Textorah

II Kings 12

1
בֶּן־שֶׁבַע שָׁנִים יְהוֹאָשׁ בְּמָלְכוֹ
Jehoash was seven years old when he began to reign.
Υἱὸς ἐπτὰ ἐτῶν Ἰωὰς ἐν τῷ βασιλεύειν αὐτόν.
Jehoash [was] seven years old when he began to reign.
2
בִּשְׁנַת־שֶׁבַע לְיֵהוּא מָלַךְ יְהוֹאָשׁ וְאַרְבָּעִים שָׁנָה מָלַךְ בִּירוּשָׁלָ͏ִם וְשֵׁם אִמּוֹ צִבְיָה מִבְּאֵר שָׁבַע
In the seventh year of Jehu began Jehoash to reign; and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem; and his mother's name was Zibiah of Beer-sheba.
Ἐν ἔτει ἑβδόμῳ τῷ Ἰοὺ ἐβασίλευσεν Ἰωὰς, καὶ τεσσαράκοντα ἔτη ἐβασίλευσεν ἐν Ἱερουσαλὴμ, καὶ ὄνομα τῆς μητρὸς αὐτοῦ Σαβιὰ ἐκ τῆς Βηρσαβεέ.
Jehoash began to reign in the seventh year of Jehu, and he reigned forty years in Jerusalem: and his mother’s name [was] Zibiah of Beersheba.
3
וַיַּעַשׂ יְהוֹאָשׁ הַיָּשָׁר בְּעֵינֵי יְהוָה כָּל־יָמָיו אֲשֶׁר הוֹרָהוּ יְהוֹיָדָע הַכֹּהֵן
And Jehoash did that which was right in the eyes of HaShem all his days wherein Jehoiada the priest instructed him.
Καὶ ἐποίησεν Ἰωὰς τὸ εὐθὲς ἐνώπιον Κυρίου πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας ἃς ἐφώτισεν αὐτὸν Ἰωδαὲ ὁ ἱερεύς.
And Jehoash did that which was right in the sight of the Lord all the days that Jehoiada the priest instructed him.
4
רַק הַבָּמוֹת לֹא־סָרוּ עוֹד הָעָם מְזַבְּחִים וּמְקַטְּרִים בַּבָּמוֹת
Howbeit the high places were not taken away; the people still sacrificed and offered in the high places.
Πλὴν τῶν ὑψηλῶν οὐ μετεστάθησαν, καὶ ἐκεῖ ἔτι ὁ λαὸς ἐθυσίαζε, καὶ ἐθυμίων ἐν τοῖς ὑψηλοῖς.
Only there were not [any] of the high places removed, and the people still sacrificed there, and burned incense on the high places.
5
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוֹאָשׁ אֶל־הַכֹּהֲנִים כֹּל כֶּסֶף הַקֳּדָשִׁים אֲשֶׁר־יוּבָא בֵית־יְהוָה כֶּסֶף עוֹבֵר אִישׁ כֶּסֶף נַפְשׁוֹת עֶרְכּוֹ כָּל־כֶּסֶף אֲשֶׁר יַעֲלֶה עַל לֶב־אִישׁ לְהָבִיא בֵּית יְהוָה
And Jehoash said to the priests: 'All the money of the hallowed things that is brought into the house of HaShem, in current money, the money of the persons for whom each man is rated, all the money that cometh into any man's heart to bring into the house of HaShem,
Καὶ εἶπεν Ἰωὰς πρὸς τοὺς ἱερεῖς, πᾶν τὸ ἀργύριον τῶν ἁγίων τὸ εἰσοδιαζόμενον ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ Κυρίου, ἀργύριον συντιμήσεως, ἀνὴρ ἀργύριον λαβὼν συντιμήσεως, πᾶν ἀργύριον ὃ ἐὰν ἀναβῇ ἐπὶ καρδίαν ἀνδρὸς ἐνεγκεῖν ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου,
And Jehoash said to the priests, [As for] all the money of the holy things that is brought into the house of the Lord, the money of valuation, [as] each man brings the money of valuation, all the money which any man may feel disposed to bring into the house of the Lord,
6
יִקְחוּ לָהֶם הַכֹּהֲנִים אִישׁ מֵאֵת מַכָּרוֹ וְהֵם יְחַזְּקוּ אֶת־בֶּדֶק הַבַּיִת לְכֹל אֲשֶׁר־יִמָּצֵא שָׁם בָּדֶק
let the priests take it to them, every man from him that bestoweth it upon him; and they shall repair the breaches of the house, wheresoever any breach shall be found.'
λαβέτωσαν ἑαυτοῖς οἱ ἱερεῖς, ἀνὴρ ἀπὸ τῆς πράσεως αὐτοῦ, καὶ αὐτοὶ κρατήσουσι τὸ βεδὲκ τοῦ οἴκου εἰς πάντα οὗ ἐὰν εὑρεθῇ ἐκεῖ βεδέκ.
let the priests take it to themselves, every man from [the proceeds of] his sale: and they shall repair the breaches of the house in all [places] wheresoever a breach shall be found.
7
וַיְהִי בִּשְׁנַת עֶשְׂרִים וְשָׁלֹשׁ שָׁנָה לַמֶּלֶךְ יְהוֹאָשׁ לֹא־חִזְּקוּ הַכֹּהֲנִים אֶת־בֶּדֶק הַבָּיִת
But it was so, that in the three and twentieth year of king Jehoash the priests had not repaired the breaches of the house.
Καὶ ἐγενήθη ἐν τῷ εἰκοστῷ καὶ τρίτῳ ἔτει τῷ βασιλεῖ Ἰωὰς οὐκ ἐκραταίωσαν οἱ ἱερεῖς τὸ βεδέκ τοῦ οἴκου.
And it came to pass in the twenty-third year of King Jehoash the priests [had] not repaired the breaches of the house.
8
וַיִּקְרָא הַמֶּלֶךְ יְהוֹאָשׁ לִיהוֹיָדָע הַכֹּהֵן וְלַכֹּהֲנִים וַיֹּאמֶר אֲלֵהֶם מַדּוּעַ אֵינְכֶם מְחַזְּקִים אֶת־בֶּדֶק הַבָּיִת וְעַתָּה אַל־תִּקְחוּ־כֶסֶף מֵאֵת מַכָּרֵיכֶם כִּי־לְבֶדֶק הַבַּיִת תִּתְּנֻהוּ
Then king Jehoash called for Jehoiada the priest, and for the other priests, and said unto them: 'Why repair ye not the breaches of the house? now therefore take no longer money from them that bestow it upon you, but deliver it for the breaches of the house.'
Καὶ ἐκάλεσεν Ἰωὰς ὁ βασιλεὺς Ἰωδαὲ τὸν ἱερέα καὶ τοὺς ἱερεῖς, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς αὐτούς, τί ὅτι οὐκ ἐκραταιοῦτε τὸ βεδὲκ τοῦ οἴκου; καὶ νῦν μὴ λάβητε ἀργύριον ἀπὸ τῶν πράσεων ὑμῶν, ὅτι εἰς τὸ βεδὲκ τοῦ οἴκου δώσετε αὐτό.
And King Jehoash called Jehoiada the priest, and the [other] priests, and said to them, Why have ye not repaired the breaches of the house? now then receive no [more] money from your sales, for ye shall give it to [repair the] breaches of the house.
9
וַיֵּאֹתוּ הַכֹּהֲנִים לְבִלְתִּי קְחַת־כֶּסֶף מֵאֵת הָעָם וּלְבִלְתִּי חַזֵּק אֶת־בֶּדֶק הַבָּיִת
And the priests consented that they should take no longer money from the people, neither repair the breaches of the house.
Καὶ συνεφώνησαν οἱ ἱερεῖς τοῦ μὴ λαβεῖν ἀργύριον παρὰ τοῦ λαοῦ, καὶ τοῦ μὴ ἐνισχῦσαι τὸ βεδὲκ τοῦ οἴκου.
And the priests consented to receive no more money of the people, and not to repair the breaches of the house.
10
וַיִּקַּח יְהוֹיָדָע הַכֹּהֵן אֲרוֹן אֶחָד וַיִּקֹּב חֹר בְּדַלְתּוֹ וַיִּתֵּן אֹתוֹ אֵצֶל הַמִּזְבֵּחַ בימין מִיָּמִין בְּבוֹא־אִישׁ בֵּית יְהוָה וְנָתְנוּ־שָׁמָּה הַכֹּהֲנִים שֹׁמְרֵי הַסַּף אֶת־כָּל־הַכֶּסֶף הַמּוּבָא בֵית־יְהוָה
And Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it beside the altar, on the right side as one cometh into the house of HaShem; and the priests that kept the threshold put therein all the money that was brought into the house of HaShem.
Καὶ ἔλαβεν Ἰωδαὲ ὁ ἱερεὺς κιβωτὸν μίαν, καὶ ἔτρησε τρώγλην ἐπὶ τῇς σανίδος αὐτῆς, καὶ ἔδωκεν αὐτὴν παρὰ ἁμμαζειβὶ ἐν τῷ οἴκῳ ἀδρος οἴκου Κυρίου· και ἔδωκας οἱ ἱερεῖς οἱ ἱεπεῖς φυλάσσοντες τὸν σταθμὸν πᾶν τὸ ἀργύριον τὸ εὑρεθὲν ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου·
And Jehoiada the priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid of it, and set it by the altar in the house of a man [belonging to] the house of the Lord, and the priests that kept the door put [therein] all the money that was found in the house of the Lord.
11
וַיְהִי כִּרְאוֹתָם כִּי־רַב הַכֶּסֶף בָּאָרוֹן וַיַּעַל סֹפֵר הַמֶּלֶךְ וְהַכֹּהֵן הַגָּדוֹל וַיָּצֻרוּ וַיִּמְנוּ אֶת־הַכֶּסֶף הַנִּמְצָא בֵית־יְהוָה
And it was so, when they saw that there was much money in the chest, that the king's scribe and the high priest came up, and they put up in bags and counted the money that was found in the house of HaShem.
Καὶ ἐγένετο ὡς εἶδον ὅτι πολὺ τὸ ἀργύριον ἐν τῇ κιβωτῷ, καὶ ἀνέβη ὁ γραμματεὺς τοῦ βασιλέως καὶ ὁ ἱερεὺς ὁ μέγας, καὶ ἔσθιγξαν καὶ ἠρίθμησαν τὸ ἀργύριον τὸ εὑρεθὲν ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου.
And it came to pass, when they saw that [there was] much money in the chest, that the king’s scribe and the high priest went up, and they tied up and counted the money that was found in the house of the Lord.
12
וְנָתְנוּ אֶת־הַכֶּסֶף הַמְתֻכָּן עַל־יד יְדֵי עֹשֵׂי הַמְּלָאכָה הפקדים הַמֻּפְקָדִים בֵּית יְהוָה וַיּוֹצִיאֻהוּ לְחָרָשֵׁי הָעֵץ וְלַבֹּנִים הָעֹשִׂים בֵּית יְהוָה
And they gave the money that was weighed out into the hands of them that did the work, that had the oversight of the house of HaShem; and they paid it out to the carpenters and the builders, that wrought upon the house of HaShem,
Καὶ ἔδωκαν τὸ ἀργύριον τὸ ἑτοιμασθὲν ἐπὶ χεῖρας ποιούντων τὰ ἔργα τῶν ἐπισκοπῶν οἴκου· Κυρίου, καὶ ἐξέδοσαν τοῖς τέκτοσι τῶν ξύλων, καὶ τοῖς οἱκοδόμοις τοῖς ποιοῦσιν ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου,
And they gave the money that had been collected into the hands of them that wrought the works, the overseers of the house of the Lord; and they gave it out to the carpenters and to the builders that wrought in the house of the Lord.
13
וְלַגֹּדְרִים וּלְחֹצְבֵי הָאֶבֶן וְלִקְנוֹת עֵצִים וְאַבְנֵי מַחְצֵב לְחַזֵּק אֶת־בֶּדֶק בֵּית־יְהוָה וּלְכֹל אֲשֶׁר־יֵצֵא עַל־הַבַּיִת לְחָזְקָה
and to the masons and the hewers of stone, and for buying timber and hewn stone to repair the breaches of the house of HaShem, and for all that was laid out for the house to repair it.
καὶ τοῖς τειχισταῖς, καὶ τοῖς λατόμοις τῶν λίθων τοῦ κτήσασθαι ξύλα καὶ λίθους λατομητοὺς τοῦ κατασχεῖν τὸ βεδὲκ οἴκου Κυρίου, εἰς πάντα ὅσα ἐξωδιάσθη ἐπὶ τὸν οἶκον τοῦ κραταιῶσαι.
And to the masons, and to the hewers of stone, to purchase timber and hewn stone to repair the breaches of the house of the Lord, for all that was spent on the house of the Lord to repair [it].
14
אַךְ לֹא יֵעָשֶׂה בֵּית יְהוָה סִפּוֹת כֶּסֶף מְזַמְּרוֹת מִזְרָקוֹת חֲצֹצְרוֹת כָּל־כְּלִי זָהָב וּכְלִי־כָסֶף מִן־הַכֶּסֶף הַמּוּבָא בֵית־יְהוָה
But there were not made for the house of HaShem cups of silver, snuffers, basins, trumpets, any vessels of gold, or vessels of silver, of the money that was brought into the house of HaShem;
Πλὴν οὐ ποιηθήσονται οἴκῳ Κυρίου θύραι ἀργυραῖ, ἧλοι, φιάλαι, καὶ σάλπιγγες, πᾶν σκεῦος χρυσοῦν, καὶ σκεῦος ἀργυροῦν, ἐκ τοῦ ἀργυρίου τοῦ εἰσενεχθέντος ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου,
Only there were not to be made for the house of the Lord silver plates, studs, bowls, or trumpets, any vessel of gold or vessel of silver, of the money that was brought into the house of the Lord:
15
כִּי־לְעֹשֵׂי הַמְּלָאכָה יִתְּנֻהוּ וְחִזְּקוּ־בוֹ אֶת־בֵּית יְהוָה
for they gave that to them that did the work, and repaired therewith the house of HaShem.
ὅτι τοῖς ποιοῦσι τὰ ἔργα δώσουσιν αὐτό· καὶ ἐκραταίωσαν ἐν αὐτῷ τὸν οἶκον Κυρίου.
for they were to give it to the workmen, and they repaired therewith the house of the Lord.
16
וְלֹא יְחַשְּׁבוּ אֶת־הָאֲנָשִׁים אֲשֶׁר יִתְּנוּ אֶת־הַכֶּסֶף עַל־יָדָם לָתֵת לְעֹשֵׂי הַמְּלָאכָה כִּי בֶאֱמֻנָה הֵם עֹשִׂים
Moreover they reckoned not with the men, into whose hand they delivered the money to give to them that did the work; for they dealt faithfully.
Καὶ οὐκ ἐξελογίζοντο τοὺς ἄνδρας οἷς ἐδίδουν τὸ ἀργύριον ἐπὶ χεῖρας αὐτῶν δοῦναι τοῖς ποιοῦσι τὰ ἔργα, ὅτι ἐν πίστει αὐτῶν ποιοῦσιν.
Also they took no account of the men into whose hands they gave the money to give to the workmen, for they acted faithfully.
17
כֶּסֶף אָשָׁם וְכֶסֶף חַטָּאוֹת לֹא יוּבָא בֵּית יְהוָה לַכֹּהֲנִים יִהְיוּ
The forfeit money, and the sin money, was not brought into the house of HaShem; it was the priests.
Ἀργύριον περὶ ἁμαρτίας, καὶ ἀργύριον περὶ πλημμελείας, ὅ, τι εἰσηνέχθη ἐν οἴκῳ Κυρίου, τοῖς ἱερεῦσιν ἐγένετο.
Money for a sin offering, and money for a trespass offering, whatever happened to be brought into the house of the Lord, went to the priests.
18
אָז יַעֲלֶה חֲזָאֵל מֶלֶךְ אֲרָם וַיִּלָּחֶם עַל־גַּת וַיִּלְכְּדָהּ וַיָּשֶׂם חֲזָאֵל פָּנָיו לַעֲלוֹת עַל־יְרוּשָׁלָ͏ִם
Then Hazael king of Aram went up, and fought against Gath, and took it; and Hazael set his face to go up to Jerusalem.
Τότε ἀνέβη Ἀζαὴλ βασιλεὺς Συρίας, καὶ ἐπολέμησεν ἐπὶ Γὲθ, καὶ προκατελάβετο αὐτήν· καὶ ἔταξεν Ἀζαὴλ τὸ πρόσωπον αὐτοῦ ἀναβῆναι ἐπὶ Ἱερουσαλήμ.
Then went up Hazael king of Syria, and fought against Gath, and took it: and Hazael set his face to go against Jerusalem.
19
וַיִּקַּח יְהוֹאָשׁ מֶלֶךְ־יְהוּדָה אֵת כָּל־הַקֳּדָשִׁים אֲשֶׁר־הִקְדִּישׁוּ יְהוֹשָׁפָט וִיהוֹרָם וַאֲחַזְיָהוּ אֲבֹתָיו מַלְכֵי יְהוּדָה וְאֶת־קֳדָשָׁיו וְאֵת כָּל־הַזָּהָב הַנִּמְצָא בְּאֹצְרוֹת בֵּית־יְהוָה וּבֵית הַמֶּלֶךְ וַיִּשְׁלַח לַחֲזָאֵל מֶלֶךְ אֲרָם וַיַּעַל מֵעַל יְרוּשָׁלָ͏ִם
And Jehoash king Judah took all the hallowed things that Jehoshaphat, and Jehoram, and Ahaziah, his fathers, kings of Judah, had dedicated, and his own hallowed things, and all the gold that was found in the treasures of the house of HaShem, and of the king's house, and sent it to Hazael king of Aram; and he went away from Jerusalem.
Καὶ ἔλαβεν Ἰωὰς βασιλεὺς Ἰούδα πάντα τὰ ἅγια ὅσα ἡγίασεν Ἰωσαφὰτ καὶ Ἰωρὰμ καὶ Ὀχοζίας οἱ πατέρες αὐτοῦ καὶ βασιλεῖς Ἰούδα, καὶ τὰ ἅγια αὐτοῦ, καὶ πᾶν τὸ χρυσίον τὸ εὑρεθὲν ἐν θησαυροῖς οἴκου Κυρίου καὶ οἴκου τοῦ βασιλέως, καὶ ἀπέστειλεν τῷ Ἀζαὴλ βασιλεῖ Συρίας, καὶ ἀνέβη ἀπὸ Ἱερουσαλήμ.
And Jehoash king of Judah took all the holy things which Jehoshaphat, and Jehoram, Ahaziah, his fathers, and kings of Judah [had] consecrated, and what he had himself dedicated, and all the gold that was found in the treasures of the Lord’s house and the king’s house, and he sent [them] to Hazael king of Syria; and he went up from Jerusalem.
20
וְיֶתֶר דִּבְרֵי יוֹאָשׁ וְכָל־אֲשֶׁר עָשָׂה הֲלוֹא־הֵם כְּתוּבִים עַל־סֵפֶר דִּבְרֵי הַיָּמִים לְמַלְכֵי יְהוּדָה
Now the rest of the acts of Joash, and all that he did, are they not written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
Καὶ τὰ λοιπὰ τῶν λόγων Ἰωὰς καὶ πάντα ὅσα ἐποίησεν, οὐκ ἰδοὺ ταῦτα γεγραμμένα ἐπὶ βιβλίῳ λόγων τῶν ἡμερῶν τοῖς βασιλεῦσιν Ἰούδα;
And the rest of the acts of Joash, and all that he did, behold, [are] not these things written in the book of the chronicles of the kings of Judah?
21
וַיָּקֻמוּ עֲבָדָיו וַיִּקְשְׁרוּ־קָשֶׁר וַיַּכּוּ אֶת־יוֹאָשׁ בֵּית מִלֹּא הַיּוֹרֵד סִלָּא
And his servants arose, and made a conspiracy, and smote Joash at Beth-millo, on the way that goeth down to Silla.
Καὶ ἀνέστησαν οἱ δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ καὶ ἔδησαν πάντα σύνδεσμον, καὶ ἐπάταξαν τὸν Ἰωὰς ἐν οἴκῳ Μαλλὼ τῷ ἐν Σελά.
And his servants rose up and made a conspiracy, and smote Joash in the house of Millo that is in Silla.
22
וְיוֹזָבָד בֶּן־שִׁמְעָת וִיהוֹזָבָד בֶּן־שֹׁמֵר עֲבָדָיו הִכֻּהוּ וַיָּמֹת וַיִּקְבְּרוּ אֹתוֹ עִם־אֲבֹתָיו בְּעִיר דָּוִד וַיִּמְלֹךְ אֲמַצְיָה בְנוֹ תַּחְתָּיו
For Jozacar the son of Shimeath, and Jehozabad the son of Shomer, his servants, smote him, and he died; and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David; and Amaziah his son reigned in his stead.
Καὶ Ἰεζιρχὰρ υἱὸς Ἱεμουὰθ, καὶ Ἰεζεβοὺθ ὁ υἱὸς αὐτοῦ Σωμὴρ, οἱ δοῦλοι αὐτοῦ, ἐπάταξαν αὐτὸν καὶ ἀπέθανε, καὶ ἔθαψαν αὐτὸν μετὰ τῶν πατέρων αὐτοῦ ἑν πόλει Δαυίδ· καὶ ἐβασίλευσεν Ἀμεσσείας υἱὸς αὐτοῦ ἀντʼ αὐτοῦ.
And Jozacar the son of Shimeath, and Jehozabad Shomer’s son, his servants, smote him, and he died; and they buried him with his fathers in the city of David: and Amaziah his son reigned in his stead.

How it works

A parallel reader for the Hebrew Bible and its oldest witnesses: the Masoretic text, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Septuagint, each with an English translation where one is available.

Reading a chapter

Choose a book and chapter at the top, or type a reference into Go to (Isa 53:11, 1 Sam 3, sam 3:4, ii kgs 2, ben sira 51). Book names can be abbreviated; a name shared by numbered books (sam, kings, chr, macc) opens the first of them unless you add the number. The arrow keys move between chapters, and the address bar keeps a link to the verse you clicked, so you can bookmark or share a place.

Each row is one verse. Rows follow the Masoretic verse numbering, so the Hebrew, JPS and Samaritan columns line up exactly. The Septuagint is numbered differently in many places (Psalms, Jeremiah, Exodus 35–40, parts of Kings, Proverbs, Daniel, and dozens of chapter boundaries). Its verses are placed against their Masoretic counterparts, and a small tag such as 50:3 shows the Septuagint's own number when it differs. Greek verses that have no Masoretic counterpart (for example the Prayer of Azariah in Daniel 3) appear in reading order as separate rows marked LXX.

Columns

The chips at the top switch columns on and off. Drag a chip (or a column heading) to reorder; with a chip focused, the ← → keys move it. Your choice is remembered. The Samaritan columns appear only in Genesis–Deuteronomy; the scrolls column appears wherever a manuscript survives, including Ben Sira. Columns marked † are licensed for non-commercial use only.

Words: lexicon and concordance

Hover over any Hebrew word (Masoretic, Samaritan or scroll) or any Greek word to see its dictionary form, Strong's number, a short gloss and its grammar. Click the word to open the concordance on the right: the full lexicon entry, then every occurrence, grouped by book — for Hebrew, separately for the Masoretic text, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the scrolls (with the manuscript named). Click a reference to go there; every form of the word in the chapter is highlighted. You can also type a word or a Strong's number into Lexicon at the top.

In the Masoretic text, a Ketiv (the written form, unpointed) is shown in grey immediately before its Qere (the form read aloud); both carry the Qere's dictionary entry.

Variants

The Samaritan Pentateuch and every scroll are compared word by word with the Masoretic text of the same verse:

In the scrolls, letters in brackets are a modern editor's reconstruction and are never counted as variants; letters with a dotted overline are uncertain; ◦ is a trace of an unreadable letter. Manuscripts written in paleo-Hebrew script, and divine names that square-script scrolls write in paleo-Hebrew, are shown in paleo-Hebrew letters (switchable under Display). Hover a manuscript to see its edition. Display → Dead Sea Scrolls can hide the manuscripts that agree with the Masoretic text, or strip the reconstructions to show only what survives.

The comparison is automatic. It aligns words by spelling, so a transposition or a long rewritten passage can be marked imperfectly, and the spelling rule cannot tell a suffix from a vowel letter. Treat the colours as a finding aid and check a critical edition before building an argument on a reading.

Books outside the Hebrew Bible

Besides the Septuagint-only books, the book list has 1 Enoch and Jubilees (“Other ancient books”), shown in R. H. Charles's English with the Qumran copies beside them, and Psalms has a chapter 151. Their scroll copies — like those of Tobit and Ben Sira — have no verse numbers in the data: each fragment is placed by its published identification, and its lines are spread over those verses, so treat the exact verse boundaries as approximate. Aramaic copies (Tobit 4Q196–199 and all of Enoch) are marked “Aramaic” and have no word lookups.

Rabbinic citations

The small ❝ under a verse number opens the passages of rabbinic literature that cite that verse — Mishnah, Tosefta, both Talmuds, Midrash, Targum and Kabbalah (and, if you tick the box, later halakhah, liturgy and thought) — fetched live from Sefaria, so it needs an internet connection. Each passage is listed with Sefaria's date for the work it comes from and a link to read it there. Sefaria's links include allusions and discussions as well as quotations; those it classes as quotations are marked. It works for the Hebrew Bible, Ben Sira (by Kahana's numbering, e.g. the Talmud's quotations of Ben Sira), Tobit and Jubilees. For 1 Enoch, which the rabbis do not quote, it lists instead the Zohar's passages about a “Book of Enoch”.

How the Septuagint is aligned

Each Greek verse is placed by combining three things: the standard table of Septuagint–Masoretic verse correspondences (SIL's lxx.vrs), the table of Masoretic–English numbering differences, and a comparison of the English of Brenton's Septuagint with the JPS English, which confirms each pairing and catches displaced verses. Where no Masoretic verse is similar enough, the Greek verse stands on its own row.

The Greek word data

No openly licensed word-by-word analysis of Brenton's Greek exists, so each Greek word is matched to the most frequent analysis of the same form in the openly licensed Swete Septuagint (Morpheus parser), then to a lexicon entry. About 95% of words are identified. Parses of ambiguous forms (e.g. αὐτοῦ, τοῦ) can be wrong; the card says "automatic parse" as a reminder.

About the texts

What each column is, where it comes from, and what to keep in mind when reading it.

Masoretic Text — Westminster Leningrad Codex

The Masoretic text is the Hebrew Bible as transmitted by the Masoretes, scribal scholars active in Tiberias and elsewhere roughly from the 7th to the 10th century, who fixed its vowel points, accents and marginal notes (the Masorah) around a consonantal text that was already essentially stable by the 1st–2nd century CE. The Leningrad Codex (St Petersburg, Firkovich I B 19 A), copied in 1008/1009 CE in the Ben Asher tradition, is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible; the slightly older Aleppo Codex lost most of the Torah in 1947. It is the base of the standard critical editions (BHK, BHS, BHQ).

The Westminster Leningrad Codex is the public-domain digital transcription of it maintained by the J. Alan Groves Center at Westminster Theological Seminary. In this edition a Ketiv appears as its own unpointed word before the pointed Qere.

JPS 1917 — The Holy Scriptures according to the Masoretic Text

The first English Bible translation produced by a committee of Jewish scholars for the Jewish Publication Society of America, under Max L. Margolis as editor-in-chief, published in 1917. Its language deliberately follows the cadence of the King James and Revised Versions, but its renderings follow the Masoretic text and Jewish exegetical tradition, and it keeps the Hebrew chapter and verse numbering. It is in the public domain; its successor, the New JPS (Tanakh, 1985), is not. The electronic edition used here writes the divine names as “HaShem” and “G-d”.

Septuagint — Brenton's Greek text and the Updated Brenton English

The Septuagint is the Jewish translation of the Hebrew scriptures into Greek. The Torah was translated in Alexandria in the 3rd century BCE (the Letter of Aristeas tells the legend of 72 translators under Ptolemy II); the other books followed over the next two centuries. Because it was made from Hebrew manuscripts older than the Masoretic text, it often preserves a different Hebrew text: Jeremiah is about one-seventh shorter and differently ordered (a shorter Hebrew text of this type survives at Qumran in 4QJerb,d), Job is about one-sixth shorter, and Esther and Daniel have long additions. It was the Bible of Philo, Josephus and the New Testament writers, and became the Old Testament of the Greek church, which in turn led Jewish translators (Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion) to produce closer revisions.

Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton published an English translation in 1844 and a Greek–English edition in 1851. His Greek is essentially the Sixtine (Roman) edition of 1587, which follows the 4th-century Codex Vaticanus. It is older and less critical than the modern editions of Rahlfs (1935) and Göttingen, which are under copyright. The English column is the Updated Brenton (Adam Boyd, 2020), Brenton's translation with modernised spelling and wording, dedicated to the public domain.

Samaritan Pentateuch †

The Torah as preserved by the Samaritan community of Mount Gerizim (Nablus), written in the Samaritan script, a descendant of the paleo-Hebrew alphabet. It differs from the Masoretic text in about 6,000 places, most of them spelling or grammar; in about 1,900 of them it agrees with the Septuagint. Some readings are distinctively Samaritan, above all the commandment to build an altar on Mount Gerizim added after the Ten Commandments (Exod 20:17; Deut 5:21) and “Gerizim” for “Ebal” in Deut 27:4. Many others — harmonising expansions that copy one passage into its parallel — are shared with “pre-Samaritan” Qumran manuscripts such as 4QpaleoExodm and 4QNumb, showing that the text type is older than the Samaritan schism.

European scholars learned of it in 1616, when Pietro della Valle brought a manuscript from Damascus; it was printed in the Paris (1645) and London (1657) Polyglots, collated by Benjamin Kennicott (1776–80) and edited critically by August von Gall (1914–18). The Hebrew here is Aleksandr Sigalov's digital text, based on Kennicott and checked against von Gall; the English is Sigalov's adaptation of the King James Version to the Samaritan readings. For modern scholarship see Abraham Tal's edition of MS Shechem 6 and Stefan Schorch's critical editio maior.

Dead Sea Scrolls and other Judean Desert manuscripts †

Between 1947 and 1956 the remains of about 950 manuscripts were found in eleven caves near Khirbet Qumran. Some 230 are biblical — every book of the Hebrew Bible except Esther is represented, from tiny fragments to the complete Great Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa) — dating from about 250 BCE to 68 CE. They are a thousand years older than the Leningrad Codex. Most are close to the ancestor of the Masoretic text (“proto-Masoretic”), but others agree with the Septuagint (4QJerb, 4QSama in places), with the Samaritan text type, or with neither — evidence that several forms of the text circulated side by side before the Masoretic text prevailed.

Manuscripts from other sites fill out the picture: Masada (before its fall in 73/74 CE; excavated by Yigael Yadin, 1963–65) and the Bar Kokhba refuges of Wadi Murabba'at and Naḥal Ḥever (132–135 CE), whose biblical texts are already virtually identical with the Masoretic text, as well as Naḥal Ṣe'elim, Wadi Sdeir and Naḥal Arugot. The official publication is the Discoveries in the Judaean Desert series (Oxford, 1955–2010).

The transcriptions here are those of Martin G. Abegg Jr., James E. Bowley and Edward M. Cook, as converted by the Eep Talstra Centre for Bible and Computer (ETCBC). Each manuscript is labelled with its siglum (e.g. 4QIsad), its DJD number, its find-site and the column or fragment and line. Besides the biblical manuscripts, the copies of Ben Sira, Tobit, 1 Enoch, Jubilees and Psalm 151 are shown under those books. Not every manuscript is in the dataset — notably the Greek scrolls (such as the Greek Minor Prophets from Naḥal Ḥever) are absent, and the Masada Ben Sira scroll is added separately (see Ben Sira).

Ben Sira

The Wisdom of Yeshua ben Eleazar ben Sira, composed in Hebrew in Jerusalem around 190–180 BCE and translated into Greek by his grandson in Egypt after 132 BCE (his prologue explains the difficulty of rendering Hebrew into Greek). It belongs to the Septuagint and to the Catholic and Orthodox canons (Latin Ecclesiasticus) but not to the Jewish one, although the Talmud and midrash quote it. Its Hebrew text was lost to the West until 1896, when Solomon Schechter, Agnes Lewis and Margaret Gibson identified medieval copies in the Cairo Genizah; ancient Hebrew copies then emerged at Qumran and Masada.

About two-thirds of the Hebrew is now known, from six medieval Genizah manuscripts (A–F, 10th–12th century) and three ancient ones: 2QSir (2Q18; Sir 6:14–15, 20–32), the acrostic of Sir 51:13–20, 30 in the Psalms Scroll 11QPsa (columns 21–22), and the Masada scroll (Mas1h), found by Yigael Yadin in 1964 in a casemate room of the fortress and published in 1965: seven columns with Sir 39:27–44:17, copied in the early 1st century BCE, little more than a century after the author. Its agreement with Genizah manuscript B showed that the medieval copies descend from the ancient Hebrew rather than from a translation back from Greek or Syriac.

Here the book is shown in Brenton's Greek and English. The Hebrew column is the Kahana edition, as transcribed on Hebrew Wikisource and distributed by Sefaria (CC BY-SA): a running text built on the Genizah manuscripts, in which words in [brackets] are Kahana's restorations; chapters with no surviving Hebrew are empty. Kahana numbers the verses in the Hebrew order — in the Greek, two blocks of chapters 30–36 are transposed — so his verses have been matched to Brenton's by content for this site, with his own number shown as “Heb.” where it differs. The scrolls column has the three ancient witnesses; the Masada text is Eric Reymond's transcription from bensira.org. Their placement was made for this site by matching the text; there is no Masoretic text to compare them with, so no variants are marked.

Psalm 151

The Septuagint Psalter ends with a short psalm “outside the number”, in which David recalls tending his father's sheep, his anointing and his victory over Goliath. It belongs to the Greek, Syriac and Ethiopic Bibles but not to the Hebrew one, and was long thought to have been composed in Greek — until the Psalms Scroll from Qumran Cave 11 (11QPsa, published by James Sanders in 1965) turned out to contain a longer Hebrew original in its 28th column, as two poems (151A on David's music and anointing, 151B, broken off, on Goliath). The Greek is a condensed translation of them. The psalm is shown as chapter 151 of Psalms, with the scroll's lines under the Greek verses they correspond to.

Tobit

A Jewish novella of the Eastern diaspora (probably 3rd–2nd century BCE): the pious exile Tobit, blinded in Nineveh, sends his son Tobias to recover money in Media, guided by the angel Raphael in disguise; on the way Tobias marries Sarah and drives off the demon Asmodeus. It is in the Septuagint and the Catholic and Orthodox canons. It survives in two Greek forms — a shorter one (Codices Vaticanus and Alexandrinus, printed by Brenton) and a longer one (Codex Sinaiticus) — and the Qumran copies, four in Aramaic (4Q196–199) and one in Hebrew (4Q200), published by Joseph Fitzmyer in 1995, side with the longer form, which is now generally taken as nearer the original. Their verse placement here follows Fitzmyer's identifications.

1 Enoch

A collection of five works ascribed to Enoch, the seventh from Adam who “walked with God” (Gen 5:24): the Book of the Watchers (ch. 1–36, 3rd century BCE), on the angels who descended to the daughters of men; the Parables (37–71); the Astronomical Book (72–82); the Dream Visions (83–90), with the “Animal Apocalypse” of Israel's history; and the Epistle of Enoch (91–108). It is quoted in the Letter of Jude (1:14–15) and is canonical in the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, whose Ge'ez version is the only complete text; Greek survives for about a third. Józef Milik published the Aramaic fragments from Qumran Cave 4 in 1976: eleven copies, covering every part except the Parables, the oldest from around 200 BCE. The English is R. H. Charles's 1917 translation from the Ethiopic (public domain). The Astronomical scrolls (4Q208–211) contain a much longer calendar than the Ethiopic; only their few passages that match chapters 76–82 are placed.

Jubilees

A retelling of Genesis and Exodus 1–14 as revealed to Moses on Sinai by an “angel of the presence”, dated by a calendar of 49-year jubilees and a 364-day solar year (mid-2nd century BCE). Like 1 Enoch it is canonical only in the Ethiopian church, whose Ge'ez version is the only complete text; parts survive in Latin, Syriac and Greek quotations. Fragments of about fifteen Hebrew copies were found at Qumran, more than of most biblical books, and are published in DJD 13 (VanderKam and Milik, 1994) and DJD 23. The English is R. H. Charles's 1917 translation (public domain).

Lexicon and concordance data

Hebrew words carry the analysis of STEPBible's Translators Amalgamated Hebrew OT (Tyndale House, Cambridge): extended Strong's numbers — James Strong's 1890 numbering, subdivided to follow the Brown–Driver–Briggs lexicon (1906) — with morphology from the ETCBC and an abridged BDB for definitions. Samaritan and scroll words take the analysis of the Masoretic word they correspond to, or, where they differ, of the same written form elsewhere in the Masoretic text. Greek words are matched through the Swete Septuagint and the Morpheus parser to STEPBible's Greek lexicon, which draws on Abbott-Smith (1922) and Liddell–Scott–Jones.

† Licensed for non-commercial use only. Full credits and licences: Credits and licences.