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Re: "Josephus" inkwells?
To Bob Schacht --
You must've missed my original post, which started the Isaiah Errors. Here's
pertinent part sans all my editorializing:
>> But Josephus, as quoted by the Cross article in "Understanding the Dead
Sea
Scrolls," cited the Hebraica veritas dogma in the first century saying, "For
although such long ages have now passed, no one has ventured to add, or to
remove, or to alter a syllable; and it is an instinct with every Jew, from the
day of his birth, to regard them as decrees of God, to abide by them, and if
need be, cheefully to die for them." <<
I remain abidingly curious as to why there seem so little professional
curiosity about the oddities of grammar and crude writing style that even a lay
reader of ancient Hebrew who can make his or her way through the Isaiah Scroll
(a) may notice. It's certainly never been explained, and it's not like were
talking about insignificant fragments.
Someone has suggested that it may have been the work of apprentices, but it
seems a great and expensive undertaking for a group of students to tackle the
entire book of Isaiah. And unlikely as well. Master scribes would not have
allowed them to continue making such a mess of holy scripture any more than a
master carpenter would let a crew of apprentices butcher a pile of good wood.
Here, I've editorialized again ...
David Crowder
El Paso