Carbon Dating Confirms World's Oldest Torah Scroll
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.
What a 19th-century cataloguer had interpreted as clumsy mistakes by what he guessed was an awkward 17th-century scribe provided the very clues that led Perani to investigate further. Read more.
Leviticus 18 Literal Hebrew Translation
In this post I was asked for my opinion on “Christians aiming out against homosexuality.” The first thing I said was that religion isn’t an indicator, individuals are. Different people from different faith claims are against homosexuality for one reason or another.
So I used a Young’s Literal Translation Bible to try as best as I could to dissect Leviticus 18, known as one of many Bible quotes that anti-rights activists bastardize for their own gain.
And as it turns out, thanks to a simple grammatical error in the Hebrew text itself, my interpretation was off as well! Which isn’t surprising, as I cannot understand Hebrew, and had to rely on the most literal translation I could find.
Under this cut is the most literal step-by-step translation of Leviticus 18 that I have ever come across, as well as a short lesson in the Hebrew language and some truly fascinating information about Hebrew women’s beds.
note: this was submitted to me politely and with kind wording rather than a passive aggressive comment on the post. And instead of being rude to me about it, this person very kindly informed me of what was inaccurate. Just a thought.
