Journal: Tyndale Bulletin
Volume: TYNBUL 71:1 (NA 2020)
Article: Is The Masora Circule, Too, Among The Scribal Habits?
Author: Kim Phillips

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Is The Masora Circule, Too, Among The Scribal Habits?

Kim Phillips

([email protected])

Summary

Research into masoretic biblical manuscripts (MSS) is heavily reliant on our ability to reunite fragments once belonging to the same codex, now separated one from the other in the Genizah morass, and to identify the scribes behind codices whose colophons have been lost. This task is made especially difficult by the fact that the oriental square hand in which these codices were written is highly stereotypical. Consequently, the paleographer must rely on paratextual features: non-textual features that accompany the biblical text itself, which form a kind of fingerprint for each MS or scribe. This article argues that the masora circule (the small circule used in these MSS to link the masoretic notes to the biblical text itself) functions as part of this unique fingerprint.

1. Introduction

Despite the huge amount of labour already invested by dedicated scholars over the past centuries, the work of gathering, describing, and analysing the biblical MSS from the close of the masoretic era is still in its infancy. Consequently, many large questions remain without sufficient data or evidence. Can we specify the nature of the interaction between the Babylonian and Tiberian masoretic traditions? Can we trace out the process of development of the system of masoretic notes? Were the Masoretes Qaraites, Rabbanites, or from either sect? Are the biblical texts from these sects different one from the other, and, if so, in what ways? Are there distinguishable schools of thought and practice among those who claim to follow the illustrious Ben Asher? For that

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matter, when, where, and why did the reputation of Ben Asher become illustrious? What happened to Ben Naphtali? These and many, many other questions – textual/masoretic, codicological, historical, and cultural – are still wide open.

At the most practical level, fully orbed answers to these questions are reliant on two vast prior palaeographic–codicological undertakings: (1) the 25,000 Genizah Bible fragments must be regrouped and individual fragments must be reunited with other fragments from the same codex or scroll;1 (2) in the absence of colophons, individual codices or parts of codices (including the hundreds of early examples in the Firkowich collection) must be allocated, as far as possible, to scribes whose names, dates, whereabouts, and styles are known from other, colophon-carrying, codices.

Regrouping fragments, and identifying the scribe behind uncolophoned codices, is especially difficult in the case of medieval Bible codice...