A complete, 13th century (circa 1270) Ashkenazi Torah scroll, one of the oldest in the world, was discovered in the US about six months ago and sold at auction by Sotheby’s in New York on December 22, now resolved an old controversy over the correct spelling of a word in Deuteronomy 23:2, Matzav Haruach reported.
The common tradition regarding the verse, “No one who has been emasculated by crushing or cutting may enter the assembly of the Lord,” holds that the Hebrew word “Daka,” for crushed testicles, is spelled with the letter Heh in the end, while the Yeminte Torahs and the Torah text approved by the “alter Rebbe,” Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, founder of the Chabad movement, spell it with the letter Alef in the end. And so does this 750-year-old manuscript.
The age of the scroll was determined by North Carolina State University physicist Dr. Hong Wand, using carbon-14 in a particle accelerator. Dr. Yossi Peretz, head of the Hebrew language specialty at Orot Israel College, was asked to analyze and verify the ancient scroll, and last week lectured on his findings at the College’s 16th annual Colloquium at its Elkana campus.
Dr. Peretz has demonstrated that the medieval Torah manuscripts as well as the few Torah scrolls which survive from that period can be typologically categorized by their geographical area of origin; this is accomplished by comparing the incidence of various features (textual variants, the presence or absence of certain “open” and “closed” section divisions, the layouts of the two biblical “songs” as well as occasional halakhic references which may help to ascertain when and where certain customs or practices obtained) to both the very few other known exemplars of early scrolls, and even more importantly, to the numerous dated and localized codices of the Torah. For the purposes of this type of research, the benchmark comparison is to the Aleppo Codex, (10th century, Tiberias) universally recognized as the most accurate revision of the traditional text of the Hebrew Bible.
According to Peretz, the scroll that was sold in auction is made up of 86 sheets, with 257 columns, each column holding 48 rows, rather than today’s 42-row standard. The Yemenite scrolls hold 51 rows, normally.
The original scribe insisted on the custom of starting each column with the letter Vav, which means “hook” in Hebrew, symbolically “hooking” each column to the one that preceded it. In order to keep up with his ambitious task, the scribe was forced to stretch or squeeze lines, occasionally overdoing the letter-stretching in order to reach the next Vav. Today’s scribes also maintain this custom, but they copy from guide books (“Tikuney Sofrim”), where all the space issues have been resolved for them, whereas our 13th century scribe was making it up as he went along.
generally refers to the age of the universe. It is invalid because creations created in their mature form appeared
much older right after creation. Also, after the flood, things
were affected by the floodwaters.
The question is not strictly Ashkanasi vs Safardi. There are many Safardi scrolls with aleph and many Ashkanasi scrolls with hei. This one is confirmation that aleph is the genuine Ashkanasic minhag.
As a number of comments have pointed out, both traditional spellings are valid. In any event, halacha is not determined by archeological discoveries.
For years, manuscripts were supporting our view, not just the two which the friediker Rebbe saw that’s recorded in hayom yom. Also, if I’m not mistaken, sefardim have had it with alef all along.
your nefesh habohamos!
eilu vaeilu divrei elokim chaim (eiruvin 13b).
Yes, unfortunately, our nefesh habehamis needs that reassurance. …
The gist of the rebbe’s argument is you can only do it within a known range, if you have ten objects from the 1300’s, you can reliably date others with a similar carbon result as being from the same era. But if an object is from before recorded history there is less reliability to date it, and the further you go beyond confirmed objects the less reliable the result. The problem with all the age predictions is they are extrapolating way out of the range of recorded history and are not taking into account the conditions that could have been… Read more »
Reading here all comments after the article itself,
1 question I have for ya’ll
“Do we need the legitimacy of a scroll from the 12th century to validate the words of the Alte Rebbe and the Rebbe ?
Seriously guys !!!!
there are different methods and different elements used for dating objects, not necessarily “carbon”
This controversy was resolved way before this, by a Torah scroll more ancient than this one. Anyone who says hayom yom knows that.
But it’s still cool
Its only missing the pages recently (since 1948) rabbis & researches had looked at it earlier (in the 1800’s) and had made notes regarding a lot of question we have in Masorah and this was one of them, and there it’s also like the alter Rebbe.
If you goggle it in Hebrew you will find it.
Isn’t the Rebbe’s statement that carbon dating is unreliable at least and a sham at most referring to dating objects to estimate the age of the world too? What other carbon dating could the Rebbe be referring to?
the rebbe writes it in hayom yom
All it shows is that the Ashkenazi tradition is an alef, which we already knew. We also know that the Sefardi tradition is a hei. We didn’t know which tradition is correct, and we still don’t know.
And it has nothing to do with Chabad or hte Alter Rebbe. The Alter Rebbe didn’t decide anything, he just followed the Ashkenazi tradition, as one would expect since he was Ashkenazi.
Peretz says that “the benchmark comparison is to the Aleppo Codex…” How can any comparison of a sefer Torah to the Aleppo Codex be made, when the Aleppo Codex is missing nearly the entire Chumash?
What the rebe was discussing was with regard to the age of the world. With regard to objects carbon 14 is almost 100 percent accurate.
David Shapiro
I thought carbon dating is unreliable for estimating age in the many letters of the rebbe.