by Geza Vermes
When you enter the land which I give you, take possession of it, dwell in it and say, ‘I will appoint a king over me as do all the nations around me!’, you may surely appoint over you the king whom I will choose. It is from among your brothers that you shall appoint a king over you. You shall not appoint over you a foreigner who is not your brother. He (the king) shall definitely not acquire many horses, neither shall he lead the people back to Egypt for war to acquire many horses and much silver and gold, for I told you, ‘You shall never again go back that way’. He shall not acquire many wives that they may not turn his heart away from me. He shall not acquire very much silver and gold.
When he sits on the throne of his kingdom, they shall write for him this law from the book which is before the priests. LVII This is the law [that they shall write for him] ... [They shall count,] on the day that they appoint hi[m] king, the sons of Israel from the age of twenty to sixty years according to their standard (units). He shall install at their head captains of thousands, captains of hundreds, captains of fifties and captains of tens in all their cities. He shall select from among them one thousand by tribe to be with him: twelve thousand warriors who shall not leave him alone to be captured by the nations. All the selected men whom he has selected shall be men of truth, God-fearers, haters of unjust gain and mighty warriors. They shall be with him always, day and night. They shall guard him from anything sinful, and from any foreign nation in order not to be captured by them. The twelve princes of his people shall be with him, and twelve from among the priests, and from among the Levites twelve. They shall sit together with him to (proclaim) judgement and the law so that his heart shall not be lifted above them, and he shall do nothing without them concerning any affair.
He shall not marry as wife any daughter of the nations, but shall take a wife for himself from his father’s house, from his father’s family. He shall not take another wife in addition to her, for she alone shall be with him all the time of her life. But if she dies, he may marry another from his father’s house, from his family. He shall not twist judgement; he shall take no bribe to twist a just judgement and shall not covet a field or a vineyard, any riches or house, or anything desirable in Israel. He shall (not) rob LVIII ...
When the king hears of any nation or people intent on plundering whatever belongs to Israel, he shall send for the captains of thousands and the captains of hundreds posted in the cities of Israel. They shall send with him (the captain) one tenth of the people to go with him (the king) to war against their enemies, and they shall go with him. But if a large force enters the land of Israel, they shall send with him one fifth of the warriors. If a king with chariots and horses and a large force (comes), they shall send with him one third of the warriors, and the two (remaining) divisions shall guard their city and their boundaries so that no marauders invade their land. If the war presses him (the king) hard, they shall send to him half of the people, the men of the army, but the (other) half of the people shall not be severed from their cities.
If they triumph over their enemies, smash them, put them to the sword and carry away their booty, they shall give the king his tithe of this, the priests one thousandth and the Levites one hundredth from everything. They shall halve the rest between the combatants and their brothers whom they have left in their cities.
If he (the king) goes to war against his enemies, one fifth of the people shall go with him, the warriors, all the mighty men of valour. They shall avoid everything unclean, everything shameful, every iniquity and guilt. He shall not go until he has presented himself before the High Priest who shall inquire on his behalf for a decision by the Urim and Tummim. It is at his word that he shall go and at his word that he shall come, he and all the children of Israel who are with him. He shall not go following his heart’s counsel until he (the High Priest) has inquired for a decision by the Urim and Tummim. He shall (then) succeed in all his ways on which he has set out according to the decision which LIX ... and they shall disperse them in many lands and they shall become a h[orror], a byword, a mockery. With a heavy yoke and in extreme want, they shall there serve gods made by human hands, of wood and stone, silver and gold. During this time their cities shall become a devastation, a laughing-stock and a wasteland, and their enemies shall devastate them. They shall sigh in the lands of their enemies and scream because of the heavy yoke. They shall cry out but I will not listen; they shall scream but I will not answer them because of their evil doings. I will hide my face from them and they shall become food, plunder and prey. None shall save them because of their wickedness, because they have broken my covenant and their soul has loathed my law until they have incurred every guilt. Afterwards they will return to me with all their heart and all their soul, in conformity with all the words of this law, and I will save them from the hand of their enemies and redeem them from the hand of those who hate them, and I will bring them to the land of their fathers. I will redeem them, and increase them and exult over them. I will be their God and they shall be my people.
The king whose heart and eyes have gone astray from my commandments shall never have one to sit on the throne of his fathers, for I will cut off his posterity for ever so that it shall no more rule over Israel. But if he walk after my rules and keep my commandments and do that which is correct and good before me, no heir to the throne of the kingdom of Israel shall be cut off from among his sons for ever. I will be with him and will save him from the hand of those who hate him and from the hand of those who seek his life. I will place all his enemies before him and he shall rule over them according to his pleasure and they shall not rule over him. I will set him on an upward, not on a downward, course, to be the head and not the tail, that the days of his kingdom may be lengthened greatly for him and his sons after him.
LX ... and all their wave-offerings. All their firstling male [bea]sts and all ... of their beasts and all their holy gifts which they shall sanctify to me together with all their holy gifts of praise and a proportion of their offering of birds, wild animals and fish, one thousandth of their catch, and all that they shall devote, and the proportion of the booty and the plunder.
To the Levites shall belong the tithe of the corn, the wine and the oil that they have sanctified to me first; the shoulder from those who slaughter a sacrifice and a proportion of the booty, the plunder and the catch of birds, wild animals and fish, one hundredth; the tithe from the young pigeons and from the honey one fiftieth. To the priests shall belong one hundredth of the young pigeons, for I have chosen them from all your tribes to attend on me and minister (before me) and bless my name, he and his sons always. If a Levite come from any town anywhere in Israel where he sojourns to the place where I will choose to cause my name to abide, (if he come) with an eager soul, he may minister like his brethren the Levites who attend on me there. He shall have the same share of food with them, besides the inheritance from his father’s family.
When you enter the land which I give you, do not learn to practise the abominations of those nations. There shall be found among you none who makes his son or daughter pass through fire, nor an augur or a soothsayer, a diviner or a sorcerer, one who casts spells or a medium, or wizards or necromancers. For they are an abomination before me, all who practise such things, and it is because of these abominations that I drive them out before you. You shall be perfect towards YHWH, your God. For these nations that LXI ... to ut[ter a word] in [my] n[ame which I have n]ot comman[ded him to] utter, or wh[o speaks in the name of oth]er go[ds], that prophet shall be put to death. If you say in your heart, ‘How shall we know the word which YHWH has not uttered?’, when the word uttered by the prophet in the name of YHWH is not fulfilled and does not come true, that is not a word that I have uttered. The prophet has spoken arrogantly; do not fear him.
A single witness may not come forward against a man in the matter of any iniquity or sin which he has committed. It is on the evidence of two witnesses or three witnesses that a case can be established. If a malicious witness comes forward agains
t a man to testify against him in a case of a crime, both disputants shall stand before me and before the priests and the Levites and before the judges then in office, and the judges shall inquire, and if the witness is a false witness who has testified falsely against his brother, you shall do to him as he proposed to do to his brother. You shall rid yourselves of evil. The rest shall hear of it and shall be awe-stricken and never again shall such a thing be done in your midst. You shall have no mercy on him: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot.
When you go to war against your enemies, and you see horses and chariots and an army greater than yours, be not afraid of them, for I am with you who brought you out of the land of Egypt. When you approach the battle, the priest shall come forward to speak to the army and say to them, ‘Hear, Israel, you approach ... ’ ... LXII [and another man shall use its fruit. If any man has betrothed a woman but has not yet married her, he shall return] home. Otherwise he may die in the war and another man may take her. [The] of[ficers shall continue] to address the army and say, ‘If any man is afraid and has lost heart, he shall go and return. Otherwise he may render his kinsmen as faint-hearted as himself.’
When the judges have finished addressing the army, they shall appoint army captains at the head of the people.
When you approach a city to fight it, (first) offer it peace. If it seeks peace and opens (its gates) to you, then all the people found in it shall become your forced labourers and shall serve you. If it does not make peace with you, but is ready to fight a war against you, you shall besiege it and I will deliver it into your hands. You shall put all its males to the sword, but the women, the children, the beasts and all that is in the city, all its booty, you may take as spoil for yourselves. You may enjoy the use of the booty of your enemies which I give you. Thus shall you treat the very distant cities, those which are not among the cities of these nations. But in the cities of the peoples which I give you as an inheritance, you shall not leave alive any creature. Indeed you shall utterly exterminate the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Hivites, the Jebusites, the Girgashites and the Perizzites as I have commanded you, that they may not teach you to practise all the abominations that they have performed to their gods.
LXIII ... [a heifer with which] he has not worked, which [has not drawn the yoke. The elders of] that city [shall bring down] the heifer to a ravine with an ever-flowing stream which has never been sown or cultivated, and there they shall break its neck.
The priests, the sons of Levi, shall come forward, for I have chosen them to minister before me and bless my name, and every dispute and every assault shall be decided by their word. All the elders of the city nearest to the body of the murdered man shall wash their hands over the head of the heifer whose neck has been broken in the ravine. They shall declare, ‘Our hands did not shed this blood, nor did our eyes see it happen. Accept expiation for thy people Israel whom thou hast redeemed, O YHWH, and do not permit the guilt of innocent blood to rest among thy people, Israel. Let this blood be expiated for them.’ You shall rid Israel (of the guilt) of innocent blood, and you shall do that which is correct and good before YHWH, your God. When you go to war against your enemies, and I deliver them into your hands, and you capture some of them, if you see among the captives a pretty woman and desire her, you may take her to be your wife. You shall bring her to your house, you shall shave her head, and cut her nails. You shall discard the clothes of her captivity and she shall dwell in your house, and bewail her father and mother for a full month. Afterwards you may go to her, consummate the marriage with her and she will be your wife. But she shall not touch whatever is pure for you for seven years, neither shall she eat of the sacrifice of peace-offering until seven years have elapsed. Afterwards she may eat. LXIV ... [the firstfruits of his virility; he has the right of the first-born.]
If a man has a disobedient and rebellious son who refuses to listen to his father and mother, nor listens to them when they chastise him, his father and mother shall take hold of him and bring him to the elders of his city, to the gate of his place. They shall say to the elders of his town, ‘This son of ours is disobedient and rebellious; he does not listen to us; he is a glutton and a drunkard.’ All the men of his city shall stone him with stones and he shall die, and you shall rid yourselves of evil. All the children of Israel shall hear of it and be awe-stricken. If a man slanders his people and delivers his people to a foreign nation and does evil to his people, you shall hang him on a tree and he shall die. On the testimony of two witnesses and on the testimony of three witnesses he shall be put to death and they shall hang him on the tree. If a man is guilty of a capital crime and flees (abroad) to the nations, and curses his people, the children of Israel, you shall hang him also on the tree, and he shall die. But his body shall not stay overnight on the tree. Indeed you shall bury him on the same day. For he who is hanged on the tree is accursed of God and men. You shall not pollute the ground which I give you to inherit. If you see your kinsman’s ox or sheep or donkey straying, do not neglect them; you shall indeed return them to your kinsman. If your kinsman does not live near you, and you do not know who he is, you shall bring the animal to your house and it shall be with you until he claims (it). LXV ...
[Wh]en a bird’s nest happens to lie before you by the roadside, on any tree or on the ground, with fledglings or eggs, and the hen is sitting on the fledglings or the eggs, you shall not take the hen with the young. You shall surely let the hen escape and take only the young so that it may be well with you and your days shall be prolonged. When you build a new house, you shall construct a parapet on the roof so that you do not bring blood-guilt on your house if anyone should fall from it.
When a man takes a wife, has sexual intercourse with her and takes a dislike to her, and brings a baseless charge against her, ruining her reputation, and says, ‘I have taken this woman, approached her, and did not find the proof of virginity in her’, the father or the mother of the girl shall take the girl’s proof of virginity and bring it to the elders at the gate. The girl’s father shall say to the elders, ‘I gave my daughter to be this man’s wife; he has taken a dislike to her and has brought a baseless charge against her saying, “I have not found the proof of virginity in your daughter.” Here is the proof of my daughter’s virginity.’ They shall spread out the garment before the elders of that city. The elders of that city shall take that man and chastise him. They shall fine him one hundred pieces of silver which they shall give to the father of the girl, because he (the husband) has tried to ruin the reputation of an Israelite virgin. He shall not LXVI ... [When a virgin betrothed to a man is found by another man in the city and he lies with her, they shall bring both of them to the gate] of that city and stone them with stones and they shall be put to death: the girl because she has not shouted (for help, although she was) in the city, and the man because he has dishonoured his neighbour’s wife. You shall rid yourselves of evil. If the man has found the woman in the fields in a distant place hidden from the city, and raped her, only he who has lain with her shall be put to death. To the girl they shall do nothing since she has committed no crime worthy of death. For this affair is like that of a man who attacks his neighbour and murders him. For it was in the fields that he found her and the betrothed girl shouted (for help), but none came to her rescue.
When a man seduces a virgin who is not betrothed, but is suitable to him according to the rule, and lies with her, and he is found out, he who has lain with her shall give the girl’s father fifty pieces of silver and she shall be his wife. Because he has dishonoured her, he may not divorce her all his days. A man shall not take his father’s wife and shall not lift his father’s skirt. A man shall not take the wife of his brother and shall not lift the skirt of his brother, the son of his father or the son of his mother, for this is unclean. A man shall not take his sister, the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother, for this is abominable. A man shall not take his father’s sister or his mother’s sister,
for this is immoral. A man shall not take the daughter of his brother or the daughter of his sister for this is abominable. (A man) shall not take LXVII ...
MMT (Miqsat Ma‘ase Ha- Torah) - Some Observances of the Law
(4Q394-9)
Mutilated fragments of six Cave 4 manuscripts have acquired international notoriety on account of a lawsuit filed before the Jerusalem district court which found that one of the official editors of this text, Elisha Qimron, owned the copyright of the MMT text as reconstructed by him. Hershel Shanks, of the Biblical Archaeology Society of Washington, was held responsible for breaching this copyright and ordered to pay $43,000 damages. However, an appeal having been lodged with the Israeli Supreme Court, the matter is still subjudice.
When the contents of the six copies are assembled into a single account, they amount to 120 lines mostly of a fragmentary nature. The document begins with a sectarian calendar (section A), which may or may not pertain to the original MMT; it continues with a series of special rules (section B), and ends with an exhortation (section C). MMT has been called an epistle, but since it lacks the introductory and concluding formulae of a letter, it is more likely to be a kind of legal tractate. It is addressed to a single leading personality who is compared to King David. The dramatis personae consist of a ‘we’ party, a ‘you’ party, and a ‘they’ party. The group responsible for MMT, who refer to themselves as ‘we‘, seek to detach the leader of the ‘you’ party from the erroneous views propounded by the ‘they’ party. The editors claim that MMT was written by the Teacher of Righteousness and sent to the Wicked Priest; that the views of the ‘we’ party are akin to those of the Sadducees; and that the ‘they’ party are the Pharisees. However, these are no more than hypotheses. In particular, the identification of the author with the Teacher of Righteousness is less likely than that of the leader of the ‘you’ group with the man who was to become the Wicked Priest, probably Jonathan Maccabaeus.
