“And everyone whose [eye]s are dim or [...] and everyone that is not quick to
un[der]stand, and everyone wh[ose tongue] is cursed, [or] speaks [with] a continuous
[voice] and does not divide his words so that [his voice] is heard, [men such as these will
not read from the scroll of the Law] in case he makes a mistake in a capital matter.”^732This text refers specifically to the capacities of one charged with publicly reading a scroll
of the Law, and requires that anyone doing so must be perfect in their faculties of vision
and speech to eliminate any possibility of misinterpretation of the text being read. Now,
although the precision of the text from which the accurate reading was to be made is not
explicitly referred to, one might assume that the scroll of the Law from which an exact
reading was to be made would itself need to be a reliable copy. It seems reasonable to
suppose that an exact text is a prerequisite for an exact reading, but it is perhaps too pre-
sumptuous to surmise that an exact text of the type termed by Lieberman as ήκριβωμένα
underlies the practice referred to in this passage. Be that as it may, it is not impossible
that this passage in the Damascus Document refers “to a practice which took place in the
Jerusalem Temple, or to one which the sectarians [at Qumran] thought should take place
there.”^733 It may be permitted, then, to presume that scrolls replicated with a high level of
precision were required for services, such as public readings, that took place within the
Jerusalem religious institution during the Second Temple period.
732
For the fragments in question, see J.M. Baumgarten, Qumran Cave 4 XIII: The Damascus Document
(4Q266-273) 733 (DJD 18; Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996) 49-50, 102 & 194.
L.H. Schiffman, "Public Reading," 46.