Shared Jewish Texts Related to the Samaritan Pentateuch

The Dead Sea Scrolls have provided radical correction to scholarly views of the Samaritan Pentateuch (SP). Jewish scriptural scrolls such as 4QpaleoExodm and 4QNumb displayed surprising resemblance to major expansions in the SP. 4QPentB and 4QPentC contained individual variants in common with the SP but also Samaritan-like major expansions beyond the SP. There were three editions of the Pentateuch - the Old Greek, the “pre-MT,” and the “pre-SP” - circulating and shared in Judah from the mid-third century bce up to the dawn of the Christian era. Rather than a specifically “Samaritan Pentateuch,” there was a shared Jewish-Samaritan Pentateuch alongside the MT edition. Moreover, 4QJosha most likely narrated the building of the first altar in the newly-entered land immediately at Gilgal, rather than on Mount Gerizim or Mount Ebal in the north. Text-critical analysis as well as logic suggests that Gilgal was the original setting of the altar, that the secondary movement to Mount Gerizim was endorsed by Judeans as well as Samarians, and that Mount Ebal was a subsequent anti-Samaritan change in the MT.