Jesus Remembered: Christianity in the Making, vol. 1

THE QUESTION OF JESUS' SELF-UNDERSTANDING §15.2
More striking still is the way the older hopes have been revived in the DSS.
The promise of 2 Sam. 7.14 is taken up, probably in association with Ps. 2.7, in
4Q174 (4QFlor) 1.10-12. 20 The 'branch of David' and the Davidic 'prince' from
Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Ezekiel reappear in a number of scrolls. 21 Equally striking
is Qumran's expectation of two messianic figures, the messiahs of Aaron and Israel,
that is, a priestly Messiah and a royal Messiah, 22 with the 'Messiah of
Israel' 23 almost certainly to be identified as the royal Messiah. 24
Moreover, if indeed the Psalter was given its canonical shape by about this
time, then it is important to note that the royal messianic psalms (Psalms 2, 72,
and 89) had been given key structural positions, thereby indicating that they were
seen in some degree as a key to the psalter and its significance (a 'messianic Psalter').
25 And not least of interest is the prayer for 'the kingship of the house of David,
thy righteous Messiah' in Shemoneh 'Esreh (the Eighteen Benedictions) 14. 26
To be noted here is the common assumption that the royal Messiah would
be a powerful ruler executing justice for all. 27 A frequent motif is his warlike
character in rooting out evil and destroying Israel's enemies. 'You shall break
20. The scroll breaks off at what was probably the beginning of an interpretative reading
of Psalm 2. See further W. M. Schniedewind, Society and the Promise to David: The Reception
History of 2 Samuel 7:1-17 (New York: Oxford, 1999), here 157-65.
21. IQSb (lQ28b) 5.20; 1QM5.1;4Q161 (4QpIsa a ) 3.18; 4Q174 (4QFlor) 1.11;4Q252
5.3-4; CD 7.19-20; 4Q285; see detail and further in Collins, Scepter and Star 57-73. Elsewhere
note Sir. 47.22 (picking up Isa. 11.1) and 1 Mace. 2.57 (picking up 2 Sam. 7.13, 16).
22. 1QS 9.11; cf. CD 12.23-13.1; 14.19; 19.10-11; 20.1. On the likelihood that CD's
phrase ('Messiah of Aaron and Israel') refers to two Messiahs, see again Collins, Scepter and
Star 74-83.
23. lQSa (lQ28a) 2.12, 14, 20.
24. See further C. A. Evans, 'Jesus and the Messianic Texts from Qumran', Jesus and
Bis Contemporaries 83-154; Schreiber, Gesalbter und König 199-245 (conclusion 240, 245). I
responded to L. Schiffman, 'Messianic Figures and Ideas in the Qumran Scrolls', in
Charlesworth, ed., The Messiah 116-29, in my 'Messianic Ideas' 367 n. 2. Note also Talmon's
observation that in the configurations of messianism which he examines, 'the conception of the
"Age to Come" is intrinsically conceived as the memory of the past projected into the future'
(87; in reference to Qumran, 104). M. O. Wise, The First Messiah (San Francisco: Harper,
1999) pushes too hard to draw out from 1QH a picture of the Teacher of Righteousness as a
claimant to messianic status.
25. B. Janowski, 'Zur Bedeutung der Psalmen für eine Theologie des Alten Testaments',
in E. Zenger, ed., Der Psalter in Judentum und Christentum (Freiburg: Herder, 1998) 381-420
(here 404).
26. Schürer, History 2.461; this may have been part of the prayer at the time of Jesus; in
the more elaborate Babylonian recension, the prayer is for the throne of David to be raised up
quickly and the shoot of David to shoot forth quickly (14-15; Schürer 458, 461-62).
27. Cf. particularly F. Hahn, Christologische Hoheitstitel 133-58 (Titles of Jesus 136-48,
242-43).
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