Septuagint

 

Septuagint

Septuagint - Wikipedia

Septuagint - Wikipedia

 

This article is about the Greek Bible translation. For the number, see 70 (number). For the moth, see Septuaginta zagulajevi. For other uses, see Septuagint (disambiguation).

SeptuagintAlso known asDateLanguage(s)

Fragment of a Septuagint: A column of uncial book from 1 Esdras in the Codex Vaticanus c. 325–350 CE, the basis of Sir Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton's Greek edition and English translation

LXX Greek Old Testament

c. 3rd century BCE

Koine Greek

Bible

The Septuagint (/ˈsɛptjuədʒɪnt/ SEP-tew-ə-jint),[1] sometimes referred to as the Greek Old Testament or The Translation of the Seventy (Ancient Greek: Ἡ μετάφρασις τῶν Ἑβδομήκοντα, romanized: Hē metáphrasis tôn Hebdomḗkonta), and often abbreviated as LXX,[2] is the earliest extant Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible from the original Hebrew.[3][4] The full Greek title derives from the story recorded in the Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates that "the laws of the Jews" were translated into the Greek language at the request of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285–247 BCE) by seventy-two Jewish translators—six from each of the Twelve Tribes of Israel.[5][6][7]

Biblical scholars agree that the first five books of the Hebrew Bible were translated from Biblical Hebrew into Koine Greek by Jews living in the Ptolemaic Kingdom, probably in the early or middle part of the third century BCE.[8] The remaining books were presumably translated in the 2nd century BCE.[4][9][10] Some targumim translating or paraphrasing the Bible into Aramaic were also made during the Second Temple period.[11]

Few people could speak and even fewer could read in the Hebrew language during the Second Temple period; Koine Greek[3][12][13][14] and Aramaic were the most widely spoken languages at that time among the Jewish community. The Septuagint therefore satisfied a need in the Jewish community.[8][15]

Etymology[edit]

The term "Septuagint" is derived from the Latin phrase Vetus Testamentum ex versione Septuaginta Interpretum ("The Old Testament from the version of the Seventy Translators").[16] This phrase in turn was derived from the Ancient Greek: Ἡ μετάφρασις τῶν Ἑβδομήκοντα, romanized: hē metáphrasis tōn hebdomḗkonta, lit. 'The Translation of the Seventy'.[17] It was not until the time of Augustine of Hippo (354–430 CE) that the Greek translation of the Jewish scriptures was called by the Latin term Septuaginta.[18] The Roman numeral LXX (seventy) is commonly used as an abbreviation,[2] in addition to �

 or G.[19]

Composition[edit]

Jewish legend[edit]

 

Beginning of the Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 11th century)

According to tradition, Ptolemy II Philadelphus (the Greek Pharaoh of Egypt) sent seventy-two Jewish translators—six from each of the Twelve Tribes of Israel—from Jerusalem to Alexandria to translate the Tanakh from Biblical Hebrew into Koine Greek, for inclusion in his library.[20] This narrative is found in the pseudepigraphic Letter of Aristeas to his brother Philocrates,[21] and is repeated by Philo of Alexandria, Josephus (in Antiquities of the Jews),[22] and by later sources (including Augustine of Hippo).[23] It is also found in the Tractate Megillah of the Babylonian Talmud:

King Ptolemy once gathered 72 Elders. He placed them in 72 chambers, each of them in a separate one, without revealing to them why they were summoned. He entered each one's room and said: "Write for me the Torah of Moshe, your teacher". God put it in the heart of each one to translate identically as all the others did.[6]

Philo of Alexandria writes that the number of scholars was chosen by selecting six scholars from each of the twelve tribes of Israel. Caution is needed here regarding the accuracy of this statement by Philo of Alexandria, as it implies that the twelve tribes were still in existence during King Ptolemy's reign, and that the Ten Lost Tribes of the twelve tribes had not been forcibly resettled by Assyria almost 500 years previously.[24] According to later rabbinic tradition (which considered the Greek translation as a distortion of sacred text and unsuitable for use in the synagogue), the Septuagint was given to Ptolemy two days before the annual Tenth of Tevet fast.[15][25]

According to Aristobulus of Alexandria's fragment 3, portions of the Law were translated from Hebrew into Greek long before the well-known Septuagint version. He stated that Plato and Pythagoras knew the Jewish Law and borrowed from it.[26]

In the preface to his 1844 translation of the Septuagint, Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton acknowledges that the Jews of Alexandria were likely to have been the writers of the Septuagint, but dismisses Aristeas' account as a pious fiction. Instead, he asserts that the real origin of the name "Septuagint" pertains to the fact that the earliest version was forwarded by the authors to the Jewish Sanhedrin at Alexandria for editing and approval.[27]

History[edit]

The 3rd century BCE is supported for the translation of the Pentateuch by a number of factors, including its Greek being representative of early Koine Greek, citations beginning as early as the 2nd century BCE, and early manuscripts datable to the 2nd century BCE.[28] After the Torah, other books were translated over the next two to three centuries. It is unclear which was translated when, or where; some may have been translated twice (into different versions), and then revised.[29] The quality and style of the translators varied considerably from book to book, from a literal translation to paraphrasing to an interpretative style.

The translation process of the Septuagint and from the Septuagint into other versions can be divided into several stages: the Greek text was produced within the social environment of Hellenistic Judaism, and completed by 132 BCE. With the spread of Early Christianity, this Septuagint in turn was rendered into Latin in a variety of versions and the latter, collectively known as the Vetus Latina, were also referred to as the Septuagint[30][31][32] initially in Alexandria but elsewhere as well.[17] The Septuagint also formed the basis for the Slavonic, Syriac, Old Armenian, Old Georgian, and Coptic versions of the Christian Old Testament.[33]

Language[edit]

The Septuagint is written in Koine Greek. Some sections contain Semiticisms, which are idioms and phrases based on Semitic languages such as Hebrew and Aramaic.[34] Other books, such as Daniel and Proverbs, have a stronger Greek influence.[20]

The Septuagint may also clarify pronunciation of pre-Masoretic Hebrew; many proper nouns are spelled with Greek vowels in the translation, but contemporary Hebrew texts lacked vowel pointing. However, it is unlikely that all Biblical Hebrew sounds had precise Greek equivalents.[35]

Canonical differences[edit]

The Septuagint does not consist of a single, unified corpus. Rather, it is a collection of ancient translations of the Tanakh, along with other Jewish texts that are now commonly referred to as apocrypha. Importantly, the canon of the Hebrew Bible was evolving over the century or so in which the Septuagint was being written. Also, the texts were translated by many different people, in different locations, at different times, for different purposes, and often from different original Hebrew manuscripts.[8]

The Hebrew Bible, also called the Tanakh, has three parts: the Torah ("Law"), the Nevi'im ("Prophets"), and the Ketuvim ("Writings"). The Septuagint has four: law, history, poetry, and prophets. The books of the Apocrypha were inserted at appropriate locations.[3][4] Extant copies of the Septuagint, which date from the 4th century CE, contain books and additions[36] not present in the Hebrew Bible as established in the Jewish canon[37] and are not uniform in their contents. According to some scholars, there is no evidence that the Septuagint included these additional books.[38][9] These copies of the Septuagint include books known as anagignoskomena in Greek and in English as deuterocanon (derived from the Greek words for "second canon"), books not included in the Jewish canon.[39][10] These books are estimated to have been written between 200 BCE and 50 CE. Among them are the first two books of Maccabees; Tobit; Judith; the Wisdom of Solomon; Sirach; Baruch (including the Letter of Jeremiah), and additions to Esther and Daniel. The Septuagint version of some books, such as Daniel and Esther, are longer than those in the Masoretic Text, which were affirmed as canonical in Rabbinic Judaism.[40] The Septuagint Book of Jeremiah is shorter than the Masoretic Text.[41] The Psalms of Solomon, 3 Maccabees, 4 Maccabees, the Letter of Jeremiah, the Book of Odes, the Prayer of Manasseh and Psalm 151 are included in some copies of the Septuagint.[42]

While the Septuagint appears to have been widely accepted by Jews of the Second Temple period, it has been largely rejected as scriptural by mainstream Rabbinic Judaism since late antiquity for several reasons. First, the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew source texts in many cases (particularly in the Book of Job).[15] Second, the translations appear at times to demonstrate an ignorance of Hebrew idiomatic usage.[15] A particularly noteworthy example of this phenomenon is found in Isaiah 7:14, in which the Hebrew word עַלְמָה‎ (‘almāh, which translates into English as "young woman") is translated into the Koine Greek as παρθένος (parthenos, which translates into English as "virgin").[43] Finally, the rabbis also wanted to distinguish their tradition from the emerging tradition of Christianity, which relied heavily on the Septuagint.

The Septuagint became synonymous with the Greek Old Testament, a Christian canon incorporating the books of the Hebrew canon with additional texts. Although the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church include most of the books in the Septuagint in their canons, Protestant churches usually do not. After the Reformation, many Protestant Bibles began to follow the Jewish canon and exclude the additional texts (which came to be called the Apocrypha) as noncanonical.[44][45] The Apocrypha are included under a separate heading in the King James Version of the Bible.[46]

Deuterocanonical and apocryphal books in the SeptuagintGreek name[17][47][a]TransliterationEnglish name

Προσευχὴ Μανασσῆ	Proseuchē Manassē	Prayer of Manasseh
Ἔσδρας Αʹ	1 Esdras	1 Esdras or 1 Ezra
Τωβίτ (called Τωβείτ or Τωβίθ in some sources)	Tōbit (or Tōbeit or Tōbith)	Tobit
Ἰουδίθ	Ioudith	Judith
Ἐσθήρ	Esthēr	Esther (with additions)
Μακκαβαίων Αʹ	1 Makkabaiōn	1 Maccabees
Μακκαβαίων Βʹ	2 Makkabaiōn	2 Maccabees
Μακκαβαίων Γʹ	3 Makkabaiōn	3 Maccabees
Μακκαβαίων Δ' Παράρτημα	4 Makkabaiōn Parartēma	4 Maccabees[48]
Ψαλμός ΡΝΑʹ	Psalmos 151	Psalm 151
Σοφία Σαλoμῶντος	Sophia Salomōntos	Wisdom or Wisdom of Solomon
Σοφία Ἰησοῦ Σειράχ	Sophia Iēsou Seirach	Sirach or Wisdom of Sirach
Βαρούχ	Barouch	Baruch
Ἐπιστολὴ Ἰερεμίου	Epistolē Ieremiou	Epistle or Letter of Jeremiah
Δανιήλ	Daniēl	Daniel (with additions)
Ψαλμοί Σαλoμῶντος	Psalmoi Salomōntos	Psalms of Solomon[b]

Final form[edit]

All the books in Western Old Testament biblical canons are found in the Septuagint, although the order does not always coincide with the Western book order. The Septuagint order is evident in the earliest Christian Bibles, which were written during the fourth century.[20]

Some books which are set apart in the Masoretic Text are grouped together. The Books of Samuel and the Books of Kings are one four-part book entitled Βασιλειῶν (Of Reigns) in the Septuagint. The Books of Chronicles, known collectively as Παραλειπομένων (Of Things Left Out) supplement Reigns. The Septuagint organizes the minor prophets in its twelve-part Book of Twelve.[20]

Some ancient scriptures are found in the Septuagint, but not in the Hebrew Bible. The additional books are Tobit; Judith; the Wisdom of Solomon; Wisdom of Jesus son of Sirach; Baruch and the Letter of Jeremiah, which became chapter six of Baruch in the Vulgate; additions to Daniel (The Prayer of Azarias, the Song of the Three Children, Susanna, and Bel and the Dragon); additions to Esther; 1 Maccabees; 2 Maccabees; 3 Maccabees; 4 Maccabees; 1 Esdras; Odes (including the Prayer of Manasseh); the Psalms of Solomon, and Psalm 151.

Fragments of deuterocanonical books in Hebrew are among the Dead Sea Scrolls found at Qumran. Sirach, whose text in Hebrew was already known from the Cairo Geniza, has been found in two scrolls (2QSir or 2Q18, 11QPs_a or 11Q5) in Hebrew. Another Hebrew scroll of Sirach has been found in Masada (MasSir).[50]: 597  Five fragments from the Book of Tobit have been found in Qumran: four written in Aramaic and one written in Hebrew (papyri 4Q, nos. 196-200).[50]: 636  Psalm 151 appears with a number of canonical and non-canonical psalms in the Dead Sea scroll 11QPs(a) (also known as 11Q5), a first-century-CE scroll discovered in 1956.[51] The scroll contains two short Hebrew psalms, which scholars agree were the basis for Psalm 151.[50]: 585–586  The canonical acceptance of these books varies by Christian tradition.

Theodotion's translation[edit]

The Book of Daniel is preserved in the 12-chapter Masoretic Text and in two longer Greek versions, the original Septuagint version, c. 100 BCE, and the later Theodotion version from c. 2nd century CE. Both Greek texts contain three additions to Daniel: The Prayer of Azariah and Song of the Three Holy Children; the story of Susannah and the Elders; and the story of Bel and the Dragon. Theodotion is much closer to the Masoretic Text and became so popular that it replaced the original Septuagint version in all but two manuscripts of the Septuagint itself.[52][53][54] The Greek additions were apparently never part of the Hebrew text.[55] Several Old Greek texts of the Book of Daniel have been discovered, and the original form of the book is being reconstructed.[20]

Use[edit]

Jewish use[edit]

See also: Development of the Hebrew Bible canon

It is unclear to what extent Alexandrian Jews accepted the authority of the Septuagint. Manuscripts of the Septuagint have been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and were thought to have been in use among various Jewish sects at the time.[56]

Several factors led most Jews to abandon the Septuagint around the second century CE. The earliest gentile Christians used the Septuagint out of necessity, since it was the only Greek version of the Bible and most (if not all) of these early non-Jewish Christians could not read Hebrew. The association of the Septuagint with a rival religion may have made it suspect in the eyes of the newer generation of Jews and Jewish scholars.[33] Jews instead used Hebrew or Aramaic Targum manuscripts later compiled by the Masoretes and authoritative Aramaic translations, such as those of Onkelos and Rabbi Yonathan ben Uziel.[57]

Perhaps most significant for the Septuagint, as distinct from other Greek versions, was that the Septuagint began to lose Jewish sanction after differences between it and contemporary Hebrew scriptures were discovered. Even Greek-speaking Jews tended to prefer other Jewish versions in Greek (such as the translation by Aquila), which seemed to be more concordant with contemporary Hebrew texts.[33]

Christian use[edit]

See also: Development of the Old Testament canon

The Early Christian church used the Greek texts,[15] since Greek was a lingua franca of the Roman Empire at the time and the language of the Greco-Roman Church, while Aramaic was the language of Syriac Christianity. The relationship between the apostolic use of the Septuagint and the Hebrew texts is complicated. Although the Septuagint seems to have been a major source for the Apostles, it is not the only one. St. Jerome offered, for example, Matthew 2:15 and 2:23, John 19:3,[58] John 7:38,[59] and 1 Corinthians 2:9[60][61] as examples found in Hebrew texts but not in the Septuagint. Matthew 2:23 is not present in current Masoretic tradition either; according to Jerome, however, it was in Isaiah 11:1. The New Testament writers freely used the Greek translation when citing the Jewish scriptures (or quoting Jesus doing so), implying that Jesus, his apostles, and their followers considered it reliable.[62][34][15]

In the early Christian Church, the presumption that the Septuagint was translated by Jews before the time of Christ and that it lends itself more to a Christological interpretation than 2nd-century Hebrew texts in certain places was taken as evidence that "Jews" had changed the Hebrew text in a way that made it less Christological. Irenaeus writes about Isaiah 7:14 that the Septuagint clearly identifies a "virgin" (Greek παρθένος; bethulah in Hebrew) who would conceive.[63] The word almah in the Hebrew text was, according to Irenaeus, interpreted by Theodotion and Aquila (Jewish converts), as a "young woman" who would conceive. Again according to Irenaeus, the Ebionites used this to claim that Joseph was the biological father of Jesus. To him that was heresy facilitated by late anti-Christian alterations of the scripture in Hebrew, as evident by the older, pre-Christian Septuagint.[64]

Jerome broke with church tradition, translating most of the Old Testament of his Vulgate from Hebrew rather than Greek. His choice was sharply criticized by Augustine, his contemporary.[65] Although Jerome argued for the superiority of the Hebrew texts in correcting the Septuagint on philological and theological grounds, because he was accused of heresy he also acknowledged the Septuagint texts.[66] Acceptance of Jerome's version increased, and it displaced the Septuagint's Old Latin translations.[33]

The Eastern Orthodox Church prefers to use the Septuagint as the basis for translating the Old Testament into other languages, and uses the untranslated Septuagint where Greek is the liturgical language. Critical translations of the Old Testament which use the Masoretic Text as their basis consult the Septuagint and other versions to reconstruct the meaning of the Hebrew text when it is unclear, corrupted, or ambiguous.[33] According to the New Jerusalem Bible foreword, "Only when this (the Masoretic Text) presents insuperable difficulties have emendations or other versions, such as the [...] LXX, been used."[67] The translator's preface to the New International Version reads, "The translators also consulted the more important early versions (including) the Septuagint [...] Readings from these versions were occasionally followed where the MT seemed doubtful"[68]