SCRIBAL PRACTICES AND APPROACHE S ... - Emanuel Tov

Scribal Practices and Approaches Reflected in the Texts from the Judean Desert 241
written in the square script, but it is paralleled by the single occurrence of such a waw in the
square script in 4QNum b XXI 28 in Num 27:22 (cf. ch. 5c1).
• The use of cancellation dots/strokes for the correction of mistakes, known from texts
written in the square script (ch. 5c2) and Greek texts (Turner, Greek Manuscripts, index), is not
known from texts written in the paleo-Hebrew script.
• Whereas all texts written in the square script, including the carefully transmitted texts of the
Masoretic family, show scribal intervention in differing degrees (see ch. 5f and col. 11 in
APPENDIX 8), the texts written in the paleo-Hebrew script show virtually no scribal intervention,
neither by the original scribes nor by subsequent scribes or users, with the exception of a few
instances. See § 1a above.
1QpaleoLev: One correction (frg. 3–4 5) in 33 lines.
4QpaleoExod m : An average of one correction in every 197 lines (corrections in XVII 30, 33, and a supralinear
correction in 10 ii 2).
4QpaleoGen-Exod l : An average of one correction in every 105 lines (a linear correction in 24–29 12; a supralinear
correction in 10 ii 2).
4QpaleoDeut r : No corrections in 114 lines.
11QpaleoLev a : An average of one correction in every 66 lines (erasures in E 3 and VI 6).
• No patches inscribed in the square script are known, while the only such patch was attached
to a text written in the paleo-Hebrew script (4QpaleoExod m ). See ch. 4 i.
• The extant fragments of paleo-Hebrew texts display no indentations, such as found in
several texts written in the square script (ch. 5a2). 313
• As a result of the splitting of words between two lines in the paleo-Hebrew texts, almost
straight left margins could be obtained (e.g. 4QpaleoExod m I, VI, IX and all columns of
11QpaleoLev a ). See ch. 4f.
The various paleo-Hebrew texts reflect a common scribal approach with some idiosyncrasies.
• In only two paleo-Hebrew texts (4QpaleoExod m and 11QpaleoLev a ) were large paleo-
Hebrew waws written in the spaces between the sections, when the first word of the following
section would have started with this letter.
• 4QpaleoDeut r is the only paleo-Hebrew text using spacing instead of dots as word-dividers.
See above.
• In three paleo-Hebrew texts, little oblique strokes or apostrophes were written at the ends
of sheets for the drawing of straight lines (2QpaleoLev; 4QpaleoExod m ; an unidentified fragment
on photograph PAM 43.694), but not in 4QpaleoGen-Exod l and 11QpaleoLev a . Cf. ch. 4a.
• Most paleo-Hebrew texts divide the text into sections, separated by spacing at the end of
the section after the last word in the line, and subdivided by smaller spaces in the middle of the
line. In addition, 4QpaleoGen-Exod l employed an even larger division with a space extending
from the last word to the end of the line and including all the following line. See ch. 5a3.
• As in texts written in the square script, most paleo-Hebrew texts use spacing in the middle
of the line for the indication of closed sections (see 1QpaleoLev, 4QpaleoGen-Exod l ,
4QpaleoExod m , 4QpaleoDeut r for clear evidence). On the other hand, the well-preserved
11QpaleoLev a does not use this device.
• 2QpaleoLev is the only text in which word-dividers were also inserted at the ends of lines.
• The same text is the only source in which both word-dividers and guide dots appear at the
ends of lines.
That the writing in two different scripts represents different scribal schools is a likely, but
still unproven, assumption. There is no reason to assume that the Qumranites themselves wrote
313 One such indentation was reconstructed by J. E. Sanderson in 4QpaleoExod m IX 30–31 (Exod 12:20-21) but, due to the
lack of parallels, this reconstruction is unlikely.