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  • From: Harold Holmyard <hholmyard AT ont.com>
  • To: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Pe in the aleppo codex
  • Date: Tue, 30 May 2006 15:50:47 -0500

Dear James,

Thanks for the explanations guys. So, if I understand correctly, a theoretical 'original' version of the completed text would have had no 'pe' at the end of each open verse but rather a line of space in its
place?


HH: I have learned from Marvin Sweeney's Hermeneia commentary on Zephaniah that the biblical system of "open section lines (petuchah) and "closed section" lines (setumah) was a Masoretic convention. Therefore, it says nothing about what the original document from the hand of Isaiah would have looked like. The open section lines marked off a large structural division in the text, and the closed section lines indicated a structural subdivision within a larger petuchah. However, the Masoretes were not always consistent in their use of this system. Perhaps that is one reason why printed editions of rabbinic Bibles (Miqra'ot Gedolot) do not even use petuchah and setumah.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard






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