Who Were the Essenes? - Dr. Steve Mason

Today I was honored to speak with Dr. Steve Mason, professor emeritus of Ancient Mediterranean Religions and Cultures at the University of Groningen.

Dr. Mason provided a scholarly overview of the Essenes and discussed the topic of the possible influence that the Essenes may have played in the early Jesus movement, while sharing how to not make false assumptions or connect dots without sufficient evidence.

Many thanks to Dr. Mason for his lifelong contributions toward these critical topics, and for his presentation here today. I am looking forward to digging deeper into this subject!

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Dr. Mason's books may be purchased here:

Dr. Mason's page on the University of Groningen website is:

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Our prior interviews may be seen here:

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Check out Dr. Mason on MythVision!

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--Tim

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Ending music by Eyal Raz, "Friends"

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[ncarmstron]

After watching Dr. Mason on MythVision, he’s become one of my favorite scholars.

[billguthrie]

Great info. What I appreciate most... intellectual honesty.

[Telecasterfan]

After listening to ~10 hours of Dr. Mason on various interviews, I've noticed I started talking like him a little bit lol

[stevenv]

It is good to hear about the other literary sources on the Essenes. I didn't know that Philo and Pliny even mentioned them.

Also I feel like Dr. Tabor is looming in the background of this conversation.

[Zen_Traveler]

Thank you for one of the most comprehensive discussion of the Essenes I've found on YouTube! Fwiw, after having an interest in the DSS for several decades I think Dr Norman Golb's view that although there may have been a community living in Qumran, most of this material came from Jerusalem and put in caves as 70 CE was on the horizon. They also may have used jars made at the site and then stored them in the caves....Thoughts?

[shuai]

Dr. Mason seems to doing his own circular reasoning in throwing shade on modern understanding of some of the most "amazing" attributes of the Essenes that most clearly links their evolution into early Christianity (i.e. marriage, pacifism, and socialism.) It's unfortunate that so many historians and scholars seem so clueless about the uniqueness of the Essenes and early Christian permeance of marriage rule. The reason so many Essenes seem to historians like Philo and Pliny to be "without women" wasn't because Essenes forbid marriage, but because they forbid re-marriage. So did every single early Christian right up until the Protestant reformation, which seemed to cause most modern scholars to forget how the teaching was practiced. Matthew 19 may as well be taken directly out of the Essene's community rule scroll. The teaching of Pacifism was also equally shared by early Christians which has now been completely forgotten in the era of Augustinian blood thirsty authoritarianism and modern day cult of Trump. Anyone who acknowledges these obvious connections must also be willing to endure much push back from exposing modern Christians as complete frauds when it comes to being in-line with some of the earliest Essene/ Christian vales and practices.

[kevinmcdonald]

great presentation, my only question would be: why would looters leave pick axes with the smashed jars in one of the caves? that's strange to me

[bevann]

"Nazareth" was the community of the Essenes.

[soljasuoheimo]

There is Essenes community in Lima, Peru, I studied there 4 years, they have a book which tells all the ancestors from the race of the Kaluum from the stars. Essenes were first "cristians" before Jesus was born.

[bevann]

IN FACT, the Essenes are mentioned in the New Testament:
Acts 24:5
Acts 28:22.

[Zen_Traveler]

Translation, Transmitting, Editing, Propaganda: Thank you for the content and Dr Mason's scholarship! Dr Eisenman really opened my eyes to how important the DSS were in showing that Judaism at the time was more diverse than previously thought. On that note, he posits from the material that possibly Essenes had different factions, with the later ones developing to more Sicarii/Zealot type using Hyppolytus having a different version of Josephus than has come down to us...Any thoughts on the possibility of this?

[Arnold-eebe]

Another thing that the speaker failed to mention was that flavius Josephus actually lived with them. So I would consider his commentary quite reliable

[Arnold-eebe]

My understanding was that there was no town of Nazareth at the time of Jesus. But there was a Brotherhood of a as scenes living there and they were known later as Nazarene. When you go to the New Testament there is a place where Jesus is referred to as Jesus of Nazarene

[Arnold-eebe]

John the Baptist appeared to be an excommunicated one because of the Oaths that they give, they were forbidden to eat normal food. Hence eating Locust and honey

[Arnold-eebe]

One would have to look at then who wandered around in the Judean desert living like that

[SkitMatrix]

We are the SOLs that are here to disSOLve all mortal traps

[satie]

Hello Tim, any updates on the projects you've been working on?

[COFFEEWITHBUDDHA]

What do y’all think about Ammon Hillman?

[josegaleano]

Team I see a big Future on you you are very talented and I like your program thank you for helping us we need to reason with reality

[Arnold-eebe]

A very knowledgeable man on the subject left out some very interesting facts. Although they the disdained from the pleasures of life, they were known to have lived to a very advanced age, over 120 years. Two of the authors said that the origins were very ancient way before the arrival of the Jews in Israel . Hence they alluded to the idea that their Origins were not related to Hebrew history. At quam run numerous copies of the Book of Enoch were found, but the Mainstay Jewish thought had already discarded that book, labeling it as fantasy. Mysterious other findings have given qumrun strong linkage with egyptian