The accounts by Josephus and Philo show that the Essenes led a strictly celibate and communal life – often compared by scholars to later Christian monastic living – although Josephus speaks also of another "rank of Essenes" that did get married.[37] According to Josephus, they had customs and observances such as collective ownership,[38][39] elected a leader to attend to the interests of them all whose orders they obeyed,[40] were forbidden from swearing oaths[41] and sacrificing animals,[42] controlled their temper and served as channels of peace,[41] carried weapons only as protection against robbers,[43] had no slaves but served each other[44] and, as a result of communal ownership, did not engage in trading.[45] Both Josephus and Philo have lengthy accounts of their communal meetings, meals and religious celebrations.
After a total of three years' probation,[46] newly joining members would take an oath that included the commitment to practice piety towards "the Deity" (το θειον) and righteousness towards humanity, to maintain a pure lifestyle, to abstain from criminal and immoral activities, to transmit their rules uncorrupted and to preserve the books of the Essenes and the names of the Angels.[47] Their theology included belief in the immortality of the soul and that they would receive their souls back after death.[18][48] Part of their activities included purification by water rituals, which was supported by rainwater catchment and storage.
The Church Father Epiphanius (writing in the fourth century CE) seems to make a distinction between two main groups within the Essenes:[31] "Of those that came before his [Elxai, an Ossaean prophet] time and during it, the Ossaeans and the Nazarean.".[49] Epiphanius describes each group as following:
The Nazarean – they were Jews by nationality – originally from Gileaditis, Bashanitis and the Transjordon… They acknowledged Moses and believed that he had received laws – not this law, however, but some other. And so, they were Jews who kept all the Jewish observances, but they would not offer sacrifice or eat meat. They considered it unlawful to eat meat or make sacrifices with it. They claim that these Books are fictions, and that none of these customs were instituted by the fathers. This was the difference between the Nazarean and the others…[50]
After this [Nazarean] sect in turn comes another closely connected with them, called the Ossaeans. These are Jews like the former… originally came from Nabataea, Ituraea, Moabitis and Arielis, the lands beyond the basin of what sacred scripture called the Salt Sea… Though it is different from the other six of these seven sects, it causes schism only by forbidding the books of Moses like the Nazarean.[49]
If it is correct to identify the community at Qumran with the Essenes (and that the community at Qumran are the authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls), then according to the Dead Sea Scrolls the Essenes' community school was called "Yahad" (meaning "unity") in order to differentiate themselves from the rest of the Jews who are repeatedly labeled "The Breakers of the Covenant".
Jesus wasn't a Jew
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Originally Posted by TheBoarzHeadBoy
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