Do Dead Sea Scrolls Link to Mormonism?
The Dead Sea Scrolls have sometimes been alleged to contain teachings that would somehow link to or vindicate Mormonism. Unfortunately, most such claims have tended to be sensationalistic. I don=t want to deflate anyone by saying that, but I think it is important to deal with the facts. Some of those claims, dating back to the 1960=s and 70=s before people really knew much about the scrolls, were quite inflated and were not based on a competent study of the scrolls. It’s true that the writings of the Essenes give hints of things that Mormons take very seriously, for example, the idea of a pre-existence and a war in heaven. But it=s also clear that the Essenes did not have a developed understanding of these concepts the way we would think about them. They didnt even have a concept of the plan of salvation, which is fundamental to that idea of pre-existence from our perspective. I’ve already mentioned the idea of ritual immersions as sometimes thought to be evidence of baptisms. This is
