the other torah

I wonder if there has been much Islamic theological reflection on the Samaritans? In popular Western imagination (especially in the parable of the Good Samaritan) they are primarily imagined as a racial / ethnic group but they are also a religious group representing an alternate version of Abrahamic religion. They claim to be the children of Israel, but they have their own distinct version of the Torah and their central holy place is Mount Sinai rather than the Temple in Jerusalem.

One area where the Samaritans might be particularly interesting to Muslims is that their version of the Torah gives us a more concrete way to talk about Biblical corruption.

For example, consider Tablet magazine's article The Other Torah on differences between the Samaritan and Masoretic texts by Chaive Lieber. There are literally thousands of variations between the texts:

The 6,000 differences between the two Torahs [...] can be split into two categories: 3,000 of the differences are orthographical, meaning there are spelling differences or additional words placed in the text, while the other 3,000 are more significant in changing the Torah’s narrative.

Some of the orthographical changes help make the story read more smoothly. For example, in Genesis 4:8, when Cain talks to Abel, the Masoretic version reads, “Now Cain said to his brother Abel, while they were in the field, Cain attacked his brother Abel and killed him,” whereas the Samaritan Torah contains additional words: “Now Cain said to his brother Abel, ‘Let’s go out to the field.’ ”

The Samaritan Torah also offers a slightly different version of some stories. It includes parts of dialogues that are not found in the Masoretic text: For example, in Exodus chapters 7 through 11, the Samaritan Torah contains whole conversations between Moses, Aaron, and Pharaoh that the Masoretic text does not.

The other differences that are significant in narrative sometimes change the story, and sometimes “fix” small sentences that appear incoherent.

In Exodus 12:40, for example, the Masoretic text reads: “The length of the time the Israelites lived in Egypt was 430 years,” a sentence that has created massive chronological problems for Jewish historians, since there is no way to make the genealogies last that long. In the Samaritan version, however, the text reads: “The length of time the Israelites lived in Canaan and in Egypt was 430 years.”

[...]

Perhaps the most variant of texts within the two Torahs is the differences in the Ten Commandments.

“The Commandments are all in the form of ‘do’ and ‘don’t do,’ ” Tsedaka asserted. “The Masoretic version includes the intro of ‘I am your God that took you out of Egypt,’ as a commandment, when we see it as an introduction. Our Ten Commandments start later, and we have our last commandment to establish Mount Gerizim.”

While an “extra” commandment to establish an altar on Mount Gerizim might seem random in the Masoretic text, the part that follows the Ten Commandants in the Masoretic version talks about the forbidden action of building stairs to an altar. Some scholars believe that the Masoretic text would not be discussing steps to an altar without talking about an altar first, and so some believe there might be a part of the text that is missing in the Masoretic version.

Until the 1950s, Bible scholars turned to the Jewish Masoretic text as the definitive version of the Torah, virtually ignoring the Samaritan text. However, in the winter of 1947, a group of archeological specialists searching through 11 caves in Qumran happened upon the Dead Sea Scrolls. After rigorous study of the scrolls, researchers have come to believe there were several versions of the Torah being studied throughout Jewish history, according to Eugene Ulrich, a theology professor at University of Notre Dame.

The scrolls they found in Qumran matched the Samaritan text more closely than the Masoretic text, leading some researchers to believe the Samaritan text held validity in the minds of Jews during the Second Temple period and that both texts were once studied together.

“Finding the Dead Sea Scrolls proved that there were two versions, if not more, of the Torah circulating within Judaism, but they were all dealt with with equal validity and respect,” said Ulrich, who served as one of the chief editors on the Dead Sea Scrolls International Publication Project. “The Samaritan Torah and Masoretic Torah used to be studied side by side. The Masoretic text wasn’t always the authoritative version. They were both seen as important during the Second Temple time period.”

[...]

Ulrich said after the destruction of the Second Temple, the people split into three groups, each with their own text: The rabbis took the Masoretic text for their own, the Samaritans took theirs, and the early Christians used much of a different version called the Septuagint—a Masoretic version translated into Greek in the 2nd century BCE—in what later become the Christian Bible.[...]

While most differences between the two Torahs are only slight and may not even be apparent to an untrained eye, according to Ulrich, the Samaritan Torah provides a more coherent reading because the story flows better in its text. “There are whole passages of stories missing from the Masoretic version,” he said. “A lot of the stories in Exodus and Deuteronomy are missing parts of the conversation, leaving the reader alone to do much assumption as the story goes on. In the Samaritan Torah, however, these gaps are filled, providing a smoother encounter of what actually happened.”

James Charlesworth, a professor of New Testament Language and Literature at Princeton University’s Department of Biblical studies, said the Samaritan Torah is his preferred version for some readings of the Bible. “As the stories and histories go, the Samaritan Pentateuch appears to be more favorable because the voice of the text reads more clear[ly],” he said. “In my judgment, the Masoretic version has some corrupt parts of it, and the Samaritan Torah is the best reading we have. There are sentences scholars are left to either reinterpret or simply ignore because they seem they don’t belong.”