Editing Masoretic Text (section)

=== Suspended letters and dotted words ===
There are four words having one of their letters suspended above the line. One of them, {{lang|he|מ<big><sup>נ</sup></big>שה}},<ref>{{bibleverse||Judges|18:30|HE}}</ref> is due to an alteration of the original משה out of reverence for [[Moses]]; rather than say that Moses's grandson became an idolatrous priest, a suspended letter nun&nbsp;(&nbsp;נ&nbsp;) was inserted to turn Mosheh into Menasheh ([[Manasseh (tribal patriarch)|Manasseh]]). The origin of the other three is doubtful.<ref>{{bibleverse||Psalms|80:14|HE}}; {{bibleverse||Job|38:13|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Job|38:15|HE}})</ref> According to some, they are due to mistaken majuscular letters; according to others, they are later insertions of originally omitted weak consonants.<ref name="Jewish"/>

In fifteen passages within the Bible, some words are stigmatized; i.e., dots appear above the letters.<ref>{{bibleverse||Genesis|16:5|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Genesis|18:9|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Genesis|19:33|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Genesis|33:4|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Genesis|37:12|HE}}, {{bibleverse||Numbers|3:39|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Numbers|9:10|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Numbers|21:30|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Numbers|29:15|HE}}, {{bibleverse||Deuteronomy|29:28|HE}}, {{bibleverse|2|Samuel|19:20|HE}}, {{bibleverse||Isaiah|44:9|HE}}, {{bibleverse||Ezekiel|41:20|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Ezekiel|46:22|HE}}, {{bibleverse||Psalms|27:13|HE}})</ref> The significance of the dots is disputed. Some hold them to be marks of erasure; others believe them to indicate that in some collated manuscripts the stigmatized words were missing, hence that the reading is doubtful; still others contend that they are merely a mnemonic device to indicate homiletic explanations which the ancients had connected with those words; finally, some maintain that the dots were designed to guard against the omission by copyists of text-elements which, at first glance or after comparison with parallel passages, seemed to be superfluous. Instead of dots some manuscripts exhibit strokes, vertical or else horizontal. The first two explanations are unacceptable for the reason that such faulty readings would belong to Qere and Ketiv, which, in case of doubt, the majority of manuscripts would decide. The last two theories have equal probability.<ref name="Jewish"/>