Micah 6 : A Parallel Perspective of the Biblical Text

The aim of this thesis is to offer a parallel presentation of the sixteen verses of Micah 6, as they were handed to us in the Masoretic Text (MT), the Septuagint (LXX) and in the Targum. The outline of this research comprises five chapters. The first chapter offers a detailed account of the history of research on the Book of Micah. The account highlights problems connected with the person of the prophet Micah, the dating of his book, division, solutions to textual problems and influential commentaries. The MT is the subject discussed in chapter two, which is divided in five parts. Prior to the actual textual analysis, (1) the history of the textual-linguistic method is described starting with H. Weinrich’s basic assumptions followed by A. Niccacci’s presentation of this method. The thesis continues with the exposition of (2) the textual critical analysis, the (3) the syntactical commentary (using the textual-linguistic method). The last two parts engage in (4) an analysis of the poetic devices and a (5) commentary of the MT text as a whole. The third chapter is dedicated to the Septuagint as an equally important witness for the transmission of the Bible. The short excursus on the research history of the Septuagint is followed by a detailed textual analysis of the major Greek manuscripts. The rest of the chapter will concentrate on presenting differences between the MT and LXX and determining what the text is saying in the Greek form. The Aramaic Targum witness of Micah 6 is the concern of the next chapter which starts with an exposition of the Biblical Aramaic verbal system according to the textual-linguistic method. The presentation proceeds with its application to the proposed text. The last part of this chapter concerns the main differences between the MT and Targum in Micah 6 introduced by a general account of the Targum as translation. The last chapter offers an outline of the most interesting findings of this research along with general conclusion about the textual-linguistic method.