The Shorter and Longer Texts of Ezekiel: The Implications of the Manuscript Finds from Masada and Qumran

The second-century CE Papyrus 967 contains a Greek version of Ezekiel that is significantly shorter than the Masoretic text. It has been argued that this shorter text reflected an earlier version of the Hebrew that was later expanded to form the text now found in the Masoretic text. Although the manuscript finds of Ezekiel from Qumran and Masada are scant, enough data are available to demonstrate a broadly proto-Masoretic text, which contains sections absent in the pre-Hexaplaric Greek versions. As these finds predate the earliest Greek witness (Papyrus 967) by over 200 years, the conclusion that the shorter text had been expanded becomes seriously questionable. This article argues that the available data are better explained by the conclusion that two different texts of Ezekiel must have been in circulation concurrently for a prolonged period of time and that the historical precedence of either text cannot be established legitimately.