The Leningrad codex is the oldest surviving complete copy of the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible, dated 1008. (The Aleppo Codex is presumably a few decades older, but parts are missing.) The Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (the edition of the Hebrew Bible most widely referred to by scholars and Bible translators) is an almost exact transcript. It contains the complete text of the Hebrew Bible (though the order differs slightly from most published Hebrew Bibles in that Chronicles precedes Psalms and Job comes before Proverbs). It also has extensive Masoretic notes. The Masoretic Text (MT) is the Hebrew text of the Tanakh approved for general use in Judaism. ... 11th century manuscript of the Hebrew Bible with Targum Hebrew Bible refers to the common portions of the Jewish and Christian canons. ... Events Olof, king of Sweden, is baptized. ... The Aleppo Codex (the Keter (Crown) Aram Tzova) is the oldest complete manuscript Hebrew Bible, though scrolls of individual books of the Tanakh are much older (see Dead Sea scrolls). ...    This article is a stub. ... 11th century manuscript of the Hebrew Bible with Targum Hebrew Bible refers to the common portions of the Jewish and Christian canons. ...

According to its colophon, it was copied from manuscripts written by Aaron ben Moses ben Asher. It has been claimed to be a product of the Ben-Asher scriptorium. However, there is no evidence that ben Asher ever saw it. Unusually for a masoretic codex, the same man (Samuel ben Jacob) wrote the consonants, the vowels and the Masoretic notes. It is believed to be the manuscript most faithful to ben Asher's tradition apart from the Aleppo Codex itself. There are numerous alterations and erasures, and it was suggested by Moshe Goshen-Gottstein that an existing text not following ben Asher's rules was heavily amended so as to make it conform to these rules. This article is about an ancient city. ... Aaron ben Moses ben Asher (10th century) developed the Tiberian system for writing down vowel sounds in Hebrew. ...

The Leningrad Codex also provides an example of medieval Jewish art. Sixteen of the pages contain decorative geometric paterns that illuminate passages from the text. The Signature Page shows a star with the names of the scribes on the edges and a blessing written in the middle.

Nomenclature

The Leningrad codex is so called because it has been housed at the Russian National Library in Leningrad since the late Nineteenth Century, and because it is a codex (as opposed to a scroll). It is often referred to by its library code of B19a. Writers before the Russian Revolution of course called it the St. Petersburg Codex. Saint Petersburg (Russian: Санкт-Петербу́рг, English transliteration: Sankt-Peterburg), colloquially known as Питер (transliterated Piter), formerly known as Leningrad (Ленингра́д, 1924–1991) and Petrograd (Петрогра́д, 1914–1924), is a city located in Northwestern Russia on the delta of the river Neva at the east end of the Gulf of Finland... Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... A codex (Latin for book; plural codices) is a handwritten book from late Antiquity or the Early Middle Ages. ... The phrase Russian Revolution can refer to three specific events in the history of Imperial Russia. ...

See also

• Aleppo Codex