Dates in the ancient world are seldom exact, and the dates of a movement that wrote no histories of itself are less exact than most. The timeline below gives the broad sequence as the fellowship understands it. Where a date is a guess we have said so. BCE means before the common era; CE means the common era.
- Before memory
Enoch walks with God
In Genesis, the seventh from Adam walks with God and is taken. Around this figure a vast literature of heavenly ascent grows up in the centuries before the Essenes, and they will treasure it.
- About 586 BCE
The first temple falls
Jerusalem is destroyed by Babylon and the people go into exile. The priesthood of Zadok, which had served in Solomon's temple, carries the memory of the true worship.
- About 515 BCE
The second temple
The returned exiles rebuild. In the following centuries the high priesthood becomes a political office, and pious Jews begin to question its legitimacy.
- About 200 to 150 BCE
The movement forms
Under Greek rule and then under the Maccabean revolt, groups of the pious separate themselves to keep the Law strictly. The Damascus Document speaks of a root sprouting from Israel and of twenty years of groping like the blind before a Teacher arose.
- About 150 BCE
The Teacher of Righteousness
A priest, unnamed in the scrolls, gathers a community and leads it into exile, perhaps to Damascus, perhaps to the desert. He is opposed by a Wicked Priest in Jerusalem. The scrolls say God revealed to him all the mysteries of the prophets.
- About 100 BCE
Qumran is settled
The site above the Dead Sea is built or rebuilt with its cisterns, its common hall, and its workrooms. The library begins to be copied and composed. This is the fellowship's best guess for the date; some place it earlier.
- About 30 BCE
Essenes in the towns and under Herod
The historian records that Herod honored the Essenes because one of them had foretold his kingship. Essenes live in Jerusalem, which has a gate named for them, and throughout Judea.
- About 30 CE
John baptizes and Jesus teaches
A prophet in the wilderness of Judea calls Israel to repentance and washing. A teacher from Galilee announces the kingdom. Whether either was an Essene, the scrolls and gospels do not say. The parallels are discussed in our articles.
- About 30 to 60 CE
The Way in Jerusalem
The first followers of Jesus hold all things in common, break bread daily, and are called followers of the Way. A Jewish philosopher in Egypt describes the Essenes of Judea and the Therapeutae of the lake.
- 68 CE
Qumran destroyed
Roman legions moving on Jerusalem burn the settlement. The scrolls are already in the caves, or are hidden now. Some of the community may flee south to the fortress above the Dead Sea where other scrolls will later be found.
- 70 CE
Jerusalem falls
The temple is destroyed. The historian records that Essenes tortured by the Romans would not blaspheme or eat forbidden food, and gave up their souls cheerfully, confident of receiving them again.
- About 75 to 100 CE
The witnesses write
The historian publishes his accounts of the Jewish war and the Jewish antiquities, with his descriptions of the Essenes. The Roman naturalist publishes his natural history. After this, the Essenes disappear from the record as a living people.
- About 100 to 400 CE
The Nazarenes and the heresy catalogues
Christian writers describe Jewish-Christian groups called Nazarenes and Ebionites who keep the Law and honor Jesus, and Jewish sects they call Ossaeans. Whether these are heirs of the Essenes, the fellowship discusses in The Two Branches.
- About 350 CE
The jar at Nag Hammadi
Thirteen codices of Christian and gnostic writings are buried in Upper Egypt, perhaps by monks protecting them from a purge of unapproved books. They will wait sixteen centuries.
- About 800 CE
A rumor of scrolls
An Eastern Christian writer records that Jewish books were found in a cave near Jericho after a shepherd's dog chased an animal into it. The story suggests that some of the desert library came to light long before our time and influenced a medieval Jewish sect.
- 1896 to 1897
The Damascus Document in Cairo
Among the discarded manuscripts of a Cairo synagogue, two medieval copies of a sectarian rule are found. No one yet knows that the same text lies in the caves of the Judean desert.
- 1945
Nag Hammadi found
Egyptian farmers digging for fertilizer uncover the jar. The sayings gospel of Thomas and its companions return to the world.
- 1946 or 1947
The first cave
A Bedouin shepherd finds jars containing seven scrolls, including a complete Isaiah, the Community Rule, and the commentary on Habakkuk. Over the next decade eleven caves give up the remains of nearly a thousand manuscripts.
- The present
The Way continues
Students across the world read the scrolls and the forgotten gospels, keep the hours, and seek the inner Light. The fellowship is one small company among them.