The Meaning of the Dead Sea Scrolls: Their Significance ... (ISBN 006068464X)

An introduction that does a great job:
This book is part introduction to the Dead Sea Scrolls, and part overview of the texts and the work done by scholars since their discovery. It is not a detailed academic work, but it doesn't set out to be. It is intended for the intelligent reader to gain a good insight into the scrolls, their history, the significance of the texts, and the work that is being done. In this respect, it achieves its objective. I like this book because it is possible to pick it up without any great knowledge of paleography or patristics, yet still be able to make sense of it, and gain some perspective at the same time. If you are interested in finding out about these fascinating texts, and if you want an intelligent yet readable work, this is the book for you.

Historical Relevance !:
This is the best book about the Dead Sea Scrolls for amateurs, being also excellent for scholars.

A very good intro to the DSS:
There are introductions... and introductions to the Dead Sea Scrolls. Most of them serve strange hypotheses. Because they hope to sell well, they are often creations espousing the authors' pet theories. Otherwise, they are academic and soporific. The discussion of Qumran archaeology, the biblical and sectarian texts themselves and their relationship to the canon and Jesus is fair, comprehensive for the layman, clear and level-headed. Flint and Vanderam's intro steers deftly between the Scylla of sensationalism and the Charybdis of dullness. It is well-organized, very readable, and...not expensive (as Scrolls literature, especially, academic ones, go). Any beginning self-learner of the Scrolls and its secondary literature will benefit from this well-written book.

the sight of it:
I found the book to have great content. However, my number one critizim involves how it looks. As much as we want to say that we don't care how a book looks but its contents are the only thing that is important, well i believe that is not true. The book is extreemly boring looking, black and white photos and cheap paper. Although the content is good, I find my eyes getting very tired looking at the boring font and lack of color. That is all I have to say.

Exceptional Textbook:
I have been facinated w/ the Dead Sea Scrolls and Qumran my entire life. I finally visited Israel, Qumran being one of the sites we visited. This is not a "guidebook", nor a tourist outline. It is a college-level textbook covering the entire topic of the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is comprehensive, expansive and accurate, focusing on the scrolls from a more archeological point of view. It doesn't offer speculation or supposition, but rather reveals the discovery process, what was found and what it means archeologically. For anyone who wants to learn about the Dead Sea Scrolls, this is a must read.