The articles are the fellowship's longer essays: on the history, on the texts, on the practice, and on the questions students bring that will not fit in a glossary entry. They are written by the keepers under their own names, so that the reader knows who is speaking and may disagree with a person rather than an institution. They are revised when we learn better.
Who Were the Essenes?
What three ancient writers tell us about the holy ones of the desert, where they agree, where they differ, and what the scrolls add to the picture.
The Voice in the Wilderness
John who baptized in the Jordan and the community that read the same verse of Isaiah. Kin, rival, or something else? A weighing of the parallels and the differences.
The Two Branches
The Nazarenes and the Ossaeans, Mount Carmel and Qumran, the marrying order and the celibate one: what the ancient writers said and what later tradition made of it.
The Healers of the Lake
The Therapeutae of Egypt, the contemplative cousins of the Essenes, and the thread that runs from their lakeside cells to the monks who buried the jar at Nag Hammadi.
Water into Wine
A mystical reading of the first sign at Cana: the six stone jars of purification, the water of the old washing, and the wine of the new way.
The Desert as Teacher
Why the holy ones went out to the dry places, and what a student with a kitchen and a mortgage can learn from them without going anywhere.
Reading the Scrolls with the Heart
On the difference between studying a text and being read by it, and how the Essenes, who did both, can teach us to hold the two together.