Soferim (Talmud) - Peculiarities of The Treatise

Peculiarities of The Treatise

As the substance of the treatise has been incorporated in later works on orthography, the Masorah, and the liturgy, only a few points peculiar to it need be mentioned here. In i. 13 occurs the maxim "He who can not read is not allowed to write." Custodians seem to be mentioned in ii. 12 (based on Yer. Meg. i. 9; comp. the Vitry Maḥzor, p. 689, note). The first notice in Jewish literature of the codex in contradistinction to the scroll occurs in iii. 6 (comp. the Vitry Maḥzor, p. 691), a passage which is to be translated as follows: "Only in a codex ; in a scroll the Torah and the Prophets must be kept separate"; while the following section describes a scroll of the Law as being divided into verses (doubtless by means of blank spaces), or as having the initial portion of its verses pointed. Among the ancients the beginning ("resh pasuḳ") of a verse rather than the end ("sof pasuḳ") was emphasized, since the former was important mnemonically. There were scribes, therefore, who marked the initial of the verse, although there is no trace of such points in the present Masorah and system of accentuation.

The earliest passage referring to "dyed leather" (parchment) is iii. 13, although it is possible, in view of ii. 10, that originally בעורות צבאים stood in place of בעורות צבועים. Even if that be true, however, this is still the first reference to colored parchment for synagogal scrolls; for nothing else could be implied by these words in the received reading. The skin of game was a favorite writing-material; so that while it was forbidden to use half leather and half parchment, half leather and half skin of game were allowable (ii. 10). It was forbidden, moreover, to cut the edges of books (v. 14). A scribal term which does not occur elsewhere is found in v. 1, 2 (מעכב, variant reading מחטב). There were generally seventy-two lines to the column in a scroll of the Law (xii. 1). The passage xiii. 1 refers to the stichic writing of the Psalms; Book of Job, and Proverbs; and the remark "A good scribe will note" shows that the passage was written at a time when this detail was no longer generally observed (comp. Müller, ad loc., and the Vitry Maḥzor, p. 704).

Soferim is the first work to distinguish between the three grades of inspiration in the Bible (xviii. 3, end), namely, that of Torah (the Law), of Kabala (tradition of the holy prophets), and of Hagiographa (words of holiness).