History’s greatest biblical scroll discovery was not the Dead Sea Scrolls found in Qumran. Rather, Hilkiah’s scroll discovery in the Temple during King Josiah’s reign was both the most important and impactful.
While the Dead Sea Scrolls provided to the world a glimpse of Second Temple Judaism and revealed the Hebrew Bible’s textual transmission integrity, Hilkiah’s discovery has touched everyone who has ever attended a Passover Seder.
Hilkiah’s discovered scroll was passed upon to Shaphan the scribe who then passed them onto King Josiah The scroll’s contents shook the King.
In a monumental event commenurate with the receipt of the Ten Commandments, “the king set out and gathered to himself all the elders of Judah and Jerusalem. The king went up to the Temple of Hashem, and all the men of Judea and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem with him, as well as all the Kohanim and the prophets and all the people, from small to great, and he read in their ears all the words of the Book of the Covenant that had been found in the Temple of Hashem.” 2 Kings 23:1-3. With this, the King, as well as the entire people accepted the covenant.
After actions were taken to re-institute the covenant, it is noted that “the king then commanded the people, declaring: “perform the pesach-offering unto Hashem, your God, as written in this Book of the Covenant. For such a pesach offering had not been celebrated since the days of the Judges who judged Israel, and all the days of the kings of Israel and the kings of Judah; but in the eighteenth year of King Josiah, this Passover was celebrated unto Hashem in Jerusalem. ” 2 Kings 23:21-23.
In sum, without this discovery and King Josiah taking the covenant to heart, history would be quite different.
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