מה גילה מנשה בן חזקיה בתורה? על שרידי הלכה צדוקית-כיתתית בספרות חז"ל

The Midrash (Sifre Numbers 112) depicts King Manasseh as "one who discloses faces in the Torah (מגלה פנים בתורה)", who "sits and offers contemptuous expositions before God, saying, Did He have nothing to write in the Torah but 'and Lotan's sister was Timna' [Gen. 36:22]?!" The article argues that the statement attributed to Manasseh is but a segment of a fuller Sadducean-sectarian biblical exposition, intentionally veiled for that reason. It suggests that the aim of the Sadducean midrash alluded to in Sifre was to support the Sadducean stance in their dispute with the rabbis regarding the laws of inheritance, as recorded in several talmudic sources. Grounded in the generally accepted assumption that the halakha of the Qumran scrolls and the Sadducean halakha are essentially the same, it appears that King Manasseh stands for a Sadducean-sectarian sage in this midrash. It is further suggested that the phrase מגלה פנים בתורה be understood as a rejoinder to the Scrolls' claim that their biblical interpretations were divinely inspired and uncovered divine mysteries (גילוי נסתרות).