Electronic Edition of the Midrash Pirqe Rabbi Eliezer: Creating an Encoding Manual

I. Introduction
This paper will deal with structural and encoding
issues encountered in the process of creating a
manual for encoding an electronic edition of Pirqe
Rabbi Eliezer (Pirqe R. El.), “the Chapters of
Rabbi Eliezer”. This work is a midrashic retelling
of significant aspects of the biblical narrative,
from the creation story through the Book of Esther. It was written in the Land of Israel probably
during the eighth century CE, i.e., in the early
Muslim period. The language of Pirqe R. El. is
Hebrew with a few non-Hebrew loan words in
transliteration.
Pirqe R. El. was exceedingly popular in medieval
and pre-modern traditionalist Jewish literary circles. It is preserved in more than twenty complete
manuscripts containing fifty-two to fifty-four
chapters and more than seventy-five partial manuscripts and fragments. In addition, over thirty printed editions of Pirqe R. El. have appeared since the
sixteenth century. Recently, scholarly interest in
Pirqe R. El. has focused on literary, historical and
interpretative issues.1
There is no scholarly edition of this text in the
modern sense of this term. An electronic text of
Pirqe R. El. exists and is commercially available.2
However, the present e-text is a semi-critical
eclectic edition, based on three manuscripts whose
relationship has not been fully determined; markup is limited to identification of citations from
biblical or rabbinic literature.
The initial goal of this project was to create a
critical edition of Pirqe R. El. The goal has now
expanded to include electronic publication of all
Pirqe R. El. manuscripts and fragments in two
forms: digital facsimiles and transcriptions with
hypertext links. There are two reasons for this: 1)
the mass of textual material and 2) recent hypotheses regarding the development of medieval Hebrew manuscripts which argue that each manuscript of a work is a completely new literary
creation.3
Thus the need to present visually a
representation of each manuscript (at least the
major ones), with the possibility of comparing
complete readings of specific passages on the fly
– something possible only electronically.
This paper will elaborate on some matters raised
in the Introduction and concentrate on technical
areas necessary for preparing an Encoding Manual
for the project.
II. SGML/TEI element and ID attribute
designations for divisions of the text
The first issue concerns the question of how the
text of Pirqe R. El. should be divided.4
Such a
decision is related to the choice of representing
either the units of meaning (Chapters, Paragraphs)
or the physical makeup of a text (Pages and Lines).
Units of meaning might be designated by the
elements DIV (division) in which the attribute
TYPE would indicate “chapter,” ID the specific
chapter number, and P (paragraph) in which the
ID attribute would contain the specific paragraph
number. Alternately, the physical make up of the
text could be represented by the elements DIV in
which the attribute TYPE would indicate “folio”
and ID the specific folio number, and L (line) in
which the ID attribute would contain the specific
line number.
Two problems emerge regarding text division,
both having to do with SGML/TEI limitations and
neither unique to this project. First, it is not presently possible to do concurrent markup, that is, to
simultaneously tag material units of meaning and
physical layout. Second, the TEI L tag is reserved
for a line in poetry, not a physical line of a prose
manuscript, i.e., it encloses a unit of meaning
which is contained in a physical line even when
the meaning may run on to the next line.
The way around this is through the use of various
MILESTONE elements: MILESTONE, PB (page
break), and LB (line break) which contain attributes to indicate divisions in the text, but cannot
contain text.
In regard to encoding manuscripts of Pirqe R. El.,
or any rabbinic text, after long evaluation, I have
concluded that the basic initial encoding must be
in units of meaning. Rabbinic units of meaning
contain quotes – primarily from the Hebrew Bible
– which may flow through two or occasionally
three lines in a manuscript. In the present state of
software development, it is not possible to place
an opening QUOTE tag within a line enclosed by
an L tag, and then place its closing QUOTE in
another line. Thus one is forced to use units of
meaning to divide the text and then insert MILESTONE tags to indicate page and line breaks for
each separate manuscript.
One further comment regarding encoding Pirqe R.
El. using units of meaning. The manuscripts and
printed editions of Pirqe R. El. divide the text by
chapters, but do not contain paragraph divisions.
Further, there is no agreed upon “canonical” reference system for Pirqe R. El.5
The only fully developed canonical reference system is found in the electronic text created by the
“Academy of the Hebrew Language” for its “Historical Dictionary of the Hebrew Language”.
This electronic edition is based on one primary
manuscript selected for its linguistic properties –
New York, JTS Enelow 886 (Yemen, 1654), –
corrected against four others. Consequently, it
either contains material – therefore “paragraphs”
– which are only found in manuscripts of the same
family, or does not contain material – therefore
“paragraphs” – which are found in manuscripts of
a different family. Nevertheless, the AHL numbering will generally be used to establish a canonical
reference system, though it may be revised as
encoding of the different manuscripts proceeds.
III. Abbreviations
As far as I can determine, this is the first
SGML/TEI editing project of a medieval Hebrew
work. Consequently, the issue of abbreviations
and references of all kinds in the electronic context
needs to be addressed. Printed editions, and especially translations of Pirqe R. El. contain notes and
index references to the Bible (Hebrew Bible, LXX
or NT), Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha, the Dead Sea
Scrolls, Rabbinic Literature, and the Church Fathers. Numerous modern scholarly publications
(books, journals, etc.) contain references to Pirqe
R. El. as well.
Several questions and issues have emerged in
regard to abbreviations and references.
First, the text is in Hebrew. Consequently, when a
source is originally in Hebrew, should references
contain Roman or Hebrew characters for titles of
books?
Second, because of the differences between the
electronic media printing, standard listings of abbreviations and references cannot always be used,
or need to be modified. For example, references to
rabbinic tractates in some abbreviation systems
use scholarly transliteration, including superscript
half circles to represent the Hebrew letters ALEF
and AYIN.
Third, because the study of biblical texts is international, Western reference systems are often reflective of different cultural traditions and can
even differ within the same language system. So,
in English language countries verses from the
biblical prophet Isaiah are often referenced in the
following ways: Isa and Is (with or without a
period). In German, this prophet’s name is Jesaja,
and referenced Jes. The tendency in recent scholarly abbreviation of scriptural and related titles is
not to include a period after the book reference.
Thus, Isa 1:5. But electronic search mechanisms
can use the period as a delimiter, setting off parts
of a reference.
Finally, even in so-called standard works, such as
the Bible, differences exists in verse numbering
(i.e., various editions of the HB, NT or LXX).6
Thus, it becomes necessary to indicate the specific
edition of the work in a bibliographical note.
How does one proceed without reinventing the
wheel? By choosing existing standards and indicating where modification is necessary. The standard for this project will be that of the AAR/SBL
requirements, found in SBL: Membership Directory and Handbook, 1994, pp. 224-240.7
However, superscript for "ALEF" and "AYIN" as well
as other diacritic marks for rabbinic texts are omitted. Where the reference contains two words, no
space should be placed between the words; ex.
“Ros Has” =<Rosh Hashanah> would appear
“RosHas.” If at all possible, each source reference
should be composed of four parts, each part separated by a period; ex. “HB.Gen.20.15.”8
The first
part represents the general body of literature
(HB=Hebrew Bible), the second the specific text
(Gen=Genesis), the third either the chapter
(20=chapter 20) or the folio, the fourth either the
verse (15=verse 15) or the column.
Reference examples
HB.Gen.20.15=Hebrew Bible, Genesis 20:15.
LXX.Gen.20.15=Septuagint, Genesis 20:15.
NT.Matt.5.6=(Greek) New Testament, Matthew,
5:6.
Rab.mAbot.1.3=Rabbinic Literature, Mishna,
Abot 1:3.
Rab.bBer.25.a=Rabbinic text, Babylonian Talmud, Berakot 25a.
QL.1QapGen.1.3=Qumran Literature, Genesis
Apocryphon from Qumran Cave 1.
Note that there should be a period even prior to the
page or folio in a Talmud reference.
Such references are to be used in the attribute "N"
for QUOTE and in various notation and bibliographical elements.
IV. Conclusions
SGML/TEI markup is particularly useful for
scripturally based text, i.e., texts from the vast
literatures of Judaism, Christianity and Islam
which frequently cite biblical or koranic verses.
There are numerous genres in these religious literatures (exegetical works, homilies, scriptural essays, dialogues, legal texts, etc.). They all have in
common the citation of texts sacred to a religious
community, the frequent mention of characters,
places and institutions found in such texts, plus
references to later religious individuals, places and
35
institutions. In addition, these texts are often macaronic, i.e., they contain more than one human
language.
Such texts offer particular problems for electronic
presentation, apart from the issues of the non-existence of SGML software for viewing correctly
encoded Semitic languages. This paper has focused on technical issues, the solution of which will
be indicated in an Encoding Manual used both as
a supplement to viewing the electronic text and as
a guide for those participating in the encoding
process.
V. Bibliography
Ide, Nancy and Jean Veronis, eds., Text Encoding
Initiative: Background and Context (Kluwer
Academic Publishers: Dordrecht/ Boston/
London, 1995).
Kaufman, Stephen A., The Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon: Text Entry and Format Manual,
Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon, Baltimore
1987.
Milikowsky, Chaim, The Henkind Talmud Text
Database, Lieberman Institute for Talmudic
Research (JTS): “Directions for Text Copyists,
Hebrew and English versions,” Jerusalem and
New York, no date.
Moscovitz, Leib, Responsa Version 3.0:
User’s Guide, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan
1994.
Robinson, Peter, The Transcription of Primary
Textual Sources Using SGML, Office for Humanities Communication Publications Number 6, Oxford 1994.
Schäfer, Peter and/or Gottfried Reeg, “Konventionen zur Aufnahmen von Handschriften für die
Datenverarbeitung,” Berlin, Stand: November
1991.
Sperberg-McQueen and Lou Burnard, ed. Guidelines for Electronic Text Encoding and Interchange (TEI3), Chicago, Oxford, April 8,
1994.
Endnotes
1 See the numerous articles cited in notes by
Jacob Elbaum, “Rhetoric, Motif and SubjectMatter: Toward an Analysis of Narrative
Technique in Pirqe Rabbi Eliezer,” Jerusalem
Studies in Jewish Folklore, XIII-XIV, (1992),
99-126. In addition to an early Latin translation, in the twentieth century Pirqe R. Eliezer
has been translated into English, French and
Spanish.
2 Bar Ilan Database (Responsa Database, Bar
Ilan University); STM Database (Polytext, Jerusalem) and Davka database of Rabbinic Literature.
3 Bibliographical references for the debate on
this issue between Schäfer and Milikowsky,
and the comments of M. Beit Aryeh will be
provided.
4 Peter Robinson has written, “perhaps the most
important decision an encoder of scholarly
text must face is how the text should be divided (Transcription, p. 64).”
5 Traditional citing most often utilizes the pagination of the edition of the RaDaL, the page
division of the edition of Higger, or occasionally reference to the “critical edition” of C.
M. Horowitz. The problems of all these texts
will be discussed in a separate document “Introduction: the Need for a Critical Edition of
Pirqe R. Eliezer.”
6 My thanks to Robin Cover for reminding me
of this.
7 For abbreviations of journals, etc., additional
items are found in the Index of Articles on
Jewish Studies, (The Jewish National and University Library: Jerusalem, 1995 and earlier),
“List of Periodicals and the Collections and
their Abbreviations,” and International Glossary of Abbreviations for Theology and Related Subjects, ed. Sigfried Schwertner (Walter
de Gruyter: Berlin and New York, 1974).
8 The MILESTONE tag LB (line break) will
also use a four part structure for the ID attribute. Example: PRE.04.26b.1. This refers to
the work Pirqe R. Eliezer.; manuscript 04 (so
designated in manuscript database0); folio
26b (+ a = rechto or b = verso); line 1.