New Testament timeline by Marisa Egerstrom

Traditional date

The community at Qumran discussed by Philo and Josephus. Developed out of the Hasidim, and were a protest community against the Hellenization of Jerusalem. (Koester, v. I, 223) A “true believer” purity sect with apocalyptic eschatology (Koester, 224; lecture, 17 Feb). “I have discussed the Essenes, who persistently pursued the active life and excelled in all or, to put it more moderately, in most of its departments” (Philo, The Contemplative Life)
(Dates from Koester, I, 224)

• along with Josephus, Philo wrote prime literary material about 1st century Jews & Christians
• wrote the Vita contemplativa Hellenistic philosopher, Platonist tendencies. Platonizing interpretation. Stoic thought too. Especially after his trip to Rome with the Jewish embassy to Gaius. Philo’s nephew was a government functionary; dude was an establishment guy (from Feb 17 lecture) Born 20 BCE (Koester, 266)

Jewish historian whose writings provide one of best attestations of biblical materials as well as wealth of material of 1st century history.
born 37/38 CE, priestly nobility of Jerusalem, died shortly after 100 ce
Wrote Jewish War but this text is lost (and in Aramaic).
“Uncritical use of source materials” (Koester, I, 334).
in 64 went to Rome to negotiate with Roman authorities.

“The oldest fully preserved and most influential apocalypse of the Hellenistic period” (Koester, I, 246). Partly in Hebrew, partly in Aramaic, Daniel is a work of consolation to Jews facing persecution under Antiochus. Much controversy around the one “like a son of man” Stories originated in 3rd and 4th century BCE, but likely completed by the time of the desecration of the temple in 167 BCE (HarperCollins, 1168).

Containing the Sectarian Manifesto, only this work "directly challenges the position of another religious group" (Wise, et al, 454) with its various legal proscriptions against mixing the sacred and profane. It lists a series of bans, for instance, one against touching both a carcass and ritually clean food:
[Concerning the hi]de from the carcass of a clean [animal, the] one who carries this carcass [must not to]uch the [sacred] pure food.