Mesorat%20hashas for Nedarim 74:4

ולמאן דאמר שכר שימור מאי טעמא לא אמר שכר פיסוק טעמים קסבר (שכר) פיסוק טעמים דאורייתא הוא

'They read in the book, it, the law of God,' refers to Scripture; 'distinctly,' to Targum;<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Targum, 'translation', generally refers to the Aramaic translation of the Bible. In Mishnaic phraseology it might refer to a translation from Hebrew or the Bible into any language, (v. J. Kid. 59a, where it denotes a Greek version of Aquila; Meg. II, 1; Shab. 115a), but the word Targum by itself was restricted to the Aramaic version of the Bible. This Aramaic translation was publically read in the synagogue, along with the original text, and rules for reading it were formulated (v. Meg. II, 1; Tosef. Meg. II, V). This practice was an ancient institution, dating back to the Second Temple, and according to Rab, going back to Ezra, v. J.E., XII, p. 57. ');">⁷</span> 'and they gave the sense', to the division of sentences; 'so that they understood the reading,' to the accentuation; others say, to the masoroth.<span class="x" onmousemove="('comment',' Masoroth: Tosaf and Asheri refer this to the plene and defective readings, e.g., where the 'o' is represented by waw (plene) and where it is missing (defective); where the 'i' is shewn by yod, and where not. Ran simply states: the traditional readings. The term 'masorah' occurs in Ezek. XX, 37, and means 'fetter'. Thus the masorah is a fetter upon the text, i.e., it fixes its reading. In course of time it was connected with masar (to hand down), and thus came to mean traditional reading. The old Hebrew text was in all probability written without any breaks. it was the work of the Masorites to make the divisions into words, books, sections, paragraphs, etc., and fix the orthography and pronunciation. The traditionally fixed text, especially with a view to its orthography, was called masoreth; the division into sense-clauses, pisuk te'ammim; the traditional pronunciation, mikra. V. J.E. s.v. Masorah. ');">⁸</span>

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