Jewish Literature in New Testament Times

The Text of the Old Testament

How was the Text of the Old Testament Transmitted?

It is believed that the Old Testament books were written originally on skins They were copied meticulously by the hand of scribes, letter by letter, word by word, sentence by sentence, paragraph by paragraph, chapter by chapter, book by book, and the entire composition. everything was also numbered each letter each word etc. when a copy of a manuscript of the Hebrew Torah was made after the numbers matched the original was disregarded. Hebrew was in square characters, from right to left with small dots or accent signs, were written above and below the consonants for vowels (the vowel system was not introduced till the 6th century A.D.). Until the Captivity of Judah official copies were kept in the Temple. Afterward many copies were made for Synagogues. The invention of printing later removed danger of errors in the manual transmission of the text; and now, as a result of the work of scholars in comparing the various manuscripts, there is a recognized Hebrew text known as Massoretic. The Dead Sea Scrolls revealed how accurate the method of copying and numbering actually was. The most prophetic book of the Old Testament relating to the activities of the Messiah was the book of Isaiah, and the Dead Sea Scrolls unveiled a perfect scroll of Isaiah.

 

Also see The Septuagint