1 Samuel 6:19
Seventy men, or 50,070?
God strikes the men of Beth-shemesh who looked into the ark. The Hebrew reads literally "seventy men, fifty thousand men." The Vulgate and KJV follow it; the library's Greek has seventy chiefs and fifty thousand men. A few Hebrew manuscripts and Josephus have only seventy.
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
- Related (shared ancestry)
Weighing the evidence
- For 50,070
- Most ancient witnesses, including the Greek and Latin, have the large figure.
- For 70
- Josephus and a few medieval Hebrew manuscripts; the awkward Hebrew suggests "fifty thousand" was added; Beth-shemesh was a small town.
- The site's approach
- The majority of witnesses support the large figure; the smaller is a minority reading supported by plausibility. Neither is asserted as original.
Every witness, in order
Unknown (debated)
Original Samuel
No original survives.
Translated c. 2nd century BC
Septuagint, 1 Kingdoms (library text: Giguet's French)
How the site knows this: Known here only through a translation.
les fils de Jéchonie n'eurent point à se féliciter… qui frappa à mort soixantedix de leurs chefs, outre cinquante mille hommes
the sons of Jechoniah did not rejoice… who struck dead seventy of their chiefs, besides fifty thousand men
Has a plus about "the sons of Jechoniah." One Greek text (Vaticanus type) via Giguet's French; not checked against a critical edition.
c. AD 93
Josephus, Antiquities 6.16
How the site knows this: Reported in scholarship; not checked by the site.
Says seventy died.
Source: Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, books 5–6
c. AD 400
Jerome's Vulgate
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Clementine Vulgate (1592 edition).
percussit de populo septuaginta viros, et quinquaginta millia plebis
Seventy and fifty thousand.
AD 1008
Masoretic Text (Leningrad Codex)
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: Westminster Leningrad Codex, a digital transcription of the Leningrad Codex.
וַיַּךְ בָּעָם שִׁבְעִים אִישׁ חֲמִשִּׁים אֶלֶף אִישׁ
and he struck among the people seventy men, fifty thousand men
No "and" between the numbers: grammatically awkward.
1611
King James Bible
How the site knows this: Read in the site's library text: King James Version (1769 text).
he smote of the people fifty thousand and threescore and ten men
Combines them.
What changed, and why
Large numbers are especially vulnerable in copying. This case shows why plausibility alone cannot decide a reading.
What the evidence shows
- The Hebrew, Greek and Latin all include fifty thousand. Greek via Giguet.
- Josephus says seventy.
- The original read seventy.
Sources
- NET Bible, note on 1 Samuel 6:19 ↗
- E. Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, 3rd ed. (2012)
- Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, books 5–6
Related lessons
- The Ark Returns →After seven months the Philistine priests and diviners send the ark back on a new cart drawn by two nursing cows, with five golden tumors and five golden mice as a guilt offering. The cows go straight to Beth-shemesh. The people rejoice, but some look into the ark and are struck down: 70 men, or 50,070, depending on the text. The ark goes to Kiriath-jearim.