AtheistGamer

Hello. I've recently run into a Christian claim that the DSS copy of Psalm 22:16 reads like a lion they peirced my hands and feet. I tried finding a translation of the DSS online but I cannot find one. Help would be appreciated.

hjalti

Well, whether it has a waw or a yod at the end (IIRC it's not very clear), it doesn't read "like a lion they pierced my hands and feet". Since that would probably be something like "k'ry k'rw", and we only have one instance of k'r- in the text.

And k'rw doesn't even seem to mean "pierced".

This has been discussed here before, and I'm sure that some of the veterans here have a picture of the relevant DSS.

Here is a nice article about this, although he doesn't examine the DSS fragment

manwithdream

Here is a Christian article with a picture of the fragment. He says the fragment is from 50 to 68 CE, but later he says it is pre-Christian. I don't know what he means by that.

http://www.torahresource.com/English...es/Ps22.16.pdf


I have some alternative translations of Psalm 22 on my site. I am not a scholar and my ideas are not mainstream, but if you are willing to consider alternative ideas, then go to
http://www.messianicmistakes.com/

Kenneth Greifer

JoeWallack

JW:
Boy did you come to the right place. As near as I can tell I Am the foremost authority the world has ever known on the likely original offending word of 22:17 (= 22:16 Christian Bible). My related Thread here is:

Psalm 22:17, Hebrew Text, "Like A Lion". Determining Who's Original And Who's Lion?

I have faith that my related summary of the argument at ErrancyWiki:

Psalm 22:16

is the best article ever written on the subject (for the serious scholar note the related god-awful article at Wikipedia They have pierced my hands and my feet).

Apologist claims that the DSS supports "pierced" for the offending word is based on a fragment from Nahal Hever. The starting point for argument than is what this fragment shows. From my article:

JW:
The most important observation at this point in time is the Script of the time period had very similar letters for Yod and Vav, especially if it was the last letter of a word. If Yod here, than we have "like a lion". If Vav, than it is an unknown word. The combination of the similarity in script of the two letters and the faded writing makes any conclusion uncertain. Visually, it looks like a Vav to me as explained above. But I have noticed that it is something of a Rorschach test where conclusions seem to lion up with sympathies. If you accept here that the offending letter (the last letter) of the offending word is ambiguous than the logical conclusion is to accept the letter Yod, which yields "like a lion" since using instead a Vav would be an unknown word. All of this is just the first step but the most important one. The rest of the arguments are relatively less important to a conclusion.

To be continued...



Joseph

ErrancyWiki

AtheistGamer

Thanks Joe. Do you happen to have a degree in this stuff? Honestly unless the people looking at the text have some sort of special device like a blacklight that makes the faded ink glow I don't know how the hell they are able to tell what is what.

If the word can either end in a Yod or a Vav with only a Yod spelling a word, then how do other scholars conclude that it is pierced?

Are there any apologists on these forums that could give their side of the arguments?

I'm pretty sure that the christian making this claim merely read the DSS translation by trinity college professors, without actually looking at the original text.

Also I know that the majority of Masoretic texts from the middle ages have like a lion, but the septuigint has a word for dig. Who was the sep. preserved by over the ages? If it was christians then I could see a christian interpolation issue going on easily with the Masoretic staying true to the original Hebrew.

HOLY SHIT! I just read Psalm 22, and the author uses lions several times in his Psalm.

Like a lion at my hands and feet totally fits with the rest of the text, since lions seem to be a theme of the text. How stupid are these people who think it says pierced??!

judge

I've always said that about you

AtheistGamer

http://katachriston.wordpress.com/20...ints-position/

I found this article which claims that *all* experts who have looked at the text agree that it is "they peirced my hands and feet". The article supplies an enhanced image of the scroll to prove it's point. I would like to know how this image was enhanced. What techniques were used to clarify the image?

DCHindley

Actually, there are no fragments from the DSS that contain Ps 22:16. However, a fragment of Psalm 22 which includes vs 16 was found at Nahal Hever, aka "Cave of Letters," which has been dated paleographically to the latter half of the 1st century CE.

It says "They have pierced my hands and my feet." This agrees with the Septuagint and some MT manuscripts. Most MT manuscripts have "Like a lion are my hands and feet."

FWIW, the "cave of letters" includes artifacts and dated letters ranging from late 1st to mid 2nd century CE, including private letters signed by Simon Bar Kochba himself (not copies).

See this link for more info.

DCH

hjalti

Sure, it looks like a waw, but I'm not sure about that "pierced" part.

AtheistGamer

How do you know it says pierced?