Psalm 145:13, the acrostic's missing line
The nun line is missing because the received Hebrew text skips from mem to samekh; 11QPsᵃ and the Septuagint include a faithfulness line. Whether a line was lost or later added remains uncertain.
The APB text at this verse
The manuscripts, editions, and versions
The committee record at this verse
The APB is translated by a committee of language models that works blind. The translators are never told they are translating the Bible, never given a book name or a verse number, and never shown the witnesses listed above. Where the manuscripts disagree, the choice between readings is made before translation by the same kind of translator working the same way: it sees the competing readings and the witnesses by age and class, but never a reference or a manuscript name. There are 14,877 such places. For APB 4.0 every one was decided again in October 2026. GPT-6.1 Sol decided every one first. Claude Fable 5.1, from another model family, decided 2,483 of them second, including every place where the first translator left the base text. A departure from the base text needs both translators to agree and the first to be at least 0.8 confident. There is no third translator, so the base text stands when the two disagree. APB 4.0 is translated over those decisions. Whatever was done at this verse was done on the language and the evidence alone, and the record is public.
“The base text reads ודור׃; the committee adopted ודור׃ נאמן יהוה בכל דבריו וחסיד בכל־מעשיו on the evidence of the copies. The possibility of a later supplement keeps confidence moderate.”
The committee’s APB 4.0 textual decision adopted the added line on the evidence of the copies. Its note says: "The possibility of a later supplement keeps confidence moderate." Translator GPT-6.1 Sol (OpenAI) read first; translator Claude Fable 5.1 (Anthropic) read second. The chair changed the verse after the committee’s run because the textual re-read changed the source text to include the line. Automated comparisons with the earlier English had refused the required wording; the revised wording passed the fidelity audit, meaning review and recall check. The committee’s printed text includes: "The LORD is faithful in all his words, and kind in all his works."
Before: Your reign is a reign for all eternity, and your dominion is throughout generation after generation.
After: Your reign is a reign for all eternity, and your dominion is throughout generation after generation. The LORD is faithful in all his words, and kind in all his works.
“The decided source text changed in the textual re-read of 2026-10-04 (GPT-6.1 Sol and Claude Fable 5.1, blind): נֶאֱמָ֔ן יְהוָ֖ה בְּ כָל דְּבָרָ֖י ו וְ֝ חָסִ֗יד בְּ כָל מַעֲשָֽׂי ו is added after דֽוֹר. The committee retranslated the verse from the source (source_fix rr1004); code gates that compare the new English with the old refused the wording for what the changed source requires. The wording then passed the committee’s fidelity audit, meaning review and recall check (source_fix_rr1004_chair_gate_20261004).”
The argument for each reading
If the line belongs
The case for including the nun line rests on its presence in both Hebrew and Greek witnesses. The Dead Sea Scrolls (11QPsᵃ) preserve a Hebrew line saying that God is faithful in his words and gracious in all his works. The Septuagint also includes the faithfulness line, with Lord where the scroll has God. Its inclusion fills the gap between mem and samekh in a psalm that follows the alphabet line by line. These witnesses support the possibility that the received Hebrew text lost a line. Their agreement on its presence does not settle whether it belonged to the psalm from the beginning.
If the gap is original
The case for preserving the gap begins with the Masoretic Text (Westminster Leningrad Codex). It transmits the mem line about the kingdom of all ages and then moves to samekh without a nun line. If that gap is original, the line in 11QPsᵃ and the Septuagint could be a later supplement completing the alphabetic sequence. The acrostic makes an omission noticeable, but it could also give someone a reason to supply a line. The received sequence therefore deserves consideration even though the other two witnesses preserve the additional statement of faithfulness.
The uncertainty concerns how the two forms arose: a line may have dropped out, or a supplement may have filled an existing alphabetic gap. The presence of the line in Hebrew and Greek does not by itself resolve that history. Including it adds an explicit statement of divine faithfulness and kindness at this point. The surrounding declarations of enduring rule and support for those who fall remain in the APB text. No doctrine needs to be decided by this variant alone.
Related entries
Witness readings for critical editions are quoted from the SBLGNT apparatus (CC BY 4.0); Hebrew text from the Westminster Leningrad Codex (Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible). Readings of ancient manuscripts and versions are cited from the sources linked above.