THE MASORETES OF THE MASORETIC TEXTS

THE MASORETES AND THE HEBREW TEXT 

By Reginald (Reggie) Lisemby

The Masoretes were the Jewish custodians of the Hebrew Scriptures, a coterie of genius attempting to preserve the Hebrew Biblical Text. It was the Masoretes who gave us the modern vowels and pointings used in Hebrew today. The Masoretes invented a system of detailed punctuation non-existent before the 5th Century, and the Masoretes revised the vowel and accent system given to Moshe and Ysrael. However, these guardians of scripture were not inspired by the Holy Ruach/Spirit as the biblical authors, and therefore they incorporated their biases and traditions in the vowels and pointings? The Masoretes over corrected and even intentionally altered the Hebrew Biblical text by the placements of vowels that would detour or redefine a word and in doing so, often reinvented the text(s) and their meaning.

The term "Hebrew" was used for the early patriarchs, Avraham, Yitzchak, and Yaaqov, and was the term used before they became Yisrael, and before the term Yehudi or Jew. Being a Hebrew meant one belonged to a certain ethnic group, and as all ethnic groups, Hebrew was also a term for a language. This is suggested in the Prologues to Sirach near c. 180 BC. The Hebrew language was written with consonants only, no vowels, and was considered a sacred language (Kelly, 4). The scribes came to be called Sopherim meaning, both, to write and to count because they counted the consonants, words, and verses of the text, one sure way to preserve the spelling and wording of the text (“Masoretes”). The one responsible for training such an elite group was Ezra and his team of scholars, called Sopherim.

With Ezra’s return from exile to Beit Ysrael ("House of Israel”) a group of scholars returned with him settling [back] in the land following the Babylonian captivity. Ezra is responsible for his biblical scroll and may also be responsible for authoring other books, like the Chronicles and Nehemiah. Ezra is also the one responsible for the canon of the TeNaK or what Christians call the Old Testament. Ezra, the father of the scribes, is further responsible for the transliteration of the Hebrew Scriptures into Aramaic, the everyday language then being spoken by Jewish people who had lived 70 years in Babylon. These Aramaic paraphrases of the Hebrew bible came to be called the Targumim, and the scribes were the translators (Goldberg, 10). These influential teachers and interpreters of the Law were responsible for ensuring that the spelling and wording of the Hebrew text did not change. Near 500 AD a new Hebrew scholar emerged to assume the responsibility of preserving and transmitting the biblical scriptures and also to develop a system for an Aramaic speaking Judaism to be able to read the difficult consonantal Hebrew TeNaK. These scholars called the Masoretes invented a system of vowel pointing’s and accent marks to assist the new learners to their native tongue (Scott, 7) and superimposed this system upon the original Hebrew texts. Those who lent the vowel points and accents were called Nakdanim or “pointers.” These vowel pointing’s and accents were penned under, above, and within the existing text. 

The Masoretes also composed notations or Massorah meaning, “to bind,” handed down as sort of a ‘fence’ to protect the meanings of texts. This Massorah became tradition and are listed to this day in the margins of the Hebrew text which supplied exegetical and text critical information (Scott, 7). These annotations at the top and bottom of the page were called Masoreh Magna and those at the end of individual books were called Masorah Finalis (Kelley, 436). Again, those who provided the Masora were the Masoretes. The last stage for these scholars was to fixate and preserve the vowel pointing’s in a tradition of pronunciation, vocalization, and writing (“Masoretes”). The scholar might be working on any one of the three assignments, thus, the work of all came to be under one title, Masoretes. 

The work of the Masoretes was over a five hundred year period, AD 500-1000, but, were the vowel pointing’s preserved from antiquity or were they the biased invention of the Masoretes? Elijah Levita (1549 AD) in his thesis, The Massoreth Ha-Massoreth of Elijah Levita, Being an Exposition of the Massoretic Notes on the Hebrew Bible (London, 1867) defended the lateness of the pointing’s, that the vowels pointing’s are not ancient; he is credited for the resolution as to the question of the historicity of the pointing of the Hebrew. However, his dissertation was and still is strongly opposed by many, in particular those who held and hold to a deeply-rooted belief in the Zohar, the masterpiece of the Hebrew Kabbalah (Chiesa, 5). The Zohar argues that the punctuation was communicated to Moshe who received the Law on Sinai. The Law could never be changed after this event not even by Moshe, not the least point in a single letter (Chiesa, 5). According to David Kimhi (1160-1235 BC) Moshe received the punctuation on Sinai. Moses b. Isaac [sic] of England (12 Century AD) specifies, “you must know that the points had been given on Sinai; I do not mean that the Tables of the Law had been pointed, but that whoever was listening to the Creator, speaking in the Holy Tongue, could distinguish between all the vowels and the syllables, both short and long (Scott, 5). His thesis suggests that the vowel pointing’s became Oral tradition and were handed down just as the commentary of scripture was handed down.

Moses ben Yom-Tov of London (1929) ascertains that the punctuation was indeed given on Sinai and was Oral Law, but was forgotten by Israel until the time of Ezra. The Karaite writer, Judah Hadassi (1075-1160 AD) supposes the Tables of Law were engraved with pointing of both vowels and accents and any inscription of scripture without them are defective. Others, like Azariah De Rossi rival this claim with another proposal, that Moshe did not write down the pointing’s (though given to him by God) so that the Law might be interpreted in the seventy known languages of that time (Scott, 6). Hai Gaon (1037 AD) on the other hand gave the following testimony: We have not heard that the scroll of the Law was provided with points when it was given to Moshe on Sinai. The punctuation had not been given on Sinai, but the sages introduced it as an aid for reading, and we are not allowed do add anything to the text, from our knowledge, lest we transgress the prohibition against, ‘you shall not add’ (Deut. 4:2). Accordingly, the scroll of the Law is not pointed, and although the division of the verses and the cantillation according to the meaning have been traditionally transmitted from Sinai to this day, as it is written (Neh.8:8), nevertheless this tradition is an oral one, not given my means of written marks of punctuation (Scott, 8).

Many at the time of the Reformation also believed that the vowel marks and other signs of the Hebrew MSS were as antiquated as the consonants. There was much dispute between the Catholics and the Protestants of the 18th century. Reformation scholars opposed Levita (above) and his challenge and refutation of the antiquity of the vowel markings. In Switzerland, 1678 a Law was even passed that no person should be licensed to preach the Gospel in their churches unless he accepted the integrity of the Hebrew text including the origin of the vowel points and accents (“Text”).

History is one’s engagement with the past and is subjective. All history too much or too little is biased, the problem of reconstructing history adequately (Wells, 7). The historicity of the pointing’s of the Hebrew must be handled with exactness and weighty evidence, every reasonable polemic appraised. Whether vowel signs or accent signs were first introduced into the text, one cannot easily determine. The earliest Biblical manuscript already shows a fully developed system of vowel and accent marks. The Talmud, however, does not mention either vowels or accents, but only the atnahta which refers to a pause or rest.

The names of the vowel signs are used in a Geniza fragment, Qaraite Lists of Terms written, in the opinion of N. Allony in the Eighth century (Allony, 1964), but not mentioned until the mid-Ninth Century. This suggests that the vowel and accent signs were introduced near the close of the Talmudic era AD 600 to about AD 750 (Yeiven 164). According to the International Organization for Masoretic Studies (IOMS) and the Society of Biblical Literature, Hebrew vowels did not exist in the 5th century, yet at the beginning of the 8th century the first vowel signs appeared. Jacob of Edessa (AD 710) testified that, “vowel sounds are thick or thin. Again, every word, that is, every member of a clause – where it is thick or broad in vowel sound there it takes a point above the line; whereas it if fine or thin it takes a point below...” (IMOS, 22) Evidence seems indisputable in favoring the late date invented by the Erudite Elijah Levita in the subject if studied separate from its apologetic and theological implications. This evidence is based on the knowledge of or lack of knowledge of the diacritical signs of Jerome (4th Century) or the Talmud (5th Century). There is preferable historical and theological symmetry when taking into the account the legacy of the Masoretes. 

As already stated, the great concern for many Jews living in Israel and in Babylon (under Arab rule) was the reading of the Hebrew text of the Bible convinced that the Word of God should be read and understood in the most correct language (Kahle, 84). Safeguarding the correct reading of the Biblical text was one of the principal aims of the Masoretes. With centers in the east (Babylonia) and the west (Tiberias, Israel) the Masoretes worked hard to preserve the consonantal text, to develop a vocalization system, a cantillation system, and with notes, that is, the Masoreh. The Masoretes created a model text of the Hebrew Bible: 

“This system stood before us as a ‘bolt from the blue,’ nobody was able to say how it came into being, how it developed. It was like a miracle for which only one explanation could be given. The pronunciation of the Hebrew as fixed by the Masoretes was handed down by them unanimously and exactly in the form in which it was transmitted to them, and by the long chain of trustworthy transmitters every guarantee was given that they had fixed the text exactly as sit was read form time immemorial in the golden days when the Temple was still in existence and services were held there (Kahle, 85).

With the discovery of the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls there has been the verdict that the Masoretic Text contains many samples of grammatical patterns not found in later Hebrew, but verified in Ugaritic from 1400 BC. It is thought because of evidence by many scholars that the vowel pointing’s and accenting is from an ancient system of pronunciation and interpretation preserved by the Masoretes (“Text). Material preserved in the Cairo Geniza also allows us to look beyond the complex system of punctuation fixed by the Masoretes and compare old fragments as one develops an understanding of how their (Masoretes) system was developed. According to Kahle there is a definite dissimilarity between the pronunciation of Hebrew before and after the work of the Masoretes. Hebrew was never pronounced the same way anywhere, but the Masoretes supposedly replaced in many cases a pronunciation of Hebrew which they regarded as lax and inaccurate with a pronunciation they thought to be more correct, a classical Hebrew, just as the Arab readers tried to improve their Koran by accommodating the reading to the ideal Arabic. This is shown by Kahle in three examples (1) the pronunciation of gutturals; (2) the pronominal suffix of the 2nd person singular masculine; (3) the pronunciation of the BGDKPT consonants (t p k d g b). This was done with Arabic and Syriac influence (Kahle, 87-103).

The work of the Masoretes was lengthy extending over a period of about five hundred years, and the business was of comparing manuscripts, and debating whether to eradicate or establish certain variations –with their difficulties of the consonantal text inherited from the scribes. Near 1000 AD there was a Textus Receptus agreed upon in the Western tradition (the Tiberian tradition) which became the leader, the Eastern of Babylonian system, by the time of the Middle Ages, disregarded and banished for about one thousand years (Scott, 8). The reason for the superiority of the ‘Palestinian’ system was the persuasion that the Tiberians wrote with purity of language and were the most refined purists of all the Jews, opposing others who “do not know Hebrew except by means of literary tradition” (Chiesa, 17). A differenced in punctuation was certain.

In conclusion, it appears that we are somewhat governed by the late origin of vowel pointing’s by the Jewish custodians of Old Testament scripture, and can suspect that in most cases, the majority of cases, the vowel points are true to the original meaning of the author. There is, however, many cases of which one may argue for a better and more accurate interpretation. Gleason L. Archer illustrates such passages in his book, Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties which interesting enough are all messianic texts. That is to say, that the Masoretes may have intentionally pointed Hebrew terms and phrases away from being too messianic. as the Gospel writers herald. Ernest Wurthwein gives several ground rules for competent textural correction (80-81) should a text be determined or questioned. First, it is unacceptable to reject the Masoretic Text and other witnesses that present the same reading. Let it stand, of course. Second, preference should be given the MT when there is a variation from it by questionable sources. Third, if the reading of the MT is not plausible and is doubtful or impossible, one might give careful considerations to the other witnesses. Fourth, when neither the MT or another witness gives a credible reading, conjecture may be the unwanted course. Fifth, one must take notice of the psychology of the scribe in observation of the rest of his writings.

Other Notes on the MASORETES

• Need arose for Jewish community to have and maintain a standardized Torah for Jews in
  Israel (small) and diaspora (huge); a universal Jewish Bible
• AD 500ish Rabbinic scholars were chosen; came to be called Masoretes from Masora,
  meaning “tradition.” Tradition is KEY in their work, not inspiration!
• Goal was to uphold the traditions of the Jewish people, not to preserve the Bible (the Bible was already preserved [although without vowels])
• Masoretes attempted to create a consistent book by creating [their] rules for the unvoweled text; they invented vowels for articulation and reading, not theology.
• Masoretes consisted of two primary groups, “Western Palestinian,” and “Eastern Babylon.” Western Palestinian concentrated in Tiberias had two thoughts: Ben Asher and Ben Naphtali.
• 930 AD Aaron Ben Moshe ben Asher produced the first complete OT Bible, called the Aleppo Codex.
• Stated earlier was a need arose for Jewish community to have and maintain a standardized Torah for Jews in Israel (small) and diaspora (huge); a universal Jewish Bible, the reason being Greek and Latin were competing for supremacy. The Jews wanted their own academic Hebrew language and universal thought.Vowels were invention from oral tradition, a way for them to preserve pronunciation of words, but also superimpose their beliefs (traditions) in that preservation.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Archer, Gleason L. Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982
Chiesa, Bruno. The Emergence of Hebrew Biblical Pointing: The indirect Sources. Frankfurt am Main: Land, 1979
Goldberg, Louis. Our Jewish Friends. Chicago: Moody Press, 1977 Kahle, Paul. The Cairo Geniza. London: Oxford, 1947
Kelley, Page H. A Handbook to Biblical Hebrew: An Introductory Grammar. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. 1994
IOMS. International Organization for Masoretic Studies: Masoretic Studies 1. New York: KTAV Publishing House, Inc. 1974
“Masoretes.” The Anchor Bible Dictionary. Vol. 4 1992 ed
Scott, William R. A Simplified Guide to BHS. Berkeley, California: Bibal, 1987 “Text.” The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. 1988 ed.
Wells, Ronald A. History Through the Eyes of Faith. San Francisco: Harper, 1989 Wurthein, Ernest. The Text of the Old Testament. New York: MacMillian, 1957.