Multiple Originals: New Approaches to Hebrew Bible Textual Criticism.

• Author: Feinstein, Eve Levavi
• Position: Book review

Multiple Originals: New Approaches to Hebrew Bible Textual Criticism. By GARY D. MARTIN. SBL Text-Critical Studies, vol. 7. Atlanta: SOCIETY OF BIBLICAL LITERATURE, 2010. Pp. xiv + 341. $42.95 (paper).

The objective of textual criticism is often thought to be the reconstruction of a single lost original text from a multiplicity of variants. Over the years, however, many textual critics of the Hebrew Bible have questioned whether the quest for a single Urtext is a worthwhile goal given the fluidity exemplified by early manuscripts. This skepticism regarding the search for an Urtext, famously voiced by Paul Kahle in the mid-twentieth century, is given new expression in Gary D. Martin's thoughtful and erudite Multiple Originals: New Approaches to Hebrew Bible Textual Criticism.

Martin defines textual criticism as an effort to "explain the differences among texts that are believed to have been intended to transmit identical textual information at the graphical and acoustic levels" (p. 4). While he does not wholly reject efforts to reconstruct original versions of particular biblical passages, he suggests that in many cases the goal of explaining variation might best be served by regarding variant texts as peers. The bulk of the book comprises an exploration of such cases and their implications for textual criticism of the Hebrew Bible.

The first part of the book, "Theories and Methods," discusses some of the questions and problems facing the field and proposes new ways of approaching the profusion of variants at the critic's disposal. Chapter 1, "In Search of the Original," surveys approaches to textual criticism in a variety of academic disciplines and examines attitudes toward fluidity in the text of the Hebrew Bible from antiquity to the present. Chapter 2, "Theories and Methods of Orality," discusses the potential for orality studies to contribute to textual criticism and vice versa. This chapter focuses primarily on formulaic theory, which addresses the use of stereotypical formulae in the composition and transmission of oral and written material. Because formulae are susceptible to considerable--though not unlimited--variation, formulaic theory offers one way of understanding fluidity in the biblical text. Martin returns to this approach in part 3, which focuses on variant texts of the Decalogue.

Part 2, "Multivalences of Meaning," explores the intersection of text and orality in cases where traditions differ regarding the vocalization of...