Sunday, April 28, 2024

Edmon L. Gallagher on Origen's Charges that the LXX Translators May Have Intentionally Altered Some Texts

  

Origen thinks that the Seventy have changed (εναλλασσω; Sel. Ps. 42:3; PG 12.1420d) the grammatical tense from future to past in several messianic prophecies in the Psalms. He observes that the LXX and Theodotion put everything in the past, whereas Aquila makes some things past and some future, and Symmachus makes everything future. ‘Εθος γαρ τοις Εβδομηκοντα πολλακις τας περι Χριστου προφητειας ως ηδη γενομενας απαγγελλειν (“For it is the custom of the Seventy often to announce the prophecies concerning Christ as if they had already happened”). Origen goes on to ascribe this custom to the Seventy’s desire to depict God as omniscient (Sel. Ps. 2:1; PG 12.1104c). The other translators speak σαφεστερον (“more clearly”) because they render these verbs with future tenses (Sel. Ps. 42:3; PG 12.1420d). The change Origen envisions is rather small and, by his own admission, not universal, for he notes that the Seventy translate some messianic prophecies with the future tense (e.g. Isa. 52:13; cf. Sel. Ps. 2:1; PG 12.1104d). Yet, if readers of the LXX interpret the tenses as Origen does (i.e., as displaying God’s omniscience), it is a change that would edify their faith.

 

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The changes that Origen attributes to the Seventy translators constitute providentially guided alterations that point toward a sense beyond the literal. At the same time, they are very limited in scale, consisting of the substitution of a single word, or merely a tense, or at the most omitting a few words. Nevertheless, the only change that Origen confidently attributes to the Seventy is that of the tense of some prophecies, whereas the other proposed changes are only possibilities that could have other explanations. Origen allows that the Seventy translators did not always adhere strictly to the text before them, but he actually invokes this option rather infrequently. (Edmon L. Gallagher, Hebrew Scripture in Patristic Biblical Theology: Canon, Language, Text [Supplements to Vigilae Christianae 114; Leiden: Brill, 2012], 183-84, 185)

 

The MT of Ps. 3:8 (Eng.: 3:7) contains the phrase כי הכית את כל איבי לחי (“for you have struck all my enemies on the cheek”), for which the LXX has οτι συ επαταξας παντας τους εχθραινοντας μοι ματαιως   (“for you struck all those hostile to me without cause”). Origen wonders about the difference between “cheek” (לחי) in the Hebrew text, as reflected in the newer Greek translations, and “without cause” (ματαιως) in the LXX (Sel. Ps. 3:8; PG 12.1129b–c). Some ‘Εβραιοι have suggested to him that the Hebrew text itself may have changed, but he also considers the possibility that the Seventy intentionally altered the text: η [sc. εικος εστι] το ευτελες περιισταμενους τους Εβδομηκοντα της λαξεως, τετολμηκεναι αντι του σιαγοναποιησαι ματαιως’ (“or [it is possible] that the Seventy, avoiding the poverty of the letter, have dared to put ‘without cause’ instead of ‘cheek’”). In any case, he accepts the LXX reading and proceeds to interpret it. His suggestion that the Seventy ‘dared’ to replace ‘cheek’ with ‘without cause’ attributes to the translators the motive of ‘avoiding the poverty of the letter’ (το ευτελες περιισταμενοι [. . .] της λαξεως). Here, λαξεις does not refer only to the words ‘cheek’ and ‘without cause’ but to literalism as opposed to the more spiritual ways of reading texts. The Seventy have produced a good interpretation of the OT not because they found fault with the Hebrew text but because they eschewed rendering it literalistically (at least, in this case). For this reason, their translation is rich (not ευτελης) in meaning. (Ibid., 184)