Were Bar Kochba coins found with the Copper Scroll in Cave 3? With thanks to Joan Taylor for bringing this to attention, and the following inquiry is quoted below with Taylor's permission. The question is if anyone can shed any light on this report. The report below is inconsistent with one of the most basic and repeated truisms of Qumran archaeology, namely that no coins were supposed to have been found in any of the scroll-bearing caves. Greg Doudna --------------- start excerpt from J. Taylor------------ I have a photocopy of Judah Lefkovitz's Ph.D. thesis 'The Copper Scroll-3Q15: A New Reading, Translation and Commentary', New York University, 1993. He was quoting a NY Times article (i.e. the bit in the quotes is from the NY Times) and his footnote states that the article derived from this Religious News service. At the beginning he [Lefkovitz] goes through all the newspaper reports of the finding of the Copper Scroll. The first report was published in NY Times, Tuesday April 1, 1952, less than 2 weeks after the discovery of the Copper Scroll. The article is entitled 'Ancient Scrolls Found - Copper Sheets Left by Essenes are Dug Up in Judea'. It states: 'Two twin copper sheets, rolled scrollwise, and apparently containing statues (sic) and laws of the Essenes, have been unearthed in a cave in Judea by Father Roland de Vaux, director of the Dominican Achaeological School. Coins dating from the second Jewish revolt of 135 A.D. were discovered with the copper scrolls.' (p.13, col.6). This report derived from the Religious News Service from Jerusalem, March 31, 1952 - presumably on the basis of an interview with de Vaux. I wonder if this is something Orion could grapple with. ----------end excerpt from J. Taylor------------------- This next is too good to resist: this is also from J. Taylor, and presumably intended humorously!--GD "There's clearly a possibility that someone misunderstood and de Vaux never said there were Bar Kochba coins found with the Copper Scroll - maybe de Vaux, speaking in a strong French accent, 'zer is the Bar Kochba period corner of zee cave 'ere?' and the reporter heard 'there are Bar Kochba period coins in the cave here', but de Vaux had also apparently said it was Essene, so I doubt if he would have speculated in this way." ------------------ For private reply, e-mail to "Greg Doudna" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ---------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe from Orion, e-mail to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: "unsubscribe Orion." Archives are on the Orion Web site, http://orion.mscc.huji.ac.il.
