OT Textual Criticism Amateur

OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 07, 2024 at 06:06 UTC

I don't think ChatGPT can produce meaningful citations yet. If asked to produce citations, it cites articles that don't exist. So if you check just one footnote from a paper, that can be a quick giveaway that research was not conducted.

And I show students www.aiweirdness.com/learn-the-bi...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 04, 2024 at 08:38 UTC

In the voice of Dr. Jones Sr. (Sean Connery): "I blocked you on social media so that I wouldn't *have* to remember."

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jul 01, 2024 at 00:52 UTC

How recent is "recent" scholarship depends on the purpose and topic. In some areas, I only need to go back ten or twenty years; in others, I have cited unsuperseded research from the 1710s. If a complete lit review is needed, that might go back a ways. From ANE, Erasmus & humanism are "recent." =-)

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 07, 2024 at 16:06 UTC

Can you maintain both open if you use two different browsers? I have used Firefox and Chrome simultaneously open for a similar purpose.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 04:37 UTC

It seems that I made this more difficult than necessary, however, since Kennicott in 1780 and Gall in 1918 had both noted that SamP Num 2:14 reads דעואל where MT reads רעואל. The source that I had copied and pasted from has the error.
archive.org/details/vetu...
macsphere.mcmaster.ca/handle/11375...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 03:46 UTC

When the transcription of SamP into square script which I found online mirrored MT's inconsistency in De'uel/Re'uel, I became suspicious. Thinking about it more, it makes sense for LXX and Pesh to be influenced by the name Re'uel occurring elsewhere, e.g. Moses's father-in-law.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 03:44 UTC

I wouldn't presume SamP is older than MT in every respect, just as I wouldn't presume MT is older than LXX (or vice versa) everywhere. But I do think SamP's tradition was never in square script, and d/r confusion is harder in Paleo-Hebrew, so SamP's text is less likely affected by d/r confusion.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 03:43 UTC

In which I learned:
(1) Cambridge University Library has posted the oldest known Samaritan Pentateuch manuscript online,
(2) Samaritan manuscript script looks crazy but is really regular, &
(3) with squinting at the Samaritan script Wikipedia page, I can read Samaritan!
bsky.app/profile/ot-t...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 02:33 UTC

I got curious and found a manuscript of SamP here: cudl.lib.cam.ac.uk/view/MS-ADD-...

On image 287 (folio 140r), line 9 from the bottom, I read the father's name as דעואל in Num 2:14 as well, which would make SamP = D always. Since d/r is less confusable in Samaritan script, probably D is original.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 02:05 UTC

If R is original, then LXX and Pesh have no errors, probably an initial r->d error occurred at 1:14, which then propagated by scribes into the occurrences in chapters 7 and 10 (but, oddly, not 2:14). Either way Vulg likely reflects a standardization based on MT Num 1:14.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 02:03 UTC

I don't think we can determine which is original by considering MT evidence alone. If D is original, then how did LXX and Pesh end up with always R? They likely would have misread 1:14 d->r, and which affected all subsequent translations of the name, and an independent d->r in MT Num 2:14. OTOH,

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 02:00 UTC

To broaden beyond just MT and LXX: SamP = MT everywhere (R in 2:14, D elsewhere), unless mis-transcribed Pesh = R everywhere Vulg = D everywhere (even in 2:14!) d/r interchanges are very common in Hebrew and Syriac, less so in Greek, rare in Latin.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 05, 2024 at 01:52 UTC

Why would we expect the tribal ordering in chapter 1 to reflect the ordering of camps in chapter 2? Chapter 2 starts with Judah, whereas chapter 1 starts with Reuben. I look at chapter 1 as mirroring the order in Genesis 35, arranged in birth order by mother, except the last three are disordered.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 03, 2024 at 19:39 UTC

George Lamsa's 1933 translation of the Peshitta was marketed to such Americans, describing the Syriac Bible as "the original Aramaic": en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lamsa_B... And it is still in print and still being purchased for "authentic Eastern insight" by such Americans today.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 03, 2024 at 19:37 UTC

I appreciate your latitude regarding laypeople and scholarly terminology! ;-) There is a swath of American evangelicalism obsessed with "the original" and also obsessed with "the Jews" (e.g. Christian Zionists), for whom "Hebrew (/Aramaic) Gospel" will sound "more original" than Greek. It's weird.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] Jun 02, 2024 at 17:20 UTC

Interesting. Of course Aramaic has geminate->n dissimilation; could this be a related phenomenon? I've noticed a bunch of y->n changes in names in the Peshitta, but I assumed those were graphical errors in Syriac script. I might be able to dig out some if you're interested.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 29, 2024 at 04:51 UTC

In #Nehemiah 10:30 (=10:29 English), where MT reads ʾaddîrēyhem, LXX reads καὶ κατηράσαντο αὐτοὺς. Might this represent Hebrew ʾaddîrûhem, interpreted as an (Aramaic) Aphʿel of ndr? Apparently the verb ndr does not have a hiphʿil form in use in Biblical Hebrew.
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 22:23 UTC

The subtitles (thank you for them!) seem to be glitching in this video, disappearing too fast, reverting to earlier ones, etc... Thank you for posting these interesting videos and commentary!

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 20:14 UTC

I may have spoken too soon about generally increasing trends, as Genesis 29-30 have much less unanimity than the Abraham and Isaac chapters! 7/5

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 20:13 UTC

I was curious to see how robust my previous chart was to selecting different dividing points, so I re-compiled the information with 7 divisions of 40 references each and with 10 divisions of 30 references each (which goes a bit further, to Genesis 30:18), shown here. 6/5

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 18:40 UTC

It is hoped that this shows that there is more variation in which name refers to God in chapters 2-8 of Genesis than in the Abraham and Isaac stories, at least.

I wonder if these sorts of differences in agreement may be a faint echo of compositional processes.

5/5
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 18:37 UTC

I calculated what percentage of each division is unanimous across witnesses. See the chart. Obviously the precise numbers will shift around a bit depending on what divisions one picks for the columns. 4/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 18:30 UTC

Chapters won't work for comparison, because different chapters have different numbers of references to God. Since I've collected just over 280 references to God in Genesis 1:1-28:13, I divided this sample into 8 divisions of 35 references (corresponding to uneven lengths of text). 3/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 18:29 UTC

I'm defining unanimity as all witnesses possess the translation equivalents, except Vulg replacing a second "and God did" with "who did" is merely stylistic, so does not break unanimity. In order to visualize the drop and then upward shift, it is necessary to have units of comparison. 2/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 26, 2024 at 18:20 UTC

Reviving my analysis of names of God in #Genesis, after chap. 1 (all witnesses agree >90%), there is a sharp drop in agreement in the first ten chapters, and then, as we move into the patriarchal narratives, a greater degree of unanimity.
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

1/?
bsky.app/profile/ot-t...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 18:51 UTC

Oh, I'm not presently in the business of making normative claims about what others ought to do (apart from telling the truth, upholding the Constitution, and not killing people, I mean). I'm just trying to understand the transmission of a collection of ancient texts. Others need not be interested.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:19 UTC

But this does mean any attempt to quantify DSS agreement with MT will overstate that agreement, and our interpretation of the DSS evidence as a whole is skewed in favor of the MT. 6/6

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:18 UTC

This means that of the texts circulating at the time the DSS were made, the ones that differ more from MT are unidentifiable, which means we overstate the similarity between DSS and MT. How much? We can't tell. Perhaps not much, perhaps a good deal. 5/6

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:18 UTC

This is less of a problem with the big scrolls, where there's enough content to determine a passage and then see diffs.

But for the many small fragments, our ability to identify their passage depends upon agreeing with MT enough.
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism
4/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:17 UTC

What passage is this? It can be identified as 2 Sam 4:33 only because it agrees with MT. If it had read instead לך וישת (the first line part of וילך, a synonym with MT's ויבא), it never would have been identified as this passage. 3/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:16 UTC

OTOH, our ability to identify which passage a DSS fragment attests is based almost solely on agreement with MT. This skews our interpretation of DSS evidence in favor of MT. For example, one fragment has only six letters divided into two lines (last letter in each line is uncertain): בא וישת 2/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 25, 2024 at 17:14 UTC

There's an interesting asymmetry in using the Dead Sea Scrolls for #HebrewBible #TextualCriticism .

On the one hand, DSS attest to many important variant readings, including substantiating many readings which were merely conjectural until the DSS were read.

1/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 24, 2024 at 18:43 UTC

If you just require footnotes (any format), ChatGPT invents citations to plausible-sounding works that don't exist, so I find that to be an easy detection mechanism.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 24, 2024 at 02:18 UTC

I have earlier posts on Mastodon at mstdn.social/@OT_TC_Amateur in case you are interested. For now I'm dual-posting on both platforms, because Mastodon is a better platform, but more scholars are here.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 24, 2024 at 01:08 UTC

It certainly isn't the only place I've seen that confusion, in part because both verbs are defective/irregular, in ways that sometimes seem to merge (and yods are the most commonly added or dropped letter).

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 23, 2024 at 22:40 UTC

bsky.app/profile/ot-t...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 23, 2024 at 22:31 UTC

Unsolicited diptych

bsky.app/profile/bnuy...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 22, 2024 at 18:09 UTC

Thanks!

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 22, 2024 at 15:37 UTC

Can I ask what text you are quoting here? I'm curious!

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 21, 2024 at 01:27 UTC

One thing I took for granted in graduate school was the presence of curious interlocutors who were willing to learn something new/unfamiliar. At the college which hired me, not so much. And to judge from my field's non-engagement with my book, not generally, which kills motivation for book #2.

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 22:59 UTC

His criticisms are cogent, but his alternative risks devolving into mere intuition, unless he smuggles the rules back in, somewhat chastened, as the principles which give his contextual arguments any logical merit. 2/2

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 22:55 UTC

When I read Emanuel Tov's #TextualCriticism of the #HebrewBible, I looked in vain for guidance about how to prefer one reading over another. Now I know why: he argued in 1982 that rules are useless for evaluating competing readings (Harvard Theological Review 75.4, pp. 429-48).
1/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:51 UTC

Of the six divine names in Genesis 6:22-7:24, none are unanimous in the textual tradition (though 7:16a is close), so it is hard to see this as stable evidence for redactional seams.

(I redid this thread since BlueSky is uncongenial for long threads.)
4/4
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:50 UTC

The two different divine names in Genesis 7:16 (first God, then Lord) almost achieve unanimity! In the former case, the evidence of Pesh is again split, while in the latter OG again reads "Lord God." 3/4

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:50 UTC

SamP swaps to YHWH in 7:5, but OG continues "Lord God" until MT reverts in 7:9. Pesh's evidence is mixed: some manuscripts say each option. Vulg follows MT. But then when MT swaps back to "God" in 7:9, both SamP and Vulg continue with "Lord." (Though OG and Pesh agree with MT's "God" here.) 2/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:49 UTC

Building on this earlier thread, #Genesis 7:1 has long been considered a documentary seam, as the name of God in the story swaps from God to YHWH (in MT).
But Gen. 7:1 is not the swapping point for SamP or OG.
1/?
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

bsky.app/profile/ot-t...

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:30 UTC

Of the six divine names in Genesis 6:22-7:24, none are unanimous in the textual tradition (though 7:16a is close), so it is hard to see this as stable evidence for redactional seams.
4/4
#HebrewBible #TextualCriticism

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:29 UTC

The two different divine names in Genesis 7:16 (first God, then Lord) almost achieve unanimity! In the former case, the evidence of Pesh is again split, while in the latter OG again reads "Lord God." 3/4

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 15:28 UTC

SamP swaps to YHWH in 7:5, but OG continues "Lord God" until MT reverts in 7:9. Pesh's evidence is mixed: some manuscripts say each option. Vulg follows MT. But then when MT swaps back to "God" in 7:9, both SamP and Vulg continue with "Lord." (Though OG and Pesh agree with MT's "God" here.) 2/?

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OT Textual Criticism Amateur @ot-tc-amateur.bsky.social [ View ] May 19, 2024 at 13:22 UTC

#Nehemiah 6:16
Where MT reads wyrʾw (“and they saw”), OG, Pesh, and even Vulg read “and they feared” (#Hebrew wyyrʾw, +/- y).
KJV and NASB follow MT; NIV and NRSV follow the other versions.
#HebrewBible

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