Biblia Babilónica. Jeremías, and: Biblia Babilónica. Fragmentos de Salmos, Job y Proverbios (review)

Hebrew Studies 31 (1990) 119 Reviews within the biblical period. the implications of canonization. and the transfonnations affecting prophecy in the later period. are dealt with only in passing. if at all. For those who wish to survey the texts in an orderly fashion and can afford the prohibitive price tag. the book may nevertheless be of service. Joseph Blenldnsopp University ofNotre Dame Notre Dame, IN 46556 BIBLIA BABIL6NICA. JEREMiAS. By Amparo Alba Cecilia. Textos y Estudios "Cardenal Cisneros" 41. Pp. xxi + 164. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas. 1987. Paper. BIBLIA BABIL6NICA. FRAGMENTOS DE SALMOS, JOB Y PROVERBIOS. By Alejandro Dfez-Macho. Textos y Estudios "Cardenal Cisneros" 42. pp. lxxiv + 106. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas. 1987. Paper. The second of these works is a final contribution by Alejandro DfezMacho to the understanding of texts with Babylonian pointing which he did so much to advance. It publishes the text of MS 508 A of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. a manuscript which he studied in 1954-1955. The description which he published as a result of that study (in Estudios biblicos 18. 1959) is reprinted as the introduction to the book. The preface. dated 1981. recognizes the valuable contribution of Angeles Navarro in the preparation of the text and apparatus of the edition. without which it could not have been published. An important product of DfezMacho 's industry has thus been preserved for scholars. It is much to be regretted. however. that he did not have opportunity to write a new introduction reflecting the knowledge gained through his continuing studies of MSS with Babylonian vocalization. The MS edited here was evidently copied from a Babylonian manuscript by a Yemenite. who made some additions to the vocalization. Further additions were made by another Yemenite hand. The text (almost half of the book of Psalms and a few chapters from Job and Proverbs) is presented in typescript with the vowel signs added by hand. (Accent signs are not used.) Hebrew Studies 31 (1990) 120 Reviews An apparatus lists consonantal and vocalic variants in Biblia hebraica and in early Babylonian MSS. It also comments on difficult readings in the work of the original scribe (which was not always clear) and gives the changes and additions made by the rather active second hand. The work is somewhat careless. The text shows occasional errors (Pss 71:17, 124:7, Prov 24:17). Variant Tiberian vowelling is quite often not noted in the apparatus (as with pausal vowelling in Pss 68:30, 69:10, 71:3). This may lead to uncertainty in the interpretation of Babylonian signs. Thus the qame$ of the 2ms pronominal suffix may appear before the kaf (ps 69:6) or even before the preceding letter (ps 71:22). It is uncertain, however, whether the vowel sign has been badly placed in these cases, or whether they have not been listed as examples of variant pausal vowelling due to oversight. A survey of the edition suggests that Ofez-Macho's view of the value of the MS relative to the Textus receptus (pp. lx-lxvi) should be modified. For instance, a yod not found in L is often used before a 2ms pronominal suffix . This occurs almost invariably where L has atnah or silluq; 1~ (Prov 25:21) is an exception. This yod is used in sixteen cases before a suffix bound to a noun which is vowelled as feminine singular, including six of eight cases of1m,., in pausal position. This appears to be part of a general tendency to mark pausal vowelling (cf. also such cases as tI'Tl' in Ps 132:9, 16). Manuscripts such as L provide the same information by means of a note that the form is haser-that is, it includes a vowel which could be marked by a vowel letter but, in the standard tradition, is not so marked. (Such notes, as on forms of 1mc~ with pausal vowelling, have no implication for the meaning of the word.) The use both of vowel letters and of notes of this sort no doubt reflects a period before the systematic use of vowel signs, so that Dfez-Macho is correct as seeing it as...