Bible Study Septuagint vs. Massoretic Text

[JM]

Septuagint History

- The Septuagint is the most ancient translation of the Old Testament and consequently is invaluable to critics for understanding and correcting the Hebrew text (Massorah), the latter, such as it has come down to us, being the text established by the Massoretes in the sixth century A.D.

- The Septuagint Version accepted first by the Alexandrian Jews, and afterwards by all the Greek-speaking countries, helped to spread among the Gentiles the idea and the expectation of the Messias, and to introduce into Greek the theological terminology that made it a most suitable instrument for the propagation of the Gospel of Christ.

- The Fathers and the other ecclesiastical writers of the early Church drew upon it, either directly, as in the case of the Greek Fathers, or indirectly, like the Latin Fathers and writers and others who employed Latin, Syriac, Ethiopian, Arabic and Gothic versions. It was held tin high esteem by all, some even believed it inspired. (sounds like KJV onlyism)

Question: I've heard it said that Jesus quoted from the Septuagint, is this true, if so...why don't we use the Septuagint to translate from?

Massoretic History

- The Massoretic text is named for a group of Hebrew scholars called the Massoretes. They had schools in Babylon and Tiberius by the Sea of Galilee. They flourished from 500 to 1,000 A.D. The word "Massoretic" comes from the Hebrew word "massorah" which means "tradition".

- The Massoretes main concern was safeguarding the Hebrew consonantal text. Originally the Hebrew text was written only in consonants as there were no vowels. The Masoretes added vowel markings underneath the consonants called ‘matres lectiones' meaning "mothers of reading". The vowel markings allowed those not familiar with the text the chance to read it. They also provided explanations of ambigious words, and counted the verses, words and letters of the Old Testament. The standardization of the Hebrew text was completed between 600 - 700 A.D.

Question: Why do we use the Massoretic text for modern versions if its older then the Greek Septuagint, but use older manuscripts (which we have less of) to translate the New Testament?

Notes on the Text

- This text DIFFERS CONSIDERABLY from the Bible that was considered "authoritative" for Early Christians. Most converts to Early Christianity were unable to read Hebrew, but they were conversant with Greek, which had become an "international language" by the first century CE. The Bible these Early Christians used was a Greek translation of a Hebrew text, made sometime in the 3rd century BCE. This Greek translation had been made for Jews, by Jews living in Alexandria, Egypt, who where more conversant with Greek than Hebrew.

- When the Early Christians came to inevitably dispute with Jews various passages in the "Old Testament" a problem arose, the Greek translation in some verses FLATLY CONTRADICTED the Jewish texts ! The Jews argued that the Early Christians had a "flawed," MISTRANSLATED Bible which was giving them WRONG ideas about God and the Messiah !

http://www.bibleorigins.net/OldTestament.html

Just wanted to know what you thought....

jason

 

[Relic]

Website Author's Background:
http://www.bibleorigins.net/WebsiteAuthorBackground.html


"I present myself as "an amateur bible scholar," not having ANY formal education in Bible studies beyond a general Intro to "History of Western Civilization 101" in college. What I know is ALL "self-taught." My "teachers" are the authors of the books which I cite in my various articles and "Reccomended Books" page in the Bibliography Menu..."


About 1970 I began a "personal quest" to discover if the Bible was "truly" the word of God or not. I had heard of scholars who claimed it wasn't and wanted to understand upon what basis they held their views. At the time, I thought the Bible was God's word. My studies eventually caused me to realize that the findings of archaeology challenged Holy Writ's presentation of Israel's early history. Archaeology revealed the story of the Exodus and Conquest of Canaan by Joshua were not supported. Upon this realization, I became a "Humanist."

"This website was created to share my findings in hopes that my research may be of some help to my fellow man. I realize that there are many different approaches to the understanding of the Scriptures, Confessional and Secular-Humanist. "


04 Dec 2004 Update ("Musings") :
I am not so foolish as to believe that just because one gets to page one, that one has a "lock" on the Truth; this is only an indicator of fickle "popularity" or "interest." I am also well aware that just because one reads an article does not mean that they will come away "convinced" of my reasoning and arguments. Just as I pick and choose what to believe, so it must be for you too dear reader.

Here is a link to his article on The various "Methodologies" he uses in his studies, and that of other authors, and the warning about using skepticism in reading them.
http://www.bibleorigins.net/Methodologies.html

Here's what I have to say about this man's way of looking into the bible:

That's all fine and dandy, but when you do research of this type, the element of the spiritual is not considered. It is biased in that ,the view point is mainly focused on the "material" fact, based on archeology, rituals without regard to the spiritual metaphysics behind them, and he focuses from the eyes of being interested only in who is the copycat, who stole what role from who mindset. And when one leaves out the "spiritual" they are then examining, from a pure humanistic, secular type of seeing, and that then becomes a religion, in itself, of it own making. The religion of Humanism.

When you study the bible and it's relics from such a perspective, you then lose the message God intends for us to gain an understand of. You then lose the whole concept of what, so called, "religion" is all about.

Show me where this guy gives spiritual value to any of his research.
did I miss that section hidden within his website of 37 Megabytes?

From what I read, he leaves it out of the equation and Spirituality has nothing to do with his findings. No wonder he considers himself to be a "HUMANIST".

If you don't see the scripture from the spiriutal aspect. You miss the whole point of the written Word of God.

It's obvious to me that this man does not know God but only knows of him.

Unless I am wrong and missed that page or atricle in which he clearly shows his "understanding" of God. A person can know a whole lot about a subject. But if you don't have an understanding of what it is meant to convey.... then you're all washed up! Lot's of jibber jabber of facts but no understanding of what the message of the Spirit is.

Am I wrong? If so, then please,I would be more that pleased and very humbled, if you show me where this man understands the Spirit of God so that I can understand Mr. Walter Reinhold Warrtig Mattfeld y de la Torre, M.A. Ed. .


.

 

[Vice]

Question: Why do we use the Massoretic text for modern versions if its older then the Greek Septuagint, but use older manuscripts (which we have less of) to translate the New Testament?

Since your first question stems from your second question, I decided to chime in on your second question.

The general rule of thumb regarding biblical texts is this: the older, the "purer." It is typically believed that an older text is closer to its original form -- less affected by scribal errors or supposed alterations of the text -- and is therefore the superior text on which to base any translations.

Now regarding the use of the LXX, it is helpful at times, and I'm sure that the translators of each version employed its clarity. Greek is a very precise language. The only example that comes to mind right now is Isaiah 7:14. In the Hebrew, the word alemah (pardon my phonetics; they're lousy) refers to a young woman of marrying age; it might also refer to a virgin girl. The LXX, however, clarifies the Hebrew by using the word parthenos, which means an unmarried virgin girl. Thus, all the translations that might have been in the dark concerning the "young unmarried girl" now know--thanks to the LXX--that she is a virgin.

Hope this helps.

 

[Adams son]

Yes Jesus and the NT writers often did quote directly from the Septuagint. We know this for certain.

However, it would be a bad idea to use the Greek Septagint as our most basic Old Testament text. This is because it has already been translated once. This means that if you use the Septuagint to translatge the OT into English you could have a compounded error on your hands. This is in fact the problem with the Vulgate which was used to translated from Latin into English - compounded errors occur.

There is no such thing as a "perfect" translation. It just cannot be done. This is because the words in one language do not have perfect matches in the other language. It is NOT a matter of simply replacing appropriate words. Sometimes words from the original language will be more specific than the best word we can find in the language which we want to translate into as so we must use a word which says more than what was originallly intended. Sometimes it works the other way arounda and we must use a word that does not say enough, that is, the constellation of ideas associated with the word in one language may be bigger or smaller than the word in the other one.

And this creates a big problem when translating from an already translated text.