Alan D. Crown
Alan D. Crown, emeritus professor of Semitic studies at the University of Sydney (Australia), was a renowned scholar of Samaritan studies. His work made him one of the foremost experts on the Abisha Scroll, a copy of the Samaritan Pentateuch that was supposedly penned by Aaron’s great-grandson Abisha, and he received a grant to produce a critical edition of the Samaritan Pentateuch.
The articles below were hand-selected by Biblical Archaeology Society editors especially for members of the BAS Library.
Articles
A small group of Samaritans—they now number fewer than 300—continues to live in ancient Shechem (modern Nablus on the West Bank) at the foot of their holy mountain, Mt. Gerizim. They claim to have the oldest Torah (the Pentateuch, or five books of Moses) in existence. It was written, they say, by Abisha,a the […]
Scholars disagree about the nature of the settlement known as Qumran, which is set in the midst of the area where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. Roland de Vaux, who directed the excavations at Qumran between 1951 and 1956, concluded that it had been inhabited by an isolated religious community, whom he identified […]