Endnote 7 – Spotlight on Scroll Scholars: Dissecting the Qumran-Essene Hypothesis

Found in 1952 in cave 3, the Copper Scroll is an enigmatic anomaly. It differs from all the other scrolls in significant respects. It is chiseled into sheets of copper rather than written on parchment or papyrus; it is not a literary work like the others but comprises a listing of 64 locations at which vast amounts of gold and silver are supposedly hidden; its Hebrew style is late (Mishnaic); and it contains words of Greek origin. If the scroll belongs with the rest of the Dead Sea corpus— de Vaux ultimately came to believe that it does not— it seems difficult to reconcile the legendary treasures it lists with the ascetic nature of the Qumran community. Some scholars conjecture that it lists the hidden treasures of the Second Temple; others, however, believe that the Copper Scroll is a work of fiction or even a hoax. See Hershel Shanks, The Copper Scroll and the Search for the Temple Treasure (Washington, DC: Biblical Archaeology Society, 2007).