The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls: The ... - josephprestonkirk

JAMES C. VANDERKAM 471
Aramaic language and one is in Hebrew. The copies preserve passages
from all 14 chapters found in the Greek text of Tobit. The largest number
of chapters is represented on the thirty identified fragments of
4QpapTobit a ar: chapters 1–7, 12–14. In addition to these thirty fragments
there are another thirty that have not been identified. 13 Two of the
manuscripts have barely survived: 4QTobit c (= 4Q198) exists in two
fragments, which offer only parts of six verses from ch. 14, and 4QTobit d
(= 4Q199), also available in just two fragments, presents a part of one
verse from ch. 7 and one from ch. 14. Based on the textual evidence,
Fitzmyer concludes that of the 245 verses in Tobit parts of 103 are preserved
in the Aramaic texts from Qumran. 14 In the rare places where the
Aramaic copies overlap, there are some slight differences between them. 15
The relatively extensive Tobit material from Cave 4 makes a significant
textual contribution, but also raises some interesting questions about
the textual history of the book.
Texts of Tobit
4Q196–99 are the first direct witnesses to what most consider the original
language of the book. There are in fact other Semitic copies of Tobit
that have been available for some time—four Hebrew copies and one
Aramaic copy—but these are probably, according to Fitzmyer, secondary
derivatives of the Greek, as are the Syriac, Coptic, Ethiopic, Armenian,
and Arabic versions. 16
Language of Tobit
While a number of scholars had argued in pre-Qumran days that Aramaic
was the original language of Tobit, 17 there were others who preferred a
Hebrew base text. 18 The Qumran copies probably do not render an
absolutely definitive answer to this question, but they point strongly in
the direction of Aramaic as the language in which the work was composed.
to the Dead Sea Scrolls Microfiche Edition [2d rev. ed.; Leiden: Brill, 1995], 45) is not a
copy of Tobit.
13. Fitzmyer, “Tobit,” 1.
14. Idem, “Aramaic and Hebrew Fragments,” 658.
15. Ibid., 664–65.
16. Idem, “Tobit,” 4. Michael O. Wise, “A Note on 4Q196 (papTob Ar a ) and Tobit i
22, ” VT 43 (1993): 566, thinks the medieval copies are retroversions from Latin.
17. For a list of these, see Carey A. Moore, Tobit (AB 40A; New York: Doubleday,
1996), 34n79. See also Fitzmyer, “Aramaic and Hebrew Fragments,” 669n50.
18. Moore, ibid., 34n78. See also Fitzmyer, “Aramaic and Hebrew Fragments,” 670n55.