Biblical Hebrew Forum

[goranson AT duke.edu]

Quoting George Athas <george.athas AT moore.edu.au>:

> I seem to remember that "Qumran" is an Arabic derivation of "Gomorrah" (Heb:
> `amorrah, with ghayin, rather than `ayin). Wasn't the site popularly thought
> to be the location of Gomorrah many centuries ago?
>
>
> Best Regards,
>
> GEORGE ATHAS
> Moore Theological College
> 1 King St, Newtown 2042, Australia
> Ph: (+61 2) 9577 9774

Hi George,
Yes, in the 1850s Felicien de Saulcy proposed that Qumran (which he spelled
Oumran and Goumran) was Biblical Gomorrah. Joan Taylor's 2002 PEQ article
discusses this. He also located a ?pays des Esséniens? between Wadi en-Nar
or Qidron and ?in el-Ghuweir.
Dio as quoted by Bishop Synesius mentions Essenes by the Dead Sea (so does
Solinus). Though I doubt it shows us anything about Bible story locations,
according to C.P. Jones (The Roman world of Dio Chrysostom) Bishop Synesius
added that they were near Sodom ruins and that, at his time, for relative
convenience of pilgrims, the supposed Sodom site was presumed to be on the
northwest shore. In the analysis of Adam Kamesar (JAOS 111 [1991] 134-5), the
Stoic Dio presented Essenes as a polis in the sense of "a group of people
living under a rule of law in the same place." And "eudaimon" was used because
of the reputed concord of the group members.
So far there's no consensus on the origin of the name "Qumran," but if that's
ever solved, it may perhaps lead to more traveller's accounts and observations
of the site in times when it was relatively better preserved. Perhaps that
could also help determine the location of the medieval Hebrew ms finds
mentioned in the letter by Timotheus.

best,
Stephen Goranson
http://www.duke.edu/~goranson