Were early Hebrew scripture texts authoritative?

It is difficult to define authority before the first century ce because Scripture was still in the making. Among the textual witnesses of Scripture, we assume textual plurality, which is particularly noticeable at Qumran, while the (proto-)rabbinic movement adhered only to the proto-mt texts, and the Samaritans only to their own Torah. We described different kinds of Scripture scrolls, assuming that Scripture-like scrolls such as liturgical scrolls had no authoritative Scripture status. Liturgical scrolls may have been authoritative as liturgy, but not as Scripture. Partial Scripture scrolls did not carry full Scripture authority for the Qumran community, but they did have some level of authority. On the other hand, all other scrolls carried full authority. These scrolls were authoritative throughout ancient Israel in spite of the differences between them in matters of content, while it is unclear which source other than tradition granted that authority. We provided some tentative criteria for assuming an authoritative status.