SITE PICTURES > TRIPS > QUMRAN

The excavated remains of the Qumran community are located on a plateau above the northwest coast of the Dead Sea. In 1947, the first of the Dead Sea Scrolls was found by Bedouin sheep herders in a cave near the Qumran remains. After several years of investigation, a total of 11 caves were found with over 800 fragmentary manuscripts which date to approximately the first century CE. These manuscripts, hidden in jars for almost 2,000 years, are widely believed to have been written by a Jewish sect called Essenes. The Essenes fled to Qumran to avoid the rule of the "corrupt" Temple in Jerusalem. According to the War scroll, the Qumran community believed that a coming apocalytic conflict between the children of the light (Essenes) and the children of darkness (the Jerusalem Temple priests and the Roman authorities) would result in the destruction of the establihed order in Jerusalem. The Roman general Titus destroyed the Qumran community on his to way to Masada.