The book was written nine years after Allegro's forced resignation from academia due to publishing The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. It is an imaginative look at what life would have been like at Qumran, West Bank at the time when Jesus was supposed to have lived in the 1st century CE. The book's aim was to show the logical progression of Jewish history through the writings and archaeology of Qumran, as opposed to the revelation of traditional Christianity. Allegro suggested that traditional Christianity developed through a literal mis-interpretation of symbolic narratives found in the scrolls by writers who did not understand the minds of the Essenes. He further argued that Gnostic Christianity developed directly from the Essenes and that Jesus Christ was a fictional character based on a real person, who had helped established the Essene movement and lived in the 1st century BCE, around one hundred years before the traditional period of New Testament events. In a chapter entitled "Will the real Jesus Christ please stand up", Allegro referred to this man as the Teacher of Righteousness. Allegro argued that the word Essenes signified "healers". They had inherited a lore of healing with plants and stones that had been passed down from the "fallen angels" that arrived on Mount Hermon mentioned in the Book of Enoch. He presumed their establishment of Qumran complex by the Dead Sea was related to the interpretation and anticipation of a prophecy about the Teacher of Righteousness, a "man whose appearance was like the appearance of bronze, with a line of flax and a measuring rod in his hand" who was to somehow create lifegiving waters to flow into the Dead Sea from a temple in some northern location.
Reaction
There was a lot of excitement in Jerusalem when Allegro published the book. Numerous rebuttals were published, and other members of the team pointed out the problems with Allegro's arguments. Despite this, Allegro's ideas were promoted thanks to efforts of essayist Edmund Wilson, supported by scholar David Flusser. Wilson wrote both a magazine article and a book on the subject. The press widely publicized Allegro's claims of connections with Christian origins, which have influenced the entire shape and focus of reporting on the subject of the scrolls ever since. Randall Price called Allegro "the father of scroll sensationalists" for his interpretations of the scrolls. Allegro believed that there was a conspiracy to prevent publication of the scrolls because they could damage the image of Jesus, which was later repeated by conspiracy theory writers such as Richard Leigh and Michael Baigent in their book The Dead Sea Scrolls Deception. While Allegro made several contributions, such as spreading awareness of the scrolls and convincing everyone that they were relevant to an understanding of Christianity, his theories about the relationship of the scrolls to Jesus led to his downfall. Allegro previously published The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross in 1970, with even more theories about Jesus. Allegro was heavily criticized by many scholars, including his own mentor at Oxford, and the publisher had to issue an apology. Allegro's scholarly reputation was destroyed, and he had to resign from his academic position. The book also spawned a CBSdocumentary film in 1985 entitled Healers of the Dead Sea, which Allegro narrated and produced with Douglas Edwards.
