Textorah

Deuteronomy 18

1
לֹא־יִהְיֶה לַכֹּהֲנִים הַלְוִיִּם כָּל־שֵׁבֶט לֵוִי חֵלֶק וְנַחֲלָה עִם־יִשְׂרָאֵל אִשֵּׁי יְהוָה וְנַחֲלָתוֹ יֹאכֵלוּן
The priests the Levites, even all the tribe of Levi, shall have no portion nor inheritance with Israel; they shall eat the offerings of HaShem made by fire, and His inheritance.
Οὐκ ἔσται τοῖς ἱερεῦσι τοῖς Λευίταις ὅλῃ φυλῇ Λευὶ μερὶς οὐδὲ κλῆρος μετὰ Ἰσραήλ· καρπώματα Κυρίου ὁ κλῆρος αὐτῶν, φάγονται αὐτά.
The priests, the Levites, even the whole tribe of Levi, shall have no part nor inheritance with Israel; the burnt offerings of the Lord [are] their inheritance, they shall eat them.
2
וְנַחֲלָה לֹא־יִהְיֶה־לּוֹ בְּקֶרֶב אֶחָיו יְהוָה הוּא נַחֲלָתוֹ כַּאֲשֶׁר דִּבֶּר־לוֹ
And they shall have no inheritance among their brethren; HaShem is their inheritance, as He hath spoken unto them.
Κλῆρος δὲ οὐκ ἔσται αὐτοῖς ἐν τοῖς ἀδελφοῖς αὐτῶν· Κύριος αὐτὸς κλῆρος αὐτοῦ, καθότι εἶπεν αὐτῷ.
And they shall have no inheritance among their brethren; the Lord himself [is] his portion, as he said to him.
3
וְזֶה יִהְיֶה מִשְׁפַּט הַכֹּהֲנִים מֵאֵת הָעָם מֵאֵת זֹבְחֵי הַזֶּבַח אִם־שׁוֹר אִם־שֶׂה וְנָתַן לַכֹּהֵן הַזְּרֹעַ וְהַלְּחָיַיִם וְהַקֵּבָה
And this shall be the priests' due from the people, from them that offer a sacrifice, whether it be ox or sheep, that they shall give unto the priest the shoulder, and the two cheeks, and the maw.
Καὶ αὕτη ἡ κρίσις τῶν ἱερέων τὰ παρὰ τοῦ λαοῦ παρὰ τῶν θυόντων τὰ θύματα, ἐάν τε μόσχον, ἐάν τε πρόβατον· καὶ δώσεις τὸν βραχίονα τῷ ἱερεῖ, καὶ τὰ σιαγόνια, καὶ τὸ ἔνυστρον,
And this [is] the due of the priests in the things coming from the people from those who offer sacrifices, whether it be a calf or a sheep; and thou shalt give the shoulder to the priest, and the cheeks, and the great intestine:
4
רֵאשִׁית דְּג͏ָנְךָ תִּירֹשְׁךָ וְיִצְהָרֶךָ וְרֵאשִׁית גֵּז צֹאנְךָ תִּתֶּן־לּוֹ
The first-fruits of thy corn, of thy wine, and of thine oil, and the first of the fleece of thy sheep, shalt thou give him.
καὶ τὰς ἀπαρχὰς τοῦ σίτου σου, καὶ τοῦ οἴνου σου, καὶ τοῦ ἐλαίου σου· καὶ τὴν ἀπαρχὴν τῶν κουρῶν τῶν προβάτων σου δώσεις αὐτῷ.
and the firstfruits of thy corn, and of thy wine, and of thine oil; and thou shalt give to him the firstfruits of the fleeces of thy sheep:
5
כִּי בוֹ בָּחַר יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ מִכָּל־שְׁבָטֶיךָ לַעֲמֹד לְשָׁרֵת בְּשֵׁם־יְהוָה הוּא וּבָנָיו כָּל־הַיָּמִים
For HaShem thy G-d hath chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand to minister in the name of HaShem, him and his sons for ever.
Ὅτι αὐτὸν ἐξελέξατο Κύριος ἐκ πασῶν τῶν φυλῶν σου, παρεστάναι ἔναντι Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ, λειτουργεῖν καὶ εὐλογεῖν ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματι αὐτοῦ, αὐτὸς καὶ οἱ υἱοὶ αὐτοῦ ἐν τοῖς υἱοῖς Ἰσραήλ.
because the Lord has chosen him out of all thy tribes, to stand before the Lord thy God, to minister and bless in his name, himself and his sons among the children of Israel.
6
וְכִי־יָבֹא הַלֵּוִי מֵאַחַד שְׁעָרֶיךָ מִכָּל־יִשְׂרָאֵל אֲשֶׁר־הוּא גָּר שָׁם וּבָא בְּכָל־אַוַּת נַפְשׁוֹ אֶל־הַמָּקוֹם אֲשֶׁר־יִבְחַר יְהוָה
And if a Levite come from any of thy gates out of all Israel, where he sojourneth, and come with all the desire of his soul unto the place which HaShem shall choose;
Ἐὰν δὲ παραγένηται ὁ Λευίτης ἐκ μιᾶς τῶν πόλεων ἐκ πάντων τῶν υἱῶν Ἰσραὴλ, οὗ αὐτὸς παροικεῖ, καθʼ ὅτι ἐπιθυμεῖ ἡ ψυχὴ αὐτοῦ, εἰς τὸν τόπον ὃν ἂν ἐκλέξηται,
And if a Levite come from one of the cities of all the children of Israel, where he himself dwells, accordingly as his mind desires, to the place which he shall have chosen,
7
וְשֵׁרֵת בְּשֵׁם יְהוָה אֱלֹהָיו כְּכָל־אֶחָיו הַלְוִיִּם הָעֹמְדִים שָׁם לִפְנֵי יְהוָה
then he shall minister in the name of HaShem his G-d, as all his brethren the Levites do, who stand there before HaShem.
λειτουργήσει τῷ ὀνόματι Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ αὐτοῦ, ὥσπερ πάντες οἱ ἀδελφοὶ αὐτοῦ οἱ Λευῖται οἱ παρεστηκότες ἐκεῖ ἐναντίον Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ σου.
he shall minister to the name of the Lord his God, as all his brethren the Levites, who stand there present before the Lord thy God.
8
חֵלֶק כְּחֵלֶק יֹאכֵלוּ לְבַד מִמְכָּרָיו עַל־הָאָבוֹת
They shall have like portions to eat, beside that which is his due according to the fathers' houses.
Μερίδα μεμερισμένην φάγεται, πλὴν τῆς πράσεως τῆς κατὰ πατριάν.
He shall eat an allotted portion, besides the sale of his hereditary property.
9
כִּי אַתָּה בָּא אֶל־הָאָרֶץ אֲשֶׁר־יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ נֹתֵן לָךְ לֹא־תִלְמַד לַעֲשׂוֹת כְּתוֹעֲבֹת הַגּוֹיִם הָהֵם
When thou art come into the land which HaShem thy G-d giveth thee, thou shalt not learn to do after the abominations of those nations.
Ἐὰν δὲ εἰσέλθῃς εἰς τὴν γῆν ἣν Κύριος ὁ Θεός σου δίδωσί σοι, οὐ μαθήσῃ ποιεῖν κατὰ τὰ βδελύγματα τῶν ἐθνῶν ἐκείνων.
And when thou shalt have entered into the land which the Lord thy God gives thee, thou shalt not learn to do according to the abominations of those nations.
10
לֹא־יִמָּצֵא בְךָ מַעֲבִיר בְּנוֹ־וּבִתּוֹ בָּאֵשׁ קֹסֵם קְסָמִים מְעוֹנֵן וּמְנַחֵשׁ וּמְכַשֵּׁף
There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire, one that useth divination, a soothsayer, or an enchanter, or a sorcerer,
Οὐχ εὑρεθήσεται ἐν σοὶ περικαθαίρων τὸν υἱὸν αὐτοῦ καὶ τὴν θυγατέρα αὐτοῦ ἐν πυρὶ, μαντευόμενος μαντείαν, κληδονιζόμενος, καὶ οἰωνιζόμενος, φαρμακοῖς
There shall not be found in thee one who purges his son or his daughter with fire, one who uses divination, who deals with omens, and augury,
11
וְחֹבֵר חָבֶר וְשֹׁאֵל אוֹב וְיִדְּעֹנִי וְדֹרֵשׁ אֶל־הַמֵּתִים
or a charmer, or one that consulteth a ghost or a familiar spirit, or a necromancer.
ἐπαείδων ἐπαοιδὴν, ἐγγαστρίμυθος, καὶ τερατοσκόπος, ἐπερωτῶν τοὺς νεκρούς.
a sorcerer employing incantation, one who has in him a divining spirit, an observer of signs, questioning the dead.
12
כִּי־תוֹעֲבַת יְהוָה כָּל־עֹשֵׂה אֵלֶּה וּבִגְלַל הַתּוֹעֵבֹת הָאֵלֶּה יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ מוֹרִישׁ אוֹתָם מִפָּנֶיךָ
For whosoever doeth these things is an abomination unto HaShem; and because of these abominations HaShem thy G-d is driving them out from before thee.
Ἔστι γὰρ βδέλυγμα Κυρίῳ τῷ Θεῷ σου πᾶς ποιῶν ταῦτα· ἕνεκεν γὰρ τῶν βδελυγμάτων τούτων Κύριος ἐξολοθρεύσει αὐτοὺς ἀπὸ προσώπου σου.
For everyone that does these things is an abomination to the Lord thy God; for because of these abominations the Lord will destroy them from before thy face.
13
תָּמִים תִּהְיֶה עִם יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ
Thou shalt be whole-hearted with HaShem thy G-d.
Τέλειος ἔσῃ ἐναντίον Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ σου.
Thou shalt be perfect before the Lord thy God.
14
כִּי הַגּוֹיִם הָאֵלֶּה אֲשֶׁר אַתָּה יוֹרֵשׁ אוֹתָם אֶל־מְעֹנְנִים וְאֶל־קֹסְמִים יִשְׁמָעוּ וְאַתָּה לֹא כֵן נָתַן לְךָ יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ
For these nations, that thou art to dispossess, hearken unto soothsayers, and unto diviners; but as for thee, HaShem thy G-d hath not suffered thee so to do.
Τὰ γὰρ ἔθνη ταῦτα, οὓς σὺ κατακληρονομεῖς αὐτοὺς, οὗτοι κληδόνων καὶ μαντειῶν ἀκούσονται· καί σοι οὐχ οὕτως ἔδωκε Κύριος ὁ Θεός σου.
For all these nations whose [land] thou shalt inherit, they will listen to omens and divinations; but the Lord thy God has not permitted thee so [to do].
15
נָבִיא מִקִּרְבְּךָ מֵאַחֶיךָ כָּמֹנִי יָקִים לְךָ יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ אֵלָיו תִּשְׁמָעוּן
A prophet will HaShem thy G-d raise up unto thee, from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken;
Προφήτην ἐκ τῶν ἀδελφῶν σου, ὡς ἐμὲ, ἀναστήσει σοι Κύριος ὁ Θεός σου· αὐτοῦ ἀκούσεσθε·
The Lord thy God shall raise up to thee a prophet of thy brethren, like me; him shall ye hear:
16
כְּכֹל אֲשֶׁר־שָׁאַלְתָּ מֵעִם יְהוָה אֱלֹהֶיךָ בְּחֹרֵב בְּיוֹם הַקָּהָל לֵאמֹר לֹא אֹסֵף לִשְׁמֹעַ אֶת־קוֹל יְהוָה אֱלֹהָי וְאֶת־הָאֵשׁ הַגְּדֹלָה הַזֹּאת לֹא־אֶרְאֶה עוֹד וְלֹא אָמוּת
according to all that thou didst desire of HaShem thy G-d in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying: 'Let me not hear again the voice of HaShem my G-d, neither let me see this great fire any more, that I die not.'
Κατὰ πάντα ὅσα ᾐτήσω παρὰ Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ σου ἐν Χωρὴβ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῆς ἐκκλησίας, λέγοντες, οὐ προσθήσομεν ἀκοῦσαι τὴν φωνὴν Κυρίου τοῦ Θεοῦ σου, καὶ τὸ πῦρ τοῦτο τὸ μὲγα οὐκ ὀψόμεθα ἔτι, οὐδὲ μὴ ἀποθάνωμεν.
according to all things which thou didst desire of the Lord thy God in Horeb in the day of the assembly, saying, We will not again hear the voice of the Lord thy God, and we will not anymore see this great fire, and [so] we shall not die.
17
וַיֹּאמֶר יְהוָה אֵלָי הֵיטִיבוּ אֲשֶׁר דִּבֵּרוּ
And HaShem said unto me: 'They have well said that which they have spoken.
Καὶ εἶπε Κύριος πρὸς μὲ, ὀρθῶς πάντα ὅσα ἐλάλησαν πρὸς σέ.
And the Lord said to me, They have spoken rightly all that they have said to thee.
18
נָבִיא אָקִים לָהֶם מִקֶּרֶב אֲחֵיהֶם כָּמוֹךָ וְנָתַתִּי דְבָרַי בְּפִיו וְדִבֶּר אֲלֵיהֶם אֵת כָּל־אֲשֶׁר אֲצַוֶּנּוּ
I will raise them up a prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee; and I will put My words in his mouth, and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him.
Προφήτην ἀναστήσω αὐτοῖς ἐκ τῶν ἀδελφῶν αὐτῶν, ὥσπερ σέ· καὶ δώσω τὰ ῥήματα ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτοῦ, καὶ λαλήσει αὐτοῖς καθʼ ὅτι ἂν ἐντείλωμαι αὐτῷ.
I will raise up to them a prophet of their brethren, like thee; and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak to them as I shall command him.
19
וְהָיָה הָאִישׁ אֲשֶׁר לֹא־יִשְׁמַע אֶל־דְּבָרַי אֲשֶׁר יְדַבֵּר בִּשְׁמִי אָנֹכִי אֶדְרֹשׁ מֵעִמּוֹ
And it shall come to pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto My words which he shall speak in My name, I will require it of him.
Καὶ ὁ ἄνθρωπος ὃς ἐὰν μὴ ἀκούσῃ ὅσα ἂν λαλήσῃ ὁ προφήτης ἐκεῖνος ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου, ἐγὼ ἐκδικήσω ἐξ αὐτοῦ.
And whatever man shall not hearken to whatsoever words that prophet shall speak in my name, I will take vengeance on him.
20
אַךְ הַנָּבִיא אֲשֶׁר יָזִיד לְדַבֵּר דָּבָר בִּשְׁמִי אֵת אֲשֶׁר לֹא־צִוִּיתִיו לְדַבֵּר וַאֲשֶׁר יְדַבֵּר בְּשֵׁם אֱלֹהִים אֲחֵרִים וּמֵת הַנָּבִיא הַהוּא
But the prophet, that shall speak a word presumptuously in My name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.'
Πλὴν ὁ προφήτης ὃς ἂν ἀσεβήσῃ λαλῆσαι ἐπὶ τῷ ὀνόματί μου ῥῆμα ὃ οὐ προσέταξα λαλῆσαι, καὶ ὃς ἂν λαλήσῃ ἐν ὀνόματι θεῶν ἑτέρων, ἀποθανεῖται ὁ προφήτης ἐκεῖνος.
But the prophet whosoever shall impiously speak in my name a word which I have not commanded him to speak, and whosoever shall speak in the name of other gods, that prophet shall die.
21
וְכִי תֹאמַר בִּלְבָבֶךָ אֵיכָה נֵדַע אֶת־הַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר לֹא־דִבְּרוֹ יְהוָה
And if thou say in thy heart: 'How shall we know the word which HaShem hath not spoken?'
Ἐὰν δὲ εἴπῃς ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ σου, πῶς γνωσόμεθα τὸ ῥῆμα ὃ οὐκ ἐλάλησε Κύριος;
But if thou shalt say in thy heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord has not spoken?
22
אֲשֶׁר יְדַבֵּר הַנָּבִיא בְּשֵׁם יְהוָה וְלֹא־יִהְיֶה הַדָּבָר וְלֹא יָבוֹא הוּא הַדָּבָר אֲשֶׁר לֹא־דִבְּרוֹ יְהוָה בְּזָדוֹן דִּבְּרוֹ הַנָּבִיא לֹא תָגוּר מִמֶּנּוּ
When a prophet speaketh in the name of HaShem, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which HaShem hath not spoken; the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously, thou shalt not be afraid of him.
Ὅσα ἐὰν λαλήσῃ ὁ προφήτης ἐκεῖνος τῷ ὀνόματι Κυρίου, καὶ μὴ γένηται, καὶ μὴ συμβῇ, τοῦτο τὸ ῥῆμα ὃ οὐκ ἐλάλησε Κύριος, ἐν ἀσεβείᾳ ἐλάλησεν ὁ προφήτης ἐκεῖνος· οὐκ ἀφέξεσθε αὐτοῦ.
Whatsoever words that prophet shall speak in the name of the Lord, and they shall not come true, and not come to pass, this [is] the thing which the Lord has not spoken; that prophet has spoken wickedly: ye shall not spare him.

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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.

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