Ascetics of the second century B.C.

• Contemporaries of the Pharisees and Sadducees
• Dead Sea monastics
• Ancient Dead Sea sect
• Early mystics
• Ancient cenobites
• Qumran inhabitants
• Presumed authors of the Dead Sea Scrolls
• Ancient monastics

The Collaborative International Dictionary Word definitions in The Collaborative International Dictionary
Essene \Es*sene"\, n.; pl. Essenes . [Gr. ?, lit., physicians, because they practiced medicine, fr. Chald [=a]say[=a] to heal, cf. Heb. as[=a].] One of a sect among the Jews in the time of our Savior, remarkable for their strictness and abstinence.