Posted on 06/01/2013 2:50:07 PM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
In 1889, an Italian librarian's faulty identification sentenced to archival obscurity an antique Torah scroll that has turned out to be the oldest complete such scroll in existence.
This week, University of Bologna Professor Mauro Perani announced the results of carbon-14 tests authenticating the scroll's age as roughly 800 years old.
The scroll dates to between 1155 and 1225, making it the oldest complete Torah scroll on record.
Like all Torah scrolls, this one contains the full text of the five Books of Moses in Hebrew and is prepared according to strict standards for use during religious services. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------snip------------------
At the end of the 12th century Maimonides [a famous rabbinic authority] set down the rules for how to copy Torah scrolls, and those fixed rules have been followed ever since. This scroll's copyist did not know of those rules. Those rules would have forbidden him from using some of the graphical elements found here, such as use of compression of letters, line justification, and which letters can have [decorative] "crowns" on top.
There is more freedom here. There are also passages whose graphical layout is identical to that of the Aleppo Codex [a Bible in book form], which dates to the 10th century. This all means that either the Torah scroll was made before the death of Maimonides, who died in 1204, or the copyist had not yet learned of those rules. Remember, there was no Internet then to spread the news immediately. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at news.nationalgeographic.com ...
Shalom: 800-year-old Torah ping - oldest known intact copy.
WOW
how wonderful
I’m probably mistaken, but I thought the Dead Sea Scrolls were much older than this... Like almost back to the time of Christ maybe. I must either be mixed up or just plain wrong I guess.
Now copyists just right click!
Amazing...
This must be written for a third-grader: “Remember, there was no Internet then to spread the news immediately. . .”
How trite, Diane. It might have helped if you’d explained that Algore hadn’t been born yet.
Three Girls, Three Graves, One Torah
www.danielgordis.org (email list) | 14 May, 2004 | Daniel Gordis
Posted on 05/17/2004 6:14:33 PM PDT by Salem
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1137422/posts
|
|
GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach | |
Thanks Pollster1. |
|
|
Older, yes. Torah, no.
The Dead Sea Scrolls do not make up a complete Torah set.
I don’t believe it is accurate to say that Maimonides’ rules for writing a Sefer Torah are followed today.
Maimonides’ rules are based on the Jerusalem Talmud and so would be similar to Italian and maybe Yemenite usage. Most scrolls would follow rules derived from the Babylonian Talmud.
Seriously?
Nice read, but that reminder was...
There’s supposed to be a Torah Scroll in Prague that was allegedly written by Ezra.
The Story Of The Jewish Torahs of Czechoslovakia
http://www.czechtorah.org/thestory.php
A Sefer Torah in the Bologna Library May Be the Oldest Known Torah Scroll
Noah Wiener
05/30/2013
http://www.biblicalarchaeology.org/daily/news/a-sefer-torah-in-the-bologna-library-may-be-the-oldest-known-torah-scroll/
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.