SCRIBAL PRACTICES AND APPROACHE S ... - Emanuel Tov

202 Chapter 5: Writing Practices
(c) Inverted nunin. The printed editions of MT present inverted nunin (also named nunin m e nuzarot,
‘separated’ or ‘isolated’ nunin) before and after Num 10:35-36, as well as in Ps 107:23-28 (in codex L before vv 21-
26 and 40), cf. Sof. 6.1. The sign in the manuscripts resembles an inverted nun, though tradition also describes it
as a kaph (Lieberman, Hellenism, 40). Actually this sign does not represent a letter, but a misunderstood parenthesis
sign (ch. 5c2), as recognized by Lieberman, Hellenism, 38–43 referring to the antisigma and diple. Indeed, in b.
Shabb. 115b the nunin are called twynmys, ‘signs.’
Sifre Numbers § 84 (p. 80) to Num 10:35 (cf. b. Shabb. 115b–116a) explains the inverted nunin in Num 10:35-
36 as signs removing this section from the context:
When the Ark was to set out . . . There are dots above and below it to indicate that
this was not its correct place. Rabbi says, ‘It is because the pericope at hand constitutes a scroll unto
itself.’ . . . R. Simeon says, ‘In the written version there are dots above and below it
to indicate that this was not its correct place.’ And what ought to have been written instead of this
pericope? ‘And the people complained in the hearing of the Lord’ (Num 11:1).
However, when their meaning was no longer understood, these signs came to be denoted by the Masoretes as
inverted nunin. While the appearance of the inverted nunin in Ps 107:23-28 in codex L is unclear, their occurrence in
Num 10:35-36 is in accordance with the scribal tradition of the Judean Desert texts, since this section was described
by Sifre as not having been written in ‘its correct place.’ The use of parenthesis signs, reflecting the antisigma and
sigma from the Alexandrian scribal tradition, is also documented in Qumran texts; see above, § c2. The section
enclosed by parenthesis signs in the Masoretic manuscripts is more extensive than the samples known from the
Qumran scrolls, but the principle is the same.
While the Masoretic manuscripts use the inverted nunin in Num 10:35-36, according to Sifre Numbers § 84 to
those verses (cf. b. Shabb. 115b–116a) these words were dotted. These two traditions are actually not contradictory.
Just as the Qumran manuscripts used different systems for canceling elements (cancellation dots, crossing out with a
line, parenthesis, erasure), the rabbinic tradition of cancellation dots and the evidence in the manuscripts of
parenthesis signs reflect two alternative systems of deletion.
(d) The extraordinary points (puncta extraordinaria). In fifteen places in Scripture, all the medieval manuscripts
of MT denote dots above certain letters and words and in one place (Ps 27:13) also below them. 266 Ten of these
instances are found in the Torah (Sof. 6.3), four in the Prophets, and one in the Hagiographa. The earliest list of
these instances is found in Sifre Numbers § 69 to Num 9:10 (the ten instances in the Torah) and the full list is in
the Masorah magna on Num 3:39. In each of these instances, the scribes of the original manuscripts, which later
became MT, intended to erase the letters, as in the Qumran manuscripts; for the latter, see § 2 above.
Although later tradition explained these dots as indicating doubtful letters (see the detailed discussion by
Strack, Prolegomena, 88–91; Blau, Masoretische Untersuchungen, 6–40; Ginsburg, Introduction, 318–34; Butin,
Nequdoth; Lieberman, Hellenism, 43–6; and S. Talmon, ‘Prolegomenon,’ to Butin, Nequdoth, all quoting rabbinic
sources), or as reflecting a hidden meaning in the text, the Qumran parallels (ch. 5c2) leave no doubt that the
original intention of these dots was the cancellation of letters. Accordingly, the traditional term wyl[ dwqyn (dot(s) on
it, scil. the letter or word) is more appropriate than the term used in scholarship ‘puncta extraordinaria.’ Indeed, the
wording in