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  • From: Harold Holmyard <hholmyard3 AT earthlink.net>
  • To: "b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Sopherim and an 'Established' Text
  • Date: Sat, 31 Jan 2009 08:03:38 -0600

(sorry about the duplication; the automatic way b-Hebrew does the reply to the individual rather than the group should be changed)

George,
The Sopherim are believed to have established the text, and
they finished their work in about 300 B.C. So textual evidence of what
existed before their work should not be expected in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

Where are you getting this information from, Harold? I'm not sure we can talk
about an 'established' text in 300 BC. There is a Proto-Masoretic family of
texts, along with the LXX Vorlage, the Samaritan Pentateuch, and other
non-aligned text types. Are you perhaps thinking within the Masoretic
tradition? And if you are, even then, your claim seems to overstate the
situation as best as we can determine it from available evidence.

HH: This was the surprising fact I learned from several sources, that the Massoretes are believed to have handled a text that was already fixed by the Sopherim. I realize that a lot of people disagree with this, but the issue was what the Jewish tradition says about the work of the Sopherim, as a basis for considering what it says about when any emendations might have entered the text. Here is one quote, but the material basically comes from Bullinger, E. W., The Companion Bible. Zondervan Bible Publishers, Grand Rapids, 1974:

http://www.geocities.com/hebrew_roots/html/hr-2-3-02.html

The Massorites were a group of Jewish scholars who copied and handed down the text of the Hebrew Scriptures. However, they themselves did not make the alterations to the text, rather they merely passed on what had been handed down to them by the Sopherim (Soph-ehr-eem Scribes). E. W. Bullinger, in Appendix #30, p. 31, of The Companion Bible, makes the following observation about the relationship between the Sopherim and the Massorites.

"The Text itself had been fixed before the Massorites were put in charge of it. This had been the work of the Sopherim (from saphar, to count, or number). Their work, under Ezra and Nehemiah, was to set the Text in order after the return from Babylon; and we read of it in Neh. 8.8 (cp. Ezra 7.6,11). The men of 'the Great Synagogue' completed the work. This work lasted about 110 years, from Nehemiah to Simon the first, 410-300 B.C.
"The Sopherim were the authorized revisers of the Sacred Text; and, their work being completed, the Massorites were the authorized custodians of it. Their work was to preserve it. The Massorah is called 'A Fence to the Scriptures,' because it locked all words and letters in their places. ..."

HH: Here is another source, the Jewish Encyclopedia:

http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=246&letter=M&search=Masorah#727


>From the statements in Talmudic literature to the effect that there was deposited in the court of the Temple a standard copy of the Bible for the benefit of copyists, and that there were paid correctors of Biblical books among the officers of the Temple (Ket. 106a); from the fact that such a copy is mentioned in the Aristeas Letter (ยง 30; comp. Blau, "Studien zum Althebr. Buchwesen," p. 100); from the statements of Philo (preamble to his "Analysis of the Political Constitution of the Jews") and of Josephus ("Contra Ap." i. 8) that the text of Scripture had never been altered; finally, from the fact that there seem to have been no differences of readings between Pharisees and Sadducees, it may be concluded that the Scriptural text, at least as much as then belonged to the canon, was already fixed, at the latest, about 200 B.C. and perhaps a century earlier.

While the text was thus early fixed, it took centuries to produce a tolerable uniformity among all the circulating copies. This is by no means astonishing when one considers that the standard copy deposited at the Temple could be of benefit only to those who were sufficiently near Jerusalem to make use of it. This was not the case with those living in the Diaspora. When to this is added the carelessness of some copyists, it will not seem strange that as late as the second century of the common era scholars found it necessary to warn against incorrect copies; and the conclusions usually drawn from differences in the late books between the Hebrew text and the Greek version lose much of their force.

HH: Here is another statement to this effect, giving the historical circumstances:

http://www.biblestudy.org/maturart/the-two-gods-of-psalms/introduction.html

In /The Christian Passover/ by Fred R. Coulter we are given a detailed account of the codification of the Old Testament by Ezra the priest. Chapter Fifteen reveals that this codification took place under the most difficult of circumstances! A remnant of the exiled Jewish people had returned to Jerusalem from their captivity in Babylon and other parts of the Medo-Persian Empire. Among these restored exiles were a large number of Levites and priests, whose duty it was to restore the temple service and to teach their brethren the laws of God, lest they fall into idolatry and once more be cast out of their own land. But Manasseh, a Levite and the legitimate heir to the high priesthood, had married the daughter of Governor Sanballat of neighboring Chaldean Samaria. In the sixth century B.C., Manasseh defected to Samaria, taking with him a major contingent of Levites, including many who were of the Aaronic priesthood.

Under the auspices of governor Sanballat, Manasseh and his fellow Levites set up a counterfeit priesthood in their own temple in Samaria. Not only was there a competing "Mosaic" religion in Samaria at this time, but there was also a competing "Mosaic" religion and temple at Elephantine, Egypt, as well as a third temple in the Tran Jordan region, where sacrifices were already being offered to God. To stem this tide of apostasy, Ezra and Nehemiah acted under God's direction and inspiration to preserve the true worship of God as commanded in the Holy Scriptures.

Because Manasseh and his heretical followers also laid claim to the Scriptures, it was with the greatest urgency that Ezra and Nehemiah acted to safeguard the integrity of the Old Testament text. Levitical *Sopherim* were placed in charge of standardizing, updating and translating the Old Testament. It was this group of Levites who compiled the Old Testament as we now know it. The Torah (the first five books) was translated, with special emphasis upon the commands in the book of Deuteronomy, which was updated, copied and sent throughout the Persian Empire. A true chronology of this period places these events between 539 and 512 B.C.

The /Jehovah/ who later became the Christ guided the Sopherim in their work on the Old Testament. At the beginning of His ministry on earth, He placed His seal of approval on the Old Testament text, saying,

"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am
not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you,
*Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise
pass from the law, till all be fulfilled*" (Matthew 5:17-18).

God will not allow any of His words to be lost. Although changes were later introduced into the Old Testament text after the original work of the Sopherim was completed, those alterations were carefully recorded, and the records were preserved and passed down to us today so that we can know the true and authentic words of God.

When the work on the Old Testament text was completed by the Sopherim, the text was passed on to the Massorites. Bullinger states,

"*The Text itself had been fixed before the /Massorites/ were put in
charge of it.* This had been the work of the /Sopherim/ (from
/saphar, /to count, or number). Their work, under Ezra and
Nehemiah, was to set the Text in order after the return from
Babylon; and we read of it in Nehemiah 8:8 (cp. Ezra 7:6,11). The
men of 'the Great Synagogue' completed the work" (/The Companion
Bible,/ Appendix 30).

God will not allow any of His words to be lost.

HH: The following is the old International Critical Commentary, talking about the text of Esther, and saying how all texts go back to a single text produced by the Sopherim:

http://www.archive.org/stream/criticalesthcr13patouoft/criticalesthcr13patouoft_djvu.txt

These are all the descendants of the text of the Sopherim, since Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, that are so helpful in other books, do not exist for Esther. By a comparison of the various forms of the text described thus far, namely, the Tiberian recension, the Babylonian recension, the Peshitto, First Targum, Second Targum, Vulgate and Talmud, it is possible to reconstruct with great certainty the consonantal text from which all are descended. The extraordinary similarity of the MSS. both of the Palestinian and of the Babylonian type a similarity which extends even to the reproduction of errors and exceptional letters and the close agreement of all the Vrss. made since the beginning of the Christian era, prove the thesis of Lagarde to be correct, that all these recensions are descendants from a single prototype, the so-called text of the Sopherim (cf. Anmerkungen zur griechischen Uebersetzung der Proverbien, 1863, pp. 1-2). At some time in the second century the exigencies of controversy with Christians, and the desire to have a fixed basis of discussion between the rabbis, led to the adoption by the Jewish authorities of an official standard codex of the OT. Since that time all copies have been made directly or indirectly from this codex and variant codices have been destroyed. The result is, that no ancient differences of reading have come down to us in this family, but only variants that have arisen since the standard codex was adopted.

Yours,
Harold Holmyard







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