Textorah

II Kings 7

1
וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלִישָׁע שִׁמְעוּ דְּבַר־יְהוָה כֹּה אָמַר יְהוָה כָּעֵת מָחָר סְאָה־סֹלֶת בְּשֶׁקֶל וְסָאתַיִם שְׂעֹרִים בְּשֶׁקֶל בְּשַׁעַר שֹׁמְרוֹן
And Elisha said: 'Hear ye the word of HaShem; thus saith HaShem: To-morrow about this time shall a measure of fine flour be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gate of Samaria.'
Καὶ εἶπεν Ἑλισαιὲ ἄκουσον λόγον Κυρίου· τάδε λέλει Κύριος, ὡς ἡ ὥρα αὕτη, αὔριον μέτρον σεμιδάλεως σίκλου, καὶ δίμετρον κριθῶν σίκλου, ἐν ταῖς πύλαις Σαμαρείας.
And Elisha said, Hear thou the word of the Lord; Thus saith the Lord, As at this time, tomorrow a measure of fine flour [shall be sold] for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gates of Samaria.
2
וַיַּעַן הַשָּׁלִישׁ אֲשֶׁר־לַמֶּלֶךְ נִשְׁעָן עַל־יָדוֹ אֶת־אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים וַיֹּאמַר הִנֵּה יְהוָה עֹשֶׂה אֲרֻבּוֹת בַּשָּׁמַיִם הֲיִהְיֶה הַדָּבָר הַזֶּה וַיֹּאמֶר הִנְּכָה רֹאֶה בְּעֵינֶיךָ וּמִשָּׁם לֹא תֹאכֵל
Then the captain on whose hand the king leaned answered the man of G-d, and said: 'Behold, if HaShem should make windows in heaven, might this thing be?' And he said: 'Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.'
Καὶ ἀπεκρίθη ὁ τριστάτης ἐφʼ ὃν ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐπανεπαύετο ἐπὶ τὴν χεῖρα αὐτοῦ τῷ Ἑλισαιὲ, καὶ εἶπεν, ἰδοὺ ποιήσει Κύριος καταράκτας ἐν οὐρανῷ, μὴ ἔσται τὸ ῥῆμα τοῦτο; καὶ Ἑλισαιὲ εἶπεν, ἰδοὺ σὺ ὄψει τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς σου, καὶ ἐκεῖθεν οὐ φάγῃ.
And the officer on whose hand the king rested, answered Elisha, and said, Behold, [if] the Lord shall make floodgates in heaven, might this thing be? and Elisha said, Behold, thou shalt see with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof.
3
וְאַרְבָּעָה אֲנָשִׁים הָיוּ מְצֹרָעִים פֶּתַח הַשָּׁעַר וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ מָה אֲנַחְנוּ יֹשְׁבִים פֹּה עַד־מָתְנוּ
Now there were four leprous men at the entrance of the gate; and they said one to another: 'Why sit we here until we die?
Καὶ τέσσαρες ἄνδρες ἦσαν λεπροὶ παρὰ τὴν θύραν τῆς πόλεως, καὶ εἶπεν ἀνὴρ πρὸς τὸν πλησίον αὐτοῦ, τί ἡμεῖς καθήμεθα ὧδε ἕως ἀποθάνωμεν;
And there were four leprous men by the gate of the city: and one said to his neighbor, Why sit we here until we die?
4
אִם־אָמַרְנוּ נָבוֹא הָעִיר וְהָרָעָב בָּעִיר וָמַתְנוּ שָׁם וְאִם־יָשַׁבְנוּ פֹה וָמָתְנוּ וְעַתָּה לְכוּ וְנִפְּלָה אֶל־מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם אִם־יְחַיֻּנוּ נִחְיֶה וְאִם־יְמִיתֻנוּ וָמָתְנוּ
If we say: We will enter into the city, then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there; and if we sit still here, we die also. Now therefore come, and let us fall unto the host of the Arameans; if they save us alive, we shall live; and if they kill us, we shall but die.'
Ἐὰν εἴπωμεν, εἰσέλθωμεν εἰς τὴν πόλιν, καὶ ὁ λιμὸς ἐν τῇ πόλει, καὶ ἀποθανούμεθα ἐκεῖ· καὶ ἐὰν καθίσωμεν ὧδε, καὶ ἀποθανούμεθα· καὶ νῦν δεῦτε, καὶ ἐμπεσωμεν εἰς τὴν παρεμβολὴν Συρίας· ἐὰν ζωογονήσωσιν ἡμᾶς, καὶ ζησόμεθα· καὶ ἐὰν θανατώσωσιν ἡμᾶς, καὶ ἀποθανούμεθα.
If we should say, Let us go into the city, then [there is] famine in the city, and we shall die there: and if we sit here, then we shall die. Now then come, and let us fall upon the camp of the Syrians: if they should take us alive, then we shall live; and if they should put us to death, then we shall [only] die.
5
וַיָּקוּמוּ בַנֶּשֶׁף לָבוֹא אֶל־מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם וַיָּבֹאוּ עַד־קְצֵה מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם וְהִנֵּה אֵין־שָׁם אִישׁ
And they rose up in the twilight, to go unto the camp of the Arameans; and when they were come to the outermost part of the camp of the Arameans, behold, there was no man there.
Καὶ ἀνέστησαν ἐν τῷ σκότει εἰσελθεῖν εἰς τὴν παρεμβολὴν Συρίας· καὶ ἦλθον εἰς μέρος παρεμβολῆς Συρίας, καὶ ἰδοὺ οὐκ ἔστιν ἀνὴρ ἐκεῖ.
And they rose up while it was yet night, to go into the camp of Syria; and they came into a part of the camp of Syria, and behold, there [was] no man there.
6
וַאדֹנָי הִשְׁמִיעַ אֶת־מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם קוֹל רֶכֶב קוֹל סוּס קוֹל חַיִל גָּדוֹל וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל־אָחִיו הִנֵּה שָׂכַר־עָלֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ יִשְׂרָאֵל אֶת־מַלְכֵי הַחִתִּים וְאֶת־מַלְכֵי מִצְרַיִם לָבוֹא עָלֵינוּ
For the L-rd had made the host of the Arameans to hear a noise of chariots, and a noise of horses, even the noise of a great host; and they said one to another: 'Lo, the king of Israel hath hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of the Egyptians, to come upon us.'
Καὶ Κύριος ἀκουστὴν ἐποίησε παρεμβολὴν τὴν Συρίας φωνὴν ἅρματος καὶ φωνὴν ἵππου, φωνὴν δυνάμεως μεγάλης· καὶ εἶπεν ἀνὴρ πρὸς τὸν ἀδελφὸν αὐτοῦ, νῦν ἐμισθώσατο ἐφʼ ἡμᾶς ὁ βασιλεὺς Ἰσραὴλ τοὺς βασιλέας τῶν Χετταίων καὶ τοὺς βασιλέας Αἰγύπτου τοῦ ἐλθεῖν ἐφʼ ἡμᾶς.
For the Lord had made the army of Syria to hear a sound of chariots, and a sound of horses, [even] the sound of a great host: and [each] man said to his fellow, Now has the king of Israel hired against us the kings of the Hittites, and the kings of Egypt, to come against us.
7
וַיָּקוּמוּ וַיָּנוּסוּ בַנֶּשֶׁף וַיַּעַזְבוּ אֶת־אָהֳלֵיהֶם וְאֶת־סוּסֵיהֶם וְאֶת־חֲמֹרֵיהֶם הַמַּחֲנֶה כַּאֲשֶׁר־הִיא וַיָּנֻסוּ אֶל־נַפְשָׁם
Wherefore they arose and fled in the twilight, and left their tents, and their horses, and their asses, even the camp as it was, and fled for their life.
Καὶ ἀνέστησαν καὶ ἀπέδρασαν ἐν τῷ σκότει καὶ ἐγκατέλιπον τὰς σκηνὰς αὐτῶν, καὶ τοὺς ἵππους αὐτῶν, καὶ τοὺς ὄνους αὐτῶν ἐν τῇ παρεμβολῇ ὡς ἔστι, καὶ ἔφυγον πρὸς τὴν ψυχὴν ἑαυτῶν.
And they arose and fled while it was yet dark, and left their tents, and their horses, and their asses in the camp, as they were, and fled for their lives.
8
וַיָּבֹאוּ הַמְצֹרָעִים הָאֵלֶּה עַד־קְצֵה הַמַּחֲנֶה וַיָּבֹאוּ אֶל־אֹהֶל אֶחָד וַיֹּאכְלוּ וַיִּשְׁתּוּ וַיִּשְׂאוּ מִשָּׁם כֶּסֶף וְזָהָב וּבְגָדִים וַיֵּלְכוּ וַיַּטְמִנוּ וַיָּשֻׁבוּ וַיָּבֹאוּ אֶל־אֹהֶל אַחֵר וַיִּשְׂאוּ מִשָּׁם וַיֵּלְכוּ וַיַּטְמִנוּ
And when these lepers came to the outermost part of the camp, they went into one tent, and did eat and drink, and carried thence silver, and gold, and raiment, and went and hid it; and they came back, and entered into another tent, and carried thence also, and went and hid it.
Καὶ εἰσῆλθον οἱ λεπροὶ οὗτοι ἕως μέρους τῆς παρεμβολῆς, καὶ εἰσῆλθον εἰς σκηνὴν μίαν, καὶ ἔφαγον, καὶ ἔπιον, καὶ ἦραν ἐκεῖθεν ἀργύριον, καὶ χρυσίον, καὶ ἱματισμόν· καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν, καὶ ἐπέστρεψαν ἐκεῖθεν, καὶ εἰσῆλθον εἰς σκηνὴν ἄλλην, καὶ ἔλαβον ἐκεῖθεν καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν, καὶ κατέκρυψαν.
And these lepers entered a little way into the camp, and went into one tent, and ate and drank, and took thence silver, and gold, and raiment; and they went and returned thence, and entered into another tent, and took thence, and went and hid [the spoil].
9
וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ לֹא־כֵן אֲנַחְנוּ עֹשִׂים הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה יוֹם־בְּשֹׂרָה הוּא וַאֲנַחְנוּ מַחְשִׁים וְחִכִּינוּ עַד־אוֹר הַבֹּקֶר וּמְצָאָנוּ עָווֹן וְעַתָּה לְכוּ וְנָבֹאָה וְנַגִּידָה בֵּית הַמֶּלֶךְ
Then they said one to another: 'We do not well; this day is a day of good tidings, and we hold our peace; if we tarry till the morning light, punishment will overtake us; now therefore come, let us go and tell the king's household.'
Καὶ εἶπεν ἀνὴρ πρὸς τὸν πλησιον αὐτοῦ, οὐχ οὕτως ἡμεῖς ποιοῦμεν· ἡ ἡμέρα αὕτη, ἡμέρα εὐαγγελίας ἐστὶ, καὶ ἡμεῖς σιωπῶμεν, καὶ μένομεν ἕως φωτὸς τοῦ πρωῒ, καὶ εὑρήσομεν ἀνομίαν· καὶ νῦν δεῦρο, καὶ εἰσέλθωμεν καὶ ἀναγγείλωμεν εἰς τὸν οἶκον τοῦ βασιλέως.
And [one] man said to his neighbor, We are not doing [well] thus: this day is a day of glad tidings, and we hold our peace, and are waiting till the morning light, and shall find mischief: now then come, and let us go into [the city], and report to the house of the king.
10
וַיָּבֹאוּ וַיִּקְרְאוּ אֶל־שֹׁעֵר הָעִיר וַיַּגִּידוּ לָהֶם לֵאמֹר בָּאנוּ אֶל־מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם וְהִנֵּה אֵין־שָׁם אִישׁ וְקוֹל אָדָם כִּי אִם־הַסּוּס אָסוּר וְהַחֲמוֹר אָסוּר וְאֹהָלִים כַּאֲשֶׁר־הֵמָּה
So they came and called unto the porters of the city; and they told them, saying. 'We came to the camp of the Arameans, and, behold, there was no man there, neither voice of man, but the horses tied, and the asses tied, and the tents as they were.'
Καὶ εἰσῆλθον καὶ ἐβόησαν πρὸς τὴν πύλην τῆς πόλεως, καὶ ἀνήγγειλαν αὐτοῖς, λέγοντες, εἰσήλθομεν εἰς τὴν παρεμβολὴν Συρίας, καὶ ἰδοὺ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐκεῖ ἀνὴρ καὶ φωνὴ ἀνθρώπου, ὅτι εἰ μὴ ἵππος δεδεμένος καὶ ὄνος, καὶ αἱ σκηναὶ αὐτῶν ὡς εἰσί.
So they went and cried toward the gate of the city, and reported to them, saying, We went into the camp of Syria, and, behold, there is not there a man, nor voice of man, only horses tied and asses, and their tents as they were.
11
וַיִּקְרָא הַשֹּׁעֲרִים וַיַּגִּידוּ בֵּית הַמֶּלֶךְ פְּנִימָה
And the porters called, and they told it to the king's household within.
Καὶ ἐβόησαν οἱ θυρωροὶ, καὶ ἀνήγγειλαν εἰς τὸν οἶκον τοῦ βασιλέως ἔσω.
And the porters cried aloud, and reported to the house of the king within.
12
וַיָּקָם הַמֶּלֶךְ לַיְלָה וַיֹּאמֶר אֶל־עֲבָדָיו אַגִּידָה־נָּא לָכֶם אֵת אֲשֶׁר־עָשׂוּ לָנוּ אֲרָם יָדְעוּ כִּי־רְעֵבִים אֲנַחְנוּ וַיֵּצְאוּ מִן־הַמַּחֲנֶה לְהֵחָבֵה בהשדה בַשָּׂדֶה לֵאמֹר כִּי־יֵצְאוּ מִן־הָעִיר וְנִתְפְּשֵׂם חַיִּים וְאֶל־הָעִיר נָבֹא
And the king arose in the night, and said unto his servants: 'I will now tell you what the Arameans have done to us. They know that we are hungry; therefore are they gone out of the camp to hide themselves in the field, saying: When they come out of the city, we shall take them alive, and get into the city.'
Καὶ ἀνέστη ὁ βασιλεὺς νυκτὸς, καὶ εἶπε πρὸς τοὺς παῖδας αὐτοῦ, ἀναγγελῶ δὴ ὑμῖν ἃ ἐποίησεν ἡμῖν Συρία· ἔγνωσαν ὅτι πεινῶμεν ἡμεῖς, καὶ ἐξῆλθαν ἐκ τῆς παρεμβολῆς καὶ ἐκρύβησαν ἐν τῷ ἀγρῷ, λέγοντες, ὅτι ἐξελεύσονται ἐκ τῆς πόλεως, καὶ συλληψόμεθα αὐτοὺς ζῶντας, καὶ εἰς τὴν πόλιν εἰσελευσόμεθα.
And the king rose up by night, and said to his servants, I will now tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They knew that we are hungry; and they have gone forth from the camp and hidden themselves in the field, saying, They will come out of the city, and we shall catch them alive, and go into the city.
13
וַיַּעַן אֶחָד מֵעֲבָדָיו וַיֹּאמֶר וְיִקְחוּ־נָא חֲמִשָּׁה מִן־הַסּוּסִים הַנִּשְׁאָרִים אֲשֶׁר נִשְׁאֲרוּ־בָהּ הִנָּם כְּכָל־ההמון הֲמוֹן יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר נִשְׁאֲרוּ־בָהּ הִנָּם כְּכָל־הֲמוֹן יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר־תָּמּוּ וְנִשְׁלְחָה וְנִרְאֶה
And one of his servants answered and said: 'Let some take, I pray thee, five of the horses that remain, which are left in the city-- behold, they are as all the multitude of Israel that are left in it; behold, they are as all the multitude of Israel that are consumed--and let us send and see.'
Καὶ ἀπεκρίθη εἷς τῶν παίδων αὐτοῦ καὶ εἶπε, λαβέτωσαν δὴ πέντε τῶν ἵππων τῶν ὑπολελειμμένων οἳ κατελείφθησεν ὧδε, ἰδού εἰσι πρὸς πᾶν τὸ πλῆθος Ἰσραὴλ τὸ ἐκλεῖπον, καὶ ἀποστελοῦμεν ἐκεῖ καὶ ὀψόμεθα.
And one of his servants answered and said, Let them now take five of the horses that were left, which were left here; behold, they are the number left to all the multitude of Israel; and we will send thither and see.
14
וַיִּקְחוּ שְׁנֵי רֶכֶב סוּסִים וַיִּשְׁלַח הַמֶּלֶךְ אַחֲרֵי מַחֲנֵה־אֲרָם לֵאמֹר לְכוּ וּרְאוּ
They took therefore two chariots with horses; and the king sent after the host of the Arameans, saying: 'Go and see.'
Καὶ ἔλαβον δύο ἐπιβάτας ἵππων· καὶ ἀπέστειλεν ὁ βασιλεὺς Ἰσραὴλ ὀπίσω τοῦ βασιλέως Συρίας, λέγων, δεῦτε, καὶ ἴδετε.
So they took two horsemen; and the king of Israel sent after the king of Syria, saying, Go, and see.
15
וַיֵּלְכוּ אַחֲרֵיהֶם עַד־הַיַּרְדֵּן וְהִנֵּה כָל־הַדֶּרֶךְ מְלֵאָה בְגָדִים וְכֵלִים אֲשֶׁר־הִשְׁלִיכוּ אֲרָם בהחפזם בְּחָפְזָם וַיָּשֻׁבוּ הַמַּלְאָכִים וַיַּגִּדוּ לַמֶּלֶךְ
And they went after them unto the Jordan; and, lo, all the way was full of garments and vessels, which the Arameans had cast away in their haste. And the messengers returned, and told the king.
Καὶ ἐπορεύθησαν ὀπίσω αὐτῶν ἕως τοῦ Ἰορδάνου. καὶ ἰδοὺ πᾶσα ἡ ὁδὸς πλήρης ἱματίων καὶ σκευῶν ὧν ἔῤῥιψε Συρία ἐν τῷ θαμβεῖσθαι αὐτούς· καὶ ἐπέστρεψαν οἱ ἄγγελοι καὶ ἀνήγγειλαν τῷ βασιλεῖ.
And they went after them even to Jordan: and, behold, all the way was full of garments and vessels, which the Syrians had cast away in their panic. And the messengers returned, and brought word to the king.
16
וַיֵּצֵא הָעָם וַיָּבֹזּוּ אֵת מַחֲנֵה אֲרָם וַיְהִי סְאָה־סֹלֶת בְּשֶׁקֶל וְסָאתַיִם שְׂעֹרִים בְּשֶׁקֶל כִּדְבַר יְהוָה
And the people went out, and spoiled the camp of the Arameans. So a measure of fine flour was sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, according to the word of HaShem.
Καὶ ἐξῆλθεν ὁ λαὸς καὶ διήρπασεν τὴν παρεμβολὴν Συρίας· καὶ ἐγένετο μέτρον σεμισάλεως σίκλου, κατὰ τὸ ῥῆμα Κυρίου, καὶ δίμετρον κριθῶν σίκλου.
And the people went out, and plundered the camp of Syria: and a measure of fine flour was sold for a shekel, according to the word of the Lord, and two measures of barley for a shekel.
17
וְהַמֶּלֶךְ הִפְקִיד אֶת־הַשָּׁלִישׁ אֲשֶׁר־נִשְׁעָן עַל־יָדוֹ עַל־הַשַּׁעַר וַיִּרְמְסֻהוּ הָעָם בַּשַּׁעַר וַיָּמֹת כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים אֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר בְּרֶדֶת הַמֶּלֶךְ אֵלָיו
And the king appointed the captain on whose hand he leaned to have the charge of the gate; and the people trod upon him in the gate, and he died as the man of G-d had said, who spoke when the king came down to him.
Καὶ ὁ βασιλεὺς κατέστησε τὸν τριστάτην ἐφʼ ὃν ὁ βασιλεὺς ἐπανεπαύετο τῇ χειρὶ αὐτοῦ ἐπὶ τῆς πυλῆς· καὶ συνεπάτησεν αὐτὸν ὁ λαὸς ἐν τῇ πύλῃ, καὶ ἀπέθανε καθὰ ἐλάλησεν ὁ ἄνθρωπος τοῦ Θεοῦ, ὃς ἐλάλησεν ἐν τῷ καταβῆναι τὸν ἄγγελον πρὸς αὐτόν.
And the king appointed the officer on whose hand the king leaned [to have charge] over the gate: and the people trampled on him in the gate, and he died, as the man of God [had] said, who spoke when the messenger came down to him.
18
וַיְהִי כְּדַבֵּר אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים אֶל־הַמֶּלֶךְ לֵאמֹר סָאתַיִם שְׂעֹרִים בְּשֶׁקֶל וּסְאָה־סֹלֶת בְּשֶׁקֶל יִהְיֶה כָּעֵת מָחָר בְּשַׁעַר שֹׁמְרוֹן
And it came to pass, as the man of G-d had spoken to the king, saying: 'Two measures of barley for a shekel, and a measure of fine flour for a shekel, shall be to-morrow about this time in the gate of Samaria';
Καὶ ἐγένετο καθὰ ἐλάλησεν Ἑλισαιὲ πρὸς τὸν βασιλέα, λέγων, δίμετρον κριθῆς σίκλου καὶ μέτρον σεμιδάλεως σίκλου· καὶ ἔσται ὡς ἡ ὥρα αὔριον ἐν τῇ πύλῃ Σαμαρείας.
So it came to pass as Elisha had spoken to the king, saying, Two measures of barley [shall be sold] for a shekel, and a measure of fine flour for a shekel; and it shall be as at this time tomorrow in the gate of Samaria.
19
וַיַּעַן הַשָּׁלִישׁ אֶת־אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים וַיֹּאמַר וְהִנֵּה יְהוָה עֹשֶׂה אֲרֻבּוֹת בַּשָּׁמַיִם הֲיִהְיֶה כַּדָּבָר הַזֶּה וַיֹּאמֶר הִנְּךָ רֹאֶה בְּעֵינֶיךָ וּמִשָּׁם לֹא תֹאכֵל
and that captain answered the man of G-d, and said: 'Now, behold, if HaShem should make windows in heaven, might such a thing be?' and he said: `Behold, thou shalt see it with thine eyes, but shalt not eat thereof';
Καὶ ἀπεκρίθη ὁ τριστάτης τῷ Ἑλισαιὲ, καὶ εἶπεν, ἰδοὺ Κύριος ποιεῖ καταράκτας ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ, μὴ ἔσται τὸ ῥῆμα τοῦτο; καὶ εἶπεν Ἑλισαιὲ, ἰδοὺ ὄψει τοῖς ὀφθαλμοῖς σου, καὶ ἐκεῖθεν οὐ μὴ φάγῃ.
And the officer answered Elisha, and said, Behold, [if] the Lord makes floodgates in heaven, shall this thing be? and Elisha said, Behold, thou shalt see [it] with thine eyes, but thou shalt not eat thereof.
20
וַיְהִי־לוֹ כֵּן וַיִּרְמְסוּ אֹתוֹ הָעָם בַּשַּׁעַר וַיָּמֹת
it came to pass even so unto him; for the people trod upon him in the gate, and he died.
Καὶ ἐγένετο οὕτως, καὶ συνεπάτησαν αὐτὸν ὁ λαὸς ἐν τῇ πύλῃ, καὶ ἀπέθανε.
And it was so: for the people trampled on him in the gate, and he died.

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.