The Oldest Known Copy of the Decalogue?
A careful examination of the three oldest copies of the Decalogue—4QDeutn, 4QPaleoExodusm, and the Nash Papyrus—surprisingly shows that none of them reflects the Masoretic Text.
Published: July 30, 2015
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Last Updated: September 7, 2026
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The serial number given to the texts as they were found in the caves.
“4Q” marks the origin of the scroll, that is, from Cave 4 of Qumran (abbreviated as “Q”), while “m,” the thirteenth letter of the alphabet, stands for copy number 13 of that book from that cave,
When discovered, column A (Deut 8:5-10) was originally attached to Sheet B (Deut 5:1-6:[ 2 ]), and was detached from it when the scroll was being treated for restoration. Later, sheet A was put back together with sheet B, and one can still see some remnants of yet another sheet – with no remains of writing – that was attached to the right side of sheet A.
Four other scrolls with similar height are of Lamentation, Ruth and Canticles, probably because of their short biblical text; see the later rabbinical rule that when you roll a scroll, its circumference must be equal to its height (b. Baba Batra 14a).
In co. 1 line 5 was left empty, and the scribe skipped also over a large splotch of ink in col. 2 line 10, and over a flaw in the leather in col. 4 lines 1-4 and lines 7-8.
In col. 3 at the end of line 11 the words כל מלאכה were added; in col. 5 line 6 the ה of היום was corrected to ב(=ביום); in line 11 of the same column the י of ידבר was added above the line, and in col. 6 אתכמ with a medial מ was added above line 9.
It was purchased from an Egyptian dealer in antiquities in 1902 by Dr. Walter Llewellyn Nash and presented to the Library in 1903.
This is a city in Middle Egypt, located 100 kilometres (62 miles) southwest of Cairo. It was the home of the famous rabbinic sage, Sa’adia Gaon, a millenium later.
As is our text (4QDeutn), the Decalogue in the Nash Papyrus probably reflects a mixed tradition, i.e., a text that has undergone Harmonistic editing, including a text of the Decalogue taken from Deuteronomy, with a number of harmonistic additions, based on Exodus.
Harmonizations appear in biblical scrolls, biblical texts with apocryphal additions, (e.g. 4QTestimonia), as well as in Tefilin and Mezuzot.
For more on the Rabbinic approach, see Marty Lockshin’s TABS essay, “The Existence of Two Versions of the Decalogue.”
This harmonization is also found in 4QTestimonia and in the Samaritan Pentateuch and is based upon Deut. 18:15-16 claiming that its law was stated, בחרב ביום הקהל.
For more on 4QDeutn, see: Esther Eshel, “4QDeutn – A Text That Has Undergone Harmonistic Editing,” HUCA 62 (1991), pp. 117-154. Esther Eshel and Hanan Eshel, “Dating the Samaritan Pentateuch’s Compilation in Light of the Qumran Biblical Scrolls,” in S.M. Paul, R.A. Kraft, L.H. Schiffman and W.W. Fields (eds.), Emanuel: Studies in Hebrew Bible, Septuagint and Dead Sea Scrolls in Honor of Emanuel Tov (Leiden: Brill, 2003), pp. 215-240.
To see the text in its original form, see here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:4Q41_2.png
