It may come as a surprise to some that BHQ Job does not include, at its core, a modern scholarly edition of the Masoretic Text. BHQ Job includes, at its core, a lightly updated version of what was, in 1977, a modern scholarly edition of the Masoretic Text: BHS. The claims I have just made about BHQ Job are probably true of all fascicles of BHQ released to date, judging from anecdotal evidence as well as introductory statements of editorial policy. But this review will only present detailed evidence of these claims regarding BHQ Job.
Like many students of Tanakh, I started out in the cult of BHS. I thought BHS was the definitive edition. Unlike many students of Tanakh, I eventually soured on BHS, for the following reasons:
My first candidate for a BHS alternative was BHQ (Biblia Hebraica Quinta). (Though I had soured on BHS, I hadn’t escaped the broader cult of DBG.)
But I soon soured on BHQ as well. I was dismayed to find that BHQ will not be complete for many years. More importantly, I found that BHQ still suffers from some of the same problems as BHS. Although BHQ now emphasizes manuscript quality over quantity, the other two problems listed above remain, albeit to a lesser degree.
I continued my search for better editions, and I found some. This made me even more disappointed with BHQ. It seems to have been made in a bubble: its editors seem to have been unaware of or uninterested in relevant work done in other editions. I can see why something like a fresh transcription of μL was beyond the scope of BHQ. But I can’t see why BHQ would ignore the work already done in other editions, in particular the following:
The first fascicle of BHQ (Megilloth) came out in 2004. So, all three of the above editions were available to the BHQ editors for all fascicles of BHQ.
All volumes of דעת מקרא predate BHQ Megilloth. Other works by Breuer are cited as sources in some fascicles of BHQ, but the BHQ editors seem to have been unaware of or uninterested in Breuer’s relevant work in דעת מקרא.
Dotan’s BHL predates BHQ Megilloth. Dotan was even a consultant to the BHQ project. What’s more, his BHL is cited as a source in many fascicles. So it is puzzling that most of the BHQ editors seem to have been unaware of or uninterested in his relevant work in BHL-A.
The editors of some fascicles cite BHL-A in their Introductions (Genesis, Leviticus, and Proverbs). Though aware of it, they were not interested in it, at least not enough to have it deeply influence the apparatus. This represents a departure from the strictly diplomatic editorial policy of BHS. For better or for worse, BHS aspired to transcribe (and often note) quirks in μL with almost no quirk deemed irrelevant, as long as it could be captured in print. A good example is BHS’s transcription of געיה before vowel marks.
With BHQ, we now have an edition that is unevenly diplomatic. It still transcribes (and often notes) most or all of the quirks that BHS editors found relevant, plus a smattering of new ones. But many quirks are not transcribed, and many that are transcribed are not noted. In a few fascicles, we know that this unevenness is by design, as the editors refer the interested reader to BHL-A for more information about the quirks in μL. Perhaps all fascicles are uneven by design, i.e. uneven by editorial policy, and these are just the few that happen to document it.
Though it does not cite BHL-A, BHQ Judges is similarly explicit about its Masoretic limitations: “Only those divergencies [of μL from consensus] that are meaningful for translation or exegesis have been noted in the apparatus.” This is disappointing, but good to know, so that one can avoid BHQ Judges if, for example, one’s interests include cantillation. (Although cantillation quirks are common in μL, I imagine that it is rare to find one that causes (or resolves) some problem of translation or exegesis.)
WLC has had various releases over its decades, many predating BHQ Megilloth. It is by far the most popular digital Hebrew Bible. Plus, it is closely related to BHS and BHQ. WLC was originally a transcription of BHS, and it carefully documents cases where it diverges from BHS and/or BHQ. While WLC “cares” a lot about DBG Bibles, the reverse seems to be false since the BHQ editors seem to have been unaware of or uninterested in WLC, whose notes are particularly relevant to BHQ. This is puzzling since Alan Groves was intimately involved in both the WLC and BHQ projects.
Although it may already be clear, I should explicitly state that my purposes are narrowly focused on the Tiberian Masoretic text. Thus I am not concerned with the many parts of BHQ that deal with the following:
For all I know, those parts of BHQ are of high quality, representing the best modern scholarship on those topics. But those parts are not my concern.
Having criticized BHQ in general terms, I will now review the specifics of the BHQ Book of Job (2024). As of now (February 2026), it is the latest fascicle of BHQ to be published and thus seems most relevant to review, if only one fascicle is to be reviewed. I assume that BHQ Job is at least broadly representative of the BHQ series so far, although each fascicle has a different primary editor and may have different editorial teams working with that editor.
First, the good news: the Job fascicle of BHQ notes 7 quirks in μL that are not noted in any of the three editions listed above. I.e. these are cases where BHQ contributes something not available in any of those other three editions. The contributions of BHQ are as follows:
Unsurprisingly, all of these contributions are new, i.e. not present in BHS. I find some of these proposed transcriptions far-fetched, i.e. unlikely to have been the scribe’s intention. Nonetheless, I consider even those ones to be valuable contributions to the documentation of μL.
It is also good news that the Job fascicle of BHQ notes 11 quirks in μL that are noted in one or more of the other three editions. I.e. these are cases where BHQ reiterates something available in one or more of the other three editions. While a reiteration is not as valuable as a new contribution, it is still valuable. Indeed my main criticism of BHQ Job is that it should have reiterated most of what can be found in those other three editions.
Unsurprisingly, all but three of the BHQ reiterations are not new, i.e. they were already present in BHS. Indeed the other editions’ source may be BHS in these cases. Nonetheless we refer to all of them as reiterations by BHQ. (The three that are new are the ones in 6:21, 18:4, and 19:16.) The reiterations made by BHQ are as follows:
Now for some mixed news: the Job fascicle of BHQ transcribes but does not note 62 quirks in μL that are noted in one or more of the other three editions. We might say that in these cases BHQ merely implies the quirk, because it is not explicit about it. (A note would be required to be explicit about it.) Those quirks implied by BHQ are as follows:
Now for some bad news: the Job fascicle of BHQ does not transcribe 33 quirks in μL that are noted in one or more of the other three editions. Not all such missing transcriptions are a bad thing, as the other editions may occasionally propose transcriptions that are far-fetched, i.e. unlikely to have been the scribe’s intention. But overall these missing transcriptions reflect poorly on BHQ Job. In all but one case, a note is also lacking. (The one with a note is the one regarding מאום in 31:7, although the note, too, is inaccurate.)
I would not expect BHQ to transcribe all the above quirks. For example it would be reasonable for the BHQ editors to find some of them unlikely to have been the scribe’s intention, for example finding some of them more likely to have been an ink-mark made accidentally, or a mark not made by ink at all.
Nonetheless, the quirks not transcribed by BHQ are of high quantity and high average quality. This strongly suggests that BHQ’s editors were either unaware of or uninterested in the other three editions. I.e. it is unlikely that all these quirks were considered but rejected: it is more likely that they were simply not considered at all. This conclusion is strengthened by the fact that 8 of the 11 reiterations were already present in BHS. The source of these 8 reiterations is almost certainly BHS, not one of the other three editions.
The failure to transcribe these quirks contrasts starkly with the BHQ’s decision to continue and expand upon BHS’s tradition of interest in Masorah notes, both parva and magna. It is puzzling that an edition that is willing to devote so much effort (and space) to an area as obscure as Masorah notes is unwilling to devote similar or greater effort to improving the transcription accuracy of the pointing of its core text.
Finally, we present some more bad news: some WLC notes help us identify that the Job fascicle of BHQ transcribes but does not note at least 32 quirks in μL that, for good reason, are not noted in any of the other three editions. The good reason is that all of these are unlikely to be the scribe’s intention, i.e. are more likely quirks in BHQ than quirks in μL. These 32 likely-false quirks can be divided into two groups: a group of 26 cases where BHQ has טרחא but should probably have דחי and a group of 6 cases not concerning a טרחא in BHQ.
Here are the 26 cases noted in WLC where BHQ has טרחא but should probably have דחי (note that 18:6 and 22:28 could also be considered to be in this group):
Then there are the 6 cases noted in WLC where BHQ is probably in error but that error does not concern a טרחא in BHQ. (One of those 6, the one in 22:12 goes in the opposite direction: BHQ has דחי but should probably have טרחא.) Here are those 6 cases:
In conclusion, by using the other three editions, we find the following about BHQ:
If BHQ Job were being compiled today, UXLC (a fork of WLC) is another edition that could help. But UXLC’s Job changes (and their accompanying notes) were made in 2022 and 2023, probably too late to be used by BHQ. Nonetheless, UXLC is an edition I would like to bring attention to. So, I would like to show the ways that UXLC might contribute to BHQ Job if it were being compiled today. I do so in the document, “BHQ Job: cases where UXLC could have helped.”
Usually, μA agrees with the consensus. Indeed, where extant, it more or less defines the consensus. Nonetheless, there are cases where it is μA rather than μL that diverges from the consensus. It is unclear what BHQ Job’s policy is regarding such quirks in μA, but regardless of aspirational policy, in practice, I found no such notes in BHQ Job. To me, it would make sense for BHQ to note them, and therefore I note a few in the document, “BHQ Job: quirks in μA.”
Other works by me about the Masoretic Text can be found in this README.