R33*. James Barr, The Variable Spellings of the Hebrew Bible. in: JSS 35 (1990): 303–316. Revised version: Emanuel Tov, Hebrew Bible, Greek Bible, and Qumran (2008), 1¬–16. (original) (raw)
Related papers
The Text of the Hebrew Bible. From the Rabbis to the Masoretes, Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013
The variants of Hebrew medieval manuscripts and the readings of the Aramaic, Syriac and Vulgate versions belong to the textual tradition of the MT. None of the distinctive characteristics of the Septuagint correspond to the medieval manuscripts or to those three versions. 2 But in the books of Kings, the medieval Hebrew manuscripts (Ms/Mss) and the Targum (T), Peshitt˙a (S) and Vulgate (V) attest readings which agree with both the Greek Kaige text as extant in the B text and with the Old Greek as preserved by the pre-Lucianic text. 3 1 The research for this paper was done under the auspices of Research Project "Edición electrónica políglota-sinóptica de 1-2 Reyes," funded by the Spanish Ministerio de Investigación, Ciencia e Innovación. We thank Prof. Juan JosØ Alarcón, member of the research team that carried out this project, for his careful revision of the Aramaic and Syriac variants quoted in this paper. 2 The Greek version falls on the side of the textual pluralism featured in Qumran versus the tendency to textual fixation already manifest in the other Dead Sea caves, see E. Tov, "The Nature of the Large-Scale Differences between the LXX and MT S T V, Compared with Similar Evidence in Other Sources," in A. Schenker (ed.), The Earliest Text of the Hebrew Bible: The Relationship between the Masoretic Text and the Hebrew Base of the Septuagint Reconsidered (Atlanta/Leiden: Society of Biblical Literature/Brill, 2003), 121-144; id., "The Text of the Hebrew/Aramaic and Greek Bible Used in the Ancient Synagogues," in id., Hebrew Bible, Greek Bible, and Qumran. Colleted Essays (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), 171-188; id., "The Dead Sea Scrolls and the Textual History of the Masoretic Text," in N. Dµvid, A. Lange, K. De Troyer and S. Tzoref (eds.), The Hebrew Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2012), 41-53. 3 The terms and sigla used in the paper are the following: MT = the Masoretic Text; G or OG = the original Greek of the Septuagint; LXX B or B = the text of the group of manuscripts B 121 509 and in general the majority text; LXX A = the text of the group of LXX manuscripts A 247; LXX L = the text of the group of manuscripts 19 82 93 108 127; AL = the common text of the groups of manuscripts A and L; Hex = the Hexaplaric text; OL = the Old Latin version or text; SyroH = the Syrohexaplaric text; Arm = the Armenian version or the Armenian text; Aeth = the Ethiopic version of the Ethiopic text; T = the Targum or Aramaic version or text; S = the Syriac Peshitṫa version or text; V = the Latin Vulgata version or text; Vrs = the Aramaic, Syriac and Vulgate versions together or some of them; R: Rossi mss; K: Kennicott mss. The rest of the signs follow Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia conventions.
2014
This volume starts to discuss the so far unstudied period from the apparent stabilization of the Hebrew biblical text until the standardization reflected in the manuscripts of biblical text. What happened from the time of the standardization of the consonantic text until the appearance of the first Masoretic codices? How was the biblical text preserved in the meantime? What about the body of notes that makes up the Masorah formed? How to explain the diversity of the textual traditions contained in the Masorah, and last but not least, is it consistent with the idea of a text established and standardized centuries before? Contributors: Emanuel Tov, John van Seters, Arie van der Kooij, Günter Stemberger, Julio Trebolle, Pablo Torijano, Nathan Jastram, Alexander Samely, Willem F. Smelik, Lea Himmelfarb, Yosef Ofer, David Marcus, Elvira Martín-Contreras, Lorena Miralles-Maciá.
The Masoretic Text (M) is the only complete representative of the Hebrew Bible, and its consonantal framework circulated 1,000 years before the medieval components were added to it. This early text, usually named the proto-Masoretic text, 1 is evidenced in the Judean Desert sites other than Qumran, 2 and actually these sites did not yield any text that differs from the medieval M. The amount of agreement between the consonants of proto-M, for example in the Minor Prophets scroll from Murabba'at or all the Masada texts, and the medieval text as represented by Codex L is remarkable. 3 On the other hand, Qumran yielded only texts that are close to M (M-like texts), as well as several additional groups of texts.
In several Scripture books, the Masoretic Text (MT) displays a substantial number of major differences when compared with the LXX and, to a lesser degree, with several Qumran scrolls and the Samaritan Pentateuch (SP). The other ancient versions were translated from Hebrew texts close to MT. The present analysis is limited to variations bearing on literary analysis, usually found in groups of variants. A difference involving one or two words, and sometimes an isolated case of a single verse, is considered a small difference, while a discrepancy involving a whole section or chapter indicates a substantial difference, often relevant to literary criticism. However, a group of seemingly unrelated small differences might also display a common pattern, pointing to a more extensive phenomenon. This pertains to many small theological changes in the MT of Samuel, short renderings in the LXX translation of Ezekiel, etc. Who created these various types of differences between ancient texts? In very broad terms, authors and editors who were involved in the composition of the texts, inserted changes that we characterize today as large differences often bearing on literary criticism. At a later stage, scribes who copied the completed compositions inserted many smaller changes and also made mistakes while copying. However, the distinction between these two levels is unclear at both ends, since early copyists considered themselves petty collaborators in the creation process of Scripture, while authors and editors were also copyists. While readings found in ancient Hebrew manuscripts provide stable evidence, there are many problems on the slippery road of evaluating the ancient versions, especially the LXX. One of these is that what appears to one scholar to be a safely reconstructed Hebrew variant text is for another one a specimen of a translator's tendentious rendering. Literary analysis of the Hebrew Bible is only interested in evidence of the first type, since it sheds light on the background of the different Hebrew texts that were once circulating. The translator's tendentious changes are also interesting, but at a different level, that of Scripture exegesis. Since a specific rendering either represents a greatly deviating Hebrew text or it displays the translator's exegesis, one wonders how are we to differentiate between the two. For almost every variation in the LXX, one finds opposite views expressed, and there are only very few objective criteria for evaluating these variations. Probably the best criteria relate to external Hebrew evidence supporting the