What is the history of Early biblical manuscripts?

Answer 1

In Judaism, the earliest manuscripts were the prophetic books that were written by the prophets themselves. At the death of each of the prophets, the original manuscript was deposited with the Sanhedrin, which was the high court of Torah-sages in the Temple premises. This is why the first Torah-scroll, which had been written by Moses himself (Deuteronomy 31:24), was found in the Temple (2 Chronicles 34:14). These originals were used to proofread later copies, to ensure no mistakes would creep in (Talmud, Soferim 6:4).

After the First Destruction, God's presence was no longer felt as clearly as before (see Deuteronomy 31:17-18). In addition, exile is not conducive to prophecy (Mechilta, parshat Bo). The Sages of the time, including the last living prophets, convened a special synod for a couple of decades, which was called the Men of the Great Assembly (Mishna, Avot ch.1). This group sealed the canon of the Hebrew Bible. It was they, for example, who set the twelve Minor Prophets as a single book, and who set the books in their traditional order (see Talmud, Bava Batra 14b). It was the Men of the Great Assembly whom Esther had to approach when she felt that the Divinely-inspired Scroll of Esther should be included in the canon (see Talmud, Megillah 7a).

Answer 2

Tradition states that Moses wrote a scroll containing the narratives of Genesis, at God's command, before the formal Giving of the Torah (Rashi commentary, Exodus ch.24).The contents of this scroll included the ancient traditions of the Creation, the Flood, the early Israelites, etc. (These traditions had been widely known, except that among other nations [the idolaters] the Flood and Creation-narratives had become garbled with idolatrous drivel.)

It was this scroll (whose contents were soon incorporated in the complete Torah itself by God), which Moses read to the Israelites (Exodus 24:7) as an introduction to what God's covenant would entail. This was not a surprise to the Israelites, since they had carefully handed down the narratives and events of the lives of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (see Midrash, Shemot Rabbah 5:18 and 22).

When God gave the Ten Commandments (Exodus ch.19-20), He gave them in writing, inscribed on stone tablets (Exodus 31:18), while He taught the rest of the Torah to Moses orally, on Mount Sinai (Exodus 24:12), without writing it.
At God's command and precise dictation (Deuteronomy 1:3), Moses penned the entire Torah (Deuteronomy 31:24) immediately before his death, so that it included events that had happened in the preceding months (such as Numbers ch.20).

No Hebrew copy of the Torah has ever been found to differ with the others, worldwide. The Torah we possess today contains the exact wording written by Moses.See also the Related Links.

Link: More about Moses

Link: The Israelite Patriarchs

Link: What is the history of the Hebrew Bible?