‘
spoke Rebellion against the Commandments of God as
(
given by
)
the hand of Moses
’ as described in CD V.20–21 and VII.21–VIII.3/XIX.10–16. Nevertheless, because God ‘r
emembered the Covenant of the First
’ (
the Forefathers
) and ‘
they understood their sinfulness and knew they were guilty men
’, ‘
He left a Remnant to I
s
rael and did not deliver them up to be destroyed
’ (
lechalah
again).
2
Here ‘
the First
’
are
the Forefathers, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Moses, and ‘
the Last’
, which Paul also applies to himself in 1 Corinthians 15:8–9, is ‘
the Last Generation
’ and ‘
the Last Days’
, presumably the time of writing.

It is at this point that the Righteous Teacher is introduced in the Damascus Document. This occurs after the ‘
Visitation
’ by God and how He ‘
caused to grow
’ the Messianic ‘
Root of Planting from Israel and from Aaron’
. In the context of the co
m
ing of this
Teacher of Righteousness
we hear that ‘
God raised him up
’ out of consideration for ‘
their works
’ and because they ‘
sought Him with a whole heart’
.
3
Here not only do we have an evocation of the all-important
Salvationary
element of ‘
works
’ again and the ‘
darash
’/
seeking
of ‘
the
Doresh
(
Seeker
)
ha-Torah
’, but also the ‘
heart
’ imagery that we have been encountering throughout our consideration of Paul and James.

In fact, the Righteous Teacher was ‘
to guide them in the Way of His
(
God
’
s
)
heart’
. Here too the ‘
heart
’ imagery is co
m
bined with that of ‘
the Way’
, language employed repeatedly throughout Acts as an alternate way of referring to early Christian
i
ty in Palestine.
4
Not only is this ‘
preparation of the Way in the wilderness
’ part and parcel of the vocabulary applied to John the Baptist’s activities in the Synoptics in exegesis of Isaiah 40:3 as well as parallel expositions of this in the Community Rule at Qumran; it explains the use of ‘
the Way
’ terminology generally throughout the documents there and, for instance, in Acts. In fact, both here in CD I.15 and in the Last Column of 4QD, the opposite language is applied to ‘
the Pourer-out of L
y
ing
’/‘
Scoffer
’ and ‘
the Peoples
,’ namely, ‘
causing them to wander astray in a wilderness without a Way
’ – one simply reversing the other.

Here, too, as in the Habakkuk
Pesher
, ‘
the Assembly of the Traitors
’ are also introduced and described as ‘
Rebels against the Way
’ and with them, of course, ‘
the Lying Scoffer’
. Just as in the Habakkuk
Pesher
, where ‘
the Traitors
’ and ‘
the Man of Lies
’ attend the Scriptural exegesis sessions of the Righteous Teacher and ‘
did not believe
’ what he told them was going to happen to God’s
People ‘
in the Last Generation
’, so here in the Damascus Document, again demonstrating the basic circular
i
ty of these documents, ‘
he made known to the Last Generations what God would do in the Last Generation to the Congreg
a
tion
(
Assembly
)
of Traitors
’.
5

Just as with the quotations from Micah and Ezekiel in Columns
IV
and
VIII
/
XIX
about the Spouter’s ‘
spouting
’ and ‘
L
y
ing visions’
, this is described in terms of a passage from Hosea 4:6 comparing Israel’s ‘
straying
’ or ‘
Rebelliousness
’ to the ‘
straying
’ of ‘
a Rebellious heifer’
.
It is this passage CD I.13-14 uses to introduce ‘
the Scoffer
’ or ‘
Man of Jesting
’/‘
Comedian
,
who poured over Israel the waters of Lying’
. Since the same vocabulary is used to describe what ‘
the Man of Scoffing
’ or ‘
C
o
median
’ does here, as is used in 4QD later and in the Habakkuk
Pesher
to describe ‘
the Pourer out
’ or ‘
Spouter of Lying’
, we can take these two to be identical. What he does is ‘
pour out Lying’
, here expressed in terms of ‘
causing them to wander astray in a trackless waste without a Way’
.

The ‘
leading astray
’
or
‘
deceiving
’ language is important where ‘
the Man of Lying
’ is concerned and is the opposite of ‘
ju
s
tifying
’ or ‘
making Many Righteous
’ predicative of the Righteous Teacher. These activities were recapitulated in the Last Co
l
umn of 4QD where ‘
the High Priest Commanding the Many
’ condemns anyone ‘
rejecting the Laws found in the
Torah
of M
o
ses
’ and characterizes God as having ‘
caused the Peoples
’ (Paul’s
Gentiles
) ‘
to wander astray in a trackless waste
’ or ‘
a wilderness without a Way’
. But where Israel was concerned, ‘
the Priest
’ avers: ‘
You chose our Fathers and to their seed gave the Laws of Your Truth and the Ordinances of Your Holiness
,
which a man shall do and thereby live
.
And boundary markers were laid down for us
. T
hose who cross over them You curse
.’
6

Moreover, Deuteronomy 30:6
actually
refers to God ‘
circumcising your heart and that of your seed to love the Lord your God with all your heart
’ to express the promise concerning ‘
thereby living’
. It is clear, too, that what is meant by the ‘
boundary marker
’ imagery here
is
the Law. So too for the description of ‘
the Pourer out of the Waters of Lying
’ at the beginning of the Damascus Document: ‘
He brought low the Everlasting Heights
,
rebelling against the Pathways of Righteousness and remo
v
ing the boundary markers
which the First had marked out as their inheritance
.’ There can be no doubt that what is being talked about so exaltedly is, once again, ‘
the Law
’, and ‘
the First
’ are none other than the Patriarchs and Moses, the
Foref
a
thers
, conceived of as having laid it down.

The text now turns to the effect of ‘
removing these Pathways of Righteousness
’ and ‘
boundary markers’
, once more r
e
sorting to the ‘
cursing
’ and ‘
Covenant
’ language of Deuteronomy 27–31, continuing: ‘
for which reason He
(
God
)
called down on them the curses of His Covenant and delivered them up to the avenging sword of Vengeance of the Covenant’
.
We have remarked the importance of these notices about ‘
delivering up
’ to those characterizing ‘
Judas Iscariot
’, who is also always d
e
scribed as ‘
delivering him up’
. The double reference to
Vengeance
reiterates similar such references in the
cursing
in the Community Rule, emphasizing just how terrible this
Vengeance
was going to be – in our view, as in the New Testament and the theology of the early Church, ‘
the avenging sword of
’
the Roman
s who, in the words of the Habakkuk
Pesher
, ‘
consume
’ or ‘
eat all the Peoples year-by-year
,
delivering many Countries up to the sword’
.
7

Curiously enough, ‘
Law-breaking
’ activities of
the Lying Spouter
are tied, in the view of these extreme visionaries, to the coming ‘
Vengeance
’ of the Romans. This
Vengeance
is going to be ‘
visited
’ upon almost everyone, but they seem to have r
e
moved themselves to the Land across Jordan in the neighborhood of Damascus and beyond. This too is the thrust of the statement in CD I.21–II.1, with which this section ends, that ‘
God
’
s Wrath was kindled against their Congregation
,
devastating all their multitude
,
for their works were unclean before Him’
.

Interestingly enough, this is now tied to two quotations from Isaiah 30:10–30:13, also having to do with
visionaries
‘
pr
e
ferring illusions
’ and ‘
looking for breaks
’ in the Wall – presumably ‘
the Wall
’ in Ezekiel 13:10 referred to in Columns
IV
and
VIII
/
XIX
, ‘
daubed upon by Lying Prophets
’ who ‘
cried Peace when there was no Peace’
. These passages from Isaiah 30:10–13 actually relate to the same subject as not only Ezekiel 13:10 but also Micah 2:11 about the ‘
spouting
’ of ‘
Lying Spouter
’s or visionaries and even use the same word we have been following here,
ma
’
as
/
reject
, in this case ‘
rejecting this Word and trusting in oppression and guile
’ (Isaiah 30:12). Here, too, is the language of ‘
Smooth Things’
,
viz
., ‘
prophesying Smooth Things and seeing delusions
’ or ‘
jests
’ (
mahatalot
, also a play here on the Hebrew word
Halakot
/
Smooth Things
– Isaiah 30:10).