[...] at the gate of the holy height [...] your plantation and your glorious channels [...] your delicious branches [...]

(Seven fragmentary lines of a single column. The text is too lacunose for continuous translation; the surviving vocabulary is presented as attested.)

[...] ... [...]
[...] may your [mulberry tr]ees blossom and [...]
[...] your winepress, [bu]ilt of stone [...]
[...] at the gate of the holy height [...]
[...] your plantation and your glorious channels [...]
[...] your delicious branches [...]
[...] your [...] Blank [...]

Colophon

Text: 4Q500 (4QpapBened, Hebrew on papyrus), Cave 4. One fragment of seven lines. Published by M. Baillet in Discoveries in the Judaean Desert VII (Oxford: Clarendon, 1982), pp. 78–79, pl. XXVII. Discussed in J.M. Baumgarten, "4Q500 and the Ancient Exegesis of the Lord's Vineyard," JJS 40 (1989) 1–6, and G.J. Brooke, "4Q500 1 and the Use of Scripture in the Parable of the Vineyard," DSD 2 (1995) 268–294.

The single surviving fragment presents a sequence of vineyard and garden images addressed in the second person: your mulberry trees, your winepress, your plantation, your glorious channels, your delicious branches. The addressee is God — this is a liturgical benediction pronounced over the sacred garden that belongs to the Lord.

Baumgarten observed that the vocabulary closely echoes Isaiah 5 (the Song of the Vineyard) and the rabbinic exegesis that identified the Lord's vineyard with the Temple and Israel. The key phrase of line 4 — לשער מרום הקודש, "at the gate of the holy height" — is the threshold of the heavenly sanctuary or Temple Mount, the point where the vineyard and the holy precinct meet. The "gate of the holy height" appears nowhere else in the DSS corpus with this exact formulation, making 4Q500 its sole attestation.

Brooke extended Baumgarten's analysis to the New Testament: the Parable of the Vineyard (Mark 12:1–9 par.) reworks the same tradition, and "the gate of the holy height" may illuminate the parable's imagery of a man who "planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it and dug a pit for the wine press and built a tower." 4Q500's "winepress built of stone" and "gate" would then be the same architectural elements in a shared vineyard-Temple exegetical tradition.

The bakha-trees (בכאים) in line 2 appear in 2 Samuel 5:23–24 as the trees whose rustling signals divine action — David is told to wait until he hears "the sound of marching in the tops of the balsam trees." In 4Q500 they seem to blossom (ינצו, root נצץ) at God's command, situating this benediction in the category of natural abundance as divine gift.

Translation: Good Works Translation from Hebrew by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026. Hebrew transcription consulted in García Martínez and Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (Brill, 1997–1999), vol. 2, p. 992.

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Source Text

4Q500 — Hebrew Fragment

Hebrew transcription from García Martínez and Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition, vol. 2, p. 992 (Brill, 1997–1999). Square brackets indicate lacunae or restorations.

[…].[…]    1
[…]…[…]. ]…בכ[איכה ינצו ו    2
]…בכ[איכה ינצו ו    2
[…]תירושכה ]ב[נוי באבני    3
]…[לשער מרום הקודש    4
[…][מטעכה ופלגי כבודכה ב    5
]…[.כפות שעשועיכה    6
]…[.מכה    7
vacat

Notes

Line 2: ]בכ[איכה = "your baka-trees / mulberry trees" (בכאים, pl. construct + 2ms suffix; cf. 2 Sam 5:23–24). ינצו = "they blossom / sparkle" (root נצץ).

Line 3: תירושכה = "your winepress / new wine" (תירוש + 2ms suffix). ]ב[נוי באבני = "built of stone" — a winepress hewn or built in stone, matching the parable of the vineyard (Mark 12:1).

Line 4: לשער מרום הקודש = "at the gate of the holy height" — the threshold of the sacred precinct. This formulation is unique in the DSS corpus.

Line 5: מטעכה = "your plantation" (מטע + 2ms suffix). ופלגי כבודכה = "and the channels/streams of your glory" (פלגים = channels, watercourses; כבוד = glory).

Line 6: כפות שעשועיכה = "the branches/fronds of your delights" (כפות = branches, palm-fronds; שעשועים = delights, pleasures).

Source Colophon

Source: Hebrew (papyrus). Cave 4, Qumran. DJD VII (Baillet, 1982). Transcription: García Martínez and Tigchelaar, DSSE (1997–1999), vol. 2, p. 992.

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