Why are the Dead Sea Scrolls significant?

The scrolls were Discovered in 1947.  Until 1947, scholars had only the clay tablets of Babylon and the Egyptian papyri to help them understand the background information on the Old Testament. Codex Babylonicus Petropalitanus (CBP) was the oldest complete copy of the Old Testament we had. This was written in Hebrew around A.D. 1008. The Dead Sea Scrolls are 1,000 years older than the CBP.

A common argument against the Bible is that it is a copy of a copy of a copy , rewritten over hundreds of years by humans who aren’t perfect and therefore information was passed down with error. Information was lost or got blurred along the way. The Dead Sea Scrolls demonstrated the fact that the Jews were faithful in their transcription of the biblical manuscripts. This reverence for Scriptures was summed up long ago by the first century Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus:

“We have given practical proof of our reverence for our own Scriptures. For, although such long ages have now passed, no one has ventured either to add, or to remove, or to alter a syllable; and it is an instinct with every Jew from the day of his birth to regard them as decrees of God, to abide by them, and, if need be, cheerfully to die for them.”

One of the world’s leading archaeologists, Dr. William F Albright writes to John Trevor:

“My heartiest congratulations on the greatest manuscript discovery of modern times! There is no doubt in my mind that the script is more archaic than that of the Nash Papyrus.”

Nash Papyrus: A small portion of the Old Testament dated between the 2nd century B.C. and the 1st Century A.D.

Cited Sources: Answers To Tough Questions by Josh McDowell