AI “Enoch” Dates Dead Sea Scrolls Older Than Previously Believed

Summary: Artificial intelligence (AI) analysis suggests that the ancient Dead Sea Scrolls are centuries older than previously believed.

Then I said, “Behold, I have come to do your will, O God, as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.” – Psalms 40:7 (ESV)

Earlier AI Dates

Found nearly 100 years ago, the Dead Sea Scrolls are considered by many to be the most important archaeological discovery of the 20th century. These ancient manuscripts include a vast collection of Jewish writings in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek which contain varied subjects and literary styles, including all or parts of every book/scroll in the Hebrew Bible except Esther. Numbering by the thousands, the scroll fragments have transformed our understanding of early Judaism and Christianity.

Until recently, the scrolls were assumed to date somewhere between the 3rd century BC and the 1st century AD. However, a new assessment suggests that some scrolls are significantly older than previously thought. Based on AI analysis, some scrolls are dating as far back as the 4th century BC, closer to the lifetimes’ of the original authors, according to lead study author Mladen Popović from the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

Paleography Problems

First found in 1946 in the  Qumrān Caves of the Judaean Desert, the Dead Sea Scrolls comprise 15,000 fragments representing about 1,000 ancient manuscripts. This great trove of writings, from over 2000 years ago, contain some of the oldest known copies of books from the Hebrew Bible, as well as laws that governed Jewish communities during centuries of instability.

Determining the chronology of these precious manuscripts is essential for reconstructing the development of ideas, said a new study published in the peer-reviewed PLOS One journal in early June. Unfortunately, only a precious few contain timestamps confirming their age, for example, the mention of a particular monarch’s reign. For decades, researchers have relied on traditional paleography, the study of ancient handwriting and letter shapes, to date manuscripts but this method lacks an objective foundation.

To adequately compare handwriting, enough date-bearing texts written in similar scripts are required. However, few other Hebrew or Aramaic scrolls from the same centuries exist. Calendar dates are only found on some of the very oldest and very youngest manuscripts. This leaves a paleographic gap between the 5th – 4th centuries BC imperial Aramaic script and the 1st – 2nd centuries AD Jewish square script. Consequently, many of the Dead Sea Scrolls are difficult to date with accuracy.

Machine Learning Model

To help solve this problem, an international team led by the University of Groningen, combined radiocarbon dating and machine learning models in an effort to provide a more accurate dating method for the individual manuscripts of the Dead Sea Scrolls. The research project is called The Hands That Wrote The Bible.

“There simply were no securely dated Hebrew or Aramaic manuscripts from the late Hellenistic era against which to compare,” explained lead study author Prof. Popović, director of the Qumran Institute at Groningen. “Our approach bridges that gap by using 24 radiocarbon-anchored examples to give an objective timecode for handwriting styles.”

The research team trained an artificial intelligence model to recognize microscopic ink trace patterns, including character shape and curvature, features often invisible to the human eye. The AI model is called Enoch, named after one of the Dead Sea Scrolls supposedly written by Noah’s great-grandfather Enoch. The book is considered pseudepigraphal, meaning it was written by someone other than the denoted author. It is not part of the Hebrew Bible.

The scrolls used in the study were carefully selected to represent a diverse range of manuscripts, according to Popović. Researchers collaborated closely with the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA), the body responsible for preserving ancient artifacts. Aramaic manuscripts from Egypt and Samaria dating to the 5th and 4th centuries BC were used as a starting point with 1st century AD Hebrew texts as the endpoint.

“We selected the scrolls for radiocarbon dating based on the different styles of handwriting we see in the Dead Sea Scrolls, or what we call formal, semiformal, and semicursive,” Popović said. “We also had to find scrolls with enough characters to train the model.”

Earlier Chronology

In the study’s first phase, researchers input digitized images of 135 scroll fragments. By correlating handwriting features with empirically established dates, Enoch was reportedly able to narrow dating uncertainty to roughly ±30 years, outperforming conventional radiocarbon ranges for the period of 300-50 BC.

While Enoch supported many traditional estimates, it also pointed out corrections in others. The new assessment revealed that two manuscripts, 4Q114 and 4Q109, the Biblical scrolls of Daniel and Ecclesiastes, were older than previously believed. The new dates are between 220 – 165 BC, decades earlier than what traditional paleography classification suggested.

“The strength and significance of the AI tool that we have developed is that it makes it possible to provide much more accurate date estimates,” said Popović. With the new system, “often individual manuscript dates are older than previously thought. This is very exciting because it changes the way we have to think about the community behind the Dead Sea Scrolls, the people who collected them, wrote them, read them.”

Hasmonean and Herodian Script

Before Enoch, by mainly relying on visual analysis of letter shapes, scholars had developed a chronological framework for the Dead Sea Scrolls that spanned centuries without independently dated manuscripts. This framework assumed that script growth progressed slowly and then accelerated during the Hasmonean period. However, the new data suggests that Hasmonaean and Herodian style scripts coexisted together earlier than previously thought. This poses a challenge to the traditional view that one script followed the other.

The new evidence may revise how scholars trace political and religious shifts in ancient Judea. King Herod is thought by many to have ruled over Judea between 37 – 4 BC and the date revisions show that the Herodian script type was already in use decades before Herod, maybe as early as the 2nd century BC, according to Popović. Additionally, the Hasmonean type also dated back earlier than previously thought, sometimes even to the late 3rd century BC.

“In general, the date predictions by Enoch for individual manuscripts moves within the timeframe of late 4th century BC until 2nd century AD,” said Popović. “Within that time frame more manuscripts are now older, being dated to the 1st half of the second century BC, the 3rd century BC and in two cases even into the late 4th century BC.”

Professor Popović and his team have not yet dated all the Dead Sea Scrolls, so more is yet to be learned about the overall age of the manuscripts. “There are more than 1,000 Dead Sea Scrolls so our study is a first but significant step, opening a door into history with new possibilities for research,” he said.

Dead Sea Qumran Caves

A shepherd boy, Muhammed Edh-Dhib, accidentally discovered the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls in a cave at Khirbat Qumrān on the northwestern shore of the Dead Sea. Later, mainly during the 1950s to the mid-1960s, similar finds were made in neighboring areas. The main sites where scrolls were recovered include: Khirbat Qumrān, Wadi Al-Murabbaʿāt, Wadi Khabrah (Naḥal Ḥever), Wadi Seiyal (Naḥal Ẓeʾelim), Wadi Daliyeh, and Masada.

Most of the Dead Sea Scrolls are written on vellum or parchment made from processed animal hide. Other scrolls were found made from papyrus, or plant matter, as well as sheets of metal. The texts contain four languages: Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek, and Nabataean from the ancient Arab Nabatean people. The texts are of great historical and religious significance including the earliest known surviving copies of Biblical and extra-Biblical documents, as well as preserving evidence of diversity in late Second Temple Judaism.

A great number and variety of documents were discovered in the Qumrān Caves. The best-preserved manuscripts came from Cave 1, including the Isaiah Scroll and the War Scroll. Cave 3 contained the Copper Scroll, listing Temple treasures and their hiding places. About 400 documents were found in Cave 4, including 100 texts from the Hebrew Bible.

Most believe the group at Qumrān were Essenes who had fled to the Judean wilderness following a dispute with priestly leaders in Jerusalem over the sacred calendar and legal interpretation matters. They formed a third major branch of Judaism at the time, along with the Pharisees and Sadducees who are mentioned in the New Testament. The Essenes preserved their beliefs of the world being divided sharply into good and evil, light and darkness. They led a communal life of extreme ritual purity with an imminent expectation of divine judgement against evil.

The Dead Sea Scrolls are notable as they offer insight into the Qumrān community and also the larger spectrum of ancient Jewish belief and practice. It has been argued that the Qumrān scrolls may represent the Jerusalem libraries that were quickly concealed right before the Roman siege of the city during the First Jewish Revolt (66-73 AD). However, even though many scrolls originate from outside the sect, an even wider variety would be expected if they were saved from the capital city.

Conclusion

“With the Enoch tool we have opened a new door into the ancient world, like a time machine, that allows us to study the hands that wrote the Bible,” according to the study authors. “It is very exciting to set a significant step into solving the dating problem of the Dead Sea Scrolls and also creating a new tool that could be used to study other partially dated manuscript collections from history.”

The new timeline for the Dead Sea Scrolls has wide implications. By placing more scrolls closer to the authors of Biblical texts, allows for deeper insight into the religious, political, and cultural changes of the time. The updated chronology could change how researchers understand the spread of literacy, the rise of the Hasmonaean dynasty, and the early roots of Christianity. It also strengthens the case for the accurate transmission of Biblical texts by pushing the oldest known copies closer to the original authors.

Enoch marks the first time a machine-learning model has delivered reliable manuscript dates using only image data, with full transparency in how the results are generated. With this revolutionary dating method, research of the Dead Sea Scrolls has entered a new era that “provides quantified objectivity” to the field of paleography, said the study scholars.

Keep Thinking!

TOP PHOTO: The War Scroll – Dead Sea Scroll. (credit: Matson Photo Service – American Colony Jerusalem, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons)