Editing Masoretic Text (section)

=== Etymology ===
From the Hebrew word ''masorah''{{Efn|Vocalization uncertain, also: ''moseirah'', ''mesorah'', ''mesarah'', ''misrah'', ''masarah''.}} "tradition"''.'' Originally ''masoret'',{{Efn|Also: ''moseret''.}} a word found in [[Book of Ezekiel]] 20:37 (there from אסר "to bind" for "fetters").

According to the majority of scholars,<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|last1=Kelley|first1=Page H.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Gh6OHYcIZgkC&q=masorah+etymology|title=The Masorah of Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia: Introduction and Annotated Glossary|last2=Mynatt|first2=Daniel S.|last3=Crawford|first3=Timothy G.|date=1998-04-09|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-0-8028-4363-0|language=en}}</ref> including [[Wilhelm Bacher]], the form of the Ezekiel word ''masoret'' "fetters" was applied by the [[Masoretes]] to the מסר root meaning "to transmit", for ''masoret'' "tradition." (See also {{slink|Aggadah|Etymology}}.)
Later, the text was also called ''moseirah'', by a direct conjugation of מסר "to transmit," and the synthesis of the two forms produced the modern word ''masorah.''<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Bacher|first=W.|date=1891|title=A Contribution to the History of the Term "Massorah"|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/1450053|journal=The Jewish Quarterly Review|volume=3|issue=4|pages=785–790|doi=10.2307/1450053|jstor=1450053|issn=0021-6682|url-access=subscription}}</ref>

According to a minority of scholars,<ref name=":0" /> including [[Caspar Levias]], the intent of the Masoretes was ''masoret'' "fetter [upon the [[hermeneutics|exposition of the text]]]", and the word was only later connected to מסר and translated as "tradition".<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001401736|title=Hebrew union college annual [1904] ...|date=1904|publisher=Students of the Hebrew union college|location=Cincinnati, Ohio}}</ref>

Other specific explanations are provided:
[[Samuel David Luzzatto]] argued that ''masoret'' was a synonym for ''siman'' by extended meaning ("transmission[ of the sign]" became "transmitted sign") and referred to the symbols used in vocalizing and punctuating the text.<ref name=":1">"Masorah, Vol. XVI. ''Encyclopaedia Judaica'', Jerusalem, NY: MacMillan Co., 1971.</ref> 
[[Ze'ev Ben-Haim]] argued that ''masoret'' meant "counting" and was later conjugated as ''moseirah'' "thing which is counted", referring to the Masoretic counts of the letters, words, and verses in the Bible, discussed in [[Kiddushin (Talmud)|Qiddushin]] 30a.<ref name=":1" />