The Septuagint Translation of the Hebrew Bible:Its Nature and Importance for Scholarship

The “Septuagint" the ancient Jewish-Greek translation of Hebrew Scripture, is the very first Greek translation,of the Torah (Pentateuch),translated by seventy-two elders, followed by the other books. The first translation was so dominant that its name was ultimately attached to these other translations as well. The collection of Greek Scripture contains Greek versions of all the books of Hebrew Scripture,Greek versions of Hebrew books such as Baruch and Sirach not included in Hebrew Scripture,and writings originally written in Greek.The LXX translation was a Jewish venture,but soon a trend developed to replace the LXX with new translations. The LXX influenced the NT at various levels. The LXX was the first written translation of Hebrew Scripture. Therefore,the translators had to overcome many problems,and among other things,they had to develop translation styles. The general approaches of translators are usually expressed as “literal",“free",or “paraphrastic".Many renderings reflect the cultural environment of the translators,which consisted of elements of both the Palestinian and Egyptian societies.The LXX was translated from a Hebrew text that differed, often greatly, from MT.This is not surprising,since in antiquity many differing copies of the Hebrew Scripture text were in circulation. Some of these differences are minor,while others are major.In our analysis of Hebrew Scripture, we must supplement the data of MT with valuable information included in the LXX