Dream-Visions in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls: Shared Compositional Patterns and Concerns

Abstract

<p>Twenty-nine of the some 900 fragmentary Scrolls recovered from the caves off the northwest shores of the Dead Sea were penned in the Aramaic language. It is generally agreed that this cross-section of Aramaic literature among the predominantly Hebrew collection derives from before and beyond the scribal community that lived at Qumran. Whether or not the Aramaic texts constitute a cohesive collection, however, is an ongoing debate. While their compositional origins are unknown, this dissertation avers that enough common traits exist among the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls to indicate an inherent unity in the group. Paramount among these traits is the pervasive usage of the dream-vision in a constellation of at least nineteen Aramaic writings.</p> <p>This study advances our understanding of the Aramaic texts by exploring the dream-vision as a literary convention from two interrelated perspectives. Part One maps out the major compositional patterns of dream-vision episodes across the collection. Special attention is paid to recurring literary-philological features (e.g., motifs, images, phrases, idioms, etc.), which suggest that pairs or clusters of texts are affiliated intertextually, tradition-historically, or originated in scribal circles in close proximity. Part Two articulates three predominant concerns advanced or addressed by dream-vision revelation. It is argued that the authors of these materials utilized the dream-vision (i) for scriptural exegesis of the patriarchal traditions, (ii) to endorse particular understandings of the origins and functions of the priesthood, and (iii) for historiography by creating <em>ex eventu </em>revelations of aspects or all of world history. In tandem these two components affirm the centrality of the dream-vision to the thought world of the Aramaic texts as well as demonstrate that this revelatory <em>topos</em> was deployed using a shared stock of language in order to introduce a closely defined set of concerns.</p>