Books in Brief: The Temple Scroll: The Hidden Law of the Dead Sea Sect, Lawrence Schiffman, Biblical Archaeology Review (11:4), Jul/Aug 1985.

The Temple Scroll- The Hidden Law of the Dead Sea Sect

Yigael Yadin

(New York- Random House, 1985) 261 pp., $24.95

Yigael Yadin, whose name was synonymous with Israeli archaeology until his untimely passing last summer, was well-known for his ability to excite the general public with the results of his research and to transmit its important conclusions to the widest possible audience. In his lifetime, he published several books designed specifically for this purpose, including The Message of the Scrolls (New York- Simon and Schuster, 1957), Masada (New York- Random House, 1966), Bar-Kokhba, the Rediscovery of the Legendary Hero of the Second Jewish Revolt Against Rome (New York- Random House, 1971), and Hazor, the Rediscovery of a Great Citadel of the Bible (London- Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1975). Now, another in this series of publications has appeared posthumously. This new volume conveys the results of Professor Yadin’s research on the Temple Scroll. This document is the most recent of the Dead Sea Scrolls to come to light; it was acquired by Yadin during the Six-Day War of 1967.

While Yadin had communicated his results to the scholarly world in major Hebrew and English publications,a as well as in numerous articles, it is the present volume that will no doubt be the most widely read.