Manuscript

The Samuel Scroll from Cave 4 (4QSamᵃ)

Also known as 4QSama · 4Q51 · 4QSamᵃ

dead-sea-scrollsold-testamentsamuelseptuagint

Summary

A Hebrew copy of Samuel that often agrees with the ancient Greek translation against the standard Hebrew — and answers a puzzle the English Bible had been carrying for centuries.

Copied c. 50–25 BC (on the handwriting).
Written in hebrew on parchment.
Kept at Israel Antiquities Authority, Jerusalem.
Contains 1 Samuel, 2 Samuel.

Sources (3)

The Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library (Israel Antiquities Authority) · accessed 2026-08-06The Israel Antiquities Authority's own imaging of the scrolls.
Frank Moore Cross et al., Qumran Cave 4.XII: 1–2 Samuel, Discoveries in the Judaean Desert XVII (Oxford, 2005) · accessed 2026-08-06The official edition. Cite-only.
Emanuel Tov, Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible, 3rd ed. (Fortress Press, 2012) · accessed 2026-08-06The standard handbook of Hebrew Bible textual criticism.

What it is

It preserves large stretches of 1 and 2 Samuel, and its text repeatedly lines up with the Septuagint where the Masoretic text differs.

That mattered immediately, because Samuel is the book where the Greek and Hebrew diverge most. Before Qumran, scholars had to guess whether the Greek translators were paraphrasing or working from a different Hebrew. Here is the different Hebrew.

The most quoted case is at the start of 1 Samuel 11, where this scroll carries a paragraph about Nahash the Ammonite gouging out the right eyes of the Israelites east of the Jordan. The Masoretic text does not have it, and its absence had always made the chapter's opening feel abrupt. Modern translations now print or footnote the passage on this scroll's evidence.

Manuscript details

Date: c. 50–25 BC (on the handwriting)
Language: Hebrew
Script: Square Hebrew
Material: Parchment
Held at: Israel Antiquities Authority, Jerusalem
Found: 1952
Found at: Cave 4, Qumran
Contains: 1 Samuel · 2 Samuel

Why it matters

The clearest demonstration that the Greek Old Testament's differences are often faithful translations of a genuinely different Hebrew copy, not translator's licence. It is also the rare case where a scroll changed what a modern Bible prints.

The passages the manuscripts argue over

The words used here: Masoretic Text, Septuagint

Masoretic Text: the Hebrew Bible copied and pointed by Jewish scribes, the text the KJV and the ASV translate.
Septuagint: the Greek translation of the Hebrew Scriptures made by Jewish scholars before Christ.

The places where the manuscripts differ, the ending of Mark, the woman caught in adultery, the three heavenly witnesses, with the case each way.

Where the manuscripts differ, all 15 places →Every handwritten copy, shelved and in date order →