HAIFA, ISRAEL—The Times of Israel reports that Eshbal Ratson and Jonathan Ben-Dov of the University of Haifa have pieced together and deciphered 60 tiny fragments of one of the last two unpublished Dead Sea Scrolls from Qumran. Notes made in the margins of the scroll by a scribe helped Ratson and Ben-Dov to read the text, which was written in code. It describes a 364-day lunar calendar, and festivals of New Wheat, New Wine, and New Oil. Today, the Jewish festival of Shavuot celebrates the festival of New Wheat. According to the newly translated text, the members of the Jewish sect that wrote the Dead Sea Scrolls celebrated the festival of New Wine 50 days after Shavuot, and the festival of New Oil 50 days after that. The text also described a festival that marked the transitions between the four seasons of the year on special days known as Tekufah, a word in modern Hebrew that translates as “period.” For more, go to “Scroll Search.”
