Talk:Dead Sea Scrolls

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 2 March 2023

I own the 2005 edition of The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation used in citation 301. I have noticed there are other citations using another editions of the book. Can someone clean up and refine the usage of A New Translation on this page? I can help, if needed. GoutComplex (talk) 21:54, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

 Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format and provide a reliable source if appropriate. M.Bitton (talk) 22:14, 2 March 2023 (UTC)

Hi @GoutComplex - apologies this seems to have taken a while. There's now only two references to DSS:ANT, and I've corrected these to correspond to the correct page numbers in the 2005 revised edition, and stated as such in the reference itself. Stephen Walch (talk) 19:08, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

The reference itself appears to show dates from the 1990s instead of 2005. GoutComplex (talk) 19:46, 18 January 2024 (UTC)

I've literally checked from the 2005 revised edition that the refs match up to those pages. Can even check it in the archive.org link I put in the reference (which is to the 2005 revised edition). I added a quote for the 101 (b) ref. I don't see an issue with these refs any more. Stephen Walch (talk) 18:00, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

It's just that the book entry for it under General and cited sources shows a different date. GoutComplex (talk) 18:34, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Ah right. The whole "references" section at the bottom needs cleaning up (citations in refs don't need to be repeated). I've removed the entry for DSS:ANT under "General and cited sources". :) Stephen Walch (talk) 22:50, 19 January 2024 (UTC)

Cave 11 tables broken

I'm not sure what's going on here, but the table isn't rendering for me. I went back 2,6,20 revisions and it's still broken, so it might be a deeper tech issue. trysten (talk) 07:46, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Broken for me as well. I'm not sure, but it seems to have something to do with the embedding of List of manuscripts from Qumran Cave 11. That link directs to List of the Dead Sea Scrolls, unlike, for example, List of manuscripts from Qumran Cave 2. That may also be why it is trying to render multiple tables under that heading when only the fifth appears to be correct. Jtrevor99 (talk) 14:41, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Not sure, but Stephen Walch recently made massive updates in the referenced pages that may have inadvertently broke this section. I posted on his Talk page about it. Jtrevor99 (talk) 14:46, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Hello @Jtrevor99 & @Trysten: I've rectified the issue now. Thankfully not caused by myself, but another user who turned the Qumran cave manuscripts list pages into redirects through to List of the Dead Sea Scrolls, hence messing up likely scores of wiki pages, and my inclusion of the cave lists on the prior mentioned page rather than relying on the separate pages. If you catch any other pages with similar issues, let me know and I should be able to sort them out as well. Stephen Walch (talk) 17:31, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

Excellent! Thank you for sorting that out. I'll ping you again if I see any others with issues. Jtrevor99 (talk) 18:35, 26 September 2023 (UTC)

That was my fault, sorry. I didn't realise the lists for the individuals caves were transcluded elsewhere. Thanks for the fixes Stephen Walch. I still think constructing complex nested pages like this is not a great idea (for exactly this reason), but I'm not going to attempt to change anything. – Joe (talk) 09:06, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

Hello @Joe Roe: to be fair I very much see your point, and think it would probably be best if the entire list of manuscripts discovered was just on one page (that being List of the Dead Sea Scrolls), which now I've merged all the info from the separate pages into that one. Not entirely sure on the best way of showing that on this Dead Sea Scrolls page, or whether perhaps it should just include a link to the separate list page, which could also include the intros to each cave on it as well. Don't particularly think separate lists for each cave are entirely justified. Happy to discuss this and the best way of merging all the necessary info into fewer wikipages. Stephen Walch (talk) 18:33, 27 September 2023 (UTC)

I agree that the tables listing each scroll is over the top for this article, especially since there is List of the Dead Sea Scrolls. I think we can safely just remove the transclusions here, retaining the prose descriptions of each cave, which should make it possible to merge the individual lists for each cave back into the main list (I think??) – Joe (talk) 05:09, 28 September 2023 (UTC)

I've done the above. Makes page a lot more readable. Stephen Walch (talk) 11:17, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

“Extra Biblical” bias

The deuterocanonical books are not extra-biblical. The Jews and Protestants consider them apocrypha, but all other Christians consider them scripture and part of the Bible. Clarification is need to not have a apparent bias. “Extra Jewish-Bible” or “Extra tanuhk” would be possible better phrasings. When you say “extra biblical” and put the deuterocanonical together you are taking a stance in this intra-faith disagreement, instead remaining neutral. Instead it would be better to put the deuterocanonical before the comma. “Biblical cannon and deuterocanonical manuscripts, along with extra biblical writtings. This way you put the Biblical cannon next to the deuterocanonicals, and then everything else that no one considers scripture. Ledex23 (talk) 06:34, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

@Ledex23: The article does not say that extra-biblical and deuterocanonical are the same. tgeorgescu (talk) 06:46, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

As tgeorgescu has noted, the article does not equate deuterocanonical = extra-Biblical; these 'extra-Biblical' writings mentioned in the article are the other writings found among the DSS that, in many cases, were unknown compositions before the discovery of the DSS. You've misread the wording of the article @Ledex23. Stephen Walch (talk) 08:28, 13 December 2023 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 4 April 2024

I would suggest since so much of the Dead Sea of Scrolls is in the context of the times of Christ, the dates should be referred to as BC and AD.This is a more widely accepted. It is confusing when using the term CE and BCE when talking about Christ 96.42.83.118 (talk) 04:16, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

It is not generally confusing, as both sets of era labels are universally known, and refer to precisely the same periodization of history. On Wikipedia, we reduce fighting over trivial things like this with WP:ERA, which states era names should generally never be changed once they are established one way or the other in an article. Cheers. Remsense诉 04:44, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Since this article is about Hebrew Bible manuscripts, dating from the 3rd century BCE to the 1st century CE, it puts the topic squarely in the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE) of Judaic history. And Second Temple Judaic history generally uses BCE and CE era style. Mojoworker (talk) 21:43, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

are you talking about the articles? while it is a bit odd when similar articles have alternating eras, it's generally not confusing unless one is rapidly editing all of them. Remsense诉 22:38, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Sorry if I wasn't clear. Out of an abundance of caution, I'm simply refuting the IPs assertion that "since so much of the Dead Sea of Scrolls is in the context of the times of Christ, the dates should be referred to as BC and AD", lest someone think that the "reasons specific to its content" clause of MOS:ERA applies in this case. On the contrary – the subject of this article is much, much more closely aligned with Second Temple Judaic history and correctly uses BCE/CE as a reason specific to its content. Mojoworker (talk) 19:31, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 7 May 2024

I would like to edit this article because I found a typo where "artifact" was spelled as "artefact" ThisGarbage1147 (talk) 22:38, 7 May 2024 (UTC)

artefact is the British English spelling of the word, and is intentional. Remsense诉 22:40, 7 May 2024 (UTC)

Arabic scrolls are not from second temple period

The mention of Arabic language scrolls needs clarification as the introduction to the article states that the dead sea scrolls date "from the 3rd century BCE to the 1st century CE" while the Arabic scrolls in the provided reference date to 7th and 8th centuries CE. This is historically confusing to the reader. Maybe add a separate section for scrolls composed during this time period or just generally outside the second temple era. 2607:F720:1902:11:0:0:0:1C0 (talk) 20:08, 18 December 2024 (UTC)

You are exactly right (as is confirmed by the source referenced). There were a few other misleading sentences in the intro (especially the confusion of BCE and CE!) which I have now corrected and reworded. Stephen Walch (talk) 21:52, 18 December 2024 (UTC)