Hebrew Bible

This article is about collected Hebrew and Aramaic texts. For the Jewish canon, see Tanakh. For the various Christian canons, see Old Testament.

11th century manuscript of the Hebrew Bible with Aramaic Targum

The Hebrew Bible (Latin Biblia Hebraica, also Hebrew Scriptures, Jewish Bible) is a term used by biblical scholars outside of Judaism to refer to the Tanakh (Hebrew: תנ"ך‎), a canonical collection of Jewish texts, and the common textual antecedent of the several canonical editions of the Christian Old Testament. These texts are composed mainly in Biblical Hebrew, with some passages in Biblical Aramaic (about half of the Book of Daniel, some parts of the Book of Ezra and a few others).

The content, which closely corresponds to the Protestant Old Testament, does not include the deuterocanonical portions of the Roman Catholic or the Anagignoskomena portions of the Eastern Orthodox Old Testaments. The term does not imply naming, numbering or ordering of books, which varies with Biblical canon.

The term is an attempt to provide specificity with respect to contents, while avoiding allusion to any particular interpretative tradition or theological school of thought. It is widely used in academic writing and interfaith discussion in relatively neutral contexts meant to include dialogue among all religious traditions, but not widely in the inner discourse of the religions which use its text.

Usage

Hebrew Bible is a term that refers to the common/shared portions of the Tanakh (Jewish canon) and the Christian biblical canons. In its Latin form, Biblia Hebraica, it traditionally serves as a title for printed editions of the Masoretic Text.

Many scholars advocate use of the term Hebrew Bible when discussing these books in academic writing, as a neutral substitute to terms with religious connotations (e.g., the non-neutral term "old testament"). The Society of Biblical Literature's Handbook of Style, which is the standard for major academic journals like Harvard Theological Review and conservative Protestant journals like Bibliotheca Sacra and Westminster Theological Journal, suggests that authors "be aware of the connotations of alternative expressions such as ... Hebrew Bible [and] Old Testament" without prescribing the use of either.

Additional difficulties include:

• In terms of theology, Christianity has struggled with the relationship between "old" and "new" testaments from its very beginnings. Modern Christian formulations of this tension, sometimes building upon ancient and medieval ideas, include supersessionism, covenant theology, dispensationalism, and dual-covenant theology. However, all of these formulations, except some forms of dual-covenant theology, are objectionable to mainstream Judaism and to many Jewish scholars and writers, for whom there is one eternal covenant between God and Israel, and who therefore reject the very term "Old Testament."
• In terms of canon, Christian usage of "Old Testament" does not refer to a universally agreed upon set of books, but rather varies depending on denomination.
• The term Old Testament is a Christian term used to identify the Hebrew Bible as a portion of the Christian scriptures and so can sometimes imply an unintended Christian frame of reference for it.^{[citation needed]}

Coin from Bar-Kokhba Revolt demonstrating Paleo-Hebrew

Hebrew in the term Hebrew Bible refers to the original language of the books, but it may also be taken as referring to the Jews of the Second Temple era and the Diaspora, and their descendants, who preserved the transmission of the Masoretic Text up to the present day. The Hebrew Bible includes some small portions in Aramaic (mostly in the books of Daniel and Ezra), which are written and printed in the Aramaic square-script, was adopted as the Hebrew alphabet after the Babylonian exile. The Paleo-Hebrew alphabet was the Hebrew alphabet of the classical era of Solomon's Temple. Some Qumran Hebrew biblical manuscripts are written using the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet of the classical era of Solomon's Temple. The famous examples of the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet are the Siloam inscription (8th century BCE), the Lachish ostraca (6th century BCE), and the Bar Kokhba coin shown above (circa 132 CE).

Biblia Hebraica

The Biblia Hebraica is edited by various German publishers.

• Between 1906 and 1955 Rudolf Kittel published 9 editions of it.
• 1966, the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft published the renamed Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia in six editions until 1997.
• Since 2004 the Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft publishes the Biblia Hebraica Quinta including all variants of the Qumran manuscripts as well as the Masorah Magna.

See also

• Biblical canon
• Books of the Bible
• Christianity and Judaism
• Development of the Jewish Bible canon
• Judeo-Christian
• Non-canonical books referenced in the Bible
• Torah
• List of major biblical figures

Further reading

• Brueggemann, Walter. An introduction to the Old Testament: the canon and Christian imagination (Westminster John Knox Press, 1997).
• Charlesworth, James H., ed. The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha. (2 vols.; Garden City: Doubleday, 1985).
• Hamilton, Mark (April 1998). "From Hebrew Bible to Christian Bible: Jews, Christians and the Word of God". From Jesus to Christ. PBS.org/Frontline. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/scriptures.html. Retrieved 9 June 2011. 
• Johnson, Paul (1987). A History of the Jews (First, hardback ed.). London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. ISBN 0-297-79091-9. 
• Kugel, James. The Bible as It Was. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1997).
• Kugel, James. In Potiphar's House: The Interpretive Life of Biblical Texts. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1990).
• Kuntz, John Kenneth. The People of Ancient Israel: an introduction to Old Testament Literature, History, and Thought, Harper and Row, 1974. ISBN 0-06-043822-3
• Leiman, Sid. The Canonization of Hebrew Scripture. (Hamden, CT: Archon, 1976).
• Levenson, Jon. Sinai and Zion: An Entry into the Jewish Bible. (San Francisco: HarperSan Francisco, 1985).
• Minkoff, Harvey. "Searching for the Better Text". Biblical Archaeology Review (online). http://www.bib-arch.org/e-features/searching-for-better-text.asp. Retrieved 9 June 2011. 
• Noth, Martin. A History of Pentateuchal Traditions. (1948; trans. by Bernhard Anderson; Atlanta: Scholars, 1981).
• Schniedewind, William M (2004). How the Bible Became a Book. Cambridge. http://books.google.com.au/books?id=tCTVc8_2vVQC&printsec=frontcover&dq=How+the+Bible+Became+a+Book#v=onepage&q&f=false. 
• Vermes, Geza, ed. The Dead Sea Scrolls in English. (3d ed.; New York: Penguin, 1987).