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biblia hebraica stuttgartensia

It’s in Pausal Form

Numbers 9:23 (they kept/obeyed)

שָׁמָ֔רוּ (they kept/obeyed) in numbers 9:23 is grammatical in pausal form and, this particular morphological form of the lexeme only appears six times in the Tanakh/Hebrew Bible. If you have access to software with a database of the Hebrew Bible you may be able to run vowel point and accent mark sensitive searches to find all six occurrences of שָׁמָ֔רוּ.

However, did you know that before software was available it was possible to local all six occurrences if you had access to the Masorah or an edition of the Hebrew Bible with the Masorah. What is the Masorah? The Masorah is a very broad ancient corpus of notes concerning various textual and scribal matters of the Hebrew Bible. Some of these notes were written in the margins of Hebrew manuscripts, as notes were written on the top of pages, and much longer notes were often written in the back of the codices of the Hebrew Bible. According to Page Kellly the purpose of the Masorah …

was to safeguard the sacred text from any additions or deletions. The Mp notes function within that larger purpose by providing the reader or copyist instant information in the margin about how a given text feature ought to appear. If the text was found to be contrary to its Mp notes, the circumstances needed investigation in order to ascertain whether an error had occurred. Without Mp notes, errors would not so readily be brought to the attention of the reader or copyist. Although the rubrics marked by Mp notes often appear trivial to the uninitiated, there is actually a fundamental principle at work behind the text features that are annotated. Mp notes mark features in the text where an error could easily be made. Many Mp notes, for example, pertain to vowel letters, which are sometimes present (plene) and sometimes absent (defective), yielding different spellings for the same word. In such cases, the Mp marks the traditional spelling so that a letter will not be accidentally inserted or deleted where it might not be noticed otherwise.

Kelley, Page H., Daniel S. Mynatt, and Timothy G. Crawford. The Masorah of Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia: Introduction and Annotated Glossary. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1998. Print.

Now, If you have a hard copy of the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia you will notice on page 229 (Numbers 9:23) the Massorah Parva (on the left margin) and the BHS masorah magna register (underneath the main text) alert you to important information about verse 23 (the part in the red box).

The Masorah Parva tells us that the phrase על־פי יהוה ביד־משה only occurs 6 times in the Hebrew Bible and that special morphological form שָׁמָ֔רוּ also occurrences 6 times. The Masorah register below tells us where we can find the corresponding lists to the Massorah in the companion Masorah Gedolah volume. List 3053 for שָׁמָ֔רוּ and list 860 for על־פי יהוה ביד־משה .



Intro to Textual criticism

What is Textual Criticism?

Textual criticism is a branch of textual scholarship, philology, and of literary criticism that is concerned with the identification of textual variants, or different versions, of either manuscripts or of printed books…The objective of the textual critic’s work is to provide a better understanding of the creation and historical transmission of the text and its variants.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textual_criticism

What does Textual Criticism look like in real life? Or, what is a simple example of Textual Criticism?

If you happen to have two or more editions of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) take a look at 1 Chronicles 10:1. How does it read? Do you find two consecutive Ethnachta accents as in the first example below or do you see an Ethnachta אֶתְנַחְתָּא followed by a mehuppach מְהֻפָּ֤ךְ as in the second example (the accents are in red)?

Here are 11 common printed editions of the Hebrew Bible worth checking out:

  1. Letteris Hebrew Bible / OT (London 1852) pg. 1290
  2. Ginsburg Hebrew Bible/OT (London 1894 /1998 ) pg. 1698
  3. Snaith Hebrew Bible/OT (London 1958) pg. 1274
  4. KorenTanakh ( Jerusalem 1966)
  5. Biblia Hebraica Kittel (1937)
  6. The Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, Stuttgart 1982)
  7. Breuer Tanach ( Jerusalem 1989)
  8. Art Scroll Tanach (Brooklyn 1996) pg. 1898
  9. Aron Doton, Biblia Hebraica Leningradensia (Peabody, Massachusetts 2001) pg. 1146
  10. JPS Hebrew-English Tanakh 2nd edition ( Philadelphia 2004 ) pg. 1911
  11. Jerusalem Crown (Jerusalem 2004) pg. 8

A check of the above eleven editions reveals that three of the above-mentioned text have the repetitive Ethnachta in 1 Chronicles 10:1. Namely, The Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS), Hendrickson Publishers Biblia Hebraica Leningradensia (BHL) edited by Aron Doton, and the Jewish publication Societies Hebrew-English Tanakh 2nd edition. Because both three above additions (BHS, BHL, and the JPS) are based on the Leningrad Codex if one has access to a facsimile of Leningrad Codex or to digital images of the Codex one should check it out to see if the BHS, BHL, and JPS actually reflect its reading at this point.

image from Accordance Bible Software’s Leningrad Codex photo collection database

Surprisingly a quick check of the image of the Leningrad Codex reveals that the 3 editions mentioned above actually have departed from the reading found in the Leningrad Codex! This means that the alternative reading found in some printed Hebrew Bibles is probably not a true textual variant found in the Leningrad Codex but rather is a modern typo or error that seems to have been introduced when the BHS was being prepared. The BHK the edition before the BHS reads with an Ethnachta אֶתְנַחְתָּא followed by a mehuppach מְהֻפָּ֤ךְ

Biblia Hebraica Kittel (1937)

Okay, this very brief example of a very simple issue demonstrates in part what Textual Criticism is.

What is meant in the BHS Critical Apparatus of Genesis 38:9, 16, 18?

I highly recommend acquiring the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia If you have an interest in the philology of the Hebrew Bible, and let’s be honest who doesn’t? Then you need to aquire a Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (BHS)! Why you ask? Good question! Well, one of the many interesting features of the BHS is its apparatus. For example, if you turn to Genesis 38:9 in the BHS (or page 62) you and you look at the apparatus on the bottom of the page you will find the following: Gen 38:9a sic L, mlt Mss Edd לאֹ

Okay so let’s parse the shorthand notes above:

sic L =(underscores the reading in the Leningrad codex)
mlt =multi / many   Mss=Manuscripts   Edd =Editions

So what? What does that mean?

First of all, this means that Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia diplomatically perseveres the textual reading found in the Leningrad Codex. In other words, לאֹ is present in many Hebrew Bible manuscripts and modern editions of the Hebrew Bible but, the Leningrad Codex has a different reading namely: לֹּ֥א. The nikuddot (vowel points) as wells the ta`amei (accents) in the Leningrad Codes apparently differ from the vast majority of manuscripts. And, it is up to the reader to decide if the Leningrad’s reading represents an alternative tradition, an original reading, a scribal mistake, or a correction. The Leningrad’s reading is similar to one found early in Gen 19:2 but this neither proves nor disproves anything it simply shows that the scribe used this form.

Gen 38:16a sic L, mlt Mss Edd ל sine dageš
Notice, the BHS and L have לִּ֔י
but, many manuscripts and edition have the lamed ‘sine'(without) the Dagesh

Gen 38:18a ut 16a || b ut 16aut= as verse 16

(this probably means that the issue in verse 16 in regards to the Lamed and dagesh is similar to the issue in verse 18)

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