B-Hebrew: The Biblical Hebrew Forum

Dear Listees, I wish you a very happy new year.

Please, what is your current opinion of the LXX/MT/DSS text critical problem of Dt 32:43, etc.

Pls see my unlearned opinion etc. at https://vimeo.com/83924606 which forms my mock PhD viva.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Many thanks,

Philip Engmann
PhD cand.

While I no longer have access to my critical editions of the relevant texts, I would say that your methods and conclusions appear sound. Based on your analysis, I would accept your conclusion that the LXX should be accepted as the more original text and should therefore be the source text for modern translations and commentary of this passage. It continues to amaze me that over 50 years after the discoveries at Qumran and nearly 100 years since the deciphering of the Ugraritic texts of Rash Shamra that these materials almost never influence modern Bible translations away from the traditional renderings of the Massoretic text as known almost 500 years ago. This is also like the field of lexicography ignoring works like Biblical hapax legomena in the light of Akkadian and Ugaritic (Dissertation series - Society of Biblical literature ; no. 37) by Chaim Cohen which are almost completely ignored and modern lexicons almost never reflect their conclusions --despite sound, scholarly methods and wide scholarly acceptance.

philipengmann wrote:Dear Listees, I wish you a very happy new year.

Please, what is your current opinion of the LXX/MT/DSS text critical problem of Dt 32:43, etc.

I think they need to be taken on a case by case basis. Not all the MSS are equally good.

One thing I note is that the Qumran MSS tend to add waws and yods by the bucketfull, so those should be discounted. Some of those seem to have made their way into the MT as well.

As for Dt 32:43, we discussed it earlier on this list, and the group conclusion that I remembered is that the DSS variant has the best reading.

Karl W. Randolph.

Ray Harder wrote:While I no longer have access to my critical editions of the relevant texts, I would say that your methods and conclusions appear sound. Based on your analysis, I would accept your conclusion that the LXX should be accepted as the more original text and should therefore be the source text for modern translations and commentary of this passage.

Generally I find that the LXX is inferior to the MT where they differ.

Part of the reason is that it appears that meanings for some of the lesser used words had been forgotten by the time of the LXX and part of it is that translation is almost always inferior to original language documents.

Ray Harder wrote:It continues to amaze me that over 50 years after the discoveries at Qumran and nearly 100 years since the deciphering of the Ugraritic texts of Rash Shamra that these materials almost never influence modern Bible translations away from the traditional renderings of the Massoretic text as known almost 500 years ago.

There are forces affecting translations that don’t exist in language study. That’s one reason I don’t consider published translations as evidence in discussions on this list.

Ray Harder wrote:This is also like the field of lexicography ignoring works like Biblical hapax legomena in the light of Akkadian and Ugaritic (Dissertation series - Society of Biblical literature ; no. 37) by Chaim Cohen which are almost completely ignored and modern lexicons almost never reflect their conclusions --despite sound, scholarly methods and wide scholarly acceptance.

How widely accepted? In the decade I’ve been a member on this list and asking about hapax legomena, this is the first mention that such a resource is even available. Has it been put online (like my mother’s dissertation) or is it behind a paywall or available only as a high priced, dead tree tome (Amazon $125)?

One of the weaknesses of Gesenius and his disciples like BDB and following appears to be an over-reliance on cognate languages to recognize the meanings of Hebrew words. At the same time don’t go the other extreme and ignore them, they have their place. But there are times that I’ve found that readings using meanings from cognate languages give nonsense readings, where there’s not enough evidence from within Hebrew to give meanings. When I come across such examples, I admit that I don’t know what the words mean. Sometimes workable understandings can be derived by looking at etymologies, so only in a few cases am I completely without a clue.

Karl W. Randolph.

Dear Listees,
thank you so much for your feedback. Hopefully, I can face my viva with some confidence.
I am trying to anticipate and prepare for possible questions?

Also in Psalm 40: 7[6] , CV reads, θυσίαν καὶ προσφορὰν οὐκ ἠθέλησας, σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι· whereas CL reads, זֶבַח וּמִנְחָה, לֹא-חָפַצְתָּ-- אָזְנַיִם, כָּרִיתָ לִּי;
To the best of my knowledge, there is no DSS for this text?
Adam Clarke tried to reconcile both texts, but this was unconvincing in my view. And so the OT/NT variant reading remains in many bible translations/versions. I am not convinced that we should simply live with this. What do you think please?

philipengmann wrote: Also in Psalm 40: 7[6] , CV reads, θυσίαν καὶ προσφορὰν οὐκ ἠθέλησας, σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι· whereas CL reads, זֶבַח וּמִנְחָה, לֹא-חָפַצְתָּ-- אָזְנַיִם, כָּרִיתָ לִּי;
To the best of my knowledge, there is no DSS for this text?
Adam Clarke tried to reconcile both texts, but this was unconvincing in my view. And so the OT/NT variant reading remains in many bible translations/versions. I am not convinced that we should simply live with this. What do you think please?

Right, Psalm 40: 7 is not in any DSS.
What is the problem here? Is it ἠθέλησας, σῶμα for א-חָפַצְתָּ-- אָזְנַיִם? It seems to me that the original translator rendered לא־חפצת אזנים as ΟΥΚΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣΩΤΙΑ and this was miscopied as ΟΥΚΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣΩMΑ and then ΟΥΚ ΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣ ΣΩMΑ.
The site https://isbtf.de/easyview_v11/ might be helpful for questions of the NT quoting the LXX.

Karl W. Randolph wrote: Ray Harder wrote:While I no longer have access to my critical editions of the relevant texts, I would say that your methods and conclusions appear sound. Based on your analysis, I would accept your conclusion that the LXX should be accepted as the more original text and should therefore be the source text for modern translations and commentary of this passage.

Generally I find that the LXX is inferior to the MT where they differ.

Part of the reason is that it appears that meanings for some of the lesser used words had been forgotten by the time of the LXX and part of it is that translation is almost always inferior to original language documents.

Please note that I never made a blanket statement like “the LXX is superior to the MT” or “the MT is superior to the LXX” nor would I ever. I was responding to Mr. Engmann’s question accompanied by his online video (which I commend to you as a good example of sound methodology) regarding the textual problem at Dt. 42:23 for which he was seeking feedback. He carefully analyzes ALL of the evidence and concludes in this one instance that the LXX contains the most original reading. His methods and reasoning are sound so I complimented him and said that short of doing my own detailed analysis (for which I simply no longer have the tools) I agreed with his conclusion. He did just what one must do in sound textual criticism and did NOT simply apply some arbitrary standard like “X text is generally superior to Y text and therefore I generally follow X text.”

The LXX and other versions have their place in good scholarly textual criticism. It is clear that the versions sometimes preserve a reading that is from an earlier Hebrew text, but has simply fallen out of the extant Hebrew manuscript tradition. The discovery of the “Dead Sea scrolls” proved this beyond a shadow of a doubt. One can not make the blanket statement that when we have discerned the oldest Hebrew text that we have the “best” text. What are our goals when we analyze texts? Is it to establish the first written tradition of the text at hand? What if the very first scribe made a mistake in transcribing an oral tradition? The simple fact is that textual criticism is methodologically very difficult. I was simply complimenting a young scholar on doing the hard work that is necessary for quality scholarship. (https://vimeo.com/83924606)

Karl W. Randolph wrote: Ray Harder wrote:This is also like the field of lexicography ignoring works like Biblical hapax legomena in the light of Akkadian and Ugaritic (Dissertation series - Society of Biblical literature ; no. 37) by Chaim Cohen which are almost completely ignored and modern lexicons almost never reflect their conclusions --despite sound, scholarly methods and wide scholarly acceptance.


How widely accepted? In the decade I’ve been a member on this list and asking about hapax legomena, this is the first mention that such a resource is even available. Has it been put online (like my mother’s dissertation) or is it behind a paywall or available only as a high priced, dead tree tome (Amazon $125)?

Cohen’s book was positively reviewed in the scholarly literature and I found it to be carefully presented and methodologically sound.

Like most professional publications this is “available only as a high priced, dead tree tome.” Because the publication and scholarly “industries” have grown up together over the last 500 years, the simple fact is that most scholarly publications are expensive. If you are going to participate in good scholarship there is simply no way to avoid this without either paying the high prices for the good stuff or going to the research library regularly. You generally do not find recent, quality scholarly works for free online. The internet has led to large collections of scholarly journals to be grouped together and made available for a much lower fee by subscription. E.g. “Behind a paywall.”

Good scholarship has a price.

Ray Harder wrote:Cohen’s book was positively reviewed in the scholarly literature and I found it to be carefully presented and methodologically sound.

Like most professional publications this is “available only as a high priced, dead tree tome.” Because the publication and scholarly “industries” have grown up together over the last 500 years, the simple fact is that most scholarly publications are expensive. If you are going to participate in good scholarship there is simply no way to avoid this without either paying the high prices for the good stuff or going to the research library regularly. You generally do not find recent, quality scholarly works for free online. The internet has led to large collections of scholarly journals to be grouped together and made available for a much lower fee by subscription. E.g. “Behind a paywall.”

Good scholarship has a price.

Unfortunately, good scholarship almost never gives financial returns to the scholar, and the high prices accrue to the publisher. However, much of that high price is eaten up in the expense of printing a limited run book.

This becomes a problem to those who have neither the big finances to be able to afford the expensive tomes, nor access to a library that carries such. Those like me have to carry on with what we have available. Thanks to the internet, we have at least this discussion group.

There really ought to be a better way to share scholarship.

Karl W. Randolph.

Many universities now put theses online in digital form. That can be a good way to keep up with some areas, and it is usually free.

Kevin Riley

Ken M. Penner wrote:

philipengmann wrote: Also in Psalm 40: 7[6] , CV reads, θυσίαν καὶ προσφορὰν οὐκ ἠθέλησας, σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι· whereas CL reads, זֶבַח וּמִנְחָה, לֹא-חָפַצְתָּ-- אָזְנַיִם, כָּרִיתָ לִּי;
To the best of my knowledge, there is no DSS for this text?
Adam Clarke tried to reconcile both texts, but this was unconvincing in my view. And so the OT/NT variant reading remains in many bible translations/versions. I am not convinced that we should simply live with this. What do you think please?

Right, Psalm 40: 7 is not in any DSS.
What is the problem here? Is it ἠθέλησας, σῶμα for א-חָפַצְתָּ-- אָזְנַיִם? It seems to me that the original translator rendered לא־חפצת אזנים as ΟΥΚΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣΩΤΙΑ and this was miscopied as ΟΥΚΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣΩMΑ and then ΟΥΚ ΗΘΕΛΗΣΑΣ ΣΩMΑ.
The site https://isbtf.de/easyview_v11/ might be helpful for questions of the NT quoting the LXX.

I thought Adam Clarke's explanation was good (http://www.sacred-texts.com/bib/cmt/clarke/psa040.htm).
What is wrong with Clarke's?
These are the kind of errors we see in the MT when compared to DSS: a word for word match, but some rare misspellings of words. I do not know Greek, so I can't follow Ken's argument. A discussion of this on b-greek is here http://lists.ibiblio.org/pipermail/b-gr ... 27504.html