<P> However, despite these variations, most of the Qumran fragments can be classified as being closer to the Masoretic text than to any other text group that has survived . According to Lawrence Schiffman, 60% can be classed as being of proto - Masoretic type, and a further 20% Qumran style with bases in proto - Masoretic texts, compared to 5% proto - Samaritan type, 5% Septuagintal type, and 10% non-aligned . Joseph Fitzmyer noted the following regarding the findings at Qumran Cave 4 in particular: "Such ancient recensional forms of Old Testament books bear witness to an unsuspected textual diversity that once existed; these texts merit far greater study and attention than they have been accorded till now . Thus, the differences in the Septuagint are no longer considered the result of a poor or tendentious attempt to translate the Hebrew into the Greek; rather they testify to a different pre-Christian form of the Hebrew text". On the other hand, some of the fragments conforming most accurately to the Masoretic text were found in Cave 4 . </P> <P> An emphasis on minute details of words and spellings, already used among the Pharisees as bases for argumentation, reached its height with the example of Rabbi Akiva (died 135 CE). The idea of a perfect text sanctified in its consonantal base quickly spread throughout the Jewish communities via supportive statements in Halakha, Aggadah, and Jewish thought; and with it increasingly forceful strictures that a deviation in even a single letter would make a Torah scroll invalid . Very few manuscripts are said to have survived the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE . This both drastically reduced the number of variants in circulation, and gave a new urgency that the text must be preserved . New Greek translations were also made . Unlike the Septuagint, large - scale deviations in sense between the Greek of Aquila of Sinope and Theodotion and what we now know as the Masoretic text are minimal . Detailed variations between different Hebrew texts in use still clearly existed though, as witnessed by differences between the present - day Masoretic text and versions mentioned in the Gemara, and often even halachic midrashim based on spelling versions which do not exist in the current Masoretic text . </P> <P> The current received text finally achieved predominance through the reputation of the Masoretes, schools of scribes and Torah scholars working between the 7th and 11th centuries, based primarily in the Land of Israel in the cities of Tiberias and Jerusalem, and in Babylonia . According to Menachem Cohen these schools developed such prestige for the accuracy and error - control of their copying techniques that their texts established an authority beyond all others . Differences remained, sometimes bolstered by systematic local differences in pronunciation and cantillation . Every locality, following the tradition of its school, had a standard codex embodying its readings . In Babylonia the school of Sura differed from that of Nehardea; and similar differences existed in the schools of the Land of Israel as against that at Tiberias, which in later times increasingly became the chief seat of learning . In this period living tradition ceased, and the Masoretes in preparing their codices usually followed the one school or the other, examining, however, standard codices of other schools and noting their differences . </P> <P> In the first half of the 10th century Aaron ben Moses ben Asher and Ben Naphtali were the leading Masoretes in Tiberias . Their names have come to symbolise the variations among Masoretes, but the differences between ben Asher and ben Naphtali should not be exaggerated . There are hardly any differences between them regarding the consonants, though they differ more on vocalization and accents . Also, there were other authorities such as Rabbi Pinchas and Moshe Moheh, and ben Asher and ben Naphtali often agree against these others . Further, it is possible that all variations found among manuscripts eventually came to be regarded as disagreements between these figureheads . Ben Asher wrote a standard codex (the Aleppo Codex) embodying his opinions . Probably ben Naphtali did too, but it has not survived . </P>

What were the scribes called who preserved the old testament text