A collection of some thirty first person Hebrew hymns of thanksgiving recovered from Qumran, named from their recurring opening formula "I thank you, O Lord." Several hymns speak in a distinctive individual voice describing persecution, chosenness and revelation, leading many scholars to attribute a core group, the so called Teacher Hymns, to the sect's founding Teacher of Righteousness himself, while a separate group, the Community Hymns, speaks more generally for the covenant community. The collection is a major witness to Qumran theology, its language of human lowliness before divine grace and its sense of living already among the elect.
Facts
Origins
Attributed Author / CompilerA core subset, the so called Teacher Hymns, is attributed by many though not all scholars to the sect's founding Teacher of Righteousness; the remaining Community Hymns are treated as a collective liturgical composition rather than a single author's work. 1 Attribution of the Teacher Hymns to a historical Teacher of Righteousness is a widely held scholarly position, not a settled consensus. Text
Literary Form Transmission
Manuscript TraditionThe principal manuscript, 1QHa from Qumran Cave 1, is the best preserved of the sectarian scrolls after the Community Rule and the two Isaiah scrolls; six further fragmentary copies (4Q427 through 4Q432) were recovered from Cave 4. 1 Status
Canonical Status Structure
StructureA collection of roughly thirty individual first person thanksgiving hymns among the Dead Sea Scrolls, some attributed by scholars to the Qumran community's own Teacher of Righteousness. 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
This source names Qumran directly: "hymns of thanksgiving recovered from Qumran, named from their recurring opening formula "I thank you, O Lord." Several hymns speak in a distinctive individual voice describing persecution..."
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