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Learn about the role and work of the sopherim, the scribes who preserved the Hebrew Bible for thousands of years. Discover how they made ink, pens, scrolls, and vowel marks, and why they were unique in Israelite society.
Soferim. Table of Contents | Books | Bibliophiles. SOFERIM (Heb. סוֹפְרִים; "scribes"). Although the word soferim is identical with the biblical word translated scribes and dealt with under that heading, during the Second Temple period the word came to denote a specific class of scholars.
Soferim is a Talmudic tractate that deals with the preparation and handling of Torah scrolls and other sacred writings. It covers topics such as parchment, writing, spaces, names of God, points, textual variants, Torah reading, and liturgy.
Sofer, any of a group of Jewish scholars who interpreted and taught biblical law and ethics from about the 5th century bc to about 200 bc. Understood in this sense, the first of the soferim was the biblical prophet Ezra, even though the word previously designated an important administrator.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Tiqqun soferim is a term for scribal corrections of the Tanakh to preserve the honor of God or for other reasons. Learn about the history, commentaries, and examples of tiqqun soferim from rabbinic literature and manuscripts.
A sofer is a Jewish scribe who can transcribe holy scrolls, tefillin, mezuzot and other religious writings. Learn about the qualifications, education, texts, and documents of sofrut, the practice of scribal arts in Judaism.
Tractate Soferim (“Scribes”) is one of the minor tractates, or works written in the style of the Mishnah on topics for which there is no specific tractate in the Mishnah or Talmud.
