Yosef Ofer on the Masorah

Yosef Ofer has a new book out The Masora on Scripture and Its Methods, which looks like a very interesting and helpful resource.

SBL Handbook of Style on Kaige

So apparently from now on it's just plain old kaige... FYI.

Tiberias Stylistic Classifier for the Hebrew Bible

Joshua Berman has announced the launch of a new stylistic classification tool for the Hebrew Bible/OT: Tiberias Stylistic Classifier for the Hebrew Bible. Tiberias permits comparison of different reference texts (classes) to identify stylistic differences and distinguishability. You can then input a text you want to classify in terms of stylistic proximity to the selected classes. Classification can be done based on specific inflected words, lexemes, morphology, and syntax, allowing for a very complex overview of stylistic differences between corpora. It would probably take some time to get the most out of this resource, but it looks like a promising database for stylistic comparisons.

Homer's Odyssy in Contemporary Scholarship

Barbara Graziosi and Johannes Haubold have a helpful review of Martin West's new edition of Homer's Odyssey that might be of interest for those following broader developments in textual scholarship. One of the most interesting passages for me was their treatment of the early papyri and the question of the orality of the Homeric epics:

"Beyond specific insights about individual passages, the new papyri confirm that the degree of textual variation in Homer is modest compared to the multiformity attested in other oral traditions. As we have argued specifically in relation to the Iliad, even the ‘so-called “wild papyri” are not as wild as all that’."

HT Agade

Catalogue of Kennicott Manuscripts

Idan Dershowitz has put online a helpful catalogue of manuscripts utilized by Kennicott with links to the National Library of Israel entries, often with digital images. This is a great resource for the sources of Kennicott's collations.

National Geographic Bible Hunters

National Geographic has posted an article Inside the cloak-and-dagger search for sacred texts. While much of it will be familiar to those following the field, the article contains numerous interesting interviews and is a good survey of important developments.

HT Peter Head

Reconsidering the Date of EGLev

Brill has graciously decided to grant free access to its first volume of Textus. That means that, in addition to other interesting articles, you can freely download my recently published article on Hebrew paleography and EGLev, Reconsidering the Date of the En-Gedi Leviticus Scroll (EGLev): Exploring the Limitations of the Comparative-Typological Paleographic Method.