James the Brother of Jesus and the Dead Sea Scrolls II (34 page)

Curiously in this account – which is obviously drawn from the same material as the one Eusebius conserves from Hegesippus – after forcing him to ‘
stand in a pit
’, James’ executioners
place
‘
a stone on his abdomen
’ oddly echoing the ‘
sto
n
ing
’ aspect of the affair in more familiar contexts. But even here there is either an echo or prefiguration of execution scenarios for ‘
blasphemy
’ in the
Talmud
’s
Mishnah Sanhedrin
where, in one description anyhow,
a heavy stone is placed on the malefa
c
tor
’
s abdomen
and considered to be the equivalent of stoning!
23

We shall also presently see how the last of these legendary Talmudic
Rainmakers
Nakdimon ben Gurion will be pictured as basically repeating Honi’s miracle-working of ‘
filling up the cisterns
,
pits
,
and caverns
’, only in Nakdimon’s case
he will
‘
r
e
fill twelve Temple cisterns
’
to
‘
overflowing
’.
24
This language of ‘
filling
’ will then reverberate back and forth through a mult
i
tude of Talmudic and New Testament episodes we shall examine in detail presently, until one’s head will fairly spin from all the interconnections, rhetorical flourish, and word-play – word-play not so different from that we have already seen Paul use to such devastating effect in his method of allegorical and rhetorical repartee.

Curiously too, the
Talmud
seems to think that in some manner the prophet Habakkuk prefigured Honi’s ‘
circle-drawing
’ and ‘
praying for rain
’.
25
One can, again, take this in an eschatological sense since Habakkuk will be seen as a key eschatological prophet for the sectaries at Qumran and, to be sure, early Christianity as well.
26
This parallel, however, is not simply fanciful for, in these sections on the prototypical Rainmakers in the
Talmud
, the prophecy in Habakkuk 2:1–2 of ‘
standing upon his Watchtower and fortifying himself firmly on his Bulwark
’ – language strongly reminiscent, as well, of the imagery of early Church descriptions of James – is applied to the actual process of Honi
drawing his circle
and ‘
taking his stand
’
within it
.
27

This prophecy also reappears in the Habakkuk
Pesher
, where it is expounded in terms of
the Righteous Teacher
’s ability
to understand scriptural prophecy and foresee
‘
the appointed End
’.
28
The crucial exegeses of Habakkuk 2:3 and 2:4 on ‘
waiting for
’
the final vision
and ‘
the Righteous living by his Faith
’ that then directly follow are interpreted in terms of what in Early Christian theology becomes known as ‘
the Delay of the
Parousia
’ and how those Jews ‘
who
do
the
Torah
’
will
‘
be saved
’
at the time of the Last Judgement
at the End of Time
, while those following the more backsliding approach of a teacher very much resembling Paul – playing off the usage ‘
puffed up
’ in the first part of Habakkuk 2:4 – will have ‘
their guilt multiplied upon them when they are judged
’.
29

In fact, the text of the Habakkuk
Pesher
, while somewhat damaged at this point, actually can be used to clarify a question
a
ble recension in the Cairo
Genizah
version of the Damascus Document – itself leading up to the all-important definition of ‘
the Sons of Zadok
’ of Ezekiel 44:15. The text which reads
taking one
’
s
‘
stand upon one
’
s
net
’ (
metzudo
), a somewhat opaque allusion, probably should read – in view of the keen interest shown in this metaphor just detailed in the Habakkuk
Pesher
above – ‘
upon one
’
s Watchtower
’ (
mishmarti
).
30
In the Habakkuk
Pesher
, the exposition of this term ‘
Watchtower
’ is eschatological and it is interpreted in terms of ‘
the Last Days
’,
their
‘
delay
’ or ‘
extension
’, and how ‘
God made known the Mysteries of the words of the Prophets
’ – uniquely as it were –
to the Righteous Teacher
.
31

Nor can there be any doubt that the interpretation of the all-important Habakkuk 2:4 that follows in the Habakkuk
Pesher
, ‘
the Righteous shall live by his Faith
’, expounded here at Qumran and in Galatians, Romans, and James, is, as we shall also see more fully as we proceed,
eschatological
as well, that is, its exposition
will relate to
‘
the Last Days
’ or ‘
the Day of Judgement
’ too.
32
As in the War Scroll, once again demonstrating the basic circularity of all these materials and their inter-relationships, the enemies in the Habakkuk
Pesher
at this juncture are ‘
the
Kittim
’ too – meaning, according to our interpretation, the Romans.

Simeon Bar Yohai, the Karaites,
Elchasai
, and Paul

A similar ‘
Hidden
’ or ‘
disappearing
’/‘
re-appearing
’ tradition is associated in the
Talmud
, with the eponymous transmitter of
Zohar
-tradition in early Second-Century Palestine and a contemporary of
Elchasai
, Simeon bar Yohai. Simeon was another Rabbi with distinctly ‘
Zealot
’ attitudes, harboring an extreme antagonism towards Rome and all vestiges of Roman rule in Pa
l
estine. A
Disciple
of the equally ‘
Zealot
’ Rabbi Akiba, Simeon was supposed to have ‘
hidden himself in a cave
’ together with his son after the death of his mentor,
eating nothing but carobs for some twelve years
(this number ‘
twelve
’ will grow in importance when it comes to telling of the story of Nakdimon’s ‘
twelve cisterns
’ below) to escape Roman retribution (and even perhaps ‘
the
Sicaricon
’!
33
).

This note about his ‘
cave-dwelling
’ is interesting relative to the Dead Sea Scrolls and other activity we have been observing including Koranic revelations in Islam thereafter. But it also tallies with traditions preserved by the Jewish Karaites, the sect opposed to Rabbinic Judaism in the Middle Ages. They asserted, not only that Jesus’
teaching was
‘
the same as
’
someone they called
‘
Zadok
’, but that
the ban on
‘
niece marriage
’, we know from writings, such as the Damascus Document and the Temple Scroll at Qumran, w
as one of his
(
Jesus
’)
fundamental teachings
.
34
Needless to say, this information is not conserved by any other source.

Not only do the Karaites folloe this ‘
ban on niece marriage
’ themselves – whereas Rabbinic Judaism followed by Christ
i
anity and Islam do not – they also
attribute it
,
not surprisingly
,
to
‘
Zadok
’. Even more to the point, where ‘
cave-dwelling
’ is concerned, a group they refer to simply as ‘
the
Maghrarians
’ or ‘
Cave-Dwellers
’ is placed chronologically between the group led by the Teacher they refer to as ‘
Zadok
’ and Jesus.
Of course, this would make it similar to a group Hippolytus in the Third Century is calling ‘
Sebuaeans
’ (that is, ‘
Sabaeans
’) or ‘
Naassenes
’. That is, according to Karaite heresiology, first came ‘
Zadok
’, then ‘
the Cave-Dwellers
’, and then came Jesus, all linked in an unbroken progression of some kind.

These matters will probably never be sorted out completely but that they relate in some manner to a ‘
Hidden
’ tradition a
s
sociated with a line of
Zaddik
s connected to Honi’s family and taking Elijah as their prototype should be clear. That this line is also connected with
rainmaking
– whether actual or eschatological – should also be clear. Regardless of the truth of Epiphanius’ notice about James’
rainmaking
, that such a procedure or ideology is connected to his person, even if only sy
m
bolically through his
Zaddik
-nature, is not insignificant. In this connection, the reappearance of all these Honi look-alikes just prior to the fall of the Temple in 70 CE should not go unremarked, nor should James’ death in almost precisely the manner of Honi and for probably very similar reasons – in James’ case (if not Honi’s),
at the hands of a more accommodating Priestly Establishment
.

That this line is also linked to the ‘
redivivus
’ ones, whether the ‘
Zealot
’-Priestly one stemming from Phineas and Elijah or the one the Synoptics suppose they are dealing with in portraying Elijah as reborn in John the Baptist, should also be clear. In turn, these lines are paralleled by the ‘
Jewish Christian
’/
Ebionite
/
Elchasaite
‘
Primal Adam
’ or ‘
Man
’ – one in Pseudoclementine and
Sabaean
tradition described above. As Muhammad, another heir to this tradition – probably via ‘
the Sabaeans
’ (that is, ‘
the Elchasaites
’) either in Northern Syria or Southern Iraq or the Manichaeans descended from them – puts this in the Koran:
‘Behold
,
the likeness of Jesus with
Allah
is the likeness of
Adam
.
He created him of the dust
.
Then He said unto him
: “
Be
!”
And he was’
(3:59).
Paul himself shows great familiarity with this doctrine in 1 Corinthians, referring to it as ‘
the Primal
’ or ‘
First Man Adam
’ or ‘
the Second Man
’/‘
the Last Adam
’ (15:21 and 45–48) and his whole discussion of these matters precedes his delineation of the state man will enjoy after the Resurrection.

For his part, Epiphanius sets forth one of the best descriptions of this ‘
Secret
’ or ‘
Second Adam
’ doctrine imaginable in a passage in which he describes how ‘
the False Prophet Elchasai joined … those called Sampsaeans
(Sabaeans),
Osseneans
(E
s
senes),
and Elchasaites
’ (here the basic coextensiveness of these three groups again). This he puts as follows:
‘Some of them say that Christ is Adam and the first to be made and given life by the Spirit of God
.
Others of them say that he is from above
,
having been created before everything
,
being Spirit and above the Angels and Lord of all
,
and is called
‘
Christ
’ ...
but He comes here when he wants
, as
when he came in Adam
....
He came also in the Last Days
and clothed himself in Adam
’
s body
....’
35