Hebrew Bible

=== Hebrew Bible ===
{{Bible-related |CB}}
{{See also|Biblia Hebraica (disambiguation)}}
Many [[biblical studies]] scholars advocate use of the term ''Hebrew Bible'' (or ''Hebrew Scriptures'') as a substitute for less-neutral terms with Jewish or Christian connotations (e.g. ''Tanakh'' or [[Old Testament]]).<ref>{{Cite news | url = https://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/25/magazine/the-new-old-testament.html | title = The New Old Testament | first = William | last = Safire | newspaper = The New York Times | date = 1997-05-25 | access-date = 2019-12-06 | archive-date = 2019-12-06 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20191206110054/https://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/25/magazine/the-new-old-testament.html | url-status = live }}.</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/scriptures.html |title=From Hebrew Bible to Christian Bible: Jews, Christians and the Word of God |first=Mark |last=Hamilton |website=[[PBS]] |access-date=2007-11-19 |quote=Modern scholars often use the term 'Hebrew Bible' to avoid the confessional terms Old Testament and Tanakh. |archive-date=2018-06-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180614021417/https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/religion/first/scriptures.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The [[Society of Biblical Literature]]'s ''Handbook of Style'', which is the standard for major academic journals like the ''[[Harvard Theological Review]]'' and conservative Protestant journals like the ''[[Bibliotheca Sacra]]'' and the ''[[Westminster Theological Journal]]'', suggests that authors "be aware of the connotations of alternative expressions such as&nbsp;... Hebrew Bible [and] Old Testament" without prescribing the use of either.<ref>{{cite book |title=The SBL Handbook of Style |publisher=Hendrickson |location=Peabody, MA |year=1999 |editor1-first=Patrick H |editor1-last=Alexander |isbn=978-1-56563-487-9 |page=[https://archive.org/details/sblhandbookofsty0000unse/page/17 17 (section 4.3)] |url=https://archive.org/details/sblhandbookofsty0000unse/page/17 |display-editors=etal }} See [https://www.sbl-site.org/assets/pdfs/pubs/SBLHS2_FAQ.pdf ''Society of Biblical Literature'': Questions Regarding Digital Editions] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304190407/https://www.sbl-site.org/assets/pdfs/pubs/SBLHS2_FAQ.pdf |date=2016-03-04 }}</ref>

"Hebrew" refers to the original language of the books, but it may also be taken as referring to the Jews of the [[Second Temple period|Second Temple era]] and their descendants, who preserved the transmission of the Masoretic Text up to the present day.<ref>{{cite news |newspaper=[[The New York Times]] |title=Scanning an Ancient Biblical Text That Humans Fear to Open |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/05/science/biblical-codes-morgan-library.html |date=January 5, 2018 |access-date=June 14, 2019 |archive-date=July 6, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190706070231/https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/05/science/biblical-codes-morgan-library.html |url-status=live }}</ref> The Hebrew Bible includes small portions in [[Biblical Aramaic|Aramaic]] (mostly in the books of [[Book of Daniel|Daniel]] and [[Book of Ezra|Ezra]]), written and printed in [[Aramaic alphabet|Aramaic square-script]], which was adopted as the [[Hebrew alphabet]] after the [[Babylonian exile]].