Commenting
on the change to Gen 31:53 in the Samaritan Pentateuch (SP) and the LXX, Juha
Pakkala wrote:
Another example of a very small omission--of
one letter only--that resulted in a significant change can be found in Gen
31:53. The originally plural reference to God, preserved in the MT, was changed
to singular in the SP and the LXX. The MT uses the plural to refer to the
god(s) of Abraham and the god(s) of Nahor: אלהי אברהם ואלהי נחור ישׁפטו בינינו. The fact that the gods of
Abraham and Nahor are listed as seperate genitives suggests that the plural is
original and that many gods were probably meant. Whether the plural is a
reference to several gods that both of them had or two gods only--one of Abraham,
the other of Nahor--cannot be determined. If one divinity was meant, one would
expect the text to read אלהי אבאהם תהור. The SP and LXX have changed the
plural verb to a singular, ישפט and κρινει respectively. It is
very likely that the PS and LXX are secondary here, because a tendency to
remove the polytheistic elements would be expected from many later authors,
while the opposite direction of development would be difficult to explain.
Similar changes are made, for example, in Gen 20:13 and 35:7. The plural
reference, in these cases preserved in the MT, is probably original. (Juha
Pakkala, God's Word Omitted: Omissions in
the Translation of the Hebrew Bible [Forschungen zur Religion und Lieratur
des Alten und Neuen Testaments 251; Bristol, Conn.: Vandenhoeck and Reprecht,
2013], 101-2)
On Gen
20:13, see the discussion of the text at:
