Paragraphing In A Tibero-Palestinian Manuscript Of The Prophets And Writings

In his catalogue of Hebrew and Samaritan manuscripts in the National Library of France, Hermann Zotenberg gave a very summary description of the manuscript B.N. h´ebreu 80. John Revell was the only one who bothered to check whether paragraphing in such Tibero-Palestinian manuscripts is in accordance with the Palestinian fragments. In Palestinian manuscripts paragraphing is often different from that of Leningrad Codex (LC). It is absolutely certain that the scribe of BN was acquainted with the Tiberian Masoretic tradition. Therefore it is not right to claim the term 'Proto-Tiberian' or 'Pre-Masoretic' for this category of manuscripts. Like other Palestinian and Tibero-Palestinian codices BN is a carelessly written manuscript, probably only intended for personal study. This introductory chapter compares the differences between the paragraphing in the Book of Isaiah according to LC and BN with that in a number of other medieval Hebrew manuscripts.Keywords: Book of Isaiah; Hebrew Bible; John Revell; Leningrad Codex (LC); Paragraphing; Prophets; Samaritan manuscripts; Tibero-Palestinian codices; Tibero-Palestinian Manuscript; Writings