抄録
Textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible is often described as requiring both “scientific” and “artistic” qualities in balance. However rigorously one conducts the weighing of essential data of manuscripts and witnesses and accounts for variants by textual principles, it is impossible to prove scientifically every textual decision one makes; it is particularly frustrating when one faces equally probable variants of MT, LXX, and the Qumran evidence, where any preference for one reading or another is arbitrary. This paper will argue that, in such a case, knowledge of early biblical interpretation can equip textual critcs with additional means to grade such ancient variants.
For the proposed study I will use exegetical material from rabbinic and Second Temple texts to help determine what is a pristine reading and what are scribal variants. In particular, choosing a problematic biblical account of David and Bathsheba's incident, I will focus on textual variants of LXX (Lucianic and non-Lucianic readings), Targum, MT, and 4QSam concerning three specific parts of 2Sam 11: 2, 4: 1)_??__??__??__??__??_2)_??__??__??_3)_??__??__??_. Examining how these parts determine the understanding of the story as a whole in midrashim, a Talmudic discourse, Josephus' Jewish Antiquities, and the Damascus Document, and suggesting specific concerns of early biblical exegetes about these parts, I will try to show how the concerned variants address themselves to these exegetical concerns. In this way, the study proposes to determine the degree of tendentiousness in each variant, which will be a guideline to sort out a superior reading.
Thus, the paper will not only stimulate fundamental thoughts as to the present practices of textual criticism but also expose the richness of early biblical interpretation of the biblical account in the exegetical problems as well as the solutions.
