DEAD SEA SCROLLS - NEW COVENANT

THE LORD SEEKS JUDGMENT

Now, therefore, hearken unto me [V Listen now], ye all who know righteousness\1 [=V; GM justice] and meditate upon [GM understand; V consider] the work [GM actions; V works] of| God\2 . For He has a controversy [GM V dispute] with all flesh\3 and He will execute [GM carry out] judgment\4[V condemn] upon [GM against] all [V all those] who despise [GM V spurn] Him. | For because of their treason that [GM V when they were unfaithful] they forsook [GM in forsaking; V and forsook] Him, He hid His face\5 from Israel and from His sanctuary| and delivered them unto [GM V up to] the sword

- Damascus Document Ch. 1:1-5

THE COVENANT AND THE WELL

But with them that held fast to\1 the commandments of God, | who were left among them, God confirmed His covenant with Israel for ever, revealing| unto them the hidden things in which all Israel erred: His holy Sabbaths and His glorious festivals, |15| the testimony of His righteousness and the ways of His truth and the desires of His will which a man shall do| and live by them\2. He opened before them\3 and they digged a well of many waters,

- Damascus Document Ch. 5:1-3

THE BUILDING OF THE WALL

\6. And they justified the righteous and condemned the wicked\7. And all they who come after them| to do according to the interpretation of the Law in which the forefathers were *instructed\8 until the *completing\9| of the end of these years. In accordance with the covenant which God has confirmed to the forefathers to make atonement|10| for their sins, so shall God make atonement for them\10. And after the completing of the end in accordance with the number of these years| *one shall not join the house of Judah\11, but every man shall stand up against his| net\12. The wall is built, the decree is far removed\13. And during all these years there will be| Belial\14 let loose against Israel as God hath spoken through Isaiah, the prophet, the son| of Amoz, saying: Fear and the net and the snare are upon thee, O inhabitant of the land\15. ## Its explanation is\16|15| : three nets of Belial concerning which Levi the son of Jacob hath spoken\17 by* which he ensnared Israel\18, and *directed their faces to the three kinds of righteousness. The first is fornication, the second is *wealth\19, the third| is the *pollution of the sanctuary\20. He that fleeth from this will be ensnared by that, and he that escapeth the one will be ensnared| by the other\21. ## They that builded the *wall\22 who walked after the *commanding one.

Damascus Document Ch. 6:6-22

TEACHER OF RIGHTEOUSNESS

they were guilty men, and but; V yet] they were like the blind persons] *groping in the way\11 and like those who grope for the path] |10| twenty years\12. And God considered appraised] their deeds\13, for because] they sought Him with a perfect heart\14| and He raised for them a\15 teacher of righteousness\16 to make them walk in order to direct them] in the way path] of His heart.

- Damascus Document Ch. 1:10-16

SMITTEN SHEPHERD

"O sword, awake, against | my shepherd and against the man that is my fellow, says God\7, smite the shepherd and the sheep shall be scattered,. | and I will turn my hand to the little ones. And they that watch him are the poor of the flock\

- Damascus Document Ch. 9:6-8

NEW COVENANT FOR ISRAEL

they shall be judged. For they uttered error against the statutes of righteousness and despised the covenant and the pledge of faith which they have affirmed in the land of Damascus; and this is the New Covenant.

- Damascus Document (BII:10)

A VOW AND A CURSE

{GM} [He will not sw]ear by the Aleph and the Lamed ('EL = God) nor by the Aleph and the Daleth ('ADONAI = The Lord), but by the oath of the youths {GM} by the curses of the covenant. ## Neither should one mention the law of Moses, for [...] {GM} ## And if he swears and transgresses, he would profane the name. ## And if he sw[ears] by the curses of the covenant [he should do it before] {GM} the judges. ## If he transgresses, he will be guilty and will have to confess and make amends but he shall not be liable [for sin and shall not] {GM} die. ##

- Damascus Document 15:1-4

SHODDY WALL-BUILDERS

The serpents are the kings of the peoples and their wine is their ways. And the head of asps is the chief of the kings of Greece who came to wreak vengeance upon them. But all these things the builders of the wall and those who daub it with plaster (Ezek. xiii, 10) have not understood because a follower of the wind, one who raised storms and rained down lies, had preached to them (Mic. ii, 11), against all of whose assembly the anger of God was kindled. And as for that which Moses said, You enter to possess these nations not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your hearts (Deut. ix, 5) but because God loved your fathers and kept the oath (Deut. vii, 8), thus shall it be with the converts of Israel who depart from the way of the people. Because God loved the first (men) who81 testified in His favour, so will He love those who come after them, for the Covenant of the fathers is theirs. But He hated the builders of the wall and His anger was kindled (MS. B: against them and against all those who followed them); and so shall it be for all who reject the commandments of God and abandon them for the stubbornness of their hearts. This is the word which Jeremiah spoke to Baruch son of Neriah, and which Elisha spoke to his servant Gehazi. None of the men who enter the New Covenant in the land of Damascus, (B I) and who again betray it and depart from the fountain of living waters, shall be reckoned with the Council of the people or inscribed in its Book from the day of the gathering in (B II) of the Teacher of the Community until the coming of the Messiah out of Aaron and Israel.

- Damascus Document Ch 8:10-23

THE WELL AND THE LAWGIVER

And He took from Aaron men of understanding and from Israel wise men and made them understand, and they digged the well. "The princes digged the well; they digged it, the nobles of the people, by the lawgiver. The well is the Law, and they who digged it are the captivity of Israel who have gone forth out of the land of Judah and sojourned in the land of Damascus, all of whom God called princes. For they sought Him and their bough was not turned back in the mouth of one. And the Lawgiver is he who interprets the Law concerning whom Isaiah said, "He bringeth forth an instrument for his work. And the nobles of the people are they who came to dig the well by the precepts which the Lawgiver ordained to walk in them for all end of the wickedness. And they shall reach nothing beside them until there will arise the teacher of righteousness in the end of the days. And all they who were brought into the covenant they shall not enter into the Sanctuary to kindle His altar, and be shutting the door, concerning whom God said, "Who is there among you who would shut the doors, neither do you kindle my altar for naught." If they will not observe to do according to the interpretation of the Law, until the end of the wickedness, and to separate from the children of destruction, and to separate from the wealth of wickedness which is contaminated by a vow and curse, and from the wealth of the sanctuary, and rob the poor of his people (so that) widows be their prey, and they murder the fatherless and to distinguish between clean and unclean and to make known between the holy and the profane, and to observe the Sabbath according to its interpretation and the feasts and the day of fast according to the command of them who entered in to the New Covenant in the land of Damascus. To raise their offerings according to their interpretation, to love every one his neighbor as himself, and to strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy and the stranger, and to seek every one the peace.

- Damascus Document ch 6:3-22

AN OATH AND A NAME - AKAE AND BEKA.

13 And this is the task of Kasbeel, the chief of the oath which he showed to the holy ones when he dwelt high above in glory, and its name is Biqa. 14 This (angel) requested Michael to show him the hidden name, that he may enunciate it in the oath, 15 So that those might quake before that name and oath who revealed all that was in secret to the children of men. And this is the power of this oath, for it is powerful and strong, and he placed his oath Akae in the hand of (under the control of) Michael. 16 And these are the secrets of this oath (God's promise, word) that heaven was suspended before the world was created, and forever, and they are strong through his oath (word, promise) 17 And through it the earth was founded in water , and from the secret recesses of the mountains came beautiful waters, from the creation of the world and to eternity.

- 1 Enoch 69:13-17.

INTERPRETATION

God abhors the builders of the wall and adores the diggers of the well. The transgression was made in forsaking the covenant and ended in bloodshed and renewed; not until the completed time, there was a remnant for God's people. There was a new covenant on the concept of purification; basis of waters and opposing those who imposed the building of the wall. The covenant was sanctioned by an oath and a curse. The curse a smitten shepherd, scattered flock; the blessing a united assembly towards a Teacher of Righteousness.