Within this period the Scriptures were divided into sections for synagogue usage (the Law and the Prophets, see, further, below), into paragraphs (myen5) and verses (?).*
(6) Massoretic period, A.D. 600-800. After the canonization of the official consonantal text the greatest care was taken that it should be trans- mitted with complete genie hence it was studied in respect to all its peculiarities, and these were noted down in a series of marginal notes called Massorah (7100). These notes embraced such particulars as calling attention to peculiar letters, giving the number of words or letters in each Bonk, and the middle word or letter, and especially in noting variant readings (the Keré), the latter being based upon the testimony of MSS, or required for religious reasons, or demanded by the connexion of the passage. All these features were a continuation and preservation of the work of the scribes. In addition to these notes, with the same end in view, and especially to render the OT readable to the people, vowel points fixing the traditional pronunciation were ΕΗ to the con- sonantal text, and asystem of punctuation (accents) extending to each word, marking off the verses. Thus finally appeared the present Massoretic text, of which the oldest MSS are of the 9th and 10th cents,t (Fora description of the most ancient MSS, ef. Ginsburg, op. cit. pp. 469-778). All Hebrew MSS represent essentially this Massoretic text, which was first printed, the Psalms 1477, the Pentateuch 1482, both at Bologna, and the entire Heb. Bible at Soncino 1488. The most important subsequent
rinted Hebrew Bible is the edition of Jacob ben
hayim, with the Massorah, at the Bomberg Press, Venice, 1524-25. All subsequent editions, so far as they are Massoretic, follow this standard edition (Ginsburg, op. cit. p. 976) until we come to two recent attempts to furnish an exact Massoretic text, that of Baer and Delitzsch, Beenie (not yet panes) and that of Christian D. Ginsburg, London, 1894. (For ancient versions of the OT see articles SEPTUAGINT, SyRIAC VERSIONS, TARGUM, and VULGATE; for modern textual criticism see below). [On printed editions of Hebrew text, οἵ. Buhl, Canon and Text of the OT, § 25; et R: cit. pp. 779-976 ; Weir, Short Hist. of the Heb.
ext, p. 129 ff]. 2. Dee or Regard and Interpretation.—(a) Early Rabbinic and Talmudic period, B.C. 400-A.D. 700. —The Law was always regarded in the Jewish Church as of a higher inspiration than the rest of the OT. It was Yeliaved to contain the original revelation of the Divine will, while the Prophets and the Writings only contained the same will further eleveved = yet these latter were equally Holy Scriptures with the former, and were cited with the same formula (in the NT they are quoted as the Law, Ro 3”, 1 Co 14, Jn 10% 12%15%). The early reverence for the Law is illustrated in Ps 1. 197! 119 (Ps 1 may have been written in reference to the Deuteronomic law). Both the Law and the
* On the point of verses authorities differ. They are men- tioned in the Talmud, but may be those of oral tradition (cf. JQR, vol. i. p. 224f.; Briggs, op. cit. p. 174; W. H. Green, Gen, Introd, to the OT Text, N.Y., 1899, p. 148f.).
t When a MS became old it was religiously destroyed, lest through its mutilation the sacred word might be violated. This explains the lack of earlier MSS.
OLD TESTAMENT 599
Prophets at the time of Christ, and probably from near the time of their canonization, were reaf each Sabbath day in the synagogue ; the former in lessons arranged to complete the Law once in three years.* The lesson from the Prophets was not rescribed. The Hagiographa were not read regu- arly, except the five ΠΣ on the appropriate feast days. Schools were established (as early as the century before Christ) for the instrue- tion of children in the Scriptures, especially the Law ; and such study was finally held to precede
every other duty (Weber, Die Judische Theologie,
Ε 30). The punctilious observance of the Law came the evidence both of patriotism and piety, and the constant endeavour was to apply the Law to every exigency of life, and to justify every cherished institution or notion by some word of the OT.
_ Such applications or interpretations or inquiries into the meaning of the ΞΟΠΡΌΩΣΟΒ were called midrashim (sing. midrash, e772 trom σι ‘to seek’). In them was sought not what a passage might declare according to the natural tenor of its words (although this method of interpretation was re- cognized, called peshut vv»), but the inferences that might be drawn by combination with other passages, by suggestion, or by allegory. Thus arose a great body of midrashim of two sorts, legal and homiletical ; the former called Halakhéth (sing. halakha, 12> from 77 ‘to go’), the latter Hagga- doth (sing. haggadd, 735 or 73x from 733 Hiph. ‘to tell’). These midrashim were handed down orally and not compiled in writing until the 2nd cent. A.D., when they appeared, especially the Hala- khoth, in the Mishna (Talmud).} This oral tradi- tion or interpretation was held to be necessary for an understanding and keeping of the Law, and was assumed to have been given in great part by Moses, and thus gradually, beginning as early as the time of Christ, if not a century or two before, it usurped the place of the Scriptures, becoming of equal and, according to some, of superior authority (Weber, op. cit. ὃ 22, p. 88ff.).§ It is fre uently referred to in the NT (Mt 15*%8 Mk 73 5-8 913, Cf. Mt 23"), and its character is well illustrated in the prohibited labours on the Sabbath. These, which are parucalarized only in a few instances in the OT, are praplified in the Mishna into thirty-nine prohibited labours, each of which is still further analyzed and discussed.