1.
New Testament
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The New Testament is the second major part of the Christian biblical canon, the first part being the Old Testament, based on the Hebrew Bible. The New Testament discusses the teachings and person of Jesus, as well as events in first-century Christianity, Christians regard both the Old and New Testaments together as sacred scripture. The New Testament has frequently accompanied the spread of Christianity around the world and it reflects and serves as a source for Christian theology and morality. Both extended readings and phrases directly from the New Testament are also incorporated into the various Christian liturgies, the New Testament has influenced religious, philosophical, and political movements in Christendom and left an indelible mark on literature, art, and music. In almost all Christian traditions today, the New Testament consists of 27 books, John A. T. Robinson, Dan Wallace, and William F. Albright dated all the books of the New Testament before 70 AD. Others give a date of 80 AD, or at 96 AD. Over time, some disputed books, such as the Book of Revelation, other works earlier held to be Scripture, such as 1 Clement, the Shepherd of Hermas, and the Diatessaron, were excluded from the New Testament. However, the canon of the New Testament, at least since Late Antiquity, has been almost universally recognized within Christianity. The term new testament, or new covenant first occurs in Jeremiah 31,31, the same Greek phrase for new covenant is found elsewhere in the New Testament. Modern English, like Latin, distinguishes testament and covenant as alternative translations, John Wycliffes 1395 version is a translation of the Latin Vulgate and so follows different terms in Jeremiah and Hebrews, Lo. Days shall come, saith the Lord, and I shall make a new covenant with the house of Israel, for he reproving him saith, Lo. Days come, saith the Lord, when I shall establish a new testament on the house of Israel, use of the term New Testament to describe a collection of first and second-century Christian Greek Scriptures can be traced back to Tertullian. In Against Marcion, written circa 208 AD, he writes of the Divine Word, by the 4th century, the existence—even if not the exact contents—of both an Old and New Testament had been established. Lactantius, a 3rd–4th century Christian author wrote in his early-4th-century Latin Institutiones Divinae and that which preceded the advent and passion of Christ—that is, the law and the prophets—is called the Old, but those things which were written after His resurrection are named the New Testament. The canon of the New Testament is the collection of books that most Christians regard as divinely inspired, several of these writings sought to extend, interpret, and apply apostolic teaching to meet the needs of Christians in a given locality. The book order is the same in the Greek Orthodox, Roman Catholic, the Slavonic, Armenian and Ethiopian traditions have different New Testament book orders. Each of the four gospels in the New Testament narrates the life, death, the word gospel derives from the Old English gōd-spell, meaning good news or glad tidings. The gospel was considered the good news of the coming Kingdom of Messiah, and the redemption through the life and death of Jesus, Gospel is a calque of the Greek word εὐαγγέλιον, euangelion
2.
Novum Testamentum Graece
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Novum Testamentum Graece is the Latin name of a compendium source document of the New Testament in its original Greek-language, and the modern day standard for translations and analysis. The first printed edition was the Complutensian Polyglot Bible by Cardinal Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros, printed in 1514, the first published edition of the Greek New Testament was produced by Desiderius Erasmus in 1516. Today the designation Novum Testamentum Graece normally refers to the Nestle-Aland editions, the text, edited by the Institut für neutestamentliche Textforschung is currently in its 28th edition, abbreviated NA28. The Nestle-Aland text is the source for most contemporary New Testament translations. The Nestle-Aland text is also the standard for academic work in New Testament studies, the title Novum Testamentum Graece can also be applied to the United Bible Societies edition which contains the same base text. The Greek text as presented is what biblical scholars refer to as the critical text, the critical text is an eclectic text compiled by a committee that examines a large number of manuscripts in order to determine which reading is most likely to be closest to the original. This view has been criticized by Gordon Fee and Bruce Metzger among others, since the majority of old manuscripts in existence are minuscules, they are often referred to as the Majority Text. The Novum Testamentum Graece apparatus summarizes the evidence for, and sometimes against, while eschewing completeness, this edition does provide informed readers with a basis by which they can judge for themselves which readings more accurately reflect the originals. The critical apparatus is different in the two editions, the UBS4 edition is prepared for the use of translators, and includes fewer textual variants, in 1901, he replaced the Weymouth New Testament with Bernhard Weisss text. In later editions, Nestle began noting the attestation of certain important manuscripts in his apparatus, eberhards son Erwin Nestle took over after his fathers death and issued the 13th edition in 1927. This edition introduced a critical apparatus and began to abandon the majority reading principle. In the apparatus only a few minuscules were included, Kurt Aland became the associate editor of the 21st edition in 1952. At Erwin Nestles request, he reviewed and expanded the critical apparatus and this eventually led to the 25th edition of 1963. The most important Papyri and newly discovered Uncials, as 0189, the great manuscript discoveries of the 20th century had also made a revision of the text necessary and, with Nestles permission, Aland set out to revise the text of Novum Testamentum Graece. Members of the Editorial Committee of the United Bible Societies Greek New Testament comprise, UBS1,1966 Kurt Aland, Matthew Black, Bruce Metzger, uBS2,1968 Kurt Aland, Matthew Black, Bruce Metzger, Allen Wikgren. UBS3,1975 Kurt Aland, Matthew Black, Carlo Maria Martini, Bruce Metzger, the committee consists of Christos Karakolis, David Parker, Stephen Pisano, Holger Strutwolf, David Trobisch and Klaus Wachtel. In all but the Catholic Epistles, the 28th edition of Nestle-Aland reproduces the text of NA27 and presents a critical apparatus. In the Catholic Epistles, the text has been edited in line with the Editio Critica Maior, the result is a change in just over 30 places
3.
Dead Sea Scrolls
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The caves are located about two kilometres inland from the northwest shore of the Dead Sea, from which they derive their name. The consensus is that the Qumran Caves Scrolls date from the last three centuries BCE and the first century CE. Bronze coins found at the same sites form a series beginning with John Hyrcanus and continuing until the First Jewish–Roman War, supporting the radiocarbon and paleographic dating of the scrolls. In the larger sense, the Dead Sea Scrolls include manuscripts from additional Judaean Desert sites, most of the texts are written in Hebrew, with some in Aramaic, and a few in Greek. If discoveries from the Judean desert are included, Latin and Arabic can be added, most texts are written on parchment, some on papyrus, and one on copper. Owing to the condition of some of the scrolls, not all of them have been identified. The practice of storing worn-out sacred manuscripts in earthenware vessels buried in the earth or within caves is related to the ancient Jewish custom of Genizah. The initial discovery, by Bedouin shepherd Muhammed edh-Dhib, his cousin Juma Muhammed, the shepherds discovered seven scrolls housed in jars in a cave near what is now known as the Qumran site. Trever reconstructed the story of the scrolls from several interviews with the Bedouin, edh-Dhibs cousin noticed the caves, but edh-Dhib himself was the first to actually fall into one. He retrieved a handful of scrolls, which Trever identifies as the Isaiah Scroll, Habakkuk Commentary, and the Community Rule, none of the scrolls were destroyed in this process, despite popular rumor. The Bedouin kept the scrolls hanging on a tent pole while they figured out what to do with them, at some point during this time, the Community Rule was split in two. The Bedouin first took the scrolls to a dealer named Ibrahim Ijha in Bethlehem, Ijha returned them, saying they were worthless, after being warned that they might have been stolen from a synagogue. Undaunted, the Bedouin went to a market, where a Syrian Christian offered to buy them. A sheikh joined their conversation and suggested they take the scrolls to Khalil Eskander Shahin, Kando, the Bedouin and the dealers returned to the site, leaving one scroll with Kando and selling three others to a dealer for 7 GBP. The original scrolls continued to change hands after the Bedouin left them in the possession of a party until a sale could be arranged. In 1947 the original seven scrolls caught the attention of Dr. John C, in March the 1948 Arab-Israeli War prompted the move of some of the scrolls to Beirut, Lebanon, for safekeeping. On 11 April 1948, Millar Burrows, head of the ASOR, early in September 1948, Metropolitan bishop Mar Samuel brought some additional scroll fragments that he had acquired to Professor Ovid R. Sellers, the new Director of ASOR. By the end of 1948, nearly two years after their discovery, scholars had yet to locate the cave where the fragments had been found
4.
Vulgate
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The Vulgate is a late fourth-century Latin translation of the Bible that became, during the 16th century, the Catholic Churchs officially promulgated Latin version of the Bible. The translation was largely the work of St. Jerome, who, in 382 AD, was commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Vetus Latina collection of biblical texts in Latin then in use by the Church. Once published, it was adopted and eventually eclipsed the Vetus Latina and, by the 13th century, was known as the versio vulgata or, more simply. The Catholic Church affirmed it as its official Latin Bible at the Council of Trent, the Vulgate has a compound text that is not entirely the work of Jerome. Its components include, Jeromes independent translation from the Hebrew, the books of the Hebrew Bible, usually not including his translation of the Psalms. Translation from the Greek of Theodotion by Jerome, The three additions to the Book of Daniel, Song of the Three Children, Story of Susanna, and The Idol Bel and the Dragon. The Song of the Three Children was retained within the narrative of Daniel, translation from the Septuagint by Jerome, the Rest of Esther. Jerome gathered all these additions together at the end of the Book of Esther, translation from the Hexaplar Septuagint by Jerome, his Gallican version of the Book of Psalms. Jeromes Hexaplaric revisions of other books of Old Testament continued to circulate in Italy for several centuries, free translation by Jerome from a secondary Aramaic version, Tobias and Judith. Revision by Jerome of the Old Latin, corrected with reference to the oldest Greek manuscripts available, Old Latin, more or less revised by a person or persons unknown, Baruch, Letter of Jeremiah,3 Esdras, Acts, Epistles, and the Apocalypse. Old Latin, wholly unrevised, Epistle to the Laodiceans, Prayer of Manasses,4 Esdras, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, and 1 and 2 Maccabees. Jerome did not embark on the work with the intention of creating a new version of the whole Bible, how much of the rest of the New Testament he then revised is difficult to judge today, but little of his work survived in the Vulgate text. Jerome first embarked on a revision of the Psalms, translated from the revised Septuagint Greek column of the Hexapla and he also appears to have undertaken further new translations into Latin from the Hexaplar Septuagint column for other books. But from 390 to 405, Jerome translated anew from the Hebrew all 39 books in the Hebrew Bible, including a further version of the Psalms. This new translation of the Psalms was labelled by him as iuxta Hebraeos, the Vulgate is usually credited as being the first translation of the Old Testament into Latin directly from the Hebrew Tanakh, rather than the Greek Septuagint. Moreover, Augustine in that passage demonstrates his own preference for the Greek thus eliminating any possibility that Saint Jerome translated the OT from Greek. In these letters, Jerome described those books or portions of books in the Septuagint that were not found in the Hebrew as being non-canonical, Jeromes views did not, however, prevail, and all complete manuscripts and editions of the Vulgate include some or all of these books. Their style is markedly distinguishable from Jeromes
5.
Latin Psalters
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The Latin Psalters are the translations of the Book of Psalms into the Latin language. They are the premier liturgical resource used in the Liturgy of the Hours of the Latin Rites of the Roman Catholic Church. These translations are typically placed in a volume or a section of the breviary called the psalter. In the Middle Ages, psalters were often lavish illuminated manuscripts, the Latin Church has a diverse selection of more-or-less different translations of the psalms. Three of these translations, the Romana, Gallicana, and juxta Hebraicum, are ascribed to Jerome. Two of these translations, the Pian and New Vulgate versions, were made in the 20th century, many of these translations are actually quite similar to each other, especially in style, the Roman, Gallican, Ambrosian, and Mozarabic psalters have relatively few differences between them. The concord among these similar psalters is attributable to an original translation from the Greek Septuagint. The New Vulgate psalter, though similar to these, diverges rather more from these traditional psalters insofar as it more closely follows the Hebrew Masoretic text. Two of these psalters stand apart as independent translations from the Hebrew, Jeromes juxta Hebraicum, also called the Psalterium Vetus, the psalter of the Old Latin Bible was used in the earliest days of the Latin liturgy in Rome, under Pope Damasus I. A translation from the Septuagint, it provided the basis for Jeromes first revision of the psalter and this is the version used in the Ambrosian rite. It was made in the middle of the 4th century from the Septuagint and it is similar to the version used in the Ambrosian and Mozarabic rites. The Roman version is used in the Roman Missal, but in the Divine Office, however and it lived on in Britain where it continued to be used until the Norman Conquest in 1066 and in Saint Peters Basilica in Rome and in St. The Versio Gallicana or Psalterium Gallicanum has traditionally been considered Jeromes second revision and this became the psalter of the Vulgate bible, and the basis for Gregorian chant. It is still used today in some monasteries and churches and by traditionalist Catholics and this most influential psalter has a distinctive style which is attributable to its origins as a translation of the Septuagint. Following the Septuagint, it eschews anthropomorphisms, for instance, the term rock is applied to God numerous times in the Hebrew Psalter, but the Latin term petra does not occur as an epithet for God in the gallicana. Instead more abstract words like refugium, refuge, locus munitus, place of strength, or adiutor and this psalter retains many Hebraisms by way of the Greek, the most noticeable being the redundant demonstrative. The relative pronoun is indeclinable in Hebrew, and so is accompanied by a redundant demonstrative and this use is reproduced in the Latin, although Latin has no need for it. For instance, Ps 18,4, quorum non audiantur voces eorum, also Ps 32,12, Beata gens cujus est Dominus Deus ejus, blessed is the nation whose God, its God, is the Lord
6.
Protestantism
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Protestantism is a form of Christianity which originated with the Reformation, a movement against what its followers considered to be errors in the Roman Catholic Church. It is one of the three divisions of Christendom, together with Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy. The term derives from the letter of protestation from German Lutheran princes in 1529 against an edict of the Diet of Speyer condemning the teachings of Martin Luther as heretical. Although there were earlier breaks from or attempts to reform the Roman Catholic Church—notably by Peter Waldo, John Wycliffe, Protestants reject the notion of papal supremacy and deny the Roman Catholic doctrine of transubstantiation, but disagree among themselves regarding the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. The Five solae summarize the reformers basic differences in theological beliefs, in the 16th century, Lutheranism spread from Germany into Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Finland, the Baltic states, and Iceland. Reformed churches were founded in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Scotland, Switzerland and France by such reformers as John Calvin, Huldrych Zwingli, the political separation of the Church of England from Rome under King Henry VIII brought England and Wales into this broad Reformation movement. Protestants developed their own culture, which made major contributions in education, the humanities and sciences, the political and social order, the economy and the arts, some Protestant denominations do have a worldwide scope and distribution of membership, while others are confined to a single country. A majority of Protestants are members of a handful of families, Adventism, Anglicanism, Baptist churches, Reformed churches, Lutheranism, Methodism. Nondenominational, evangelical, charismatic, independent and other churches are on the rise, and constitute a significant part of Protestant Christianity. Six princes of the Holy Roman Empire and rulers of fourteen Imperial Free Cities, the edict reversed concessions made to the Lutherans with the approval of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V three years earlier. During the Reformation, the term was used outside of the German politics. The word evangelical, which refers to the gospel, was more widely used for those involved in the religious movement. Nowadays, this word is still preferred among some of the historical Protestant denominations in the Lutheran and Calvinist traditions in Europe, above all the term is used by Protestant bodies in the German-speaking area, such as the EKD. In continental Europe, an Evangelical is either a Lutheran or a Calvinist, the German word evangelisch means Protestant, and is different from the German evangelikal, which refers to churches shaped by Evangelicalism. The English word evangelical usually refers to Evangelical Protestant churches, and it traces its roots back to the Puritans in England, where Evangelicalism originated, and then was brought to the United States. Protestantism as a term is now used in contradistinction to the other major Christian traditions, i. e. Roman Catholicism. Initially, Protestant became a term to mean any adherent to the Reformation movement in Germany and was taken up by Lutherans. Even though Martin Luther himself insisted on Christian or Evangelical as the only acceptable names for individuals who professed Christ, French and Swiss Protestants preferred the word reformed, which became a popular, neutral and alternative name for Calvinists
7.
Samaritan Pentateuch
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The Samaritan Pentateuch, also known as the Samaritan Torah, is a text of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, written in the Samaritan alphabet and used as a scripture by the Samaritans. It constitutes their entire biblical canon, some six thousand differences exist between the Samaritan and the Masoretic Text. Nearly two thousand of these textual variations agree with the Koine Greek Septuagint and some are shared with the Latin Vulgate. Throughout their history, Samaritans have made use of translations of the Samaritan Pentateuch into Aramaic, Greek, some Pentateuchal manuscripts discovered among the Dead Sea Scrolls have been identified as bearing a pre-Samaritan text type. Samaritans believe that God authored their Pentateuch and gave Moses the first copy along with the two containing the Ten Commandments. They believe that they preserve this divinely composed text uncorrupted to the present day, Samaritans commonly refer to their Pentateuch as קושטה. Samaritans include only the Pentateuch in their biblical canon and they do not recognize divine authorship or inspiration in any other book in the Jewish Tanakh. A Samaritan Book of Joshua partly based upon the Tanakhs Book of Joshua exists, according to a view based on the biblical Book of Ezra, the Samaritans are the people of Samaria who parted ways with the people of Judah in the Persian period. The Samaritans believe that it was not they, but the Jews, modern scholarship connects the formation of the Samaritan community with events which followed the Babylonian Captivity. One view is that the Samaritans are the people of the Kingdom of Israel who separated from the Judaites, others believe that the real schism between the peoples did not take place until Hasmonean times when the Gerizim temple was destroyed in 128 BCE by John Hyrcanus. The script of the Samaritan Pentateuch, its connections at many points with the Septuagint. Manuscripts of the Samaritan Pentateuch are written in a different Hebrew script than is used in other Hebrew Pentateuchs, Samaritans employ the Samaritan alphabet which is derived from the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet used by the Israelite community prior to the Babylonian captivity. Afterwards, Jews adopted a script based on the Aramaic alphabet that developed into the Hebrew alphabet, originally all manuscripts of the Samaritan Pentateuch consisted of unvocalized text written using only the letters of the Samaritan alphabet. Beginning in the 12th century, some show a partial vocalization resembling the Jewish Tiberian vocalization used in Masoretic manuscripts. More recently a few manuscripts have produced with full vocalization. However, many extant manuscripts show no tendency towards vocalization, the Pentateuchal text is divided into 904 paragraphs. Divisions between sections of text are marked with various combinations of lines, dots or an asterisk, the critical apparatus accompanying the London Polyglots publication of the Samaritan Pentateuch lists six thousand instances where the Samaritan differs from the Masoretic Text. However, as different printed editions of the Samaritan Pentateuch are based upon different sets of manuscripts, only a minority are significant, most can be categorized as one of the following types, More matres lectionis in the Samaritan Pentateuch to indicate vowels compared with the Masoretic
8.
Bible
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The Bible is a collection of sacred texts or scriptures that Jews and Christians consider to be a product of divine inspiration and a record of the relationship between God and humans. Many different authors contributed to the Bible, what is regarded as canonical text differs depending on traditions and groups, a number of Bible canons have evolved, with overlapping and diverging contents. The Christian Old Testament overlaps with the Hebrew Bible and the Greek Septuagint, the New Testament is a collection of writings by early Christians, believed to be mostly Jewish disciples of Christ, written in first-century Koine Greek. These early Christian Greek writings consist of narratives, letters, among Christian denominations there is some disagreement about the contents of the canon, primarily the Apocrypha, a list of works that are regarded with varying levels of respect. Attitudes towards the Bible also differ amongst Christian groups and this concept arose during the Protestant Reformation, and many denominations today support the use of the Bible as the only source of Christian teaching. With estimated total sales of over 5 billion copies, the Bible is widely considered to be the book of all time. It has estimated sales of 100 million copies, and has been a major influence on literature and history, especially in the West. The English word Bible is from the Latin biblia, from the word in Medieval Latin and Late Latin. Medieval Latin biblia is short for biblia sacra holy book, while biblia in Greek and it gradually came to be regarded as a feminine singular noun in medieval Latin, and so the word was loaned as a singular into the vernaculars of Western Europe. Latin biblia sacra holy books translates Greek τὰ βιβλία τὰ ἅγια ta biblia ta hagia, the word βιβλίον itself had the literal meaning of paper or scroll and came to be used as the ordinary word for book. It is the diminutive of βύβλος byblos, Egyptian papyrus, possibly so called from the name of the Phoenician sea port Byblos from whence Egyptian papyrus was exported to Greece, the Greek ta biblia was an expression Hellenistic Jews used to describe their sacred books. Christian use of the term can be traced to c.223 CE, bruce notes that Chrysostom appears to be the first writer to use the Greek phrase ta biblia to describe both the Old and New Testaments together. The division of the Hebrew Bible into verses is based on the sof passuk cantillation mark used by the 10th-century Masoretes to record the verse divisions used in oral traditions. The oldest extant copy of a complete Bible is an early 4th-century parchment book preserved in the Vatican Library, the oldest copy of the Tanakh in Hebrew and Aramaic dates from the 10th century CE. The oldest copy of a complete Latin Bible is the Codex Amiatinus and he states that it is not a magical book, nor was it literally written by God and passed to mankind. In Christian Bibles, the New Testament Gospels were derived from traditions in the second half of the first century CE. Riches says that, Scholars have attempted to reconstruct something of the history of the oral traditions behind the Gospels, the period of transmission is short, less than 40 years passed between the death of Jesus and the writing of Marks Gospel. This means that there was time for oral traditions to assume fixed form
9.
Bible translations into English
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Partial Bible translations into languages of the English people can be traced back to the late 7th century, including translations into Old and Middle English. More than 450 translations into English have been written, the New Revised Standard Version is the version most commonly preferred by biblical scholars. Although John Wycliffe is often credited with the first translation of the Bible into English, there were, in fact, the English Bible was first translated from the Latin Vulgate into Old English by a few select monks and scholars. Such translations were generally in the form of prose or as interlinear glosses, very few complete translations existed during that time. Rather, most of the books of the Bible existed separately and were read as individual texts, thus, the sense of the Bible as history that often exists today did not exist at that time. Instead, a rendering of the Bible was more common. Toward the end of the 7th century, the Venerable Bede began a translation of scripture into Old English, aldhelm translated the complete Book of Psalms and large portions of other scriptures into Old English. This is the oldest extant translation of the Gospels into the English language, the Wessex Gospels are a full translation of the four gospels into a West Saxon dialect of Old English. Produced in approximately 990, they are the first translation of all four gospels into English without the Latin text, in the 11th century, Abbot Ælfric translated much of the Old Testament into Old English. The Ormulum is in Middle English of the 12th century, like its Old English precursor from Ælfric, an Abbot of Eynsham, it includes very little Biblical text, and focuses more on personal commentary. This style was adopted by many of the original English translators, for example, the story of the Wedding at Cana is almost 800 lines long, but fewer than 40 lines are the actual translation of the text. An unusual characteristic is that the translation mimics Latin verse, and so is similar to the known and appreciated 14th-century English poem. Richard Rolle wrote an English Psalter, many religious works are attributed to Rolle, but it has been questioned how many are genuinely from his hand. Many of his works were concerned with personal devotion, and some were used by the Lollards, the 14th century theologian John Wycliffe is credited with translating what is now known as Wycliffes Bible, though it is not clear how much of the translation he himself did. This translation came out in two different versions, the earlier text is characterised by a strong adherence to the word order of Latin, and might have been difficult for the layperson to comprehend. The later text made more concessions to the grammar of English. Early Modern English Bible translations are of between about 1500 and 1800, the period of Early Modern English and this, the first major period of Bible translation into the English language, began with the introduction of the Tyndale Bible. The first complete edition of his New Testament was in 1526, Tyndale used the Greek and Hebrew texts of the New Testament and Old Testament in addition to Jeromes Latin translation
10.
Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia
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It is the fourth edition in the Biblia Hebraica series started by Rudolf Kittel and is published by the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft in Stuttgart. Bhs is a revision of the edition of the Biblia Hebraica, edited by Paul Kahle. It originally appeared in installments, from 1968 to 1976, with the first one-volume edition in 1977, the fifth reprint of the bhs was revised and redistributed in 1997. Initial volumes of the Bible Hebraica Quinta have been available for sale since 2004, completion of the project is intended by 2020. The work has been published in 15 fascicles from 1968 to 1976 according to this release schedule taken from the Latin prolegomena in the book. The processing and development of the Masoretic annotations and notes within all editions of the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia was the privilege of Gérard E. Weil, the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia is meant to be an exact copy of the Masoretic Text as recorded in the Leningrad Codex. According to the introductory prolegomena of the book, the editors have accordingly refrained from removing obvious scribal errors, diacritics like the Silluq and Meteg which were missing in the Leningrad Codex also have not been added. The only exception to that is the Rafe diacritic which has been omitted in the BHS due to almost insuperable technical difficulties with its implementation in the typeface. This is not untypical, since almost every Hebrew Bible print edition, like its predecessor the Biblia Hebraica Kittel the BHS adds the letters samekh ס and פ into the text to indicate blank spaces in the Leningrad Codex, which divide the text into sections. One more difference to the Leningrad Codex is the book order, the bhs is composed of the three traditional divisions of the Hebrew Scriptures, the Torah, Neviim, and the Ketuvim. In the margins are Masoretic notes and these are based on the codex, but have been heavily edited to make them more consistent and easier to understand. Even so, whole books have been written to explain these notes themselves, some of the notes are marked sub loco, meaning that there appears to be some problem, often that they contradict the text. The editors never published any explanation of what the problems were, the sub loco notes do not necessarily explain interesting text variants, they are, in the vast majority, only notes on inaccurate word countings/frequencies. See Daniel S. Mynatt, The Sub Loco Notes in the Torah of Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia, Christopher Dost, footnotes record possible corrections to the Hebrew text. Many are based on the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea Scrolls and on early Bible translations such as the Septuagint, Vulgate, the order of the biblical books generally follows the codex, even for the Ketuvim, where that order differs from most common printed Hebrew bibles. Thus the Book of Job comes after Psalms and before Proverbs, the only difference is with Chronicles. Malachi The Ketuvim The Sifrei Emet, the books,14. Proverbs The Five Megillot or Five Scrolls,17, Esther The rest of the Writings,22
