1 and 2 Chronicles

Sources

• Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library (Israel Antiquities Authority) (opens in a new tab)

  Explore the archive by manuscript, site, and language

• Peter W. Flint, “The Significance of the Biblical Dead Sea Scrolls,” Southwestern Journal of Theology 53.1 (2010), manuscript table (opens in a new tab)

  Southwestern Journal of Theology 53, no. 1 (2010): 15-25

Objections & responses

One fragment of 2 Chronicles is practically nothing, and it isn’t even certain the fragment is from Chronicles rather than a related text.

Agreed on both counts; the identification of 4Q118 has been questioned, and the safest wording is probable rather than certain. This is a thin data point. The near-absence of Chronicles at Qumran is more likely a fact about the community’s interests than about the book’s existence, since Chronicles is quoted and known elsewhere in the period. It is listed here for completeness, not as support.

Appears under 1 claim in this case

• The Dead Sea Scrolls show the Old Testament text was copied with remarkable stability across about a thousand years, alongside a documented plurality of text forms.