SCRIBAL PRACTICES AND APPROACHE S ... - Emanuel Tov

236 Chapter 7: Special Scribal Characteristics
• Column width: The width of the columns varies from a mere 1.7–2.0 cm in 4QMMT a
(4Q394) 1–2 i–v (re-edited as 4QCal Doc D by S. Talmon, DJD XXI, 157–66) to 7.5–8.0 cm
(reconstructed) for the only comparable text, 4QCal Doc C (4Q326). The scribe of 4Q394 1–2
presented the information in a narrow format, in order to record one piece of information per line,
either a number or a date. Some exceptions are noted, among other things due to the inclusion of
wb (‘in it’) and because of compound numerals written on either one or two lines. 4QCal
Doc/Mish B (4Q321) V is 13.0 cm wide, but that text has a different content. The mentioned
columns of 4Q394 and 4QCal Doc/Mish A (4Q320) are the narrowest among all the Qumran
documents, together with 4QApocryphal Psalm and Prayer (4Q448) with nine lines of 1–3
words (c. 2.7 cm); see ch. 4e.
• Size of sheets: 4QCal Doc/Mish A (4Q320) 4 iii–v is unique: with one sheet of 4.7 cm (col.
iii) and one of 9.8 cm (cols. iv–v), this document presents the narrowest sheets in any Qumran
document. The fact that a calendrical text contains the narrowest sheets from Qumran is not
necessarily connected with the fact that the narrowest columns (see above) are found among
these texts as well.
• Length: The length of these texts cannot be examined easily. The longest preserved text is
4QCal Doc/Mish A (4Q320), while the shortest is probably 4QMish H (4Q329a). The latter
ends with a straight left border without stitching, which is clearly the end of the document, a fact
also shown by the vertical addition in the margin (see n. 151).
• Use of number signs: Number signs are used in three calendrical texts, 4Q320 4Q326, and
6Q17—albeit not for the same categories of numerals—but not in the majority of similar texts.
See ch. 5c9.
• Opisthographs: 4QMish C (4Q324) has on its verso 4QAccount C ar or heb (4Q355). Little
is known about this account which includes a few letters and signs for numerals. This is the only
opisthograph (ch. 4b) among the calendrical texts. The writing on the back probably implies little
with regard to the calendrical texts; it means merely that the verso of this document was used for
another purpose.
• Layout: A special layout is employed in 4QCal Doc/Mish A (4Q320), with each line
beginning with b followed by a number, signifying the day of the month ‘on which’ (-b) a festival
occurs. In contrast, other documents with a similar content do not start each unit on a new line,
but rather present the details in the list as running prose texts: 4QCal Doc/Mish B (4Q321),
4QCal Doc/Mish C (4Q321a), 4QCal Doc C (4Q326).
• Final and nonfinal letters: Within this small corpus, a few final letter forms were used in
medial position in 4Q394 1–2 (cf. ch. 2g).
a. Biblical texts
Since no concrete facts are known regarding the background of the Qumran scrolls, these scrolls
are assumed to be one corpus. In that corpus, little distinction between biblical and nonbiblical
literary manuscripts and, more generally, between sacred and nonsacred literary manuscripts is
recognizable in scribal conventions or precision in copying. A few special features of the biblical
scrolls are nevertheless mentioned below, but these do not amount to a deliberate overall
distinction between the two types of texts.
The analysis shows that the rules for the writing of sacred texts recorded in Massekhet
Soferim and in earlier rabbinic sources are somewhat misleading when detached from the writing
of nonsacred texts, since most details recorded there pertain to writing practices employed in an
identical way in nonsacred texts during the Second Temple period. For example, Sof. 1.15 states