Documenti di Didattica
Documenti di Professioni
Documenti di Cultura
1 See in much more detail, Reinhard PUMMER, The Samaritans (Iconography of Relig-
ions 23/5; Leiden: Brill, 1987); Ingrid HJELM, The Samaritans and Early Judaism: A
Literary Analysis (JSOTSup 303; Copenhagen International Seminar 7; Sheffield: Shef-
field Academic Press, 2000); EADEM, Jerusalem’s Rise to Sovereignty: Zion and Gerizim
in Competition (JSOTSup 404; Copenhagen International Seminar 14; London: T & T
Clark International, 2004); Alan D. CROWN and Reinhard PUMMER, A Bibliography of
the Samaritans (3d ed.; ATLA Bibliography Series 51; Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press,
2005).
2 E.g., Richard J. COGGINS, Samaritans and Jews: The Origins of Samaritanism Re-
considered (Atlanta: John Knox, 1975) 82–115, 162–64; Rudolf HANHART, “Zu den
ältesten Traditionen über das Samaritanische Schisma,” ErIsr 16 (1982) 106–115; James
D. PURVIS, “The Samaritan Problem: A Case Study in Jewish Sectarianism in the Roman
Era,” Traditions in Transformation: Turning Points in Biblical Faith (ed. B. Halpern and
J. Levenson; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1981) 323–50; Alan D. CROWN, “Redating
the Schism between the Judaeans and the Samaritans,” JQR 82 (1991) 17–50; Reinhard
PUMMER, “The Samaritans and their Pentateuch,” in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Mo-
dels for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance (ed. G. N. Knoppers and B. M.
Levinson; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 237–69.
2 Gary N. Knoppers
and the Jews. In the words of Otto Eissfeldt, “When an independent Sa-
maritan community was founded, the Torah was taken over from the
Jews.”3 The Samaritan Pentateuch was thus thought to be derivative of the
Jewish Pentateuch. The Samaritan Pentateuch was but a descendant, albeit
in somewhat expanded and altered form, of the Torah created, redacted,
ratified, and promulgated in Judah.
In some cases, the creation of the Samaritan Pentateuch was tied to the
rise of an independent sacrificial cultus in Samaria. In discussing religious
developments in the early Hellenistic period, Martin Noth attempted to
place the so-called Samaritan schism in this particular historical context.4
He associated the rise of an independent Samaritan cultus with the con-
struction of a Samaritan temple at Mt. Gerizim. By this time, Noth ob-
served, the Pentateuch had become “so firmly accepted as the holy book in
the Jerusalem religious community as to leave the Samaritans no option but
to adopt it as the foundation of their cultus too.”5 In other words, if the
Samaritans wished their new worship center and religious establishment to
have any real credibility, they needed to accept and embrace the Penta-
teuch as their own sacred writ.
Not all scholars in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries thought of the
Samaritan Pentateuch as simply a later imitation of an earlier Jewish coun-
terpart. In 1877, Abraham Geiger wrote that the Samaritan Pentateuch
comprised an old version of the Pentateuch that was in general use at that
time.6 In 1935, Albrecht Alt wrote that he doubted whether the Pentateuch,
as a common possession of Jews and Samaritans, could have had its origin
in the adoption of the completed Pentateuch by the Samaritans after they
had separated from Jerusalem.7 Instead, he argued that it is much more
plausible to see the Pentateuch as a common patrimony from the time be-
fore the separation of Jews from Samaritans, which was to be dated (so Alt
thought) to a considerable time after Nehemiah. In Alt’s view, the creation
of a political division between Judah and Samaria in the Persian period did
3 Otto EISSFELDT, The Old Testament: An Introduction (New York: Harper & Row,
1965) 695.
4 Martin NOTH, The History of Israel (rev. ed.; New York: Harper & Row, 1960)
354–55.
5 History of Israel, 355.
6 Abraham GEIGER, “Einleitung in die biblischen Schriften. 11: Der samaritanische
Pentateuch,” in Abraham Geiger's Nachgelassene Schriften (5 vols.; ed. L. Geiger; Ber-
lin: L. Gerschel, 1877) 4:67.
7 Albrecht ALT, “Zur Geschichte der Grenze zwischen Judäa und Samaria,” PJ 31
(1935) 107–108; repr. in Kleine Schriften zur Geschichte des Volkes Israel (3 vols.; Mu-
nich: Beck, 1953–1959) 2:358–59.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 3
not entail that the ancient cultic community, which the two shared, ceased
to exist.8
In a few cases, scholars have sought to overturn the consensus by view-
ing the Jewish Pentateuch as essentially derivative of the Samaritan Penta-
teuch. Recently, Étienne Nodet has argued that the Samaritans were “the
most direct heirs of the ancient Israelites and their cult” and that much of
the material in the Hexateuch should be attributed to them.9 With respect to
the Pentateuch, Nodet thinks that its appearance as an authoritative compi-
lation arose during the mid- to late-third century B.C.E. in Samaria in as-
sociation with Mt. Gerizim and its priesthood.10
Nodet’s views are, however, by his own admission in the minority.
Many have continued to think of the Samaritan Pentateuch as some kind of
offshoot of the proto-Masoretic Pentateuch. As a result, the value of the
Samaritan Pentateuch has been chiefly confined to the fields of textual
criticism, historical linguistics, reception history, and Samaritan studies.
To be sure, some have postulated that northern traditions and stories were
incorporated and edited in the various strata making up the Pentateuch.11
8 In Alt’s view, the areas of Judah and Samaria were in close contact throughout much
of the early Achaemenid period in part because Judah was but a subsection of the larger
province of Samaria at this time. Judah only became its own province (so Alt thought) in
the mid-fifth century, IDEM, “Die Rolle Samarias bei der Enstehung des Judentums,”
Festschrift Otto Proksch zum 60. Geburtstag (Leipzig: Deichert & Hinrichs, 1934) 5–28;
repr. in Kleine Schriften, 2:316–37, here 323. This view still has its defendants, but is no
longer widely shared in contemporary scholarship, Frank M. CROSS, From Epic to
Canon: History and Literature in Ancient Israel (Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins
University Press, 1998) 153–64, 179–99; Oded LIPSCHITS, “Judah, Jerusalem, and the
Temple 586–539 B.C.,” Transeu 22 (2001) 129–42; Ephraim STERN, Archaeology of the
Land of the Bible, 2: The Assyrian, Babylonian, and Persian Periods 732–332 BCE
(ABRL; New York: Doubleday, 2001) 422–43; Lester L. GRABBE, A History of the Jews
and Judaism in the Second Temple Period, 1:A History of the Persian Province of Judah
(London: T & T Clark International, 2004) 140–42, 263–313.
9 Étienne NODET, Essai sur les origines du judaïsme: de Josué aux Pharisiens (Paris:
Cerf, 1992) [ET (rev. ed.): A Search for the Origins of Judaism: From Joshua to the
Mishnah (JSOTSup 248; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997)]; IDEM, La crise
macabéenne: Historiographie juive et traditions bibliques (Paris: Cerf, 2005).
10 Search for Origins, 188–95.
11 E.g., Erhard BLUM, Die Komposition der Vätergeschichte (WMANT 57;
Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1984); IDEM, Studien zur Komposition des
Pentateuch (BZAW 189; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1990); Rainer ALBERTZ, A History of Relig-
ion in the Old Testament Period, 1: From the Beginnings to the End of the Monarchy
(OTL; Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1994) 163–86; Raymond de HOOP, Genesis
49 in its Literary and Historical Context (OtSt 39; Leiden: Brill, 1998); Ernst A. KNAUF,
“Bethel: The Israelite Impact on Judean Language and Literature,” in Judah and the
Judeans in the Persian Period (ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming; Winona Lake, Ind.: Ei-
senbrauns, 2006) 295; IDEM, “Towards an Archaeology of the Hexateuch,” in Abschied
4 Gary N. Knoppers
For example, the origins of the Jacob cycle, the so-called Elohistic source,
and Deuteronomy have sometimes been sought in the history of the north-
ern kingdom.12 Nevertheless, few have regarded the existence of the Sa-
maritan Pentateuch as potentially important for gaining a better under-
standing of the formation, editorial history, and early transmission of the
Pentateuch. The discovery and analysis of a variety of pentateuchal manu-
scripts among the Dead Sea Scrolls have begun, however, to change this
picture.13
In what follows, I will review the character of the so-called pre-
Samaritan manuscripts found among the Dead Sea Scrolls. These frag-
ments share many features with the Samaritan Pentateuch, such as confla-
tionary tendencies (based upon other texts found within the Pentateuch),
linguistic features, and content (at least, in some passages).14 That these
texts were found among the Dead Sea Scrolls means that some of the spe-
cific features that were formerly thought to be distinguishing marks of the
Samaritan Pentateuch turn out to be non-exclusive to the Samaritans.
Rather, these particular texts belong to the common patrimony of Judeans
and Samarians.15 If the Samaritan Pentateuch was developed with its dis-
vom Jahwisten: Die Komposition des Hexateuch in der jüngsten Diskussion (ed. J. C.
Gertz, K. Schmid, and M. Witte; BZAW 315; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2002) 275–94.
12 Albrecht ALT, “Die Heimat des Deuteronomiums,” Kleine Schriften, 2:250–75;
Moshe WEINFELD, Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School (Oxford: Clarendon,
1972) 166; Alan W. JENKS, The Elohist and North Israelite Traditions (SBLMS 22; Mis-
soula, Mont.: Scholars Press, 1977); H. Louis GINSBERG, The Israelian Heritage of Juda-
ism (Texts and Studies of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America 24; New York:
Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1982); Eckart OTTO, Jakob in Sichem: Überlie-
ferungsgeschichtliche Studien zur Entstehungsgeschichte Israels (BWANT 110; Stuttgart:
Kohlhammer, 1979); Robert B. COOTE, In Defense of Revolution: The Elohist's History
(Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1991).
13 See the foundational studies of Frank M. CROSS, “Aspects of Samaritan and Jewish
History in Late Persian and Hellenistic Times,” HTR 59 (1966) 201–11; IDEM, From Epic
to Canon, 173–202; James D. PURVIS, The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Origin of the
Samaritan Sect (HSM 2; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1968); COGGINS,
Samaritans and Jews, 148–55. See also Ernst WÜRTHWEIN, The Text of the Old Testa-
ment: An Introduction to the Biblia Hebraica (rev. ed.; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995)
42–44; PUMMER, “Samaritans,” 237–69.
14 On conflation, see especially Jeffrey H. TIGAY, “Conflation as a Redactional Tech-
nique,” in Empirical Models for Biblical Criticism (ed. J. H. Tigay; Philadelphia: Univer-
sity of Pennsylvania Press, 1985) 53–95.
15 The issue of terminology is difficult, but I am referring to the residents of Yehud
and Samerina (Samaria) during the Persian and early Hellenistic periods as Judeans and
Samarians to distinguish them from the later Jews and Samaritans of the Maccabean and
Roman periods. In both cases, one can see lines of continuity from one period to the next.
Some would want to distinguish between general residents of Samaria, called Samarians,
from those specific residents of Samaria, who worshiped Yhwh, called Samaritans. The
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 5
trouble is that this earlier distinction was partly based on the erroneous assumption that
Yhwh worship was a relatively late development or arrival. Given the recognition that
Yahwism in Samaria is much older than previous scholars had recognized, some (e.g.,
PUMMER, “Samaritans,” 238–39) favor the designation proto-Samaritans for the Yahwists
of Persian period times.
16 See, for instance, EISSFELDT, Introduction, 695. A more up-to-date and detailed as-
sessment can be found in Esther ESHEL and Hanan ESHEL, “Dating the Samaritan Penta-
teuch's Compilation in Light of the Qumran Biblical Scrolls,” in Emanuel: Studies in
Hebrew Bible, Septuagint, and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov (ed. S. M.
Paul et al.; VTSup 94; Leiden: Brill, 2003) 216–19.
17 Such variants have been classified in a variety of different ways. See, e.g., Wilhelm
GESENIUS, De Pentateuchi samaritani origine, indole et auctoritate commentatio phi-
lologico-critica (Halle: Impensis librariae Rengerianae, 1815) 24–61; Paul KAHLE,
“Untersuchungen zur Geschichte des Pentateuchtextes,” Theologische Studien und
Kritiken 88 (1915) 399–439; Jean MARGAIN, “Samaritain (Pentateuque),” in DBSup 11
(1991) 763–68; Bruce WALTKE, Prolegomena to the Samaritan Pentateuch (Ph.D. diss.,
Harvard University, 1965) 271–338; IDEM, “The Samaritan Pentateuch and the Text of
the Old Testament,” in New Perspectives on the Old Testament (ed. J. Barton Payne;
Symposium Series of the Evangelical Theological Society 3; Waco, Tex.: Word, 1970)
212–39; Carmel MCCARTHY, “Samaritan Pentateuch readings in Deuteronomy,” in Bibli-
cal and Near Eastern Essays (ed. C. McCarthy and J. F. Healey; JSOTSup 375; London:
T & T International, 2004) 118–30; PUMMER, “Samaritans,” 241–43.
6 Gary N. Knoppers
together against the LXX than cases in which the SamP and the LXX line
up together against the MT.23
The parallels between the SamP and the LXX, on the one hand, and be-
tween the SamP and the MT, on the other hand, complicate any facile at-
tempt to construe the historical relationship between the proto-MT and the
SamP. Indeed, this evidence augurs against analyzing the variants between
the SamP and the MT in isolation from other available textual evidence.
Rather, it is best to compare the readings of the Samaritan and the
Masoretic traditions in the context of the many other textual witnesses that
attest to the transmission of the Pentateuch in the last centuries B.C.E. and
the first centuries C.E.
Third, the oft-cited figure of 6,000 (or more) textual variants between
the SamP and the MT goes back to a list drawn up by Brian Walton, Ed-
mund Castell and John Lightfoot, which appeared in the sixth volume of
the London Polyglot of the mid-seventeenth century.24 The Polyglot was
quite a literary and historical achievement for its time in that it offered the
scriptures to readers in nine different languages and in several different
scripts. Unfortunately, as Reinhard Pummer points out, the number of vari-
ants in the SamP was calculated on the basis of examining only one manu-
script.25 Considering that approximately 750 SamP manuscripts (or frag-
ments thereof) survive in modern times, the somewhat arbitrary selection
and use of one particular manuscript does not constitute a sound basis for
scientific analysis.26
A new eclectic edition of the SamP is currently in preparation.27 The
well-known older edition published by August von Gall in 1914–18, al-
though eclectic in nature, is plagued by an idiosyncratic selection of read-
23 A point also underscored in the detailed study of James R. DAVILA, “Text-Type and
Terminology: Genesis and Exodus as Test Cases,” RevQ 16 (1993) 3–37.
24 Brian W ALTON et al., Biblia Sacra polyglotta (6 vols.; London: Thomas Roycroft,
1653–58). The list may be found in Appendix IV (pp. 19–34). PUMMER (“Samaritans,”
241) calls attention to another lengthy list compiled by Julius H. PETERMANN, Versuch
einer hebräischen Formenlehre nach der Aussprache der heutigen Samaritaner nebst einer
darnach gebildeten Transscription der Genesis und einer Beilage enthaltend die von dem
recipirten Texte des Pentateuchs abweichenden Lesarten der Samaritaner (Abhandlungen
für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 5/1; Leipzig: Brockhaus, 1868) 219–326.
25 The manuscript was first published with numerous mistakes in the Paris Polyglot of
1629 and then republished with corrections in the London Polyglot of 1657, PUMMER,
“Samaritans,” 241.
26 For a brief discussion of the SamP manuscripts surviving today, see Alan D.
CROWN, Samaritan Scribes and Manuscripts (TSAJ 80; Tübingen: Mohr-Siebeck, 2001)
35.
27 The new work (Der Samaritanische Pentateuch) is being edited by Stefan
SCHORCH, Ulrike HIRSCHFELDER, and József ZSENGELLÉR.
8 Gary N. Knoppers
28 August von GALL, Der hebräische Pentateuch der Samaritaner (Giessen: Alfred
Töpelmann, 1914–18).
29 Abraham TAL, The Samaritan Pentateuch Edited According to MS 6 [C] of the
Shekhem Synagogue (Texts and Studies in the Hebrew Language and Related Subjects 8;
Tel Aviv University: Chaim Rosenberg School of Jewish Studies, 1994) [Hebrew]. Tal’s
edition of the SamP is being employed in the preparation of the new Biblia Hebraica
Quinta (BHQ).
30 TAL, “Divergent Traditions,” 300.
31 Text-critically, the SamP has, however, its own distinctive history (see Section III
below). I am speaking of the SamP as a parallel Pentateuch, because the textual evidence
indicates that it is too simplistic to view the SamP as an expanded form of the Jewish
Pentateuch. The sectarian additions to the SamP, although quite limited in number, are
significant enough to create an alternative edition of the Torah.
32 Ferdinand DEXINGER, “Das Garizimgebot im Dekalog der Samaritaner,” in Studien
zum Pentateuch (ed. G. Braulik; Vienna: Herder, 1977) 111–33; IDEM, “Samaritan Ori-
gins and the Qumran Texts,” in Methods of Investigation of the Dead Sea Scrolls and the
Khirbet Qumran Site: Present Realities and Future Prospects (ed. M. O. Wise et al.; An-
nals of the New York Academy of Sciences 722; New York: The New York Academy of
Sciences, 1994) 238; Ze'ev BEN-HAYYIM, “The Tenth Commandment in Samaritan Re-
search,” in Essays in Honour of G. D. Sixdenier: New Samaritan Studies of the Société
d'Études Samaritaines III & IV (ed. A. D. Crown and L. Davey; Studies in Judaica 5;
Sydney: Mandelbaum, 1995) 487–92; Judith E. SANDERSON, An Exodus Scroll from
Qumran: 4QpaleoExodm and the Samaritan Tradition (HSS 30; Atlanta, GA: Scholars
Press, 1986) 235–37, 317–20; Innocent HIMBAZA, Le Décalogue et l’histoire du texte:
Études des formes textuelles du Décalogue et leurs implications dans l’histoire du texte
de l’Ancien Testament (OBO 207; Freiburg, Switz.: Academic and Göttingen: Vanden-
hoeck & Ruprecht, 2004) 63–66, 183–219.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 9
election of Mt. Gerizim clear already at Mt. Sinai. The insertion of this
material is especially important, because the laws given in Exod 20:1–17
carry a special status in the Sinaitic legislation as the only statutes commu-
nicated directly by Yhwh to the people of Israel.33
Perhaps the best known discrepancy between the MT and the SamP is
the variant of the Deuteronomic expression, “the place that Yhwh your
God will choose (rxby),” as “the place that Yhwh your God has chosen
(rxb)” in each and every relevant context within Deuteronomy.34 Whether
this important variant between the MT and the SamP amounts to a late sec-
tarian change in the SamP is not altogether clear. That the use of rxb in the
SamP amounts to a late ideological change has been recently disputed by
Adrian Schenker, who points out that the Deuteronomistic references to the
Deuteronomic central place formula, “the city/Jerusalem that Yhwh has
chosen” (e.g., 1 Kgs 8:16, 44, 48; 11:13, 32, 36; 14:21; 2 Kgs 21:7; 23:27)
are phrased consistently in the perfect (rxb).35 Similarly, the citation of the
restoration promises of Deut 30:4 in Neh 1:9, which blends those promises
with the Deuteronomic chosen place formula (ytrxb rva ~wqmh), reflects
rxb, rather than rxby.36 Reasoning that the later biblical writers are quot-
ing older prestigious texts, Schenker argues that the Vorlage used by these
writers likely read rxb. In Schenker’s understanding, the MT lemma in
Deuteronomy (rxby) represents a later Judean (sectarian) change.
To this line of argumentation it could be objected that the LXX supports
the reading of the MT.37 This is largely true, because all of the major LXX
witnesses follow the MT. But Schenker counters that there are witnesses to
the LXX, the OL, the Bohairic, and the Coptic, which support the lemma of
the SamP.38 The contention is that the major LXX witnesses were all cor-
rected at some point toward the emerging MT text. By contrast, it is
33 Among the relevant passages, see especially Exod 19:10–14, 21–25; 20:18–21 (cf.
Deut 5:19–28; 18:15–19).
34 The relevant texts are: Deut 12:5, 11, 14, 18, 21, 26; 14:23, 24, 25; 15:20; 16:2, 6,
7, 11, 15, 16; 17:8, 10; 18:6; 26:2; 31:11 (cf. Josh 9:27 [rxby]). See the discussions of
WEINFELD, Deuteronomic School, 324 [no. 1a]) and PUMMER, “Samaritans,” 244–45.
35 Adrian SCHENKER, “Le Seigneur choisira-t-il le lieu de son nom ou l’a-t-il choisi?
L’apport de la Bible grecque ancienne à l’histoire du texte samaritain et massorétique,” in
Scripture in Transition: Essays on Septuagint, Hebrew Bible, and Dead Sea Scrolls in
Honour of Raija Sollamo (ed. A. Voitila and J. Jokiranta; JSJSup 126; Leiden: Brill,
2008) 339–51.
36 On the formula, ~v wmv !kvl rxby / rxb rva ~wqmh, found in Deut 12:11;
14:23; 16:2, 6, 11; 26:2, see WEINFELD, Deuteronomic School, 325 [no. 3]; Sandra L.
RICHTER, The Deuteronomistic History and the Name Theology: lešakkēn šemô šām in
the Bible and the Ancient Near East (BZAW 318; Berlin: de Gruyter, 2002).
37 The LXX reads consistently the first aorist middle subjunctive of eklegō (eklexētai
= rxby of the MT) in all of the above cases in Deuteronomy.
38 SCHENKER, “Seigneur,” 342–49.
10 Gary N. Knoppers
unlikely that the SamP influenced the readings of the minor witnesses to
the LXX, OL, Bohairic, and Coptic versions, because the SamP would
seem to have been unknown by these translators. The issues raised by
Schenker in his reevaluation of the text-critical evidence are complex and
too many to be addressed in detail here. But, at the very least, he has dem-
onstrated that one cannot take for granted that the MT reading of rxby was
deliberately changed to rxb in the SamP. The text-critical situation is not
as simple as most have supposed.39
Related to the same principle of centralization is the reformulation of
the altar law in Exod 20:24 (20:21 in some versions). According to both
the SamP and the MT, Yhwh commands the people of Israel to build an
earthen altar (hmda xbzm). In the MT the text reads: “in every place
(~wqmh lkb) at which I shall cause (rykza) my name to be remembered, I
shall come to you and bless you.” But in the SamP, the text reads: “in the
place (~wqmb) at which I have caused (ytrkza) my name to be remembered,
there (hmv) I shall come to you and bless you.” The assertion in the SamP
resonates with the story of Abram’s construction of an altar at Shechem.
As Tov and, much more thoroughly, Levinson have pointed out, the SamP
intimates that Mt. Gerizim had been selected by the deity from ancestral
times. In speaking of “the place (~wqm) at which I have caused my name to
be remembered,” the SamP alludes to the construction of an altar at the
“place of Shechem” (~kv ~wqm) by Abram, following his arrival in the
39 To complicate matters, it cannot be said that one reading (the SamP) is ideological,
whereas the other (the MT) is not. There is ambiguity in both Pentateuchs in that the
precise location of the site in Deut 12 is not revealed. Whether the site is already chosen
or yet to be chosen, the site goes unnamed. But both lemmata fit within their larger liter-
ary contexts – the Pentateuch (so the SamP) and the Pentateuch and the Former Prophets
(so the MT). In the SamP, the proximity of the centralization demand to what precedes is
quite important. There, Israel is instructed: “You will pronounce the blessing upon Mt.
Gerizim” (Deut 11:29). The fact that Yhwh is said to have elected (rxb) the central sanc-
tuary comports with the earlier pronouncement in Deut 11. Given the sequence found in
Deut 11 and 12, it is no wonder to find Moses later instructing the Israelites that having
crossed the Jordan, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph and Benjamin are to stand
upon Mt. Gerizim to hear the blessing spoken (Deut 27:11–13). By contrast, if Yhwh is
yet to choose (rxby) the central sanctuary, that formulation pointing toward the indeter-
minate future effectively distances the central shrine from the earlier pronouncement of a
blessing on Mt. Gerizim (Deut 11:29). Given the consistent repetition of the rxby formu-
lation throughout MT Deuteronomy, the centralization mandate points beyond the time of
Israel’s encampment upon the Plains of Moab toward some point in the future when
Yhwh will make his choice known. Even though the formulations of the centralization
mandate in the MT and the SamP are each vaguely phrased, the two different formula-
tions have theological, literary, and historical implications for how readers construe the
meaning of Deuteronomy.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 11
land of Canaan (Gen 12:6–8).40 Also of interest is the divine curse in Lev
26:31 (MT and LXX) in which Yhwh threatens Israel with the desolation
of “your sanctuaries” (~kyvdqm). In the SamP, the threat involves the deso-
lation of “your sanctuary” (~kvdqm).41
I wish to return to the sectarian readings in the SamP later in this essay,
but first I would like to discuss the relevance of the non-sectarian variants
in the context of the variety of pentateuchal manuscripts found at Qumran.
The issue of non-sectarian variants is highly important, because many of
the variants between the MT and the SamP fall into this category. The
small stratum of sectarian variants in the SamP has drawn the bulk of atten-
tion from scholars over the past centuries, but it is the larger stratum of
non-sectarian variants that is of equal, if not greater, importance for under-
standing the genesis of the SamP.
40 TOV, Textual Criticism, 95; Bernard M. LEVINSON, “Is the Covenant Code an Ex-
ilic Composition? A Response to John Van Seters,” in In Search of Pre-exilic Israel:
Proceedings of the Oxford Old Testament Seminar (ed. J. Day; JSOTSup 406; London: T
& T Clark International, 2004) 297–315; repr. in “The Right Chorale”: Studies in Biblical
Law and Interpretation (FAT 54; Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2009) 276–330.
41 But the reading of SamP is not unique. It is shared by the Syriac and by many me-
dieval Heb. mss.
42 The criteria by which one should classify a text as pre-Samaritan (as opposed to
proto-Masoretic, proto-LXX, or non-affiliated) is itself an issue, Chelica HILTUNEN, “An
Examination of the Supposed Pre-Samaritan Scrolls from Qumran” (M.A. Thesis; Trinity
Western University, 2009).
43 The nomenclature “pre-Samaritan,” rather than “proto-Samaritan,” for these manu-
scripts was chosen “on the assumption that one of them [the harmonistic Pentateuchal
texts] was adapted to form the special text of the Samaritans,” TOV, Textual Criticism,
97.
12 Gary N. Knoppers
44 PURVIS, Samaritan Pentateuch, 80; Emanuel TOV, “The Proto-Samaritan Texts and
the Samaritan Pentateuch,” in The Samaritans (ed. A. D. Crown; Tübingen: J. C. B. Mohr
[Paul Siebeck], 1989) 397–407; IDEM, “The Samaritan Pentateuch and the So-Called
‘Proto-Samaritan’ Texts,” in Studies on Hebrew and Other Semitic Languages Presented
to Professor Chaim Rabin on the Occasion of his Seventy-Fifth Birthday (ed. M. H.
Goshen-Gottstein, S. Morag, and S. Kogut; Jerusalem: Academon, 1990) 136–46 (He-
brew); IDEM, Textual Criticism, 80–100.
45 Sidney W. CRAWFORD, “4QDeutn,” in Qumran Cave 4. IX: Deuteronomy, Joshua,
Judges, Kings (ed. E. Ulrich et al.; DJD 14; Oxford: Clarendon, 1995) 117–28; EADEM,
Rewriting Scripture in Second Temple Times (Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls and Related
Literature; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2008) 30–35; Esther ESHEL, “4QDeutn —A Text
that has Undergone Harmonistic Editing,” HUCA 62 (1991) 117–54.
46 Nathan R. JASTRAM, “4QNumb,” in Qumran Cave 4.VIII: Genesis to Numbers (ed.
E. Ulrich and F. M. Cross; DJD 12; Oxford: Clarendon, 1994) 229–30, 242–45.
47 Near the end of Num 21:21 (following yrmah-$lm) another addition (~wlv yrbd)
occurs in the SamP and the LXX (logois eirēnikois) based on Deut 2:26. Unfortunately,
the text of 4QNumb breaks off at this point.
48 Some of which are paralleled in the SyrH. Jastram would reconstruct further addi-
tions in Num 12:16b; 21:22b, 23b; 31:21a, “4QNumb,” 215.
49 The text is fragmentary, John M. ALLEGRO, “Biblical Paraphrase: Genesis, Exo-
dus,” in Qumrân Cave 4. I (4Q158–4Q186) (ed. J. M. Allegro; DJD 5; Oxford: Claren-
don, 1968) 3 (Pl. I); John STRUGNELL, “Notes en marge du volume V des ‘Discoveries in
the Judaean Desert of Jordan,’” RevQ 7 (1970) 168–76. On the issue of the classification
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 13
of 4Q158 and its relations with 4Q364–367, note the somewhat contrasting positions of
Emaunel TOV and Sidney WHITE (Crawford), “Reworked Pentateuch,” in Qumrân Cave
4. VIII: Parabiblical Texts, I (ed. H. Attridge et al.; DJD 13; Oxford: Clarendon, 1994)
189–91 and George J. BROOKE, “4Q158: Reworked Pentateuch or Reworked Pentateuch
A?” DSD 8 (2001) 219–41. See also Molly M. ZAHN, “Building Textual Bridges: To-
wards an Understanding of 4Q158 (4QReworked Pentateuch A),” in Qumranica Hafnien-
sia: Selected Texts from Discoveries in the Judaean Desert V Revisited (ed. J. Høgen-
haven et al.; STDJ; Leiden: Brill, forthcoming). The fragments classified as 4Q158 are
the subject of a thorough reexamination, reanalysis, and new edition by Moshe J.
BERNSTEIN and Molly M. ZAHN (to appear in DJD 5).
50 ALLEGRO, “Biblical Paraphrase,” 3 (Pl. I).
51 John M. ALLEGRO, “Testimonia,” in Qumrân Cave 4. I (4Q158–4Q186) (ed. J. M.
Allegro; DJD 5; Oxford: Clarendon, 1968) 57–60 (Pl. XXI). Interestingly, the textual
blend created by the author(s) of 4QTestimonia draws on a pre-Samaritan text of Exod
20:19–21, but a text of Deuteronomy that shares affinities with 4QDeuth and the LXX,
CRAWFORD, Rewriting Scripture, 35–36.
52 Unfortunately, 4QpaleoExodm is not extant for this portion of the text, Patrick W.
SKEHAN, Eugene C. ULRICH, and Judith E. SANDERSON, “4QpaleoExodm,” Qumran Cave
4.IV: Palaeo-Hebrew and Greek Biblical Manuscripts (DJD 9; Oxford: Clarendon, 1992)
101–103. But, the editors of 4QpaleoExodm argue that col. XXI of the scroll originally
contained this expansion both because of the respective line counts in the MT, SamP, and
4QpaleoExodm and because of the earlier (corresponding) insertion of Deut 5:24–27 in
the SamP (Exod 20:16).
53 On Exod 20:2–17 (//Deut 5:1–18) as the “ten words” (~yrbdh trf[), see already
Exod 34:28; Deut 4:13; 10:4.
14 Gary N. Knoppers
The recounting of the golden calf episode in Deut 9:20 has Moses declare
that “Yhwh was incensed with Aaron to such an extent that he was ready to
destroy him and so I (Moses) interceded with him.” This detail in Deuter-
onomy is lacking in the source text of (MT) Exod 32:10. Nevertheless, a
nearly identical declaration to the one in Deut 9:20 has been interpolated
into the text of Exod 32:10 in some witnesses to the LXX and into
4QpaleoExodusm as well.54 The same insertion appears in SamP Exod
32:10. Such additions are consistent with the view that Deuteronomy is a
hrwt hnvm.55 If so, the text of Deuteronomy is expected to repeat explicitly
the content of earlier passages in the Torah and not to conflict with them.
As many commentators have observed, the two accounts narrating
Moses’ appointment of judges in Exodus and Deuteronomy differ from one
another in a number of details, including the characterization of the
judges.56 In 4QpaleoExodusm and in the SamP, these tensions have been
eased to a degree through the inclusion of Deut 1:9–18 after Exod 18:24
and in Exod 18:25.57 As a result of this interpolation, the text of Deuteron-
omy more precisely repeats the (expanded) text of Exodus. From the van-
tage point of a scribe, who views Deuteronomy as a hrwt hnvm, the text of
Exod 32 exhibits a gap. Hence, it is not too surprising that the scribe at-
tempts to fill the perceived lacuna. The result is a slightly expanded Penta-
teuch that exhibits greater internal literary coherence.58
One interesting and very important aspect of this development for un-
derstanding the history of early Judaism and early Samaritanism is the im-
54But 4QpaleoExodusm (4Q22) maintains the third person narration (hvm llpt[y]w),
SKEHAN, ULRICH, and SANDERSON, “4QpaleoExodm,” 124. John W. WEVERS comments
with respect to the LXX witnesses: “How this gloss [the expansion in the SamP and in
4QpaleoExodusm] came into the Greek tradition remains a mystery,” Notes on the Greek
Text of Exodus (SCS 30; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990) 523. The plusses found within
some witnesses to the LXX and in the pre-Samaritan manuscripts have to be understood
in the context of long-range developments within the growth of the Pentateuch in the last
centuries B.C.E. At least within certain circles, the text of the Pentateuch was not yet a
static entity, completely impervious to change. A process of selective growth through
supplementation, based on other texts within the Pentateuch, began before such texts
were translated into Greek.
55 TOV, Textual Criticism, 86–87.
56 The relationships among Exod 18:13–27, Num 11:11–17, and Deut 1:9–18 are
more fully discussed in the essays by Joel BADEN and David CARR elsewhere in this vol-
ume.
57 TOV, Textual Criticism, 88.
58 Such attempts to create greater harmony are in evidence elsewhere within the MT
and within the Versions. See, e.g., Anneli AEJMELAEUS, “Septuagintal Translation Tech-
niques: A Solution to the Problem of the Tabernacle Account,” in On the Trail of Septua-
gint Translators (Kampen: Kok Pharos, 1993) 107–21; Bernard M. LEVINSON, “Textual
Criticism, Assyriology, and the History of Interpretation: Deuteronomy 13:7a as a Test
Case,” JBL 120 (2001) 211–43; repr. in Studies in Biblical Law, 112–44.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 15
59 James L. KUGEL, “Ancient Biblical Interpretation and the Biblical Sage,” in Studies
in Ancient Midrash (ed. J. L. Kugel; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2001)
1–26; IDEM, The God of Old: Inside the Lost World of the Bible (New York: Free Press,
2003).
60 TOV and W HITE (Crawford), “Reworked Pentateuch,” 209–11 (Pl. XIII);
CRAWFORD, Rewriting Scripture, 39–59.
61 SANDERSON provides a thorough analysis, Exodus Scroll, 196–207; EADEM, “The
Contribution of 4QpaleoExodm to Textual Criticism,” RevQ 13 (1988) 547–60.
62 Exod 7:18 (cf. Exod 7:15–18); 7:29 (cf. Exod 7:26–29); 8:19 (cf. 8:16–19); 9:5 (cf.
Exod 9:1–5); 9:19 (cf. 9:13–19); 10:2 (cf. 10:3). One important effect of these additions
is to underscore the position of Moses as the reliable and divinely-designated spokesper-
son of the deity, Magnar KARTVEIT, “The Major Expansions in the Samaritan Pentateuch
– The Evidence from the 4Q Texts,” in Proceedings of the Fifth International Congress of
the Société d'Études Samaritaines, Helsinki, August 1–4, 2000: Studies in Memory of
Ferdinand Dexinger (ed. H. Shehadeh, H. Tawa, with R. Pummer; Paris: Geuthner, 2005)
117–24; IDEM, The Origin of the Samaritans (VTSup 128; Leiden: Brill, 2009) 259–312.
63 The SamP also contains an expansion relating to the plague of frogs (Exod 8:1b)
and expansions relating to the last plague affecting the firstborn (Exod 11:3b).
4QpaleoExodm is not extant for these lemmata, but the reconstruction of the relevant
16 Gary N. Knoppers
columns of 4QpaleoExodm suggests that the Qumran text originally included these expan-
sions as well, SKEHAN, ULRICH, and SANDERSON, “4QpaleoExodm,” 76–77, 84–85.
64 So also CRAWFORD, Rewriting Scripture, 23–37.
65 Such scribal operations are predicated on the premise that “the Pentateuchal Torah
of Moses is integral and indivisible,” Michael FISHBANE, Biblical Interpretation in An-
cient Israel (Oxford: Clarendon, 1985) 136.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 17
dence (MT, LXX, SamP, DSS) indicates that the harmonistic expansions in
the pre-Samaritan manuscripts were made over the course of centuries and
did not occur as the result of a systematic recension at one particular
time.66 Many expansions are found only in the pre-Samaritan manuscripts
and the SamP, while some others are shared by the SamP and the LXX
(over against the MT). A few harmonistic expansions are shared by the MT
and the SamP (over against the LXX), while yet others are peculiar to one
of the major traditions (MT, SamP, LXX). To this consideration, a related
text-critical point must be added. One must allow for each of the major
witnesses to develop its own peculiar features, for example, the three dif-
ferent chronological systems (MT, SamP, LXX) evident in Gen 5:19–31
and 11:10–26.67 Hence, one is inevitably dealing with a series of historical
developments, rather than with one sudden event.68 Precisely how long a
process may be involved to account for all the textual divergences to ac-
cumulate is unclear. But from a chronological vantage point, the shared
traits of the pre-Samaritan tradition and the Vorlage of the LXX that are
arguably secondary must have taken some time to develop prior to the
translation of the Pentateuch into Greek, beginning some time in the third
century B.C.E.69
We have been discussing a number of pentateuchal manuscripts found at
Qumran that contain conflationary readings, that is, readings imported
from one literary context into another literary context to render the penta-
teuchal text more internally consistent. It should be mentioned that these
so-called pre-Samaritan texts are not all identical to the base of the SamP.
Some contain fewer harmonistic readings than does the SamP, while others
(e.g., 4QNumb) contain more.70 Moreover, the pre-Samaritan fragments
cannot all be considered to be of one piece. There are some manuscripts in
the so-called reworked Pentateuch category (4Q158; 4Q364; 4Q365) that
move beyond other texts in the pre-Samaritan tradition by creating new
66 The basic fact that the harmonistic additions were integrated into the text over a
considerable period of time was realized already by KAHLE, who did not have the benefit
of having access to the Qumran evidence, “Untersuchungen,” 402–10.
67 In this case, there is some overlap between the SamP and LXX in secondary fea-
tures, Ron S. HENDEL, The Text of Genesis 1–11: Textual Studies and Critical Edition
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1998) 61–80.
68 Frank M. CROSS, The Ancient Library of Qumrân and Modern Biblical Studies
(rev. ed.; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1961) 188–92; IDEM, “The Contribution of the
Discoveries at Qumran to the Study of the Biblical Text,” IEJ 16 (1966) 81–95.
69 As rightly pointed out by Ron HENDEL (personal communication). See further his
Textual Studies, 93–103.
70 Nathan R. JASTRAM, “A Comparison of Two ‘Proto-Samaritan’ Texts from Qum-
ran: 4QpaleoExodm and 4QNumb,” DSD 5 (1998) 264–89; TOV and CRAWFORD, “Re-
worked Pentateuch,” 187–352.
18 Gary N. Knoppers
last two centuries B.C.E. When the forces of John Hyrcanus destroyed the
Mt. Gerizim sanctuary in the late second century B.C.E. (Josephus, Antiq-
uites 13.256, 275–81), the Samarians most likely had possessed a Penta-
teuch for centuries.
Second, the written remains from Qumran suggest that virtually identi-
cal pre-Samaritan texts were in circulation within both communities. Third,
the development of a distinctive Samaritan Pentateuch, incorporating par-
ticular sectarian readings, occurred fairly late, that is, in the last two centu-
ries B.C.E.80 In the last section of this essay, it will be helpful to grapple
with the historical implications of these considerations for our understand-
ing of the development of the Samaritan and Jewish Pentateuchs.
80That some pre-Samaritan texts (e.g., 4QNumb) contain additions that were evi-
dently incorporated into these texts after the development of the SamP leads ESHEL and
ESHEL to date the SamP before the time of John Hyrcanus’ destruction of the Samaritan
Temple on Mt. Gerizim in the late second century B.C.E., “Compilation,” 238–39. Such a
determination may presuppose a more uniform trajectory in the development of the addi-
tions interpolated into the pre-Samaritan pentateuchal manuscripts than is justified by the
available evidence.
81 On this weighty question, see the many fine essays (with further references) else-
where in this volume.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 21
84 One has to speak of overlap, rather than of outright identity, because of the pres-
ence of ~yaybnh and ~ybwtkh in Jewish tradition.
85 So also SANDERSON, Exodus Scroll, 317.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 23
communities in the Persian and early Hellenistic periods. During this time,
the Pentateuch was likely a document shared by both groups. If, as some
pentateuchal scholars hold, certain editorial changes and expansions were
made to the Pentateuch in the fourth and early third century B.C.E., one
has to reckon with the possibility that such editorial changes and expan-
sions were made virtually identically in the pentateuchal manuscripts held
within both Judah and Samaria.86 Given such a set of circumstances, con-
siderable cooperation between at least some members of each group has to
be assumed.87 After all, one has to account for the issues of maintenance
and transmission, if not also of editing and small additions. The probability
of some contacts and cooperation between the scribes of the two communi-
ties may help to explain why the Jewish and Samaritan Pentateuchs share
many readings over against the Septuagint. The proposition that precisely
the same changes arose spontaneously and independently in both commu-
nities so that both Pentateuchs remained virtually identical over a consid-
erable period of time strains historical credulity.88 It makes much more
sense to maintain that whatever major changes were introduced into the
text during this time were done so with the knowledge of the relevant
scribes and authorities of both groups.
Admittedly, the scenario being sketched involves some speculation. The
same may be said, however, of most, if not all, critical explanations of how
the Samaritans and Judeans came to share practically the same Pentateuch.
In such a situation, one is obliged to formulate hypotheses to account for,
86 But one has also to account historically for the fact that the process of translating
the Pentateuch into Greek seems to have begun in the third century B.C.E., Arie van der
KOOIJ, “The Septuagint of the Pentateuch and Ptolemaic Rule,” The Pentateuch as Torah:
New Models for Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance (ed. G. N. Knoppers
and B. M. Levinson; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 289–300.
87 This point is acknowledged by ESHEL and ESHEL, who posit a connection between
Samaritans and Jews in the second century B.C.E., “Compilation,” 240.
88 In the local texts theory of Frank M. CROSS, the period (or periods) of such influ-
ence was the Hasmonean or Herodian age, when a number of Judeans returned from
Babylon, “The History of the Biblical Text in the Light of the Discoveries in the Judaean
Desert,” HTR 57 (1964) 297; repr. in Qumran and the History of the Biblical Text (ed. F.
M. Cross and S. Talmon; Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1975) 193. This
was the context in which pentateuchal texts in the Babylonian (i.e., proto-rabbinic) tex-
tual family were partially reconciled with pentateuchal texts in the Palestinian (i.e., pre-
Samaritan) textual family, PURVIS, Samaritan Pentateuch, 84–85. In the view of Julio C.
TREBOLLE BARRERA, such a mixing of textual families must have occurred before the
Samaritan schism, The Jewish Bible and the Christian Bible: An Introduction to the His-
tory of the Bible (Leiden: Brill, 1998) 297. This is not the place to debate the relative
merits of Cross’s important theory. For the purposes of this discussion, it will suffice to
say that such a partial merging of text-types presupposes cooperation among the scribes
editing and copying texts within the two (or more) respective traditions.
24 Gary N. Knoppers
as best one can, the available historical and literary evidence. In this con-
text, it may be useful to mention four particular sets of considerations, even
if space constraints do not allow us to explore any one of them. First, the
material and epigraphic evidence from the Persian and Hellenistic eras
points to a tremendous cultural overlap between the areas of Samaria and
Yehud.89 Notable traits include a similar deployment of bilingualism
among the literati (Aramaic for day-to-day business, diplomacy, and corre-
spondence, Hebrew for certain official or religious purposes), archaizing
tendencies, for example, the studied reuse of the palaeo-Hebrew script,90 a
significant overlap in personal names, and a predominance of Yahwistic
personal names.91
Second, the Aaronide priesthood seems to have been in control in both
Jerusalem and Mt. Gerizim.92 The acknowledgment of priesthoods related
one to another by reference to ultimate origins in a common eponymous
ancestor illuminates not only similar sacrifices, rites, and rituals, but also
the facilitation of scribal communications between the staffs of the two
temples. Third, the pan-Israelite point of view contained within the Penta-
89 See my “Revisiting the Samarian Question in the Persian Period,” in Judah and the
Judeans in the Persian Period (ed. O. Lipschits and M. Oeming; Winona Lake, Ind.:
Eisenbrauns, 2006) 265–89; IDEM, “Nehemiah and Sanballat: The Enemy Without or
Within?” in Judah and the Judeans in the Fourth Century (ed. O. Lipschits, G. N. Knop-
pers, and R. Albertz; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 305–31.
90 Frank M. CROSS, “The Papyri and Their Historical Implications,” in Discoveries in
the Wâdī ed-Dâliyeh (ed. P. W. Lapp and N. L. Lapp; AASOR 41; Cambridge, Mass.:
ASOR, 1974) 17–29 (pl. 61); Mary J. W. LEITH, Wadi Daliyeh I: The Seal Impressions
(Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997) 16–21, 184–87; I. EPH'AL, “Changes in Pales-
tine during the Persian Period in Light of Epigraphic Sources,” IEJ 48 (1998) 106–19;
Joseph NAVEH, “Scripts and Inscriptions in Ancient Samaria,” IEJ 48 (1998) 91–100;
Andrè LEMAIRE, “Grafitto Hébreu sur Tétradrachme Pseudo-Athénian,” Israel Numis-
matic Journal 15 (2003–2006) 24–27; Yitzhak MAGEN, Haggai MISGAV, and Levana
TSFANIA, Mount Gerizim Excavations, I: The Aramaic, Hebrew and Samaritan Inscrip-
tions (JSP 2. Jerusalem: Israel Antiquities Authority, 2004); Jan DUŠEK, Les manuscrits
araméens du Wadi Daliyeh et la Samarie vers 450–332 av. J.-C. (CHANE 30; Leiden:
Brill, 2007).
91 A summary with further references may be found in my “Some Aspects of
Samaria’s Religious Culture during the Early Hellenistic Era,” in The Historian and the
Bible: (ed. P. R. Davies and D. V. Edelman; LHBOTS; London: T. & T. Clark Contin-
uum, forthcoming).
92 Moshe FLORENTIN, Tulida – A Samaritan Chronicle: Text, Translation, Commen-
tary (Hebrew) (Jerusalem: Yad Izhaq Ben Zvi, 1999); Theodor W. J. JUYNBOLL, Chroni-
con Samaritanum Arabice conscriptum, cui titulus est Liber Josuae (Leiden: S. & J.
Luchtmans, 1848); Paul STENHOUSE, The Kitāb al-tarīikh of Abū ’l Fath (Studies in Ju-
daica 1; Sydney: Mandelbaum Trust, University of Sydney, 1985); James W. WATTS,
“The Torah as the Rhetoric of Priesthood,” in The Pentateuch as Torah: New Models for
Understanding Its Promulgation and Acceptance (ed. G. N. Knoppers and B. M. Levin-
son; Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007) 319–31.
Parallel Torahs and Inner-Scriptural Interpretation 25
Conclusions
93 One of the late third/early second century B.C.E. Samaritan inscriptions discovered
on the Aegean island of Delos mentions Mt. Gerizim and employs the term “Israelites” to
refer to the Samaritans, Philippe BRUNEAU, “Les Israélites de Délos et la juivierìe déli-
enne,” Bulletin de Correspondance Hellénique 106 (1982) 465–504; L. Michael WHITE,
“The Delos Synagogue Revisited: Recent Fieldwork in the Graeco-Roman Diaspora,”
HTR 80 (1987) 133–60. On the parallels between Samaritan and Jewish synagogues, see
Reinhard PUMMER, “How to Tell a Samaritan Synagogue from a Jewish Synagogue,”
BAR 24/3 (May/June 1998) 24–35; IDEM, “Samaritan Synagogues and Jewish Syna-
gogues: Similarities and Differences,” in Jews, Christians, and Polytheists in the Ancient
Synagogue: Cultural Interaction during the Greco-Roman Period (ed. S. Fine; London
and New York: Routledge, 1999) 120–21; Lee I. LEVINE, The Ancient Synagogue: the
First Thousand Years (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000) 102–103.
94 The Samaritan Targum of the Pentateuch stems from the third or fourth century
C.E., Abraham TAL, The Samaritan Targum of the Pentateuch: A Critical Edition (Texts
and Studies in the Hebrew Language and Related Subjects 4–6; Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv Uni-
versity, 1980–1983); IDEM, “The Samaritan Targum of the Pentateuch,” in Mikra: Text,
Translation, Reading and Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in Ancient Judaism and
Early Christianity (ed. M. J. Mulder; CRINT 2/1; Assen: Van Gorcum, 1988) 189–216.
For other parallels between Jews and Samaritans in late antiquity, including the articula-
tion of the 613 Precepts, see PUMMER, “Samaritans,” 251–52.
26 Gary N. Knoppers
ing, and early transmission of the Pentateuch. Rather than fixating simply
on the question of whether the Samaritan Pentateuch is a borrowed imita-
tion of the Jewish Pentateuch or vice versa (legitimate questions, to be
sure), it may be helpful, historically speaking, to consider whether the Pen-
tateuch was, at least for a time, a common endeavor.95 In this understand-
ing, the Pentateuch was a foundational literary corpus binding the Judean
and Samarian communities together. The two groups could disagree on
many things, of course, including the very understanding and application
of key texts within the Torah. But the Pentateuch validated the claims of
each group to be descendants of the eponymous ancestor Jacob/Israel and
provided each community with foundational stories and legal precepts to
structure societal life. Fulfilling this corporate function, the Torah was an
important social and religious social force uniting, rather than dividing, the
two groups together.