SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH. — The five books of Moses, which for the Samaritans constitute the entire Bible, limited as it was to the initial stage of the Canon at the time of the Samaritan secession (c. 400 B.C.). This tôrâh, the basis of all their religious and social life, is transmitted with remarkable conservatism. Even the script in which it is preserved is the ancient Hebrew or slightly evolved Phoenician script.
This is important in the textual criticism of the Old Testament. The Samaritans refused to admit any evolutionary or recensional purifications, nor the entire Masoretic apparatus that fixed the sacred text; they had no need of it, dwelling in a restricted territory and being few in number. Had they possessed the true original text, no Pentateuchal text would be more genuine than theirs; the first editor of a Samaritan Pentateuch manuscript in Europe (J. Morin, Exercitationes..., Paris 1631) had reason to extol it above the Masoretic text, after P. Valle (v.) had brought that manuscript together with a targum of it to Europe in 1616. But according to P. Kahle, the matter is far more complicated. Yet those who, influenced by dogmatic prejudices, exclude the Samaritan Pentateuch from textual criticism research are mistaken, as was G. Gesenius (v.), to whom we owe the most accurate classification of its variants.
On the whole, the Masoretic text is to be preferred, being based on manuscripts older than the Samaritan Pentateuch, free from later additions to the vulgar texts, and preferring in a certain measure more difficult but more original grammatical forms. Yet even the learned Masoretic recension is not without dogmatic influences. The Samaritan Pentateuch, on the contrary, is a popular text which, before and after the secession, in the Samaritan community was modernized according to the needs of its readers and listeners, as today the poets of the 16th and 17th centuries are presented in modern orthography. The following adaptations were necessary: an abundance of matres lectionis, similar to that found in the first Isaiah scroll discovered in 1947 at Khirbet Qumrân; corrections or even emendations of grammatical forms that were too archaic or not well understood. Several intrusive passages remained in the text, deriving from parallel places, as happens when the word of God is alive in liturgy, preaching, and dogmatic teaching. Moreover, it is probable that the Samaritan manner of writing the sacred text reflects dialectal influences different from those of Jerusalem (Sperber); the Samaritan system of simple "pointing" appears only after A.D. 1200, in some manuscripts only. From the spoken language, which became increasingly the Samaritan Aramaic, similar to that of Galilee, many Aramaisms were introduced. This explains the mass of variants and the purpose of providing a Masoretic text.
More controversial, however, are the variants that reveal the particular dogmatics of the Samaritans, especially those that arose around biblical passages referring to Mount Gerizim, where they built their temple. Here too an equitable judgment presupposes knowledge of the pre-Masoretic history of the Hebrew text. Some apocryphal works, such as the Ethiopian Hemoch (v.) and the Book of Jubilees (v.), have identical figures with the Samaritan Pentateuch for the patriarchs in Gen. 5:10-11. This can only be explained by admitting that, in circles considered Judæan, besides the type of text that later determined the Masoretic text, besides the "semi-popular" type (P. Kahle) that underlies the Septuagint (v.), a third type close to the Samaritan was in use. This is confirmed by citations from Philo of Alexandria and references in the New Testament (e.g., Acts 7:4; 7:32; 7:35; Heb. 9:3), which find their counterpart only in the Samaritan Pentateuch.
There was thus an anti-Samaritan tendency in the fixing of the Hebrew textus receptus around A.D. 100, which gradually eliminated texts favorable to the Samaritans. A similar tendency already existed before their secession, and one witnesses the curious fact that some anti-Samaritan readings were transmitted by the Samaritans themselves through their veneration of tradition, as additions to the text of Deut. 11:29; 27:12; Josh. 8:33, which even today in the Masoretic text attribute to Gerizim the function of the mountain of blessing, while to Ebal that of the mountain of cursing. Historically, there was a sanctuary on Gerizim, though not so famous in the time of the kings. The additions, however, not excluded by the Samaritan Pentateuch, suggest that it refers to a locality near Gilgal, near the Jordan, in contrast to the Samaritan conception. Some scholars affirm with reasonable probability that it was not the Samaritans who changed the text in their favor by substituting in Deut. 27:4 "Ebal" with "Gerizim," but rather the Jews by substituting "Gerizim" for "Ebal" in Deut. 27:4 and Josh. 8:30 (cf. E. Meyer, C. C. Torrey, R. H. Pfeiffer, and already B. Kennicott); God would have commanded an altar rather on the mountain of cursing than on that of blessing, which, even according to the Masoretic text, is only Gerizim. But in another 19 passages (removing the prefix of the verb "to choose") it was rather the Samaritans who changed the text in favor of their dogmatics.
It will often be necessary to correct and emend it in a significant number of cases. Even among its most ardent supporters, its testimony requires serious examination. In 1900 of its variants, Fr. S. drew support from the Septuagint; however, it is not possible to establish mechanical rules of preference.
Despite many lively discussions, textual criticism has not yet developed, in the case of Fr. S., the working tool that would be desirable. The text is accessible in the Paris (1645) and London (1657) Polyglots, both with Latin translations. B. Kennicott (Oxford 1776–80) and today R. Kittel note its important variants in their Bibles. Blayney provided a convenient edition based especially on the Paris manuscript (Oxford 1790). A. von Gall (Berlin 1914–18) produced a critical edition with a valuable introduction (to which P. Kahle supplied materials) and a critical apparatus; yet the critical edition has serious defects: it does not rely on all the manuscripts, it does not address the Samaritan Targum (edited by Petermann and Vollers in an even less satisfactory manner), nor the Arabic or Greek versions (the Samaraitikon, already used by Origen in the Hexapla: a version according to the Hebrew-Samaritan text but with the Septuagint version [and perhaps versions earlier than the Septuagint?] in view), nor the commentaries, especially the Aramaic Memar of Marqah, the greatest writer among the Samaritans, nor the biblical passages cited in the liturgy. A graver defect is the adoption of eclectic principles not entirely consonant with the facts. Thus Fr. S. remains a difficult field for extensive work, reserved for a few specialists, requiring vast erudition in the pre-Masoretic history of the Hebrew Bible and much discernment.
SAMARITAN PENTATEUCH — SAMGAR
established by the civil districts of Ganpur, Bonai, and Barma (ceded by the diocese of Ranchi), those of Patna and S. and part of the district of Sonepur (ceded by the diocese of Nagpur), and finally the districts of Raikol Athamalik, Angul, Pal Lahara, Talchar, Hindol, and Dhenkanal (ceded by the archdiocese of Calcutta).
It borders on the dioceses of Ranchi, Nagpur, Cuttack, and the archdiocese of Calcutta. The total area of the diocese, which lies entirely within the State of Orissa, is 47,000 sq. km., with a population of 3,608,795 (1941 census), of whom: 2,570,000 Hindus, 924,000 aborigines, 14,000 Muslims, and 100,000 of various other races. The language used and understood by all is Oriya, though other languages are spoken among the aboriginal tribes. There are 66,000 Catholics and 30,000 Protestants of various sects. The city of S., the see of the diocese, is the most populous center, with about 20,000 inhabitants. The diocese has been entrusted to the Society of the Divine Word and declared a suffragan of Calcutta. At present there are 6 residences with 6 churches, 231 small chapels, 116 catechists and 112 teachers, 2 convents of sisters (one foreign and one indigenous), 1 secondary school, 6 middle schools, 2 normal schools, 2 vocational schools, 125 elementary schools, 3 small hospitals, and not a few dispensaries. Some of the districts that make up the diocesan territory were, before the proclamation of India as an independent state, small semi-independent principalities closed to Christianity. With the promulgation of the Constitution of the new Indian Republic, which guarantees freedom of worship and proselytism everywhere, it will now be possible for missionaries to enter regions hitherto closed to all forms of evangelization.