Take the tablets and read everything — all my troubles and all that was to come upon me, over the one hundred and forty-seven years of my life.

(Three fragmentary fragments from a single Cave 4 Aramaic manuscript. Fragment 1 is the clearest: Jacob on his deathbed passes inscribed tablets and names 147 years — the exact figure of Genesis 47:28. Fragment 2 preserves a vision of priestly service. Fragment 3 is a land-promise blessing. Too lacunose for continuous translation; surviving vocabulary is presented as attested.)

Fragment 1 — The Tablets

[...] your descendants. And all the just will survive
and the upright [...]
[...] iniquity, and absolutely no deceit will be found [...]
And now — take the tablets, and read everything:
[...] all my troubles and all that was to come upon me,
over the one hundred and forty-seven years of my life.
Again he said to me: Take the tablet from my hands.
[...] I took then this tablet from his hands [...]
And I saw written in it that [...]
[...] you would leave there, and on that day [...]
before the Most High God [...]

Fragment 2 — The Vision of the Sanctuary

[...] and how the building will be [...] and how their priests will dress —
their hands purified —
and how they will offer sacrifices on the altar;
and how, as food, they will eat a portion of their sacrifices
throughout the whole land;
[...] who will leave the city
and from beneath its walls;
and where they will be [...]
[...] before me: a land of two parts [...]

Fragment 3 — The Land Blessing

[...] the land, and you will eat its fruit and all its goodness —
and you will live [...]
[...] to go astray and to walk the path of error [...]
[...] your wickedness, until you will be before him [...]

Colophon

Text: 4Q537 (4QTestament of Jacob (?) ar, Aramaic), Cave 4. PAM 43.599; ROC 260. Published in J.T. Milik, "Écrits préesséniens de Qumrân: D'Hénoch à Amram," Qumrân: Sa piété, sa théologie et son milieu (1978), pp. 91–106; K. Beyer, ATTM (1984), pp. 186–187; É. Puech, "Fragments d'un apocryphe de Lévi et le personnage eschatologique, 4QTestLévic-d (?) et 4QAJa," The Madrid Qumran Congress (1992), pp. 489–496. Transcription consulted in García Martínez and Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (Brill, 1997–1999), vol. 2, pp. 1074–1075.

The identification of the speaker as Jacob is secured by Fragment 1, line 4: "the one hundred and forty-seven years of my life" (כל מאה וארבעין ושבע שני חיי) — the exact lifespan of Jacob in Genesis 47:28. The scene is Jacob on his deathbed, transmitting inscribed tablets containing the record of his life's trials to his sons. This parallels the deathbed testament structure found in the Aramaic Levi Document (4Q213–214), the Testament of Qahat (4Q542), and the Visions of Amram (4Q543–548), which together constitute the Qumran priestly-patriarchal testament tradition.

Fragment 1's tablets (luḥaya, לוחיא) are the physical record of Jacob's life — a written testament functioning as the materialization of memory and blessing. "Take and read" (sab u-qeri, סב וקרי) is the classic testament formula. The admonition that "all the just will survive and the upright will remain" while "iniquity and deceit will not be found" is the ethical core of the testament genre: the patriarch's deathbed speech frames a moral vision for his descendants.

Fragment 2 is striking: Jacob does not simply bless his sons — he describes a vision of the future sanctuary, its priests, their vestments, their ritual purity, their sacrifices and sacred meals, and the boundaries of priestly territory. This is the same tradition as the Temple Scroll's priestly legislation and the Aramaic Levi Document's vision of Levi's priestly future. The phrase "a land of two parts" (ar'a rivʿin taryn, ארע רבעין תרין) may preserve a geographical term for the priestly land allotment — the double portion given to the firstborn, or the specific territory assigned to the tribe of Levi.

Fragment 3 preserves a land-promise formula: "you will eat its fruit and all its goodness and live." The transition to warning language — "to go astray and walk the path of error" — follows the conditional-blessing pattern of Deuteronomy and the Damascus Document's historical survey: blessing for obedience, exile and confusion for apostasy. Jacob speaks from his deathbed as both patriarch and prophet.

The manuscript is related to 4Q536 (a companion text) and possibly to the larger patriarchal-testament corpus to which 4Q538 (Testament of Judah ar) and 4Q539 (Apocryphon of Joseph B ar) belong. The scholarly query mark (*?) reflects uncertainty about whether this is a standalone testament or part of a larger composite work.

Translation: Good Works Translation from Aramaic by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026. Hebrew and Aramaic transcription consulted in García Martínez and Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition (Brill, 1997–1999), vol. 2, pp. 1074–1075. All lacunae marked [...]; restorations follow the DSSE editors. The divine title אל עליון ("El Elyon / Most High God") preserved in translation.

🌲

Source Text

4Q537 — Aramaic Fragments

Aramaic transcription from García Martínez and Tigchelaar, The Dead Sea Scrolls Study Edition, vol. 2, pp. 1074–1075 (Brill, 1997–1999). Square brackets indicate lacunae or restorations. Blank (vacat) indicates scribal spacing.

Fragment 1

[…  זרעך וישתארון כל צדיקיא וישירי]א    1
[…]לא עוד ישתכח עול וכל שקר    2
[… ] וכען סב לוחיא וקריא כולא    3
וכל עקתי וכל די יתא על]י כל מאה וארבעין ושב[ע שני חיי]    4
    תובא אמר לי סב[ לוחא מן
[… יד]י ]א[נסב דן לוחא מן ידו]הי … [וחזית כתיב בה די    5
[… [תפקון מנה וביום ]…[ ריקין מן קודם ] אל עליון    6
]…[…]…[    7

Fragment 2

]…[ והיך להוא בנינ]א … והיך כהנ[יהון להוון לבשין    1
]ידיהון והיך להוון [מסקין דבחיא למדבחא וה]יך כלח[ם] להוון    2
    בכ[ל] אר[עא אכלין מן קצת דבחיהון
]… [די להוון נפקין מן קריתא ומן    3
]…[תחות שוריהא ואן להוון מש    vacat    4
]…[ קדמי ארע רבעין תרין    5
]…[ל    6
]…[וא    7

Fragment 3

]… [ארעא ותכלון פריה וכל טבתה ותיחון    1
]… ל[משתא    2

Notes

Fragment 1, line 4: כל מאה וארבעין ושבע שני חיי = "all the one hundred and forty-seven years of my life" — matches Genesis 47:28 exactly (יְהִי יַעֲקֹב בְּאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם שְׁבַע עֶשְׂרֵה שָׁנָה וַיְהִי יְמֵי יַעֲקֹב שְׁנֵי חַיָּיו שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים וְאַרְבָּעִים וּמְאַת שָׁנָה). The identification of the speaker as Jacob is definitive.

Fragment 1, line 3: לוחיא = "tablets" (plural of לוח, luaḥ). The same term used for the tablets of the Torah (Exodus 31:18). The patriarch's testament is inscribed on physical tablets, materializing memory.

Fragment 1, line 6: אל עליון = El Elyon, "God Most High" — the ancient Canaanite epithet for the creator God, adopted into Israelite theology (Genesis 14:18–22). The same epithet appears throughout the Qumran Aramaic texts (Testament of Qahat, Visions of Amram, Sons of God).

Fragment 2, lines 1–2: כהניהון להוון לבשין = "how their priests will dress." לבשין from לבש, "to wear/clothe." מסקין דבחיא למדבחא = "offering/bringing up sacrifices to the altar." The vision of priestly vestments, ritual purity of hands, and sacrificial portions echoes the Aramaic Levi Document (4Q213–214) and the Temple Scroll.

Fragment 2, line 5: ארע רבעין תרין = "a land of two parts/quarters." The term רבע (riva') is a quarter section; תרין = two. May indicate a priestly territorial allotment — the portion assigned for priestly sustenance. Compare Numbers 18:20 (Aaron's inheritance: no territory, but the LORD is his portion) and the Temple Scroll's detailed priestly land provisions.

Fragment 3, line 1: פריה = "its fruit" (3fs suffix on פרי, "fruit"). טבתה = "its goodness." ותיחון = "and you will live." The land-blessing formula echoes Deuteronomy 8:7–10 and the Genesis covenant promises.

Source Colophon

Source: Aramaic (Jewish Palestinian Aramaic). Cave 4, Qumran. PAM 43.599; ROC 260. Transcription: García Martínez and Tigchelaar, DSSE (1997–1999), vol. 2.

🌲