B”H

Talmudi Megillat HaN’Choshet

(Studies in the Copper Scroll)

From Wikipedia-

While most of the Dead Sea Scrolls were found by Bedouins, the Copper Scroll was discovered by an archaeologist.^[4] The scroll, on two rolls of copper, was found on March 14, 1952^[5] at the back of Cave 3 at Qumran. It was the last of 15 scrolls discovered in the cave, and is thus referred to as 3Q15.^[6] The corroded metal could not be unrolled by conventional means, and John Marco Allegro arranged for Professor H. Wright Baker, of the College of Technology at Manchester, England, to cut the sheets into 23 strips in 1955 and 1956.^[7]

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Megillat ha’Nechoshet, (The Copper Scroll) has intrigued scholars and laymen alike for it’s content, myth, legends, and potential disclosure of an immense amount of wealth seeming to have been inscribed thereon.

What is the Copper Scroll? Is is a “treasure map” or just a hoax? Is it a religious document and not an administrative – quasi civil document of the Second Temple era? If it is a religious document which comports with the practice of the Qumran Communities adherence to shunning wealth, then the Copper Scroll should be given serious theological consideration as to why and how it fits into the Qumran Communities theology and end times (eschatological) out-look upon their immediate circumstances within that Second Temple era.

Copper was used in the construction of the Tabernacle for the: Brazen Altar, (Exodus 38.4), foot of the altar (38.8), rings (27.4), pins (27.19) and sockets (38.10). As well, the Copper Serpent (Numbers 21.6-9) was a healing agent for those who looked upon it. Hezekiah crushed the Copper Serpent (Mishneh Pesachim 4.6) and hid the Book of Remedies (M.Pesachim 4.6) as it became used in avodah zarah idol worship. In short, it is the base of or foundation necessary for burnt offerings. Copper, “precious as gold” was weighed by Ezra, the Priests, as well as the Levites (Ezra 8.27), who wrote all the weight of the free-will offering to the L-RD. (8.34) Copper is thus identified primarily seven times in the Jewish Bible (TaNaCh) of lessor or lower importance in metallurgy and the value of metals as the basis upon which to build the Mishkan.

So, what, if any thing happened to the “treasures” of the Copper Scroll? Do they still exist or are they lost to antiquity? Although the answer may be found in the writings of the Jewish historian Josephus; siman (signs) do not attest to the veracity of the “location” treasure themselves.

For theological reasons, I prefer to suggest that the treasure map theory is a “wisdom mystery” couched in the Dead Sea Scrolls themselves. From my research paper on the Dead Sea Scrolls: As can be seen by 1Q21 “The Words of Levi”

 (The Dead Sea Scrolls, A New Translation, Wise, Michael; Abegg, Martin, Jr.; and Cook, Edward; Harper Collins Publishers, San Francisco, 1996 pp.251-52):

“Then he gave me the blessings of the Priesthood…”. “Consider, my sons, my brother Joseph, who teaches writing and discipline and wisdom. …. So wisdom is a great fortune of glory, and a fine treasure for all who possess it. If mighty kings come with many people, and an army, horsemen, and many chariots with them, and if they seize the wealth of the lands and nations, plundering everything in them, they still could not plunder the storehouses of wisdom, nor could they find its hidden riches. 4Q213 Frag. 6+7 (Wise 257)

According to Michael Wise in The Dead Sea Scrolls, A New Translation; “Copper was used for the safekeeping of nonliterary records, Roman public laws, and even the private discharge papers of Roman Military veterans. More to the point, copper and bronze were common media of choice for the archival records of temples in the Roman period.

According to Josephus, …. The Romans pursued a definate policy to retrieve treasure hoards that citizens of Jerusalem had secreted during the siege. As always, the key to their recovery lay with the interrogation of prisoners. One such, Pinchas, was an official treasurer of the Temple. The historian tells us that this man delivered up to the Romans “‘the tunics and girdles worn by the priests… many other treasures also were delivered up by him, with sacred ornaments (War 6.390-91). (Wise, pp. 190-91)

Megillat ha’Nechoshet begins:

[First Cache]

“In the ruin in the Valley of Achor, under the steps with the entrance at the East at a distance of 40 cubits a strong-box of silver with it’s vessels, 17 talents in weight. KEN

[Fourth Cache]

“In the ruin-heep of Kohlit: vessels of tribute of the master of nations, and ephods. All of this belongs to the tribute and the seventh treasure, a second tithe rendered unclean. Its opening is in the edge of the aqueduct on the north six cubits to the immersion bath, XAG.” (CHAG)

[Sixth, Seventh, Eleventh Caches]

Forty two talents lie under the stairs in the salt pit.HN (HEN) Sixty five bars of gold lie on the third terrace in the cave of the old Washers House.QE (TA’AH) Seventy telents of silver are enclosed in wooden vessel that are in the cistern of a burial chamber in Matia’s courtyard. Fifteen cubits from the front of the eastern gates, lies a cistern. The ten talents lie in the canal of the cistern.DI (DAY)

[Fifteenth Cache]

Dig down sixteen cubits under the eastern corner to find forty talents of silver.TR (TAPH)

[Eighteenth Cache]

Fourteen talents of silver can be found in the pillar on the northern side of the big cistern in Kohlit. SK (SOOK)

Here, the Greek characters are transliterated into Hebrew: Ken, Chag, Hen, Ta’ah, Day, Taph, Sook (Yes, Their Festival [in] Booths [to play, tap or beat] Tamborines [is] Enough [for] Anointing)

“Thus the scroll is not a ‘free’ literary prose creation; instead, it is a work designed according to a fixed and defined (preset) structure. Even if none of the 60 items is complete in containing entries for all seven subjects or ‘fields’ that exist in the scroll, the form of the description was preset, and the author was not permitted to express himself freely. Indeed, Wolters has shown that the Copper Scroll could have been written in seven columns, a fact that emphasizes that we cannot regard this as a text with a free form but a text with a rigid structure.”

Copper Scroll Studies George J. Brooke, Philip R. Davies A&C Black, Oct 27, 2004 – Religion – 362 pages

“All Sevens Are Precious”

The Copper scroll according to Al Wolters was written in seven columns

Wolters identifies seven subjects or fields that exist in the Copper scroll

seven places that Greek characters appear on the Copper scroll. Here, the Greek characters are transliterated into Hebrew: Ken, Chag, Hen, Ta’ah, Day, Taph, Sook (Yes, Their Festival [in] Booths [to play, tap or beat] Tamborines [is] Enough [for] Anointing)

The seven locations (listed in the Copper Scroll possessing Greek letters) are thought to be by some scholars to “represent the quantities of treasure buried at the site. Or, “Another recent suggestion is that they are abbreviations of names of priestly families responsible for the treasure at that particular site.” Meir Bar Ilan (referencing Shekalim 3.2) states that “the Greek letters were used as private signs.”

However, this Mishneh states first, that Aleph, Bet, Gimmel were the “siman” (or signs) “used for the half-shekel levy imposed on the public;” whereas the Greek letters, Alpha, Beta, Gamma, appear in the Mishneh only as a secondary opinion (of Rabbi Ishmael). In Rabbi Ishmael’s rules of hermenuetics, heyqesh – comparison, the matter of whether Hebrew or Greek characters were used for designation of the registrant who had paid the treasurer the Temple tax (shekel) imposed upon them is resolved because when one compares the Hebrew to the Greek, the characters only make sense as a coherent sentence in Hebrew. As private signs (siman) for the Temple tax (shekel) they make perfect sense.

Since only seven locations possess Greek characters and according to Al Wolters, Megillat HaNechoshet the Copper Scroll was written in seven columns, the numeral seven plays a significant role in our “discovery” concerning the treasures from Qumran.

For instance, this could tell us who composed the scroll or which priestly family might have contributed to the half shekel levy during the Hashmonean Dynasty.

ZAYIN is the seventh letter of the Hebrew aleph-bet which means a sword or sceptre

(as in the symbol for royal authority) – As for example –

Esther 5.2 “When the king saw Esther the queen standing in the court, she obtained favor in his sight; and the king held out to Esther the golden scepter that was in his hand. So Esther came near, and touched the top of the scepter.”

The seventh letter of the alef-bet is zayin. Its design is the form of a sword. The top of the zayin is the handle, and the vertical leg is the blade. Another interpretation of the zayin’s design is that it represents a crown and a scepter. The zayin thus alludes to power and authority.

seven days shall you eat unleavened bread – matzah – Parsha Bo – Shmoth 12.8, 15-20 introduces the lesson of matzah unleaven bread; the complete nullification of leaven (or leavening agents, that is nullification of the individual’s ego or pride) from one’s home commemorated annually with Pesach – Passover. Thus, every year BEGINS with a nullification of leavening agents from our midst!

Zachor remember the seventh day to sanctify it Exodus 20.8

Shomer guard or keep the seventh day Deuteronomy 5:12

“all sevens are precious”

Pesach and Sukkot are seven day festivals

“Ye shall dwell [“B’Simcha”] in booths seven days; all that are home-born in Israel shall dwell in booths.”

For, “The Joy of the L-RD is your Strength” – Nechemiah 8.10,

“And all the congregation of them that were come back out of the captivity made booths, and dwelt in the booths; for since the days of Joshua the son of Nun unto that day had not the children of Israel done so. And there was very great gladness.” Nechemiah 8.17

the Challah (Bride) at her wedding goes around her Katan (groom) seven times

under the Chuppah (wedding canopy) seven blessings are said

they the Challah and Katan celebrate for seven days

There are also seven “lower sefiroth”- the Lower Shekinah (“spheres of illumination”) found in Sefer Yetzirah – the Book of Creation.

there are seven weeks between Pesach and Shavuot

seventh year – shmitta the Year of Release and Land Laying Fallow

seventh year – Hakhel Deuternomy 31.10 The King’s Assembly (National Address) (Chapter of the King) Biblically speaking, even the King is subject to the Torah in a Biblically permissable, yet limited Monarchy. Deuternomy 17.18-20 Disempowered King: Monarchy in Classical Jewish Literature (3.3 The King’s Subjugation to the Torah) By Yair Lorberbaum.

seven years times seven years is 49 years before the 50th Jubilee (Yovel) Year of Liberty

Zachor remember the seventh day

Zaqen aged, elder

Yosef Dayan

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Yosef Dayan was born in 1945 in Mexico to Sephardic Jewish parents from Aleppo, Syria. The Dayan family traces its lineage directly to the Exilarchs of the ancient Near East.

Dayan made aliyah (emigrated to Israel) in 1968 and joined Rabbi Meir Kahane’s Kach movement. He was instrumental in establishing the Hebron Hills settlement of El-Nakam, which was destroyed on the orders of the then-Minister of Defense, Moshe Arens in 1982.

He is the founder and current director of Malchut Israel, an organization with the goal of restoring Israel’s royal Davidic house, and is known as the Rabbi who enacted the Pulsa diNura against the Prime Ministers of Israel Yitzhak Rabin and Ariel Sharon.

Dayan is also the author of several books in Hebrew, Spanish and Italian. He also worked to translate modern Spanish literature into Hebrew. He is married with 6 children and currently resides in Psagot, Israel.

His son, Sgt. Hananel Dayan, refused to shake Chief of General Staff Lt.-Gen. Dan Halutz’s hand during the 2006 Independence Day ceremonies while Hananel Dayan was being given the President of Israel award for outstanding soldiers.

Relationship

The Dayan Family, whose eponymous ancestor was Yosef Dayan of Aleppo, Syria, who became the royal heir of a dynasty of the Jewish Palestinian Nesi’im, its collateral-line, the Nasi Family, upon its extinction, which were both representative of the House of Bostanai, the “3rd” dynasty of Babylonian Exilarchs.

The office of the Palestinian Principate was in abeyance during the period of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, 1099-1187 & 1229-1244, but by the 1300s many other families of royal Davidic descent began supplying royal scions to be the rulers of the various Jewish settlements in Palestine, especially at Jerusalem, where its last dynasty of Jewish “Nesi’im” established itself circa 1187, which is essentially of Israel’s “dispossessed” royal house, and its head or spokesman is “Prince of Israel”, the royal Davidic heir, the unofficial and/or “uncrowned” “King of the Jews”. There is reference to the existence of the Palestinian Principate as late as the 1800s.

The Jewish “Prince” Yeshai, who was a medieval Davidic Dynasty prince of the exilarch’s house, the grandson of the 34th Exilarch Azariah, emigrated along with his father, “Prince” Solomon, to Israel/Palestine and founded another dynasty of the Israeli/Palestinian “nesi’im”, c. 1187, and, became the ancestor of the Ha-Nasi Family, which family reigned until its deposition by the Turkish sultan in 1678, whereupon, the dynasty’s heir took up residence in Aleppo, Syria. The Nassi Family, which became extinct in the male-line, upon which its surviving off-shoot, the Dayan Family, inherited its legacy.

Yitzak Dayyan was considered heir in 1933 by Jewish rabbis as the Davidic Dynasty’s heir and titular “King of Israel”; but after his death none of his three sons pursued their father’s dynastic claims. Then, in 1968, another family member, Yosef Dayan, was encouraged by Jewish rabbis to be an active claimant to the throne

The Dayan Family appears to have the best claim to Israel’s throne, for Dr. Nahum Sloushz in his article “Where are the True Descendants of King David?”, in “The Jewish Morning Journal”, dated September 1, 1933, says that Rabbi Isaac (Yitzhak) Dayan was considered the head of King David’s House in his time due primarily to his strong personality, rather than according to his place in the line of succession. Too, in 1617 the old great Rabbi Kehahr [Kevod HaRav HaGaon] recorded in an unpublished manuscript the ancestral-line of his contemporary Nathan Ha-Dayan [son of Mordechai Ha-Dayan and father of Yosef Dayan, the royal heir] in which he heaps praise upon him reminiscence of the praise heaped upon the post-exilic royal heir Zerubabel by the prophets Haggai and Zechariah, which suggests appointment of him, his family, and descendants, as the heirs of the Davidic Dynasty and/or the ancient Jewish kings.

Will Israel Have A ‘King’ Soon? The Modern-Day Sanhedrin Say “YES!”

from Yaakov Katz
THE JERUSALEM POST – January 12, 2005

Will Jews begin proclaiming “Long live the king” in the near future?

According to a group of 71 Jewish scholars who met this week in the Old City of Jerusalem in the form of a modern-day Sanhedrin “a duplicate of the religious tribunal which convened during the time of the Second Temple” a coronation day is growing closer.

As one member of the group put it, “We would have liked it to happen yesterday. But we are willing to wait until tomorrow.”

There hasn’t been a genuine Sanhedrin in Israel for nearly 1,600 years; the last one to be proclaimed was in France, by Napoleon, for political gain. Shortly after the establishment of the State of Israel, religious affairs minister Judah Leib Maimon raised the notion of reinstituting the ancient body, to no avail.

The group composed largely of Kahane sympathizers that gave itself the name Sanhedrin in October, however, met Sunday to discuss the creation of a Jewish monarchy in the State of Israel.

For the past several years a group called the Monarchists has conducted extensive research into the lineage of several families in an effort to discover who has the closest bloodline to the biblical King David — a requirement for any future Jewish king.

Rabbi Yosef Dayan from Psagot, known for his recent threats to place a death curse on Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, is said to be a leading candidate to become the “king of Israel.”

“Dayan has the best lineage to King David,” several members of the Sanhedrin told The Jerusalem Post. They say he has two documented ancient sources which draw a direct line between him and the males in his family to King David some 3,000 years ago.

“Many people can show they are descendants of King David, but they cannot show that the line is only male,” one Sanhedrin member explained. “That makes Dayan the leading candidate to become king.”

The Monarchists have consulted with non-Jewish experts on lineage. They concurred that, without a doubt, Dayan is a direct descendent of the House of David.

The only question now is how to establish the Jewish monarchy in spite of the presiding democratic government.

“There are two possibilities,” Dayan explained. “The first is that the nation or a majority from within will want the monarchy and will uproot the presiding democratic government.”

The second, more realistic option, he said, is “the one cited by Maimonides” and that is that no one will know how it will be until it happens.”

Some of the other ideas discussed at the Sanhedrin meeting included the construction of an altar on the Temple Mount to be used for the Passover Offering during the upcoming holiday.

One of the ideas, members said, is to climb the Mount and build the altar within minutes and sacrifice the lamb before security forces can stop them. Another, said leading Sanhedrin member Baruch Ben-Yosef, is to pray for a tsunami-like disaster on the Mount.

“In one second, God wiped out 150,000 people,” he said. “Who knows? Maybe he’ll help us if we show him we are ready.”

Participants also discussed Ben-Yosef’s idea of reinstating the Sanhedrin’s authority to announce Rosh Hodesh, the beginning of the new lunar month.

“It is very important to reinstate the Sanhedrin’s authority to announce the month, because it will force people to understand that God gave us the power to control the calendar and our own destiny,” Ben-Yosef said.

* * * * * * *

Background on the Sanhedrin

“Sanhedrin” – (m., pl. “Sanhedriyaot”) – 1. the Jewish “Supreme Court;” it consisted of seventy one great Torah Sages, who met in the “Lishkat HaGazit,” the “Office of Hewn Stone,” adjacent to the Temple in Jerusalem; 2. The Masechta, or Folio of the Talmud that discusses the activities of the Sanhedrin, and related matters.

The Rabbis who were the members of the Sanhedrin had all received “Semichah,” the formal passing over of the Tradition from their teachers.

On the floor of the Sanhedrin were debated the fundamental principles of the Torah, and the result was established by majority vote.

Cases that were the most difficult or the most critical for the Jewish People were decided by the Sanhedrin. A majority had to be at least two votes. Any Capital case in which all the votes were for condemnation, was automatically changed to acquittal.

There is discussion in the Talmud of the question of how frequently capital punishment was imposed by the Sanhedrin, although the Torah does explicitly allow for it. Some said that a Sanhedrin that imposed the death penalty once in seven years was considered “bloody;” another opinion is that it was seventy years. Another said that it depended on the generation. Yet another was that restraint in imposing the death penalty would increase the number of murderers in Israel.

After the Temple was destroyed, the Sanhedrin moved from place to place in Israel. It finally was dissolved when, in the absence of the greatest Sages of Israel, the Institution of Semichah could no longer be applied.

During the Middle Ages, there was an attempt to revive the Sanhedrin by re-instituting Semichah. But due to opposition by some of the Torah Sages of that generation, the idea never became a reality.

The Sanhedrin was reestablished in a ceremony in Tiberias, where the original Sanhedrin was disbanded, on October, 2004 (Tishrei 5765).