Until recently, most non-biblical manuscripts attested in the Qumran library were regarded as copies of texts that were composed after the books of the Hebrew Bible were written. Students of the Hebrew Bible found the Dead Sea Scrolls therefore mostly of interest for the textual and interpretative histories of these books. The present collection confirms the importance of the Dead Sea Scrolls for both areas, by showing that they have revolutionized our understanding of how the text of the biblical books developed and how they were interpreted. Beyond the textual and interpretative histories, though, many texts attested in the Qumran library illuminate the time in which the later books of the Hebrew Bible were composed and reworked as well as Jewish life and law in the time when the canon of the Hebrew Bible developed. This volume gives important examples as to how the early texts attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls help to better understand individual biblical books and as to how the later texts among them illustrate Jewish life and law when the canon of the Hebrew Bible evolved. In order to find an adequate expertise for the seminar 'The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Hebrew Bible', the editors invited both junior and senior specialists in the fields of Hebrew Bible, Second Temple Judaism, Dead Sea Scrolls and Rabbinics to Rome.

Emanuel Tov is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Bible at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Die Beiträge dieses Bandes zeigen beispielhaft, was die frühen Texte aus den Funden vom Toten Meer zu einem besseren Verständnis der einzelnen biblischen Bücher beitragen können. Zum anderen veranschaulichen die späteren unter den gefundenen Texten das jüdische Leben aus der Zeit als die Bücher der Hebräischen Bibel entstanden.>