[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]
Re: orion Autograph vs. copy:
[The following text is in the "ISO-8859-1" character set]
[Your display is set for the "US-ASCII" character set]
[Some characters may be displayed incorrectly]
Roshelle´s is an interesting posting on scribal procedures in the
Greco-Roman world. Anyone seeking further information should have a look
at, among other things, Timothy W. Seid´s Interpreting Ancient Manuscripts
Website, plus some of the more interesting introductions under the heading
of papyrology.
I am, however, unsure of the relevance of Greek and Latin scribal practices
to the study of the DSS or to Hebrew-language parchment and papyrus
documents in general, as it is clear that the scribal practices of the
NW-semitic writing area dominated there, plus that the very evolved systems
of the Greco-Roman world had not yet achieved their equivalent in
Syria-Palestine. There is a difference between staying within the ambit of
the practices observed in the documents at hand and importing distinctions
and expectations foreign to them. This is hardly "reinventing the wheel".
The DSS have already been stretched out of shape by attempts to transform
them into much later rabbinical manuscripts; let us allow them to retain
their proprium as Syrian-Palestinian texts.
Frederick H. Cryer
Assoc. Prof. for Research
Univ. of Copenhagen
Faculty of Theology
Købmagergade 44-46
1150 København K.
e-mail: fc.dss@pop.teol.ku.dk
fax: (045) 35 32 36 52