The Old Testament textual critic should first consider the transmission of the text. Utilizing translations of a text to discover its earliest recoverable form is an especially difficult task and will be discussed in more detail below. These ancient translations such as LXX and the Syriac Peshitta often predate the earliest Hebrew manuscripts that are currently available. However, there are more witnesses to the Old Testament in other languages than there are in Hebrew. This is especially difficult in the context of Old Testament textual criticism due to the fact that many of the books’ early witnesses are in different languages.įor New Testament textual critics, a plethora of Greek manuscripts exist as witnesses to the original text. The art of textual criticism involves the retroversion of texts. In practicing textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible, one must evaluate the variants across all manuscript traditions and then determine what reading is closest to the original. One should be cautious of emphasizing one of these aspects over the other. It is a science because it involves discovering and evaluating errors in a text, but it is also an art because it focuses on emending texts and reconstructing the original. Housman points out that textual criticism, in general, is not exclusively an art or a science.

Unfortunately, there is no step-by-step process for Old Testament textual criticism and no clear path to a text’s earliest recoverable form. The primary goal of textual criticism is to discover the earliest recoverable form of a text. Textual criticism seeks to answer the questions of how and why changes occurred in a text’s transmission over time. How does one determine which of these readings most closely reflects the pen of the original author? What sources are available that enable the textual critic to reconstruct the earliest form of the text? The source which contains the original language of the text says one thing, but the Septuagint and Peshitta are earlier witnesses to the text and may reflect a more original form. The Masoretic Text (MT) reads, “In the days of the judging of the judges,” but the Greek Septuagint (LXX) simply reads, “when the judges judged.” Moreover, the Syriac Peshitta reads, “In the days of the judges.” Though this example is relatively insignificant, it demonstrates the dilemma of the Old Testament textual critic. In the opening words of the book of Ruth, one finds a variety of readings between the textual witnesses. An Introduction to Old Testament Textual Criticism

Textual criticism old testament