The Proper Name of the CREATOR
Part 10: The Companion Bible’s Appendix 32
By Ken Burns
Appendix 32 of The Companion Bible presents “the 134 passages where the Sopherim altered ‘Jehovah’ to ‘Adonai’” (http://www.therain.org/appendixes/app32.html), as well as some passages in which the Sopherim changed “Jehovah” (i.e., YHWH, “Yahweh”) to Elohim (i.e., “God”). This seemingly straightforward Appendix raises several interesting issues important to our study of the proper name of the CREATOR, such as: (1) who the Sopherim were, (2) what the Massorah is, and (3) the accuracy of the list of 134 passages given in The Companion Bible.
The “Sopherim”
Who were “the Sopherim?” Appendix 30 of The Companion Bible-which is also available on the Internet (http://www.therain.org/appendixes/app30.html)--states that the word “Sopherim” comes from the Hebrew verb saphar, meaning “to count” or “to number.” The Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible (http://www.blueletterbible.org/freeoffer.html#strongs) indicates that the word saphar (Strong’s #5608) occurs in the Old Testament as: (1) a verb--with the meanings of “to count,” “to recount,” or “to relate”; and (2) a masculine noun--with the meanings of “enumerator” (i.e., one who counts or lists), “muster-officer,” “secretary,” or “scribe.” “Sopherim” is a transliteration into English of the plural form of the masculine noun, and thus has the basic meaning of “scribes.” [And saphar is translated as “scribe(s)” in 50 of its 161 occurrences in the Old Testament of the King James Version.]
Appendix 30 goes on to state: “The Sopherim were the authorised revisers of the Sacred Text [i.e., of the Hebrew Bible].” It also says:
Their work [i.e., the work of the Sopherim], under Ezra and Nehemiah, was to set the Text in order after the return from Babylon; and we read of it in Nehemiah 8:8 1 (compare Ezra 7:6,11). The men of "the Great Synagogue" completed the work. This work lasted about 110 years, from Nehemiah to Simon the first, 410-300 B.C.
The two verses cited above from Ezra chapter seven both contain occurrences of the noun form of saphar:
Ezra 7:6a, 11:
This Ezra went up from Babylon; and he was a ready scribe [“scribe” is saphar] in the law of Moses, which the LORD God of Israel had given: . . .
Now this is the copy of the letter that the king Artaxerxes gave unto Ezra the priest, the scribe [saphar], even a scribe [saphar] of the words of the commandments of the LORD, and of his statutes to Israel.
“The Massorah”
Appendix 32 twice refers to Ginsberg’s work titled The Massorah as the source of the list of 134 passages in which YHWH (“Yahweh”) in the Hebrew text was changed by the Sopherim to Adonai (“Lord”). According to The Columbia Encyclopedia, Sixth Edition (2001), C. D. [Christian David] Ginsburg (1831-1914) was an English Hebrew scholar who was born in Warsaw (Poland), converted to Christianity in 1846, settled in England, and published a number of works on the Hebrew Bible and other topics. (http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/G/Ginsburg.asp).
Appendix 30 (http://www.therain.org/appendixes/app30.html) states the following concerning the “Massorah” (also spelled “Masora”) about which C. D. Ginsburg wrote his title:
All the oldest and best manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible contain on every page, beside the Text (which is arranged in two or more columns), a varying number of lines of smaller writing, distributed between the upper and lower margins. This smaller writing is called the Massorah Magna or Great Massorah, while that in the side margins between the columns is called the Massorah Parva or Small Massorah. . . .
The word Massorah is from the root masar, to deliver something into the hand of another, so as to commit it to his trust. Hence the name is given to the small writing referred to, because it contains information necessary to those whose trust the Sacred Text was committed, so that they might transcribe it, and hand it down correctly.
Appendix 30 continues:
The Text itself had been fixed before the Massorites [also spelled “Masorites,” “Masoretes,” and “Massoretes”] were put in charge of it. This had been the work of the Sopherim. . . . This work lasted about 110 years, . . . 410 - 300 B.C.
The Sopherim were the authorized revisers of the Sacred Text; and, their work being completed, the Massorites were the authorized custodians of it. Their work was to preserve it. The Massorah is called "A Fence to the Scriptures," because it locked all words and letters in their places. It does not contain notes or comments as such, but facts and phenomena. It records the number of times the several letters occur in the various books of the Bible; the number of words, and the middle word; the number of verses, and the middle verse; the number of expressions and combinations of words, &c. All this, not from a perverted ingenuity, but for the set purpose of safeguarding the Sacred Text, and preventing the loss of misplacement of a single letter or word.
This Massorah is not contained in the margins of any one MS. No MS. contains the whole, or even the same part. It is spread over many MSS., and Dr. C. D. Ginsburg has been the first and only scholar who has set himself to collect and collate the whole, copying it from every available MS. in the libraries of many countries. He has published it in three large folio volumes, . . . [emphasis added]
According to the British Library Integrated Catalogue (available online), the publication information for this title is:
Ginsburg, Christian David. The Massorah compiled from Manuscripts, alphabetically and lexically arranged by C. D. Ginsburg. (3 vol., London, 1880-85, folio)
The Companion Bible’s Appendix 93 (http://www.therain.org/appendixes/app93.html) refers to “Dr. C.D. Ginsburg's four large folio volumes, which contain the Massorah . . .” [emphasis added]. Other publication data concerning Ginsburg’s title The Massorah indicates that a fourth volume was published by 1905. For example:
Ginsburg, Christian D. The Massorah Compiled from Manuscripts Alphabetically and Lexically Arranged. [Reprint.] The Library of Biblical Studies. New York: KTAV, 1975. 4 volumes. ISBN: 087068020X Originally published 1880-1905.
The following information may provide a source for this Ginsburg title on CD-ROM:
Dabar Bible Tools, Inc. is offering a copy of C. D. Ginsburg's four volume translation of the Hebrew Massorah notes on CD-ROM. This is a great opportunity for the deeper student of God's Word to research important Hebrew interpretation Notes of God's Word originally included in the oldest Hebrew Old Testament manuscripts. These Massorah Notes lock the Scriptures and were missing from the Hebrew manuscripts which the translators of the King James Bible consulted in their translation. (Recommended for advanced study by those familiar with Biblical Hebrew).
Dabar Bible Tools
P.O. Box 5
Metamora, MI 48455
Appendix 30 then points out the vital importance of Ginsburg’s work to biblical studies:
When the Hebrew Text was printed, only the large type in the columns was regarded, and the small type of the Massorah was left, unheeded, in the MSS. from which the Text was taken.
When translators came to the printed Hebrew Text, they were necessarily destitute of the information contained in the Massorah; so that the Revisers as well as the Translators of the Authorized Version carried out their work without any idea of the treasures contained in the Massorah; and therefore, without giving a hint of it to their readers.
This [i.e., The Companion Bible] is the first time that an edition of the A.V. has been given containing any of these treasures of the Massorah, that affect so seriously the understanding of the Text. . . .
Some of the important lists of words which are contained in the Massorah are also given, viz. . . . the 134 passages where they [i.e., the Sopherim] substituted Adonai for Jehovah (see Ap. 32); . . .
For further information on the Massorah see Dr. Ginsburg's Introduction to the Hebrew Bible, . . .
According to the British Library Integrated Catalogue (available online), the publication information for this title is:
Ginsburg, Christian David. Introduction to the Massoretico-critical edition of the Hebrew Bible.
pp. xii. 1028. Trinitarian Bible Society: London; Wien [printed], 1897. 8o.
The publication data for the reprinted edition of the Ginsburg title is:
Ginsburg, Christian. Introduction to the Massoretico-Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible. With a prolegomenon by Harry M. Orlinsky: The Masoretic text: a critical evaluation. (New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1966). Li, 1028 p. 24 cm. ISBN 0870680609
For a modern source of (brief) information on the Massorah, see the reference under "Masora" at Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/html/m/masora.asp.
The Accuracy of the List(s) in Appendix 32
A careful comparison of the verses presented in Appendix 32's list of the “134 passages . . .” either with the main text of The Companion Bible or with the Hebrew text reveals several problems. For example, the word “Lord” does not occur in Ps. 35:3 in the King James Version (KJV), and neither YHWH nor Adonai occurs in the Hebrew text underlying the KJV. Another example is Gen. 18:31. “LORD” occurs marked with an asterisk in the main text of The Companion Bible (meaning that the Sopherim declared in the Massorah that YHWH originally occurred in the Hebrew text), but the verse is not given in Appendix 32. If this verse is added to the list in Appendix 32, then there would be 135 “passages” in which the Sopherim changed YHWH to Adonai. And there are other problems with this list (e.g., Ps. 37:12, in which “Lord” does not occur in the KJV). What is the cause of these problems?
The problems seem to be due to errors that arose during the process of copying the lists of verses from Ginsburg’s work titled The Massorah over into The Companion Bible’s Appendix 32. The following statement is made in that Appendix:
The official list given in the Massorah (§§ 107-15, Ginsburg's edition) contains the 134.
The New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures - With References (New York: Watchtower Bible and Tract Society of New York, 1984) also apparently contains Ginsburg’s 134-item list. Appendix 1B, titled “Scribal Changes Involving the Divine Name,” states:
Following is a list of these 134 places, according to Gins. Mas, Vol. I, pp. 25, 26, [section] 115:
Ge 18:3,27,30,31,32; 19:18; 20:4;
Ex 4:10,13; 5:22; 15:17; 34:9,9;
Nu 14:17;
Jos 7:8;
Jg 6:15; 13:8;
1 Ki 3:10,15; 22:6;
2 Ki 7:6; 19:23;
Ezr 10:3;
Ne 1:11; 4:14;
Job 28:28;
Ps 2:4; 16:2; 22:30; 30:8; 35:17,22,23; 37:13; 38:9,15.22; 39:7; 40:17; 44:23; 51:15; 54:4; 55:9; 57:9; 59:11; 62:12; 66:18; 68:11,17,19,22,26,32; 73:20; 77:2,7; 78:65; 79:12; 86:3,4,5,8,9,12,15; 89:49,50; 90:1,17; 110:5; 130:2,3,6;
Isa 3:17,18; 4:4; 6:1,8,11; 7:14,20; 8:7; 9:8,17; 10:12; 11:11; 21:6,8,16; 28:2; 29:13; 30:20; 37:24; 38:14,16; 49:14;
La 1:14,15,15; 2:1,2,5,7,18,19,20; 3:31,36,37,58;
Eze 18:25,29; 21:9; 33:17,20;
Da 1:2; 9:3,4,7,9,15,16,17,19,19,19;
Am 5:16; 7:7,8; 9;1;
Mic 1:2;
Zec 9:4;
Mal 1:12,14.
We restored the original reading in 133 places and rendered it as "Jehovah." The only exception is Ps 68:26, where BHK [i.e., Biblia Hebraica edited by Rudolf Kittel] and BHS [i.e., Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia] already have the Tetragrammaton [i.e., YHWH]. . . .
The New World Translation’s Appendix 1B also states:
Gins. Mas, Vol. IV, p. 28, [section] 115, says: "We have seen that in many of these one hundred and thirty-four instances in which the present received text reads Adonai in accordance with this Massorah, some of the best MSS. and early editions read the Tetragrammaton, and the question arises how did this variation obtain? The explanation is not far to seek. From time immemorial the Jewish canons decreed that the incommunicable name is to be pronounced Adonai as if it were in writing *19! [Adho-nair] instead of %0%* [YHWH]. Nothing was, therefore, more natural for the copyists than to substitute the expression which exhibited the pronunciation for the Tetragrammaton which they were forbidden to pronounce.”
There are ten (10) differences between the list of 134 “passages” given in Appendix 32 of the Companion Bible (CB) and the list of 134 “places” given in Appendix 1B of the New World Translation of the Holy Scriptures (NWT). These differences (i.e., verses) will be examined in detail below. Appendix 32 of the CB states that the places where the Sopherim changed YHWH (“Yahweh”) to Adonai (“Lord”) are printed “LORD” (i.e., in small capital letters) in the main text, and marked “with an asterisk in addition to the note in the margin, to inform the reader of the fact.” The Hebrew word(s) in the Hebrew text underlying the King James Version (KJVHT) and in the Hebrew text underlying the New International Version (NIVHT) will also be given below. In addition, Rotherham’s Emphasized Bible (EB)-which also drew on Ginsburg’s Massorah material-is cited below when it has relevant information on the given verse].
Gen. 18:31: The KJV has “Lord”;
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have Adonai;
The main text of the CB has “LORD*”;
App. 32 of the CB omits this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT includes this verse
Ps. 22:19: The KJV has “LORD” (indicating YHWH occurs in the Hebrew text);
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have YHWH, rather than Adonai;
The main text of the CB has “LORD*”;
App. 32 of the CB includes this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT omits this verse
Ps. 35:3: “Lord” is not in this verse in the KJV;
Neither the KJVHT nor the NIVHT has either YHWH or Adonai;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
App. 32 of the CB includes this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT omits this verse
Ps. 35:23: The KJV has “my God and my Lord”;
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have “(my) Elohim and (my) Adonai”;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
App. 32 of the CB omits this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT includes this verse
Ps. 37:12: “Lord” is not in this verse in the KJV;
Neither the KJVHT nor the NIVHT has either YHWH or Adonai;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
App. 32 of the CB includes this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT omits this verse
Ps. 37:13: The KJV has “Lord”;
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have Adonai;
The main text of the CB has “LORD*”;
App. 32 of the CB omits this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT includes this verse
Ezek. 21:9: The KJV has “the LORD” (indicating YHWH occurs in the Hebrew text);
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have Adonai;
The EB states: “Some cod. (w. 3 ear. pr. edns. [1 Rabb.]): ‘My Lord Y.’-G.n.”;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
The CB marginal note says: “the LORD = Jehovah . . . Some codices, with three
early printed editions (one Rabbinic in marg.), read Adonai”;
App. 32 of the CB omits this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT includes this verse
Ezek. 21:13: The KJV has “the Lord GOD” (indicating Adonai Yahweh in the Hebrew text);
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have Adonai Yahweh;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
App. 32 of the CB includes this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT omits this verse
Ezek. 33:20: The KJV has “Lord”;
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have Adonai;
The EB has “Lord” with a note indicating the Hebrew word is adhonay;
The main text of the CB does not have “LORD*;
App. 32 of the CB omits this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT includes this verse
Ezek. 33:29: The KJV has “the LORD” (indicating YHWH occurs in the Hebrew text);
Both the KJVHT and the NIVHT have YHWH;
The EB has “Yahweh” with no note;
The main text of the CB has “LORD*”;
App. 32 of the CB includes this verse;
App. 1B of the NWT omits this verse
In summary--but without my having access (yet) to an actual copy of Ginsburg’s (very rare) title The Massorah--it appears to me that the list given in the NWT is correct, and that there are a few errors in Appendix 32 (and in the main text) of the CB. In other words:
1. Add the following verses to the 134-passage list in Appendix 32 of the CB:
Gen. 18:31; Ps. 35:23; Ps. 37:13; Ezek. 21:9; Ezek. 33:20
2. Delete the following verses to the 134-passage list in Appendix 32 of the CB:
Ps. 22:19; Ps. 35:3; Ps. 37:12; Ezek. 21:13; Ezek. 33:29
Words of Caution
I trust that this present article strongly illustrates the importance of attention to detail in biblical research. There are also two other concerns I would like to mention at this point.
First, if you make the time to check each of the 134 places where C. D. Ginsburg says the Sopherim removed the personal name of the CREATOR (i.e., YHWH, “Yahweh”) from older Hebrew manuscripts and replaced it with the title Adonai (i.e, “Lord”), I trust you will notice that several of those changes have very significant impact on the meanings of the verses in which the changes are said to have occurred.
Second, you should know that at least some modern scholars do not accept Ginsburg’s assertion that the Sopherim replaced YHWH with Adonai in Hebrew manuscripts older than those known to Ginsburg in 1880. For example, Professor Lawrence Schiffman, Chair of the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University, recently stated concerning Ginsburg’s 134-item list:
In vol.4 Ginzberg [sic] correctly translated the heading of the first list, for the Pentateuch, as "Lord occurs twelve times in the Pentateuch.[”] In other words, as he explains there, this is not a list of textual variants but rather a list of the times ad-onai is used when it is clearly an equivalent (in meaning) to the shem ha-meforash [i.e., YHWH, “Yahweh”]. We know in any case, that ad-onai was secondarily introduced in the Second Temple period often to indicate that the tetragrammaton [i.e., YHWH, "Yahweh"should be pronounced in this manner (not as written). This is not textual variation at all, . . . [Email message from Lawrence H. Schiffma]n to Moshe Shulman, quoted by Moshe Shulman on January 5, 1996, in a post to the alt.messianic Usenet newsgroup; spelling corrected]
Welcome to biblical research!
In GOD's love,
Ken Burns
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