{"id":434,"date":"2026-10-16T21:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-10-16T21:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/hbce-and-the-new-critical-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible\/"},"modified":"2026-10-19T00:46:41","modified_gmt":"2026-10-19T00:46:41","slug":"hbce-and-the-new-critical-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/hbce-and-the-new-critical-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible\/","title":{"rendered":"HBCE and the New Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Almost every scholarly Hebrew Bible on a library shelf today prints the text of a single medieval manuscript and puts the evidence of every other witness underneath it. <em>The Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition<\/em> (HBCE) sets out to do something different. Begun as the Oxford Hebrew Bible and published since 2015 by SBL Press under the general editorship of Ronald Hendel, it prints in each volume the text its editor judges to be the earliest that can be recovered, with the reasons set out in an apparatus and a long textual commentary. Only one volume has appeared so far, Michael V. Fox\u2019s <em>Proverbs<\/em>. Even so, the project has prompted a long and detailed debate about what an edition of the Hebrew Bible is for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group at-a-glance\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"at-a-glance\">At a glance<\/h3>\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\n<li><strong>1886\u20131904:<\/strong> eclectic editions of single books appear, among them Carl Heinrich Cornill\u2019s <em>Ezechiel<\/em> (1886) and Paul Haupt\u2019s colour-printed <em>Critical Edition of the Hebrew Text<\/em> (1893\u20131904).<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>1929\u201337:<\/strong> the third edition of Kittel\u2019s <em>Biblia Hebraica<\/em> adopts the Leningrad Codex as its base text, setting the diplomatic pattern followed by BHS (1967\u201377) and BHQ (from 2004).<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>1956:<\/strong> Moshe Goshen-Gottstein founds the Hebrew University Bible Project, a diplomatic edition built on the Aleppo Codex.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>1998:<\/strong> Ronald Hendel publishes <em>The Text of Genesis 1\u201311: Textual Studies and Critical Edition<\/em> with Oxford University Press.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2008:<\/strong> Hendel\u2019s \u201cPrologue to a New Critical Edition\u201d and three sample editions appear in <em>Vetus Testamentum<\/em> under the name Oxford Hebrew Bible.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2009:<\/strong> H. G. M. Williamson asks \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d in a lecture in Rome, published in <em>Biblica<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2013:<\/strong> the editors of five new editions present their projects in <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> and at the IOSOT congress in Munich.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2014:<\/strong> the Society of Biblical Literature takes on the project, renamed <em>The Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2015:<\/strong> Michael V. Fox\u2019s <em>Proverbs<\/em> appears as HBCE volume 1.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2016:<\/strong> Hendel gathers his essays on the project in <em>Steps to a New Edition of the Hebrew Bible<\/em>.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2017\u201321:<\/strong> the CEDAR project at the University of Chicago builds digital tools for an online HBCE.<\/li>\n\n\n<li><strong>2026:<\/strong> Proverbs is still the only volume in print. Others, including 1 Kings, are in preparation.<\/li>\n\n<\/ul>\n\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"two-ways-to-edit-an-ancient-text\">Two Ways to Edit an Ancient Text<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"diplomatic-editions\">Diplomatic Editions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">An edition of any text that survives in many copies has to decide what to print on the page. The Hebrew Bible survives in thousands of medieval manuscripts, in the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Dead_Sea_Scrolls\">scrolls and fragments from the Dead Sea<\/a>, in the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Samaritan_Pentateuch\">Samaritan Pentateuch<\/a>, and in ancient translations into Greek, Aramaic, Syriac and Latin. Emanuel Tov\u2019s handbook of <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Textual_criticism\">textual criticism<\/a> states the two basic answers. A <em>diplomatic<\/em> edition reproduces one particular form of the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Masoretic_Text\">Masoretic Text<\/a> unchanged as its base text and records divergent readings in an accompanying apparatus. An <em>eclectic<\/em> edition presents a reconstructed text \u201cselected from elements found in all known sources\u201d, again with an apparatus.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-1\"><a href=\"#note-1\">1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Every major scholarly edition of the Hebrew Bible in use is diplomatic. The <em>Biblia Hebraica<\/em> series, from the third edition of 1929\u201337 through <em><a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Biblia_Hebraica_Stuttgartensia\">Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia<\/a><\/em> (BHS) to the current <em>Biblia Hebraica Quinta<\/em> (BHQ), prints the <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/the-leningrad-codex\/\">Leningrad Codex<\/a>, copied in 1008 or 1009. The Hebrew University Bible Project (HUB) prints the older but incomplete <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/the-aleppo-codex-and-the-tiberian-standard\/\">Aleppo Codex<\/a>. Williamson describes the shared policy as reproducing \u201cthe text of an important medieval manuscript\u201d and relegating to the apparatus \u201call reporting and evaluation of variants from whatever period, as well as conjectures for emendation\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-2\"><a href=\"#note-2\">2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"eclectic-editions\">Eclectic Editions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Editors of almost every other ancient text work the other way. For the Greek and Latin classics, the Greek New Testament and the critical <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Septuagint\">Septuagint<\/a>, the editor gathers the evidence and prints what he or she judges to be the probable original wording. The printed text matches no single manuscript in its entirety, and the apparatus documents what each source reads. Williamson, who is no enthusiast for eclectic Hebrew Bibles, nevertheless calls the difference in practice an \u201coddity\u201d that has become more apparent since the Dead Sea Scrolls were published in full.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-3\"><a href=\"#note-3\">3<\/a><\/sup> The best-known example in biblical studies is the <em><a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Novum_Testamentum_Graece\">Novum Testamentum Graece<\/a><\/em>, whose text is a modern reconstruction found in no single ancient copy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Eclectic editions of the Hebrew Bible are not new in themselves. Tov lists dozens of reconstructions of single books and chapters from the late nineteenth century onwards. They include Cornill\u2019s Ezekiel (1886), Haupt\u2019s colour-printed edition and its English sequel, the <em>Polychrome Bible<\/em> (1893\u20131904), and C. C. Torrey\u2019s reconstruction of the archetype of the twin Psalms 14 and 53 in 1927. That last one drew a rival reconstruction from Karl Budde the following year.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-4\"><a href=\"#note-4\">4<\/a><\/sup> Kittel himself said that his <em>Biblia Hebraica<\/em> was born as a criticism of Haupt\u2019s edition, which had combined textual and literary judgements and changed the Masoretic Text drastically.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-5\"><a href=\"#note-5\">5<\/a><\/sup> Newer experiments include Pier Giorgio Borbone\u2019s edition of Hosea (1990), Anthony Gelston\u2019s eclectic text of Isaiah 52:13\u201353:12 (1990) and Kristin Hognesius\u2019s edition of 2 Chronicles 1\u201316 (2003).<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-6\"><a href=\"#note-6\">6<\/a><\/sup> What none of them attempted was an eclectic edition of the whole Bible, prepared by a team to common rules.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"from-oxford-to-atlanta\">From Oxford to Atlanta<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"genesis-1-11-and-the-oxford-hebrew-bible\">Genesis 1\u201311 and the Oxford Hebrew Bible<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The HBCE grew out of one scholar\u2019s work on one book. Ronald Hendel, now Norma and Sam Dabby Professor of Hebrew Bible and Jewish Studies at the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/University_of_California,_Berkeley\">University of California, Berkeley<\/a>, published <em>The Text of Genesis 1\u201311: Textual Studies and Critical Edition<\/em> with Oxford University Press in 1998.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-7\"><a href=\"#note-7\">7<\/a><\/sup> Writing in 2016, he recalled that he had \u201cformulated a plan to create a new critical edition of the Hebrew Bible\u201d two decades earlier, and that, \u201cmuch to my surprise, a number of excellent scholars agreed to take part\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-8\"><a href=\"#note-8\">8<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The proposal went to Oxford University Press in New York, and the series was announced as the Oxford Hebrew Bible. David Baker notes that the name came from the publisher, not the university.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-9\"><a href=\"#note-9\">9<\/a><\/sup> Williamson, writing from Oxford\u2019s Oriental Institute, records that the Press\u2019s Delegates were consulted only when the decision was \u201cmore or less a fait accompli\u201d, and says that he regretted \u201cthe proposed title and its implications\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-10\"><a href=\"#note-10\">10<\/a><\/sup> The public launch came in 2008. <em>Vetus Testamentum<\/em> printed Hendel\u2019s programmatic \u201cPrologue to a New Critical Edition\u201d together with sample editions by three of the editors: Sidnie White Crawford on Deuteronomy 32:1\u20139, Jan Joosten on 1 Kings 11:1\u20138, and Eugene Ulrich on Jeremiah 27:1\u201310, which in the Greek numbering is chapter 34.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-11\"><a href=\"#note-11\">11<\/a><\/sup> Hendel had already published a small sample of a plural text in a study of 1 Samuel 17.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-12\"><a href=\"#note-12\">12<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"a-new-name-and-a-new-publisher\">A New Name and a New Publisher<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In May 2014 the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Society_of_Biblical_Literature\">Society of Biblical Literature<\/a> announced that it would publish the project under a new name, <em>The Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition<\/em>, still under Hendel\u2019s general editorship. The announcement planned twenty-one volumes with an international team of authors. It described the method as building \u201can eclectic text, drawing together readings from many manuscripts and, where warranted, conjectural readings\u201d. In books like Jeremiah, \u201centirely variant texts of books are set side by side\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-13\"><a href=\"#note-13\">13<\/a><\/sup> In an essay for the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bibleinterp.arizona.edu\/opeds\/2014\/08\/hen388019\">Bible and Interpretation<\/a> website that August, Hendel described the HBCE as \u201ca new model for a critical edition of the Hebrew Bible\u201d, though one that \u201cwill be generally familiar to scholars who use critical editions of other ancient works such as the Septuagint or New Testament\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-14\"><a href=\"#note-14\">14<\/a><\/sup> The SBL\u2019s series page now names Hendel and Crawford as joint leaders of the editorial board, with editors drawn from North America, Europe, Africa and Israel.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-15\"><a href=\"#note-15\">15<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"how-the-edition-works\">How the Edition Works<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"aiming-at-the-archetype\">Aiming at the Archetype<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The HBCE does not claim to print the original text of any book. Its stated target is the <em>archetype<\/em>. The SBL describes this as the manuscript that was \u201cthe latest common ancestor of all the extant manuscripts\u201d, or the \u201cearliest inferable text\u201d. This is \u201cnot identical to the original text (however one defines this elusive term)\u201d. More precisely, the edition aims at a <em>corrected<\/em> archetype, since the archetype itself will have contained scribal errors that can be put right.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-16\"><a href=\"#note-16\">16<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hendel\u2019s 2008 prologue gives the reason for the caution. Each biblical book is \u201cthe product of a complicated and often unrecoverable history of composition and redaction\u201d. The original that lies behind the archetype is often \u201ca collective production, sometimes constructed over centuries, perhaps comparable to the construction of a medieval cathedral\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-17\"><a href=\"#note-17\">17<\/a><\/sup> Fox, writing in the first volume, goes further. The text he has produced \u201cnever had physical existence. It is a construct\u201d. Its goal, he says, \u201cis heuristic: approachable but not wholly attainable\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-18\"><a href=\"#note-18\">18<\/a><\/sup> An early project document puts the same point more bluntly: \u201cThe dream of a perfect text is unreal, counterfactual. The best we can do is to make a good critical text.\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-19\"><a href=\"#note-19\">19<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"copy-text-and-accidentals\">Copy-Text and Accidentals<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">An eclectic Hebrew text runs into a practical problem that editors of Greek texts largely escape. The consonants of the biblical books are ancient. Their vowel points and cantillation accents were added by the Masoretes in the early Middle Ages, and the spelling itself changed during transmission. No one can reconstruct how an archetype of Isaiah or Kings was spelled, still less how it was pointed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hendel\u2019s answer comes from English literary editing: W. W. Greg\u2019s theory of the <em>copy-text<\/em>, set out in \u201cThe Rationale of Copy-Text\u201d (1950\u201351). Greg distinguished <em>substantives<\/em>, the words that carry meaning, from <em>accidentals<\/em> such as spelling and punctuation. The editor argues for every substantive reading but follows one good manuscript for the accidentals.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-20\"><a href=\"#note-20\">20<\/a><\/sup> The HBCE\u2019s copy-text is the Leningrad Codex, chosen as the earliest complete manuscript and one whose quality is widely recognised. It is not followed slavishly, and obvious scribal errors are corrected.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-21\"><a href=\"#note-21\">21<\/a><\/sup> Where the edition departs from the copy-text, it keeps the copy-text\u2019s spelling conventions. In the 2008 prologue, readings that departed from Leningrad were to be printed without vowels or accents. The editors\u2019 guide of 2010 changed this, so that such readings are now vocalised in the style of the copy-text but left without accents. They are marked off with half-brackets, so the reader can see at once where the printed text is not Leningrad\u2019s.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-22\"><a href=\"#note-22\">22<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Ketiv and qere pairs need their own rule. These are places where the Masoretic consonants (<span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05db\u05b0\u05bc\u05ea\u05b4\u05d9\u05d1<\/span>, <em>ketiv<\/em>, \u201cwhat is written\u201d) differ from the form tradition reads aloud (<span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05e7\u05b0\u05e8\u05b5\u05d9<\/span>, <em>qere<\/em>, \u201cwhat is read\u201d). The HBCE treats them as variants like any other. The qere is taken as the intended reading of the copy-text and kept unless the ketiv is clearly preferable. A preferred ketiv is then marked as a non-copy-text reading.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-23\"><a href=\"#note-23\">23<\/a><\/sup> The Masorah, the medieval scribes\u2019 apparatus of notes, is not printed at all, since it was never part of the archetype.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-24\"><a href=\"#note-24\">24<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"critical-text-and-apparatus\">Critical Text and Apparatus<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Below the critical text runs an apparatus that, in Hendel\u2019s words, presents \u201cthe evidence\u201d and justifies \u201cthe editorial decisions\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-25\"><a href=\"#note-25\">25<\/a><\/sup> It is selective in a different way from the diplomatic editions. It concentrates on readings that reflect ancient Hebrew variants. Differences that arise only in the process of translation are generally left out, as are later Masoretic manuscripts unlikely to preserve an independent ancient text and differences of spelling.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-26\"><a href=\"#note-26\">26<\/a><\/sup> The major witnesses (the Masoretic Text, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Septuagint and the Dead Sea Scrolls) are cited throughout. The Targums, the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Peshitta\">Peshitta<\/a> and the Vulgate are cited only when they appear to depart from the Masoretic Text, on Hendel\u2019s reasoning that \u201cthe latter in most instances reproduce the readings of M\u201d. Readings from translations are given in the original language and also retroverted into Hebrew. Baker counts that last feature a clear advantage over BHQ and the HUB, because readers can see what Hebrew a translator probably had in front of him.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-27\"><a href=\"#note-27\">27<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A short example shows the kind of decision involved. At Genesis 4:8 the Masoretic Text reads <span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05d5\u05b7\u05d9\u05b9\u05bc\u05d0\u05de\u05b6\u05e8 \u05e7\u05b7\u05d9\u05b4\u05df \u05d0\u05b6\u05dc\u05be\u05d4\u05b6\u05d1\u05b6\u05dc \u05d0\u05b8\u05d7\u05b4\u05d9\u05d5<\/span> (<em>va-yomer qayin el-hevel a\u1e25iv<\/em>, \u201cCain said to his brother Abel\u201d) and then moves straight on to the field, without saying what Cain said. The Samaritan Pentateuch, the Septuagint, the Peshitta and the Vulgate add <span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05e0\u05b5\u05dc\u05b0\u05db\u05b8\u05d4 \u05d4\u05b7\u05e9\u05b8\u05bc\u05c2\u05d3\u05b6\u05d4<\/span> (<em>nelkhah ha-sadeh<\/em>, \u201clet us go out to the field\u201d). Tov counts the shorter Masoretic reading as an accidental omission.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-28\"><a href=\"#note-28\">28<\/a><\/sup> A diplomatic edition prints the Masoretic sentence and reports the longer reading underneath. An eclectic editor who agrees with Tov puts the words into the text.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"parallel-editions\">Parallel Editions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The HBCE\u2019s most distinctive feature concerns books that circulated in more than one edition. The SBL names Exodus, Samuel, Kings and Jeremiah as examples. In such books, \u201cthe HBCE text will be plural, approximating the archetypes of each ancient edition\u201d, printed in parallel columns aligned to show where they differ. Editions that survive only in Greek translation are retroverted into Hebrew as far as possible.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-29\"><a href=\"#note-29\">29<\/a><\/sup> Where one edition is not the ancestor of the other, the editors also aim to reconstruct their common ancestor, as far as the evidence allows.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-30\"><a href=\"#note-30\">30<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Book_of_Jeremiah\">Jeremiah<\/a> is the classic case. The Greek text is about one-sixth shorter than the Masoretic Text, and it places the oracles against the nations in the middle of the book rather than at the end. Two fragmentary Hebrew scrolls from Qumran, 4QJer\u1d47 and 4QJer\u1d48, share the Greek text\u2019s main features. Tov regards the old question as settled: the translator very likely worked from a shorter Hebrew edition and did not abridge the longer one.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-31\"><a href=\"#note-31\">31<\/a><\/sup> Ulrich\u2019s sample of Jeremiah 27 set the two texts side by side. Joosten\u2019s sample of 1 Kings 11 did the same for the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Books_of_Kings\">Books of Kings<\/a>, and in verse 5 it recorded a variant reconstructed from the Peshitta as an \u201cequal\u201d reading, one the editor could not rank above or below the copy-text.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-32\"><a href=\"#note-32\">32<\/a><\/sup> Adrian Schenker has said that BHQ will flag such literary variants in Jeremiah, <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Book_of_Ezekiel\">Ezekiel<\/a> and Kings, and Tov singles out chapters of Ezekiel, such as chapter 7, as a hard test for any eclectic text.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-33\"><a href=\"#note-33\">33<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"the-textual-commentary\">The Textual Commentary<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Each volume opens with a text-critical introduction to the book and its witnesses. It ends with a commentary in which the editor argues the decisions that the apparatus can only summarise.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-34\"><a href=\"#note-34\">34<\/a><\/sup> The SBL presents the commentary as more than a defence of the critical text. Many variants are simple scribal errors, but \u201cothers are deliberate revisions, motivated by the desire to explain, update, harmonize, and even expurgate the text\u201d. The edition therefore \u201cmoves both backward and forward in time\u201d: back towards the earliest inferable text, and forward through the interpretations that later scribes built into it.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-35\"><a href=\"#note-35\">35<\/a><\/sup> Tov opens his own chapter on critical editions with A. E. Housman\u2019s complaint that a \u201ccritical edition\u201d was too often one \u201cin which the editor is allowed to fling his opinions in the reader\u2019s face without being called to account and asked for his reasons\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-36\"><a href=\"#note-36\">36<\/a><\/sup> The HBCE\u2019s commentaries are its attempt to give the reasons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"the-volumes-so-far\">The Volumes So Far<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"proverbs-2015\">Proverbs (2015)<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The first volume, Michael V. Fox\u2019s <em>Proverbs: An Eclectic Edition with Introduction and Textual Commentary<\/em>, was published by SBL Press in April 2015.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-37\"><a href=\"#note-37\">37<\/a><\/sup> Fox, Halls-Bascom Professor Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin\u2013Madison, had already written a two-volume commentary on the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Book_of_Proverbs\">Book of Proverbs<\/a> for Yale University Press. The volume runs to about five hundred pages in three parts. A long introduction covers method, the Hebrew witnesses and the versions, with tables classifying the ketiv\u2013qere cases. Then comes a textual commentary printed under the critical text. Last is the critical text on its own, set to be read from the back of the book in the Hebrew direction, with brief notes beneath.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-38\"><a href=\"#note-38\">38<\/a><\/sup> One reviewer, Joseph Abrahamson, singled out Fox\u2019s habit of giving every versional reading both in its own language and in English, so that readers can check how Fox understood it.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-39\"><a href=\"#note-39\">39<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Proverbs was not a typical first case, and Fox said so. He judged the Greek Proverbs to be a literary revision different from the Hebrew. In his view no Hebrew text behind it could be reconstructed, so he gave no parallel Greek column. He recorded its differences in the apparatus to a text close to the Masoretic one instead.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-40\"><a href=\"#note-40\">40<\/a><\/sup> He also defined his goal more narrowly than the project\u2019s general aim. He sought \u201cthe correct hyparchetype of the Masoretic Proverbs, that is to say, the proto-Masoretic text\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-41\"><a href=\"#note-41\">41<\/a><\/sup> Hendel\u2019s <em>Steps to a New Edition of the Hebrew Bible<\/em> (2016) ends with an appendix comparing the Proverbs volumes of BHQ, edited by Jan de Waard in 2008, and the HBCE.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-42\"><a href=\"#note-42\">42<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"work-in-progress\">Work in Progress<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The publisher\u2019s pages still list Proverbs as the only completed volume. The SBL\u2019s project page said after its publication that \u201cmore volumes will appear over the next decade\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-43\"><a href=\"#note-43\">43<\/a><\/sup> A list of editorial assignments shows the scale of the plan. Hendel is editing Genesis and Crawford Deuteronomy. Alexander Rof\u00e9 and Guy Darshan have Samuel, Matthieu Richelle (with Jean Koulagna and Sr Bonifatia) 1 Kings, Andr\u00e9s Piquer Otero 2 Kings, Miika Tucker Jeremiah, Stephen Cook Ezekiel and Eugene Ulrich Daniel. Several books, among them Joshua, Job and Esther, were still unassigned.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-44\"><a href=\"#note-44\">44<\/a><\/sup> Richelle, a professor at UCLouvain, describes his 1 Kings as \u201cin progress\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-45\"><a href=\"#note-45\">45<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"the-debate\">The Debate<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"williamson-do-we-need-a-new-bible\">Williamson: \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The most detailed early critique came from H. G. M. Williamson, then Regius Professor of Hebrew at Oxford. He gave it as a lecture at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome on 27 March 2009, and <em>Biblica<\/em> printed it that year.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-46\"><a href=\"#note-46\">46<\/a><\/sup> Williamson accepts much of the project\u2019s rationale. In books like Samuel and Jeremiah, he writes, the text-critical work of the Oxford Hebrew Bible \u201cis entirely justified and indeed necessary\u201d. He also agrees that no form of the text should be preferred for religious reasons.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-47\"><a href=\"#note-47\">47<\/a><\/sup> His objections are to the edition as a printed Bible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The first concerns the copy-text. The Masoretic Text, he argues, \u201cis not in itself a unified entity\u201d. Its spelling, with vowel letters added inconsistently over centuries, and its pointing belong to linguistic levels \u201cas much as a millennium apart\u201d. Hendel\u2019s rule of keeping the accidentals of Leningrad glosses over that mixture.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-48\"><a href=\"#note-48\">48<\/a><\/sup> At Isaiah 7:11 the Masoretes pointed <span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05e9\u05b0\u05c1\u05d0\u05b8\u05dc\u05b8\u05d4<\/span> (<em>she\u2019alah<\/em>, \u201cask\u201d or \u201crequest\u201d), but three later Greek versions and the Vulgate presuppose <span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05e9\u05b0\u05c1\u05d0\u05b9\u05dc\u05b8\u05d4<\/span> (<em>she\u2019olah<\/em>, \u201cto Sheol\u201d). The consonants are identical, and Williamson notes that nearly all commentators and translations follow the second reading. NRSV, for example, has \u201clet it be deep as Sheol\u201d. His point is that a rule which takes the vowels from the copy-text treats the Masoretes\u2019 choice as a mere accidental, when here it decides the meaning.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-49\"><a href=\"#note-49\">49<\/a><\/sup> He gives a subtler case from the accents. In passages such as Ruth 1:22 the word <span lang=\"he\" dir=\"rtl\">\u05d4\u05b7\u05e9\u05b8\u05bc\u05c1\u05d1\u05b8\u05d4<\/span> (<em>ha-shavah<\/em>, \u201cwho returned\u201d) is accented as a perfect verb after the definite article. That construction is unknown in Classical Hebrew and looks like a later linguistic habit of the Masoretes. Because it is marked only by the accent, it \u201cwill not show up in the text of the new edition\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-50\"><a href=\"#note-50\">50<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The second objection concerns multiple editions. Williamson finds the sample Hebrew column behind the Greek Jeremiah \u201castonishing\u201d. Wherever it runs parallel with the Masoretic Text, it is printed fully vocalised. That, he argues, presents readers with \u201ca text which we know simply never existed\u201d. He calls the policy \u201cgrossly irresponsible\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-51\"><a href=\"#note-51\">51<\/a><\/sup> He doubts too whether fragmentary scrolls can support whole parallel editions, or whether every such scroll was a biblical text at all.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-52\"><a href=\"#note-52\">52<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The third is that the most important judgements do not fit into an apparatus. Crawford\u2019s sample of Deuteronomy 32, for instance, ends by deleting a word by conjecture even though every surviving witness has it. Decisions like that, Williamson argues, rest on philology and literary judgement that only a commentary can explain, so an eclectic text hides from inexperienced readers \u201cprecisely the judgments of the scholar which are most determinative\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-53\"><a href=\"#note-53\">53<\/a><\/sup> His conclusion is that full textual commentary is what the field needs. He expects that part of the project to be widely used, \u201cbut it is not a Bible, new or old\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-54\"><a href=\"#note-54\">54<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"tov-an-archetype-that-never-existed\">Tov: An Archetype That Never Existed<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Emanuel Tov, the author of the standard handbook on the subject and an editor of the HUB until 2004, was critical from the start. Writing in 2008, he argued that \u201cthere never was an \u2018archetype\u2019 or \u2018original text\u2019 of most Scripture books\u201d. Most books, in his view, passed through compositional stages, each meant to be authoritative when it was completed.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-55\"><a href=\"#note-55\">55<\/a><\/sup> If an editor may rebuild verses, Tov asked, why stop there? By the project\u2019s own logic, editors could leave out passages that most critics regard as secondary, such as the Song of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2 or the remark at Genesis 12:6 that \u201cthe Canaanites were then in the land\u201d. He did not expect them to, but he thought the logic pointed that way. He also judged the plan to reconstruct whole Greek-attested editions \u201cnaive\u201d, given how little is known of texts such as the short Jeremiah. And he foresaw rival eclectic editions of the same book: \u201cOn whose edition, or whose Bible, will scholars focus their exegetical activity?\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-56\"><a href=\"#note-56\">56<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tov repeated the core objection in his formal response to the 2013 symposium. Fox\u2019s statement that the reconstructed text \u201cnever had physical existence\u201d was in his view an argument against the whole enterprise. \u201cI agree, but if so, why should we reconstruct it?\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-57\"><a href=\"#note-57\">57<\/a><\/sup> He noted that Proverbs could not show the parallel-column system at work, since Fox had found a Hebrew column for the Greek impossible to reconstruct. In Tov\u2019s view, neither column could be fully reconstructed in other books either. \u201cThe proof of the pudding is in the eating,\u201d he wrote. The real test would be books such as Deuteronomy 32, Joshua 24, Samuel, Jeremiah and Ezekiel.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-58\"><a href=\"#note-58\">58<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Tov\u2019s verdict was mixed, however. He voted for a diplomatic edition, but thought the HBCE preferable to the diplomatic editions \u201cin several respects\u201d. He expected its parallel columns to handle large blocks of variant text better than any apparatus. He judged it easier to use than BHQ or the HUB, and he said that the HBCE and the Biblia Qumranica would excel at training a new generation of exegetes.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-59\"><a href=\"#note-59\">59<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"other-voices\">Other Voices<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Baker\u2019s 2010 survey of the new editions welcomed an eclectic edition in principle. He also thought the project\u2019s eventual decision to add vowels to non-copy-text readings was the most workable of the options. His own worry was practical. With no one-volume edition planned, the HBCE would reach few of the non-specialist readers it aimed to spare from the apparatus. He also asked whether the minor versions deserved to be cited only when they disagree with the Masoretic Text.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-60\"><a href=\"#note-60\">60<\/a><\/sup> The SBL itself names Adrian Schenker, general editor of BHQ, alongside Tov and Williamson among its critics.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-61\"><a href=\"#note-61\">61<\/a><\/sup> More recently Gert Prinsloo has argued that diplomatic and eclectic editions share the same weaknesses. Both offer only a selective \u201csnippet view\u201d of the evidence. Like Tov, he favours a synoptic edition that sets whole witnesses side by side.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-62\"><a href=\"#note-62\">62<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"hendel-s-replies\">Hendel\u2019s Replies<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hendel answered at length, first in \u201cThe Oxford Hebrew Bible: Its Aims and a Response to Criticisms\u201d (2013). There he argued that many of the objections reflect \u201cdifferences about the epistemology of textual criticism and critical biblical scholarship\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-63\"><a href=\"#note-63\">63<\/a><\/sup> Revised versions of that response and of the 2008 prologue open <em>Steps to a New Edition of the Hebrew Bible<\/em>, which also includes essays on the genealogy of the idea of a critical edition, on what a biblical book is and on a typology of scribal error.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-64\"><a href=\"#note-64\">64<\/a><\/sup> In its foreword Hendel credits \u201cthe precise arguments of our critics\u201d with sharpening the project, so that its \u201cconceptual underpinnings and practices\u201d developed \u201cinto a finely-grained structure\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-65\"><a href=\"#note-65\">65<\/a><\/sup> One change of this kind is the decision, noted by Baker, to vocalise readings that depart from the copy-text. The SBL\u2019s own description of the series makes the same point: \u201cDetailed argument is the lifeblood of good scholarship.\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-66\"><a href=\"#note-66\">66<\/a><\/sup> Hendel closed his 2013 article modestly: \u201cThis is our theory of what a critical edition should be. It will not be a perfect edition.\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-67\"><a href=\"#note-67\">67<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"alongside-bhq-and-the-hub\">Alongside BHQ and the HUB<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Hendel presented the HBCE as a complement to the diplomatic editions, not a rival: \u201cThe BHQ and OHB are complementary rather than contradictory projects.\u201d<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-68\"><a href=\"#note-68\">68<\/a><\/sup> Tov disagreed, arguing that an edition that changes its base text and one that never does reflect different <em>Weltanschauungen<\/em>.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-69\"><a href=\"#note-69\">69<\/a><\/sup> In practice the three editions now coexist, each at a different stage.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Adrian Schenker\u2019s terminology helps to sort them. BHQ is an <em>editio critica minor<\/em>, a single-volume manual edition with a compact apparatus. The HUB and the HBCE are <em>editiones criticae maiores<\/em>.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-70\"><a href=\"#note-70\">70<\/a><\/sup> <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/biblia-hebraica-quinta-the-fifth-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible\/\">BHQ<\/a> prints Leningrad diplomatically with its full Masorah and marks its preferred readings in the apparatus. Nine of its planned twenty fascicles are now in print.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-71\"><a href=\"#note-71\">71<\/a><\/sup> The HUB prints the Aleppo Codex with Masorah and a series of apparatuses for the ancient versions, early Hebrew witnesses (scrolls, Samaritan Pentateuch, rabbinic quotations) and medieval manuscripts, followed by editorial notes.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-72\"><a href=\"#note-72\">72<\/a><\/sup> Its volumes on Isaiah (1995), Jeremiah (1997) and Ezekiel (2004) were joined in 2024 by <em>The Twelve Prophets<\/em>, edited by Michael Segal and Shemaryahu Talmon.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-73\"><a href=\"#note-73\">73<\/a><\/sup> The HBCE alone offers a reconstructed text and a full argued commentary. Michael Segal, co-editor of the HUB\u2019s Twelve Prophets, has remarked that the two kinds of edition \u201care fundamentally not as far apart from each other as is usually claimed\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-74\"><a href=\"#note-74\">74<\/a><\/sup> Each records the same evidence. They differ over whether the editor\u2019s conclusions belong in the text or underneath it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"the-digital-edition\">The Digital Edition<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">From the start the HBCE was planned to exist online as well as in print. The SBL promises \u201ca sophisticated electronic version\u201d containing the print material, \u201call the texts and versions\u201d and photographs of important manuscripts. It is to be \u201can interactive polyglot edition\u201d, free and open-access, built on an open architecture so that others can reuse the data.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-75\"><a href=\"#note-75\">75<\/a><\/sup> Electronic versions were meant to follow each volume within a couple of years.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-76\"><a href=\"#note-76\">76<\/a><\/sup> The phrase recalls the great printed polyglots of Alcal\u00e1, Antwerp, Paris and London, the <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/the-complutensian-polyglot-cisneros-alcala-1514-17\/\">Complutensian<\/a> among them, and before them Origen\u2019s six-column <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/the-hexapla-of-origen\/\">Hexapla<\/a>. Hendel counts those polyglots among the first modern critical editions of the Hebrew Bible, and the last chapter of <em>Steps<\/em> is titled \u201cFrom Polyglot to Hypertext\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-77\"><a href=\"#note-77\">77<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The technical work was taken up at the University of Chicago. Its Critical Editions for Digital Analysis and Research initiative (CEDAR) began in 2017 and tested database methods on several textual traditions, from Gilgamesh to Shakespeare.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-78\"><a href=\"#note-78\">78<\/a><\/sup> The Hebrew Bible team was led by Jeffrey Stackert, with Simeon Chavel, Hendel and the postdoctoral research specialist Sarah Yardney. It used the OCHRE database platform, developed at Chicago\u2019s Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-79\"><a href=\"#note-79\">79<\/a><\/sup> A tool called Critical View stacks manuscripts or editions on one another and colour-codes them: green for agreement, red for disagreement, black for text found in only one witness. Comparative View sets texts in different languages side by side and highlights words that occupy the same place, without judging whether they agree. The project\u2019s demonstration compares Hendel\u2019s critical text of Genesis with the Leningrad Codex.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-80\"><a href=\"#note-80\">80<\/a><\/sup> Yardney, Sandra Schloen and Miller Prosser described this digital HBCE in <em>Open Theology<\/em> in 2019.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-81\"><a href=\"#note-81\">81<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">When CEDAR ended in 2021, the Bible team carried on as the Chicago Digital Bible. In its database every word, letter and diacritical mark is stored as a separate item and then reassembled into each manuscript on request, rather than kept as a fixed string of text. The project says its first edition, the <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/Song_of_Songs\">Song of Songs<\/a>, will appear in 2026\u201327, with tools that let users compare manuscripts and build their own critical editions.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-82\"><a href=\"#note-82\">82<\/a><\/sup> That brings the project close to the kind of edition Tov said he wanted in 2014, a visual electronic device in which scholars could work with the Masoretic Text, the Septuagint, the Samaritan Pentateuch and the scrolls \u201con an equal footing\u201d.<sup class=\"fn-ref\" id=\"ref-83\"><a href=\"#note-83\">83<\/a><\/sup> On this point the critic and the editor want something similar: a way of seeing the witnesses together that a single printed page cannot give.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" id=\"notes\">Notes<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list post-notes\">\n\n<li id=\"note-1\">Emanuel Tov, <em>Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible<\/em>, 2nd rev. edn (Minneapolis: Fortress; Assen: Van Gorcum, 2001), p. 20; see also p. 141 on the eclectic G\u00f6ttingen Septuagint. See our <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/emanuel-tov-textual-criticism-3rd-edition-2012\/\">review of the third edition<\/a>. <a href=\"#ref-1\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-2\">H. G. M. Williamson, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bsw.org\/biblica\/vol-90-2009\/do-we-need-a-new-bible-reflections-on-the-proposed-oxford-hebrew-bible\/13\/\">Do We Need a New Bible? Reflections on the Proposed Oxford Hebrew Bible<\/a>\u201d, <em>Biblica<\/em> 90 (2009), pp. 153\u201375, at pp. 155, 157; on the date of the Leningrad Codex, p. 155 n. 4. <a href=\"#ref-2\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-3\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 157. <a href=\"#ref-3\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-4\">Tov, <em>Textual Criticism<\/em>, pp. 372\u201373 n. 2; Emanuel Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions: Philosophy and Praxis\u201d, revised in his <em>Hebrew Bible, Greek Bible, and Qumran: Collected Essays<\/em> (T\u00fcbingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008), ch. 18, \u00a7 2f, citing C. C. Torrey, \u201cThe Archetype of Psalms 14 and 53\u201d, <em>JBL<\/em> 46 (1927), pp. 186\u201392, and K. Budde, \u201cPsalm 14 und 53\u201d, <em>JBL<\/em> 47 (1928), pp. 160\u201383. <a href=\"#ref-4\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-5\">Emanuel Tov, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1628\/219222714x14260590652028\">New Editions of the Hebrew Scriptures: A Response<\/a>\u201d, <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> 3 (2014), pp. 375\u201383, at p. 375 and n. 3, citing R. Kittel, <em>\u00dcber die Notwendigkeit und M\u00f6glichkeit einer neuen Ausgabe der hebr\u00e4ischen Bibel<\/em> (Leipzig, 1901). <a href=\"#ref-5\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-6\">Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 2f n. 48; Tov, <em>Textual Criticism<\/em>, p. 373 n. 2. <a href=\"#ref-6\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-7\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sbl-site.org\/sbl-press\/browse-books\/the-hebrew-bible-a-critical-edition\/\">The Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition<\/a>\u201d (series page, consulted 19 October 2026); Ronald S. Hendel, <em>The Text of Genesis 1\u201311: Textual Studies and Critical Edition<\/em> (New York: Oxford University Press, 1998). <a href=\"#ref-7\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-8\">Ronald Hendel, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/cart.sbl-site.org\/books\/067010P\">Steps to a New Edition of the Hebrew Bible<\/a><\/em>, Text-Critical Studies 10 (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2016), p. ix. <a href=\"#ref-8\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-9\">David L. Baker, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.53751\/001c.29286\">Which Hebrew Bible? Review of Biblia Hebraica Quinta, Hebrew University Bible, Oxford Hebrew Bible, and Other Modern Editions<\/a>\u201d, <em>Tyndale Bulletin<\/em> 61.2 (2010), pp. 209\u201336, at p. 220. <a href=\"#ref-9\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-10\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 159 n. 12. <a href=\"#ref-10\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-11\">Ronald Hendel, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1163\/156853308x302006\">The Oxford Hebrew Bible: Prologue to a New Critical Edition<\/a>\u201d, <em>Vetus Testamentum<\/em> 58 (2008), pp. 324\u201351; Sidnie White Crawford, Jan Joosten and Eugene Ulrich, \u201cSample Editions of the Oxford Hebrew Bible: Deuteronomy 32:1\u20139, 1 Kings 11:1\u20138, and Jeremiah 27:1\u201310 (34 G)\u201d, <em>Vetus Testamentum<\/em> 58 (2008), pp. 352\u201366; Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 159 and n. 13. <a href=\"#ref-11\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-12\">Ronald Hendel, \u201cPlural Texts and Literary Criticism: For Instance, 1 Samuel 17\u201d, <em>Textus<\/em> 23 (2007), pp. 97\u2013114; cited by Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 159 n. 13, and Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 379. <a href=\"#ref-12\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-13\">Society of Biblical Literature, announcement of 22 May 2014, as quoted in full on the blog <em>OTTC: A Blog for Old Testament Textual Criticism<\/em>, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition (HBCE)\u201d, 22 May 2014. <a href=\"#ref-13\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-14\">Ronald Hendel, \u201cA New Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible\u201d, <em>Bible and Interpretation<\/em>, August 2014. <a href=\"#ref-14\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-15\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-15\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-16\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page); the same wording appears in Hendel, \u201cA New Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-16\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-17\">Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, as quoted in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g. <a href=\"#ref-17\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-18\">Michael V. Fox, <em>Proverbs: An Eclectic Edition with Introduction and Textual Commentary<\/em>, HBCE 1 (Atlanta: SBL Press, 2015), pp. 4\u20135, as quoted in Joseph Abrahamson, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/diatheke.blogspot.com\/2017\/06\/review-michael-fox-proverbs-eclectic.html\">Review: Michael Fox, Proverbs<\/a>\u201d, <em>\u03b4\u03b9\u03b1\u03b8\u03b7\u03ba\u03b7<\/em> (blog), 12 June 2017. Fox had used the phrase earlier in \u201cEditing Proverbs: The Challenge of the Oxford Hebrew Bible\u201d, <em>Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages<\/em> 32 (2006), pp. 1\u201322, at p. 7. <a href=\"#ref-18\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-19\">Oxford Hebrew Bible, \u201cIntroduction\u201d (project document, p. 16), as quoted in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g n. 94. <a href=\"#ref-19\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-20\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 222 and n. 16, citing Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, pp. 343\u201346, and W. W. Greg, \u201cThe Rationale of Copy-Text\u201d, <em>Studies in Bibliography<\/em> 3 (1950\u201351), pp. 19\u201336. <a href=\"#ref-20\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-21\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 222; Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 2f, citing Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, pp. 343\u201344. <a href=\"#ref-21\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-22\">Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 2f, quoting Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, p. 345; Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, pp. 222 n. 17, 224\u201325 and 227 n. 24, citing \u201cThe Oxford Hebrew Bible: Guide for Editors\u201d (2010), pp. 3\u20134. <a href=\"#ref-22\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-23\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 225. <a href=\"#ref-23\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-24\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 225. <a href=\"#ref-24\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-25\">Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, p. 325, as quoted in Gert T. M. Prinsloo, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.4102\/hts.v78i1.7813\">Diplomatic or Eclectic Critical Editions of the Hebrew Bible? Considering a Third Alternative<\/a>\u201d, <em>HTS Teologiese Studies\/Theological Studies<\/em> 78.1 (2022), a7813. <a href=\"#ref-25\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-26\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 226. <a href=\"#ref-26\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-27\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 226, quoting Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, p. 347. <a href=\"#ref-27\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-28\">Tov, <em>Textual Criticism<\/em>, pp. 236\u201337; on the section break in the middle of the verse in some Masoretic manuscripts, p. 53. <a href=\"#ref-28\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-29\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-29\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-30\">Oxford Hebrew Bible, \u201cIntroduction\u201d, p. 2, as quoted in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g; Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, pp. 329\u201330, as quoted there, \u00a7 2f. <a href=\"#ref-30\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-31\">Tov, <em>Textual Criticism<\/em>, pp. 320\u201321; Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 167, who puts the difference at \u201capproaching 20%\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-31\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-32\">Crawford, Joosten and Ulrich, \u201cSample Editions\u201d, p. 359, as described in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 2f; Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 379. <a href=\"#ref-32\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-33\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, pp. 377, 379, the latter citing A. Schenker, \u201cThe Edition Biblia Hebraica Quinta (BHQ)\u201d, <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> 2 (2013), p. 10. <a href=\"#ref-33\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-34\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, p. 227. <a href=\"#ref-34\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-35\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-35\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-36\">Tov, <em>Textual Criticism<\/em>, p. 371, quoting A. E. Housman, introduction to <em>M. Manilii Astronomicon<\/em>, vol. 5 (London, 1930), p. xxxiii. On Housman see <a href=\"https:\/\/grokipedia.com\/page\/A._E._Housman\">Grokipedia<\/a>. <a href=\"#ref-36\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-37\">Society of Biblical Literature Bookstore, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/cart.sbl-site.org\/books\/062401C\">Proverbs: An Eclectic Edition with Introduction and Textual Commentary<\/a>\u201d (HBCE 1, April 2015; consulted 19 October 2026). <a href=\"#ref-37\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-38\">SBL Bookstore, \u201cProverbs\u201d, which also lists Fox\u2019s <em>Proverbs 1\u20139<\/em> and <em>Proverbs 10\u201331<\/em> (Yale University Press); Abrahamson, \u201cReview\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-38\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-39\">Abrahamson, \u201cReview\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-39\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-40\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, pp. 377\u201378, citing Fox, \u201cEditing Proverbs\u201d, p. 4. <a href=\"#ref-40\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-41\">Fox, \u201cEditing Proverbs\u201d, p. 7, as quoted in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g n. 98; compare Fox, <em>Proverbs<\/em>, p. 2, as quoted by Abrahamson: \u201cThe primary goal of The Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition (HBCE) is to reconstruct the corrected archetypes of biblical books.\u201d <a href=\"#ref-41\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-42\">Hendel, <em>Steps<\/em>, p. 331, \u201cAppendix: Comparing Critical Editions: BHQ Proverbs and HBCE Proverbs\u201d; on de Waard\u2019s fascicle (BHQ 17, 2008) see Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 376 n. 5. <a href=\"#ref-42\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-43\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cHebrew Bible Critical Edition: Volumes Published\u201d (former project page, archived by the <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/2023\/https:\/\/www.sbl-site.org\/HBCE\/HBCE_Volumes.html\">Internet Archive<\/a>); SBL, series page. <a href=\"#ref-43\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-44\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cHebrew Bible Critical Edition: Editorial Assignments\u201d (former project page, <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/2023\/https:\/\/www.sbl-site.org\/HBCE\/HBCE_Editorial-Assignments.html\">archived 2023<\/a>). Assignments may have changed since. <a href=\"#ref-44\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-45\">Matthieu Richelle, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/matthieurichelle.com\/about\">About<\/a>\u201d (personal website, consulted 19 October 2026). <a href=\"#ref-45\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-46\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 153 n. *. <a href=\"#ref-46\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-47\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, pp. 161, 163. <a href=\"#ref-47\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-48\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, pp. 163, 165. <a href=\"#ref-48\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-49\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, pp. 165\u201366. Vowels are given here in standard Tiberian form. <a href=\"#ref-49\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-50\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 167, listing Gen 18:21; 46:27; Isa 51:10; Job 2:11; Ruth 1:22; 2:6; 4:3. <a href=\"#ref-50\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-51\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 169 and n. 29. <a href=\"#ref-51\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-52\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, pp. 169, 173. <a href=\"#ref-52\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-53\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 171. <a href=\"#ref-53\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-54\">Williamson, \u201cDo We Need a New Bible?\u201d, p. 175. Williamson returned to the subject in \u201cComments on New Editions of the Hebrew Scriptures\u201d, <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> 3 (2014), pp. 384\u201391. <a href=\"#ref-54\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-55\">Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g; on his role in the HUB, Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 375. <a href=\"#ref-55\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-56\">Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 3g. <a href=\"#ref-56\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-57\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 378 and n. 13, citing Fox, \u201cEditing Proverbs\u201d, p. 7. <a href=\"#ref-57\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-58\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, pp. 377\u201378. <a href=\"#ref-58\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-59\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, pp. 378, 381\u201382. <a href=\"#ref-59\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-60\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, pp. 223\u201326. <a href=\"#ref-60\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-61\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-61\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-62\">Prinsloo, \u201cDiplomatic or Eclectic Critical Editions\u201d, sections \u201cA critical evaluation\u201d and \u201cConsidering a third alternative\u201d; Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, pp. 382\u201383. <a href=\"#ref-62\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-63\">Ronald Hendel, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1628\/219222713x13663793700268\">The Oxford Hebrew Bible: Its Aims and a Response to Criticisms<\/a>\u201d, <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> 2 (2013), pp. 63\u201399, abstract. <a href=\"#ref-63\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-64\">Hendel, <em>Steps<\/em>, pp. vii\u2013viii (contents) and x\u2013xi (sources of the chapters). <a href=\"#ref-64\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-65\">Hendel, <em>Steps<\/em>, p. ix. <a href=\"#ref-65\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-66\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-66\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-67\">Hendel, \u201cIts Aims and a Response\u201d, p. 99, as quoted in Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 383. <a href=\"#ref-67\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-68\">Hendel, \u201cPrologue\u201d, p. 337, as quoted in Tov, \u201cHebrew Scripture Editions\u201d, \u00a7 2f. <a href=\"#ref-68\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-69\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 377. <a href=\"#ref-69\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-70\">Prinsloo, \u201cDiplomatic or Eclectic Critical Editions\u201d, section \u201cCritical editions of the Hebrew Bible: A brief overview\u201d, citing A. Schenker (1996), p. 59. <a href=\"#ref-70\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-71\">Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.die-bibel.de\/en\/bible-society-and-biblical-studies\/current-projects\/biblia-hebraica-quinta-bhq\">Biblia Hebraica Quinta (BHQ)<\/a>\u201d (project page). See also our article on <a href=\"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/biblia-hebraica-quinta-the-fifth-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible\/\"><em>Biblia Hebraica Quinta<\/em><\/a>. <a href=\"#ref-71\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-72\">Baker, \u201cWhich Hebrew Bible?\u201d, pp. 218\u201319. <a href=\"#ref-72\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-73\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 376 n. 7; Magnes Press, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/www.magnespress.co.il\/en\/book\/The_Twelve_Prophets-8607\">The Twelve Prophets: The Hebrew University Bible Project Edition<\/a>\u201d (Jerusalem, 2024; consulted 19 October 2026). <a href=\"#ref-73\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-74\">Michael Segal (2017), p. 45, as quoted in Prinsloo, \u201cDiplomatic or Eclectic Critical Editions\u201d, section \u201cA critical evaluation\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-74\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-75\">Society of Biblical Literature, \u201cThe Hebrew Bible: A Critical Edition\u201d (series page). <a href=\"#ref-75\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-76\">SBL, \u201cVolumes Published\u201d (archived). <a href=\"#ref-76\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-77\">Hendel, <em>Steps<\/em>, ch. 13, \u201cFrom Polyglot to Hypertext\u201d, from p. 317; on the polyglots as the first modern critical editions, Hendel, \u201cThe Idea of a Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible: A Genealogy\u201d, <em>Hebrew Bible and Ancient Israel<\/em> 3 (2014), pp. 392\u2013423, at p. 394, as quoted in Prinsloo, \u201cDiplomatic or Eclectic Critical Editions\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-77\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-78\">Chicago Digital Bible, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/voices.uchicago.edu\/digitalbible\/about\/\">About the Project<\/a>\u201d (consulted 19 October 2026); Neubauer Collegium for Culture and Society, \u201cThe CEDAR Project: Critical Editions for Digital Analysis and Research\u201d (project page). <a href=\"#ref-78\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-79\">OCHRE, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/voices.uchicago.edu\/ochre\/project\/cedar-bible\/\">Critical Editions for Digital Analysis and Research (CEDAR), Bible project<\/a>\u201d (consulted 19 October 2026); Neubauer Collegium, \u201cThe CEDAR Project\u201d; University of Chicago Divinity School, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/divinity.uchicago.edu\/directory\/sarah-yardney\">Sarah Yardney<\/a>\u201d (staff page). <a href=\"#ref-79\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-80\">OCHRE, \u201cCEDAR, Bible project\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-80\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-81\">Sarah Yardney, Sandra R. Schloen and Miller C. Prosser, \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1515\/opth-2019-0006\">New Digital Tools for a New Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible<\/a>\u201d, <em>Open Theology<\/em> 5 (2019), pp. 80\u201394. <a href=\"#ref-81\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-82\">Chicago Digital Bible, \u201cAbout the Project\u201d. <a href=\"#ref-82\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n<li id=\"note-83\">Tov, \u201cNew Editions\u201d, p. 383. <a href=\"#ref-83\" aria-label=\"Back to text\">\u21a9<\/a><\/li>\n\n<\/ol>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Almost every scholarly Hebrew Bible on a library shelf today prints the text of a single medieval manuscript and puts the evidence of every other witness underneath it. The Hebrew Bible: A&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":508,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[28,422,250,46,425,43,420,424,24,421,423],"class_list":["post-434","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-text-transmission","tag-bhs","tag-cedar-project","tag-codex-leningradensis","tag-dead-sea-scrolls","tag-digital-hebrew-bible","tag-emanuel-tov","tag-hbce","tag-hebrew-textual-criticism","tag-masoretic-text","tag-new-critical-edition-of-the-hebrew-bible","tag-sarah-yardney"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=434"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":507,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/434\/revisions\/507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=434"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=434"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/masoretes.online\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=434"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}