The Essenes & The Dead Sea Scrolls 

the fact that sleeping during worship was a problem as old as religion itself never ceased to surprise me.

Your channel and religion for breakfast do such a good job in collaborations. I hope you keep working together.

As a child I was brought up in a psuedo-Essene church. I've spent decades trying to find digestible information about them in order to move forward with my life and remove what was essentially a coping mechanism for the adults in charge of raising me. Thank you, and the rest of the religious scholar community, for shedding a light on who these people were historically.

I am absolutely loving when academics work together for the knowledge of us all. This gives me hope

I love Dr. John Bergsma's theory of John the Baptist being an excommunicated Essene. It really gives context for why he scavenged for food as the Qumran community took vows to not eat food prepared outside of the community, from what I remember, so eating locusts and wild honey was a neat little loophole when keeping that vow.

It’s a good day: a Let’s Talk Religion and Religion for Breakfast collaboration. All I need is a LTR-RFT-Esoterica meeting, and my life will be complete.

Please do a video on Ethiopian religious history. There are so so many fascinating stories.

I love you Swedish Guy

I love how respectful yet learned and all encompassing this guy is. Ive learned the nuances of many things from this fellow.

I visited Qumran three times in one month. I went to some of the Dead Sea Scrolls caves. I enjoyed every moment. It is a very spiritual place. The Essenes were true believers. I encourage every believer to read and study the profound writings of the Dead Sea Scrolls. You will not regret it.

As always you do a masterful job. It manages to be just enough over my head to keep me on my toes and looking but not a black belt class that I couldn't even follow. Really appreciate your content. One of the true rare gems of youtube. Keep it up.

This is my new favorite channel. The topics, content and your voice make the information easily understandable. Thank you for sharing!

Thank you so very much for this very informative, knowledgeable video that you make to extend and share with your trusted teachings to the masses is so greatly appreciated. I've been researching the Essenes in detail along with The Dead Sea Scrolls or The Qumran Scrolls which excitingly still have much to decipher and discover. The Essenes (as a group of scholars) had an extremely important role in history, much more than known... And religion, which completely ruled the world in those days. The Essenes highly influenced the world, as we are uncovering and re-discovering. Interestingly, It has been suggested that Jesus Christ, himself, or maybe even John the Baptist, were members of the Essenes, or heavily influenced by them which separated itself from society at large and defined itself against Jerusalem, or more so The Temple in Jerusalem in protest, which does equate according to scripture, not to leave out other sects that have been influenced by them. The Essenes went to live in the wilderness, to live by themselves, totally isolated from the rest of the community. Jesus was known to verbally preach and spread his word for only 3 years, so perhaps during his missing years, he was living and learning as a part of the Essene sect or community being taught by them, learning and becoming a pundit, a rabbi, a priest (a Levite or a Cohen) even though he supposedly is known to come from the tribe of Judah) before he decided to leave to preach to society?! ...Just a thought. I sincerely thank you again along with Dr. Henry at 'Religion for Breakfast' who too has a very knowledgeable, learned, kind mind who is extremely credible and honorable. P.S. "Welcome to SCROLLS FROM THE DEAD SEA, The Ancient Library of Qumran and Modern Scholarship" www.ibiblio.org/expo/deadsea.scrolls.exhibit/intro.html An extensive "Outline of Objects and Topics in Scrolls from the Dead Sea"www.ibiblio.org/expo/deadsea.scrolls.exhibit/overview.html "The Qumran Library" (Scroll Fragments, Outline of Objects and Topics in Scrolls from the Dead Sea from the Qumran Library) www.ibiblio.org/expo/deadsea.scrolls.exhibit/Library/library.html This is a interesting and great article by PBS that gives much insight on "The Essenes and The Dead Sea Scrolls" (The Dead Sea Scrolls: A New Translation by: Michael Wise Martin Abegg, Jr. Edward Cook, HarperSanFrancisco,'1996) : www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/essenes.html that connect to many of the scrolls to give insight on such as the "The Manual of Discipline" (The Community Rule): www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/community.html "The War Scroll" (an apocalyptic vision of the final battle between the Sons of Light and the Sons of Darkness): www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/scrolltranslation.html "War of the Sons of Light against the Sons of Darkness": www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/portrait/scrolltranslation.html

Amazing, I was excited to see another video from you Filip. Andrew being in here was a great treasure as well.

Thank you, Filip. Another very interesting and informative video on a complex religious topic.

The discovery of the DSS was a discovery of a treasure for Biblical studies!!

Two of my favorite youtubers collaborating on an intresting video!

I just want to say that it was a really nice surprise to see Andrew Henry on your channel! I love his channel and I follow it passionately, as do I yours! Thank you both for the very interesting work you do 🙏🏼

Love the little collaboration, both of y’all are my best RU-vid channels

Fabulous. As always, your broad and deep knowledge provides historical context and scholarly and sometimes surprising (a solar calendar!) details. And this time you included my other favorite religious scholar, Andrew Henry, and drawings from my favorite prophet, William Blake. So great. Thanks.

It's funny how I'm getting all these recommendations on religion after having finished watching evangelion. I don't think RU-vid understands the difference lol But I'm not complaining, this was a very interesting watch

Cool! It is about time these two excellent channels teamed up!

Of late, I've started watching the videos on this channel, i must admit i simply love them. I love both history and religion and also philosophy and so it seems a natural home to find myself here. Thank you for all you're wonderful work

It makes sense that the Essenes would die out if they were celibate and therefore not reproducing. They were a small group to begin with and how many new volunteers could they possibly get? It is a very interesting topic. Thank you.

I don't even know what to believe in sometimes with all these different religions but this channel is so fascinating!

I’m simple, I see a Let’s Talk Religion video and I click

as already said, great to see 2 of the most respected and knowledgeable peoples on you tube (at least from my stand point) working together! I have studied religions all my life (and practiced a few also!) and you guys are the only ones I can listen to without having the feeling to have to fact check you or have an outright disagreement. Your words are precise and very accurate and sometimes I have to listen twice to get exactly what you are saying. Keep up the good works you both are doing!! It may be esoteric but you are helping those of us on a spiritual level unseen.

I believe Qumraan is Imraan sometimes read as Umraan as well, mentioned in Qur'an. The house of Imraan or Umraan also included Zacharia, Yahya or John the baptist and Mary, as mentioned in Qur'an. This amazing.

Another land mark in to the study of humanity by Mr.Flip H. I see no chance of not seeming this academic investigation. With lots of appreciation, a sufi student from India ❤

another amazing video. thank you phillip for always spreading this knowledge to those who want to seek and learn. would love to see a video on sethian gnostics

Holy smokes..... absolutely FANTASTIC work. Bravo!

So interesting. Thank you, Filip and Andrew.

My two favorite theology RU-vidrs collabed!!! Awesome video as always, both channels are so dope

The essenes have much importance in several mystery schools and esoteric traditions. Rosicrucianism, freemasonry, OTO, Rudolf Steiner, Edgar Cayce, some christian mystical sects. I wonder if there perhaps was a connection to the cathars, at least on a spiritual plane and/or some yet to be found texts? Speculation ofcourse, but a few days before the fall of Montsegur in 1244, three cathars escaped with a treasure. Most people I've spoken to who are deep into the cathar fate, believes it was invaluable scriptures, even the legendary 'Book of Love'. However, what puzzles me is the concept or knowledge about 'gilgul', reincarnation. Some early christian sects seems to have embraced that doctrine. Is it a post-nicene/roman catholic work to exclude it from the teaching as Cayce and others said? Available scriptures is very thin regarding this topic, to say the least. Great episode Filip, thank you.

Greatly informative! It really puts some things into perspective. Fascinating to see what these ancient communities were like.

My two favorite channels on religion in one video

Thankyou Philepe for solving another piece of the puzzle of Christianity . .the never ending quest. It's so much more than most people imagine it to be..

Just when I attended a book review seminar about Dead Sea Scrolls and Ashabul Kahfi (the sleepers in cave), this video came. What a great timing indeed. By the way the book titled "Naskah Laut Mati dan Ashabul Kahfi" by Wisnu Tanggap Prabowo. Probably the only book written in Indonesian about Dead Sea Scrolls.

Wow! this video is excellent! Here the obscure Qumran community is more clearly & scholarly explained than I have seen elsewhere, with great images that illustrate it beautifully. Thank you

once again a great video as always many thanks

omg! i've just discovered ur channel coupla days ago and belive it or not i was like: hm, does this guy have a video on essenes - and here you go!

This is such a great community

Thank you! Excellent...as always.

Great teaching Mr. Holm!

We are not human beings having a spiritual experience; we are spiritual beings having a human experience.

Love the channel. A full video on the Book of Enoch as teased here would be great!

Thank you for all of your research. Much appreciated. I really enjoyed this presentation. Cheers Colin 🇦🇺

Thank you!! A very interesting and instructive video ❤

Outstanding presentation!

Fire episode. Thank you Filip 🙏🏼

Thanks so much for posting

Great listen!

Great video, as always! Minor pronunciation note: righteousness, ‘zedek’- this ‘z’ stands for the consonant ts/tz rather than z, at least in modern Hebrew. Reconstructing the pronunciation of Hebrew in the biblical and 2nd-Temple eras is tricky since evidence is scarce.

According to Origen (‘near Jericho rock caves were discover’d by Palestinian Bedouin shepherds [c. 217 CE] containing jars with Hebrew/Aramaic & Greek scrolls written on goatskin-Jews came in droves & carted them off’… later Timotheos I wrote [c. 790 CE] (‘jars containing Hebrew scrolls were found by Bedouin in rock caves near Jericho-Jews came in droves & carted them off…’ and in 1865 a set of 1st person (‘and YHWH said to me’) extracts [written c. 110 BCE] from the book of Deuteronomy written in paleoHebrew Ugaritic preHerodian script were unearth’d by Bedouin in Rock Caves at Seccacah-Qumran near the Dead Sea… then in Dec 1946 Bedouin found scrolls in jars in several rock caves in the same area and the era of The Dead Sea Scrolls officially began - but by that time, the caves had been already rifl’d through at least 3 times by Bedouin over the centuries … one must bear these facts in mind when discussing the 1946/1947 re-discoveries…

Very well done. Thank you!

Thank you for your knowledge you share with us.

Delores Cannon’s book, Jesus & the Essenes is a great read that dovetails this

The Essene's also considered themselves healers and were a secret society. So much of their 'knowledge' was not written down but alluded to in their writings.

Another great lecture. Thanks

Great work. Thank you very much.

The fragmented nature of these artifacts makes me wonder if there are any particularly frustrating instances where an interesting passage isn’t preserved in its entirety, essentially leading to our speculation? You might know, and it could be a cool topic :) Epic video as always!

I think you sort of misrepresented the Catholic Apocrypha; their absence from the Masoretic text-and presence in the Vulgate-is representative of the inclusion of the Jewish books written in Greek during the Seleucid occupation into the Septuagint (and then later Protestants ignorantly deeming such texts less authentic when the Septuagint is older than the Masorite's version). Awesome collaboration guys.

THANK you very much for this video. Very enlightening.

Im from jordan where this archaeological gems were found.. thanks for informing me in depth about this topic. I wonder if you can do a competitive video about the content of these scrolls and the mainstream bible and the Old Testament

Fascinating stuff. Nice work as usual. Thanks. Cheers from cool Vienna, Scott

When I was younger there was this concept that the Essenes were pacifists, but in the literature I've read, there doesn't seem to be any real definitive reason to believe this, though it's entirely possible that I'm just missing something. Dr. Robert Eisenman (Who seems to me to be a bit of a historical conspiracy theorist, and I don't take him as authoritative, but I do find him interesting) suggests the possibility of an alliance between the Essenes and the Zealots in the first Jewish War, though he also spews a bunch of nonsense about the "Teacher of Righteousness", so, again, he could be completely off his nut about it. I'm curious, though: is such an alliance between Essenes and Zealots (Josephus' "Fourth Way") a possibility? And if it happened, might that have explained their abrupt disappearance from history?

keep up the good work!

Thank you for this content.

a lot of the practices of the Essenes sound incredibly similar to the practices of the Catholic Clergy

It would be most interesting to hear your take on the Ceasers Messiah hypothesis of Achariya - she says Josephus Flavius was a member of the ruling Flavians and so isnt neutral in any sense and that to deracinate the crazy Hebrew volatility a ‘new’ Jewish religion with ‘love thy enemy’ as a big part of it….so that the gospels are part of. flavian plot in the second and third century ie whennthe New Testament appears…..Achrya was quite a scholar ….and died very young on Christmass Day …..ha! However she had a huge following and James Atwill and others follow her wake Anyway you reminded me of her when I saw Josephus popping up. The RU-vid channel is Ceasers Messiah Re, Qumran Jhn Allegro had a lot to say about the place and the weapons and fortified aspects of the architecture……..worthy of thought….seeibg its the Mushroom Man himself and was on the translation team until thrown off…

great job enjoyed the topic and you are very good

I really enjoyed this presentation on the dead sea scrolls!

0:57 Historical accounts about the Essenes 6:27 Dead Sea Scrolls 10:35 Jewish community of Qumran 18:27 Were the Qumran community Essenes?/Did the Essenes write the dead sea scrolls? 19:17 Essene beliefs (by Religion for Breakfast 😄)

Your videos are a cure for insomnia

Luv ur channel bro. Learnt so much from you 🤲

great video. Thanks for doing it

Im a muslim and I find the dead sea scrolls really interesting

It was me i was there.

Amazing information brother good job

Need to visit again, so many wonders to Learn about

Great topic and video!

woooooo a Let's Talk Religion For Breakfast collab :3

I did. I wrote them. Kidding. Love your videos man. Keep up the excellent work.

Really nice video. Great to see Dr. Henry. Great work!

I can read and write in the Dead Sea Scroll Herodian Script, the exact writing which would have been used in Jesus’ times. I am also currently attempting to revive Aramaic used in the Second Temple.

I do have an intuitive feeling that the timing of the finding of both the Qumran scrolls and the Nag Hammadi texts, within a few years after the creation of atomic weapons, is a synchronicity worthy of contemplation. It would also be interesting to see what modern scholars now think of former Qumran scholar leader, John Allagro, most provocative takes that encoded in these early texts, are the myths of a mushroom/entheogenic cult.

My two fav religion guys working together. Yay!

The amount of religions never seases to amaze me.

John the Baptist is often treated rather fruitfully as a link between the Essenes and the followers of Jesus. And the gospel of Luke plays in that field, with John’s mother, Elizabeth, being relative and spiritual guide to Jesus’ mother, Mary. Likewise, John’s father appears as a Temple priest whose mystical experience in the Holies serve to alienate him from mainstream temple worshippers, and lead to him surrendering John to the desert (Qumran?) to grow up.

Ohhh boy I been waiting on this 1🤓 Sidenote: When I was in grade school we performed an experiment where my classmates and I would form a big circle. The teacher would whisper a sentence in the 1st students ear and he would turn to the next kid and then whisper the sentence in his ear who would turn and whisper into the 3rd kids ear, so on and so forth. By the last student the sentence wouldn’t be anything close to its starting form lol. How tf did these stories make it GENERATIONS?!

So far it's excellent stories about the history of the dead sea.

Yo collab of my 2 favorite religion channels

Interesting. But yeah, academics don't make their careers by agreeing with each other :)

I grew up as a Jehovah's Witness and this sounds like an ancient, Jewish version of that. I'm...horrified. I've seen the Dead Sea Scrolls. My parents took me out of school for a day and my ENTIRE extended family went to San Francisco to go looj at what I distinctly remember as a child thinking "were just some old papers with Hebrew on them". My grandma hit me for saying that. I stand by it all these decades later. TBH the obsession with purity reminds me of Hassidic values but much older. Anyway we'd call this a cult now, pretty certain of it. Very interesting to know that kind of thing was possible in the ancient world as well.

I thought it was accepted knowledge that the term 'Essenes' referred to a subset of very similar clans, tribes, communities etc. Great informative video so thanks.

Either one big video or videos going through each book/separate texts of the Dead Sea scrolls by you would be perfect

And yes is there a story about the travel between Musa and Khidr , in the Jewish Books , from the story in surah Kehf....thx

Love your stuff around DSS and early christianity. Thanks for some enlightening stuff, even for a plebian atheist like me. :)

I have seen this documentary before. This is another great one. Thank you. "THE DEAD SEA SCROLLS." MANY BOOKS ON THIS SUBJECT AND DOCUMENTARIES. ❤️✨️

At the beginning I was thinking "I wonder if he has beef with Religion For Breakfast" and then bam! Its our boy lol Great vid as always, its exciting see my fav channels crossover.