SCRIBAL PRACTICES AND APPROACHE S ... - Emanuel Tov

Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts from the Judean Desert 131
inserted secondarily, such as the indication of a pause after groups of words, especially in the
middle of the verse, but also in other positions; see the third column in the TABLE in APPENDIX 5
(for the details regarding 8H≥evXIIgr, see Tov, DJD VIII, 11–12). These mid-verse divisions
probably reflect pauses that were natural for a scribe or early reader. A relatively late source such
as P.Oxy. 11.1352 (leather) of Psalms 82–83 LXX (early 4 CE), presenting dicola in spaces after
groups of words, shows how unnatural this tradition (often against MT may have been. The
spacing in P.Oxy. 4.656 of Genesis 14–27 (2 or 3 CE) separating the verbs of speaking from the
direct speech in 15:7a, 9a and in P.Chester Beatty VIII of Jeremiah 4–5 (2–3 CE) before speech in
Jer 4:31 are paralleled by 4QDan a mentioned above and SP to be mentioned below. See also the
high dots preceding or following personal names in accordance with the Greek writing system (cf.
Threatte, Attic Inscriptions, 82, 85) in P.Fouad 266a–c (942, 848, 847) of Genesis and
Deuteronomy (1 BCE), P.Berlin 11766 of Exodus 5–7 (4 CE) as well as the spaces in these places
in 4QpapLXXLev b (1 BCE) and 4Qpap paraExod gr (4Q127).
d. Sam. Pent. In most medieval manuscripts of SP, the ends of verses were indicated with a straight (:) or
oblique (:) dicolon (afsaq), while larger sense units (sections) were indicated by the qis≥s≥ah sign in combination
with a completely empty line (see the analysis in § 3i). Direct speech within a verse would start with two dots level
with the tops of the letters (··), e.g. Gen 3:12, 17. Although all the SP manuscripts derive from the Middle Ages,
the scribal traditions recorded in them probably reflect ancient practices. 185 The SP differs often from the other textual
witnesses with regard to the indication of subdivisions of verses, but these sources may nevertheless be based on a
common exegetical tradition (thus Oesch, Petucha und Setuma, 313). Usually, units ending with an afsaq in SP
equal verses of MT, but sometimes they are larger than the Masoretic verses. On the other hand, examples of larger
verse units as recorded in Tal’s edition (see p. x above) based on MS 6 (C) of the Shekhem synagogue are Gen
2:16b-17; 3:1b-4; 8:6-7; 10:13-14; 19:12-13a. Sometimes, the divisions of verses in SP equal half-verses of MT as
in Gen 1:29a, b; 3:1a, 1b; 3:5a, b.
e. Masoretic accents. Various early written traditions concerning the division of the text into small units
(verses) have come down to us as described above. All these texts are based probably on an ancient reading tradition
that initially was oral. Such an oral reading tradition was put into writing at a later stage, and integrated into the
recording of the accents of MT. Within this tradition, each unit ending with a silluq is considered a verse. 186
According to Revell, an additional, parallel, system for verse division was once operative, visible now only in the
so-called pausal forms, occurring not only at the ends and in the middle of the Masoretic verses, but also in other
positions. 187 When the verse division was still being developed orally, there must have been some lack of clarity in
individual instances. This is alluded to by the rabbinic tradition regarding the five verses in the Torah ‘of undecided
syntactical adhesion’ ([rkh ˆhl ˆyaç) concerning the type of relation between a word and that preceding or following.
These doubts pertain to the divisions at the end and in the middle of these Masoretic verses. 188
f. Different verse divisions in the biblical text quoted in the pesharim? The pesharim from caves 1 and 4 at
Qumran often differ from the Masoretic tradition regarding the scope of the biblical text quoted in the lemmas. Thus,
while the lemmas quoting the biblical text in the exposition in 1QpHab sometimes conform to what is now a verse
in the Masoretic tradition of Habakkuk (1:5, 11, 12, 17; 2:14, 15, 16, 18), more frequently they comprise half-verses
or even smaller segments (1:3a, 3b, 4ba, 1:4bb, 6a, 6b, 10a, 10b, 1:13aa, 13b; 2:3a, 3b, 4a, 4b, 8b, 17a, 17b), oneand-a-half
verses (1:1-2a; 1:6bb-7; 1:12b-13a; 2:7-8a), or stretches of two (2:1-2, 5-6, 12-13, 19-20), or three (1:14-
16; 2:9-11) verses. Similar deviations from the scope of the verses of MT are reflected in the lemmas of 1QpMic
(1Q14), 4Qpap pIsa c (4Q163), 4QpIsa d (4Q164), and 4QpNah (4Q169), and to a lesser degree 4QpHos a (4Q166) and
185 Thus Anderson, Studies; Crown, “Studies. III”; E. J. Revell, “Biblical Punctuation and Chant in the Second Temple
Period,” JSJ 7 (1976) 181–98; Robertson, Catalogue, xxi–xxii, xxv–xxvi, 3. See also Crown, Samaritan Scribes, 80.
186 These verses were not numbered until a system of chapter division was introduced in the copies of the Vulgate in the
thirteenth century by Archbishop Stephen Langton (d. 1228). From the Vulgate, that numbering system was introduced
into editions of the Hebrew Bible as well as in manuscripts and editions of the other ancient versions. For the
differences between the Hebrew editions, see J. S. Penkower, “Verse Divisions in the Hebrew Bible,” VT 50 (2000)
379–93.
187 E. J. Revell, “Pausal Forms in Biblical Hebrew: Their Function, Origin and Significance,” JSS 25 (1980) 165–79.
188 See the discussion in S. Kogut, Correlations between Biblical Accentuation and Traditional Jewish Exegesis:
Linguistic and Contextual Studies (Jerusalem 1994) 33–8 (Heb.); T. Jansma, “Vijf teksten in de Tora met een dubieuze
constructie,” NTT 12 (1957–58) 161–79; M. Breuer, “Biblical Verses of Undecided Syntactical Adhesion,” Leshonenu
58 (1994–5) 189–99 (Heb.).