ABSTRACT
In this chapter, Hindy Najman proposes a move beyond (now) classical distinctions between “old” and “new philology.” If “old philology” seeks ideally to reconstruct the original text and/or author, and seeks as a second best option to trace the history of distortions that have produced multiplicity since the earliest known archetype, then “new philology” seeks to know and determine what can readily be understood: the physicality of the manuscript, the live hand or hands of the scribal community, the signs of correction, and the variations of form and object. Both approaches fail to countenance the “excess of vitality” possessed by scriptural texts, which expresses itself in the fact that they provide the basis for new texts – emulations that purport to “say the same” as the original scripture although they are self-evidently different. That which is generated by a scriptural text or tradition may be regarded as a dynamic textual unity, and such unities come in many varieties. A focus on the different varieties of textual unities, Najman argues, allows historians to move beyond authority and beyond looking backward with the aim of reconstructing texts, and instead to look forward and in ways that are essential to the dynamic and ever-growing traditions and collections of authoritative literature.
