The Dead Sea Scrolls have shed light on the canonization of the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible in the Second Temple period. They provide us with exemplars of their biblical texts and how they used them in an authoritative manner. ‘The canon, authoritative scriptures, and the scrolls’ explains that the sectarian concept of authoritative scriptures seemed to reflect a dual pattern of authority by which the traditional biblical texts served as the source of the sectarian interpretation that in turn was defined by it. The authority was graded, beginning with the biblical books and extending to other books that were not eventually included in the canon.
Review of Elizabeth Boase, The Fulfilment of Doom? The Dialogic Interaction between the Book of Lamentations and the Pre-Exilic/Early Prophetic Literature (Library of Hebrew Bible/Old Testament Studies, 437; New York/London: T 7 t Clark, 2006). Pp. x + 268. Hardcover, US$145.00. ISBN 0-567-02672-8.