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Journey of a Passage

1 Samuel 14:41

Urim and Thummim: the longer prayer

The Hebrew has only "Give perfect [tamim]." The library's Greek and the Vulgate have a full prayer: if the guilt is in Saul or Jonathan, give Urim; if in the people, give Thummim. The longer text is the clearest picture of how the lots worked.

Manuscript variant: witnesses differ in wording

The family tree

Each row is a language or text tradition. Witnesses in the same row may share ancestry, revise one another, or have an uncertain relationship; the line under each box says which. A solid arrow appears only where direct copying or a documented revised edition is established. Order by date never implies copying. Scroll sideways on a phone.

✓ contains it · ✕ does not · ❝ quotes part of it · ⓘ reports on manuscripts · ▢ pages lost · – no copy survives

  • Same line, through lost copies
  • Translation
Hebrew
  1. Original SamuelUnknown (debated)
  2. Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)AD 1008Descends, through lost copies, from Original Samuel
Greek
  1. Septuagint, 1 Kingdoms (library text: Giguet's French)Translated c. 2nd century BCTranslated from a Hebrew text of the period
Latin
  1. Jerome's Vulgatec. AD 400Translated from Hebrew texts of Jerome's day
English
  1. King James Bible1611Translated from printed Masoretic Hebrew

Why the Hebrew is probably shorter

Eye-skip
The long text has "Israel" twice; a scribe's eye could jump from the first to the second, losing everything between.
Tamim / Thummim
The same consonants; the short Hebrew may preserve the last word of the lost prayer.
Modern Bibles
NRSV, NIV and ESV include the longer text.

Every witness, in order

  1. Unknown (debated)

    Original Samuel

    – No copy survives

    No original survives.

  2. Translated c. 2nd century BC

    Septuagint, 1 Kingdoms (library text: Giguet's French)

    ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from a Hebrew text of the period

    How the site knows this: Known here only through a translation.

    pourquoi refusez-vous aujourd'hui de répondre à votre serviteur? Est-il en moi ou en mon fils Jonathas quelque iniquité? Donnez-nous des signes, et, s'ils nous accusent, donnez à votre peuple Israël, donnez-lui le privilége de l'innocence

    why do you refuse to answer your servant today? Is there iniquity in me or my son Jonathan? Give us signs ["clear ones," Urim], and if they accuse us, give to your people Israel, give it holiness [Thummim]

    Giguet translates the Greek words for Urim and Thummim (dēloi, hosiotēs) as "signs" and "innocence." One Greek text (Vaticanus type) via Giguet's French; not checked against a critical edition.

  3. c. AD 400

    Jerome's Vulgate

    ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from Hebrew texts of Jerome's day

    How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Clementine Vulgate (1592 edition).

    Domine Deus Israël, da indicium: quid est quod non responderis servo tuo hodie? si in me, aut in Jonatha filio meo, est iniquitas hæc, da ostensionem: aut si hæc iniquitas est in populo tuo, da sanctitatem

    The Vulgate also has the long text.

  4. AD 1008

    Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)

    ✓ Contains this passageDescends, through lost copies, from Original Samuel

    How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Westminster Leningrad Codex, a digital transcription of the Leningrad Codex.

    הָבָה תָמִים

    Give perfect

    תמים (perfect) may be a remnant of תמים, Thummim.

  5. 1611

    King James Bible

    ✓ Contains this passageTranslated from printed Masoretic Hebrew

    How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: King James Version (1769 text).

    Give a perfect lot.

    Follows the short Hebrew.

What changed, and why

Widely cited as a clear example of a Hebrew text that probably lost words the versions preserve.

What the evidence shows

  • Independently documentedThe library's Greek and the Vulgate have the long text of 14:41.
  • Strongly supportedThe Hebrew lost the longer text by eye-skip.

    Source: NET Bible, note on 1 Samuel 14:41 ↗

Sources

Related lessons

  • Jonathan's Raid and Saul's Oath →Jonathan and his armor-bearer climb between two crags, Bozez and Seneh, and attack a Philistine outpost; panic spreads and Israel routs the Philistines. Saul has forbidden anyone to eat until evening. Jonathan, unaware, tastes honey. When God gives no answer, Saul casts lots; Jonathan is taken. The people refuse to let him die.
  • How 1 Samuel Came to Us →Samuel was one book in the Hebrew Bible, divided in two by the Greek translators. Its Hebrew text is unusually difficult, and the Greek often reflects a different Hebrew. A Dead Sea Scroll, 4QSam-a, agrees with the Greek in many places, preserves a paragraph found nowhere else in the Bible, and changed how scholars study the text of the Old Testament.