Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Vadym Zhuravlov <Vadym.Zhuravlov AT cern.ch>]

Dear Karl,

>> 1. David is spelled as DWD in "stone" text (lines 16 and 72), and
>> excusively as DWYD in the scroll.
>
>
> We can see this also in Chronicles, indicating that this change was
> occurring already in late Biblical times.

Yes, this is why I was a bit surprised to see the reading DWD in a text 
dated by the end of BCE.

> The S- was already used in the first book, namely Genesis 49:10

I would not take the verse you mentioned as a prove of existence of 
relative particle S- in biblical Hebrew. Such understating of the 
text is not the only possible interpretation.

> Already during the second temple period, it appears that there was an 
> effort of textual criticism, i.e. an attempt to get the most accurate 
> text as possible. The Great Isaiah scroll was written before that 
> attempt, or it was merely a cheap text that did not try to adhere to the 
> most accurate of transcriptions. Since the stone was a late, second 
> temple document, it is possible that Biblical references were written 
> with an eye towards following the Biblical norms, while post Biblical 
> references followed common speech.

I am not sure I completely understand what you mean by "attempt to get the 
most accurate text as possible". I know the story written in Palestinian 
Talmud about three scrolls found in Azarah, and the reading of two scrolls 
was accepted, while the reading of the one was disregarded (Yer. Taan. 
4.2). From this evidence we can derive that there was some effort to 
improve the accuracy of the biblical text, but I would not extend this 
tendency to newly produced non-biblical texts. To be sure that your 
explanation is valid, I would like to see the other "synthetic" text of 
this period where biblical references are written in biblical Hebrew 
and post-biblical passages are written in late language.

Best regards,
Vadym Zhuravlov