Question: 'What is the importance of the Dead Sea in the Bible?'
Answer:

The Dead Sea scrolls and the Bible / James C. 'Six of the seven chapters in The Dead Sea scrolls and the Bible began as the Speaker's Lectures at Oxford University, delivered during the first two weeks of May 2009' — Introd. Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 978-0-8028-6679-0 (pbk.: alk. Dead Sea scrolls. The Dead Sea Scrolls are universally proclaimed as the greatest archaeological find of the 20th century. The first scrolls were discovered quite by accident by a young Bedouin shepherd in the Qumran area near the Dead Sea in 1947. When tossing a rock into an open cave in the cliffs just above the Dead Sea, he heard the sound of a breaking pot.

• The Dead Sea Scrolls are universally proclaimed as the greatest archaeological find of the 20th century. The first scrolls were discovered quite by accident by a young Bedouin shepherd in the Qumran area near the Dead Sea in 1947. When tossing a rock into an open cave in the cliffs just above the Dead Sea, he heard the sound of a breaking pot.
• While the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls draw upon and extend the authority of a variety of traditions in the Hebrew Scriptures, a common feature was casting figures or setting scenes where ancient or otherworldly “books” turn up in the hands of a lead character. To read, write, or reveal something from such materials was a way of claiming fresh.
• The much-celebrated Dead Sea Scrolls are a treasure trove of ancient Jewish religious texts discovered between 1947 and 1956 in 11 different desert caves near the northwest shore of the Dead Sea. Many scholars regard the scrolls as the greatest archaeological find of the twentieth century, having been composed or copied between approximately.

The Dead Sea is a large body of salt water on the southern end of the Jordan River. Cited sixteen times in the Bible, the Dead Sea is mentioned primarily to describe the borders of the Promised Land.
The Dead Sea is known by a few different names in the Bible, including the Salt Sea (Genesis 14:3; Numbers 34:3, 12; Deuteronomy 3:17; Joshua 3:16; 12:3), the Sea of the Arabah (Deuteronomy 3:17; 4:49; Joshua 3:16; 2 Kings 14:25), and the Eastern Sea (Ezekiel 47:18; Zechariah 14:8). It was called the Salt Sea for its unusually high salinity. The name Sea of the Arabah was given for its location in the Arabah Valley. In Hebrew, arabah means “a wasteland” or “barren district.” And the name Eastern Sea originated from the Dead Sea’s position on the eastern boundary of the land of Israel.
Only in Genesis 14:3 is the Dead Sea referred to as a location. In all other instances, it is used to designate a border for the land of Israel. Thus, the Dead Sea was likely considered more of a territorial boundary line than a destination for the people of the Bible. Nevertheless, several noteworthy biblical settlements were positioned on the shores of the Dead Sea, including Masada, En Gedi, and Qumran.
The Dead Sea is located 16 miles directly east of Jerusalem. A long and narrow oblong, the sea, in Bible times, measured a little over 50 miles from north to south and about 11 miles wide at its broadest point. The Dead Sea lies within the great trough of the Jordan Valley, also known as the Rift Valley, which forms part of the longest and deepest crack in the earth’s crust. At approximately 1,300 feet (400 meters) below sea level, the Dead Sea sits at the lowest point of the earth’s surface.
Fed mainly by the Jordan River and a few smaller streams and rivers, the Dead Sea receives an average of six or seven million tons of daily inflow with no outlet for the water except through evaporation. The extreme heat and dry conditions of the region produce an exceptionally high rate of evaporation. Even with no outflow of water, the Dead Sea’s surface rises no more than 10 to 15 feet a day.
The waters that feed the Dead Sea contain an unusually high salt content (approximately 26 percent), making it the world’s most saline body of water, with almost five times the level of salt concentration of the ocean (on average 3.5 percent). With such high salinity, no marine life can live in the Dead Sea.
Even with its inability to sustain life, the Dead Sea provided a valuable commodity for trading in ancient times—salt. The sea was also known for producing bitumen, a natural petroleum product similar to asphalt, prized for its waterproofing properties. Historians have suggested that Cleopatra’s ambition to rule the Dead Sea region was motivated by her desire to control the bitumen trade.
Biblical archaeologists believe the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah in Genesis 18—19 took place in the vicinity of the Dead Sea. Some believe that Sodom and Gomorrah lie underneath the Dead Sea. Exactly how God destroyed these cities is still debated. Some theorize God used a volcanic eruption or a spontaneous explosion of subsurface pockets of bituminous soil. Curiously, at the southeast corner of the Dead Sea is a salt rock plug known today as Mount Sodom. On its slopes, which are formed by a combination of gypsum, salt, limestone, and chalk, can be seen strange formations of salt, like pillars. These pillars are often pointed out to tourists by the nickname “Lot’s wife” (see Genesis 19:26).
When David fled from King Saul, he found a place of refuge on the western shore of the Dead Sea in the town of En Gedi. In contrast to the lifeless nature of the Dead Sea, En Gedi is an oasis full of fresh flowing springs, fine dates, aromatic and medicinal plants, and semitropical vegetation.
The prophet Ezekiel foresaw a time when the Dead Sea’s toxic waters would be transformed into a fresh River of Life flowing from the throne of God: “This water flows toward the eastern region and goes down into the Arabah, where it enters the Dead Sea. When it empties into the sea, the salty water there becomes fresh. Swarms of living creatures will live wherever the river flows. There will be large numbers of fish, because this water flows there and makes the salt water fresh; so where the river flows everything will live. Fishermen will stand along the shore; from En Gedi to En Eglaim there will be places for spreading nets. The fish will be of many kinds—like the fish of the Mediterranean Sea. . . . Fruit trees of all kinds will grow on both banks of the river. Their leaves will not wither, nor will their fruit fail. Every month they will bear fruit, because the water from the sanctuary flows to them. Their fruit will serve for food and their leaves for healing” (Ezekiel 47:8–12).

Dead Sea Scrollsrejected Scriptures God

In recent times the Dead Sea has been shrinking because its waters are evaporating faster than the inflow from the Jordan and other streams can replenish. In the last 40 years or so, the sea has lost about 30 percent of its area and has divided into two basins. The shallow southern basin is used primarily for the mining of Dead Sea minerals.

Roman Catholic and Orthodox Faith Examined and
The Apocrypha

'The Jewish canon, or the Hebrew Bible, was universally received, while the Apocrypha added to the Greek version of the Septuagint were only in a general way accounted as books suitable for church reading, and thus as a middle class between canonical and strictly apocryphal (pseudonymous) writings. And justly; for those books, while they have great historical value, and fill the gap between the Old Testament and the New, all originated after the cessation of prophecy, and they cannot therefore be regarded as inspired, nor are they ever cited by Christ or the apostles' (Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, book 3, chapter 9)

21 reasons why the Apocrypha is not inspired:

1. The Roman Catholic Church did not officially canonize the Apocrypha until the Council of Trent (1546 AD). This was in part because the Apocrypha contained material which supported certain Catholic doctrines, such as purgatory, praying for the dead, and the treasury of merit.
2. Not one of them is in the Hebrew language, which was alone used by the inspired historians and poets of the Old Testament.
3. Not one of the writers lays any claim to inspiration.
4. These books were never acknowledged as sacred Scriptures by the Jewish Church, and therefore were never sanctioned by our Lord.
5. They were not allowed a place among the sacred books, during the first four centuries of the Christian Church.
6. They contain fabulous statements, and statements which contradict not only the canonical Scriptures, but themselves; as when, in the two Books of Maccabees, Antiochus Epiphanes is made to die three different deaths in as many different places.
7. The Apocrypha inculcates doctrines at variance with the Bible, such as prayers for the dead and sinless perfection.

And the day following Judas came with his company, to take away the bodies of them that were slain, and to bury them with their kinsmen, in the sepulchers of their fathers. And they found under the coats of the slain some of the donaries of the idols of Jamnia, which the law forbiddeth to the Jews: so that all plainly saw, that for this cause they were slain. Then they all blessed the just judgment of the Lord, who had discovered the things that were hidden. And so betaking themselves to prayers, they besought him, that the sin which had been committed might be forgotten. But the most valiant Judas exhorted the people to keep themselves from sin, forasmuch as they saw before their eyes what had happened, because of the sins of those that were slain. And making a gathering, he sent twelve thousand drachmas of silver to Jerusalem for sacrifice to be offered for the sins of the dead, thinking well and religiously concerning the resurrection, (For if he had not hoped that they that were slain should rise again, it would have seemed superfluous and vain to pray for the dead,) And because he considered that they who had fallen asleep with godliness, had great grace laid up for them. It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins. (2 Maccabees 12:39-46)

8. The apocrypha contains offensive materials unbecoming of God's authorship.

Ecclesiasticus 25:19 Any iniquity is insignificant compared to a wife's iniquity.

Ecclesiasticus 25:24 From a woman sin had its beginning. Because of her we all die.

Ecclesiasticus 22:3 It is a disgrace to be the father of an undisciplined, and the birth of a daughter is a loss.

9. It teaches immoral practices, such as lying, suicide, assassination and magical incantation.
10. The apocryphal books themselves make reference to what we call the Silent 400 years, where there was no prophets of God to write inspired materials.

And they laid up the stones in the mountain of the temple in a convenient place, till there should come a prophet, and give answer concerning them. (1 Maccabees 4:46)

And there was a great tribulation in Israel, such as was not since the day, that there was no prophet seen in Israel. (1 Maccabees 9:27)

And that the Jews, and their priests, had consented that he should be their prince, and high priest for ever, till there should arise a faithful prophet. (1 Maccabees 14:41)

11. Josephus rejected the apocryphal books as inspired and this reflected Jewish thought at the time of Jesus

'From Artexerxes to our own time the complete history has been written but has not been deemed worthy of equal credit with the earlier records because of the failure of the exact succession of the prophets.' ... 'We have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, disagreeing from and contradicting one another, but only twenty-two books, which contain the records of all the past times; which are justly believed to be divine...'(Flavius Josephus, Against Apion 1:8)

12. The Manual of Discipline in the Dead Sea Scrolls rejected the apocrypha as inspired.
13. The Council of Jamnia held the same view rejected the apocrypha as inspired.

They debated the canonicity of a few books (e.g., Ecclesiastes), but they changed nothing and never proclaimed themselves to be authoritative determiners of the Old Testament canon. 'The books which they decided to acknowledge as canonical were already generally accepted, although questions had been raised about them. Those which they refused to admit had never been included. They did not expel from the canon any book which had previously been admitted. 'The Council of Jamnia was the confirming of public opinion, not the forming of it.' (F. F. Bruce, The Books and Parchments [Old Tappan, NJ.: Fleming H. Revell, 1963], p. 98])

14. Although it was occasionally quoted in early church writings, it was nowhere accepted in a canon. Melito (AD 170) and Origen rejected the Apocrypha, (Eccl. Hist. VI. 25, Eusebius) as does the Muratorian Canon.
15. Jerome vigorously resisted including the Apocrypha in his Latin Vulgate Version (400 AD), but was overruled. As a result, the standard Roman Catholic Bible throughout the medieval period contained it. Thus, it gradually came to be revered by the average clergyman. Still, many medieval Catholic scholars realized that it was not inspired.
16. The terms 'protocanonical' and 'deuterocanonical' are used by Catholics to signify respectively those books of Scripture that were received by the entire Church from the beginning as inspired, and those whose inspiration came to be recognized later, after the matter had been disputed by certain Fathers and local churches.
17. Pope Damasus (366-384) authorized Jerome to translate the Latin Vulgate. The Council of Carthage declared this translation as 'the infallible and authentic Bible.' Jerome was the first to describe the extra 7 Old Testament books as the 'Apocrypha' (doubtful authenticity). Needless to say, Jerome's Latin Vulgate did not include the Apocrypha.
18. Cyril (born about A.D. 315) - 'Read the divine Scriptures - namely, the 22 books of the Old Testament which the 72 interpreters translated' (the Septuagint)
19. The apocrypha wasn't included at first in the Septuagint, but was appended by the Alexandrian Jews, and was not listed in any of the catalogues of the inspired books till the 4th century
20. Hilary (bishop of Poictiers, 350 A.D.) rejected the apocrypha (Prologue to the Psalms, Sec. 15)
21. Epiphanius (the great opposer of heresy, 360 A.D.) rejected them all. Referring to Wisdom of Solomon & book of Jesus Sirach, he said 'These indeed are useful books & profitable, but they are not placed in the number of the canonical.'

Is the Apocrypha Inspired? Does it really belong in the Bible?

Let us consider while we are at this point, the subject of the Catholic apocrypha, for which they make such great claims; and because of which they deny the Bible in common use by most brethren. 2 Macc 12:38-46 seems to be the principal reason they cling to the apocrypha. There is no other doctrine that depends so heavily upon support in the apocrypha. If I were not afraid of absolute statements, I would say that their defense of the apocrypha is only because of the passage and their claims about its teachings.

The Catholics have 46 Old Testament books rather than the 39 found in our Bibles. However, they have added much more material to other books which does not appear under separate titles. That material follows: The Rest of Esther added to Esther; The Song of the Three Holy Children, The History of Susanna, Bel and the Dragon added to Daniel; Baruch; 1 and 2 Maccabees; Tobias; Judith; Ecclesiasticus; and the Wisdom of Sirach.

The only powerful support for these books is that they appear in the Septuagint version. However, in many of our Bibles there is much material that is uninspired, including history, poetry, maps, dictionaries, and other information. This may be the reason for the appearance of this material in the Septuagint. The apocrypha was not in the Hebrew canon.

There are reputed to be 263 quotations and 370 allusions to the Old Testament in the New Testament and not one of them refers to the Apocryphal

The usual division of the Old Testament by the Jews was a total of 24 books: The Books of Moses (51, The Early prophets 14; Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings ~, The Late Prophets (4; Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, the 12 Minor Prophets), and the Hagiagrapha (11; Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Song of Solomon. Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, Esther, Daniel, Ezra-Nehemiah, and Chronicles i. These 24 books contain all the material in our numbering of 39.

Josephus spoke concerning the canon, but his book division combined Ruth-Judges and Lamentation-Jeremiah for a total of 22 books rather than 24:

Dead Sea Scrolls Bible Accuracy

'For we have not an innumerable multitude of books among us, ... only 22 books. which contain the records of ail the past times; which are justly believed to be divine;...It is true, our history hath been written since Artaxerxes very particularly, but hath not been esteemed of the like authority with the former by our forefathers;...and how firmly we have given credit to these books of our own nation is evident by what we do; for during so many ages as have already passed, no one has been so bold as either to add anything to them, or to make any change in them.' (Flavius Josephus Against Apion Book 1, Section 8).

Plainly Josephus distinguishes between those books written before and after Artaxerxes. This eliminates most of the apocrypha, especially the Maccabees.

Dead Sea Scrolls Scripture

The apocrypha itself denies all notion of inspiration. Referring to the events in the Maccabees the author makes these statements:

'...all such things as have been comprised in 5 books by Jason of Cyrene, we have at-tempted to abridge in one book. For considering the difficulty that they find that desire to undertake the narrations of histories, because of the multitude of the matter, we have taken care for those indeed that are willing to read,...And as to ourselves indeed, in undertaking this work of abridging, we have taken in hand no easy task, yea. rather a business full of watching and sweat. .. Leaving to the authors the exact handling of every particular, and as for ourselves. according to the plan proposed, studying to brief... For to collect all that is known, to put the discourse in order, and curiously to discuss every particular point, is the duty of the author of a history. But to pursue brevity of speech and to avoid nice declarations of things, is to be granted to him that maketh an abridgement.' (2 Maccabees 2: 24-32).

'...I will also here make an end of my narration. Which if I have done well, and as it becometh the history, it is what I desired; but if not so perfectly, it must be pardoned me. For as it is hurtful to drink always wine, or always water, but pleasant to use sometimes the one, and sometimes the other, so if the speech be always nicely framed, it will not be grateful to the readers...' 12 Maccabees 15: 39-40).

This forms a bizarre contrast with passages in the New Testament:

'Take no thought how or what ye shall speak: for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak. but the spirit of your Father which speaketh in you' (Matthew 10: 19-20).

'Now we have received. not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God: that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak, not in words which man s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth' (1 Corinthians 2: 12-131.

Catholics argue:	This is refuted because:
Early Christians quote from the apocrypha proves it belongs in the Bible	Early Christians quoted from all kinds of uninspired writings other than the apocrypha. Why do Catholics not include these in their Bible's
They were included in the Septuagint.	The Jews Never accepted the apocrypha as part of the Old testament canon.
The Church Councils at Hippo (393) and Carthage (397, 419), listed the apocrypha as Scripture. Since these same councils also finalized the 66 canonical books which all Christians accept, they must accept them all.	False. The canon of the New Testament was set from the first century. It is Catholic myth that Catholics gave the world the Bible!

The New Testament never quotes from the any of the apocryphal books written between 400 - 200 BC. What is significant here is that NONE of the books within the 'apocryphal collection' are every quoted. So the Catholic argument that 'the apocryphal books cannot be rejected as uninspired on the basis that they are never quoted from in the New Testament because Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon are also never quoted in the New Testament, and we all accept them as inspired.' The rebuttal to this Catholic argument is that 'Ezra, Nehemiah, Esther' were always included in the 'history collection' of Jewish books and 'Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon' were always included in the 'poetry collection'. By quoting one book from the collection, it verifies the entire collection. None of the apocryphal books were ever quoted in the New Testament. Not even once! This proves the Catholic and Orthodox apologists wrong when they try to defend the apocrypha in the Bible.

The apocrypha does not belong in the Bible because It IS not inspired.

Steve Rudd