Tuesday, August 15, 2023

Note on Symmachus and his Translation Methodology

  

Little is known of the biography of Symmachus. He worked in the first half of the third century, or perhaps the second century. He is sometimes identified with the Ebionites—a Christian group who observed the practices of Judaism—though he is more likely to have been a Jew. The revision of Symmachus “combined the best Biblical Greek style, remarkable clarity, a high degree of accuracy regarding the Hebrew, and the rabbinic exegesis of his day.” Generally speaking Symmachus translates ad sensum, while nonetheless attempting to reflect the Hebrew as precisely as he is able to. (Hector M. Patmore, Adam, Satan, and the King of Tyre: The Interpretation of Ezekiel 28:11-19 in Late Antiquity [Jewish and Christian Perspectives 20; Leiden: Brill, 2012], 182)