Rating: 
Summary: at the front of the crowd
Review: In a rapidly expanding field this book is up to date, well-reasoned and very detailed. One is able to read it as a text or dip into it as a reference as ist is well set out.
Rating:
Summary: at the front of the crowd
Review: In a rapidly expanding field this book is up to date, well-reasoned and very detailed. One is able to read it as a text or dip into it as a reference as ist is well set out.
Rating:
Summary: A good resource (with reservations)
Review: In reading "James the Brother of Jesus" by Robert Eisenman, I found that I needed a translation of the Dead Sea Scrolls. I chose this edition over Vermes, who makes use of pseudo-biblical archaic language in his translations, because the language in Wise is clear and modern, and the introductions are excellent. My reservation is due to a puzzling ediorial decision: there are no informative headers on the pages to let the reader know at a glance which scroll is being looked at, particularly annoying in the longer scrolls. What is gained by inconviencing the the reader?
Rating: 
Summary: This book is intended for the general reader!
Review: My co-authors and I have written this book to provide the interested
non-specialist with a clear and readable translation and introduction to the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is the first com-
prehensive translation of the Scrolls since they were discovered
almost 50 years ago.
Rating: 
Summary: BIASED
Review: The Dead Sea Scrolls, A New Translation leaves much to be desired. This translation APPEARS to be the work of three authors who sat down together and envisioned how they could make it more palatable.It is very slanted from a Christian viewpoint. If you are a serious student looking for answers, forget this book. You might as well go down to any neighborhood church and get a pastors conclusion on the Dead Sea Scrolls. They would probably be quite similar.This is not what I consider scholarly work. Scholarly work would consist of unbiased, unslanted views that don't fill in the blanks with New Testament writing, when and where it is convenient. There are excellent translations out there---take time to search for a good one; unless you like reading Dead Sea Scroll material just for pleasure!
Rating: 
Summary: Diverse topic leades to long commentary.
Review: This book had a good topic and concept, but after every relevent concept, commentary was added. After the first 50 pages or so, I simply skipped all oppions and insights added by the authors and came to my own conclusions. I would rather have a book dedicated to pure translation. I am not saying the authors conclutions where incorrect, just bothersome to me.
Rating:
Summary: Diverse topic leades to long commentary.
Review: This book had a good topic and concept, but after every relevent concept, commentary was added. After the first 50 pages or so, I simply skipped all oppions and insights added by the authors and came to my own conclusions. I would rather have a book dedicated to pure translation. I am not saying the authors conclutions where incorrect, just bothersome to me.
Rating: 
Summary: This is how this book stacks up
Review: This book needs to be considered alongside _The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated_ edited by Florentino Garcia-Martinez. Both are "comprehensive" translations of the Dead Sea Scrolls which have become available since the end of the embargo in the fall of 1991. Wise, Abegg, and Cook organize this book primarily by the Qumran manuscript number. The exceptions are the manuscripts found in Cave 1 which have no number. These appear at the beginning of the book along with other manuscripts which relate to the same text. So for example, the Thanksgiving Scroll appears at the beginning of the book along with 4Q427-432. The Damascus Document also appears at the beginning of this book along with manuscripts Geniza A and B. At the end of the book there is a helpful index of DSS manuscripts and the page(s) on which they may be found. There is also an index of references to other liturature, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and Rabbinic texts. So for example the editors find some connection between 4Q525 and Matthew 5.3-10. Both are beatitudes. It is not a disadvantage of this book that it contains no Hebrew texts. I find that I want to look at photos of the manuscripts and judge the translations for myself. Nor is it a disadvantage of this book that it does not contain any biblical texts. Those may be found in a translated form in Martin Abegg's _Dead Sea Scrolls Bible_. The advantage this book does have is its commentary. The editors have brought numerous significant items to the the attention of the reader which the non-specialist probably had not noticed. Even so, the commentary will bring some enlightenment to DSS specialists as well.
Rating:
Summary: This is how this book stacks up
Review: This book needs to be considered alongside _The Dead Sea Scrolls Translated_ edited by Florentino Garcia-Martinez. Both are "comprehensive" translations of the Dead Sea Scrolls which have become available since the end of the embargo in the fall of 1991. Wise, Abegg, and Cook organize this book primarily by the Qumran manuscript number. The exceptions are the manuscripts found in Cave 1 which have no number. These appear at the beginning of the book along with other manuscripts which relate to the same text. So for example, the Thanksgiving Scroll appears at the beginning of the book along with 4Q427-432. The Damascus Document also appears at the beginning of this book along with manuscripts Geniza A and B. At the end of the book there is a helpful index of DSS manuscripts and the page(s) on which they may be found. There is also an index of references to other liturature, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and Rabbinic texts. So for example the editors find some connection between 4Q525 and Matthew 5.3-10. Both are beatitudes. It is not a disadvantage of this book that it contains no Hebrew texts. I find that I want to look at photos of the manuscripts and judge the translations for myself. Nor is it a disadvantage of this book that it does not contain any biblical texts. Those may be found in a translated form in Martin Abegg's _Dead Sea Scrolls Bible_. The advantage this book does have is its commentary. The editors have brought numerous significant items to the the attention of the reader which the non-specialist probably had not noticed. Even so, the commentary will bring some enlightenment to DSS specialists as well.
Rating:
Summary: Vast and extraordinary-- (with only one lacunae)
Review: This is an outstanding collection of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Admittedly, any collection would have been quite satisfying, but this volume had a far more extensive collection than I had expected. Most people who would buy this likely know something of the scrolls, so there should be no guilt in a cursory reading of the introduction. Yet I am certainly glad it is there because it is a relevant, thorough, and well-written reference, covering Jewish history, work on the scrolls, ideas on translation, a timeline, etc. But the most exciting part is the texts themselves. I suppose volumes have been written on the implications of these scrolls, but I will briefly say that I was only expecting to skim the book, but after the first couple texts I was overwhelmed with the significance of what these scrolls are actually saying, though sometimes indirectly, in context of what was previously thought of scriptural history. In other places the scrolls fill in gaps of the Old Testament with so much sense that the accounts are nearly unequivocol (e.g., of Abraham, Sarai, and Pharoah). There are sometimes surprisingly Christian overtones, and the temple context is fascinating. The collection, as I have said, is extensive, including the Manual of Discipline, War Scroll, Copper Scroll, Thanksgiving Psalms (although my only disappointment is their exclusion of the smallest fragments of text, which I have found are not so insignificant), texts perhaps originally by Moses, many Biblical commentaries, and the long awaited Temple Scroll (there are 131 in all). I would think these would be especially interesting to Latter-day Saints (the "Yahad... ahari hayamim"-- Mohlin mentions this, cf. 1QSa 1:1, ).
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