Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Vayechi: Mind The Gap: Is Vayechi Unique In Not Being Introduced With A Break?


According to the Karaite scholar Aharon ben Yosef, there also was no break before parshat Vayeitzei. And similar reasons of given/develop for this.

In the explanation (right), we see that the sefarim in hand all had the gap before Vayeitzei. The suggestion is that Ben Asher manuscripts only omit the gap by Vayechi, while Ben Naftali manuscripts omit the gap also by Vayeitzei.

Can anyone confirm this assertion by comparison to some known Ben Naftali manuscript?

Update: a slight clarification. The commentary on Torah is by the Karaite Aharon ben Yosef, and the only tradition he reports is one that lacks the gap by both Vayeitzei and Vayechi. And the supercommentary (by someone else) suggests that Aharon ben Yosef was working specifically off of a Ben Naftali tradition.

The supercommentary was by Yosef Shlomo Luzki, a 19th century Karaite. And all *his* manuscripts were ben Asher, which is why he suggests that the much earlier Aharon ben Yosef was working off Ben Naftali.

No comments:

LinkWithin

Blog Widget by LinkWithin