Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Ken Penner <kpenner AT stfx.ca>]

Daniel 12 is not attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls.

 

Ken M. Penner, Ph.D.

Associate Professor, Religious Studies

2329 Notre Dame Avenue, 409 Nicholson Tower

St. Francis Xavier University

Antigonish, NS  B2G 2W5

Canada

(902)867-2265

kpenner AT stfx.ca

 

 

 

From: b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:b-hebrew-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of K Randolph
Sent: Friday, June 28, 2013 12:28 PM
To: Hedrick Gary
Cc: b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Daniel 12:13

 

Gary:

 

On Wed, Jun 26, 2013 at 7:33 PM, Hedrick Gary <GaryH AT cjfm.org> wrote:

 לקץ הימין

 

Why does the Hebrew text of Daniel 12:13 have qetz hayamin (with a final nun) instead of qetz hayamim (with a mem at the end). Shouldn't "end of days" be qetz hayamim?

 

Yes, you are right if the text means “end of days” which the context seems to indicate.

 

It’s possible that this is a copyist error, that early on, before Jewish copyists adopted the Aramaic square characters, someone mistook a mem for a nun. In archaic Hebrew script, those two characters looked quite similar, and if someone was not careful, one could be mistaken for the other.

 

It’s possible that the error came as late as to show up in the DSS, but I think less likely. 

 

Gary Hedrick

San Antonio, Texas USA

 

On the other hand, I don’t understand this passage. It’s possible that he meant to go to the right side. But I don’t know what that means either.

 

Karl W. Randolph.