Subject: OT, Hebrew Bible, or ...?

From: "James R. Adair" <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 29 Nov 1995 23:53:53 -0500 (EST)

The SBL has a section called the "Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible" 
section.  Emanuel Tov's book has a similar title.  On the other hand, 
Wuerthwein's book is _The Text of the Old Testament_, and many seminaries 
offer a course called Old Testament Textual Criticism.  What are the 
pros and cons of these terms, and are there better alternatives?

First, though Old Testament is obviously a term derived from the Christian
canon, even many Christian scholars favor the term "Hebrew Bible," in part
because it is less sectarian.  However, when referring to textual
criticism, does this phrase not prejudice the discussion in favor of the
Hebrew _language_ witnesses, especially the MT?  Especially when 
dealing with books that apparently existed in different literary forms 
(e.g., Jeremiah, Samuel, Ezekiel, Job), doesn't "textual criticism of the 
Hebrew Bible" suggest that the form found in the MT be accorded some sort 
of preference (cf. Tov, p. 317)?  And what would textual criticism of the 
book of Tobit be called?

What are the alternatives?  "Textual criticism of the Tanakh" avoids the 
term "Hebrew," and so could presumably refer indifferently to MT or LXX, 
for example, but it stumbles over the differences between the 
Jewish/Protestant and Catholic/Orthodox canons in regard to these books.  
James Sanders and others use the term "First Testament," and "First 
Testament textual criticism" does seem to avoid the problems of Old 
Testament on the one hand and Hebrew Bible or Tanakh on the other.  But 
then aren't we forced to speak of "textual criticism of the Second 
Testament" as well?

I would be interested to see what thoughts others might have on these 
matters of terminology.

Jimmy Adair
Manager of Information Technology Services, Scholars Press
    and
Managing Editor of TELA, the Scholars Press World Wide Web Site
---------------> http://scholar.cc.emory.edu <-----------------