Capturing the Voices of Pseudepigraphic Personae: On the Form and Function of Incipits in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls

Full title
Capturing the Voices of Pseudepigraphic Personae: On the Form and Function of Incipits in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls
Research notes

Reader Checked|OA 02/07/2013

Reference type
Author(s)
Perrin, Andrew B.
Year
2013
Journal / Book Title || Series Title
Dead Sea Discoveries
Volume
20
Number of volumes
0
Issue / Series Volume
1
Pages
98-123
Alternative title
DSD
Label
27/05/2013
Abstract

It is widely recognized that the authors of the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls often shrouded their tales in first person voices and exhibited a perennial interest in the production and transmission of ancestral booklore. The present study explores the literary convention of the incipit in light of these interrelated methods of pseudepigraphy. Throughout the Aramaic Scrolls incipits introduce entire compositions and putative texts within narratives. Comparative philological analysis reveals that these incipits feature strikingly similar literary-linguistic idioms. However, it is equally apparent that that these common elements were uniquely patterned by individual authors. It is suggested that these commonalities should inform how we conceive of the scribal milieu(s) from which the Aramaic Scrolls emerged and our understanding of pseudepigraphy in early Judaism. The article concludes with a fresh proposal for the function of the title “A Copy of the Writing of the Words of Noah” in 1QapGen 5:29.