Qumran Prayer and Religious Poetry

This work addresses liturgical and poetic texts from the Qumran, examining in their light the stages of transition from Biblical prayer, which essentially functions as a free accompaniment to the cult of (animal) sacrifices, to an orderly, comprehensive liturgy of Divine worship through prayer. Such a discussion is made possible by the explicit information in the Qumran texts bearing upon the practice of Divine worship through prayer, its times, and its aims, as well as the prayer texts of various types found in the Qumran corpus. This book provides the reader with the tools for a renewed study of the history of prayer in Judaism in the light of information from the Second Temple period.