Image Details

PHOTOGRAPHY BY ARDON BAR-HAMA, SPONSORED BY GEORGE S. BLUMENTHAL

In the Aleppo Codex, dating to c. 920 CE, precisely the same white spaces appear in the early verses of 2 Samuel 3. The section comprising verses 2–5 begins near the bottom of the middle column of the folio, with a “closed” setuma break (right) functioning as a paragraph indentation in the eighth line from the bottom of the column. The text then wraps to the next column, with the section ending on the fourth line and a major “open” petuḥa break, including an entirely blank line, following the end of the verse (left).