Essenes

The Essenes (from the Greek «εσσηνοι», «εσσαιοι» or «οσσαιοι»; essenoi, essaioi, ossaioi) were members of a Jewish sect, probably established from mid-century II a. C. after the Maccabean Revolt, and whose existence until the I century a. C. is documented by different sources. Its immediate antecedents could be in the Hasidic movement, from the time of the Seleucid domination (198 to 142 BC).

Name

Several hypotheses have been woven about the origin of the word «Essene»: it may come from the Greek word «ὅσιος» (ossios: 'holy', ossa: ' saints'), or be a reference to the Greek hasidei ('pious'), in Aramaic hese. Arabic writings refer to them as magaritas ('of the caves'). It has been proposed that the name comes from the Hebrew asaim (עשים), that is "doers", since they said "if the Torah says so, we do it", from the verb to do=laasot (לעשות), and from the masculine plural=im (ים), which in Greek was “εσσηνοι” (essenoi), “εσσαιοι” (essaioi) or “οσσαιοι” (ossaioi). It is also held that the name comes from the Syriac word "Asaya", doctors; in Greek, therapists; because his only ministry, to the public, was to cure physical and moral diseases. "They studied with great care, says Josephus, certain medical writings that dealt with the hidden virtues of plants and minerals" (reference: Edouard Schuré. The great initiates. page 318).

Documents

For a long time they were known only from references to ancient authors, such as Pliny the Elder, Flavius Josephus, Philo, Dio Crisóstomo, Hipólito de Ostia and Epifanio de Constancia, although for some scholars, the Essenes were a group of ascetics who lived isolated in separate communities. Probably most of the several thousand members of the faith lived in towns and cities, and a significant Essene community lived in Jerusalem, on whose walls was the "gate of the Essenes", which has since been found by archaeologists.

The Community

Quran.

After the Maccabean Revolt (166-159 BC), which they had supported but whose final results they did not share, they withdrew into the desert to "prepare the way of the Lord", under the command of a new leader, the Master of Justice.

If someone wanted to be a member of the community (yahad) they had to be educated, accepted and then pass three years of probation to enter definitively. A lifetime of study of the Law, humility, and discipline were required of those who took the oath and entered the community. They did not swear again, as they were obliged to always tell the truth. Their assets became part of the entire community and, like the fruits of personal work, they were distributed according to the needs of each one, leaving a part to help the poor, widows, orphans, single elderly women, the unemployed, foreigners. and runaway slaves who, without being members of the community, required help. Observance of a strict code of discipline was also imposed, the basis of which was mutual fraternal correction. In general, women were accepted within the community, and men practiced celibacy all their lives, although according to Josephus, a part of the Essenes did allow marriage and among the Qumran regulations the option of marriage is clearly recognized. marry, but strict monogamy is required for all people, even kings.

They administered the ultimate interpretation of the Law that had been revealed to its founder, who is referred to in their writings as the Master of Justice. This character, about which there is more speculation thanks to the Dead Sea Scrolls, acted around 150 B.C. C. and would have opposed the ordering as High Priest of Jonathan Maccabee, brother of Judas Maccabee, considering that he had abandoned faithfulness to God. It is likely that this rejection was due to the fact that the opposition leader was a Sadokite priest, who considered the Hasmonean pontificate illegitimate.His followers marched to Qumran, a site that the members of the community called Damascus. Archeology shows that the occupation of Qumran was intense from 103 to 76 BCE. C., during the reigns of Aristobulus I and Alejandro Janeo, who cruelly persecuted their opponents.

Essenism was not limited to Qumran. It is known that in the I century in Jerusalem there was an Essene quarter. Many Essenes - some 4,000, according to Flavio Josefo - lived in the cities, in a particular, pacifist way, in community of goods, manifesting their doctrine. According to this author, part of the Essenes did not marry, but others, on the contrary, did. Among the latter were those of Qumran, who were required to marry at the age of 20.

The Qumran community was self-sustaining by farming. In the ruins the number of water tanks is notable. These were essential for the physical needs of the community in the middle of the desert, but they also performed an important part of their ritual, which included numerous washings. Some have supposed that, like the Egyptian therapists, within their laws and duties the Essenes were vegetarians, but there is absolutely nothing to indicate such a thing in the Qumran scrolls.

It has been speculated that Jesus of Nazareth and John the Baptist were related to them or even belonged to the creed:

It seems that John the Baptist and perhaps also Jesus and his family were close to this community. In any case, in Qumrán manuscripts there are multiple points of contact with the Christian message. It cannot be ruled out that John the Baptist lived a while in this community and received in it, in part, his religious formation.

Among them they wanted to see the germ of Christianity and Ernest Renán went so far as to write that "Christianity was to a great extent the triumphant Essenism". Those who deny the relationship between Jesus and the Essenes cite a reference in the gospel of John 10:22-23, where it is said that Jesus attended the Feast of Dedication (or Hanukkah), in which it is believed that the Essenes did not participate, considering said party illegal, since it was not ordered by the Tanakh. However, Jesus had been in Jerusalem since two months before, when he had gone to the Feast of Tabernacles ( John 7:2-10 ).

Regarding whether Jesus belonged to the congregation of the Essenes or shared their views, it is known from the Synoptic Gospels that it is possible that Jesus celebrated Pesach (Jewish Passover) on the date indicated in the calendar followed in Qumran, since they clearly indicate that the last supper was a Passover celebration (Matthew 26:17-19, Mark 14:12-16 , Luke 22:7-15) and further that the Bethany anointing occurred two days before the Feast of Unleavened Bread and the Passover (Mark 14:1-9), while the Gospel of John indicates that the Bethany anointing was six days before Easter (John 12:1< /span>) and Jesus died the day before the official Passover (John 18:28). The Bible, however, does not mention the term "Essene"; nor has a historical source been found in Hebrew or Aramaic that designates any community or creed with the Greek name of "Essenes", and the Qumran scrolls use designations such as "community of saints", "congregation of the poor" and " assembly of the many".

Disputes

In the 19th century, the Essenes were popularized by the writings of the spiritualist Allán Kardec (1804-1869) and the theosophist Madame Blavatsky (1831-1891), as well as at the beginning of the XX century the writings of Josefa Luque (1893-1965).

Studies reported between 1995 and 2009, particularly those involving Professor Norman Golb (of the University of Chicago) and Dr. Rachel Elior (of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), suggest that the Dead Sea Scrolls (or Qumran scrolls) were not written by the Essenes, but by Sadducee priests expelled from the temple in Jerusalem. For Elior, the Sadducees, a creed descended from the high priest Zadok who anointed Solomon as king, are the true authors of the Qumran scrolls, the same ones that belonged to the Temple and moved to the Dead Sea with the intention of protecting them. Rachel Elior also claims that the Essenes were introduced by the historian Flavius Josephus, while there is no mention of the Essenes in the Dead Sea Scrolls; at the same time that no historical testimony of the Essenes is found in Hebrew or Aramaic sources. She considers it atypical that people who have coexisted in community life in a parsimonious and frugal way ―contrary to the law of the Torah ― do not appear mentioned in Hebrew or Greek sources.

Sadducean authorship of the Dead Sea Scrolls has been refuted by various scholars, as the Qumran rules and the Damascus Document explicitly require community of property as an entry requirement, which was contrary to Sadducean practices. The Qumranites were designated as "the poor", while the Sadducees belonged to the cream of the wealthy and aristocratic society. Although the authors of the found scrolls claim their priestly origin and therefore a common origin with the Sadducees, they also denounce that the Temple was contaminated by the corruption of the priests who remained there, for which reason it is impossible that the latter were the ones who fled. they would have preserved the scrolls. During the years of Sadducee control of the Temple (from 134 to 76 BC), under the reigns of John Hyrcanus, Aristobulus I and Alexander Jannaeus, the authors of the scrolls were severely persecuted; therefore it is clear that they were not Sadducees, but their contradictors. Angelology, as well as the insistence of the various scrolls on following the solar calendar of the Book of Jubilees and the First Book of Enoch, also exclude the possibility of authorship. sadducee

According to The Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, the Essenes were even more exclusive than the Pharisees and “could sometimes be more self-righteous than the Pharisees themselves.” However, while the Pharisees, to save property, allowed a bruised cattle to be pulled out of a well on the Sabbath (“you” Matthew 12:11), they opposed to cure people on Saturday, the Essenes on the other hand were opposed to rescuing a cow from a well on Saturday, but at the same time if it was the accident of a person on a Saturday, they demanded to remove their clothes and rescue with them whoever it was that it had fallen into the water, immediately, on the same Saturday. (Damascus Document XI:12-15).