A More Elaborate Offering
While for the Mt the brethren
transported back from the Diaspora are themselves the gift of the Lord, the LXX
agglomerates the means upon which they are transported to the gift itself.
In the Hebrew text, the returnees are carried ‘upon horses, upon chariots, upon
litters, upon mules and upon dromedaries’ (ב + the article is repeated before
each of the five nouns). The LXX, on the other hand, singles out covered mule
wagons as the vehicles by which the emissaries accomplish their mission, while
the horses and chariots become a part of the procession that is to be offered
to the Lord along with the returnees from Diaspora (the preposition εν in the phrase εν λαμπηναις ημιονων appears to be marked off from
other listed items as the truly vehicular εν by the use of μετα [of
accompaniment] for those other items).
Though this might at first appear
a culpable misjudgment on the part of the translator, it is possible to
understand why he translated as he did, for ב prefixed to a beast of burden is
not the most common way for the Hebrew Bible to speak of mounts (It occurs of
chariots at 2 Kgs 9.21, 24[?], 10.16, Jer. 17.25, 27.4 and of animals in Jer.
17.25, 22.4, 1 Chron. 12.40 and Est. 8.10). Rather, we more often find that a
person rides upon (על-) a beast or vehicle, or that he simply rides (רכב) an
animal (for על- + a substantive [or pronoun with antecedent animal- or
vehicle-substantive, cf. Judg. 4.15, 2 Sam. 13.29, 18.9, 1 Kgs 20.20, 2 Kgs
14.20, Isa. 30.16, 31.3, 36.8, Jer. 6.23, 50.42, Hos. 14.4, Eccl. 10.7 and 2
Chron. 25.28 and 35.24. For רכב על- specifically, cf. Isa. 36.8, Hab. 3.8,
Zech. 1.8 and Est. 6.8, 9. For רכב + a direct object, cf. 2 Kgs 7.14, 9.18 and
2 Kgs 9.19. For ב + substantive, Isa. 66.20, Jer. 17.25, 22.4. Ezek. 23.6, 12,
23, 38.15, Amos 2.15 and Est. 8.10).
Furthermore, there are examples of
ב + a beast of vehicle where the idea is manifestly one of exchange or
accompaniment, the latter of which corresponds to the LXX translator’s
understanding in the verse under consideration (exchange: Gen. 47.17. Accompaniment:
Exod. 15.19, 2 Kgs 5.9, Isa. 22.6, Ezek. 26.7 [translated μεθ’ ιππων, as Isa. 66.20], where the
plurals make it impossible that this was vehicular beth. Other instrumental
uses: 2 Kgs 29.23 [K], Hos. 1.7 and Dan. 11.40). Additionally, there are several
passages where some combination of beats, chariots and carts was indeed part of
a list of gifts presented as a מנחה or קרבן, again matching the LXX
interpretation of our verse (Num. 7.3, 1 Kgs 10.25 and 2 Chron. 9.24). (David A. Baer, When We All Go Home:
Translation and Theology in LXX Isaiah 56-66 [Journal for the Study of the
Old Testament Supplement Series 318; The Hebrew Bible and its Versions 1;
Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001], 248-49)
