i heard about this a few years ago. if i remember correctly Yehhezqeil had another vision that showed God's Presence lifting up from Yerushalayim after/during/before the Destruction and heading with the people towards Bavel, that Shadal's emendation is based on.
Unfortunately I don't have access to the text now, so I couldn't post the complete rationale and what exegetical considerations were bothering him. Thanks for the more background info!
He didn't put forth emendations lightly.
Shadal is supposedly the first Jew to suggest emendations to the Bible
re this particular emendation, he was preceded by Hizig by two years, although Greenberg assumes Luzzatto arrived at it independently.
(although he never countenances making them in the text, it must be noted--the above did not lead him to suggest 'correcting' Ezekiel or the Qedusha
well, come on, not too many scholars ever countenance actually changing the text. right? it's all theoretical, saying what the "original" text probably looked like. There's that famous story of Greatz (?) changing it in while reading the haftoro but that remains an exception. at least until the Oxford Hebrew bible comes out.
but re the qedusha part there, Shadal himself goes into a whole discussion there about why it remains as it is
and as a BTW, i found it amusing that Erlich in citing this emendation (approvingly) only cites it in the name of "hakham yehudi ehad" What, was he afraid to name names??
Sorry, as usual, I spoke too soon. Shadal died in 1865, his commentary on Ezek, which was first printed in 1876, was obviously written much earlier. Hizig, whose book was published in 1874 obviously had arrived at the same conclusion independently.
>well, come on, not too many scholars ever countenance actually changing the text. right? it's all theoretical, saying what the "original" text probably looked like. There's that famous story of Greatz (?) changing it in while reading the haftoro but that remains an exception. at least until the Oxford Hebrew bible comes out.
Yeah, I know. I reiterate it here for the benefit of my readers. :)
Shadal worked on Ezekiel for more than 25 years. I think this was one of his early emendations.
So S. would you care to comment re this post?
http://www.avakesh.com/2006/10/
e...nging_lett.html
thanks!
"In addition he vehemently--and irrationally--was oppose to any conjectural emendation of the Torah, but not Nakh."
As you know, Shadal's ninth principle of parshanut asserts that for various reasons--including Hazal's preoccupation with the Hamishah Humshei Torah and the relative freedom with which the later books of Nakh were at one time treated--a few copyist's errors crept into the later books. The corollary to this seems to be that because of the care that Hazal took with the Torah, copyist's errors were much less likely to occur therein. One may contest this idea, but it does not seem all that irrational to me.
That said, I can think of one instance in which Shadal does seem to flirt with an emendation of the Torah text. In Gen. 40:19, Joseph tells the baker, "Yissa Far'oh et roshekha me-alekha," literally, "Pharaoh will lift your head from upon you." Although Shadal himself translates the phrase as "Pharaoh will decapitate you," his comment notes that "some say" that the word "me-alekha" is a scribal error mistakenly repeated from the same word at the end of the verse. Shadal makes it clear that he would have been happier with the reading "Yissa Far'oh et roshekha," which is exactly what Joseph says to the cup bearer in v. 13. Shadal goes on to say that just such a reading of v. 19, without "me-alekha," was found by Giovanni Battista de Rossi (a Christian Hebraist who collected variant readings) in two manuscripts.
In my translation of Shadal, I devote a long footnote to a discussion of why the Massoretic text of v. 19 may be viewed as correct. Nevertheless, this is the closest that Shadal comes, as far as I know, to violating his own rule, "irrational" or not.
Since Y'chezkel's prophecy was in Bavel, and the book was canonized by Anshei K'nesset Hagedola after galut bavel, wouldn't it have always been written in c'tav ashurit?
Dan, thanks for that comment. Most interesting.
By the way, although I did call his unwillingness to emend the Torah irrational, I certainly meant nothing disparaging by it. As you know, Shadal was fiercely opposed to rationalism in religion, so I felt justified in calling it as I see it, confident that I did no injustice to him. Now if he'd have sensed the accusation of intellectual dishonesty he surely would have objected, but one cannot say that it really is rational to maintain that the one book could not by definition contain textual corruptions but the others could.
That said, I do agree that there are better grounds for maintaining that about the Torah than other biblical books, in terms of what the ancient witnesses show vis a vis the Torah vs other biblical books, and the reasonable conclusion that the Torah's text really was--and is--better safeguarded.
Mike, I don't think we can conclude that the cessation of ktav ivri was that abrupt. In fact, all evidence indicates that it was not, rather it was phased out in EY. According to the traditional understanding, anyway, it was Ezra who introduced the ktav ashuri, so Yechezkel's prophecy would still have originally been written in ktav ivri.
Fascinating. Thanks as usual
Tangential, but I'm curious- how did the text of Kedusha become ככתוב על יד נביאך by most people? The Tur states that it should read וכן כתוב על יד נביאך, and many kehillos from Galicia preserved this nusach (it is this way in my siddur).
I imagine that if the MT had read barom, some clever fellow would have come along suggesting that it be emended to baruch. And how would we know whether he was right or wrong?
Berom reads well and wouldn't have raised a question.
In any case, you are right. All sorts of unqualified persons engaged (and to a much lesser extent engage) in conjectural emendations. Note the past tense, because today the uncontrolled excesses of the past has been checked. In fact, as I noted in my post, Shadal apparently was uncomfortable if he was to be used as a vehicle through which the masoretic text would be attacked.
But it needs to be realized that *he* was not unqualified. He was a living concordance of Tanakh and possibly the world's greatest expert on Hebrew of his day. He still holds up well. In addition, his exegesis was very rigorous. He didn't make such suggestions lightly. In fact, he was fully cognizant of an important rule in textual criticism lectio difficilior potior, "the more difficult reading is the stronger," a rule which was widely disregarded for a very long time, but as I said, is more adhered to now. The intent of that rule is to highlight the fact that in copying texts the tendency is to smooth over errors and therefore if an APPARENT error remains in the text there is a good chance that it isn't an error at all, but it only remains to be shown why the difficult spelling or reading is actually the original.
Shadal was mindful of this. If he came across a difficult reading he exhausted his mental resources AND the large manuscript evidence available to him first and only then did he put forth a conjectural emendation. He spent decades on his perushim, refusing to publish them until they were worked over and over again.
In short, he wasn't full of it. It can't be proven if this truly was the original reading, but without a doubt he could not resolve the difficulty with any satisfaction any other way.
>And how would we know whether he was right or wrong?
Not this one, but more than a few conjectural emendations were proved to be real variant readings once the Dead Sea Scrolls were recovered.
IIRC, at another point in Yehezkel the text speaks about the chariot rising (Va-yarom). This would support Shadal. When I taught Yehezkel in Maimoindes School in Brookline in 1970 or 71 I mentioned this interpretation of Shadal. BTW, I have an article on Shadal in Conservative Judaism, 1985.
IIRC, another famous emendation of Shadal was to change Baayam (in Amos?) to Be-Otzem. I don't have a Nakh in front of me, and, unlike my grandfather, I don't know it all by heart.
On DSS: Perhaps the most famous and important emendation supported by the DSS is changing "le-mispar benei Yisrael" (Deut. 32) to "le-mispar benei el."
The traditional respect for the Masoretic text seems a bit strange to me. There are hundrends of variant readings preserved in Talmudic literature. Most of them can be explained as not necessarily representing an actual variant, but there are quite a few that are simply better readings and many that are supported by the Septuagint or other early versions. One would think that this fact would diminish traditional Judaism's respect for the Masoretic text which cannot be dated earlier than the 8th or 9th century.
Ba'yam is in Isaiah.
Regarding this verse in Ezekiel, I heard in the name of Prof. Moshe Greenberg of HU the rueful comment that we have so few quotations of the ministering angels; it's a pity that 50% of them are corrupt!
50% of zero is zero.
Huh?
I think the emendation I was thinking of is to change 'Ha-yaharosh bivkarim" to "ha-yaharosh be-vakar yam."
Based on the paleo-Hebrew drawing, there doesn't appear to be any distinction between a standard "chaf" and a "chaf-sofit". Is that correct? When was that change implemented?
To clarify: What Prof. Moshe Greenberg was referring to was that we have the quote of the angels from Isa. 6 "Kadosh Kadosh Kadosh", but the quote from Yehezkel "Barukh Kevod HaShem mimkomo" is corrupt. A very witty comment.
On the meaning of "Barukh Kevod Ha-Shem mimkomo" see Guide 1:8.
Re "ba'yam / be-otsem": this occurs in Isaiah 11:15. Shadal suggests the emendation because "ba'yam" (bet-ayin-yud-mem) is an obscure word that appears nowhere else, while "be-otsem" (bet-ayin-tsadi-mem) would fit well in the context ("and with his mighty wind (be-otsem ruho) will He shake His hand over the river"). Shadal supports his suggestion by pointing out that in the Samaritan alphabet, the letters "tsadi" and "yud" were very similar and could have been confused by a later copyist.
>Shadal supports his suggestion by pointing out that in the Samaritan alphabet, the letters "tsadi" and "yud" were very similar and could have been confused by a later copyist.
You're a good person to ask: was this a mistake on Shadal's part?
I ask, because while the Samaritan alphabet is descended from paleo-Hebrew (and a Hasmonean-era version of it, according to James Purvis) the two are hardly identical, as any comparison shows. While its true that in Samaritan the tzade and yod look very similar, they really are not that close in true paleo-Hebrew.
Was Shadal just working with an incomplete idea of that paleo-Hebrew looked like, given the fact that most of the inscriptions were uncovered after he died?
Prof Kaplan's article on Shadal is in CJ vol 35 from 1982.
>The traditional respect for the Masoretic text seems a bit strange to me. There are hundrends of variant readings preserved in Talmudic literature. Most of them can be explained as not necessarily representing an actual variant, but there are quite a few that are simply better readings and many that are supported by the Septuagint or other early versions. One would think that this fact would diminish traditional Judaism's respect for the Masoretic text which cannot be dated earlier than the 8th or 9th century.
I'm not sure I agree. First, its a bit incorrect or incomplete to speak of the MT as emerging in the 8th or 9th c. The proto-MT text was the text of rabbinic Judaism going back to antiquity. Although there are variants in the rabbinic literature, it is clear that what would become the MT was the text of the rabbis. The 'project' of the Masoretes was to standardize or perhaps record the 'true' text of Tanakh. I won't even say the true text of rabbinic Judaism, since obviously the Karaites accepted this text as well, and in some respects may have even been at the forefront of the project.
But the work of the Masoretes didn't begin in the 8th or 9th century, rather it reached its fruition then, so there would not have been a perception on the part of anyone that what they produced was a new text. Rather, what they produced was the best text.
As for the better readings preserved in non-Hebrew versions, by their very non-Hebraic nature it should be obvious that they'd have been discounted entirely. WRT Septuagint, it seems that the rabbis considered it an undesirable version; witness the later traditions which were unfavorable toward it, as opposed to the earlier ones in which it was seen as miraculous. Whether the Christian adoption of that text had something to do with it too is anyone's guess. It seems that the Aquila version, which is much closer to the proto-MT was commissioned to replace the LXX as an 'authorized' Greek text.
In short, there has never been a perception in Jewish history that there is something better or more original than the MT. Now that we have DSS we know that MT-like texts were current with LXX-like or Samaritan-like ones.
Also bear in mind that irregularities preserved in the MT were given mystical and homiletical signifigance by traditional Jews. That probably also militated against accepting the possibility of there being better readings (and it must be noted that minority opinions did opine that we really should correct our texts to match variants attested in rabbinic literature).
That's my opinion, anyway.
Re Shadal and paleo-Hebrew: yes, I was aware that tsadi and yod were not as similar in "true" paleo-Hebrew as they were in Samaritan. I can only guess that Shadal was not, and could not have been, aware of this. In his comment to Isaiah 11:15, he equates "[ha-]ketivah ha-kadmonit" with "ketivat ha-shomronim."
A similar problem is presented by his occasional references to Egyptian hieroglyphics, where he relies on outdated scholarship as to their meaning. As far as I can tell, such scholarship may have been outdated even during his lifetime (d. 1865), though apparently it took a while for Champollion's decipherments to gain acceptance among 19th century academics.
I definitely agree that Chazal were not happy with the LXX. However, there are quite a few of the "Rabbinic variants" that are supported by it, giving us two witnesses to those readings.
As you said, the MT represents a standardization of what Chazal considered authentic, but the variants preserved in Talmudic literature indicate that the rabbis were working with a slightly different version than the "standard" MT.
I am aware that there were attempts to adopt the rabbinic variants.משפחת סופרים by S. Rosenfeld is probably the best example. I was just wondering why the variants were never taken as an indication that there is no one completely authoritative rabbinic version, thus allowing even traditional Jews the liberty of engaging in Lower Criticism.
Incidentally, I don't think that it was the non-Hebraic nature of other versions that caused the rabbis to discount them. The Yerushalmi often quotes Aquila, the "frum" translation, as an authority.
Even the LXX, although not considered authoritative, was probably not completely ignored. A friend of mine once suggested that R' Yehoshua's question to R' Yishmael (Mishna AZ 2:5) as to the reading of דדיך in Shir HaShirim may have been influenced by the LXX, which translates it as breasts.
Fascinating. I heard of this from Dr. Steiner in our classes on Biblical Hebrew and the History of Hebrew Phonology. Excellent explanation and discussion. Thanks!
Andy: Thanks for giving the reference my article. Would you be interested in contacting me offline?
berel- is the Mishpachos Sofrim available anywhere in print or on a cd? prof kaplan- Yes. I suppose I could find your email address through McGill U?
Andy: It's
lawrence.kaplan@mcgill.ca
>As you said, the MT represents a standardization of what Chazal considered authentic, but the variants preserved in Talmudic literature indicate that the rabbis were working with a slightly different version than the "standard" MT.
That's true, but I think my response adequately addressed your question about the reverence for the MT. The MT is the text of rabbinic Judaism, even if in earlier stages it is not identical with the text of Chazal. This would hardly be the first case of things which aren't perfectly Talmudic supplanting, or so it seems, the Talmudic view of what the halakhah should be or what the hashkafah should be.
Furthermore, the MT enjoys codification in the halakhic codes.
>I was just wondering why the variants were never taken as an indication that there is no one completely authoritative rabbinic version, thus allowing even traditional Jews the liberty of engaging in Lower Criticism.
Traditional Jews *did* engage in Lower Criticism. All of the books that deal with masorah were doing just that. It just so happens that moveable type printing did a lot to stabilize the text. Once there was a more stable text then ever before, perhaps there came an impression that the text no longer needs 'fixing.'
And in fact perfectly frum Jews do work in lower criticism of Tanakh to this very day, although the 'platonic' Torah text is so uniform today that there is no perceived need to make further changes, except in idiosyncratic circles.
As for the rest of Nakh, such as Shmuel, where the text is more corrupt than the Torah seems to be, the consensus of posekim seems to be that there would be no end if we changed the text, so there ought to be no beginning.
>Incidentally, I don't think that it was the non-Hebraic nature of other versions that caused the rabbis to discount them. The Yerushalmi often quotes Aquila, the "frum" translation, as an authority.
As we said, the LXX wasn't the "frum" translation. It was the Christian version; there already existed many corrupt LXX texts; perhaps Hazal would not have even considered the LXX to be authentic, given 1) that Hazal seems never to have recognized the LXX on Nakh, period and 2) its divergence from Hazal's own tradition of key translations in the original LXX; its divergances from Torah she-be-'al peh-dikke translation, which the Aquila and Targumim apparently corrected.
In addition, although Hazal did recognize Targums, I don't think there's any evidence that they accepted the interpretations as evidence of different readings in the Hebrew text they were based upon, only as interpretations of the text.
>Even the LXX, although not considered authoritative, was probably not completely ignored. A friend of mine once suggested that R' Yehoshua's question to R' Yishmael (Mishna AZ 2:5) as to the reading of דדיך in Shir HaShirim may have been influenced by the LXX, which translates it as breasts.
Could be. Bear in
Bear in mind that as early Tannaim, the LXX might not have yet been repugnant to them (although I think Aquila dates to their period).
>I can only guess that Shadal was not, and could not have been, aware of this. In his comment to Isaiah 11:15, he equates "[ha-]ketivah ha-kadmonit" with "ketivat ha-shomronim."
Re: See http://onthemainline.blogspot.co...brew-
aleph.html
One sees the assumption that ktav ivri and the Samaritan script were the same until even later than Shadal. I've seen that mentioned quite often. Major finds like the Mesha Stele and the Siloam inscription were after Shadal.
Although we should bear in mind that in antiquity the Samaritan alphabet actually did look more or less the same as paleo-Hebrew. The script we are familiar with developed over the ages, gaining calligraphic flourishes etc. On the other hand in all probability Shadal was familiar with the Samaritan script used today, certainly having seen polyglot Bibles written with that script, and probably Samaritan mss too.
Andy -
I doubt it. To the best of my knowledge Vilna 1883 was the one and only printing and I haven't seen it on any CD.
The bulk of the book is just a list of variants. The intresting part is the introduction where he advocates actually adopting them.
Of course with the very Kabbalah that Shadal so disliked, all difficulties fall away. The following explanation is somewhat similar to Shaarei Orah,end of Shaar III and also based on the Pardes.
Kavod refers to the sefirah of Keter (pay atention to the terms, kavod, shem, malchus, and the concept of geula, which proceeds from keter to yesod-malchus complex). Kedusha represents a descent from Keter to Malchus via three stations. Shaarei Orah seems to present three triad possibilites at once but probably the simplest is that Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh refers to the three complexes of 3 sefirot - chabd, chagat, nhy. At the level of malchus, the source in the Keter is already uncognizable and can only be known only by name and not substance. The angels who want to know from where redemption comes into malchus have to suffice with conceding "Blesed is the name of the kavod of his malchus, from its place" (makom is another code name for Keter, see Pardes, Shaar Arachim).
Some time ago I posted the ten principles of Tanakh interpretation of Shadal. Once you consider them carefully, his disinction between emending TOrah text and the prophets becomes mcuh more reasonable. See avakesh.com, On Tanach
Avakesh: One thing is certain: The kabbalistic explanation of the verse is not the peshat.
I used to think like you and distinguish between peshat and other forms of interetation. A satisfactory defintion of peshat has never been rigorously formulated and the debates whether derash is also a form of deep peshat will never be settled.
I used to be a rationalist and believe that logic is greater than feeling. I trusted evident truth more than the deeper sense. I engaged with doubt rather than transcended it.
Now, life has taught me that feeling is more powerful than reason, that faith is stronger than thought and that past a certain age rationalism leads one into blind alleys. On the other hand, feeling alone leads you exactly nowhere.
The real question is how to combine the two. When I learn that, I will be able to explain what peshat is and what it isn't. On my blog I attempt to approach a synthesis of rationalism and feeling by melding images and text.
Kabbala is an attempt to grasp a feeling though thought and describe a deeper reality thorugh a formulation of a mental representation and image. In this fashion, it is also a type of sophisticated peshat.
peshat is contextual.
Avakesh: The fact that one cannot always draw clear dividing lines between peshat and derash does not mean that the distinction between them has no value and that one can't identify some interpretations as being clearly peshat and others as clearly derash.
I don't deny the value of derash. I give a devar Torah in my shul every Shabbos for "shaleshudes," and I generally base myself on derash. But I try to convey to the audience, without hitting them over the head, that the midrash I am citing is derash and not peshat.
>peshat is contextual.
You're a Halivnian.
Why is "raash" translated as rushing, rather than "noise?"
S:
cool. i learned that from someone else.
Halivni doesn't say that peshat is contextual. He says that that is the concept of peshat that the Talmud had in mind when it used the word, as in the famous statement אין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו.
His book Peshat and Derash is based on the thesis that the concept of peshat has evolved, and that the later concept of peshat as literal or simple meaning was unknown to the rabbis of the Talmud.
Does anyone know why Shadal was so opposed to Jewish philosophy?
Because he believed that philosophy was the antithesis of Judaism. In his view there are two systems which are opposing poles. One he termed Abrahamism and the other Atticism. It's like your most parochial elementary school rebbe come alive. ;)
To him, Abrahamism is the pure religion of Avraham which is based on compassion, and it is the basis for Judaism. (Sinai, Torah, mitzvos etc come into play when the family of Abraham becomes a nation and needs a small religion to become a big one.) Atticism, on the other hand, has nothing to do with compassion. It's cold and Machiavelian. It can't possibly be responsible for steering people towards compassion and mitzvot ben adam le-havero.
He was careful to note that these are two paradigms, not that in the real world these cartoonish attitudes are fully present in nations or groups or people which completely embody one or the other. Rather, that which is good and kind in society comes from Abrahamism. That which is cold is Atticism. Philosophy was Atticism.
To Shadal Rashi was an Abrahimist par excellence, while Rambam dressed his Judaism up in Atticism.
In truth, the record shows that the Rambam personally was not a cold elitist at all. On the contrary; he was a compassionate person who treated people exceedingly well. You might say this is proof that philosophy could lead to the good qualities that Shadal ascribed to Abrahamism. Shadal would probably reply that the Rambam's good personal qualities derived from his Abrahimic roots, not from Aristotle.
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