Holy Hormones Bible Study: If your book isn’t a buzz, it’s not the Bible.
HOW MANY STALLS AND HORSES DID SOLOMON HAVE?
Typos in the Torah #11
If you are not a financial member of Medium you can read it HERE for free.
Prologue
If you have already read a Holy Hormones article you know what to expect. If this is your first visit, it is advised that you read HERE before proceeding.
Introduction
In an article dated 1992–07–24 a Jim Meritt posted, “A List of Biblical Contradictions.” There were about 65 of them. This series will gradually work through them, as time allows.
Who is this post for?
Those who waste their time finding fault with the Word of God.
THE ALLEGED CONTRADICTION
How many stalls and horsemen?
It is written in 2 Chronicles 9:25║ And Solomon had four (H702 — ‘arbaʿ) thousand stalls for horses and chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen; whom he bestowed in the chariot cities, and with the king at Jerusalem.
Four: H702 — ‘arbaʿ אַרְבַּע (Inflection = אַרְבַּעַת)
And in 1Kings 4:26║ And Solomon had forty (H705 — ‘arbāʿîm) thousand stalls of horses for his chariots, and twelve thousand horsemen.
Forty: H705 — ‘arbāʿîm אַרְבָּעִים (Inflection = אַרְבָּעִים)
Obviously, they are not the same. How do I know which is correct?
Other references?
Both of the most Authoritative references, The Septuagint (LXX) and Aleppo Codex, confirm that 2 Chronicles 9:25 is four.
Unfortunately, 1Kings 4:26 does not appear in either of the references. It is not known why the LXX is shy but the Aleppo Codex was damaged in riots in 1947.
But all is not lost.
Some boring Hebrew Grammar
The suffix ים (pronounced “im”) denotes a plural in Hebrew.
Comparing four and forty it can be seen that forty is אַרְבָּעִ + ים (four + im)
In the post, ARE THERE REALLY TYPOS IN THE TORAH? it is shown that Torah Typos have been well known in Judaism. There is a Scribal procedure, Tiqqun Soferim, “correction of scribes” or “scribal correction,” which has been practiced since time immemorial in Judaism.
The same post also shows a list of scribal errors assembled by the Department of Manuscript Studies, Medieval and Early Modern, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. One of those types of error is Unwitting Mistranscription where the Scribe “sees” something partly because a piece of text had appeared so often already, and partly because it made “sense” in the passage, so the initial error was not immediately caught.
In my part of town it is not well understood that the Westminster Leningrad Codex, the one used for both the Jewish Tanakh and Gentile Old Testament, is the Masoretic Text which dates from about the 12th Century, and is the earliest complete copy available.
IT IS A HAND-WRITTEN COPY — NOT THE ORIGINAL — SO IS SUBJECT TO THE SAME POTENTIAL FOR SCRIBAL ERROR AS ALL HAND-WRITTEN COPIES AFTER AND BEFORE IT.
A cynical view
In deriding the Bible on the Tekton Aplogetics website, a cynical view used these verses as an example. It is in such dire need of fact-checking that I won’t post it here. You can find it on the Tekton site.
This figure of 1Kings 4:26 shows that this text contains many plural (ים) words.
Because of the four (אַרְבָּעִ) in the existing Authoritative copies, and the number of plurals (ים) in the verse, it is not unreasonable to deduce that four is the intended number and forty is an Unwitting Mistranscription. The Scribe’s mind wandered for some reason.
That’s my conclusion. What do the qualified say?
(Unidentified) Textual critics have determined that four is correct, and 1 Kings has been hit by a copyist error, citing as support:
- The reading found in 2 Chronicles.
- Archaeological data indicating that 4000 would be an appropriate number of stalls for a nation the size of ancient Israel, whereas 40,000 would be very excessive.
- 4000 comports better with the number of horsemen.
- There is sufficient explanation for a change. Tekton associate Eric Vestrup notes that there is a reasonable probability that a scribe copied incorrectly, for “40” is spelled aleph-resh-bet-ayin-yodh-mem with “4” being spelled aleph-resh-bet-ayin-heh , the only difference being the plural “-im” ending in “40” while “4” has the singular feminine ending.
This conclusion is synergistic to mine.
Conclusion
It is highly probable that 40,000 is an Unwitting Mistranscription. The true value is 4,000.
Discussion
For what it is worth coming from me, as this series continues it becomes more and more apparent that too much emotional energy is spent majoring on the minors.
Today on the news feed was something about the “overview effect” experienced by astronauts. That is, there is a “sobering realisation” of, “What overrides everything?” when they gaze on the Earth.
The answer is not Jehoiachin’s age nor Solomon’s horses. It’s God’s Redemption Plan — the one that He has laid out in advance (Prophecy) and is bringing to fruition. Just look at the news.
Let the Nations huff-&-puff. Who cares who wins the US Election; it matters not. God’s Prophecies have been reliable so far and he has promised to make Jerusalem, “A cup of trembling to all the surrounding peoples, when they lay siege against Judah and Jerusalem.”
Just watch, all you campus demonstrators.
The forgoing evidence has not been presented to convince any reader but to allow a personal decision to be made. There is much more to know about this subject. Perhaps you’ll pay another visit, sometime. If you have seen something you like, I encourage plagiarism. So, always check everything I say first, then please re-cycle, re-brand, re-structure, re-issue, re-label, or re-gurgitate in any manner you please. No need to acknowledge me because the Holy Spirit Who holds the Intellectual Rights.
All Glory to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
(We all have a plank in our eye. It’s bigger than we think.)
