Who Is the Teacher of Righteousness?

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The Dead Sea Scrolls frequently refer to a mysterious figure called the “Teacher of Righteousness” (Moreh ha-Tsedek in Hebrew). According to the most widely held view, the Teacher of Righteousness founded the Dead Sea Scroll sect (the sect is usually identified with the Essenes). In this common view, the Teacher of Righteousness organized the Community (the Yahad) and composed many of its most important works.

The nemesis of the Teacher of Righteousness is another shadowy figure called the Wicked Priest (ha-Kohen ha-Rasha). He is also known by a number of other epithets, including the Lion of Wrath, the Liar, the Spreader of Lies and the Man of Scoffing.

Still following the standard interpretation, the Wicked Priest and the Teacher of Righteousness are thought to be historical figures. But that is where the consensus ends. There is no agreement over who they were.

The conjectures over their identities began long before the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered near Qumran in 1947. What some call the first Dead Sea Scroll was found half a century earlier, in 1896, not near the Dead Sea, but in a storeroom for worn-out texts (called a genizah) of the Ezra Synagogue in Old Cairo.^a The Cairo Genizah, as it is known, contained 200,000 pages of Hebrew manuscripts, two of which were medieval copies of what appeared to be a much older document. They were published in 1910 by the man primarily responsible for recovering the Cairo Genizah, Solomon Schechter.^b In 1896 Schechter was affiliated with Cambridge University in England, where most of the documents still reside. He speculated that the two medieval documents were late copies of a work that originated with a Jewish sect whose members lived before the Roman destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. He called this work a Zadokite Work; it subsequently became known as the Damascus Document, or CD (the Cairo Document).

Schechter proved to be prescient. Among the more than 600 nonbiblical Dead Sea Scrolls recovered between 1947 and 1956 were at least ten copies of CD.

In the Cairo Genizah copies of the Damascus Document, we read:

[God] raised for them a Teacher of Righteousness to guide them in the way of His heart…This is the time concerning which it has been written: “As a backsliding heifer so did Israel slide back [Hosea 4:16],” when there arose the Man of Scoffing who dropped on Israel waters of deceitfulness and caused them to wander in the wilderness where there is no path, to bring down the everlasting heights, to turn away from the ways of righteousness and to remove the boundary that the forefathers have set for their inheritance.

CD 1:10–17¹

The Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest (under his various names, such as the Man of Scoffing) reappear many times in other sections of the Damascus Document.

Before the discovery of the Qumran scrolls, scholars speculated that the Teacher of Righteousness might have been the purported discoverer of the Book of Deuteronomy (see 2 Kings 22). Others suggested he was Ezra. Still others, such as Eduard Meyer, sought a figure during the Seleucid era (c. 200 B.C.E.).²

Since 1947, however, armed with a vast new array of texts, 028scholars have focused on the Hasmonean period (152–38 B.C.E.), the time of the Maccabees, as the time of the Teacher. In 167 B.C.E. the Assyrian monarch Antiochus IV, whose empire included Palestine, desecrated the Jerusalem Temple. The Jews, led by Judah Maccabeus and his brothers, rebelled, and in 164 B.C.E. they recaptured the Temple and cleansed it, a moment in history still celebrated in the Jewish festival of Hannukah. The victory was only temporary, but in 152 B.C.E. an independent Jewish state was established, and Hasmonean kings continued to rule until 38 B.C.E., when the Romans set up Herod as the ruler of Judea.

A number of scholars identify the Teacher of Righteousness as the high priest in Jerusalem who officiated from 163 to 152 B.C.E. (his name is not recorded in surviving documents). He was displaced in 152 B.C.E. by Jonathan, the brother of Judah, who served from 152 to 142 B.C.E. This was regarded as a usurpation by many, since the high priests were biblically ordained to be descended from the first high priest, Zadok, who had been appointed by King Solomon, which leads some to believe that the high priest Jonathan is the Wicked Priest.

Variations on this kind of reasoning have led to other identifications. For example, some identify the Teacher of Righteousness as the Hasmonean ruler John Hyrcanus (134–104 B.C.E.), while another Hasmonean ruler, Alexander Jannaeus (103–76 B.C.E.), is said to have been the Wicked Priest.³

These various views come from what might be called the (Dead Sea) Scroll establishment. More radical ideas are espoused by Robert Eisenman and Barbara Thiering, each of whom, in different ways, connects these figures with the founders of nascent Christianity. Eisenman believes the Teacher of Righteousness was James, the brother of Jesus, and Paul was the Liar (a figure that Eisenman distinguishes from the Wicked Priest); Thiering puts forth John the Baptist as the Teacher and Jesus as the Wicked Priest!⁴

Despite the absence of any consensus over these identifications, all scholars seem to agree that the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest were historical figures.⁵ I believe they are wrong. I believe the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest are eschatological figures who were expected to appear at the End of Days, not historical figures who lived in the past.

At the outset, there is something that should make us suspicious about the supposed historical nature of the two figures, especially if we accept the view, as most scholars, including myself, do, that the Dead Sea Scroll sect is to be identified with the Essenes. The Essenes are extensively described (even more extensively than the Pharisees and the Sadducees) by the first-century C.E. Jewish historian Josephus. But he makes no allusion to the Teacher of Righteousness or the Wicked Priest. The same is true of the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria, who also describes the Essenes at length. Ditto for the Roman scholar Pliny the Elder. As for the New Testament, it describes the Pharisees and the Sadducees but does not even mention the Essenes, let alone the Teacher of Righteousness or the Wicked Priest. Thus, despite an abundance of classical sources, there is no mention of historical figures known as the Teacher of Righteousness or the Wicked Priest.

The Talmud, that vast complex of rabbinical law, literature and lore, contains polemical passages aimed at various sectarian movements like the Essenes but, again, no reference to the Teacher of Righteousness or the Wicked Priest.

Another suspicious detail: Although the Teacher and the Priest were apparently well-known figures within the Dead Sea Scroll sect, the scrolls never identify either by their proper names. Instead, the Wicked Priest goes by the sobriquet of the Liar or the Scoffer, while the Teacher of Righteousness is known as the Unique Teacher, the Expounder of the Law, the Priest or the Chosen One.

The obvious question is why these numerous sources avoided naming these two figures, the one so revered and the other so hated. Could one imagine the New Testament never naming Jesus but only alluding to him by aliases? It can hardly be argued that code names were used to hide them from harm. After all, these would have been public figures known to everyone. And why protect the identity of the Wicked Priest? Moreover, as we will see in a moment, the Teacher of Righteousness, as commonly identified, was dead and buried.

I wonder what would have been the path of scholarship if Solomon Schechter had not made the suggestion in 1910 that the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest were historical figures. Since Schechter formulated that hypothesis, it has never been questioned. Had Schechter not taken the position he did, the course of Dead Sea Scroll research might have been very different.

Schechter, followed by numerous translators and commentators, interpreted certain verbal forms in the Damascus Document as depicting the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest in the past. And it is true that some of these verbs do use the past tense. A more careful reading, however, shows that these verbal forms—in context—make more sense as referring to the future. Even actions described in the past tense are typically set in a future context. In some cases, moreover, these pivotal personalities are clearly associated with the End of Days.

The best known passage that supposedly indicates that the Teacher of Righteousness lived in the past dates the coming of the Teacher of Righteousness to 390 years after the capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon (597 B.C.E.), or after its destruction (586 B.C.E.). This would date the advent of the Teacher to sometime between 207 and 196 B.C.E.:

For when they were unfaithful and forsook Him, He hid His face from Israel and His Sanctuary and delivered them up to the sword. But remembering the Covenant of the forefathers, He left a remnant to 029Israel and did not deliver it up to be destroyed. And in the age of wrath, 390 years after He had given them into the hand of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, He visited (paqad) them, and He caused a plant root to spring from Israel and Aaron to inherit His Land and to prosper on the good things of His earth. And they perceived their iniquity and recognized that they were guilty men, yet for 20 years they were like blind men groping for the way.

And God observed their deeds, that they sought Him with a whole heart, and He raised for them a Teacher of Righteousness to guide them in the way of His heart.

CD 1⁶

Note that in this translation, as in virtually every translation of this passage since Schechter, the verbs are in the past tense. But it makes more sense, in context, to translate them as being in the future tense. This would be a more accurate translation:

For when they were unfaithful and forsook him, He hid His face from Israel and His Sanctuary and delivered them up to the sword. But remembering the Covenant of the forefathers, He left a remnant to Israel and did not deliver it up to be destroyed. And in the age of wrath, 390 years after He had given them into the hand of King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, He is visiting (paqad) them, and He will cause a plant root to spring from Israel and Aaron to inherit His Land and to prosper on the good things of His earth. And they will perceive their iniquity and will recognize that they are guilty men, yet for 20 years they will be like blind men groping for a way. And God will observe their deeds, that they sought Him with a whole heart, and He will raise for them a Teacher of Righteousness to guide them in the way of His heart.

The Damascus Document is clearly a messianic document. No one doubts that. Yet if the verbs in the above passage are understood to be in the past tense, the passage would have had no relevance to the author’s purpose: It would have been merely a lesson in history, not part of a messianic document.

In my view, when the Damascus Document states that “remembering the Covenant” God “visited them,” it echoes the passage in Genesis that announces that the previously barren Sarah had conceived: “And the Lord visited (paqad) Sarah” (Genesis 21:1).⁷ The Damascus Document uses the same verb: God “visited (paqad) them.” The Damascus Document is telling us that just as the biblical passage announced a new beginning in the history of Israel, so too will there be a new beginning to Israel’s destiny in the author’s own time. The messianic age was expected momentarily.

It is well known, and universally agreed, that the Dead Sea Scroll sectarians (like the early Christians) interpreted Scripture as applying to their own time. That is how the 390-year passage in the Damascus Document should be interpreted. This is consistent with the interpretations in the so-called pesharim (pesher, singular), or biblical commentaries on the books of the prophets and the psalms, found at Qumran. The pesharim quote a passage from Scripture and then give an interpretation. The Qumran pesharim frequently refer to the Teacher of Righteousness and the Wicked Priest in a messianic context. For example, here is the interpretation of Habakkuk 2:5ff.:

Then God told Habakkuk to write down what is going to happen to the generation to come; but when that period would be complete He did not make known to him. When it says, “so that with ease someone can read it,” this refers to the Teacher of Righteousness to whom God made known all the mysterious revelations of his servants the prophets.⁸

Pesher Habakkuk, Colossians 7:1–5

Another passage from Pesher Habakkuk describes the activities of the Wicked Priest:

This refers to the Wicked Priest who had a reputation for reliability at the beginning of his term of service; but when he became ruler over Israel, he became proud and forsook God and betrayed the commandments for the sake of riches. He amassed by force the riches of the lawless who had rebelled against God, seizing the riches of the peoples, thus adding to the guilt of his crimes, and he committed abhorrent deeds in every defiling impurity.⁹

Pesher Habakkuk, Colossians 8:8–13

Here, too, the verbs are in the past tense, but it seems clear they should be understood as referring to the future.

Pesher Nahum describes some of the atrocities, which some people view as a reference to crucifixion, committed by the Wicked Priest (here called the Lion of Wrath). Interpreting Nahum 2:12, Nahum 2:13 the pesher comments:

This refers to the Lion of Wrath […ven]geance against the Flattery-Seekers, because he used to hang men alive, [as it was done] in Israel in former times, for to anyone hanging alive on the tree, [the verse app]lies: “Behold I am against [you], says the Lord of Hosts.”¹⁰

Pesher Nahum, fragments 3–4, Colossians 1:6–9

Here again we feel the futuristic context.

In several passages in the Damascus Document, the Teacher of Righteousness is called not Moreh ha-Zedek but Yoreh ha-Zedek, the future form, which might be translated as “he who will teach righteousness.” In one instance the text speaks of “one who will teach righteousness (Yoreh ha-Zedek) at the end of days” (CD 6:8–11),¹¹ as if to emphasize the eschatological, futuristic context. The modern-day editors of this text account for their use of the future form by positing the expected return of the Righteous Teacher. In fact, all references to the Teacher of Righteousness point to the End of Days.¹²

Both the Damascus Document as a whole and the biblical commentaries from Qumran are eschatological documents, not historical treatises. There are many other passages in the Dead Sea Scrolls that could, and probably will, be cited and argued about. The question will be, Are they historical or eschatological?

The arguments get complicated and technical, as well as philosophical. In each instance, however, I believe a strong case can be made that the context is eschatological and futuristic. The authors of these works understood them as presaging what they believed to be imminent—the coming struggle between the Teacher of Righteousness and his nemesis, the Wicked Priest, a struggle that would initiate the messianic age.

I wish to thank David M. Maas for his assistance in the composition of this paper.

Dead Sea Scroll scholars have long debated the identity of the shadowy figure described in the scrolls as the Teacher of Righteousness. But was he a historical figure or someone expected at the end of time?