The Septuagint Fallacy Exposed

Nearly Two Thousand Years of Testimony That the LXX
Has Never Been a Fixed Text, But Only a Name Applied
to Diverse, Corrupt, and Ever-Changing Greek Texts

by Stuart DiNenno

Introduction and Summary

The “Septuagint,” commonly abbreviated LXX, is the traditional name applied to the ancient Greek translations of the Hebrew Old Testament. The name derives from the Latin word for “seventy” and reflects an ancient tradition according to which seventy-two Jewish translators were brought to Alexandria, Egypt in the third century before Christ to translate the Pentateuch (the five books of the Law of Moses) into Greek. It is believed that many Jews in the ancient Mediterranean world who lived outside the land of Israel had adopted Greek as their everyday language and were no longer fluent in Hebrew, creating a need for Greek translations of the Scriptures. Although the traditional account of the Septuagint’s origin in Alexandria is fanciful and unlikely to have any factual basis, historians are reasonably certain that a Greek translation of the Law of Moses was made before the Christian era. It is also believed that other portions of the Hebrew Old Testament were translated into Greek before the first century by different hands. As these various translations accumulated, they came to collectively constitute the Greek Old Testament, and the name “Septuagint,” originally associated with the story of the translation of the Law of Moses by the Seventy, came to be applied much more broadly to the entire collection of Old Testament Greek texts.

The difficulty with the continued use of one name for this collection is that it can easily create a false impression of its history. “The Septuagint” is commonly spoken of as though it were one ancient Greek Old Testament, possessing a single textual identity and transmitted through the centuries in a substantially stable form. This is far from the truth. Henry Barclay Swete (1835–1917), the Anglican Septuagint specialist, stated the historical reality more accurately: “Strictly speaking … [it] is not a single version, but a series of versions produced at various times and by translators whose ideals were not altogether alike.” The evidence gathered in this article shows not only that the so-called Septuagint originated as a disparate body of Greek translations, but also that these diverse texts were subsequently subjected to extensive corruption and alteration during their transmission over the course of time. What was transmitted under the name “Septuagint” was never one pure, fixed, and stable text at any point in its history, and it became progressively more corrupted through successive ages.

To demonstrate the point, this article brings together seventy-two later witnesses spanning nearly two thousand years. They include Christian writers and biblical scholars from the early church through the modern era who examined the origin, transmission, revision, corruption, and textual condition of the Greek Old Testament commonly called the Septuagint. They represent widely differing periods and churches, as well as different scholarly traditions. Some devoted substantial portions of their careers to studying and editing the Greek texts.

These witnesses were not selected because they all held the same theological position or were uniformly hostile to the LXX. Some valued the ancient Greek translation highly, while others judged it severely. They also differed over how much of its earliest form could still be recovered. Their disagreements have been retained rather than concealed. What gives their testimony weight is that men separated by centuries, nations, churches, and methods nevertheless converge upon the same broad historical facts.

Their testimony shows that the books grouped under the name “Septuagint” did not constitute one uniform Greek translation produced at one time. They also show that the Greek texts suffered corruption and alteration in transmission, that differing forms became mixed together, and that later scholars repeatedly sought to recover earlier forms of texts that had not been preserved in a pure and fixed condition.

The case therefore does not rest upon isolated textual mistakes or upon the opinion of one school of scholarship. Individual examples of textual errors are singled out in the entries that follow, but the principal argument rests upon broad historical judgments made by a large and diverse body of witnesses. Their testimony concerns both the uncertain identity of what was called the Septuagint and the deterioration of its constituent Greek texts during transmission.

Evidence of textual alteration appears almost immediately in the surviving Christian record. In the middle of the second century, Justin Martyr (100–165) charged that “many passages of Scripture” had been removed by the Jews from the Greek translation associated with the elders under Ptolemy. He further stated concerning one disputed passage that “it was only a short time ago that they cut these things out.” Whatever judgment is made concerning Justin’s particular examples, his testimony is important for the history of the Septuagint tradition: by the second century, a prominent Christian writer already believed that the Greek text associated with the Seventy had suffered deliberate alteration.

In the following century, Origen (185–253), one of the most important figures in the textual history of the Greek Old Testament, spoke explicitly of “the disagreement among the copies.” The differences were serious enough that he regarded some Septuagint readings as doubtful and attempted to deal with the problem by comparison with other Greek versions and by marking additions and omissions with critical signs.

Jerome (347–420) described the commonly circulating Septuagint as “an old corrupted edition.” Elsewhere he said that the “genuine and ancient translation” had been “corrupted and violated,” complained of material “corrupted through the fault of copyists,” and described substantially different Greek forms circulating in different regions. His testimony is among the earliest and clearest evidence that the Greek Old Testament known to the church had already become debased and existed in substantially differing textual forms.

The same recognition continued through the Middle Ages. The Dominican cardinal Hugh of Saint-Cher (1190–1263), while discussing the Greek-derived biblical tradition, referred directly to “many corruptions,” attributing them to defective copies as well as deficiencies in translation. Roger Bacon, the Correctorium Vaticanum, Gérard de Huy, and other medieval witnesses likewise reflect concern with faulty translation, corruption, correction, and the difficulty of recovering a sound Greek form. Medieval scholars recognized that the Septuagint tradition had suffered much corruption and required correction.

By the Reformation period, some scholars expressed still more radical doubts concerning the identity of the Greek texts circulating under the ancient name. William Whitaker (1548–1595), the English Reformed controversialist, said that the sounder judgment was that “the true Septuagint is wholly lost” and that the Greek version then extant was “a mixed and miserably corrupted document.” He later concluded that it was either no longer the work originally produced by the Seventy or had been “so infinitely and shamefully corrupted that it is now of exceedingly slight authority.”

The Flemish Reformed scholar Johannes Drusius (1550–1616), who devoted extensive attention to the ancient Greek translations, was equally direct. He wrote that he believed no knowledgeable person in his day doubted that “the translation commonly found among the Greeks is not that of the Seventy interpreters.” He spoke of “innumerable passages” displaying serious deficiencies and concluded emphatically: “He who does not see this in that edition sees nothing.” Amandus Polanus, Andrew Willet, and other Reformed writers of the period reached similar conclusions concerning the difference between the ancient translation associated with the Seventy and the Greek texts then in circulation.

James Ussher (1581–1656), Church of Ireland archbishop and one of the most learned Protestant scholars of the seventeenth century, likewise maintained that “the primitive interpretation of the Seventy Elders has completely perished” and that the Greek received under their name was “plainly different from it.” Edward Leigh (1602–1671), an English Reformed writer, similarly described the extant Greek as “full of corruptions,” repeated the judgment that “the true Seventy is lost,” and characterized what survived under that name as “mixed and miserably corrupted.” John Gregory and John Lightfoot likewise regarded what was being called the Septuagint in their time as a composite and degraded body of texts, shaped by mixture and alteration to such an extent that its relationship to the earliest Greek translations had become deeply uncertain.

Not every witness concluded that the primitive Septuagint had disappeared altogether. Some believed that substantial portions of the ancient translation remained recoverable. But even writers who rejected the strongest claims of complete loss repeatedly acknowledged extensive corruption and alteration, as well as the intermixture of differing Greek forms. The disagreement was over how much of the ancient text could still be recovered, not over whether serious textual disturbance had occurred.

The repeated correction of the Greek texts themselves was recognized as evidence of their degradation. The Lutheran theologian Johann Gerhard (1582–1637), after noting the corrections associated with Origen, Lucian, Hesychius, and Jerome during the first ages of the New Testament church, asked: “And who would believe that, when during the first three hundred years it had contracted corruptions, it remained uncorrupted during the remaining thirteen hundred years?”

The Roman Catholic cardinal Robert Bellarmine (1542–1621), despite maintaining a high view of the original LXX translators, reasoned in essentially the same way. After observing that the Greek text had repeatedly been corrected, he stated the obvious principle that “nothing is corrected unless it had previously been corrupted.” He then questioned how a text which had already accumulated so many defects in its early centuries could reasonably be supposed to have remained intact thereafter. Sixtus of Siena and other Roman Catholic writers also acknowledged serious defects in the Greek tradition without abandoning a high regard for the ancient translation itself.

The Lutheran theologians Johann Andreas Quenstedt (1617–1688) and Abraham Calov (1612–1686) were still more severe. Quenstedt said that the Greek version “abounds with many errors and corruptions” and spoke of “the innumerable errors with which the present Greek version of the Seventy is filled.” Calov likewise said that it “abounds in errors” and, describing its transmitted condition, declared that “everything is confused in the edition of the Septuagint.” Lutherans August Pfeiffer and Johann Gottlob Carpzov also wrote of extensive deterioration and the need to distinguish the received Greek texts from their earlier forms.

The English Puritan theologian John Owen (1616–1683) wrote that “nothing almost is manifest concerning it but that it is wofully corrupt.” He distinguished defects attributable to the early Greek translators from the “innumerable corruptions and interpolations” subsequently introduced into the text. Elsewhere he said that the Greek had been “corrupted and gone off from the original in a thousand places twice told,” calling it a “corrupt stream.” Henry Owen in the next century, along with other English writers, likewise treated pollution and alteration of the Greek texts as established facts.

Francis Turretin (1623–1687), the Genevan Reformed theologian, supplied one of the strongest descriptions in the collection. He wrote that the Septuagint was “not possessed today in a pure form, but has been wonderfully corrupted and interpolated,” and continued: “we have only its ruins and remnants, so that it can now scarcely be called the version of the Septuagint.” Johann Heinrich Hottinger, Franciscus Junius, and Bernardinus De Moor made closely related judgments concerning the defective condition of the transmitted Greek texts.

These statements did not arise from one theological party. Writers from sharply differing churches and scholarly traditions repeatedly acknowledged the same underlying historical problem, even when they differed over its extent or consequences.

Another major difficulty was mixture. The texts transmitted under the name “Septuagint” did not merely accumulate ordinary copying mistakes. Readings from other Greek translations and from differing revised forms entered the tradition, and distinctions between those forms became increasingly difficult to recover.

Humphrey Hody (1659–1707), an Anglican scholar who defended substantial continuity between the surviving Greek and the ancient Septuagint, nevertheless stated that the principal Greek forms had become “so thoroughly confused and intermixed with one another by copyists that the distinction between them almost entirely disappeared.” His testimony is especially significant because he was not attempting to discredit the LXX. Even a defender of its substantial continuity acknowledged deep mixture within its transmission. John Ernest Grabe, Lambert Bos, and other scholars of the same broad period likewise devoted substantial effort to disentangling competing Greek forms and readings.

John Pearson (1613–1686), Anglican bishop and theologian, acknowledged that the Septuagint had been “corrupted and violated” and that its “former purity” had to be “restored and recovered.” He also observed that major Greek editions “differ greatly from one another.” Pearson’s language leaves no doubt that he regarded the received Greek texts as substantially degraded and altered, and therefore as requiring textual restoration rather than being accepted in their existing forms.

By the eighteenth century, the problem had become the object of large-scale critical work. Robert Holmes (1748–1805), an Anglican clergyman who spent years collecting and comparing Septuagint readings, described the genuine text as dispersed among differing copies, with “more or less of omission or interpolation in every one.” His work illustrates the condition of the Greek textual tradition: earlier readings had to be sought by comparison because the transmitted text had become widely altered. Sebastian Seemiller, Johann David Michaelis, Johann Gottfried Eichhorn, and others likewise examined the history of corruption and revision within the Greek tradition.

Alfred Rahlfs (1865–1935), the German Protestant editor whose work became foundational for modern printed editions of the Greek Old Testament, stated that “the original text of the Septuagint degenerated in the course of time.” His editorial goal was to seek “the oldest attainable text.” That aim itself presupposed a history of textual alteration and the need to distinguish earlier readings from later ones. Other Protestant scholars, such as Henry Barclay Swete, Richard Rusden Ottley, and Henry St. John Thackeray also described the Greek Old Testament as a varied and historically altered textual tradition rather than one uniform translation transmitted unchanged.

William Henry Green (1825–1900), the American Presbyterian theologian and Old Testament scholar, also belongs among the stronger later witnesses. He rejected the notion that apostolic use of the Septuagint validated its inaccuracies, stating that such use “by no means sanction[s] its inaccuracies.” His treatment of the subject reflects the same distinction repeatedly found throughout this collection: antiquity and use do not convert the defects of a human translation into authority.

Joseph Ziegler (1902–1988), a German Roman Catholic priest and one of the principal twentieth-century Septuagint editors, acknowledged that “Some corruptions have obscured the entire manuscript tradition and can be restored only by conjecture.” He further admitted that in difficult cases “Complete certainty can never be attained.”

John William Wevers (1919–2010), the Presbyterian Septuagint scholar and one of the foremost modern editors of the Greek books of Moses, likewise warned that even a scholarly critical text “is not … the original text.” He described the complete restoration of a text free from later readings as “an impossible but laudable goal.” Anglican Sidney Jellicoe (1906–1973) and other modern Septuagint specialists likewise recognized the corruption and unstable transmission of the Greek tradition.

These modern statements are especially significant because they come from scholars who devoted much of their professional lives to editing and studying the Septuagint. Yet their work still proceeds by comparing divergent witnesses, identifying later readings, distinguishing revised forms, and attempting to recover earlier forms of the Greek texts.

The cumulative force of nearly two thousand years of testimony is difficult to evade. Justin Martyr charged that passages had been removed by the Jews from the Greek translation associated with the Seventy. Origen encountered disagreement among the copies. Jerome described an adulterated common edition and substantially divergent Greek forms circulating in different regions. Medieval scholars recognized degeneration and defective translation. Reformation and post-Reformation theologians described the transmitted Greek as mixed, altered, corrupted, interpolated, or no longer identifiable with the primitive Septuagint. Later editors and textual scholars continued trying to recover earlier forms of Greek texts whose history they acknowledged to be marked by alteration and mixture.

The witnesses do not all make precisely the same claims. They differed over the faults of the early translators and over how much of the earliest Greek text could still be recovered. Some nevertheless continued to value the LXX.

That continued regard for the Septuagint does not remove the textual problems they acknowledged. A text may be ancient and valuable for historical study while still containing mistranslations, having undergone alteration in transmission, having been mixed with other forms, and presenting serious uncertainty as to its earlier Greek wording. The question addressed by this collection is not whether ancient Greek translations of the Old Testament existed or whether they may be studied profitably. They certainly did, and they certainly may.

The question is whether the Greek Old Testament transmitted under the name “Septuagint” can truthfully be represented as one ancient, uniform, trustworthy, and continuously preserved text. The historical testimony assembled here shows that it cannot.

The name “Septuagint” remained fixed. The Greek texts represented by that name did not. Their history was marked by repeated alteration and mixture, producing competing forms whose relationships had to be investigated and whose earlier readings had to be sought by comparing differing manuscripts and other evidence.

Readers who do not wish to examine all seventy-two entries may obtain a strong and representative sampling of the evidence by reading 1. Justin Martyr, 3. Jerome, 10. Hugh of Saint-Cher, 11. Roger Bacon, 18. Peter Martyr Vermigli, 23. William Whitaker, 24. Johannes Drusius, 27. James Ussher, 28. Johann Gerhard, 35. John Owen, 36. Johann Andreas Quenstedt, 38. Francis Turretin, 41. Humphrey Hody, 49. Robert Holmes, 61. William Henry Green, 64. Henry Barclay Swete, 68. Alfred Rahlfs, 70. Joseph Ziegler, 71. Sidney Jellicoe, and 72. John William Wevers. Together these twenty witnesses provide a broad cross section of the nearly two thousand years of evidence summarized above.

Dates of birth and death are approximate where the historical evidence does not permit exact dating.

The Witnesses:

1. Justin Martyr (100–165)

Justin Martyr provides exceptionally early Christian testimony that the Greek Old Testament associated with the Seventy had been deliberately altered after its translation. He defends the original translators, while accusing later Jewish teachers of rejecting their work and removing passages from it.

Removal of Passages from the Translation of the Seventy

In Dialogue with Trypho 71, Justin writes:

Ἀλλ’ οὐχὶ τοῖς διδασκάλοις ὑμῶν πείθομαι, μὴ συντιθεμένοις καλῶς ἐξηγῆσθαι τοῖς παρὰ Πτολεμαίῳ τῷ Αἰγυπτίων γενομένῳ βασιλεῖ ἑβδομήκοντα πρεσβυτέροις, ἀλλ’ αὐτοὶ ἐξηγεῖσθαι πειρῶνται. Καὶ ὅτι πολλὰς γραφὰς τέλεον περιεῖλον ἀπὸ τῶν ἐξηγήσεων τῶν γεγενημένων ὑπὸ τῶν παρὰ Πτολεμαίῳ γεγενημένων πρεσβυτέρων, ἐξ ὧν διαρρήδην οὗτος αὐτὸς ὁ σταυρωθεὶς ὅτι θεὸς καὶ ἄνθρωπος καὶ σταυρούμενος καὶ ἀποθνήσκων κεκήρυκται ἀποδεικνύεται, εἰδέναι ὑμᾶς βούλομαι.

Translation: “But I do not believe your teachers, who do not agree that the seventy elders who were with Ptolemy, the king of the Egyptians, translated correctly, but instead attempt to translate for themselves. And I wish you to know that they completely removed many passages of Scripture from the translations made by the elders who were with Ptolemy, from which this very man who was crucified is expressly demonstrated to have been proclaimed as God and man, and as being crucified and dying.”

The crucial statement is:

πολλὰς γραφὰς τέλεον περιεῖλον ἀπὸ τῶν ἐξηγήσεων τῶν γεγενημένων ὑπὸ τῶν παρὰ Πτολεμαίῳ γεγενημένων πρεσβυτέρων

Translation: “They completely removed many passages of Scripture from the translations made by the elders who were with Ptolemy.”

The accusation is explicit: passages had been removed from the translation made by the elders associated with Ptolemy.

Esdras and Jeremiah

In chapter 72 Justin gives examples of passages he believed had been removed, including material attributed to Esdras and Jeremiah. Concerning one passage from Jeremiah, he writes:

ἔτι ἐστὶν ἐγγεγραμμένη ἔν τισιν ἀντιγράφοις τῶν ἐν συναγωγαῖς Ἰουδαίων (πρὸ γὰρ ὀλίγου χρόνου ταῦτα ἐξέκοψαν)

Translation: “It is still written in some copies in the synagogues of the Jews (for it was only a short time ago that they cut these things out).”

Justin believed, then, that the disputed passage still survived in some manuscript copies because its removal had occurred only recently. The word ἀντίγραφα means simply “copies”; he does not specify the language of these particular synagogue manuscripts. The statement occurs, however, among the examples offered in support of his charge in chapter 71 that passages had been removed from the translation of the Seventy.

Assessment

Justin’s testimony is important because it dates from the middle of the second century and expressly charges that “many passages of Scripture” had been removed from the translation made by the elders associated with Ptolemy. He supports the charge with particular examples and says that one disputed passage could still be found “in some copies.”

Whether the passages Justin cites ever belonged to the original translation is a separate historical question. For the purpose of this collection, his testimony establishes that at a remarkably early date a prominent Christian writer believed that the Greek Old Testament tradition associated with the Seventy had suffered deliberate textual alteration.

Citation: Justin Martyr, Dialogus cum Tryphone 71–72; Miroslav Marcovich, ed., Iustini Martyris Dialogus cum Tryphone, Patristische Texte und Studien 47 (Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter, 1997).

2. Origen (185–253)

Origen was an early Christian theologian, biblical commentator, and one of the most important figures in the textual history of the Greek Old Testament. His Hexapla placed several Greek versions of the Old Testament in parallel columns. In his Commentary on Matthew, he explicitly describes disagreement among copies of the Septuagint and explains how he attempted to remedy it.

“The Disagreement Among the Copies”

Origen writes:

τὴν μὲν οὖν ἐν τοῖς ἀντιγράφοις τῆς παλαιᾶς διαθήκης διαφωνίαν, θεοῦ διδόντος, εὕρομεν ἰάσασθαι, κριτηρίῳ χρησάμενοι ταῖς λοιπαῖς ἐκδόσεσιν· τῶν γὰρ ἀμφιβαλλομένων παρὰ τοῖς οʹ διὰ τὴν τῶν ἀντιγράφων διαφωνίαν, τὴν κρίσιν ποιησάμενοι ἀπὸ τῶν λοιπῶν ἐκδόσεων, τὸ συνᾷδον ἐκείναις ἐφυλάξαμεν· καὶ τινα μὲν ὠβελίσαμεν ἐν τῷ Ἑβραϊκῷ μὴ κείμενα, οὐ τολμῶντες αὐτὰ πάντη περιελεῖν, τινὰ δὲ μετ᾽ ἀστερίσκων προσεθήκαμεν· ἵνα δῆλον ᾖ ὅτι μὴ κείμενα παρὰ τοῖς οʹ ἐκ τῶν λοιπῶν ἐκδόσεων συμφώνως τῷ Ἑβραϊκῷ προσεθήκαμεν, καὶ ὁ μὲν βουλόμενος προῆται αὐτά· ᾧ δὲ προσκόπτει τὸ τοιοῦτον, ὃ βούλεται περὶ τῆς παραδοχῆς αὐτῶν ἢ μὴ ποιήσῃ.

Translation: “As for the disagreement among the copies of the Old Testament, with God’s help we found a way to remedy it, using the other editions as a criterion. For in those passages of the Septuagint which were doubtful because of the disagreement among the copies, we made a judgment from the other editions and retained what agreed with them. Some passages we marked with an obelus because they were not found in the Hebrew, not daring to remove them altogether; and others we added with asterisks, so that it might be clear that they were not found in the Septuagint, but that we had added them from the other editions in agreement with the Hebrew; and whoever wishes may accept them, while whoever objects to such a thing may decide as he wishes concerning whether to accept them or not.”

Origen twice refers to “the disagreement among the copies.” The Septuagint manuscripts available to him contained readings sufficiently divergent that he considered some passages doubtful and attempted to remedy the problem by consulting other Greek editions. He also distinguished material that he believed did not belong to the Septuagint from material that he supplied to it from other Greek versions.

Assessment

Origen provides direct third-century testimony that the Septuagint existed in differing manuscript forms requiring textual correction. His statement is particularly valuable because he is not making a general accusation against the Septuagint; he is describing a textual problem encountered in his own work. The copies disagreed, some readings were doubtful because of those disagreements, and his solution required comparison with other Greek editions and the use of critical signs to distinguish different kinds of textual material.

Citation: Origen, Commentarium in Matthaeum 15.14; Erich Klostermann and Ernst Benz, eds., Origenes Werke, vol. 10, Origenes Matthäuserklärung I: Die griechisch erhaltenen Tomoi, GCS 40 (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1935).

3. Jerome (347–420)

Jerome was a fourth- and fifth-century Christian theologian, biblical commentator, and translator. His writings contain some of the clearest early testimony concerning the textual condition of the Greek Old Testament. He describes the commonly circulating Septuagint as corrupted, speaks of corruption introduced by copyists, identifies additions and omissions, and describes different Greek forms circulating in different regions.

Letter 106 — The Corrupted Common Edition

In Letter 106 to Sunnia and Fretela, Jerome describes the commonly circulating Greek edition:

Κοινὴ autem ista, hoc est communis, editio ipsa est, quae et Septuaginta. Sed hoc interest inter utramque, quod κοινὴ pro locis et temporibus et pro voluntate scriptorum vetus corrupta editio est.

Translation: “Now this κοινή, that is, the common edition, is itself the Septuagint. But this is the difference between the two: the κοινή, according to places and times and according to the activity of the copyists, is an old corrupted edition.”

Jerome contrasts this with the Septuagint text contained in Origen’s Hexapla:

Ea autem, quae habetur in Ἑξαπλοῖς et quam nos vertimus, ipsa est, quae in eruditorum libris incorrupta et immaculata Septuaginta interpretum translatio reservatur.

Translation: “But that which is contained in the Hexapla, and which we translated, is the very translation of the Septuagint which is preserved in the books of learned men uncorrupted and undefiled.”

Jerome therefore distinguishes the critically corrected Hexaplaric form from the commonly circulating Greek edition, which he expressly calls an “old corrupted edition.”

Citation: Jerome, Epistula 106.2.3–4.

Prologue to Job — Omission and Scribal Corruption

In his Prologue to Job, Jerome describes readings in the older textual tradition as:

aut obscura sunt, aut omissa, aut certe scriptorum vitio depravata

Translation: “Either obscure, or omitted, or certainly corrupted through the fault of copyists.”

He describes the work of correction as:

omissa repetere, depravata corrigere

Translation: “To restore what was omitted and to correct what was corrupted.”

Jerome thus distinguishes omissions from corruption introduced through the activity of copyists.

Citation: Jerome, Praefatio in Librum Iob.

Preface to the Psalms — A Corrected Psalter Corrupted Again

Jerome relates that while at Rome he had previously corrected the Psalter according to the Septuagint, only to find that corruption had again entered the text:

Psalterium Romae dudum positus emendaram, et iuxta Septuaginta interpretes… correxeram. Ecce vobis iterum… scriptorum vitio depravatum, plusque antiquum errorem quam novam emendationem valere conspicitis.

Translation: “Long ago, while I was at Rome, I had corrected the Psalter, and had corrected it according to the Septuagint translators…. Behold, you see it again corrupted through the fault of copyists, and that ancient error has greater force than recent correction.”

This provides direct testimony to the recurrence of textual corruption in transmission: a Psalter Jerome says he had already corrected according to the Septuagint had subsequently become corrupted again through copying.

Citation: Jerome, Praefatio in Psalterium iuxta Hebraeos.

Letter 57 — Additions and Omissions

In Letter 57 to Pammachius, Jerome makes a sweeping statement about additions and omissions:

Longum est nunc evolvere, quanta Septuaginta de suo addiderint, quanta dimiserint.

Translation: “It would take too long now to recount how much the Septuagint added of its own, and how much it omitted.”

He indicates the extent of such differences:

si proferre nitamur, infinitis libris opus est.

Translation: “If we attempted to set them forth, innumerable books would be required.”

This is particularly useful because Jerome does not merely identify individual disputed readings. He makes a general judgment concerning the extent of additions and omissions that he attributed to the Septuagint.

Citation: Jerome, Epistula 57.11; CSEL 54, pp. 522–523.

Prologue to Chronicles — The Ancient Translation “Corrupted and Violated”

In his Prologue to Chronicles, Jerome gives one of his broadest judgments concerning the transmitted Greek text:

germana illa antiquaque translatio corrupta sit atque violata

Translation: “That genuine and ancient translation has been corrupted and violated.”

He then describes different forms of the Greek text associated with different regions: the text of Hesychius in Alexandria and Egypt, that of Lucian from Constantinople to Antioch, and the form associated with Origen and circulated by Eusebius and Pamphilus in Palestine. He concludes:

totusque orbis hac inter se trifaria varietate compugnat.

Translation: “And the whole world is at variance through this threefold diversity.”

Jerome thus describes not merely isolated errors but a broader condition in which the ancient translation had become “corrupted and violated” and substantially different forms circulated in different regions.

Citation: Jerome, Prologus in Paralipomena.

Assessment

Jerome is one of the strongest early witnesses in the collection because his statements are predominantly broad judgments rather than observations about isolated readings. He calls the commonly circulating Septuagint an “old corrupted edition,” says that the “genuine and ancient translation” had been “corrupted and violated,” describes corruption caused by copyists, says that the Septuagint “added of its own” and omitted so much that recounting the differences would require “innumerable books,” and describes a threefold regional diversity in the transmitted Greek text.

His statements also distinguish two different sources of difficulty. Some additions and omissions he attributes to the Septuagint translation itself, while other corruption arose during subsequent transmission. At the same time, his description of the Hexaplaric form as “uncorrupted and undefiled” is an important qualification: Jerome does not indiscriminately condemn every form of the Greek Old Testament. His testimony is nevertheless explicit that the commonly circulating Greek tradition had become corrupted, varied according to place and time, and existed in substantially differing forms.

Citation: Jerome, Epistula 106.2.3–4; Praefatio in Librum Iob; Praefatio in Psalterium iuxta Hebraeos; Epistula 57.11, CSEL 54, pp. 522–523; Prologus in Paralipomena.

4. Theodore of Mopsuestia (350–428)

Theodore of Mopsuestia was a fourth- and fifth-century Christian theologian and biblical commentator. He generally valued the Septuagint highly and often preferred it to the other ancient Greek translations. His testimony is therefore particularly useful when he expressly acknowledges its shortcomings. In his commentary on the Psalms, he makes a broad judgment that the Seventy did not always translate better than their competitors, and in one especially important passage he alleges that later Christians actually altered the Greek text of a Psalm.

The Septuagint Sometimes Gives the Weaker Interpretation

While discussing the relative merits of the ancient Greek translations, Theodore gives substantial praise to the Septuagint but expressly qualifies that judgment:

“Not that everything is translated better by them: there are places, in fact, where they offer the weaker interpretation, and sometimes they fall short of the others, who said things more clearly and logically. But in general by comparison with the others they are found far superior, even if saying a good many things in a rather unfamiliar way.”

This is Theodore’s broadest useful judgment concerning the quality of the Septuagint. He does not condemn it as a whole; indeed, he generally considers it superior to the competing Greek translations. Nevertheless, he expressly denies that its renderings are invariably better and acknowledges that in some places it gives the weaker interpretation and “falls short” of the others.

Psalm 40 — A Greek Reading Altered by Later Christians

Theodore’s discussion of Psalm 40 is more important for the history of the transmitted Greek text. He believed that the Psalm originally read “ears you have prepared for me” and that the apostle, in Hebrews 10:5, intentionally adapted “ears” to “body” for the purpose of his argument. Theodore then charges that later Christians misunderstood what the apostle had done and altered the text of the Psalm itself:

“But those who had not understood the apostle’s purpose and intention wished to attach the psalm to Christ, and changed ‘ears you have prepared for me’—for so the Hebrew reads—and put ‘a body you have prepared for me,’ without attending to the reason for the apostle’s alteration.”

Theodore is not merely criticizing the original translation here. He is alleging subsequent deliberate alteration of a Greek Old Testament reading by Christians who wished to make the Psalm agree with the wording of Hebrews.

This is Theodore’s explanation of the textual history and need not be accepted as an independently established account of how the reading arose. Its importance is historical: Theodore believed that a Greek Old Testament text could be altered after its original translation and that such an alteration had actually occurred in Psalm 40.

Assessment

Theodore’s testimony is valuable precisely because his general attitude toward the Septuagint was favorable. He nevertheless expressly states that not everything was translated better by the Seventy, that in some places they give “the weaker interpretation,” and that they sometimes “fall short” of other Greek translators. He therefore did not regard the Septuagint as uniformly accurate.

More importantly for the history of textual transmission, Theodore believed that later Christians had altered the Greek wording of Psalm 40 from “ears” to “body” in order to make it correspond to Hebrews 10:5. His testimony thus encompasses two distinct problems: shortcomings which he attributed to the translation itself and a subsequent textual alteration which he attributed to later Christian transmitters.

Citation: Theodore of Mopsuestia, Commentary on the Psalms, Psalms 40 and 56; Robert Devreesse, ed., Le commentaire de Théodore de Mopsueste sur les Psaumes (I–LXXX), Studi e Testi 93 (Vatican City, 1939), especially pp. 247–248; Robert C. Hill, trans., Theodore of Mopsuestia: Commentary on Psalms 1–81 (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2006).

5. Theodoret of Cyrus (393–458)

Theodoret of Cyrus was a fifth-century Christian theologian and biblical commentator who held the Septuagint in high regard. His treatment of Jonah 3:4 is therefore significant because he believed that an erroneous reading had entered the Greek text through an early copying mistake and subsequently spread throughout the copies known to him.

An Early Copying Error Spread Through the Copies

The Greek text known to Theodoret said that Nineveh would be overthrown after “three days.” Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, the Syriac, and the Hebrew instead read “forty.” After comparing these witnesses, Theodoret writes:

Ταύτας δὲ καὶ ὁ Ἀκύλας, καὶ ὁ Σύμμαχος, καὶ ὁ Θεοδοτίων, τεσσαράκοντα ἔφασαν, συμφωνοῦσι δὲ τούτοις καὶ ὁ Σύρος, καὶ ὁ Ἑβραῖος· ἔχει δὲ καὶ τὸ εἰκὸς οὗτος ὁ ἀριθμός. Καὶ γὰρ τρισὶν ἡμέραις ποτὲ μὲν ἅπασαν ἐνόστησε τὴν πόλιν ὁ Ἰωνᾶς, ποτὲ δὲ τὴν μετάνοιαν τὴν ἐπίπονον ἐκείνην οἱ Νινευῖται τῷ Θεῷ προσενεγκόντες, τῆς παρ’ αὐτοῦ σωτηρίας ἀπήλαυσαν· ποτὲ δὲ πρὸ τῶν πυλῶν καθήμενος τὸ τῆς προφητείας ἀνέμενε τέλος. Διό μοι δοκεῖ τὸ τῶν τεσσαράκοντα ἡμερῶν ἀληθέστερον εἶναι. Εἰκὸς δὲ καὶ τοὺς Ἑβδομήκοντα σύμφωνον τοῖς ἄλλοις τεθεικέναι τὸν ἀριθμόν· τοὺς δὲ τὴν ἀρχὴν ἐγγραψαμένους ἁμαρτεῖν περὶ τοῦτο, εἶτα οὕτω γενέσθαι πάσῃ τῶν ἀντιγράφων τὴν ἔκδοσιν.

Translation: “But Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion said ‘forty,’ and with these agree both the Syriac and the Hebrew; and this number is also probable. For at one time Jonah traversed the whole city in three days; at another time the Ninevites, having offered that laborious repentance to God, obtained salvation from Him; and at another time, sitting before the gates, he awaited the fulfillment of the prophecy. Therefore it seems to me that the forty days is the truer reading. And it is probable that the Seventy also set down the number in agreement with the others, but that those who first copied it erred in this matter, and that in this way the reading came to be established throughout the copies.”

Theodoret therefore does not blame the Seventy themselves for the erroneous reading. He considers “forty days” the truer reading and supposes that the original translators probably also wrote “forty.” The reading “three days,” in his judgment, arose when the earliest copyists erred.

His final statement is particularly important:

τοὺς δὲ τὴν ἀρχὴν ἐγγραψαμένους ἁμαρτεῖν περὶ τοῦτο, εἶτα οὕτω γενέσθαι πάσῃ τῶν ἀντιγράφων τὴν ἔκδοσιν.

Translation: “But those who first copied it erred in this matter, and in this way the reading came to be established throughout the copies.”

The significance of the passage therefore extends beyond the single numerical discrepancy in Jonah 3:4. Theodoret believed that a scribal error introduced very early in the transmission of the Greek Old Testament could propagate so extensively that the erroneous reading became established throughout the copies represented by the Greek tradition available to him.

Assessment

Theodoret provides a specific rather than a broad judgment concerning the Septuagint, so his testimony should not be made to say more than it does. He does not accuse the original translators of error in Jonah 3:4. On the contrary, he attempts to vindicate them by supposing that they originally translated the number correctly.

Its importance lies instead in the textual history assumed by his explanation. Theodoret accepts the Hebrew, Syriac, Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion against the Septuagint reading known to him; declares “forty days” to be the truer reading; attributes the erroneous Greek reading to the earliest copyists; and believes that their mistake subsequently became established throughout the copies.

His testimony is especially useful because it demonstrates that a writer with a favorable view of the Septuagint could nevertheless believe that the transmitted Greek Old Testament had acquired an erroneous reading so early and so extensively that the correct reading had disappeared from the Septuagint copies available to him.

Citation: Theodoret of Cyrus, Interpretatio in XII Prophetas Minores, commentary on Jonah 3:4, Patrologia Graeca 81:1733–1736. Greek text translated directly above.

6. Cassiodorus (485–585)

Cassiodorus was a Roman statesman, scholar, and founder of the monastery at Vivarium in southern Italy. His Institutiones divinarum et saecularium litterarum, written for the monks of Vivarium, describes the collection, copying, comparison, and correction of biblical manuscripts. He valued and preserved the Septuagint tradition, but his description of its textual condition shows that he did not regard the form available to him as untouched or beyond correction.

The Septuagint Text Had Been Altered and Required Correction

In describing a biblical codex at Vivarium containing the Septuagint form of the Old Testament, Cassiodorus writes:

Hic textus multorum translatione variatus, sicut in prologo Psalterii positum est, patris Hieronymi diligenti cura emendatus compositusque relictus est.

Translation: “This text, having been altered through the work of many, as is stated in the prologue to the Psalter, was left corrected and arranged through the diligent care of Father Jerome.”

The important terms are variatus and emendatus: the text had been altered and subsequently corrected. Cassiodorus therefore describes a Septuagint textual tradition that had undergone changes requiring textual correction.

His wording should not be made stronger than it is. He does not call the text corruptus in this passage, nor does he say that the Septuagint had been “corrupted by many translators.” His more measured statement is that the text had been altered through the work of many and subsequently corrected by Jerome.

Biblical Texts Were to Be Corrected

Cassiodorus’s instructions for correcting biblical manuscripts further illustrate his approach to the textual tradition:

Quod si tamen aliqua verba reperiuntur absurde posita, aut ex his codicibus quos beatus Hieronymus in editione Septuaginta Interpretum emendavit, vel quos ipse ex Hebraeo transtulit, intrepide corrigenda sunt; aut, sicut beatus Augustinus ait, recurratur ad Graecum pandecten, qui omnem legem divinam dignoscitur continere collectam; vel quibus possibile fuerit, Hebraeam scripturam, vel eius doctores requirere non detrectent.

Translation: “But if any words are found absurdly placed, they should confidently be corrected either from those codices which blessed Jerome corrected in the edition of the Septuagint interpreters, or from those which he himself translated from the Hebrew; or, as blessed Augustine says, recourse should be had to the Greek pandect, which is known to contain the whole divine law collected together; or those for whom it is possible should not hesitate to seek out the Hebrew Scripture or its teachers.”

Cassiodorus thus treats biblical manuscripts as texts in which defective readings could occur and require correction. Particularly relevant is his reference to codices of the Septuagint edition that Jerome had already “corrected.”

Assessment

Cassiodorus is a measured rather than hostile witness. He valued the Septuagint and preserved its textual tradition at Vivarium. Yet he describes the Septuagint text available to him as variatus—altered—and emendatus—corrected—and refers to codices of the Septuagint edition that had required Jerome’s correction. His testimony therefore shows that a sixth-century Christian who highly esteemed the Greek Old Testament nevertheless regarded its transmitted text as capable of alteration and in need of textual correction.

Citation: Cassiodorus, Institutiones divinarum et saecularium litterarum I.14.3; I.15.20.

7. Bede the Venerable (672–735)

Bede the Venerable was an Anglo-Saxon monk, theologian, historian, and biblical commentator. In discussing chronological differences between the Greek and Hebrew forms of Genesis, he expressly attributes one significant discrepancy to corruption in the Greek codices. He also invokes Jerome’s broader testimony concerning corruption in the transmitted Septuagint.

“Corruption of the Greek Codices”

Discussing the chronological problem created by the Greek genealogy of Genesis, Bede writes:

Per hanc autem corruptionem Graecorum Codicum exoritur illa famosissima quaestio, ubi Mathusalem XIV annis vixisse post diluvium computatur, cum certum sit apud Hebraeos Codices eodem anno diluvii eum fuisse defunctum.

Translation: “Through this corruption of the Greek codices arises that famous question, in which Methuselah is reckoned to have lived fourteen years after the Flood, when it is certain from the Hebrew codices that he died in the same year as the Flood.”

Bede does not merely observe a difference between textual traditions. He expressly calls the condition responsible for the discrepancy a “corruption of the Greek codices.”

“Not the Hebrew but the Greek Codices” Were Falsified

Bede also considers the claim that the differences resulted from subsequent Jewish falsification of the Hebrew Scriptures. He rejects that explanation and appeals to Jerome:

Audiat beatum Hieronymum, quod non Hebraeos sed Graecos Codices dicat esse falsatos.

Translation: “Let him hear blessed Jerome, who says that it is not the Hebrew but the Greek codices that have been falsified.”

Bede then quotes Jerome’s broader description of what had happened to the Septuagint tradition:

Si Septuaginta interpretum pura, et ut ab eis in Graecum versa est Editio permaneret, superflue … impelleres, ut tibi Hebraea volumina Latino sermone transferrem.

Translation: “If the pure edition of the Seventy, as it was translated by them into Greek, had remained, you would have urged me in vain to translate the Hebrew volumes for you into the Latin language.”

He continues:

Nunc vero cum pro varietate regionum diversa ferantur exemplaria, et germana illa antiquaque translatio corrupta sit atque violata…

Translation: “But now, since different copies are circulated according to the diversity of regions, and that genuine and ancient translation has been corrupted and violated….”

The latter statements originate with Jerome, but Bede deliberately adduces them in support of his own argument. The testimony is broader than the individual chronological problem: different copies circulated in different regions, and the ancient translation itself was described as “corrupted and violated.”

Assessment

Bede’s strongest independent statement is his explicit reference to the “corruption of the Greek codices.” Although it arises from a particular chronological discrepancy, his language plainly attributes that discrepancy to textual corruption rather than merely to a different interpretation or translation.

His further testimony is partly derivative, since he relies upon Jerome. It nevertheless remains significant as evidence of how Jerome’s judgment was received and employed in the early Middle Ages. Bede expressly endorses the conclusion that the problem lay in the Greek codices and reproduces Jerome’s broader description of a Septuagint tradition in which different regional copies circulated and the “genuine and ancient translation” had become “corrupted and violated.”

Citation: Bede the Venerable, Epistola ad Pleguinam de aetatibus saeculi (commonly numbered Epistola III), in Bede’s discussion of the chronology of Genesis and the differences between the Greek and Hebrew textual traditions; cf. Jerome, Prologus in Paralipomena.

8. Peter Comestor (died 1178)

Peter Comestor was a twelfth-century theologian and author of the widely influential Historia Scholastica, a biblical history that became a standard work in medieval education. In discussing Daniel, he records an unusually strong judgment concerning the Septuagint version of that book: its text differed so greatly from the truth that the Church used Theodotion’s Greek version instead.

The Septuagint Daniel “Differed Greatly from the Truth”

Introducing the book of Daniel, Comestor writes:

Librum ejus transtulit Hieronymus ad petitionem Paulae et Eustochii cum magna difficultate. Scriptus enim erat Hebraicis litteris, sed Chaldaico sermone, nec legebatur ab Ecclesia secundum LXX, quia multum a veritate discordabat eorum editio, sed secundum Theodotionem.

Translation: “Jerome translated his book at the request of Paula and Eustochium with great difficulty. For it was written in Hebrew letters, but in the Chaldean language; nor was it read by the Church according to the Seventy, because their edition differed greatly from the truth, but according to Theodotion.”

The judgment is expressly limited to Daniel and should not be represented as Comestor’s verdict upon the entire Septuagint. Within that limitation, however, his language is unequivocal: multum a veritate discordabat eorum editio—the edition of the Seventy “differed greatly from the truth.” According to Comestor, the discrepancy was sufficiently serious that the Church read Daniel according to Theodotion instead.

Esther — “Corrupted in Greek through Various Editions”

Comestor makes another relevant statement when introducing Esther:

Librum Esther transtulit Hieronymus ad petitionem Paulae et Eustochii de Hebraeo in Latinum et quia in Graeco corruptus erat per varias editiones relevavit eum de archivis Hebraeorum, et diligenter transtulit de verbo ad verbum.

Translation: “Jerome translated the book of Esther at the request of Paula and Eustochium from Hebrew into Latin, and because it had been corrupted in Greek through various editions, he recovered it from the archives of the Hebrews and carefully translated it word for word.”

This statement is substantially dependent upon Jerome and therefore has less value as an independent judgment by Comestor. Nevertheless, the language is directly relevant to the textual history represented in the collection: a biblical book is described as having become “corrupted in Greek through various editions.”

Assessment

Comestor does not make a general condemnation of the Septuagint, and his strongest statement concerns one particular book. Nevertheless, his judgment concerning Daniel is unusually broad within that limitation: the Septuagint edition “differed greatly from the truth,” to such an extent that another Greek version was used by the Church instead. His statement concerning Esther adds a distinct textual point, describing that book as having been “corrupted in Greek through various editions.” Together the passages show a prominent medieval biblical writer accepting that Greek forms of individual Old Testament books could depart substantially from the true text and become corrupted through differing editions.

Citation: Peter Comestor, Historia Scholastica, Historia libri Danielis, opening section; Historia libri Esther, preface; in J.-P. Migne, Patrologia Latina, vol. 198.

9. Nicolaus Maniacoria (active in the twelfth century)

Nicolaus Maniacoria was a twelfth-century biblical scholar and textual critic who wrote extensively about errors arising in the copying and translation of Scripture. His Libellus de corruptione et correctione Psalmorum et aliarum quarundam scripturarum contains a broad argument that biblical texts transmitted through successive translations were especially liable to error and departure from their source.

Translations Through Greek Are “More Corrupt”

Nicolaus gives his broadest relevant judgment when explaining the consequences of transmitting a text through successive languages:

Ab eo enim fonte hauserunt Graeci, quae sunt postea propinata Latinis; quare mendosiores sunt translationes nostrae de Graeco sumptae translationibus de Hebraico editis, quia scilicet tertio deductae gradu, dum ab Hebraeis ad Graecos, a Graecis ad nos devenerunt. Quo magis per diversa ora devolutae sunt, eo a veritate amplius elongarunt.

Translation: “For the Greeks drew from that [Hebrew] fountain what was afterward passed on to the Latins; therefore our translations taken from the Greek are more corrupt than translations made from the Hebrew, because they are derived, as it were, in the third degree, having come from the Hebrews to the Greeks and from the Greeks to us. The more they have passed through different mouths, the farther they have departed from the truth.”

The statement is broader than an accusation concerning a particular mistranslated passage. Nicolaus argues that successive transmission itself increased the opportunity for textual deterioration: the more stages through which a translation passed, the farther it could depart from the truth.

He continues:

Praeterea multos habuisse leguntur expositores, qui translationes varias commiscentes et ad diversos sensus dicta extorquentes prophetica, addunt ad mendacia translatorum multa imponentes prophetis, quae nunquam venerunt in cor eorum.

Translation: “Moreover, they are said to have had many expositors who, mixing various translations and twisting the prophetic words to different meanings, add many things of their own to the falsehoods of the translators, attributing to the prophets things which never entered their minds.”

Particularly relevant is Nicolaus’s reference to translationes varias commiscentes—“mixing various translations.” His criticism therefore encompasses not merely errors made in translation but the subsequent mixture of differing translated forms.

Disagreeing Manuscripts Were Not to Be Treated as a Uniform Text

Nicolaus states a general principle for dealing with conflicting copies:

Cum ergo discordantia repereris exemplaria, ad linguam recurre unde translata sunt et de variantibus inter se voluminibus illi crede quem linguae de qua sumptum est invenies concordare.

Translation: “Therefore, when you find manuscripts disagreeing, return to the language from which they were translated, and among the volumes differing from one another, believe the one which you find agrees with the language from which it was taken.”

His language presupposes a textual situation involving discordantia exemplaria—disagreeing copies—and variantibus inter se voluminibus—volumes differing among themselves. Nicolaus therefore did not treat the translated biblical tradition available to him as textually uniform.

Assessment

Nicolaus does not explicitly name the Septuagint in his strongest statement, and his immediate subject is the Latin biblical tradition transmitted through Greek. He therefore should not be quoted as simply declaring that “the Septuagint is corrupt.”

His broader textual argument nevertheless bears directly upon Greek-mediated transmission. He says that translations derived through Greek are mendosiores—“more corrupt” or “more erroneous”—and that the more a text passes through successive stages, “the farther” it departs from the truth. He also speaks of the mixing of different translations and of manuscripts and volumes disagreeing among themselves. His testimony is therefore relevant not as a direct condemnation of the Septuagint as a whole, but as a medieval recognition of corruption, mixture, and textual variation within biblical traditions transmitted through Greek.

Citation: Nicolaus Maniacoria, Libellus de corruptione et correctione [also styled correptione] Psalmorum et aliarum quarundam scripturarum, Montpellier, Bibliothèque de l’École de Médecine, MS H294, fols. 144r–159v; Vittorio Peri, “Correctores immo corruptores. Un saggio di critica testuale nella Roma del XII secolo,” Italia Medioevale e Umanistica 20 (1977), pp. 88–125, especially pp. 92, 96–97; Cornelia Linde, ed., Nicolai Maniacoria Suffraganeus bibliothece, CCCM 262 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013).

10. Hugh of Saint-Cher (1190–1263)

Hugh of Saint-Cher (Hugo de Sancto Caro) was a French Dominican cardinal, theologian, and biblical commentator. His extensive Postillae in Bibliam, produced principally during the 1220s and 1230s, became one of the most widely transmitted biblical commentaries of the Middle Ages. His discussions of Jerome’s biblical prologues contain unusually explicit medieval testimony concerning errors in the Septuagint, corruption during transmission, differences among Greek copies, omissions and additions, and the mixture of readings from different Greek translations.

“Many Corruptions” in the Transmitted Text

In his exposition of Jerome’s prologue to the books of Moses, Hugh explains why a translation made directly from the Hebrew was necessary:

Sed quia multe corruptiones erant, ibi propter falsitatem exemplarium, et imperitiam Translatorum.

Translation: “But because there were many corruptions there, because of the falsity of the copies and the inexperience of the translators.”

He immediately applies the discussion to the Septuagint:

Ostendit autem in hac epistola HIERONYMUS septuaginta Interpretes, qui primo transtulerunt de Hebreo in Grecum, multa subticuisse de Hebraica veritate.

Translation: “Jerome shows in this epistle that the Septuagint interpreters, who first translated from Hebrew into Greek, suppressed many things from the Hebrew truth.”

Hugh therefore distinguishes two sources of defect: shortcomings in translation and corruption in transmission.

The Greek Translations Had Been Corrupted

In his exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Chronicles, Hugh names the translations of the Septuagint, Symmachus, Aquila, and Theodotion, then explains why Jerome translated anew:

Tamen quia ille corrupte fuerant, ideo iuxta fontem Hebraice veritatis hanc translationem edidit Chromatio.

Translation: “Nevertheless, because those had been corrupted, he therefore produced this translation for Chromatius according to the fountain of the Hebrew truth.”

His exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Isaiah gives the same judgment:

Sed quia iste translationes corrupte erant, necesse fuit, ut de ipso fonte Hebraice veritatis transferret eum Hieronymus in Latinum.

Translation: “But because these translations were corrupted, it was necessary for Jerome to translate it into Latin from the very fountain of the Hebrew truth.”

These are broad judgments concerning the condition of the Greek versions rather than isolated textual criticisms.

The Septuagint Had Not “Remained Uncorrupted”

In his exposition of Jerome’s second prologue to Chronicles, Hugh explains “pure” as:

Pura] id est incorrupta.

Translation: “‘Pure,’ that is, uncorrupted.”

He then states:

Comprobari] quasi dicat si translatio Septuaginta incorrupta mansisset, iustius esset.

Translation: “‘To approve’—as though he were saying: if the translation of the Septuagint had remained uncorrupted, it would have been more proper.”

When Jerome describes the ancient translation as “violated,” Hugh identifies the cause:

Violata] vitio scriptorum.

Translation: “‘Violated’—through the fault of copyists.”

Hugh thus expressly understands the Septuagint as a translation that had not remained uncorrupted and attributes part of its deterioration to scribal transmission.

Different Greek Copies and Mixture of Versions

Hugh also explains Jerome’s discussion of differing regional texts:

Ostendit, quod dixerat, scilicet quod diverse regiones diversa habebant exemplaria.

Translation: “He shows what he had said, namely, that different regions had different copies.”

He then describes Origen’s work with the ancient Greek versions:

Quatuor editionum] scilicet Septuaginta Symmachi, Aquile, Theodotionis. quasi dicat Origenes ex illis quatuor editionibus unam composuit.

Translation: “‘Of the four editions’—namely, the Septuagint, Symmachus, Aquila, and Theodotion; as though he were saying that Origen composed one from those four editions.”

Elsewhere he states even more directly:

qui Theodotionem miscuit cum Septuaginta et sic utramque corrupit.

Translation: “Who mixed Theodotion with the Septuagint and thus corrupted both.”

Hugh therefore understood the Greek textual history as involving not only differing copies but also deliberate correction and mixture between distinct Greek versions.

Omissions, Alterations, and Additions

Hugh explains Origen’s critical signs by reference to defects in the Septuagint:

Ubi SEPTUAGINTA aliquid omiserant, vel mutaverant de Hebraica veritate, ponebat asteriscum quasi dicat hic est defectus, et indiget lumine.

Translation: “Where the Septuagint had omitted something or had altered something from the Hebrew truth, he placed an asterisk, as though to say: here there is a deficiency and it needs illumination.”

He then describes the opposite problem:

Sed ubi SEPTUAGINTA aliquid de suo addiderant, quod non erat in Hebraica veritate, ponebat obelum, quasi dicat hic est aliquid superfluum, et iugulandum.

Translation: “But where the Septuagint had added something of its own which was not in the Hebrew truth, he placed an obelus, as though to say: here there is something superfluous and to be cut away.”

In his exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Joshua, Hugh similarly says Origen found:

multa vel deesse, vel superfluere.

Translation: “Many things either lacking or superfluous.”

Hugh thus recognizes omission, alteration, addition, and superfluous material within the Greek tradition.

“The Septuagint Erred in Some Places”

In his exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Ezekiel, Hugh draws the conclusion explicitly:

Mirum est quod alicubi sequuntur Hebraicam veritatem, alicubi non. Et nota quod Hieronymus hic innuit Septuaginta alicubi errasse.

Translation: “It is remarkable that in some places they follow the Hebrew truth and in others they do not. And note that Jerome here indicates that the Septuagint erred in some places.”

Hugh therefore did not indiscriminately reject the Septuagint. He could acknowledge where it agreed with the Hebrew while maintaining that it erred elsewhere.

Esther and Daniel

At Esther 10, Hugh states concerning material following what he understood to be the Hebrew ending of the book:

Non est de Hebraica veritate, sed additum est a Septuaginta.

Translation: “It is not from the Hebrew truth, but was added by the Septuagint.”

In his exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Esther, Hugh also describes:

ordinem confusum secundum Septuaginta.

Translation: “The confused order according to the Septuagint.”

His treatment of Daniel provides another specific judgment:

Primo dicit quod iuste Translatio Septuaginta repudiata sit.

Translation: “First, he says that the translation of the Septuagint was rightly rejected.”

This last judgment applies specifically to the Septuagint form of Daniel rather than to the Greek Old Testament as a whole.

Assessment

Hugh of Saint-Cher provides substantial medieval testimony concerning defects and instability in the Septuagint tradition. He distinguishes errors of translation from corruption introduced during transmission, states that the Septuagint had not remained uncorrupted, attributes part of its deterioration to copyists, and recognizes omissions, additions, alterations, differing regional copies, and mixture with other Greek versions.

His testimony is broad but not indiscriminate. He acknowledges agreement with the Hebrew where he believes it exists while also stating that the Septuagint “erred in some places.” Taken together, his statements present a Greek Old Testament tradition marked by translation error, scribal corruption, textual variation, editorial correction, and mixture.

Citation: Hugh of Saint-Cher (Hugo de Sancto Caro), Postillae in Bibliam: exposition of Jerome’s prologue Desiderii mei to the books of Moses, Prol. 285b; exposition of Jerome’s prologues Quomodo Grecorum historias and Si Septuaginta to 1 Chronicles, Prol. 327b–328b; exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Joshua, Prol. 1b; exposition of Jerome’s prologue Nemo cum prophetas to Isaiah, Prol. 482b; exposition of Jerome’s prologue to Ezekiel, Prol. 492; exposition of Jerome’s prologue Danielem prophetam to Daniel, Prol. 494; exposition of Jerome’s prologue Librum Esther variis and commentary on Esther 10:3–4. Latin text in Martin Morard, ed., Hugo de Sancto Caro, Postilla in totam Bibliam, Sacra Pagina: Glossae Scripturae Sacrae-electronicae, IRHT-CNRS; based principally upon Hugonis de Sancto Charo … Opera omnia in universum Vetus & Novum Testamentum, 8 vols. (Venice: Nicolaus Pezzana, 1703).

11. Roger Bacon (1214–1292)

Roger Bacon was an English Franciscan philosopher, theologian, and biblical scholar. His writings contain unusually broad medieval judgments concerning the Septuagint. He distinguishes between corruption introduced by later copyists and defects which he believed belonged to the translation from its beginning.

Corrupted by Scribes and Defective “from Its Very Beginning”

In the Opus Minus, Bacon writes:

Quia autem non solum ex vitio scriptorum translationem Septuaginta corruptam invenit Hieronymus, sed ab ipso initio multas habuit falsitates, et defectus necessariorum, et multas superfluitates….

Translation: “Moreover, Jerome found the translation of the Seventy corrupted not only through the fault of scribes, but from its very beginning it had many falsities, omissions of necessary things, and many superfluities….”

This is a particularly comprehensive judgment. Bacon expressly refers to the translationem Septuaginta corruptam—the “corrupted translation of the Seventy”—and distinguishes corruption caused by scribes from problems he believed went back ab ipso initio, “from its very beginning.” Those original defects included “many falsities,” omissions of necessary material, and superfluous additions.

Falsity Demonstrated in Innumerable Passages

Bacon makes another broad statement in the Opus Majus:

Et accepta est negatio a paucis temporibus de alia translatione, scilicet LXX interpretum, cujus falsitatem Hieronymus ostendit locis infinitis….

Translation: “And the negative was adopted in recent times from another translation, namely that of the Seventy, whose falsity Jerome demonstrates in innumerable passages….”

Although Bacon expressly appeals to Jerome, he adopts the judgment in the course of his own textual argument. The expression locis infinitis presents the problem as extensive rather than confined to a few isolated readings.

Bacon subsequently explains the preference for Jerome’s translation:

Nam ipse dicit in libro de Officiis quod generaliter omnes Ecclesiae Latinae utuntur translatione Hieronymi, pro eo quod veracior sit in sententiis et clarior in verbis, excepto quod propter nimium usum psallendi in Ecclesia solius psalterii translatio secundum LXX. interpretes remansit.

Translation: “For he himself says in the book On Offices that generally all the Latin churches use Jerome’s translation, because it is more truthful in its meanings and clearer in its words, except that, because of the very great customary use of singing in the Church, the translation of the Psalter according to the Seventy alone remained.”

Assessment

Bacon provides unusually explicit and broad medieval testimony concerning defects in the Septuagint. He calls it the “corrupted translation of the Seventy” and distinguishes two sources of difficulty: corruption introduced “through the fault of scribes” and defects which he believed existed “from its very beginning.” He characterizes the latter as “many falsities,” omissions of necessary material, and superfluous additions, and elsewhere speaks of the Septuagint’s “falsity” being demonstrated in innumerable passages.

Bacon relies substantially upon Jerome for these conclusions, but he does not merely preserve an isolated quotation from him. He incorporates Jerome’s judgments into his own discussion of biblical translation and textual transmission. His testimony is therefore especially valuable for showing the continued acceptance in the medieval period of a distinction between defects attributed to the original Greek translation and corruption subsequently introduced by copyists.

Citation: Roger Bacon, Opus Minus, in J. S. Brewer, ed., Fr. Rogeri Bacon Opera Quaedam Hactenus Inedita, vol. I (London, 1859), pp. 336–337; Roger Bacon, Opus Majus, ed. John Henry Bridges, vol. I (Oxford, 1897), Part III, p. 79.

12. Correctorium Vaticanum (thirteenth century)

The anonymous Correctorium Vaticanum was produced during the thirteenth-century movement to identify and correct errors in biblical manuscripts. In discussing the different forms of the biblical text, it draws an explicit distinction between the Septuagint represented in the Hexapla and the commonly transmitted Greek edition.

The Common Septuagint Was “Greatly Corrupted”

The correctory states:

Sciendum autem quod ista editio LXX in exaplois contenta, quia non fuit publicata, mansit incorrupta; sed illa comunis, que asteriscos et obelos non habuit, vitio scriptorum valde corrupta fuit.

Translation: “It should be known, however, that this edition of the Seventy contained in the Hexapla, because it was not published, remained uncorrupted; but that common edition, which did not have the asterisks and obeli, was greatly corrupted through the fault of scribes.”

This is the work’s strongest testimony for the present collection. It does not describe the Septuagint indiscriminately as corrupt. Rather, it distinguishes a supposedly uncorrupted Hexaplaric form from the commonly circulating edition, which it says had become valde corrupta—“greatly corrupted”—through scribal transmission.

Septuagint Material Entered the Latin Text

The correctory also identifies material from the Septuagint that had entered a contemporary Latin biblical exemplar:

In Parabolis etiam plures versus de translatione LXX additi sunt in Exemplari Parisiensi, qui in hebreo non habentur nec in antiquis.

Translation: “In Proverbs also several verses from the translation of the Seventy were added to the Paris exemplar which are not found in the Hebrew nor in the ancient manuscripts.”

This passage concerns the Latin textual tradition rather than corruption within the Greek Septuagint itself. It nevertheless shows the correctory distinguishing material derived from the Septuagint from material represented by older manuscripts.

Assessment

The Correctorium Vaticanum provides explicit thirteenth-century testimony that the Greek text associated with the Septuagint existed in distinguishable forms and that its commonly transmitted form had suffered substantial scribal corruption. Its description of the common edition as vitio scriptorum valde corrupta—“greatly corrupted through the fault of scribes”—is unusually direct. At the same time, the work preserves an important qualification by regarding the Septuagint text represented in the Hexapla as having remained uncorrupted. Its testimony therefore concerns corruption in the transmission of the commonly circulating Greek text rather than a wholesale condemnation of the Septuagint translation itself.

Citation: Correctorium Vaticanum, Vatican Library, Vat. lat. 3466; Heinrich Denifle, “Die Handschriften der Bibel-Correctorien des 13. Jahrhunderts,” Archiv für Literatur- und Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters 4 (1888), pp. 298–302, especially p. 301; Proverbs passage, Vat. lat. 3466, fol. 61r, quoted by Denifle, p. 289.

13. Gérard de Huy (active in the thirteenth century)

Gérard de Huy was a thirteenth-century biblical corrector whose Correctorium reflects the practical comparison of differing biblical texts and manuscripts. His testimony is particularly useful because he expressly identifies several kinds of variation in the Septuagint edition and describes examining old manuscripts and comparing textual sources.

Addition, Subtraction, Alteration, Division, and Conjunction

Gérard gives a concise description of textual phenomena found in the Septuagint:

Hec supradicta, scilicet additio, subtractio, mutatio, divisio, coniunctio in editione LXX reperiuntur.

Translation: “These things mentioned above—namely addition, subtraction, alteration, division, and conjunction—are found in the edition of the Seventy.”

The statement is broad rather than confined to a single disputed passage. Gérard expressly attributes to the editio LXX phenomena encompassing added material, omitted material, alteration, division, and conjunction.

Comparison of Old Manuscripts and Original-Language Texts

Gérard describes the textual investigation underlying his work:

Cum igitur has falsitates et alias huiusmodi in modernis libris conspicerem, antiquos et antiquissimos codices perscrutatus sum, et contuli cum originalibus et hebreis et grecis….

Translation: “Therefore, when I observed these falsities and others of this kind in the modern books, I examined old and even very old manuscripts and compared them with the originals, both Hebrew and Greek….”

This passage concerns textual errors in the contemporary biblical manuscripts more generally and should not be represented as though has falsitates referred exclusively to the Septuagint. It is nevertheless important for understanding Gérard’s method: his conclusions resulted from comparing differing manuscripts and textual forms rather than simply accepting the text currently before him.

Assessment

Gérard provides unusually concise medieval testimony concerning textual variation in the Septuagint edition. His statement that “addition, subtraction, alteration, division, and conjunction” are found in editione LXX is directly relevant and sufficiently broad to stand without an accumulation of individual examples.

His language does not establish that he attributed every such phenomenon to the original translators rather than to subsequent transmission, and that distinction should not be imposed upon his words. His accompanying description of examining old and very old manuscripts and comparing textual sources shows that his judgments formed part of an active program of textual collation. His testimony therefore provides independent medieval evidence that the Septuagint edition presented significant textual differences requiring examination rather than being treated as an invariably uniform text.

Citation: Gérard de Huy, Correctorium Biblicum (Correctorium E), principally Vatican Library, Vat. lat. 4240; Heinrich Denifle, “Die Handschriften der Bibel-Correctorien des 13. Jahrhunderts,” Archiv für Literatur- und Kirchengeschichte des Mittelalters 4 (1888), especially pp. 302–310, 483–525.

14. Giannozzo Manetti (1396–1459)

Giannozzo Manetti was an Italian Renaissance humanist, biblical translator, and scholar who served the Florentine Republic and later enjoyed the patronage of King Alfonso V of Aragon. He undertook a new Latin translation of the Psalter directly from the Hebrew and defended his work in his five-book Apologeticus, written during the final years of his life. His defense included a detailed comparison of the Hebrew Psalter with the Greek-derived Latin tradition.

Approximately Six Thousand Differences Between the Psalters

In the second book of his Apologeticus, Manetti described the extraordinary extent of the differences between the two Latin Psalters he was comparing, one derived from the Greek and the other from the Hebrew:

Quantum inter se distent he due celeberrime Psalterii iam crebro commemorate interpretationes … vix excogitari, nedum dici explicarique potest. Cunctis quippe predictarum interpretationum differentiis diversitatibusque diligentissime enumeratis accuratissimeque, ut ita dixerim, recensitis, sex circiter milia numero (mirabile et incredibile dictu!) comperiuntur.

Translation: “How greatly these two most celebrated translations of the Psalter, so frequently mentioned already, differ from one another can scarcely be conceived, much less stated and explained. For when all the differences and variations between these translations have been most diligently enumerated and, so to speak, most accurately counted, they are found to number approximately six thousand—a marvelous and incredible thing to report!”

Additions, Omissions, and Divergent Renderings

Manetti expressly stated that the Greek-derived Psalter differed substantially from the Hebrew through additions, omissions, and renderings foreign to the original:

Cum pleraque huius translationis partim per additamenta, partim per omissiones, partim denique per alienas conversiones ab hebraica veritate plurimum dissidere videantur.

Translation: “Since very many passages of this translation appear to differ greatly from the Hebrew original, partly through additions, partly through omissions, and finally through renderings foreign to the original.”

An Addition to Psalm 14

Manetti also identified a substantial passage in the Greek-derived version of Psalm 14 that was absent from the Hebrew text:

In eodem cuncta que secuntur (mirabile dictu!) superflua sunt.

Translation: “In the same Psalm, everything that follows is superfluous—a remarkable thing to say!”

Assessment

Manetti’s testimony demonstrates that substantial differences between the Hebrew Psalter and the Greek-derived tradition were recognized and critically examined in the fifteenth century. His report of approximately six thousand differences, together with his identification of additions, omissions, and divergent renderings, provides evidence of his recognition of significant textual problems in the Greek-derived Psalter.

Citation: Giannozzo Manetti, Apologeticus, Book II, §§81, 86; Book III, discussion of additions to Psalm XIV.

15. Alfonso de Madrigal (1410–1455)

Alfonso de Madrigal was a fifteenth-century Spanish theologian and biblical commentator whose extensive biblical writings include discussion of differences between the Septuagint and other textual forms. In his commentary on Genesis, he expressly characterizes departures by the Septuagint translators as errors.

The Seventy “Departed from the Hebrew Truth”

In discussing Jerome’s treatment of differences in the Septuagint, Madrigal writes:

Vocat hic errorem deviationem a litera hebraica, sive rationabiliter, sive irrationabiliter hoc contigerit, et dicit manifestum est, quia interpretes septuaginta deviaverunt a veritate hebraica; sed quare deviaverunt, ad me non pertinet exponere.

Translation: “He here calls ‘error’ a departure from the Hebrew text, whether this happened for a reasonable or an unreasonable cause; and he says that it is manifest that the seventy translators departed from the Hebrew truth; but why they departed from it is not for me to explain.”

Madrigal thus expressly uses the language of “error” and says that the departure of the Septuagint translators is manifestum—“manifest.” His qualification concerns the reason for the departure, not its existence.

He continues:

Hieronymus autem licet subticeat satis videtur velle, quod septuaginta interpretes erraverint ex ignorantia.

Translation: “Jerome, however, although he does not expressly say so, seems sufficiently to mean that the seventy translators erred through ignorance.”

Madrigal also records an alternative explanation:

Sed Iudaei prudenti factum dicunt esse consilio.

Translation: “But the Jews say that it was done by prudent design.”

The alternatives therefore concern whether the departures resulted from ignorance or deliberate action. In either case, Madrigal accepts the underlying premise that the Septuagint translators departed from their source.

Assessment

Madrigal provides explicit medieval testimony concerning errors in the Septuagint translation itself rather than merely later corruption introduced by copyists. He defines the relevant “error” as a departure from the source text and states that it is manifest that the Seventy “departed from the Hebrew truth.” He then discusses possible explanations for those departures, including ignorance and deliberate action.

His testimony should not be extended into a claim that the entire Septuagint was corrupt or unreliable. Its importance lies in his explicit acknowledgment that the original translators themselves could err and depart from their source. This supplies a distinct form of evidence alongside medieval witnesses who concentrated primarily upon subsequent scribal corruption and textual variation.

Citation: Alfonso de Madrigal, Commentaria in Genesim, in Commentaria in Pentateuchum (Venice: Giovanni Battista and Giovanni Bernardo Sessa, 1596), p. 36, commentary on Jerome’s preface to the Pentateuch, at “Causas erroris exponere non est meum.”

16. Martin Bucer (1491–1551)

Martin Bucer was one of the leading Reformers of Strasbourg and an influential biblical commentator, churchman, and theologian. His exegetical works include commentaries on the Psalms, Romans, the Gospels, Ephesians, Judges, and Zephaniah. Bucer’s Old Testament work was grounded in the Hebrew text, which he repeatedly described as the proper basis for translation and interpretation.

The Greek Text as Transmitted Was Unreliable

In the preface to his commentary on the Psalms, Bucer explains why he generally did not make extensive use of the Greek version:

Eadem causa et Graecorum editionem, ita ut ad nos pervenit, adducere saepius praetermisi. Nam variat haec ab Hebraeis plus nimio…

Translation: “For the same reason I also generally refrained from citing the Greek edition as it has come down to us. For it differs far too much from the Hebrews…”

Bucer’s concern was not merely that the Greek was a translation. He questioned whether the Greek text circulating in his own day could even be identified with confidence as the original work of the Seventy:

et indubitatum habeo, eam quae ab Aldo quidem primum edita est, haudquaquam septuaginta illorum interpretum esse; sed ex illorum forsan, ac aliorum interpretationibus conflata.

Translation: “And I hold it beyond doubt that the one first published by Aldus is by no means the version of those seventy interpreters, but was perhaps compiled from their translation and those of others.”

This is an unusually explicit Reformation-era judgment. Bucer did not assume that the printed Greek Old Testament of his day represented a single, pristine Septuagint tradition descending unchanged from the original translators. He instead regarded the current Greek text as composite and textually unstable.

Ancient Quotations Did Not Match the Printed Greek

Bucer supported this judgment by comparing the Greek text available in his own day with quotations attributed to the Septuagint in Jerome, Hilary, and other ancient writers. He observed that the patristic citations differed in numerous places from the printed Greek edition.

For Bucer, this discrepancy was evidence that the Greek text then circulating could not simply be equated with the ancient Septuagint. He therefore distinguished between the historical translation associated with the Seventy and the much later Greek textual form available to sixteenth-century readers.

He also referred to the tradition reported by Josephus that the original Seventy translated only the books of Moses, using this as an additional reason for caution in applying the name “Septuagint” indiscriminately to the entire extant Greek Old Testament.

The Extraordinary Preservation of the Hebrew Text

Bucer sharply contrasted his uncertainty about the Greek textual tradition with his confidence in the preservation of the Hebrew Scriptures.

Quoties siquidem considero incredibilem istam curam et diligentiam, qua illa per Iudaeos servata sunt…

Translation: “Whenever I consider that incredible care and diligence by which these things were preserved by the Jews…”

He points especially to the minute care reflected in the Masorah and in the recording of textual details. Bucer regarded this scrupulous attention as evidence of providential preservation. He marveled that God had preserved the sacred writings so intact through the Jewish people despite their opposition to Christianity.

He concludes:

fatendum tamen est omnibus, qui in his iudicare possunt, nihil unquam esse sanctius, quam ii servarunt lectionem Sacrorum Bibliorum.

Translation: “Yet all who are capable of judging these matters must acknowledge that nothing was ever preserved more scrupulously than they preserved the reading of the Sacred Scriptures.”

Thus Bucer’s preference for the Hebrew was not based merely upon its status as an original language. He specifically believed that the Hebrew textual tradition had been transmitted with exceptional care, in contrast to the instability he observed in the Greek tradition.

The “Hebrew Truth”

Bucer repeatedly expressed this principle in the titles and method of his Old Testament works. His Psalms were translated ad Hebraicam veritatem—“according to the Hebrew truth.” His commentary on Zephaniah likewise presents the prophet as translated and explained according to the Hebrew truth.

This language places Bucer within the older Christian tradition of the Hebraica veritas: the Hebrew text was the textual standard by which translations were to be evaluated.

His exegetical practice follows the same rule. When the Greek differs from the Hebrew, Bucer does not ordinarily treat the Greek as preserving a superior text. Instead, he investigates the Hebrew wording directly and uses translations comparatively.

Greek Additions and Divergent Readings

Bucer’s Psalms commentary contains numerous examples in which he notices readings or additions in the Greek that have no equivalent in the Hebrew.

At Psalm 4, for example, he notes additional Greek material and remarks that he does not know on what basis it was added, since nothing corresponding to it appears in the Hebrew.

Similarly, Bucer did not allow divergent Greek Psalm superscriptions to determine the historical setting of a psalm where they differed from the Hebrew tradition. His treatment of such differences reflects the principle already stated in his preface: the Greek text was a useful witness but not the controlling textual authority.

Translation Must Remain Subordinate to the Original Language

Bucer also warned against relying excessively upon translations when the original language could be consulted. Because translators differ among themselves, he urged students of Scripture to learn the sacred languages so that they could hear the biblical writers sua loquentes lingua—“speaking in their own language.”

This conviction governed his own translation work. His earlier Psalter and his subsequent defense of that translation likewise emphasize direct engagement with the Hebrew rather than dependence upon an inherited Greek or Latin version.

For Bucer, no translation—Greek, Latin, or otherwise—could displace the Hebrew text as the ultimate linguistic basis for interpreting the Old Testament.

Assessment

Martin Bucer is one of the clearest Reformation witnesses against identifying the extant Greek Old Testament with a single, pristine Septuagint text.

His testimony is particularly valuable because he does more than note isolated translation differences. He offers a sustained textual argument. The Greek edition available to him differed “far too much” from the Hebrew; he was convinced that the Aldine Greek was not simply the work of the original Seventy; he believed it had likely been compiled from more than one Greek translation; and he observed that patristic quotations attributed to the Septuagint did not consistently agree with the printed Greek text of his own day.

By contrast, Bucer regarded the Hebrew Scriptures as having been transmitted with extraordinary care and repeatedly appealed to the “Hebrew truth” as the proper basis of Old Testament translation and interpretation.

His position therefore directly opposes the notion that Christians inherited one fixed and continuously preserved Greek Old Testament possessing textual authority over the Hebrew. Bucer regarded the Greek tradition as historically valuable but textually variable, while the Hebrew remained the controlling standard.

Citation: Martin Bucer, S. Psalmorum libri quinque ad Ebraicam veritatem versi et familiari explanatione elucidati (Strasbourg, 1529), preface, especially sigs. 6v–7r; commentary on Psalm 4 and other discussions of divergent Greek readings, additions, and superscriptions.

17. Agostino Steuco (1497–1548)

Agostino Steuco, an Augustinian canon, Vatican librarian, and prominent Roman Catholic biblical scholar, undertook extensive direct comparison of the Septuagint with Hebrew manuscripts in his Recognitio Veteris Testamenti ad Hebraicam veritatem (1529). His testimony is unusually valuable because his conclusions emerged from sustained textual comparison.

The Septuagint “Erroneous in Many Places”

Discussing Genesis 5, Steuco writes:

Septuaginta aeditio, cum multis in locis mendosa deprehenditur, tum vero in recensendis his annis.

Translation: “The Septuagint edition, although it is found erroneous in many places, is especially so in the reckoning of these years.”

He then distinguishes errors in the transmitted text from the work of the original translators:

Is autem malus computus, non ab ipsis interpretibus, ut ipse arbitror, emanavit, sed librariis, ipsaque vetustate. Facileque fuit in his numeris addere vel subtrahere aliquid.

Translation: “But this erroneous computation, as I myself judge, did not originate from the translators themselves, but from scribes and from antiquity itself. And it was easy in these numbers to add or subtract something.”

The Hebrew Chronology Is the True One

Steuco continues:

cum itaque maiores nostri tam Graeci quam Latini, editionem Septuaginta sequerentur, in describendis quoque temporibus eos secuti, a veritate Hebraica plurimum recesserunt. Verissima vero temporum supputatio, et sacris literis consentanea, ea est, quae apud Hebraeos extat.

Translation: “Since therefore our predecessors, both Greek and Latin, followed the Septuagint edition, in reckoning the times they likewise followed them and departed very far from the Hebrew truth. But the truest computation of the times, and that which agrees with Holy Scripture, is the one which exists among the Hebrews.”

This combines an assertion of widespread error in the Septuagint, an explanation in terms of scribal transmission, and an explicit preference for the Hebrew chronology.

Explicitly Corrupt and Erroneous Passages

Commenting on Genesis 4:16, Steuco states:

Corruptus est is locus apud Septuaginta….

Translation: “This passage is corrupt in the Septuagint….”

On Deuteronomy 34:6, he writes:

Quare mendosa est editio Septuaginta hoc loco….

Translation: “Therefore the Septuagint edition is erroneous in this place….”

Concerning the numerical readings in Genesis 46:27, he writes:

Cum ea in numeris sit mendosissima.

Translation: “Since it is exceedingly erroneous in numerical matters.”

Assessment

Steuco is a particularly strong witness because his judgments arise from repeated comparison of the Greek and Hebrew texts. He describes the Septuagint as erroneous “in many places,” identifies individual passages as corrupt or erroneous, and regards its numerical readings as especially unreliable. At the same time, he does not necessarily attribute these defects to the original translators, expressly arguing in the case of Genesis 5 that the erroneous chronology arose from scribes and the effects of antiquity. Most importantly, when the Septuagint chronology conflicts with the Hebrew, he states that Greek and Latin writers who followed the Septuagint “departed very far from the Hebrew truth,” while the chronology preserved among the Hebrews is “the truest” and the one agreeing with Holy Scripture.

Citation: Agostino Steuco, Recognitio Veteris Testamenti ad Hebraicam veritatem (Venice: Aldus Manutius’s heirs and Andrea Torresano, 1529), commentary on Genesis 4:16 (p. 38), Genesis 5 (pp. 39–40), Genesis 46:27 (pp. 95–96), and Deuteronomy 34:6 (p. 112).

18. Peter Martyr Vermigli (1499–1562)

Peter Martyr Vermigli was an Italian Reformer, biblical commentator, and one of the leading theologians of the Reformed churches. After leaving Italy, he worked at Strasbourg, Oxford, and Zürich and produced extensive biblical commentaries and theological works. His exegesis frequently compared the Hebrew Old Testament with the Septuagint and other ancient versions.

The Hebrew as the “Hebrew Truth”

Vermigli repeatedly referred to the Hebrew Old Testament as the veritas Hebraica, the “Hebrew truth.” When the Hebrew and Septuagint differed, the Hebrew served as his controlling textual standard rather than the Greek translation.

In discussing the apostles’ use of Old Testament translations, he states:

In his quae ad substantiam fidei non pertinent, Apostoli in novo testamento interdum sequuntur Septuaginta interpretationem, etsi a veritate Hebraica discrepet.

Translation: “In matters which do not pertain to the substance of faith, the apostles in the New Testament sometimes follow the interpretation of the Septuagint, even though it differs from the Hebrew truth.”

This statement is significant because Vermigli simultaneously acknowledges apostolic use of the Septuagint and denies that such use establishes identity between the Greek wording and the authoritative Hebrew text. An apostle could quote the Greek even where it “differs from the Hebrew truth.”

Paul’s Use of the Septuagint

Vermigli applies this principle repeatedly in his Commentary on Romans. At Romans 3:4, where Paul quotes Psalm 51:4, he notes that the apostle follows the Septuagint and then separately gives the Hebrew wording. At Romans 9:15 he again observes that Paul follows the Septuagint but compares its wording with “the Hebrew truth.”

At Romans 2:24 Vermigli explains that an apostle could employ Septuagint wording because it was familiar to his readers and suitable to his argument. Apostolic use therefore did not imply that every word of the Septuagint represented the original Hebrew text.

The principle appears still more explicitly at Romans 15:12, where Paul follows the Septuagint of Isaiah 11:10. Vermigli says that Paul “seems here to depart somewhat from the Hebrew truth” by following the Septuagint. He nevertheless explains how the Greek could faithfully convey the point for which it was cited.

The Existing Greek Text Had Been Altered

Vermigli also denied that the Greek text circulating in his own day could simply be identified without qualification with the original translation of the Seventy.

While discussing Paul’s quotation at Romans 11:26–27, he compares the apostle’s wording with both the Hebrew and the Greek text then available and concludes:

aut non esse Septuaginta, aut in multis locis vitiatam

Translation: “Either it is not the Septuagint, or it has been corrupted in many places.”

This is one of Vermigli’s strongest statements concerning the transmitted Greek text. The Greek copies current in his day could not simply be assumed to preserve unchanged the original work of the Seventy.

Septuagint Additions and Paraphrases

Vermigli’s Old Testament commentaries show the same textual hierarchy in practice. At Genesis 23:2 he notes that the Septuagint adds the words “in the valley,” although they are absent from the Hebrew, without using the Greek addition to correct the Hebrew text.

He also treats some Septuagint renderings as interpretive paraphrases rather than evidence of a different authoritative Hebrew text. At Psalm 78:25, where the Hebrew refers to the food of “mighty” or “strong” men, the Septuagint renders the expression as “bread of angels.” Vermigli regards this as an interpretation of the Hebrew rather than proof that “angels” stood in the original Hebrew text.

His treatment of such passages shows that a Septuagint rendering could be useful, and even suitable for apostolic citation, without thereby becoming a standard by which the Hebrew text should be altered.

Assessment

Vermigli provides unusually clear Reformation-era testimony concerning the relationship between the Hebrew Old Testament and the Septuagint. He openly acknowledged that the apostles sometimes quoted the Septuagint even where its wording differed from the Hebrew, yet he continued to call the Hebrew the veritas Hebraica, the “Hebrew truth,” and treated it as the controlling Old Testament text.

He also recognized additions and interpretive paraphrases in the Greek and concluded that the Greek text circulating in his own day was either not precisely the original Septuagint or had been “corrupted in many places.” His testimony therefore stands against the idea of a single, pristine, continuously preserved Greek Old Testament possessing authority over the Hebrew text.

Citation: Peter Martyr Vermigli, In Epistolam S. Pauli Apostoli ad Romanos Commentarii, comments on Romans 2:24; 3:4; 9:15; 11:26–27; 15:12; see also his Old Testament discussions of Genesis 23:2 and Psalm 78:25.

19. John Calvin (1509–1564)

John Calvin was a sixteenth-century Reformer, theologian, and biblical commentator whose exegetical writings repeatedly compare the Hebrew Old Testament with the ancient Greek translation. Calvin did not reject the Septuagint indiscriminately; he sometimes approved its renderings and occasionally appealed to ancient Greek evidence in textual questions. His criticism is therefore selective. Nevertheless, he repeatedly charges the Greek translators with erroneous renderings and, in at least one important case, attributes a Septuagint discrepancy to corruption introduced by later copyists.

The Greek Translators “Change the Whole Sentence”

Commenting on Genesis 4:7, Calvin rejects the Septuagint rendering as a substantial departure from the Hebrew sense. He writes that the Greek interpreters:

“recede, in my judgment, far from the genuine meaning of Moses”

and, after explaining how the Hebrew could have been misunderstood, says:

“their error”

is evident to anyone moderately acquainted with Hebrew. He concludes:

“the Greeks change the whole sentence.”

Calvin therefore does not treat the Greek wording merely as an alternative interpretation. He expressly identifies it as an erroneous rendering that alters the meaning of the passage.

“Deceived by the Similitude of One Letter to Another”

At Genesis 6:3 Calvin gives another explanation for a Septuagint mistranslation:

“The Greek interpreters, deceived by the similitude of one letter to another, have improperly read, ‘shall not remain.’”

He rejects the resulting interpretation as unrelated to the actual sense of the passage. Here Calvin attributes the error specifically to confusion between similar Hebrew letters.

A similar judgment occurs at Psalm 29:1, where Calvin says that the Septuagint translators:

“were led into a mistake by the affinity of the Hebrew words.”

These statements show that Calvin regarded the ancient Greek translators as capable of ordinary philological error.

“So Great a Mistake” — Jeremiah 23:23

Calvin’s language becomes especially strong in his commentary on Jeremiah 23:23. Concerning the Greek rendering, he writes:

“It is a wonder that the Greek translators made so great a mistake”

and says that:

“they wholly changed the sense.”

He further complains that:

“they contrived from their own brains what is wholly remote from the words of the Prophet.”

This is one of Calvin’s clearest condemnations of a Septuagint rendering. The problem, in his judgment, is not a minor stylistic difference but a translation that substantially changes the prophetic meaning.

A Rendering “Contrary to the Meaning of the Prophet”

At Romans 3:4 Calvin discusses Paul’s use of Psalm 51 and observes:

“the Greek translators, I have no doubt, rendered it passively, contrary to the meaning of the Prophet.”

Calvin therefore distinguishes between Paul’s use of familiar Greek wording and the accuracy of the underlying translation. Apostolic use of the Greek form does not, in his judgment, prove that the translators correctly represented the Hebrew original.

A “Mistake” in Hebrews 11:21

Commenting on Hebrews 11:21, Calvin addresses the Greek reading “staff” where the Hebrew reads “bed.” He treats the Septuagint rendering as a mistake and argues that the difference probably arose from the form in which the Hebrew text was then written. He nevertheless concludes that the meaning intended by Moses must be recovered from:

“the pure and original text of Scripture.”

Calvin thus allows for a plausible historical explanation of the translators’ mistake without treating their rendering as authoritative over the Hebrew source.

Corruption Introduced by Later Copyists

Calvin’s most important testimony for the textual transmission of the Septuagint concerns the numerical discrepancy between Genesis 46:27 and Acts 7:14. The Hebrew text gives seventy persons, while the Greek tradition gives seventy-five.

In his commentary on Genesis, Calvin argues that the Seventy probably translated the number correctly originally and that the discrepancy arose afterward:

“the error is to be imputed to the transcribers”

because the translators elsewhere agreed with the Hebrew reckoning. Since numerical values could be represented by letters, Calvin adds that:

“it was easy … for one passage to be corrupted.”

This is significant because Calvin expressly distinguishes an original Greek translation from a later corrupted state of the text.

His commentary on Acts 7 develops the argument further. Calvin considers whether the Seventy themselves gave the erroneous number or whether it:

“crept in afterward through negligence.”

He notes that an older form of the Septuagint known in Jerome’s time agreed with Moses in Deuteronomy, whereas the Greek copies current in Calvin’s own day did not. He therefore concludes:

“I think that this difference came through the error of the writers which wrote out the books.”

Calvin thus believed that the transmitted Septuagint could acquire readings through scribal error which were not present in an earlier form of the Greek text.

The Septuagint Was Not Beyond Correction

Calvin’s scattered judgments form a consistent pattern. He does not attack the Septuagint as a whole, nor does he deny its usefulness. He frequently employs it and sometimes approves its readings. But he does not regard its antiquity or New Testament use as guaranteeing textual or translational correctness.

He expressly says that the Greek translators could “change the whole sentence,” be “deceived” by similar Hebrew letters, make “so great a mistake” that they “wholly changed the sense,” and render a passage “contrary to the meaning of the Prophet.” More importantly, he also believed that later copyists could corrupt the Greek text and that a reading found in the Septuagint copies of his own day could differ from an earlier state of the same Greek tradition.

Assessment

Calvin is a valuable Reformation witness precisely because his attitude toward the Septuagint was not uniformly hostile. He sometimes accepted its renderings and used its evidence, yet he repeatedly judged particular Greek translations to be erroneous and expressly attributed at least one important discrepancy to subsequent scribal corruption.

His testimony therefore encompasses two distinct problems: mistakes which he believed were made by the original Greek translators and alterations which he believed entered the Septuagint during later transmission. In Genesis 46 and Acts 7 he goes beyond criticism of translation and explicitly distinguishes the original work of the Seventy from later Greek copies corrupted through the errors of transcribers. His evidence is therefore directly relevant to the question whether the Greek Old Testament associated with the Septuagint existed as a fixed and uniformly preserved text.

Citation: John Calvin, Commentary on Genesis, on Genesis 4:7, 6:3, and 46:27; Commentary on the Psalms, on Psalm 29:1; Commentary on Jeremiah, on Jeremiah 23:23; Commentary on Romans, on Romans 3:4; Commentary on Acts, on Acts 7:14; Commentary on Hebrews, on Hebrews 11:21; Institutes of the Christian Religion, relevant discussion of the Greek rendering of Hebrew legal terminology.

20. Sixtus of Siena (1520–1569)

Sixtus of Siena (Sixtus Senensis) was a Dominican theologian and biblical scholar whose Bibliotheca Sancta, first published in 1566, became an influential Roman Catholic introduction to biblical literature. Although Sixtus speaks highly of the original translators of the Septuagint, he repeatedly identifies errors and corruptions in the Greek text and expressly distinguishes the original translation from corruptions subsequently introduced into its manuscript tradition.

Genesis 4:7 — Departure from the Hebrew

In Book V, Annotation LXV, Sixtus writes:

Septuaginta Interpretes … omnia perturbarunt deviaruntque vehementer a veritate contextus Hebraici…. Quorum verborum nihil est in Hebraico….

Translation: “The Septuagint translators … threw everything into confusion and departed greatly from the truth of the Hebrew text…. None of these words is in the Hebrew….”

After discussing what he regarded as the translators’ misunderstanding, Sixtus calls one interpretation:

estque maxima hallucinatio.

Translation: “And it is a very great error.”

He also says:

facileque in hunc errorem inciderunt….

Translation: “And they easily fell into this error….”

Genesis 5 — Corruption of the Chronology

In Annotation LXVIII Sixtus gives a broader judgment:

Septuaginta Interpretes cum multis in locis corrupti deprehendantur, in hoc potissimum 5. capite mendosi sunt, & maxime depravati circa supputationem annorum, quos vixerunt viri illustres ab Adam usque ad diluvium: in quibus omnino recedunt a verissima supputatione contextus Hebraici….

Translation: “Since the Septuagint translators are found to be corrupt in many places, they are especially erroneous in this fifth chapter, and most of all corrupted concerning the reckoning of the years which the illustrious men lived from Adam to the Flood; in these they depart entirely from the most true reckoning of the Hebrew text….”

Sixtus follows the consequences of the Greek chronology, including the problem of Methuselah surviving the Flood.

Genesis 8:4 — The Error Is in the Greek

Sixtus writes:

Septuaginta Interpretes … verterunt … Vigesima & septima die mensis, facta additione dierum decem. Hunc errorem noster quoque interpres in vulgata editione secutus est: neque credere par est, Hebraeos codices esse corruptos….

Translation: “The Septuagint translators … rendered [it] ‘on the twenty-seventh day of the month,’ making an addition of ten days. Our translator in the Vulgate also followed this error; nor is it reasonable to believe that the Hebrew copies are corrupt….”

This is especially pertinent to the Hebrew-Greek comparison: Sixtus expressly rejects the explanation that the Hebrew manuscripts had been corrupted in order to account for the discrepancy.

Original Septuagint Versus Its Transmitted Text

In Book VIII Sixtus states:

Sed hoc tantum reperiatur, Septuaginta editionem, vitio scriptorum corruptam, in sua puritate non permansisse.

Translation: “But this much is found: that the Septuagint edition, corrupted through the fault of copyists, did not remain in its purity.”

Sixtus is defending the original Seventy in this context while acknowledging corruption in the text subsequently transmitted under their name. His position is therefore not that every defect originated with the translators.

Assessment

Sixtus provides unusually substantial Roman Catholic testimony concerning the textual condition of the Septuagint. He describes it as corrupt or erroneous “in many places,” identifies specific departures and additions, expressly refuses to attribute one significant discrepancy to corruption of the Hebrew manuscripts, and states unequivocally that the Septuagint edition had been corrupted by copyists and “did not remain in its purity.” At the same time, his defense of the original translators must be preserved: Sixtus distinguished defects he believed arose with the translators from later corruptions introduced during manuscript transmission.

Citation: Sixtus Senensis, Bibliotheca Sancta, Book V, Annotations LXV, LXVIII, and the discussion of Genesis 8:4; Book VIII.

21. Robert Bellarmine (1542–1621)

Robert Bellarmine was an Italian Jesuit theologian, cardinal, Archbishop of Capua, and one of the principal Roman Catholic controversialists of the Counter-Reformation. In De Verbo Dei, Bellarmine discusses at length the origin, authority, and textual condition of the Septuagint. He strongly defends the fidelity of the original translators and maintains that they enjoyed special assistance of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless, he distinguishes that original translation sharply from the Greek text transmitted to his own time, which he regards as extensively corrupted.

The Present Septuagint So Corrupt That It Seems “Entirely Different”

After considering whether the original Septuagint had completely disappeared, Bellarmine writes:

De postrema quaestione, licet non ignorem nonnullos in ea sententia esse, ut existiment interpretationem LXX Seniorum penitus interiisse; multo probabilius censeo, illam adhuc superesse, sed adeo corruptam et vitiatam, ut omnino alia esse videatur.

Translation: “Concerning the last question, although I am not unaware that some are of the opinion that the translation of the Seventy has completely perished, I judge it much more probable that it still survives, but so corrupted and vitiated that it seems to be an entirely different work.”

Bellarmine therefore does not believe that the Septuagint had disappeared altogether. Rather, he believes that the original translation survives within the transmitted Greek tradition, but in a severely corrupted condition.

Too Corrupt to Correct the Hebrew from the Greek

Bellarmine immediately strengthens his judgment:

Non esse autem incorruptam, sed valde vitiatam in pluribus locis, ut jam tutum non sit, Hebraicos vel Latinos textus ex Graecis codicibus emendare, probari potest multis argumentis.

Translation: “That it is not uncorrupted, but greatly corrupted in many places, so that it is now not safe to correct the Hebrew or Latin texts from the Greek manuscripts, can be proved by many arguments.”

This is the statement later represented by Francis Turretin. Bellarmine’s own words confirm the substance of Turretin’s report: the surviving Greek text was, in Bellarmine’s judgment, sufficiently corrupted that it could not safely serve as the standard for correcting the Hebrew Old Testament.

The Present Greek Differs Extensively from the Hebrew

Bellarmine also states:

At ista Graeca versio quam nunc habemus, in pluribus locis dissentit ab Hebraeo, multa non habet quae sunt in Hebraeo, multa habet quae non sunt in Hebraeo, ut omnes noverunt, qui in ea versati sunt.

Translation: “But this Greek version which we now have differs from the Hebrew in many places; it lacks many things that are in the Hebrew, and it contains many things that are not in the Hebrew, as all who are acquainted with it know.”

Bellarmine thus treats substantial additions, omissions, and disagreements with the Hebrew as readily observable characteristics of the extant Greek text.

Disagreement with the Greek Does Not Prove the Hebrew Corrupt

Bellarmine expressly rejects the attempt to resolve these discrepancies simply by charging the Hebrew text with corruption:

Neque videtur satis apte hoc argumentum solvi ab iis qui respondent, textum Hebraeum esse corruptum ubicumque a Graeco discrepat.

Translation: “Nor does this argument seem to be adequately answered by those who reply that the Hebrew text is corrupt wherever it differs from the Greek.”

He adds that, apart from the Psalter, the Latin Vulgate itself agrees more closely with the Hebrew manuscripts than with the Greek:

Nam excepto Psalterio, Latina editio cum Hebraeis codicibus magis convenit, quam cum Graecis.

Translation: “For, excepting the Psalter, the Latin edition agrees more with the Hebrew manuscripts than with the Greek.”

Corrupted “in Many and Various Ways”

As his first argument demonstrating the corruption of the transmitted Septuagint, Bellarmine appeals to Jerome:

Primum testimonio B. Hieronymi, qui praefat. in Paralip., et in Esdram, et alibi frequenter monet, versionem LXX. esse vitiatam multis et variis modis.

Translation: “First, by the testimony of blessed Jerome, who in the preface to Chronicles, in Ezra, and frequently elsewhere, warns that the version of the Seventy has been corrupted in many and various ways.”

Corruption, Revision, and Mixture with Theodotion

Bellarmine gives another historical argument:

Probatur ultimo, quia satis constat editionem LXX interpretum a Judaeis multis in locis fuisse corruptam, ut Justinus affirmat in Dialogo cum Tryphone. Constat item eandem editionem saepe saepius emendatam ab Origene, Luciano, Hesychio, Hieronymo: nihil autem emendatur, nisi quod ante vitiatum est.

Translation: “Finally, it is proved because it is sufficiently established that the edition of the Seventy was corrupted by the Jews in many places, as Justin affirms in the Dialogue with Trypho. It is likewise established that the same edition was repeatedly corrected by Origen, Lucian, Hesychius, and Jerome; but nothing is corrected unless it had previously been corrupted.”

Bellarmine then reasons from the history of the text:

Neque credibile est, eam editionem, quae primis trecentis annis tot maculas contraxerat, reliquis annis mille ducentis inviolatam atque integram servatam.

Translation: “Nor is it credible that an edition which had contracted so many blemishes during the first three hundred years was preserved inviolate and entire during the remaining twelve hundred years.”

Finally, Bellarmine appeals to Jerome for the mixture of readings from Theodotion into Greek Septuagint manuscripts. He explains that material from Theodotion had been introduced into Greek copies with critical signs, that the signs subsequently disappeared, and that the resulting mixture produced such confusion that the respective material could no longer reliably be distinguished:

Inde autem necessario orta est confusio, ut jam nemo judicare possit, quid in iis libris sit LXX., quid vero Theodotionis.

Translation: “From this necessarily arose such confusion that now no one can judge what in those books belongs to the Seventy and what belongs to Theodotion.”

Assessment

Bellarmine is a particularly important witness because his criticism of the extant Septuagint cannot be attributed to hostility toward the original Greek translation. On the contrary, he holds an exceptionally high view of the original Seventy and defends their fidelity and special divine assistance. Yet precisely because he distinguishes the original translation from its later textual transmission, his judgment concerning the surviving Greek text is unusually explicit.

The Greek Septuagint available in his day, he says, differed from the Hebrew in many places, omitted material found in the Hebrew, contained material absent from the Hebrew, had been corrupted “in many and various ways,” and was “greatly corrupted in many places.” He rejects the expedient of assuming that the Hebrew must be corrupt wherever Hebrew and Greek disagree. Most strikingly, he judges the transmitted Septuagint so corrupted and vitiated that it appeared almost to be “an entirely different” work and could no longer safely be used to correct the Hebrew text. He further describes a history of repeated corruption, revision, and mixture with Theodotion that had produced such confusion that portions of the transmitted Greek could no longer confidently be assigned to the original Seventy.

Citation: Robert Bellarmine, Disputationes de controversiis Christianae fidei, First General Controversy, De Verbo Dei, Book II, ch. 6, “De interpretatione LXX Seniorum.”

22. Franciscus Junius (1545–1602)

Franciscus Junius was a Reformed theologian and biblical scholar who collaborated with Immanuel Tremellius on their influential Latin translation of the Old Testament. He devoted extensive attention to the Hebrew and Greek texts of Scripture and to the comparison of Old Testament passages with their Greek forms. Of particular importance here are his observations on the Greek Old Testament associated with the Frankfurt Greek Bible of 1597. The discussion below concerns the Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint tradition, and not the Byzantine Greek New Testament or the Textus Receptus.

The Extant Greek Old Testament Differs Extensively from the Hebrew

Amandus Polanus, writing only a few years after Junius’s death, explicitly appeals to Junius’s work in the 1597 Frankfurt Greek Bible when describing defects in the extant Greek Old Testament. After contrasting the original translation with the Greek text then current, Polanus writes:

versio quæ jam habetur, in plurimis locis dissentit ab Hebræo textu, multa habet quæ non sunt in Hebræo, & rursus multa non habet quæ sunt in Hebræo: multa etiam habet pugnantia cum Hebræo ut annotavit quædam Augustinus libro decimoquinto de Civitate Dei, capite decimotertio: plura verò observata sunt à Francisco Junio per totum Vetus Testamentum in Græca editione Francofortensi excusa in folio apud Andreæ Wecheli hæredes Claudium Marnium & Johan. Aubium Anno M.D.XCVII.

Translation: “But the version which we now have differs from the Hebrew text in very many places; it contains many things which are not in the Hebrew, and again lacks many things which are in the Hebrew; it also contains many things conflicting with the Hebrew, as Augustine noted certain examples in the fifteenth book of The City of God, chapter thirteen; but more were observed by Franciscus Junius throughout the whole Old Testament in the Greek edition printed at Frankfurt in folio by the heirs of Andreas Wechel, Claude de Marne, and Johann Aubry in the year 1597.”

Polanus therefore identifies Junius’s work specifically with numerous discrepancies between the Hebrew Old Testament and its transmitted Greek version, extending “throughout the whole Old Testament.”

The Greek Old Testament Was “Faulty in Many Ways”

When Polanus subsequently asks about the authority of the Greek Old Testament attributed to the Seventy, he again appeals specifically to Junius’s work on the Greek Old Testament:

Non est. 1. quia non est immediatè à Spiritu Sancto inspirata. 2. quia est multis modis vitiosa, ut sæpe queritur Hieronymus, & Franciscus Junius in editione Bibliorum Græcorum ostendit. 3. quia Augustinus, qui versioni septuaginta plurimum detulit, illam tamen esse ex fontibus emendandam censuit.

Translation: “It is not. 1. Because it is not immediately inspired by the Holy Spirit. 2. Because it is faulty in many ways, as Jerome often complains, and as Franciscus Junius shows in the edition of the Greek Bible. 3. Because Augustine, who attributed very much to the version of the Seventy, nevertheless judged that it ought to be corrected from the sources.”

The expression “faulty in many ways” is Polanus’s characterization rather than a recovered statement in Junius’s own words. Nevertheless, Polanus expressly says that Junius demonstrated these defects in his work on the Greek Bible, and the surrounding discussion identifies the subject as the Greek Old Testament and its relationship to the Hebrew text.

Proverbs 8:22 — A Greek Old Testament Reading Compared with the Hebrew

Independent evidence from 1615 preserves a specific example of Junius’s textual work on the Greek Old Testament. In a letter discussing the Septuagint rendering of Proverbs 8:22, Sibrandus Lubbertus rejects the familiar Greek reading ἔκτισέ με, “created me,” as an incorrect representation of the Hebrew קנני. After arguing that the Hebrew requires the sense “possessed” or “acquired,” Lubbertus states:

In hebraeo enim est יְקָנָנִי, quod non est κύριος ἔκτισε με, sed ἔκτησέ με, quod ita legere aliquos docet Franciscus Junius, in bibliis Graecis.

Translation: “For in the Hebrew it is יְקָנָנִי, which is not ‘the Lord created me,’ but ‘possessed/acquired me’; and Franciscus Junius teaches in the Greek Bible that some read it in this way.”

This testimony, written only thirteen years after Junius’s death, provides a concrete example of the textual work Polanus attributes to him. Junius had recorded Greek Old Testament textual evidence supporting a reading corresponding more closely to the Hebrew against the familiar Septuagint reading.

Assessment

Junius is an important witness to extensive disagreement between the transmitted Greek Old Testament and the Hebrew text. Although a direct general statement from Junius describing the Septuagint as corrupt has not been recovered, Polanus explicitly states that Junius demonstrated from his work on the Greek Old Testament that the Greek version was “faulty in many ways.” More specifically, Polanus says that Junius documented throughout the Old Testament numerous places where the extant Greek differs from the Hebrew, contains material absent from the Hebrew, omits material present in the Hebrew, or contains readings conflicting with the Hebrew.

The independent testimony of Lubbertus supplies a concrete example at Proverbs 8:22, where Junius recorded Greek Old Testament textual evidence supporting the Hebrew against the ordinary Septuagint reading. The evidence therefore shows Junius engaged in systematic comparison of the Greek Old Testament with the Hebrew and documenting numerous departures of the transmitted Greek Old Testament from the Hebrew text.

Citation: Amandus Polanus, Syntagma Theologiae Christianae (Hanau, 1609), Book I, chapter 41, pp. 537–538, citing Franciscus Junius’s observations in the Greek Bible printed at Frankfurt by the heirs of Andreas Wechel, Claude de Marne, and Johann Aubry, 1597; Sibrandus Lubbertus to Antoine de La Faye, Franeker, August 25, 1615, Bibliothèque de Genève, MS K. 197 aa (I), no. 423, fol. 74v; quotation reproduced in C. van der Woude’s study of Lubbertus.

23. William Whitaker (1548–1595)

William Whitaker was Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge and one of the leading English Reformed controversialists of the sixteenth century. In his controversy concerning the authentic text of Scripture, he addressed the Septuagint extensively. His treatment is among the strongest Reformation-era Protestant statements concerning the condition and authority of the transmitted Greek Old Testament.

Faulty in Itself as Well as Corrupted by Copyists

Whitaker distinguishes between corruption introduced during the transmission of the Septuagint and defects belonging to the Greek translation itself. Referring to Jerome’s treatment of the Septuagint, he writes:

in commentariis saepe improbat Graecam versionem septuaginta interpretum, non modo vt corruptam a librarijs, sed etiam in se vitiosam.

Translation: “In his commentaries he frequently condemns the Greek version of the seventy interpreters, not merely as corrupted by copyists, but also as faulty in itself.”

Whitaker therefore recognizes two distinct sources of error: defects in the original translation and corruption subsequently introduced by copyists.

The True Septuagint Wholly Lost

Whitaker considers whether the Greek Old Testament surviving in his own time was actually the translation produced by the Seventy:

Quae vero nunc in manibus habetur Graeca versio Scripturarum, ea sitne septuaginta seniorum, an alia, inter doctos dubitatur. Verior illorum sententia videtur, qui versionem illam omnino periisse existimant, & Graecam hanc, quam nunc habemus, mixtam esse quandam, misereque corruptam statuunt.

Translation: “Learned men question whether the Greek version of the Scriptures now extant be or be not the version of the seventy elders. The sounder opinion seems to be that of those who determine that the true Septuagint is wholly lost, and that the Greek text, as we have it, is a mixed and miserably corrupted document.”

Whitaker does not merely accuse the surviving Greek of containing scribal errors. He considers it more probable that the original Septuagint had disappeared altogether and that the extant Greek was a mixed and extensively corrupted text.

Extensive Disagreement with the Hebrew

Whitaker continues:

At haec nostra ab Hebraeis codicibus mirifice discrepat, cum in aliis locis atque libris, tum praecipue in Psalmis Davidicis. Nec est quod quisquam Hebraea esse corrupta respondeat.

Translation: “But this of ours differs amazingly from the Hebrew copies, as well in other places and books, as specially in the Psalms of David. Nor is there room for any one to reply that the Hebrew is corrupt.”

He immediately adds:

Nam nec Papistae audent affirmare Graeca esse Hebraeis incorruptiora.

Translation: “For even the papists will not venture to maintain that the Greek is purer than the Hebrew.”

Whitaker thus expressly rejects the suggestion that differences between the Greek and Hebrew should be explained by assuming corruption of the Hebrew text.

Methuselah — Plainly False in the Greek

Whitaker points to the chronology of Methuselah as a concrete example:

Illud vero ridiculum est, quod Methusaleni secundum Graecam transsationem annos 14. post diluvium superstes fuerit. Ubi enim in diluvio permansit? Aut quomodo servatus est? In arca quidem non fuit: in qua non plures omnino quam octo homines fuisse Scriptura testatur.

Translation: “It is even a laughable mistake in the Greek by which Methuselah is made to survive the flood fourteen years. Where did he remain during the deluge? Or how was he preserved? Certainly he was not in the ark, in which Scripture testifies that there were no more than eight persons.”

He concludes:

Itaque hoc palam quidem falsum est in editione Graeca. Hebraeus autem liber longe verius de Methusalemi annis aetateque scripsit….

Translation: “Therefore this is plainly false in the Greek edition. But the Hebrew book speaks far more truly concerning the years and age of Methuselah….”

Whitaker explicitly identifies the Greek chronology as false and accepts the Hebrew account as the correct standard.

Jonah 3:4 — “A False Reading”

Whitaker gives another example from Jonah 3:4. The Hebrew announces the destruction of Nineveh after forty days, whereas the Greek has three days. Of the Greek reading he says:

quam esse falsam lectionem, manifestum est.

Translation: “That this is a false reading is manifest.”

“Infinitely and Shamefully Corrupted”

Whitaker draws his general conclusion from these and numerous similar examples:

Ex his aliisque hujusmodi innumeris concludi potest, aut hanc Graecam versionem, quae ad nostra tempora pervenit, non illam esse quam septuaginta Iudaici seniores ediderunt: aut esse tam infinite foedeque depravatam, vt authoritatis perexiguae nunc sit.

Translation: “From these and innumerable other examples of this kind it may be concluded either that this Greek version which has come down to our times is not that which the seventy Jewish elders produced, or that it has been so infinitely and shamefully corrupted that it is now of exceedingly slight authority.”

Whitaker immediately appeals to Jerome as evidence that this corruption was already ancient:

Nam ne ipse Hieronymus puram habuit transsationem Graecam septuaginta interpretum. Illam enim, quam habuit, corruptam vitiosamque esse, saepe in commentariis conqueritur.

Translation: “For not even Jerome himself possessed the Greek translation of the seventy interpreters in its purity. For he frequently complains in his commentaries that the one which he possessed was corrupt and faulty.”

Assessment

Whitaker is one of the strongest Reformation-era witnesses concerning the textual condition of the Septuagint. He regards as the sounder opinion that the original translation had been entirely lost and that the surviving Greek was a “mixed and miserably corrupted document.” Alternatively, he concludes that the original translation had undergone such extensive corruption that it possessed “exceedingly slight authority.”

His criticism extends beyond individual erroneous readings. He distinguishes defects in the translation itself from corruption introduced by copyists, describes extensive disagreements with the Hebrew, and maintains that even Jerome did not possess an uncorrupted Septuagint. His examples from Methuselah and Jonah demonstrate his willingness to reject Greek readings as plainly false rather than attribute the disagreements to corruption of the Hebrew. His conclusion that the transmitted Greek had been “infinitely and shamefully corrupted” is among the most emphatic judgments in the collection.

Citation: William Whitaker, Disputatio de Sacra Scriptura contra huius temporis Papistas (Cambridge: Thomas Thomas, 1588), Controversy I, Question II, ch. 3; English translation in William Whitaker, A Disputation on Holy Scripture, Against the Papists, Especially Bellarmine and Stapleton, trans. and ed. William Fitzgerald (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press for the Parker Society, 1849), pp. 121–123.

24. Johannes Drusius (1550–1616)

Johannes Drusius (Johannes van den Driesche) was a Flemish Reformed biblical scholar and professor who worked at Oxford, Leiden, and Franeker. He devoted extensive attention to the ancient Greek versions of the Old Testament, publishing studies of the Greek text and collecting surviving readings from Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and other ancient translators. His writings contain unusually direct judgments concerning the identity, mixture, and textual condition of the Greek text commonly called the Septuagint.

The Common Greek Translation Was Not the Work of the Seventy

In Observationum sacrarum, Drusius devoted an entire chapter to the proposition:

Vulgatam translationem Graecam non esse LXX. interpretum, contra quam olim existimatum fuit.

Translation: “That the common Greek translation is not that of the Seventy interpreters, contrary to what was formerly believed.”

He states:

Translatio ea quae vulgo apud Graecos habetur, quin LXX. interpretum non sit, nemini hodie dubium esse arbitror. Nam si nihil aliud, innumeri in ea loci sunt, qui arguunt magnam imperitiam sermonis Ebraici; sed et negligentiam singularem in legendo, et oscitantiam tantis viris indignam. Qui in ea editione non videt, nihil videt.

Translation: “I think no one today doubts that the translation commonly found among the Greeks is not that of the Seventy interpreters. For, if there were nothing else, there are innumerable passages in it which show great ignorance of the Hebrew language, as well as remarkable negligence in reading and carelessness unworthy of such men. He who does not see this in that edition sees nothing.”

Drusius therefore did not merely criticize particular Septuagint readings. He denied that the commonly received Greek text itself could properly be identified with the original work of the Seventy, appealing to “innumerable passages” as evidence.

“Septuagint” Was a Customary Rather Than a True Name

Drusius explains why he nevertheless continued to use the traditional designation:

Nos quoque cum aliquid inde proferimus usitato magis quam vero nomine utimur, exemplo videlicet Hieronymi, quem suspicamur, licet crederet interpretationem eam a viris illis elaboratam minime fuisse, ne offenderet Graecos, voluisse tamen recepto nomine semper appellare.

Translation: “We too, when we quote something from it, use a name that is customary rather than true, following the example of Jerome, whom we suppose, although he believed that this translation had by no means been produced by those men, nevertheless wished, so as not to offend the Greeks, always to call it by the received name.”

For Drusius, therefore, “Septuagint” was a conventional name applied to the received Greek edition rather than proof that the surviving text was actually the translation produced by the Seventy.

Material from Different Greek Versions Entered the Common Text

Drusius’s study of Origen’s Hexapla led him to distinguish carefully between the Septuagint and the other ancient Greek translations. After describing Origen’s arrangement of several Greek editions in separate columns, he states:

Ex iis modo singulares voces, modo dimidiati versus, modo etiam integrae periodi in editione vulgata, qua hodie utimur, remanserunt.

Translation: “From these, sometimes individual words, sometimes half verses, and sometimes even entire sentences remained in the common edition which we use today.”

Drusius thus believed that material associated with different Greek versions had entered the commonly received Greek text. In his judgment, the Greek edition current under the name of the Septuagint was not an unmixed transmission of one ancient translation.

The Greek Edition Had “Wounds” Requiring Correction

Drusius repeatedly compared received Greek readings with the Hebrew and with other ancient Greek versions. In discussing readings he regarded as textually defective, he concludes:

Atque haec notare debent, quicumque operam suam conferent ad sananda vulnera editionis illius.

Translation: “And these things ought to be noted by whoever devotes his labor to healing the wounds of that edition.”

The expression “wounds of that edition” reflects Drusius’s treatment of the received Greek text as something requiring textual correction rather than unquestioned acceptance. His separate Coniectanea in Graecam editionem on the Minor Prophets repeatedly applied the same method by comparing Greek readings with the Hebrew and with the other ancient Greek translators.

Assessment

Drusius provides strong Reformed testimony concerning both the identity and transmitted condition of the Septuagint. He denies that the common Greek translation of his day was actually the original work of the Seventy, says that “innumerable passages” display serious defects, and describes the name “Septuagint” as customary rather than literally accurate.

He also maintains that material from different ancient Greek versions had entered the common text and describes defective readings in the received Greek edition as “wounds” requiring correction. His testimony therefore directly challenges the identification of the transmitted Greek Old Testament with one pure, unmixed, and faithfully preserved translation of the Seventy.

Citation: Johannes Drusius, Observationum sacrarum libri XVI (Franeker: Aegidius Radaeus, 1594), book VI, chs. 9, 11, and 20, pp. 130–145.

25. Amandus Polanus (1561–1610)

Amandus Polanus was a prominent Reformed Protestant theologian and professor of theology at Basel. In Book I of his Syntagma theologiae christianae (1609), he treats the authority and preservation of the Hebrew Old Testament and subsequently devotes a sustained discussion to the Greek Old Testament attributed to the Seventy.

The Extant Greek Version Is Not the Original Translation of the Seventy

Polanus asks whether the Greek Old Testament then extant was the translation originally produced by the seventy-two interpreters. His answer is explicit:

Græca versio Veteris Testamenti, quæ nunc habetur, non est septuaginta duorum illorum interpretum….

Translation: “The Greek version of the Old Testament which is now extant is not [the version] of those seventy-two interpreters….”

This distinction is fundamental to Polanus’s argument. He does not simply maintain that the Septuagint contains occasional erroneous readings. He distinguishes the original translation attributed to the Seventy from the Greek Old Testament actually circulating under their name in his own time.

Additions, Omissions, and Readings Contrary to the Hebrew

Polanus explains why he considers the extant Greek different from the original:

At versio quæ jam habetur, in plurimis locis dissentit ab Hebræo textu, multa habet quæ non sunt in Hebræo, & rursus multa non habet quæ sunt in Hebræo: multa etiam habet pugnantia cum Hebræo….

Translation: “But the version which is now extant disagrees with the Hebrew text in very many places; it contains many things which are not in the Hebrew, and conversely lacks many things which are in the Hebrew; it also contains many things conflicting with the Hebrew….”

Polanus therefore identifies three distinct textual phenomena: material present in Greek but absent from Hebrew; material present in Hebrew but absent from Greek; and readings in Greek that conflict with Hebrew.

His argument concerns specifically the versio quæ jam habetur—“the version which is now extant.” It therefore bears directly upon the condition of the transmitted Greek Old Testament rather than necessarily attributing every difference to the original translators.

“Corrupted and Spoiled in Many and Various Ways”

Polanus then invokes Jerome as historical testimony concerning what had happened to the Greek tradition:

Et Hieronymus ipse in Præfatione in Paralipomena & in Esdram, & alibi frequenter monet, versionem illam LXX. multis & variis modis esse vitiatam & corruptam.

Translation: “And Jerome himself, in the Preface to Chronicles and to Ezra, and frequently elsewhere, warns that that version of the Seventy has been corrupted and spoiled in many and various ways.”

The two terms are strong: vitiatam & corruptam—“spoiled and corrupted.”

Here Polanus is explicitly appealing to Jerome, so the historical assertion concerning the earlier corruption of the Septuagint should not be represented as originating with Polanus. What follows, however, is Polanus’s own judgment concerning the Greek Old Testament of his own day.

“The Errors of the Present-Day Greek Translation Are Manifest”

Polanus declares:

Manifesta sunt Græcæ hodiernæ translationis vitia, quæ nullo modo excusari possunt.

Translation: “The errors of the present-day Greek translation are manifest and can in no way be excused.”

This is one of the strongest statements in the collection because Græcæ hodiernæ translationis explicitly identifies the object of his criticism: the Greek translation existing in Polanus’s own day.

Moreover, vitia is not merely an abstract theological objection to the authority of translations. Polanus immediately supplies concrete examples. He says that the Greek chronology gives 2,242 years from creation to the Flood, whereas the Hebrew gives 1,656; that the Greek gives 1,082 years from the Flood to Abraham, whereas the Hebrew gives no more than 312; that the Greek makes Adam 230, or in some copies 330, when Seth was born, whereas the Hebrew gives 130; that according to the Greek chronology Methuselah survived the Flood by fourteen years; and that Jonah 3 in the Greek announces Nineveh’s destruction after three days, whereas the Hebrew gives forty days.

Translations Containing Material Absent from the Hebrew Are Corrupt

Earlier in his defense of the integrity of the Hebrew text, Polanus considers the argument that the Hebrew must have suffered losses because translations contain material absent from it:

Ac primò quidem Hebraicum textum corruptum esse hinc facilè colligi posse ajunt, quòd translationes multa habeant, quæ textui Hebraico desunt.

Translation: “And first, they say that it can easily be concluded that the Hebrew text is corrupt from the fact that the translations contain many things which are lacking in the Hebrew text.”

Polanus reverses the argument:

RESP. Primò contrarium potius inferri debet: Translationes multa habent, quæ textui Hebraico desunt: Ergo translationes sunt corruptæ. Deinde probandum est, multa Hebraico textui deesse.

Translation: “RESPONSE. Rather, the contrary conclusion ought first to be drawn: The translations contain many things which are lacking in the Hebrew text; therefore the translations are corrupt. Next, it must be proved that many things are lacking in the Hebrew text.”

This statement supplies the textual principle underlying his treatment of the Greek Old Testament. The mere presence of additional material in a translation does not establish a deficiency in the Hebrew source. Polanus instead places the burden of proof upon anyone alleging corruption of the Hebrew and regards the translations as derivative witnesses to be judged against their original sources.

Is the Septuagint Authentic?

Polanus next poses the question explicitly:

SECUNDO quæritur, An Græca illa versio Veteris Testamenti, quæ septuaginta duorum interpretum esse dicitur, sit authentica?

Translation: “Second, it is asked whether that Greek version of the Old Testament which is said to be of the seventy-two interpreters is authentic?”

His answer is unequivocal:

RESP. Non est. 1. quia non est immediatè à Spiritu Sancto inspirata. 2. quia est multis modis vitiosa, ut sæpe queritur Hieronymus, & Franciscus Junius in editione Bibliorum Græcorum ostendit. 3. quia Augustinus, qui versioni septuaginta plurimum detulit, illam tamen esse ex fontibus emendandam censuit.

Translation: “RESPONSE. It is not [authentic]. 1. Because it is not immediately inspired by the Holy Spirit. 2. Because it is faulty in many ways, as Jerome often complains, and as Franciscus Junius shows in the edition of the Greek Bible. 3. Because Augustine, who attributed very much to the version of the Seventy, nevertheless judged that it ought to be corrected from the sources.”

Polanus thus combines two distinct objections: the Greek translation lacks the immediate inspiration belonging to the original text, and the transmitted Greek Old Testament is textually “faulty in many ways.”

The Hebrew Text and Providential Preservation

Polanus’s position on the Septuagint forms part of his larger defense of the authenticity and preservation of the Hebrew Old Testament. He refuses to infer from Greek-Hebrew disagreement that the Hebrew text must therefore have been corrupted. Rather, the translation is to be tested by the source language.

This principle is particularly clear in his response to the claim that additions found in translations demonstrate omissions from the Hebrew. Polanus insists that the opposite inference should be made unless corruption of the Hebrew can actually be proved: additions in derivative translations are evidence against those translations, not by themselves evidence against the Hebrew text.

In his larger argument concerning Scripture, Polanus likewise appeals to divine providence in defending the preservation of the original-language text. His textual hierarchy is therefore theological as well as critical: the Hebrew Old Testament possesses an authority that a derivative and demonstrably variable Greek translation does not.

Assessment

Polanus is one of the strongest Reformed Protestant witnesses in the collection. He explicitly says that the Greek Old Testament “which is now extant” is not the version of the original Seventy; says that it differs from the Hebrew “in very many places”; identifies additions, omissions, and readings conflicting with the Hebrew; reports Jerome’s conclusion that the Septuagint had been “corrupted and spoiled in many and various ways”; and declares concerning the Greek Old Testament of his own day:

Manifesta sunt Græcæ hodiernæ translationis vitia, quæ nullo modo excusari possunt.

Translation: “The errors of the present-day Greek translation are manifest and can in no way be excused.”

He also rejects the argument that material appearing in translations but absent from the Hebrew proves corruption of the Hebrew, answering instead: Ergo translationes sunt corruptæ—“therefore the translations are corrupt.”

He consequently denies authentic authority to the Greek version and maintains that it must be judged and corrected from the original sources. This is not merely an argument that translations lack the inspiration of their Hebrew source. Polanus expressly addresses the textual condition of the Greek Old Testament transmitted under the name of the Septuagint and regards that transmitted text as extensively defective in comparison with the Hebrew.

Citation: Amandus Polanus, Syntagma theologiae christianae (Hanau, 1609), Book I, discussion of the integrity and preservation of the Hebrew text, p. 493; Book I, discussion De versione Græca LXX. interpretum, pp. 536–538.

26. Andrew Willet (1562–1621)

Andrew Willet was an English Protestant theologian, biblical commentator, and controversialist. In both his Synopsis Papismi and his Hexapla commentaries, he repeatedly compares the Greek Old Testament with the Hebrew. He distinguishes the ancient translation from the Greek text transmitted in his own day, which he describes as corrupt, mixed, and textually uncertain. He consistently treats the Hebrew as the “authenticall originall.”

The Extant Greek Is “Full of Corruptions”

In Synopsis Papismi, Willet distinguishes between the ancient translation attributed to the Seventy and the Greek text then extant:

“That ancient and true translation of the Septuagint, is corrupted and violated, which, as Hierome saith, was agreeable to the Hebrew: but so is not the Greeke copie now extant, which is full of corruptions, and seemeth to be a mixt and confused translation of many.”

Willet does not identify the Greek text available in his own day with an unchanged translation produced by the Seventy. Whatever the character of the original translation, the extant Greek had, in his judgment, become “full of corruptions” and “a mixt and confused translation of many.”

“In Many Places … Verie Corrupt”

Discussing the Septuagint in his Hexapla in Danielem, Willet writes:

“It is evident that the translation which goeth under the name of the 70. in many places is verie corrupt, and varieth from the originall….”

He points particularly to chronological differences in Genesis and other numerical discrepancies as evidence that the Greek text bearing the name of the Seventy could not simply be assumed to preserve the original accurately.

“Great Varietie and Uncertaintie of Copies”

Willet addresses the plurality of Greek textual forms known from antiquity. He refers to the editions associated with Hesychius, Lucian, and Origen and concludes:

“But there is great uncertaintie beside….”

After describing these differing Greek editions and mentioning the translations of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion, he writes:

“And beside the translation of the Septuag. whereof there were so many editions, there were other translations of the Scriptures into the Greeke tongue, as by Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion: wherefore in so great varietie and uncertaintie of copies, the most sure way is, to have recourse unto the originall, as Hierome and Augustine doe well advise….”

The existence of multiple Greek editions and the resulting “varietie and uncertaintie of copies” made recourse to the Hebrew original, in Willet’s judgment, the most reliable course.

Genesis 8:7 — “We Hold the Septuagint … to Be Corrupt”

In discussing the account of Noah’s raven, Willet rejects attempts to reconcile the Greek and Latin readings with the Hebrew:

“We also refuse their conjectures, who to justifie this erroneous reading, would have the Septuagint and Latin to keepe the sense, though not the words….”

He concludes:

“Wherefore, we hold the Septuagint and Latin to be corrupt: and that according to the Hebrew text, the raven went and came to the arke….”

Willet therefore judges the divergent Greek and Latin readings corrupt rather than correcting the Hebrew to agree with them.

The Apostles Did Not “Approve Their Errors”

Willet addresses the argument that New Testament use of the Septuagint establishes its authority. Commenting on Genesis 47:31, he writes:

“The Apostles indeede doe sometime follow the Septuagint, because it was a common translation, and of authoritie: but they therein neither approve their errors, nor yet make it of equall authoritie to the originall….”

He explains that the apostles could employ the familiar Greek wording when it conveyed the Hebrew sense:

“This then is no argument the Apostles follow the Septuagint, where they keepe the Hebrew sense, though not the words….”

Thus, apostolic use of Septuagint wording did not, in Willet’s judgment, authenticate its errors or place the Greek translation on the same level as the Hebrew original.

“Too Great Boldnesse” to Add to the “Authenticall Originall”

At Exodus 23:23, Willet objects to the Septuagint’s insertion of the Girgashites into the list of peoples:

“The Septuagint, whose manner is to supplie out of one place, that which is wanting in another; do heere also insert the Girgashite. But this is too great boldnesse to adde any thing to the authenticall originall.”

Willet identifies supplementation from parallel passages as characteristic of the translators’ practice and expressly condemns such additions to the “authenticall originall.”

Assessment

Willet clearly distinguishes the ancient Septuagint from the transmitted Greek Old Testament. He describes the extant Greek as “full of corruptions” and “a mixt and confused translation of many,” while declaring elsewhere that the version going under the name of the Seventy is “in many places … verie corrupt, and varieth from the originall.”

His criticism extends beyond isolated mistranslations. He recognizes multiple ancient Greek editions and the resulting “great varietie and uncertaintie of copies,” for which reason he recommends recourse to the original Hebrew. His textual discussions apply the same principle: he rejects erroneous Greek readings, condemns additions to the Hebrew, and maintains that even apostolic use of the Septuagint neither approves its errors nor makes it “of equall authoritie to the originall.”

Citation: Andrew Willet, Synopsis Papismi, that is, A Generall Viewe of Papistrie, 4th ed. (London, 1614), discussion of the authority of the Hebrew and Greek texts; Andrew Willet, Hexapla in Genesin, discussions of Genesis 8:7 and 47:31; Andrew Willet, Hexapla in Exodum (London: Felix Kyngston for Thomas Man and John Norton, 1608), discussion of Exodus 23:23; Andrew Willet, Hexapla in Danielem (Cambridge, 1610), discussion of the Septuagint and the Greek textual tradition of Daniel.

27. James Ussher (1581–1656)

James Ussher was an Irish Protestant theologian, biblical scholar, and Archbishop of Armagh in the Church of Ireland. He devoted a separate treatise to the history and textual condition of the Greek Old Testament, De Græca Septuaginta Interpretum Versione Syntagma. His testimony is especially important because he distinguishes what he regarded as the primitive translation of the Seventy from later Greek texts transmitted under its name and argues that the primitive translation had disappeared.

The Primitive Septuagint Had Perished

After considering earlier opinions concerning the surviving Greek text, Ussher states:

Inde enim veriorem omnino eorum esse sententiam apparebit, qui primitivam illam Septuaginta seniorum interpretationem penitus interiisse censuerunt; diversamque plane ab ea fuisse, quæ et nostris, et veterum patrum temporibus illorum nomine est recepta.

Translation: “From these considerations it will plainly appear that the opinion of those is altogether more true who have judged that the primitive interpretation of the Seventy Elders has completely perished, and that the one received under their name both in our own times and in the times of the ancient Fathers was plainly different from it.”

Ussher thus maintains not merely that surviving Septuagint manuscripts contain corrupt readings, but that the primitive translation itself had “completely perished” and that even the Greek text known to the ancient Fathers was “plainly different” from it.

Later Corruption of the Greek Old Testament

Ussher proposes a historical reconstruction in which a later Jewish translator or reviser produced another Greek form of the Old Testament:

Post quartum igitur illum Philometoris Ptolemæi annum, ut gentium curiositati, Judaica sacra penitius intelligere desiderantium, aliquo modo satisfieret, a Judæo aliquo opus hoc peractum fuisse videtur; eandem sibi licentiam in tota vetere Scriptura additionibus, detractionibus et mutationibus suis vitianda permittente, quam ejus æmulatus exemplum Dositheus Samaritanus in ipso originali Pentateuchi Mosaici textu interpolando apostolorum postea temporibus usurpavit.

Translation: “After the fourth year of Ptolemy Philometor, therefore, it appears that this work was carried out by some Jew, in order in some measure to satisfy the curiosity of the Gentiles who desired to understand the Jewish sacred writings more thoroughly; he allowing himself the same liberty in corrupting the whole Old Testament by his additions, omissions, and alterations which Dositheus the Samaritan afterward employed in interpolating the original text of the Mosaic Pentateuch.”

Whatever the merits of Ussher’s historical reconstruction, his judgment concerning the textual condition of this Greek form is clear: he describes “additions, omissions, and alterations” affecting the Old Testament.

The “Uncorrupted” and Common Greek Editions

In discussing Origen’s textual work, Ussher distinguishes between a form regarded as the pristine translation of the Seventy and the common Greek edition:

Sed hoc interest inter utramque: quod κοινῆς pro locis et temporibus et pro voluntate scriptorum veterum corrupta editio est; ea autem quæ habetur in ἑξαπλοῖς; et quam nos vertimus, ipsa est quæ in eruditorum libris incorrupta et immaculata Septuaginta interpretum translatio reservatur.

Translation: “But this is the difference between the two: the common edition is a corrupted edition according to places and times and the will of the ancient copyists; but that which is contained in the Hexapla, and which we translate, is that which is preserved in the books of the learned as the uncorrupted and unblemished translation of the Seventy interpreters.”

He later describes the common edition as:

tot corruptelis et veterum scriptorum varietatibus laborante

Translation: “laboring under so many corruptions and variations of the ancient copyists.”

Thus a Greek text commonly known as the Septuagint could nevertheless be, in Ussher’s judgment, a “corrupted edition” marked by numerous corruptions and scribal variations.

The Common Greek Text Had a “Multiple Form”

Ussher further emphasizes plurality within the common Greek edition:

Ceterum textus utriusque dissimilitudinem nemo hic mirabitur, qui non solum editionis illius quæ pro genuina habebatur a κοινῇ sive communi discrepantiam, sed etiam ipsius communis multiplicem faciem consideraverit.

Translation: “But no one will be surprised here at the dissimilarity of the two texts who considers not only the difference between that edition which was regarded as genuine and the κοινή, or common edition, but also the multiple form of the common edition itself.”

The problem, therefore, was not simply that one corrupted Greek edition had replaced an earlier pristine text. Ussher recognized differing textual forms within the common Greek tradition itself.

The Greek Daniel Was Not the Septuagint

Ussher also notes that the Greek Daniel ordinarily in use was Theodotion’s version:

Ea vero qua nos utimur Græca Danielis editio, in vetustissimo Renati Marchali prophetarum exemplari titulum præfixum habet, “Δανιὴλ κατὰ Θεοδοτίωνα, Daniel secundum Theodotionem.”

Translation: “But the Greek edition of Daniel which we use has prefixed to it, in the very ancient copy of the Prophets belonging to Renatus Marchalus, the title, ‘Daniel according to Theodotion.’”

He then cites Jerome’s judgment concerning the older Septuagintal Daniel:

multum a veritate discrepet, et recto judicio liber repudiatus sit

Translation: “It differs greatly from the truth, and the book was rejected by a right judgment.”

The latter words are Jerome’s, quoted by Ussher. Ussher uses them within his account of how one Greek form of a biblical book could cease to be ordinarily used while another Greek translation took its place.

Origen’s Signs Marked Differences from the Hebrew

In describing Origen’s critical signs, Ussher explains that the asterisks marked:

ea quæ in Hebræo reperta a Septuaginta omissa fuerant

Translation: “those things which were found in the Hebrew but had been omitted by the Seventy.”

The obeli marked:

ea quæ Hebraicæ veritati sunt adjecta

Translation: “those things which had been added to the Hebrew truth.”

These statements show how Ussher understood the textual differences Origen sought to mark: some material was absent from the Greek that stood in the Hebrew, while other material stood in the Greek that was absent from the Hebrew.

Assessment

Ussher is one of the strongest witnesses in the collection because he addresses the identity and transmission of the Septuagint itself, not merely isolated errors of translation. He maintains that the primitive translation of the Seventy had “completely perished,” that the Greek text later received under its name was “plainly different” from it, and that the common edition existed in a “multiple form” marked by corruption and scribal variation.

His testimony therefore directly challenges the idea of a single, continuously preserved Greek Old Testament identifiable without qualification as “the Septuagint.” For Ussher, that name had come to be applied to differing and altered Greek textual forms after the primitive translation itself was no longer extant.

Citation: James Ussher, De Græca Septuaginta Interpretum Versione Syntagma (London: John Crook, 1655), especially pp. 4, 22–23, 52–53; James Ussher, The Whole Works of the Most Rev. James Ussher, ed. Charles Richard Elrington, vol. 7 (Dublin: Hodges, Smith, 1864), De Græca Septuaginta Interpretum Versione Syntagma, especially pp. 441, 470–471, 482–493, 536.

28. Johann Gerhard (1582–1637)

Johann Gerhard was one of the foremost Lutheran theologians of the seventeenth century and a major representative of Lutheran orthodoxy. In his Loci Theologici, while discussing the authority of Scripture and translations, he denies that the Greek Septuagint possesses authority equal to the Hebrew text and gives several reasons based upon its textual condition.

The Septuagint Is Not Equal in Authority to the Hebrew

Gerhard states:

Sed non possumus Graecae isti versioni auctoritatem authenticam tribuere vel Hebraeo textui eam aequiparare.

Translation: “But we cannot attribute authentic authority to this Greek version or place it on an equality with the Hebrew text.”

For Gerhard, the Septuagint was a translation whose readings were to be judged rather than an independently authentic textual authority equal to the Hebrew.

Additions and Omissions

Gerhard describes discrepancies between the transmitted Greek and the Hebrew:

in multis discrepat a fonte Hebraeo, praesertim in Psalmis. Quaedam habet, quae non sunt in textu Hebraeo; quaedam omittit, quae in Hebraeo habentur….

Translation: “In many places it differs from the Hebrew fountain, especially in the Psalms. It contains some things which are not in the Hebrew text; it omits some things which are contained in the Hebrew.”

He attributes at least some of these differences to the translators:

Nam quia illi interpretes passim multa de suo addiderunt explicandarum rerum quae tractantur gratia, multa etiam tanquam supervacanea consulto omiserunt….

Translation: “For those translators everywhere added many things of their own for the sake of explaining the matters being treated, and they also deliberately omitted many things as though they were superfluous.”

Gerhard therefore did not assume that every difference between the Greek and Hebrew resulted from a different Hebrew exemplar.

Chronological Errors

Gerhard also charges the Greek version with errors in its chronological numbers:

mendas in chronologicis numeris habet complures. Ab Adamo ad diluvium numerat annos 2242, cum in Hebraeo textu tantum habeantur 1656 anni. A diluvio ad Abrahamum numerat annos 1082, cum in Hebraeo sint 292.

Translation: “It has numerous errors in the chronological numbers. From Adam to the Flood it reckons 2,242 years, whereas the Hebrew text has only 1,656 years. From the Flood to Abraham it reckons 1,082 years, whereas the Hebrew has 292.”

He gives Methuselah as a specific example:

Mathusalem secundum Graecam translationem 14 annis post diluvium superstes mansit, unde magna oritur quaestio, ubi in diluvio servatus fuerit? in quo nodo solvendo August. lib. 15. de civ. Dei c. 11. plurimum sese torquet; sed ex textu Hebraico colligitur ipsum eodem anno fuisse mortuum, quo terra diluvio fuit obruta.

Translation: “According to the Greek translation, Methuselah remained alive fourteen years after the Flood, whence arises the great question where he was preserved during the Flood. Augustine, City of God, book 15, chapter 11, greatly troubles himself in solving this difficulty; but from the Hebrew text it is gathered that he died in the very year in which the earth was overwhelmed by the Flood.”

Gerhard treats these chronological differences as errors in the Greek rather than as grounds for correcting the Hebrew chronology.

Jonah 3:4 — The “Authentic Hebrew Text” Preferred

Gerhard gives Jonah 3:4 as another example:

Jonae 3. in Graeco est: Adhuc tres dies, et destruetur Ninive. Sed rectius in textu Hebraico authentico post 40 dies exitium ei denuntiatur, vix enim tribus diebus Jonas civitatem peragrare potuit.

Translation: “In Jonah 3 the Greek has: ‘Yet three days, and Nineveh shall be destroyed.’ But more correctly, in the authentic Hebrew text its destruction is announced after forty days, for Jonah could scarcely have traversed the city in three days.”

Gerhard expressly calls the Hebrew text authentic and judges its forty-day reading to be “more correct.”

Is the Extant Greek the Ancient Septuagint?

Gerhard then raises the more fundamental question whether the Greek text surviving in his own time was identical with the ancient Septuagint:

Multi dubitant, an Graeca versio, quae hodie exstat, sit illa a veteribus tantopere celebrata LXX interpretum versio.

Translation: “Many doubt whether the Greek version which exists today is that version of the Seventy interpreters so highly celebrated by the ancients.”

He adds:

Sed Graeca versio, quam nunc habemus, multis in locis a textu Hebraeo dissentit.

Translation: “But the Greek version which we now have differs from the Hebrew text in many places.”

And:

Adde quod Graeca versio, quae hodie exstat, in locis multis non possit ulla ratione cum textu Hebraeo conciliari….

Translation: “Add that the Greek version which exists today in many places cannot by any means be reconciled with the Hebrew text….”

Gerhard thus distinguishes the question of what the ancient translators originally produced from the condition of the Greek version “which exists today.”

The Septuagint Had “Contracted Corruptions”

Gerhard appeals directly to the textual history of the Septuagint:

Versio LXX interpretum jam olim ab Origene, Luciano, Hesychio, Hieronymo emendari coepit, quomodo igitur ab erroribus immunis fuit? et quis credat, cum primis trecentis annis corruptelas contraxerit, quod reliquis annis mille trecentis incorrupta manserit?

Translation: “The version of the Seventy had already long ago begun to be corrected by Origen, Lucian, Hesychius, and Jerome; how, then, was it free from errors? And who would believe that, when during the first three hundred years it had contracted corruptions, it remained uncorrupted during the remaining thirteen hundred years?”

The phrase corruptelas contraxerit—“had contracted corruptions”—is especially important because Gerhard distinguishes corruption acquired in transmission from errors or liberties attributable to the translators themselves.

Assessment

Gerhard’s testimony operates on two levels. He attributes some Septuagintal differences to the translators themselves, including additions, omissions, and chronological errors. At the same time, he questions whether the Greek version existing in his own day was identical with the ancient Septuagint and expressly states that the version had “contracted corruptions” during its early transmission.

His testimony therefore distinguishes both between the Hebrew and Greek texts and between the original Greek translation and the later Greek textual tradition transmitted under its name.

Citation: Johann Gerhard, Loci Theologici, Locus Primus: De Scriptura Sacra, §508; ed. Eduard Preuss, vol. I (Berlin: Gustav Schlawitz, 1863), pp. 225–226. See also Johann Gerhard, Loci Theologici, tom. I, De Scriptura Sacra (Frankfurt and Hamburg: Zacharias Hertel, 1657), and the accompanying Exegesis sive uberior explicatio articulorum de Scriptura Sacra.

29. Simon Episcopius (1583–1643)

Simon Episcopius was a Dutch Remonstrant theologian and a leading successor to Jacobus Arminius. In his Institutiones Theologicae, he maintained that the ancient Septuagint had not been transmitted in its original purity. His testimony is especially useful because he was not generally hostile toward the Septuagint and held that, had the ancient Greek version survived intact, its authority for Christians should have been no less than that of the Hebrew text.

The Septuagint Had Become “So Corrupted”

In discussing Origen’s critical work upon the Greek Old Testament, Episcopius explains why such correction had become necessary:

quia eam adeo vitiatam esse cum non pauca in ea extare videret, quae in Hebraeo textu non leguntur….

Translation: “because he saw that it had become so corrupted, since not a few things appeared in it which are not read in the Hebrew text….”

In the surrounding discussion Episcopius refers to material present in the Greek but absent from the Hebrew, material absent from the Greek that was supplied from other Greek versions, and readings introduced from Theodotion. His criticism therefore concerns alteration in the transmitted Greek text, not merely the ordinary limitations of translation.

The Septuagint Did Not Come Down “Pure and Uninterpolated”

Episcopius states his conclusion unequivocally:

Sed vero nec hoc contentiose admodum urgere velim, quia certum est, translationem veterem LXX, puram ac non interpolatam ad nos non devenisse, uti ex antedictis manifestum est.

Translation: “But I would not wish to press even this too contentiously, because it is certain that the ancient translation of the Seventy has not come down to us pure and uninterpolated, as is evident from what has been said above.”

His conclusion is explicit: the ancient translation itself had not reached his own time “pure and uninterpolated.” In context, this follows his discussion of additions, omissions, and material introduced from other Greek versions.

What Its Authority Would Have Been Had It Survived Intact

Episcopius’s favorable attitude toward the ancient Septuagint makes this admission more significant:

Nempe siquidem ea pura ac non interpolata ad nos devenisset, non minor ejus autoritas apud nos esse debuisset, quam textus Ebraici….

Translation: “Indeed, if it had come down to us pure and uninterpolated, its authority among us ought to have been no less than that of the Hebrew text….”

Thus his objection is not that a Greek translation must necessarily possess lesser authority. He grants that a pure and uninterpolated Septuagint would have deserved authority comparable to the Hebrew, but denies that such a text had survived.

The New Testament and Septuagintal Readings

Episcopius nevertheless does not adopt an unqualified Hebrew-over-Greek position. Where a New Testament citation differs from the extant Hebrew text and supports a Greek reading, he is prepared to prefer the reading attested by the inspired New Testament.

This qualification is important because it shows that his judgment concerning the transmitted Septuagint does not rest merely upon a prior determination always to prefer the Hebrew. He could accept a Greek reading on apostolic authority while still maintaining that the Septuagint as transmitted had undergone textual alteration.

Assessment

Episcopius combines a high estimation of the ancient Septuagint with an explicit denial that its pristine text survived. He describes the Greek text encountered by Origen as having become “so corrupted” and concludes that “it is certain” that the ancient translation of the Seventy “has not come down to us pure and uninterpolated.”

His testimony therefore distinguishes the ancient Septuagint from the altered Greek textual tradition transmitted under its name. The authority he was willing to attribute to the original translation depended upon its having survived intact—a condition he expressly denied had been fulfilled.

Citation: Simon Episcopius, Opera theologica, vol. I (Amsterdam, 1678), Institutiones Theologicae, Book IV, chapter XXI, especially pp. 275–276.

30. Edward Leigh (1602–1671)

Edward Leigh was an English Puritan theologian, biblical scholar, and member of the Westminster Assembly. In his treatment of the authority and transmission of Scripture, he distinguished between what he regarded as the ancient Septuagint and the Greek text subsequently transmitted under its name. Following Jerome and William Whitaker, he maintained that the ancient translation had been corrupted and that the Greek text extant in his own day was a mixed and seriously corrupted text.

The Ancient Septuagint and the Extant Greek Text

Leigh writes:

“That ancient and true Translation of the Septuagint, is corrupted and violated, which (as Jerome saith) was agreeable to the Hebrew, but so is not the Greek Copy now extant, which is full of corruptions, and seemeth to be a mixed and confused Translation of many.”

Leigh therefore distinguishes between the ancient translation and the “Greek Copy now extant,” which he describes as “full of corruptions” and as “a mixed and confused Translation of many.”

The “True Seventy Is Lost”

Leigh immediately strengthens the point by appealing to William Whitaker:

“There is indeed a Greek Edition extant, which goeth under the name of the Seventy; but Whitaker saith, That the true Seventy is lost, and that this which we now have is mixed and miserably corrupted.”

The distinction is explicit. A Greek edition existed in Leigh’s day and “goeth under the name of the Seventy,” but the “true Seventy” was regarded as lost and the surviving Greek as “mixed and miserably corrupted.”

The Septuagint Was Not an Independent Authentic Standard

Leigh connects the condition of the Greek text with the question of its authority:

“If the Seventy, as well as the Hebrew, had been Authentical, the Lord would have been careful to have kept it pure and uncorrupt unto our days, as well as he hath done the Hebrew.”

He further writes:

“Therefore since that version when pure was but a human, not divine work, and proceeded from Interpreters not Prophets; it could be neither Authentical, nor fide digna, any farther then it agreed with the Hebrew Text.”

Leigh’s point is that even the Septuagint “when pure” did not possess independent authentic authority. Its failure, in his judgment, to remain “pure and uncorrupt” reinforced that conclusion.

The Apostles Frequently Used the Septuagint

Leigh nevertheless acknowledges extensive New Testament use of the Greek translation:

“The Apostles and Evangelists writing in Greek, often followed the version of the Septuagint then common amongst the Grecians, and cited it sometimes where there is a most manifest difference from the Hebrew Text, but yet they did not always use that Translation, which they would have done, if they had esteemed it Divine and Authentical.”

His criticism of the Septuagint therefore does not depend upon denying its importance or its frequent use by the apostles and evangelists.

Origen and Jerome Corrected the Greek from the Hebrew

Leigh also appeals to ancient textual correction:

“The Ancients themselves commenting upon Scripture, used not the Septuagint Edition as Authentic, from which it would not have been then lawful to depart; but rather often correct it, as Origen and Jerome from the Hebrew fountains: which everyone knoweth that is versed in their works.”

For Leigh, this practice confirmed that the Septuagint was not treated as an independent and unalterable textual standard.

Changes to the Numbers

Leigh gives specific examples of Greek-Hebrew differences:

“They are most bold in changing numbers without any reason, as Gen. 5, to Seth, Enos, Cainaan, Malaleel, they give each a hundred years beyond the Hebrew truth. In the 46th Chapter of Genesis for Seventy souls they say Seventy-five.”

Leigh treats these numerical differences as alterations in the Greek rather than as evidence of an equally authoritative competing textual form.

Proverbs 8:22 and Possible Scribal Corruption

Leigh also considers the possibility that a divergent Greek reading arose during transmission rather than from the original translators:

“The Seventy read Prov. 8:23. In the beginning God created me; for, In the beginning God possessed me, whether because they mistook the Hebrew word Chava for Cava, upon their likeness in the Hebrew Characters, or their Translation was at the first ἔκτησε possedit, possessed, and the Copies slipping in one letter, made it ἔκτισε creavit, created, as Bellarmine after Zanchi thinketh.”

Leigh thus presents two possible explanations: either the translators misread the Hebrew, or the original Greek reading was subsequently corrupted by copyists through the alteration of a single letter. His discussion therefore distinguishes errors of translation from corruption introduced during transmission.

Assessment

Leigh distinguishes sharply between the ancient Septuagint and the Greek text transmitted under its name. He describes the extant Greek as “full of corruptions,” cites the judgment that the “true Seventy is lost,” and characterizes the surviving text as “mixed and miserably corrupted.”

His testimony is especially useful because it recognizes two different sources of textual difficulty: errors attributable to the translators themselves and corruption introduced later in the copying of the Greek text. The Greek edition circulating under the name of the Seventy could therefore not, in Leigh’s judgment, simply be identified with a pristine ancient translation.

Citation: Edward Leigh, A Treatise of Divinity (London: E. Griffin for William Lee, 1646), Book I, discussion of the Septuagint; expanded as A Systeme or Body of Divinity (London: A. M. for William Lee, 1654), Book I, chapter VII, “Of the Seventy and Vulgar Translation.”

31. John Lightfoot (1602–1675)

John Lightfoot was an English Puritan theologian, biblical scholar, member of the Westminster Assembly, and later Vice-Chancellor of the University of Cambridge. Although he regarded the Septuagint as highly important for understanding the New Testament, he rejected attempts to elevate it above the Hebrew and attributed many Greek-Hebrew differences to the translators themselves rather than to a lost Hebrew textual tradition.

The Greek Version Was the Work of Different Hands

Commenting on Luke 3:36 and the appearance of Cainan in the genealogy, Lightfoot observes:

“It is plain enough to any one that diligently considers the Greek version throughout, that it was composed by different hands, who greatly varied from one another, both in style and wit….”

Lightfoot therefore regarded the Greek Old Testament as the work of different translators whose methods and abilities varied substantially.

The Septuagint Was “Over Authorized by Some”

Lightfoot nevertheless spoke favorably of the New Testament’s use of the Greek translation. In Erubhin, or Miscellanies Christian and Judaical, he writes:

“And admirable it is to see, with what sweetness and harmony the New Testament doth follow this translation, sometime even besides the letter of the Old….”

Yet the following chapter is explicitly entitled:

“The Septuagint over authorized by some.”

Lightfoot begins:

“Some there were in the primitive church, like the Romanists now, that preferred this translation of the Greek … before the Hebrew fountain.”

Thus his criticism did not arise from hostility toward the Septuagint. He could value its New Testament importance while rejecting the authority some had attributed to it.

No Corresponding Hebrew Text

In discussing whether Greek-Hebrew differences might reflect Hebrew manuscripts substantially different from the surviving Hebrew tradition, Lightfoot argues:

“To conclude: Before the Bible had been translated for Ptolemy (as it is supposed) into the Greek tongue, there were an infinite number of copies in the Hebrew in Palestine, Babylon, Egypt, even everywhere, in every synagogue: and it is a marvellous thing, that in all antiquity there should not be the least hint or mention of so much as one Hebrew copy amongst all these that agrees with the Greek version.”

Lightfoot therefore resisted the assumption that differences between the Greek and Hebrew should automatically be explained by positing a different Hebrew exemplar behind the Greek.

Different Septuagint Editions Disagreed with One Another

Lightfoot then contrasts the Hebrew evidence with the plurality of Greek editions:

“We have various editions of that version which they call the Septuagint, and those pretty much disagreeing among themselves: but who hath ever heard or seen one Hebrew copy that hath in every thing agreed with any one of them?”

This is one of Lightfoot’s strongest statements concerning the textual history of the Septuagint. He refers explicitly to “various editions of that version which they call the Septuagint” and states that they were “pretty much disagreeing among themselves.” The traditional designation therefore did not, in his usage, imply a single uniform Greek textual form.

The Translators “Abounded in Their Own Sense”

Lightfoot immediately gives another explanation for Greek-Hebrew differences:

“The interpreters have still abounded in their own sense, not very strictly obliging themselves to the Hebrew text.”

For Lightfoot, therefore, such differences need not imply a different Hebrew Vorlage. They could arise from the translators’ own methods and freedom in rendering the Hebrew. This accords with his earlier observation that the Greek version was produced by “different hands” who varied considerably from one another.

Cainan and the Greek Version

Lightfoot applies this principle to Cainan in Luke 3:36. He argues that Luke faithfully reproduced the Greek form familiar to his readers:

“the learned amongst them knew from whence he had it; for what reason this addition had been made in the Greek version, and that St. Luke had faithfully transcribed it thence: so that if there were any fault, let them lay the blame upon the first authors, and not upon the transcriber.”

Lightfoot thus distinguishes Luke’s inspired use of the familiar Greek form from the origin of the divergent reading itself. If there were a fault, he attributed it to those responsible for the Greek version rather than to Luke.

Assessment

Lightfoot is valuable because he combines considerable respect for the Septuagint with explicit recognition of its textual and translational difficulties. He describes it as the work of “different hands,” speaks of “various editions” that were “pretty much disagreeing among themselves,” and says that its translators sometimes “abounded in their own sense, not very strictly obliging themselves to the Hebrew text.”

His testimony therefore bears directly upon both the plurality of Greek texts transmitted under the Septuagint name and the danger of assuming that every Greek-Hebrew difference necessarily reflects a lost Hebrew exemplar.

Citation: John Lightfoot, Erubhin, or Miscellanies Christian and Judaical (London, 1629), chapters XXII–XXIII, in The Whole Works of the Rev. John Lightfoot, D.D., ed. John Rogers Pitman, vol. 4 (London: J. F. Dove, 1822), pp. 30–33; John Lightfoot, “Hebrew and Talmudical Exercitations upon the Gospel of St. Luke,” on Luke 3:36, in The Whole Works of the Rev. John Lightfoot, D.D., ed. John Rogers Pitman, vol. 12 (London: J. F. Dove, 1823), pp. 56–58.

The main change was condensation rather than substantive alteration. I removed the separate section on “The Hebrew Copies and the Preservation of the Text” because it shifted attention toward defending the Hebrew tradition rather than establishing Lightfoot’s testimony about the Septuagint, contrary to the collection’s stated focus. I also compressed repeated commentary after the “different hands,” “no corresponding Hebrew,” “various editions,” and Cainan quotations, and reduced the Assessment from five paragraphs to two. Pasted markdown

All of the strongest distinct evidence remains: different translators, favorable recognition of New Testament use, criticism of over-authorizing the Septuagint, absence of a corresponding Hebrew textual form, multiple Greek editions disagreeing among themselves, translator freedom, and the Cainan example. No primary quotation was removed except material that was only editorial prose; the six substantive quotations in the supplied entry are retained.

32. John Gregory (1607–1646)

John Gregory was an English scholar and chaplain of Christ Church, Oxford. In A Discourse of the LXX Interpreters and A Disproof of the Second Cainan, he discussed the textual history of the Septuagint at considerable length. Gregory attributed serious corruption to the transmitted Greek text and, in his treatment of its chronology, argued that some alterations were deliberate rather than accidental.

“Divers and Dangerous Corruptions”

Discussing efforts to correct the Greek translation, Gregory writes:

“This though in it self a very laudable and pious Enterprise, and pretended also to be most necessarily done, because of divers and dangerous Corruptions wherewith the Greek Translation was found to be incumbred….”

Gregory therefore treats corruption of the Greek text as sufficiently extensive and serious to have made critical correction necessary.

The Translation “Supernumerary and Corrupt”

In discussing the chronological differences between the Greek and Hebrew, Gregory concludes:

“The ways of Reconciliation and Defence being thus shut against us, the Translation it self must be called in question, and written upon as Supernumerary and Corrupt.

“For the Anni [years], ’tis evident from the method and demeanour of the undertaking, it is not of that kind as could fall out in Time, or by Transcription, but of deliberation and purpose, the number for the most part increasing by a Centenary accession.”

Gregory thus goes beyond accidental scribal corruption. In his reconstruction, the chronological alterations could not plausibly have arisen merely “by Transcription,” but displayed “deliberation and purpose.”

The Additional Cainan

Gregory connects the additional Cainan with the same deliberate chronological alteration:

“But neither is the forgery constant to itself; for though we meet still with it in the Book of Genesis, yet in the better Copies of the Chronicles it is not found; the Projector so much forgot himself.

“Manifestly therefore both Cainan and the Numbers came in the wrong way; the design whereof, what it was, and managed by whom, I go about to shew.”

He then explains his reconstruction of the alteration:

“By the Period of Theophilus the Interval from Adam to Phalec was 2891 years; to this 110 years were to be added. First therefore, and to make it look the more unlike a cheat, they cut off 20 years from Methusala’s sum; and whereas Theophilus had reckoned him at 187, they set him down 167, as in some Copies it still standeth. Then it was from Adam to Phalec 2871 years. This done, they insert a new Cainan, assigning him 130 years, which added to the former sum, precisely maketh up 3001 years from Adam to the 130 year of Phalec. And therefore Cainan was not taken into the Seventy out of St. Luke, as the Learned Grotius prejudged, but contrarily.”

Whatever judgment is made concerning Gregory’s historical reconstruction, his textual position is unmistakable. He regarded both the altered chronology and the additional Cainan as secondary intrusions into the Greek tradition, and he appealed to disagreement among Greek copies themselves as part of his case.

Assessment

Gregory is a particularly strong witness because he distinguishes accidental textual corruption from what he believed to be deliberate alteration. He speaks generally of “divers and dangerous Corruptions” in the Greek translation and calls the transmitted chronology “Supernumerary and Corrupt.” He then argues that its numerical alterations were not the sort of changes that could arise merely through time or transcription, but were made “of deliberation and purpose.”

His discussion of Cainan adds an important manuscript dimension: the reading appeared in Genesis but was absent from what he regarded as the better copies of Chronicles. Gregory consequently treated the additional Cainan and the altered chronological numbers as secondary features of the transmitted Greek text rather than as evidence for correcting the Hebrew.

Citation: John Gregory, The Works of the Learned Mr. John Gregory, 4th ed. (London: M. Clark for Richard Royston, Benjamin Tooke, and Thomas Sawbridge, 1684), A Discourse of the LXX Interpreters and A Disproof of the Second Cainan, especially pp. 86–90.

33. Abraham Calov (1612–1686)

Abraham Calov was a leading Lutheran orthodox theologian and biblical scholar and professor of theology at Wittenberg. In his Criticus Sacer Biblicus, he treated the authority, canon, original languages, textual purity, and principal ancient versions of Scripture at considerable length. In his discussion De Versione Græca LXX. Interpretum (“On the Greek Version of the Seventy Interpreters”), Calov denied divine or authentic authority to the Septuagint and insisted that, as a human translation, it must be judged and corrected by the Hebrew original.

A Translation That “Abounds in Errors”

While discussing claims for the inspiration of the Septuagint, Calov writes:

Cæterum sunt hæc prorsus ἀσύστατα; versionem θεόπνευστον dicere, quæ erroribus scateat, in multis redundet, & deficiat in multis: ut & versionem saltem non contemnere, sed tolerare, & credere versionem divinam & authenticam.

Translation: “Moreover, these things are altogether inconsistent: to call a translation divinely inspired which abounds in errors, is redundant in many places, and is deficient in many places; likewise, merely not to despise but to tolerate a translation, and [at the same time] to believe it to be a divine and authentic translation.”

Calov’s rejection of the Septuagint’s inspiration is therefore based in part upon its actual textual condition: it “abounds in errors,” contains excess material in many places, and is deficient in others.

“Everything Is Confused” in the Septuagint Edition

Discussing the Septuagint text and its chronological difficulties, Calov writes:

Ita omnia sunt perturbata in editione Septuaginta, inde ab Hieronymi ætate, quæ perturbatio sive ipsis LXX. Senioribus adscribenda sit, sive aliorum imperitiæ tribuenda, multas certe difficultates peperit….

Translation: “Thus everything is confused in the edition of the Septuagint, [as it has been] from the age of Jerome; and whether this confusion is to be attributed to the Seventy elders themselves or to the ignorance of others, it has certainly produced many difficulties….”

Calov leaves open whether particular defects originated with the translators or arose subsequently through the actions of others. What he does not leave open is his judgment concerning the resulting text: omnia sunt perturbata—“everything is confused.”

No Divine or Authentic Authority

Near the conclusion of his treatment, Calov draws the consequence of the preceding evidence:

Quanquam vero ex his luculentum sit, non convenire versioni LXX. autoritatem divinam, vel authenticam….

Translation: “Although from these things it is manifest that divine or authentic authority does not belong to the Septuagint translation….”

The importance of this statement lies in its connection with what precedes it. Calov’s denial of authentic authority follows his discussion of the Greek version’s errors, redundancies, deficiencies, and textual confusion.

The Greek Must Be Subjected to the Hebrew

Calov then states his governing principle for the relationship between the Greek translation and the Hebrew original:

Sed quia humano spiritu facta, ut cæteræ versiones omnes, conferri nullatenus potest cum originali Scriptura Prophetica, vere divina, & divinitus inspirata, verum subjici debet eidem; ita ut inserviat Ebraicæ veritati explicandæ, qua illi congruit, non præjudicet ei, nec autoritatem ullam obtineat, qua dissonat, & repugnat, sed ad eandem exigi, & castigari debeat.

Translation: “But because it was made by human agency, like all other translations, it can in no way be placed on a level with the original prophetic Scripture, which is truly divine and divinely inspired; rather, it must be subjected to it, so that it may serve in explaining the Hebrew truth where it agrees with it, but may not prejudice it nor possess any authority where it differs from and contradicts it; rather, it must be tested and corrected according to it.”

Calov thus allows the Septuagint to assist in explaining the Hebrew where the two agree. Where the Greek differs from or contradicts the Hebrew, however, it possesses no authority against it; instead, the Greek itself “must be tested and corrected” according to the Hebrew.

Assessment

Calov is a strong Lutheran witness because his argument combines an explicit judgment concerning the textual condition of the Septuagint with an equally explicit statement of its proper relationship to the Hebrew original. He says that the Greek version “abounds in errors,” is redundant in many places and deficient in others, and that “everything is confused” in its edition, while leaving open whether particular defects originated with the translators or with later hands.

From these defects he expressly concludes that divine or authentic authority does not belong to the Septuagint. Most importantly, where the Greek differs from or contradicts the Hebrew, Calov denies that it possesses authority against the Hebrew and states that the Greek itself “must be tested and corrected” according to the original prophetic text.

Citation: Abraham Calov, Criticus Sacer Biblicus (Wittenberg: Borckardus, 1673), De Versione Græca LXX. Interpretum, especially pp. 501, 513, 605–606.

34. John Pearson (1613–1686)

John Pearson was an English Anglican theologian and biblical scholar who became Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity and Master of Trinity College, Cambridge, and later Bishop of Chester. Pearson was notably favorable toward the Septuagint and wrote his Praefatio Paraenetica ad Vetus Testamentum Graecum ex Versione Septuaginta Interpretum expressly to encourage its study. His testimony is therefore especially significant: while defending the value of the ancient translation, he explicitly distinguished it from its corrupted subsequent transmission and emphasized substantial disagreement among the principal Greek editions and manuscripts available in his own time.

The Septuagint “Corrupted and Violated”

Near the conclusion of the Praefatio Paraenetica, Pearson writes:

Quoniam autem haec Seniorum Versio, etiam S. Hieronymi tempore, corrupta fuit atque violata, danda est opera, ut ei pristina puritas restitui & redintegrari possit.

Translation: “But since this Version of the Seventy, even in the time of St. Jerome, had been corrupted and violated, care must be taken that its former purity may be restored and recovered.”

Pearson’s language is explicit: the Septuagint had been “corrupted and violated” by the time of Jerome and required restoration to its “former purity.” He therefore distinguishes the earlier state of the translation from its subsequently transmitted Greek text.

The Principal Greek Editions “Differ Greatly”

Pearson immediately points to the diversity among the surviving Greek witnesses:

Certum est, exemplaria quae habemus, Complutense, Aldinum, Romanum, plurimum inter se & ab Alexandrino discrepare; alios etiam Codices aliquarum S. Scripturae partium satis antiquos, nunc cum nullo convenire.

Translation: “It is certain that the copies which we possess—the Complutensian, Aldine, and Roman—differ greatly from one another and from the Alexandrian; and that other sufficiently ancient manuscripts of certain parts of Holy Scripture now agree with none of them.”

The principal Greek witnesses therefore did not present Pearson with a single uniform text. The Complutensian, Aldine, and Roman editions differed greatly from one another and from the Alexandrian manuscript, while other ancient manuscripts agreed with none of them.

The Earlier Greek Text Had to Be Recovered

Pearson’s two observations belong together. If the Septuagint had become “corrupted and violated,” and the principal surviving Greek witnesses differed substantially among themselves, its ancient form could not simply be identified with any one extant edition without textual investigation.

He therefore hoped that a learned scholar might produce a purer edition:

Quale opus utinam aliquando vir doctissimus Isaacus Vossius, qui optime potest, perficeret ederetque.

Translation: “Would that the most learned Isaac Vossius, who is exceedingly capable of it, might someday complete and publish such a work.”

Pearson’s objective was restorative: the pristina puritas, or “former purity,” of the ancient translation had to be recovered from the differing surviving witnesses.

The Septuagint as an Aid to the “Hebrew Truth”

Pearson’s acknowledgment of corruption did not diminish his high estimation of the Septuagint. Among the reasons he gives for studying it is its usefulness:

ad Hebraicam veritatem probe perspiciendam

Translation: “for thoroughly understanding the Hebrew truth.”

Near the end of the preface he writes:

Cum igitur LXX viralis Versio ad Hebraicam veritatem probe perspiciendam … tam sit utilis atque necessaria, quis eam doctis omnibus, praesertim theologis, non videt debere esse commendatissimam?

Translation: “Since, therefore, the Version of the Seventy is so useful and necessary for thoroughly understanding the Hebrew truth … who does not see that it ought to be most highly commended to all learned men, especially theologians?”

Pearson could therefore commend the Septuagint highly while still maintaining that its transmitted Greek text had suffered corruption and survived in substantially differing forms.

Assessment

Pearson is especially valuable because his testimony comes from a writer strongly favorable toward the Septuagint. He states that the Version of the Seventy had been “corrupted and violated,” required restoration to its “former purity,” and survived in major Greek editions and manuscripts that “differ greatly” from one another.

His position therefore distinguishes the ancient translation from the divergent Greek textual forms transmitted under its name. The Septuagint remained highly valuable, but its earlier textual form had to be recovered through comparison of witnesses rather than assumed to be preserved unchanged in any single extant edition.

Citation: John Pearson, Praefatio Paraenetica ad Vetus Testamentum Graecum ex Versione Septuaginta Interpretum, prefixed to Vetus Testamentum Graecum ex Versione Septuaginta Interpretum: juxta exemplar Vaticanum Romae editum (Cambridge: John Field, 1665); reprinted in The Minor Theological Works of John Pearson, ed. Edward Churton, vol. 2 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1844), especially pp. 274–275.

35. John Owen (1616–1683)

John Owen was one of the leading English Reformed theologians of the seventeenth century, a prominent Puritan divine, and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford from 1652 to 1657. His discussions of the Septuagint arise repeatedly in comparison of the Hebrew Old Testament, the Greek translation, and New Testament citations. He also devoted an entire Latin digression in his Theologoumena Pantodapa to De Versione Græca Sacrarum Scripturarum LXX. Seniorum (“On the Greek Version of the Holy Scriptures of the Seventy Elders”).

“All Things” Commonly Said About the Septuagint Are Extremely Uncertain

Owen begins his Latin digression on the Septuagint with a sweeping statement concerning the uncertainty surrounding its history:

Omnia enim, quæ de versione illa vulgò dicuntur, adeò sunt incerta, tot tantæque circa ea sunt opinionum digladiationes, ut iis omnibus accurate examinandis, vix vitæ spatium sufficeret.

Translation: “For all things that are commonly said concerning that version are so uncertain, and there are so many and such great conflicts of opinion concerning them, that scarcely the span of a lifetime would suffice for examining them all accurately.”

Owen thus emphasizes uncertainty not merely concerning individual readings but concerning what was commonly asserted about the version itself.

The Septuagint “Wofully Corrupt”

In his treatment of the integrity and purity of the biblical text, Owen writes:

“But here again all things are exceedingly uncertain; nothing almost is manifest concerning it but that it is wofully corrupt.”

He attributes Greek divergences both to the translators and to subsequent transmission, referring to:

“the translators’ own inadvertency, negligence, ignorance … desire to expound and clear the sense, and, as it was likely, of altering and varying many things from the original, with the innumerable corruptions and interpolations that have befallen that translation….”

Owen therefore distinguishes errors or liberties of the translators from the “innumerable corruptions and interpolations” subsequently introduced into the Greek text.

“Corrupted … in a Thousand Places Twice Told”

Opposing Ludovicus Capellus’s use of ancient versions in correcting the Hebrew text, Owen writes:

“The translation especially insisted on by him is that of the LXX. That this translation, either from the mistakes of its first authors, (if it be theirs whose name and number it bears), or the carelessness, or ignorance, or worse, of its transcribers, is corrupted and gone off from the original in a thousand places twice told, is acknowledged by all who know aught of these things.

“Strange that so corrupt a stream should be judged a fit means to cleanse the fountain; that such a Lesbian rule should be thought a fit measure to correct the original by….”

Owen deliberately leaves open whether particular errors originated with the original translators or later copyists, while characterizing the Septuagint as a “corrupt stream” in relation to the Hebrew “fountain.”

The Greek Translation Was “Variously Changed and Corrupted of Old”

In his Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Owen argues that alteration of the Greek Old Testament occurred at an early period:

“It is certain that some words, used by the apostle, have been inserted into some copies of the Greek Bible, which, being single words, and of little importance, prevailed not in them all…. And why may we not think that some whole sentences might on the same account be inserted in some of them, which, being of more importance, found a more general acceptance?”

He adds:

“And how by other means also that translation was variously changed and corrupted of old, and that before the days of Jerome, learned men do know and confess.”

Owen thus distinguishes secondary readings confined to some copies from others that later obtained wider acceptance.

New Testament Wording Inserted into the Greek Old Testament

Owen argues that agreement between an extant Septuagint reading and an apostolic quotation does not necessarily prove that the apostle derived his wording from the Septuagint:

“I say, then, it is highly probable that the apostle, according to his wonted manner, which appears in almost all the citations used by him in this Epistle, reporting the sense and importance of the places in words of his own, the Christian transcribers of the Greek Bible inserted his expressions into the text; either as judging them a more proper version of the original, whereof they were ignorant, than that of the LXX., or out of a preposterous zeal to take away the appearance of a diversity between the text and the apostle’s citation of it.”

He concludes:

“And thus, in those testimonies where there is a real variation from the Hebrew original, the apostle took not his words from the translation of the LXX., but his words were afterwards inserted into that translation….”

Owen therefore regarded Christian harmonization of Greek Old Testament manuscripts to New Testament quotations as a source of later Septuagint readings.

Ancient Copies of the Septuagint Contained Different Readings

Discussing Psalm 8, Owen writes:

“From all which variety it is most evident that there were various readings of this context in the ancient copies of the LXX., for no footsteps of them appear in the remains of Aquila, Theodotion, or Symmachus; and that therefore the common reading which is now fixed in the Greek Bible was translated thither from this place of the apostle.”

For Owen, the existence of a commonly received Greek reading therefore did not establish that it belonged to the original translation.

Deuteronomy 32:43 and Hebrews 1:6

Owen gives a specific example involving Hebrews 1:6 and Deuteronomy 32:43:

“Because indeed there are no such words in the original text, nor any thing spoken that might give occasion to the sense expressed in them; but the whole verse is inserted in the Greek version quite beside the scope of the place.”

He continues:

“Now, though it may perhaps be safely granted that the apostles, in citing the Scripture of the Old Testament, did sometimes use the words of the Greek translation then in use, yea, though not exact according to the original, whilst the sense and meaning of the Holy Ghost was retained in them; yet to cite that from the Scripture as the word and testimony of God which indeed is not therein, nor was ever spoken by God, but by human failure and corruption crept into the Greek version, is not to be imputed unto them.”

Owen concludes:

“And indeed I no way question but that this addition unto the Greek text in that place was made after the apostle had used this testimony.”

Elsewhere he writes:

“This some of the transcribers of the Bible, not knowing well where to find, have inserted, in the very syllables of the apostle’s expression, into Deuteronomy 32:43; where it yet abides, though originally it had no place there….”

For Owen, the transmitted Greek reading in Deuteronomy was therefore the result of later interpolation rather than evidence that Hebrews had quoted it from that location.

Psalm 40:6 and Hebrews 10:5

Owen gives another example in his discussion of Hebrews 10:5 and Psalm 40:6. He regards the agreement of the surviving Greek with Hebrews as:

“an evidence that a change had been made in that translation, to comply with the words used by the apostle.”

He maintains that the apostle:

“did not take them from the translation of the LXX., but used them himself, to express the sense of the Hebrew text.”

He then makes the broader assertion:

“That sundry passages have been unquestionably taken out of the New Testament, and inserted into that translation; which I have elsewhere proved by undeniable instances.”

Owen adduces further examples from Psalm 102, Isaiah 8, Jeremiah 31, and Psalm 95, sometimes describing Greek copies as having been “tampered withal” to bring them into conformity with apostolic quotations.

Interpolations Could “Prevail to Common Acceptation”

Owen explains how such alterations could become established:

“I suppose I may conclude, that it is more probable at least, that the Apostle’s interpretations of the testimonies used by him, all agreeably unto the mind of the Holy Ghost, were by some of old inserted into the vulgar copies of the Greek translation of the Old Testament, and therein prevailed to common acceptation, than that he himself followed in the citation of them a translation departing without reason from the original text….”

Thus a secondary reading could spread through Greek copies and eventually “prevail to common acceptation.” Widespread attestation in the later Greek tradition did not, in Owen’s judgment, establish originality.

The Hebrew Original as the Standard

Discussing corruptions in ancient translations, Owen writes:

“For those of the several translations, we are not at all concerned in them; where any or all of them fail or are corrupted, we have a rule, blessed be God, preserved to rectify them by.”

This corresponds with his image of the Hebrew as the “fountain” and the corrupted Septuagint as a “stream.” Ancient translations might supply useful evidence, but Owen did not regard their divergent readings as the controlling standard for correcting the Hebrew original.

Assessment

Owen is one of the strongest witnesses in the collection because his testimony concerns not only corruption in general but mechanisms by which the Greek text could change. He describes the Septuagint as “wofully corrupt,” attributes its divergences both to the translators and to later “corruptions and interpolations,” recognizes variant readings among ancient Greek copies, and states that the translation had been “variously changed and corrupted of old.”

Most significantly, he argues that New Testament wording could be inserted into Greek Old Testament manuscripts and eventually “prevail to common acceptation.” For Owen, therefore, neither widespread later attestation nor agreement with a New Testament citation necessarily established that a reading belonged to the ancient Septuagint.

Citation: John Owen, Theologoumena Pantodapa, sive De Natura, Ortu, Progressu, et Studio Veræ Theologiæ Libri Sex (Bremen: Hermann Brauer, 1684), Liber V, Digressio II, De Versione Græca Sacrarum Scripturarum LXX. Seniorum, p. 398; Of the Integrity and Purity of the Hebrew and Greek Text of the Scripture, in The Works of John Owen, ed. William H. Goold, vol. 16 (Edinburgh: Johnstone and Hunter, 1853), especially pp. 406–409; An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Preliminary Exercitation V, “Testimonies Cited by the Apostle Out of the Old Testament,” and the expositions of Hebrews 1:6, 3:7–11, 8:8–12, and 10:5, in Works, vols. 1–5.

36. Johann Andreas Quenstedt (1617–1688)

Johann Andreas Quenstedt was a prominent Lutheran theologian and professor at Wittenberg, associated with the later period of Lutheran orthodoxy. In his Theologia Didactico-Polemica, he treated the authority, preservation, original languages, and versions of Scripture at length. In discussing the Septuagint, he denied authentic authority to the Greek translation, catalogued its errors, additions, alterations, and omissions, and distinguished the Hebrew archetype from the corrupted Greek text transmitted under the name of the Seventy.

The Septuagint “Abounds with Many Errors and Corruptions”

Nec LXX. Interpp. Translationi Graecae V. Test. αὐθεντίας laudem tribuere possumus…. 2. quia multis scatet erroribus & corruptelis. Saepius ab Hebraeo Archetypo discrepat, multa ad eum addit, multa mutat, nonnulla quoque praetermittit.

Translation: “Nor can we attribute the distinction of authenticity to the Greek translation of the Old Testament by the Seventy interpreters…. Second, because it abounds with many errors and corruptions. It frequently differs from the Hebrew archetype, adds many things to it, changes many things, and also omits some things.”

Quenstedt’s objection is explicitly textual: the Greek differs from the Hebrew archetype through errors, corruptions, additions, alterations, and omissions.

The Surviving Septuagint Is “So Corrupted and Vitiated” That It Seems Another Version

Restat tertia sententia & verior, eorum, qui asseverant, superesse quidem adhuc LXX. Interp. translationem, sed adeo corruptam & vitiatam, ut omnino alia esse videatur….

Translation: “There remains the third and truer opinion, that of those who assert that the translation of the Seventy interpreters does indeed still survive, but so corrupted and vitiated that it seems to be altogether another [translation]….”

Quenstedt therefore does not maintain that the ancient Septuagint had simply disappeared. He says that it survives, but in such an altered condition that it appears to be another translation. He elsewhere refers expressly to:

Ex infinitis erroribus, quibus hodierna LXX. Versio Graeca repleta est….

Translation: “From the innumerable errors with which the present Greek version of the Seventy is filled….”

The word hodierna—“present”—shows that Quenstedt is speaking specifically of the Greek version existing in his own day.

Greek-Hebrew Disagreement Does Not Prove Corruption of the Hebrew

Quenstedt rejects the argument that disagreement between the Hebrew and Septuagint establishes corruption of the Hebrew:

Inepta ergo est illa Pontificiorum quorundam assertio: Hebraeus textus & LXX. Interpp. Translatio discrepant, Ergo Hebraeus textus est corruptus: Invertendum potius est argumentum, Ergo LXX. Interpp. Translatio est vitiata & depravata.

Translation: “Therefore that assertion of certain Papists is inept: ‘The Hebrew text and the translation of the Seventy interpreters disagree; therefore the Hebrew text is corrupt.’ Rather the argument must be inverted: therefore the translation of the Seventy interpreters is vitiated and corrupted.”

For Quenstedt, mere disagreement with the Greek supplied no warrant for correcting the Hebrew from the Septuagint.

Greek Additions Are Not Hebrew Omissions

Quenstedt applies this principle to longer Greek readings:

Versio LXX. Interp. uti multis mendis scatet, ita hoc quoque est mendosum & adscititium…. non ergo in Hebraeo textu detractionem, sed in Graeca versione superfluam additionem agnoscimus. Tales additiones Graecae occurrunt Gen. XI.12. Gen. XLVI.20. &c.

Translation: “Just as the version of the Seventy interpreters abounds with many errors, so this also is erroneous and adventitious…. Therefore we recognize not an omission in the Hebrew text, but a superfluous addition in the Greek version. Such Greek additions occur in Genesis 11:12, Genesis 46:20, etc.”

Quenstedt therefore interprets these longer Greek readings as secondary additions rather than as evidence of omissions from the Hebrew text.

Assessment

Quenstedt is a strong Lutheran witness because he distinguishes between the ancient Septuagint and the Greek text transmitted under its name. He states that the version “abounds with many errors and corruptions” and accepts as the “truer opinion” that it still survives, but “so corrupted and vitiated that it seems to be altogether another.”

He also rejects the assumption that Greek-Hebrew disagreement proves corruption of the Hebrew and identifies some longer Greek readings as secondary additions. For Quenstedt, survival of the Septuagintal tradition did not imply preservation of an unchanged or textually pure Greek form.

Citation: Johann Andreas Quenstedt, Theologia Didactico-Polemica, sive Systema Theologicum, first published at Wittenberg in 1685; 1691 ed., Pars I, Cap. IV, Sect. II, especially pp. 201, 212.

37. Johann Heinrich Hottinger (1620–1667)

Johann Heinrich Hottinger was a Swiss Reformed scholar and professor at Zürich. A 1647 academic disputation issued under his presidency was devoted specifically to the causes of disagreement between the Hebrew text and the Greek Old Testament commonly attributed to the Seventy. The work was formally defended by Heinrich Erni; accordingly, its statements are most precisely described as those of Hottinger’s presided disputation rather than unqualifiedly as Hottinger’s personally authored words.

Jews and Heretics “Considerably Disturbed” the Greek Manuscripts

Among the causes assigned for the discrepancies, the disputation states:

Accedit Decimò Judaeorum & Haereticorum perfidia, quâ codices Graeci non parùm fuere turbati. Quod enim Patres nonnulli acrius in Judaeos tanquam Scripturae corruptores invehiuntur, non intelligi debet de fontibus Hebraeis, ac si illos profanè tractâssent, sed tantùm de versione Graeca….

Translation: “There is added, tenthly, the perfidy of Jews and heretics, by which the Greek copies were considerably disturbed. For when some of the Fathers inveigh rather sharply against the Jews as corrupters of Scripture, this ought not to be understood of the Hebrew sources, as though they had treated them profanely, but only of the Greek version….”

The disputation therefore interprets patristic accusations of Jewish textual corruption as referring to the Greek version rather than the Hebrew sources and expressly alleges that the Greek copies had been substantially disturbed.

The Present Greek Version Is “Corrupted, Altered, and Mutilated”

The disputation concludes:

Ex his autem quae hactenus dicta sunt sequentia emergunt πορίσματα.

1. Ex versione Graeca Contextum Hebr. non esse emendandum.

2. Versionem Graecam hodiernam ita esse corruptam, mutatam, mutilatam, ut illius integritatis & genuinitatis lineamenta magnam partem perierint.

Translation: “From what has been said thus far, the following conclusions emerge:

1. The Hebrew text is not to be emended from the Greek version.

2. The present Greek version has been so corrupted, altered, and mutilated that the features of its integrity and genuineness have for the most part disappeared.”

This conclusion concerns the present Greek version generally, not merely isolated readings, and describes its integrity and genuineness as largely lost.

The disputation proceeds:

3. Magnum operae pretium facturum illum, qui vel ipsam versionem antiquam castigaret, omnes differentiarum fontes ostenderet, loca transposita restitueret, luxata redintegraret; vel novam, eamque ad veritatem Hebraeam exactam translationem adornaret.

Translation: “3. He would perform a work of great value who would either correct the ancient version itself, show all the sources of its differences, restore transposed passages, repair damaged ones; or prepare a new translation, one conformed to the Hebrew original.”

The call to correct the ancient version, restore transposed passages, and repair damaged ones reinforces the disputation’s judgment concerning the condition of the transmitted Greek text.

Assessment

Hottinger’s 1647 presided disputation is unusually explicit concerning the textual condition of the Greek Old Testament. It characterizes the Greek version then current as “corrupted, altered, and mutilated” to such an extent that the features of its integrity and genuineness had largely disappeared, while also alleging that Jews and heretics had “considerably disturbed” the Greek copies.

It therefore treats the transmitted Septuagint as a damaged textual tradition requiring correction and restoration rather than as a single, uniformly preserved Greek text.

Citation: Johann Heinrich Hottinger, praeses, and Heinrich Erni, respondent, Quaestio de causis varietatis & discrepantiae a textu Hebraeo editionis V. T. Graecae LXXII. interpretibus Hierosolymitanis vulgo tributae (Zürich: Johann Jakob Bodmer, 1647), unpaginated, final two leaves.

38. Francis Turretin (1623–1687)

Francis Turretin was a Genevan Reformed theologian and professor at the Geneva Academy, widely known for his Institutio Theologiae Elencticae. In his treatment of Scripture, particularly Topic II, Questions XII and XIV, he examines the authority and textual condition of the Septuagint. He distinguishes errors attributable to the original translators from corruption introduced during subsequent transmission and argues that the Greek text surviving under the name of the Seventy had been extensively altered.

Can the Present Greek Be Identified with What the Seventy Wrote?

In Question XII, Turretin challenges the assumption that differences between the Septuagint and Hebrew necessarily preserve readings from alternative Hebrew manuscripts:

Deinde quis fidem facere poterit, LXX. fidelissime secutos fuisse suum Textum Hebræum, & Textum Græcum, qui hodie legitur ipsissimum esse cum eo quem LXX. exararunt?

Translation: “Then who can assure us that the Seventy followed their Hebrew text most faithfully, and that the Greek text which is read today is the very same as that which the Seventy wrote?”

Turretin thus questions both the fidelity of the original translators and the identity of the surviving Greek text with their work.

Errors of Translation and Subsequent Corruption

Turretin identifies several causes of disagreement between the Septuagint and the Hebrew that do not require different Hebrew manuscripts:

Nam quis nescit eos sæpius ad sensum potius quam ad verba attendere potuisse, ut Hieron. non semel ait de LXX. Interpretibus? Deinde aliquando discrepantia potuit oriri ab eorum imperitia vel negligentia, quia non satis attenderunt ad verba, unde sæpius aberrare potuerunt in literis & vocibus similibus, etiam sine vario codice; ut Hiero. hoc non semel in illis carpit.

Translation: “For who does not know that they could often have attended to the sense rather than to the words, as Jerome says more than once concerning the Seventy interpreters? Then, at times, a discrepancy could have arisen from their ignorance or negligence, because they did not pay sufficient attention to the words, whence they could often have erred in similar letters and words, even without a different manuscript; as Jerome more than once censures this in them.”

He continues:

Nimiam licentiam potuerunt etiam sumere, ut licet aliter legerent in suo codice, aliter tamen nimis audacter redderent, quod non satis sensum & cohærentiam Textus Hebraici assequerentur, & cum levi mutatione sensum quem existimabant commodius fluere sequi mallent.

Translation: “They could also have taken excessive liberty, so that although they read one thing in their manuscript, they nevertheless rendered it otherwise too boldly, because they did not sufficiently grasp the sense and connection of the Hebrew text, and preferred, with a slight alteration, to follow the sense which they thought flowed more suitably.”

Turretin then turns to later textual corruption:

Constat Versiones varias veteres non amplius tales esse quales primitus adornatæ fuerant, sed mirum in modum corruptas & immutatas, ut certum est præsertim de LXX. & Vulgata.

Translation: “It is evident that the various ancient versions are no longer such as they were when originally produced, but have been wonderfully corrupted and altered, as is certain especially concerning the Septuagint and the Vulgate.”

He adds:

Ex scriptorum oscitantia, vel imperitia fieri potuit, ut multæ corruptelæ in Versiones irreperent, quæ non ideo a varietate Codicum ortæ sunt.

Translation: “Through the carelessness or ignorance of copyists it could happen that many corruptions crept into the versions, which therefore did not arise from a diversity of manuscripts.”

Turretin therefore distinguishes mistakes or liberties of the translators from corruptions introduced by later copyists.

The Septuagint Has Been “Wonderfully Corrupted and Interpolated”

In Question XIV, devoted specifically to the Septuagint, Turretin denies that it possesses authentic authority equal to the original Scriptures. Among his reasons, he states:

Quia nec rebus nec verbis convenit in multis cum fontibus, sed varias habet παρερμηνείας, & discrepantias, ut ostensum est ab illis qui hoc argumentum tractarunt.

Translation: “Because in many things it agrees with the sources neither in substance nor in words, but has various false interpretations and discrepancies, as has been shown by those who have treated this subject.”

He then gives his strongest judgment concerning the transmitted Greek text:

Quia non habetur hodie pura, sed mirum in modum corrupta & interpolata; Ejus rudera tantum & λείψανα habemus, ut vix possit jam vocari Versio LXX. similis navi Argo, quæ sæpius refecta, nec eadem nec alia amplius erat.

Translation: “Because it is not possessed today in a pure form, but has been wonderfully corrupted and interpolated; we have only its ruins and remnants, so that it can now scarcely be called the version of the Septuagint, like the ship Argo, which, having been repaired so often, was no longer either the same ship or another.”

Turretin thus maintains that the accumulated alterations were extensive enough to call into question the identity of the surviving Greek text with the original Septuagint.

Apostolic Quotations Do Not Establish the Authority of the Entire Version

Turretin rejects the argument that apostolic use of the Septuagint establishes the authority of the translation as a whole:

Si Apostoli sæpius usi sunt ista Versione, non ideo fecerunt, quod eam authenticam crederent & divinam, sed quia tunc temporis usitatissima erat & recepta inter omnes.

Translation: “If the apostles frequently used this version, they did not do so because they believed it to be authentic and divine, but because at that time it was very commonly used and received among all.”

He further explains:

Testimonia quæ ex LXX. versione allegantur in N. T. authentica sunt non per se, sive quatenus a LXX. ex Hebræo in Græcum sunt traducta, sed per accidens, quatenus approbata & sanctificata sunt a Spiritu S. & ejus afflatu ab Evangelistis in contextum sacrum relata.

Translation: “The testimonies which are cited from the Septuagint version in the New Testament are authentic not in themselves—that is, insofar as they were translated by the Seventy from Hebrew into Greek—but incidentally, insofar as they were approved and sanctified by the Holy Spirit and, under his inspiration, brought by the evangelists into the sacred text.”

Turretin therefore distinguishes the authority of an inspired New Testament quotation from that of the Greek translation from which it was taken.

Chronological Discrepancies and Conflicting Greek Manuscripts

Turretin adduces the chronology of Genesis as evidence of corruption:

Discrepantia maxima quæ occurrit inter Textum Hebraicum & Versionem LXX. in Chronologia, dum ab Orbe condito usque ad cataclysmum Hebræi Codices numerant tantum annos 1656. LXX. vero recensent 2242. non evincit Versionem istam esse authenticam, sed potius ejus corruptionem arguit.

Translation: “The very great discrepancy which occurs between the Hebrew text and the Septuagint version in chronology, when from the creation of the world to the Flood the Hebrew manuscripts number only 1,656 years, while the Septuagint reckons 2,242, does not prove that this version is authentic, but rather argues for its corruption.”

Turretin also acknowledges disagreement among Greek witnesses:

Nec si quædam exemplaria græca hic sequuntur Hebræum, ut ait Vossius de Africano & Alexandrino Codice, pauca illa quæ ex Hebræo procul dubio sunt correcta, opponi debent tot millibus quæ Ecclesiæ & Patres sequuntur, in quibus talis computus habetur.

Translation: “Nor, if certain Greek copies here follow the Hebrew, as Vossius says concerning Africanus and the Alexandrian Codex, ought those few—which without doubt were corrected from the Hebrew—to be opposed to the many thousands which the churches and Fathers follow, in which such a computation is found.”

Although Turretin explains the agreement of certain Greek witnesses with the Hebrew as later correction, the passage explicitly acknowledges conflicting Greek readings.

He does not insist that the corruption was deliberate:

Licet vero dedita opera hæc corruptio facta non esset, cur non potuit fieri ex scriptorum incuria, vel ἀβλεψίᾳ?

Translation: “But even if this corruption was not made deliberately, why could it not have arisen from the carelessness or oversight of copyists?”

Thus Turretin distinguishes the judgment that a Greek reading is corrupt from the separate question of how and when the corruption arose.

Assessment

Turretin is a particularly strong witness because he addresses both defective translation and subsequent textual corruption. He maintains that ancient versions, especially the Septuagint, had been “wonderfully corrupted and altered,” and says that the Greek text of his own day was “wonderfully corrupted and interpolated,” leaving only its “ruins and remnants.”

He also recognizes conflicting Greek readings and allows that corruption could arise through the carelessness or oversight of copyists. His testimony therefore directly distinguishes the original Septuagint from the altered and textually diverse Greek tradition transmitted under its name.

Citation: Francis Turretin, Institutio Theologiæ Elencticæ, Pars Prima, revised and enlarged edition (Geneva: Samuel de Tournes, 1688), Locus II, Quaestio XII, §§VII–VIII, pp. 131–132; Quaestio XIV, §§VI–VIII, XI–XIII, pp. 141–144. English translations compared with Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, trans. George Musgrave Giger, ed. James T. Dennison Jr., vol. 1 (Phillipsburg, NJ: Presbyterian and Reformed, 1992), Topic II, Questions 12 and 14.

39. Richard Simon (1638–1712)

Richard Simon was a French Roman Catholic priest, Oratorian, and biblical scholar whose historical and critical studies of Scripture examined the transmission of ancient biblical texts. Although he frequently defended the original Greek translators against criticisms he considered unjust, he distinguished their work from the subsequently transmitted Septuagint, which he regarded as extensively corrupted and altered.

“Very Gross Errors”

Comparing the principal printed editions of the Septuagint, Simon concluded that none was exact and that all contained serious errors:

“But it must be admitted that not one of them is exact, and that there are very gross errors in them all. To have a true and faithful one, it would be necessary to examine them all individually according to the rules of criticism, and approximately in the same manner in which the edition of the Latin Vulgate was corrected from good and ancient Latin copies…. It is not enough to consult the Fathers in order to restore the ancient Greek version…. To which it may be added that this version was already corrupted before the most ancient Fathers.”

Simon therefore regarded the corruption as older than the surviving patristic evidence.

Alterations and Variations Before Origen

Simon describes how unfamiliarity with the Hebrew original contributed to alterations in the Greek text:

“Since those who used it were not capable of recurring to the Hebrew original when some difficulty occurred, and since, moreover, the Greek of the translation of the Septuagint is quite different from ordinary Greek, a great many words were changed in it in order to form other senses which appeared more suitable.”

He also appeals to Origen’s testimony:

“It cannot be doubted that there was a great number of variations in the Greek version of the Septuagint before Origen put his hand to it, since he himself affirms that the Greek copies differed greatly among themselves, whether through the negligence of copyists, or through the temerity of some who had added and subtracted with great liberty.”

Simon thus identifies several sources of corruption: alterations intended to improve the apparent meaning, scribal negligence, and deliberate additions and omissions.

Common Copies “Filled with Errors”

Simon describes the copies available to Origen:

“Origen, having seen that the common copies of the version of the Septuagint were filled with errors, corrected them from ancient Greek copies…. He removed from the Septuagint a great number of errors, as he himself testifies; and furthermore he corrected from the Hebrew original several transpositions which were in the Septuagint.”

The commonly circulating Greek copies therefore contained errors and transpositions substantial enough to require critical correction.

Material from Other Translations Entered the Septuagint

Simon explains how marginal readings and material from other Greek translations entered the body of the Septuagint:

“But since the copyists were not altogether exact in observing these minute marks, great confusion arose in the version of the Septuagint; and what increased this confusion still further was that scholia, or notes, were placed in the margins of some editions, in which the different translations of the same thing were marked, which the copyists afterward inserted into the body of the version of the Septuagint. Even today examples may be seen of this mixture of translations, for which there is no remedy except by consulting the Hebrew text, or Greek copies which have not been altered.”

Simon therefore describes a process by which readings from different Greek translations became incorporated into the transmitted Septuagint.

The Greeks Were Less Exact in Preserving Their Copies

Simon summarizes his judgment:

“Everything that we have just related concerning the version of the Septuagint proves evidently that the Greeks were less exact than the Jews in preserving their copies, and that it would be difficult to restore this ancient version in the form in which it was at the beginning.”

His conclusion concerns both the transmission of the Greek manuscripts and the difficulty of recovering the original translation.

Critical Revision Introduced Further Confusion

Simon believed that attempts to correct the Septuagint could themselves introduce further alteration:

“To which it may be added that, according to the testimony of Origen and St. Jerome, the Greek copies had been altered in several places; and there is even reason to fear that Origen also corrupted them under the pretext of correcting them, since the method which he followed was liable to error, and since the liberty which he took of joining supplements to the version of the Septuagint in his Hexapla afterward produced great confusion. It is certain, moreover, that the Greek copyists took great liberties…. These latter themselves did not take sufficient precautions to preserve the Greek version in its purity.”

Simon further states:

“The true and original version of the Septuagint … was greatly altered by these two Fathers under the pretext of making it more conformable to the Hebrew.”

Thus, in Simon’s account, extensive variation existed before Origen, while subsequent critical revision and copying introduced further alterations.

“No Greek Copy” Without Defects

Simon concludes:

“There is therefore no Greek copy of the Septuagint which does not have its defects, and which did not even have considerable ones before the time of Origen and St. Jerome; and perhaps it would have been desirable if these two Fathers had not reformed the ancient copies of the Septuagint with so much liberty, or at least if they had not inserted into them so many additions, which it would have been much more appropriate to mark in the margins of the copies.”

Assessment

Simon distinguishes the original Septuagint from the Greek text subsequently transmitted under its name. He describes extensive variation before Origen, common copies “filled with errors,” deliberate and accidental alteration, and the incorporation of material from other Greek translations.

He also maintains that later critical revision contributed further confusion and concludes that no Greek copy of the Septuagint was free from defects. His testimony therefore presents the transmitted Septuagint as a text substantially altered through both copying and editorial intervention, while still distinguishing those later corruptions from the work of the original translators.

Citation: Richard Simon, Histoire critique du Vieux Testament (Amsterdam: Reinier Leers, 1680), Book II, chaps. III and VIII, especially pp. 224, 260–261.

40. August Pfeiffer (1640–1698)

August Pfeiffer was a German Lutheran theologian and linguist of the period of Lutheran Orthodoxy. His Critica Sacra (1680) treats the biblical languages, textual criticism, translations, and the purity of the original texts. In his discussion De Versione LXX. Interpp., Pfeiffer gives a particularly strong assessment of the textual condition of the Septuagint.

Its Faults “Overwhelm Its Virtues”

After acknowledging what he regarded as virtues of the Septuagint, Pfeiffer writes:

Vitia tamen versionis hujus absorbent virtutes. Nam infinita occurrunt σφάλματα, orta tum e confusione & neglectu elementorum, tum integrarum vocum & phrasium distractione, diversarum conjunctione. Imo & loca quaedam studio mutata dicuntur….

Translation: “Nevertheless, the faults of this version overwhelm its virtues. For innumerable errors occur, arising partly from the confusion and neglect of letters, partly from the separation of entire words and phrases and the joining together of different ones. Indeed, certain passages are even said to have been deliberately altered….”

Pfeiffer speaks of “innumerable errors” and identifies several possible causes, including confusion of letters and erroneous separation or combination of words and phrases. He also reports the allegation that certain passages had been deliberately altered.

Its Authority Is “Human and in Fact Slight”

Pfeiffer concludes:

Inde sequitur, quod autoritas versionis LXX. interpretum non sit divina, neque vero inspiratam esse a Sp. S., uti incautius Patres quidam & Pontificii asseruere; sed humanam & revera exiguam.

Translation: “From this it follows that the authority of the translation of the Seventy interpreters is not divine, nor indeed was it inspired by the Holy Spirit, as certain Fathers and the Papists have rather incautiously asserted; but its authority is human and in fact slight.”

His judgment concerning its authority follows directly from the defects he has described.

The Extant Septuagint Is “Patched Together” and “Interpolated”

Pfeiffer then considers whether the genuine translation of the Seventy survives in the Greek text circulating under their name:

Si dicendum, quod res est, versio Graeca, quae hodie sub nomine LXX. Interpp. circumfertur, e variis versionibus Graecis confarcinata atque interpolata….

Translation: “If the matter is to be stated as it really is, the Greek version which today circulates under the name of the Seventy interpreters has been patched together from various Greek versions and interpolated….”

Pfeiffer thus distinguishes the ancient translation from the Greek text “which today circulates under the name” of the Seventy and describes the latter as a composite and interpolated text.

“Innumerable Discrepancies” from the Hebrew

Among his reasons for this conclusion are the Greek text’s:

infinitas a Textu Ebraeo discrepantias, LXX. viris Ebraeis vix adscribendas….

Translation: “innumerable discrepancies from the Hebrew text, which can scarcely be attributed to the Seventy Hebrew men….”

Pfeiffer therefore does not attribute every difference between the extant Greek and Hebrew to the original translators. The extent of the discrepancies is itself part of his argument that the transmitted Greek text had undergone subsequent alteration.

Remnants of the Ancient Translation Survive

Pfeiffer qualifies his judgment:

Interim tamen rudera quaedam superesse ejusdem e citationibus N. T. & veterum non abnuimus.

Translation: “Nevertheless, we do not deny that certain remnants of it survive, as is evident from the citations of the New Testament and the ancients.”

He therefore does not claim that the original Septuagint disappeared without trace. Rather, the Greek text circulating under its name was, in his judgment, composite and interpolated, while “certain remnants” of the ancient translation still survived.

Assessment

Pfeiffer distinguishes defects attributable to translation from subsequent alteration of the Greek textual tradition. He describes the Septuagint as containing “innumerable errors,” while the Greek version circulating in his own day under the name of the Seventy had been “patched together from various Greek versions and interpolated.”

At the same time, he maintains that “certain remnants” of the ancient translation survive. His testimony therefore presents the extant Septuagint not as an intact transmission of a single original Greek text, but as a substantially altered and composite tradition containing surviving remains of the earlier translation.

Citation: August Pfeiffer, Critica Sacra (Dresden: Martin Gabriel Hübner, 1680), chap. XI, “De Versionibus Graecis,” discussion “De Versione LXX. Interpp.,” pp. 451–452; Section II, Question V, pp. 455–456.

41. Humphrey Hody (1659–1707)

Humphrey Hody was an English Anglican scholar and theologian, Regius Professor of Greek at Oxford from 1698 and later Archdeacon of Oxford. His De Bibliorum Textibus Originalibus, Versionibus Graecis, & Latina Vulgata (1705) contains an extensive examination of the history and transmission of the Greek Old Testament.

Christian Alteration of the Greek Text from the New Testament

Discussing Zechariah, Hody argues that certain Greek copies had been altered to agree with the wording found in the Gospel:

Mihi vero credibilius videtur, ex Evangelio emendatam fuisse in istis exemplaribus Versionem Graecam, quam reliqua omnia tam vetusta quam recentiora fuisse depravata….

Translation: “It seems to me more credible that in those copies the Greek version had been corrected from the Gospel than that all the other copies, both ancient and more recent, had been corrupted….”

He explains why he believes the Gospel reading was introduced:

Hanc enim procul dubio posuerunt, non quia repererunt in suis Zachariae exemplaribus, sed quia Versionem apud Evangelistam repertam, & omnibus notam, LXXVirali praetulerunt.

Translation: “For they undoubtedly inserted this reading, not because they found it in their copies of Zechariah, but because they preferred the rendering found in the Evangelist, and known to everyone, to that of the Septuagint.”

No Surviving Manuscript Preserves a Pure Recension

Hody describes the surviving Greek manuscript tradition:

Ex Editionibus antedictis Origeniana, Lucianea, & Hesychiana promanarunt, quotquot exstant, Versionis Graecae exemplaria integra hodierna. Nullum tamen reperitur quod unam aliquam Editionem puram atque sinceram exhibeat, sed omnia mixta sunt partim ex illis, partim ex Κοινῇ Editione; nonnullis etiam ex aliis illis Versionibus Aquilae, Theodotionis, Symmachi, &c. subinde admixtis.

Translation: “From the editions mentioned above—the Origenian, Lucianic, and Hesychian—have descended all the complete manuscripts of the Greek version that survive today. Yet no manuscript is found which exhibits any one edition pure and unmixed; rather, they are all mixed, partly from those editions, partly from the Common Edition, with material from those other versions—Aquila, Theodotion, Symmachus, and so forth—also occasionally intermixed.”

He further writes:

Editiones sane variae, Origenis, Luciani & Hesychii, intra unius circiter seculi, aut alterius curriculum videntur inter se usque adeo a librariis fuisse confusae ac commixtae, ut earum distinctio ferme penitus evanuerit.

Translation: “The various editions—those of Origen, Lucian, and Hesychius—within the course of about one or two centuries appear to have been so thoroughly confused and intermixed with one another by copyists that the distinction between them almost entirely disappeared.”

Hody therefore describes a manuscript tradition in which the principal ancient recensions had become extensively mixed, with material from other Greek translations also entering the text.

Editorial Alteration of the Printed Septuagint

Hody describes how the Complutensian editors deliberately brought their Greek text into closer agreement with the Hebrew. Quoting Flaminius Nobilius, he reports:

Origenis Editionem hac ex parte imitandam sibi statuerunt, ut quae in Hebraico erant, & in LXX. deessent, ex alia interpretatione explerent: in eo autem ab Origenis instituto discesserunt; quod quae apud LXX. supererant, quaeque Origenes satis habuerat obelo notare, ipsi saepenumero rejecerunt…. ubi varia se offerebat lectio (quod frequentissime evenit) eam probarunt ac retinuerunt, quae ad Hebraicam propius accederet….

Translation: “They determined to imitate Origen’s edition in this respect: that what was present in the Hebrew but absent from the Septuagint they would supply from another translation. But in this they departed from Origen’s procedure: what was superfluous in the Septuagint, and what Origen had considered it sufficient merely to mark with an obelus, they very often rejected…. Where a variant reading presented itself—which happened very frequently—they approved and retained the one which approached the Hebrew more closely….”

Hody concludes:

Ob hanc cum Codicibus Heb. consonantiam, in maximo pretio a nonnullis habebatur Editio Complutensis, verum eo longius ab antiqua Versione Graeca, qua usi sunt Patres, & a germanis ejus Exemplaribus recedit.

Translation: “Because of this agreement with the Hebrew manuscripts, the Complutensian edition was held in the highest esteem by some; but for that very reason it departs all the farther from the ancient Greek version used by the Fathers and from its genuine manuscripts.”

Concerning the Aldine edition, Hody records Ussher’s observation:

Observat Usserius, eam sequi interdum non LXX. sed Aquilae lectiones, & varia in eam glossemata irrepsisse.

Translation: “Ussher observes that it sometimes follows readings not of the Septuagint but of Aquila, and that various glosses had crept into it.”

The Sixtine Edition Contained Almost Innumerable Errors

Hody rejects the claim that the Sixtine edition preserved the original Septuagint without corruption:

Perperam ergo & frustra contendunt nonnulli, Sixtinam τῶν LXX. editionem esse puram putam atque incorruptam, ipsissimamque τῶν LXX. Translationem, cum in ea (vix minus quam in caeteris Editionibus) innumeræ pene occurrant glossemata insulsa, & σφάλματα librariorum incuria, ἀγνοίᾳ, incogitantia illapsa, aut etiam eorundem temeritate & audacia introducta.

Translation: “Therefore some contend altogether wrongly and in vain that the Sixtine edition of the Septuagint is pure, genuine, and uncorrupted, and the very translation of the Seventy itself, since in it (scarcely less than in the other editions) there occur almost innumerable absurd glosses and errors which slipped in through the carelessness, ignorance, and thoughtlessness of copyists, or were even introduced by their rashness and audacity.”

Hody also disputes the assertion that the Hexaplaric edition had been universally regarded by ancient writers as pure:

Ex dictis autem patet errare Waltonum, cum affirmat omnes scriptores veteres puram & sinceram judicasse editionem illam quae in Hexaplis exstabat.

Translation: “From what has been said, however, it is evident that Walton errs when he affirms that all the ancient writers judged that edition which stood in the Hexapla to be pure and uncorrupted.”

Substantial Continuity Despite Textual Corruption

Hody nevertheless rejects the stronger claim that the surviving Greek Old Testament had lost its essential identity with the ancient Septuagint:

Libens tamen agnosco Editionem, quae hodie superest, Graecam quoad partem longe majorem, eandem esse cum illa, quae Patrum antiquorum temporibus pro LXXvirali habebatur. Non enim accedo eorum Protestantium sententiae, qui ut Graecae Versionis auctoritatem deprimant, negant eam, quae hodie exstat, eandem esse cum illa quae Patrum temporibus, sub nomine τῶν LXX. ferebatur.

Translation: “Nevertheless, I readily acknowledge that the Greek edition which survives today is, as regards by far the greater part, the same as that which in the time of the ancient Fathers was regarded as the Septuagint. For I do not agree with the opinion of those Protestants who, in order to diminish the authority of the Greek version, deny that the one which exists today is the same as that which in the time of the Fathers circulated under the name of the Septuagint.”

Assessment

Hody describes a Greek Old Testament tradition affected by scribal alteration, mixture among ancient recensions, contamination from other Greek translations, and deliberate editorial reconstruction. He states that no surviving complete manuscript preserves a single recension in a pure form and that the distinctions among the principal ancient recensions had almost disappeared through copying.

He nevertheless maintains substantial continuity between the surviving Greek text and that known to the ancient Fathers. His position is therefore not that the Septuagint had disappeared, but that its surviving textual forms were extensively mixed and corrupted despite retaining substantial historical continuity with the ancient version.

Citation: Humphrey Hody, De Bibliorum Textibus Originalibus, Versionibus Graecis, & Latina Vulgata (Oxford: Sheldonian Theatre, 1705), Book III, pp. 250–251, 561; Book IV, §19, p. 634; chap. 2, §§22–24; chap. 3, §§15–17.

42. John Ernest Grabe (1666–1711)

John Ernest Grabe was a German-born biblical and patristic scholar who settled in England and became associated with Oxford. A major Septuagint editor, he produced an edition based principally on Codex Alexandrinus. His Dissertatio de variis vitiis LXX. interpretum versioni ante B. Origenis ævum illatis (1710) was devoted specifically to corruptions introduced into the Septuagint before the time of Origen, the measures Origen employed to correct them, and the surviving remains of Origen’s Hexaplaric edition.

The Septuagint of Jeremiah Mutilated at an Early Date

Grabe states that the Greek version of Jeremiah had already undergone serious textual damage long before Origen:

Ego equidem in eam propendeo sententiam, quod aliquanto ante Servatorem nostrum, nec ita diu post ipsorum Interpretum ætatem, Jeremiæ versio tam misere mutilata, & quibusdam in locis abbreviata fuerit….

Translation: “I confess myself inclined to the opinion that, some time before our Saviour, and not very long after the age of the interpreters themselves, the version of Jeremiah had been so miserably mutilated and in some places abbreviated….”

Corruptions Predating Origen

Grabe further maintains that Origen did not eliminate all of the corruptions that had already entered the Septuagint:

Corruptiones aliquæ longe ante in Versionem LXX. introductæ, ab ipso Origene intactæ relictæ sunt….

Translation: “Some corruptions long before introduced into the version of the Seventy were left untouched by Origen himself….”

Different Greek Versions Became Conflated

Grabe describes another mechanism by which the transmitted Greek text became corrupted: readings belonging to different Greek translations were combined:

…atque hoc ipso modo LXX. Interpretes, præsertim in Prophetarum scriptis, passim corrupti sunt, & duæ tresve versiones sæpius in unam coaluerunt.

Translation: “…and by this very means the Seventy interpreters, especially in the writings of the Prophets, have here and there been corrupted, and two or three versions have repeatedly coalesced into one.”

Assessment

Grabe’s testimony is especially significant because textual corruption of the Septuagint was the express subject of his dissertation rather than an incidental observation. He regarded serious corruption as having entered the Greek tradition well before Origen, even suggesting that the Greek Jeremiah had been “miserably mutilated” not very long after the original translators. Origen’s critical work did not remove all these earlier corruptions, while subsequent transmission could combine readings from two or three Greek versions into a single text.

Grabe’s own work as a major editor of the Septuagint also shows that these conclusions were compatible with a high valuation of the ancient Greek version rather than arising simply from hostility toward it.

Citation: John Ernest Grabe, Dissertatio de variis vitiis LXX. interpretum versioni ante B. Origenis ævum illatis, et remediis ab ipso in Hexaplari ejusdem versionis editione adhibitis, deque hujus editionis reliquiis tam manu scriptis quam prælo excusis (Oxford: Sheldonian Theatre, 1710), especially pp. 49, 96.

43. Lambert Bos (1670–1717)

Lambert Bos (1670–1717) was professor of Greek at the University of Franeker and editor of the important 1709 Septuagint edition, Vetus Testamentum ex versione Septuaginta interpretum. In his Prolegomena, he discussed the authority of the Greek translation, errors attributable to its translators, corruption introduced by copyists, and defects in its printed editions.

The Septuagint Not Equal in Authority to the Hebrew

Bos warned against assigning the Septuagint an authority equal to that of the Hebrew text:

At vero cavendum etiam, ne nimium hanc Versionem extollamus, & plusquam par est, ei fidamus: ne aequiparemus eam Veritati Hebraicae, nedum praeponamus. Conferre eam oportet Codici Hebræo, non præferre.

Translation: “But we must also beware lest we exalt this Version too highly, and trust it more than is proper; lest we equate it with the Hebrew Truth, much less prefer it. It ought to be compared with the Hebrew Codex, not preferred to it.”

He nevertheless acknowledged that particular Greek readings could sometimes be preferable:

Occurrunt enim loca, in quibus Graecorum Interpretum lectio & distinctio praeferenda est hodiernae lectioni & distinctioni codicis Hebraei.

Translation: “For there are passages in which the reading and division of the Greek translators is to be preferred to the present reading and division of the Hebrew codex.”

Bos therefore did not reject every Greek reading that differed from the Hebrew text available to him.

Errors Made by the Original Translators

Bos rejected the belief that the translators had been divinely inspired:

Neque fuerunt illi homines divino Numine afflati & Spiritu Sancto ducti, quum verterent libros sacros… Hoc enim si ita sese habuisset, nunquam illi in vertendo errassent, nec illa Graecum inter & Hebræum codicem reperiretur discrepantia, quæ non exigua nunc aliquando est.

Translation: “They were not men inspired by the divine power and guided by the Holy Spirit when they translated the sacred books. For if this had been the case, they would never have erred in translating, nor would there sometimes be the considerable discrepancy which now exists between the Greek and Hebrew codices.”

Concerning certain prophetic books, he observed:

Observavi equidem aliquoties, minus exercitatos fuisse homines, parumque judicio valentes, qui Propheticos quosdam libros transtulere.

Translation: “I have indeed observed on several occasions that the men who translated certain prophetic books were less practiced and deficient in judgment.”

Bos thus attributed some deficiencies to the original translators rather than exclusively to subsequent corruption.

Corruption Introduced by Scribes and Copyists

Bos also emphasized that many defects attributed to the translators originated during subsequent transmission:

Ceterum monendum hic etiam, magnam nævorum qui Interpretibus illis imputantur partem, immerito illis imputari: plurimi enim ex illis tribui debent scribis atque librariis. Certum enim est, librarios multis in locis ex oscitantia & negligentia, aut inscitia voces male scripsisse, depravasse aut omisisse.

Translation: “Moreover, it should also be noted that a large part of the defects which are attributed to those Translators are unjustly attributed to them; for many of them ought to be attributed to scribes and copyists. For it is certain that the copyists, in many places, through carelessness and negligence, or ignorance, wrote words incorrectly, corrupted them, or omitted them.”

Bos therefore distinguishes errors in the original translation from corruption introduced by later copyists.

Errors in the Printed Septuagint Editions

Bos also identified substantial errors in the printed tradition. Concerning the London edition, he referred to:

sphalmatis ac mendis, quæ perquam multa heic occurrunt, neque ea levia

Translation: “Very many errors and faults, and those not minor.”

He reported omissions extending to entire sentences, counted nearly a hundred omitted words, and observed that errors were reproduced in subsequent editions. He also described the alteration of readings by the Complutensian editors to bring them into closer agreement with the Hebrew, and the incorporation of material from other editions and versions into the Aldine text.

The Purpose of Bos’ Edition

Bos described his editorial objective:

Textum igitur B. L. heic tibi exhibeo purum Codicis Vaticani secundum editionem Romanam, accuratum & a mendis repurgatum.

Translation: “Therefore, dear reader, I here present to you the pure text of the Vatican Codex according to the Roman edition, carefully prepared and purged of errors.”

He also supplied the scholia of the Roman edition and the variant readings he had collected:

Caeterum ne quid in hac nova nostra editione desideraretur, visum fuit singulis paginis subjicere Scholia Romanae Editionis, et praeter illa omnes variantes Lectiones quotquot conquirere potuerimus.

Translation: “Moreover, so that nothing might be lacking in this new edition of ours, it seemed appropriate to place beneath each page the scholia of the Roman edition, and in addition to these all the variant readings that we were able to collect.”

Assessment

Bos is particularly valuable because he was himself an editor of the Septuagint. He acknowledged errors by the original translators, distinguished these from corruption introduced by scribes and copyists, and identified substantial defects and omissions in printed editions.

His position was nevertheless discriminating rather than hostile. He recognized that particular Greek readings could be preferable to those in the Hebrew manuscripts of his day and defended the original translators against defects unjustly attributed to them. His testimony therefore clearly distinguishes the limitations of the original translation from the corruption and variation of its subsequent textual tradition.

Citation: Lambert Bos, Vetus Testamentum ex versione Septuaginta interpretum (Franeker: Franciscus Halma, 1709), Prolegomena.

44. Johann Gottlob Carpzov (1679–1767)

Johann Gottlob Carpzov was a German Lutheran theologian and biblical scholar. In his Critica Sacra Veteris Testamenti, he defended the integrity of the Hebrew Old Testament while examining the ancient versions and their textual condition. An English treatment of his arguments appeared as A Defence of the Hebrew Bible, in Answer to the Charge of Corruption Brought Against It by Mr. Whiston (London, 1729).

Corruption Before and After the Time of Christ

In answering William Whiston’s propositions concerning the Septuagint, Carpzov explicitly acknowledged corruption introduced after Origen:

“Corruptions have crept into the Greek Version since the Days of Origen. No knowing Man ever denied that, and we have not only granted and demonstrated it, but we have endeavour’d also to search into and discover the Causes of those Corruptions.”

He further accepted John Ernest Grabe’s findings that corruption had entered the Greek translation even before the Christian era:

“The very learned Dr. Grabe, in his Dissertation upon the many Corruptions crept into the Translation of the LXX Interpreters, before the Days of Origen, hath proved to a Demonstration, that Interpolations, Omissions, Transpositions, and finally Corruptions of very many Texts in this Translation, had been brought in before the Age of our Saviour himself; and he hath also discovered and declared the Sources and Causes of them.”

Carpzov also rejected the proposition that the Septuagint had remained uncorrupted in the second century:

“What Mr. Whiston with great Confidence takes for granted, we can by no means admit of, that the Septuagint Translation in the second Century … remained yet uncorrupted, and without any Blemish.”

He appealed to the diversity of quotations by writers of that period as evidence against a uniform and uncorrupted Greek text.

The Greek Copies Had Acquired “a Quite Different Face”

Carpzov acknowledged that the Greek copies available in the time of Christ and the apostles were probably more accurate than those transmitted in later centuries:

“I cannot altogether deny, that in the Time of Christ and the Apostles, the Copies of the Greek Translation were more correct, and for that Reason it came nearer to the Hebrew Original in that Age, than either in the next Age, when the Pale of the Church being enlarged all over the World, it came to be so often transcribed; or than it is at present, after a Course of so many Ages, and so many Casualties upon Literature and ancient Books, having undergone considerable Changes, and having put on a quite different Face, especially by means of the Works of Origen; so that in our Copies we cannot easily tell in many Places, what Part of the ancient Translation hath remained whole, nor what Patches out of Symmachus and Theodotion, have thrust out the primitive Text from its Place.”

Carpzov therefore distinguishes the earlier Greek tradition from the surviving copies, in which material from other Greek translations had become intermingled with the Septuagint.

The Septuagint “Differs Also So Much from Itself”

Carpzov gives a broad description of the textual variation among surviving Greek editions:

“Let us admit that the Greek, which is called the Septuagint, differs very widely from the Hebrew Copy, yet it differs also so much from itself, that as many Editions of it as are to be seen this Day, so many various Readings may be observed; and no Man is so clear-sighted, as to be able to declare or inform us, which of them exactly agrees with the original Greek Text, or which of them is interpolated; what Changes, Transpositions, Additions and Mutilations, many of these Editions have suffered, partly from the Boldness of Criticks and ignorant Pretenders, partly from the Injuries of Time: And how many Things have been foisted into it, which change and confound the ancient and genuine Text of this Translation, is the Versions of Aquila and Theodotion, and other Greek Translators, out of the Octapla of Origen.”

He therefore identifies substantial variation within the Greek tradition itself and regards the original readings as difficult to distinguish from later alterations and interpolations.

He summarizes the resulting uncertainty in particularly strong terms:

“the Greek Version, which now passes under that Name, is either altogether different from the old one of the LXX Elders, or that it is strangely interpolated and vitiated.”

Defects in the Original Translation and Subsequent Transmission

Carpzov does not attribute every difference to later corruption. He also acknowledges the freedom exercised by the original translators:

“For the Interpreters, in preparing their Version, indulged themselves the Liberty of varying often considerably from the Original, contenting themselves with giving the Sense; which whether in every Place they rightly apprehended, being Alexandrian Jews, still remains under Debate, neither can it at this Day be determined: But they certainly used great Liberty in Words and Phraseology.”

He distinguishes this from later transmission:

“neither did all the Copists, nor Criticks, nor even Interpreters, treat this Translation with such religious Fidelity and Care, as to make all the Copies exactly answer to its Original and its primitive Reading.”

Carpzov therefore distinguishes deficiencies attributable to the original translators from the later failure to preserve their text faithfully.

Origen’s Septuagint Required Extensive Correction

Carpzov describes the condition of the Greek text encountered by Origen:

“So much did Origen’s Septuagint Version depart from the Hebrew Text, that it wanted to have Deficiencies supplied, and Redundancies pared off, and the ill-rendered or corrupt Places amended, together with great Variety of critical Helps, to bring it back again somewhat nearer to the Hebrew Text.”

He also judged Aquila’s translation more faithful to the Hebrew in its wording:

“Whence I think it evident, that the Version of Aquila is by far preferable, to the Septuagint, as to its Agreement with the Original.”

Concerning the Greek Psalter, he likewise declared:

“Nor Secondly, Is the Greek Psalter of such known Integrity, as to deserve the Preference above the Hebrew.”

He added:

“the Credit of it is exceeding lame, and very frequently falters.”

Assessment

Carpzov provides extensive testimony concerning both the corruption and internal variation of the Septuagint. He acknowledges corruptions before Christ and after Origen, describes later Greek copies as having undergone “considerable Changes” and acquired “a quite different Face,” and states that the Septuagint “differs also so much from itself” that original readings can be difficult to distinguish from later alterations and interpolations.

He nevertheless distinguishes these later corruptions from the freedom exercised by the original translators and acknowledges that Greek copies in the apostolic age were probably more accurate than those surviving in his own day. His testimony therefore bears directly against identifying the extant Septuagint with an unchanged and uniformly transmitted ancient Greek text.

Citation: Johann Gottlob Carpzov, Critica Sacra Veteris Testamenti (Leipzig, 1728); A Defence of the Hebrew Bible, in Answer to the Charge of Corruption Brought Against It by Mr. Whiston (London, 1729).

45. John Gill (1697–1771)

John Gill was an English Particular Baptist pastor, theologian, and biblical commentator. He served a London congregation for more than fifty years and produced an extensive Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, numerous theological works, and A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points, and Accents (1767). Gill frequently consulted the Septuagint and sometimes cited its readings approvingly. Nevertheless, he expressly maintained that its surviving text had undergone alteration and identified several instances of what he believed to be later interpolations.

The Septuagint “Is Not in the Same State Now It Formerly Was”

In his 1767 dissertation, Gill criticized several Septuagint renderings which he attributed to erroneous readings of the Hebrew:

“The authors of the several Greek versions of the Bible, the Septuagint interpreters, Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus, were all Jews, excepting the last, and he was a Samaritan, and may be allowed to have a considerable share of knowledge of the Hebrew language; yet these, especially the seventy interpreters, neglecting the points, and translating without them, what gross senses have they put upon the text? sometimes directly contrary to what is intended, sometimes what is very absurd, and even wicked and blasphemous, or nearly so.”

At Psalm 7:11, Gill observed that where the Hebrew declares, “God is angry every day,” the Greek gives the opposite sense.

At Isaiah 24:23, Gill described the Greek rendering as:

“most miserably obscured in the Greek version of it, and a sense given extremely low, mean, and absurd.”

At Lamentations 3:33, he accused the Greek rendering of:

“charging God with insincerity and dissimulation.”

More importantly for textual transmission, Gill observed that the wording of Isaiah 9:6 known to Clement of Alexandria differed from that found in the Septuagint of his own day:

“and how have the same interpreters, by changing points and letters, spoiled the famous prophecy of the Messiah in Isaiah 9:6, where, instead of everlasting Father, the Prince of peace, they translate I will bring upon the princes peace? though the passage is otherwise produced by Clemens of Alexandria, more agreeable to the Hebrew text; which shows that the Septuagint version is not in the same state now it formerly was.”

Gill thus distinguishes errors he attributed to the original translators from subsequent changes in the transmitted Greek text.

Material in the Present Septuagint That “Was Not Originally There”

Commenting on the additional Cainan in Luke 3:36, Gill argued that the name had been introduced into the Greek Old Testament after appearing in the New Testament textual tradition:

“This Cainan is not mentioned by Moses in Gen. 11:12 nor has he ever appeared in any Hebrew copy of the Old Testament, nor in the Samaritan version, nor in the Targum; nor is he mentioned by Josephus, nor in 1 Chron. 1:24 where the genealogy is repeated; nor is it in Beza’s most ancient Greek copy of Luke: it indeed stands in the present copies of the Septuagint, but was not originally there; and therefore could not be taken by Luke from thence, but seems to be owing to some early negligent transcriber of Luke’s Gospel, and since put into the Septuagint to give it authority: I say ‘early,’ because it is in many Greek copies, and in the Vulgate Latin, and all the Oriental versions, even in the Syriac, the oldest of them; but ought not to stand neither in the text, nor in any version.”

Gill therefore regarded the reading as an ancient interpolation rather than part of the original Septuagint.

Marginal Additions Incorporated into the Greek Text

At Proverbs 6:8, Gill explained the Septuagint’s additional passage concerning the bee as a possible marginal note subsequently incorporated into the text:

“But this is not in the Hebrew text; but perhaps being written in the margin of some copy of the Septuagint as a parallel instance, was by some unskilful copier put into the text of the Greek version, from whence the Arabic version has taken it; it crept in very early, for Clemens of Alexandria makes mention of it.”

Gill proposed a similar explanation for an addition at Isaiah 23:15:

“and so it is added in the Septuagint version, ‘as the time of a man’; which perhaps was a marginal note, way of explanation, and crept into the text.”

In both cases Gill presents the marginal-note explanation as a possibility rather than an established fact.

Altering the Septuagint to Agree with the New Testament

Discussing the difference between the seventy persons mentioned in Genesis 46 and the seventy-five mentioned in Acts 7:14, Gill rejected the necessity of altering the Greek Old Testament to harmonize the accounts:

“nor was there any need to alter and corrupt the Septuagint version … to make it agree with Stephen’s account; or to add five names in it … to make up the number seventy five: and it may be observed, that the number is not altered in the version of Deuteronomy 10:22 which agrees with the Hebrew for seventy persons.”

Gill thus regarded the expanded enumeration in the Greek Genesis tradition as an alteration introduced to produce agreement with Stephen’s account.

Assessment

Gill is a useful witness because he made extensive use of the Septuagint and did not reject its readings indiscriminately. Nevertheless, he expressly states that the Greek version was “not in the same state now it formerly was” and identifies several readings which he believed had entered the text through later transmission.

His examples include interpolation from the New Testament tradition, marginal material incorporated by copyists, and alterations intended to harmonize biblical passages. Although some of his explanations are conjectural, he consistently distinguishes the original Greek translation from its surviving textual forms.

Citation: John Gill, A Dissertation Concerning the Antiquity of the Hebrew Language, Letters, Vowel-Points, and Accents (London, 1767), discussion of Hebrew vowel points and the ancient Greek versions; Exposition of the Old and New Testaments, on Luke 3:36, Proverbs 6:8, Isaiah 23:15, and Acts 7:14.

46. Bernardinus De Moor (1709–1780)

Bernardinus De Moor was a Dutch Reformed theologian and a leading representative of later Reformed scholasticism. A student of Johannes à Marck, he became best known for his extensive Commentarius Perpetuus on Marck’s Compendium Theologiae Christianae. De Moor distinguished errors attributable to the original Septuagint translators from subsequent textual corruption, examined the divergent recensions and printed editions of the Greek Old Testament, and denied that the Septuagint possessed independent authority equal to the Hebrew original.

The Ancient and Genuine Septuagint Is Not Available in Its Entirety

De Moor explicitly addressed the condition of the surviving Septuagint:

“With respect to the Greek version of the Septuagint, learned men think that that ancient and genuine version is not available to us in its entirety: indeed, a collation of the diverse editions, for example, of the Roman and Anglican, shows that almost innumerable discrepancies of the Greek text are given by them; so that from an adulterated, corrupt, and uncertain version nothing is able to be concluded firmly against the Hebrew sources, and the possession of the points in good faith.”

De Moor thus appealed to extensive differences among Greek editions as evidence that the ancient Septuagint was no longer available in its entirety and described the surviving text as “adulterated, corrupt, and uncertain.”

The Common Septuagint Was Already “Vitiated to a Significant Degree”

De Moor described the condition of the common Greek text before Origen’s recension:

“Formerly there existed the Septuagint Version, which they were calling κοινὴν/koine/common or Vulgate, vitiated to a significant degree, which ORIGEN accordingly purposed to emend and to publish a more accurate edition.”

He likewise described Lucian’s subsequent efforts:

“Moreover, the Version of the Septuagint, called κοινῆν/Koine, was reviewed, and both with the help of copies more ancient and of approved fidelity, and unto the norm of the Hebrew text, was purged from numerous errors, which had crept in over a long stretch of time, by LUCIAN…”

De Moor therefore presents Origen and Lucian as correcting a Greek text that had already undergone substantial deterioration. He also identifies Hesychius as responsible for another recension.

Three Different Recensions Divided the Christian World

De Moor cites Jerome’s description of the principal Septuagint recensions:

“Alexandria and Egypt, in the matter of the Septuagint, commend the author Hesychius. Constantinople, all the way to Antioch, approves the exemplars of Lucian the martyr. The middle provinces between these read the Palestinian Codices, which, having received the labors of Origen, Eusebius and Pamphilus published. And the whole world by this threefold difference is agitated within itself.”

This testimony, quoted from Jerome, describes a Greek Old Testament tradition divided among the Hesychian, Lucianic, and Palestinian or Hexaplaric recensions rather than represented by one universally uniform text.

The Complutensian Edition Departed from the Ancient Greek Version

De Moor described the editorial methods employed in preparing the Complutensian Septuagint:

“The Editors supplied what things were in the Hebrew text, if they were wanting in the Septuagint, from another translation; but what things were superfluous in the Greek, they often trimmed off.”

He also notes that the editors selected readings more closely corresponding to the Hebrew when different Greek readings were available. He consequently concludes:

“Whence this Edition recedes some distance from the ancient Greek Version.”

De Moor identifies four principal printed forms of the Septuagint: the Complutensian, Aldine, Roman, and Anglican editions. The Aldine was prepared through comparison of ancient exemplars whose precise identity was not reported; the Roman rested principally upon the Vatican manuscript; and the Anglican edition, prepared by John Ernest Grabe, represented the Alexandrian manuscript.

The Septuagint Is “Corrupted in a Variety of Ways”

De Moor expressly denied that the Septuagint possessed independent authenticity:

“On the contrary, we, with our AUTHOR, deny Authenticity to this Version.”

His principal textual argument was especially comprehensive:

“The super-abounding errors of this Version [LXX] are evident, in its less suitable expression of the sense, addition, subtraction, mutation, through an incorrect reading of the letters, through incorrect punctuation, signification of the words, inverted construction of the words, etc., just as Bellarmine himself . . . acknowledges, and demonstrates that this Version is now corrupted in a variety of ways, and that it is no longer extant in its integrity; so that it is not now safe to emend the Hebrew or Latin texts out of the Greek codices. But a consideration of those errors, which defile this Version, teaches that a great part of those is to be ascribed to the Interpreters themselves; to which, nevertheless, far more were able to be added thereafter by injury of time, blindness and sleepiness of scribes, etc.”

De Moor thus distinguishes defects originating with the translators from further corruption introduced during transmission.

Patristic and Apostolic Use Does Not Establish Independent Authenticity

De Moor acknowledged the high esteem in which many ancient Christians held the Septuagint. Nevertheless, he observed that early Christian writers sometimes departed from its readings and employed other Greek translations, occasionally preferring them as “better and more accurate.”

He also noted the mixture of Greek translations in Origen’s Hexapla:

“ORIGEN has almost conflated the two into one in his Hexaplis”

Here De Moor refers to the Septuagint and Theodotion.

De Moor likewise acknowledged that New Testament writers frequently agreed with the Septuagint, including in passages where its wording differed from the Hebrew, while also recognizing instances in which they departed from it and followed the Hebrew more closely. He therefore denied that apostolic use of familiar Greek wording established the inspiration or independent authenticity of the entire Septuagint.

He also reported the theory that some apparent agreements between the Septuagint and New Testament resulted from later Christian alteration of Greek Old Testament manuscripts. However, he presented Brian Walton’s substantial objections and left the matter to the reader’s judgment.

Assessment

De Moor presents the surviving Septuagint as a textually diverse and corrupted tradition rather than the complete and unchanged form of the ancient translation. He reports “almost innumerable discrepancies” among Greek editions, describes the common Septuagint before Origen as already “vitiated to a significant degree,” and cites the existence of three major competing recensions.

He also distinguishes errors attributable to the original translators from later scribal corruption and states that the Septuagint is “corrupted in a variety of ways” and “no longer extant in its integrity.” His testimony therefore bears directly on both the instability of the transmitted Greek text and the difficulty of identifying it without qualification with the ancient and genuine Septuagint.

Citation: Bernardinus De Moor, Commentarius Perpetuus in Johannis Marckii Compendium Theologiae Christianae, vol. 1 (Leiden, 1761), pars I, cap. II, §§8, 11; English translation by Steven Dilday, Didactico-Elenctic Theology, vol. 2, “The Authenticity of the Hebrew and Greek Originals,” especially pp. 141, 211. De Moor’s quotation concerning the three recensions derives from Jerome, Preface to Chronicles.

47. Henry Owen (1716–1795)

Henry Owen was a Welsh Anglican clergyman, physician, Fellow of the Royal Society, and biblical scholar. He devoted considerable attention to the textual history of the Greek Old Testament in An Enquiry into the Present State of the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament (1769), Critical Disquisitions (1784), and A Brief Account, Historical and Critical, of the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament (1787). Although Owen held the original Septuagint in high regard, he believed that its transmitted text had suffered extensive alteration and no longer survived intact in any single manuscript or printed edition.

Jewish and Christian Alteration of the Septuagint

In his 1769 Enquiry, Owen attributed some alterations of the Greek text to religious controversy rather than merely accidental copying errors:

“A clear proof, among several others, that, if the violent malice of the Jews did much harm to the Septuagint version, the indiscreet zeal of Christians did it likewise no small damage.”

He elsewhere stated:

“Upon these grounds, and by these artifices, the Jews made many and signal alterations in the Septuagint Version; and not a few in their own Books.”

Owen also identified ordinary causes of textual variation:

“These differences arose from various causes: but chiefly, 1. from the negligence or inadvertency, 2. from the ignorance, and, 3. from the boldness and conceit, of transcribers. For I meddle not here with the alterations made by contending parties which are not a few both in the Greek and Hebrew copies.”

He thus distinguished ordinary scribal errors from deliberate alterations arising through religious controversy.

The “Corrupt State” of All the Printed Editions

Owen explicitly stated the purpose of his Enquiry:

“The purport of my design is, to convince the world of the corrupt state of the Septuagint version, as it stands in all the printed editions: — and consequently, to convince the world of the necessity of collating all the MS copies of it, that are now to be found; and of bringing their variations under one view.”

He continued:

“We should then proceed on surer grounds: and, being more able to ascertain the true text, might comment upon it with greater certainty, precision, and judgement: whereas, in the situation we are now in, we unwarily undertake to write comments on we know not what; and, while we mean to illustrate the truths of Scripture, are often defending the errours of transcribers.”

Owen therefore did not identify the original Septuagint with any printed Greek edition available in his day.

No Single Manuscript Contains the Pure Septuagint

In his Critical Disquisitions (1784), Owen rejected the assumption that the Vatican manuscript preserved the original Septuagint:

“The Vatican MS, though ancient, venerable, and of high value, can yet on no reasonable grounds be supposed to contain the simple version of the Seventy. It has its additions and omissions, as well as other copies; though not perhaps in equal degrees.”

He then stated more broadly:

“The simple version of the Seventy is now included in no single MS; it lies dispersed among the various copies. And it is by collating these various copies, and comparing them with the collated Hebrew, that we can ever hope to come at the truth.”

Owen thus distinguished the original translation from every surviving manuscript while maintaining that much of its wording could be recovered through textual comparison.

Origen’s Revision Introduced an “Unhappy Mixture”

Owen believed that Origen’s correction of the Septuagint introduced additional difficulties. After discussing Amos 9:12, he wrote:

“Seeing then that Origen’s Hebrew copy was evidently mutilated, interpolated, and corrupted, what immense injury must he have done to the Septuagint Version, when he reduced it to the form of so imperfect a standard! How often must he have applied his obeli and asterisks, not only without necessity, but even to the prejudice and violation of truth!”

He also objected to Origen’s incorporation of readings from later Greek translators:

“He often subjoined to the old Greek version another, and, as he judged, a better version of the same passage, taken from some of the later interpreters, and thereby introduced an unhappy mixture.”

Owen summarized the result:

“From these three sources arose many corruptions, which defaced the integrity of the Septuagint Version.”

He then described the Hexaplaric text:

“By these means the Hexaplar column of the Septuagint soon became, especially when the signatures were omitted, a strange, heterogeneous mixture; dissimilar in style, and irregular in construction; of which the attentive reader has, at this time, frequent occasion to complain.”

The omission of Origen’s critical signs obscured the distinction between older Septuagint readings and material drawn from other Greek translations.

Further Corruption Through Later Transmission

Owen maintained that corruption continued after Origen:

“But, besides this injury, which it suffered more immediately from the perverse diligence of Origen; the Septuagint version still underwent further adulterations, most of them founded on the Hexapla, from the critical audacity of transcribers.”

He explains that preferred readings from other Greek translations could be placed in margins or between the lines and subsequently incorporated into the continuous text.

Owen concluded:

“The forementioned points being duly considered, we cannot, I think, but conclude, that the author of the Hexapla, eventually indeed, though not intentionally, contributed a great deal to the depravity and corruption of the Septuagint version; which we can by no means rectify again.”

He immediately qualified this judgment:

“All the blame, however, must not be laid on Origen’s Hexapla: the other two editions, those I mean of Lucian and Hesychius, bore most probably a share in the mischief.”

Owen therefore attributed substantial responsibility to the ancient recensions while expressly denying that Origen intended to corrupt the text.

The Ancient Editions “Destroyed and Ruined” Its Integrity

Owen stated the principal conclusion of his investigation:

“For the chief purport of this disquisition is, to shew, what effect the several editions, and particularly the Hexaplar edition had on the original Septuagint text. And the effect, as it now appears, was, that, instead of improving it, they manifestly destroyed and ruined its integrity.”

He explained:

“Ruined, I say, its integrity: because we have now no means in our hands, by which it can be thoroughly restored.”

Owen did not mean that every trace of the original Septuagint had disappeared, but that its original textual integrity could no longer be completely recovered.

In his Brief Account (1787), he reaffirmed the point:

“By these means, and the consequent omission of the signatures in future transcripts, the original Septuagint soon became a confused, heterogeneous mass—debased and adulterated by this foreign alloy to such a degree, that it is now difficult to restore it to its genuine purity.”

He characterized the result as:

“eventually, though not intentionally, a lasting and irreparable injury.”

The Chisian and Alexandrian Manuscripts

Owen also rejected the claim that the Chisian manuscript of Daniel preserved the pure Septuagint:

“Let it, finally, be farther observed, that the Chisian MS. of Daniel, which pretends to be the pure version of the Seventy, will be found on examination to belie its title in the most shameful degree.”

Nor did he regard the Alexandrian manuscript as invariably pure. Discussing Deuteronomy 32:43, he remarked:

“See how the verse is interpolated and corrupted in the Alexandrian manuscript.”

Owen therefore refused to identify the original Septuagint with any one celebrated manuscript witness.

The Hebrew as “the Principal Remedy”

Despite his severe criticism of the transmitted Septuagint, Owen believed substantial recovery of its ancient text remained possible:

“If it can be restored at all, it is chiefly to be done by collating the Greek manuscripts, and comparing those collations with the collated Hebrew. This I look upon as the principal remedy; and sorry I am it has remained so long untried.”

He also recommended consulting ancient translations made from the Greek and quotations preserved by early Christian writers.

Assessment

Owen consistently distinguishes the original Septuagint from its surviving manuscript and printed forms. He describes all the printed editions as being in a “corrupt state,” denies that the “simple version of the Seventy” survives in any single manuscript, and attributes further alteration to the ancient recensions and subsequent copyists.

His strongest conclusion is that these processes “destroyed and ruined” the integrity of the Septuagint so that it could no longer be thoroughly restored. Nevertheless, he valued the ancient translation and believed much of its earlier text could still be recovered through comparison of Greek manuscripts, the Hebrew, ancient versions, and patristic citations.

Citation: Henry Owen, An Enquiry into the Present State of the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament (London: B. White, J. Fletcher, and T. Payne, 1769), Preface, especially pp. vii–viii; Critical Disquisitions, Containing Some Remarks, I. On Masius’s Edition of the Book of Joshua. And II. On Origen’s Celebrated Hexapla (London: J. Nichols, 1784), second disquisition; A Brief Account, Historical and Critical, of the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament (London: J. Nichols, 1787).

48. Johann David Michaelis (1717–1791)

Johann David Michaelis was a German Lutheran theologian, biblical scholar, and professor at the University of Göttingen. He devoted extensive attention to the Hebrew Old Testament, the ancient versions, and textual criticism. His writings contain explicit judgments concerning errors in the Septuagint, additions made by its translators, conjectural alterations, and subsequent corruption of the Greek text.

The Septuagint Frequently Erred

While discussing the lost Hebrew original of 1 Maccabees, Michaelis compared its Greek translator with the translators of the canonical Old Testament:

Man kann nicht daran zweifeln, daß der Griechische Ueberseker des Buchs der Maccabäer eben so häufig gefehlt haben sollte, als die LXX in den canonischen Büchern des Alten Testaments, bald aus Schuld einer unrichtigen Leseart in seinem Hebräischen Exemplar, bald weil er das Hebräische falsch verstand oder im Griechischen unbequem ausdrückte: und wie viel würde uns mangeln, wie viel unrichtiges würden wir in der Geschichte annehmen müssen, wenn wir die canonischen Bücher blos in der Griechischen Uebersehung hätten?

Translation: “One cannot doubt that the Greek translator of the book of Maccabees should have erred just as frequently as the LXX in the canonical books of the Old Testament, sometimes because of an incorrect reading in his Hebrew exemplar, sometimes because he misunderstood the Hebrew or expressed it awkwardly in Greek; and how much would be lacking to us, how much that is incorrect would we have to accept in history, if we had the canonical books only in the Greek translation?”

Michaelis expressly says that the LXX frequently erred and identifies several possible causes: an erroneous Hebrew exemplar, misunderstanding of the Hebrew, and defective expression in Greek.

“Innumerable” Additions by the Pentateuchal Translator

Discussing a Septuagint addition at Exodus 5:3, Michaelis rejected the assumption that the translators necessarily found the additional words in their Hebrew exemplar:

von der ich nicht einmahl überzeugt bin, daß die LXX sie in ihrem Hebräischen Exemplar fanden, denn dergleichen kleine, den Sinn gar nicht ändernde Zusäße macht jeder Ueberseher: er hat Sinn des Textes ins Gedächtniß gefasset, und sieht nicht bey jedem Wort, das er schreibt, nach, ob es auch im Text stehe; der Griechische Ueberseker der Bücher Mosis macht sie unzähligemahl.

Translation: “I am not even convinced that the LXX found it in their Hebrew exemplar, for every translator makes such small additions that do not alter the sense: he has grasped the sense of the text in his memory and does not look back at every word he writes to see whether it actually stands in the text; the Greek translator of the books of Moses makes such additions innumerable times.”

Michaelis therefore attributes such additions to the translator himself rather than assuming that they represent additional material in the Hebrew exemplar.

Conjectural Alteration Without Manuscript Support

Michaelis also believed that the Septuagint translators sometimes altered readings by conjecture rather than following manuscript evidence:

Gesekt die LXX hätten, wie sich in ihrer Uebersehung Spuren davon finden, oft ohne Handschriften nach einer critischen Conjectur die Leseart geändert, so stimmte sie nicht mit dem Hebräischen überein, und doch konnten die Richter glauben, sie sey gut gemacht, und habe Fehler des Textes verbessert.

Translation: “Suppose the LXX, as traces of this appear in their translation, often altered the reading by critical conjecture without manuscripts; then it would not agree with the Hebrew, and yet the judges could believe that it was well made and had corrected errors in the text.”

Michaelis thus regarded conjectural alteration without manuscript support as something for which he believed the Septuagint itself showed traces.

The Greek Chronology Was Altered

Discussing the chronological differences in Genesis 5 and 11, Michaelis concluded that the changes occurred in the Greek rather than the Hebrew:

daß entweder der Hebräische Text oder die LXX nachher verändert seyn. Ich glaube nun zwar, der Folgesak sey wahr, und die Zahlen dieser Capitel, nicht im Hebräischen, sondern, noch dazu ziemlich spät, im Griechischen geändert.

Translation: “That either the Hebrew text or the LXX must afterward have been altered. I do indeed believe that the conclusion is true, and that the numbers of these chapters were altered, not in the Hebrew, but in the Greek—and, moreover, rather late.”

In another discussion of chronology, he questioned whether the extant Septuagint reading was even as old as Josephus:

wiewohl ich wirklich nicht glaube, daß die jekige Leseart der LXX so alt sey als Josephus.

Translation: “Although I really do not believe that the present reading of the LXX is as old as Josephus.”

Michaelis therefore distinguished the “present reading” of the Septuagint from an earlier form of its Greek text.

Alteration by Greek Copyists

Michaelis explicitly attributed variation within the Septuagint tradition to later scribes. Discussing competing Greek readings in the Psalms, he wrote:

Vielleicht ist in den LXX ἡμῶν die richtige Leseart, und αὐτῶν blos Aenderung der Abschreiber, die dachten, es müsse nach dem Zusammenhang des vorhergehenden von Niederlagen, nicht der Israeliten, sondern der Feinde die Rede seyn.

Translation: “Perhaps ἡμῶν is the correct reading in the LXX, and αὐτῶν merely an alteration of the copyists, who thought that, according to the context of what preceded, the defeats must refer not to the Israelites but to the enemies.”

Michaelis therefore believed that copyists could alter the Greek text according to what they thought the context required.

Harmonizing “Improvements” by the Translator

In Samuel, Michaelis encountered versional readings that removed an apparent contradiction in the Hebrew. Rather than assuming that these represented a different Hebrew text, he attributed them to the translator:

Allein diese, durch keinen zweiten unabhängigen Zeugen bestätigten Varianten sehen mir wie Verbesserungen des Uebersetzers aus, der den Scheinwiderspruch des Grundtextes wegschaffen wollte.

Translation: “But these variants, confirmed by no second independent witness, look to me like improvements by the translator, who wanted to remove the apparent contradiction of the original text.”

Michaelis thus refused to infer a different Hebrew exemplar automatically from a divergent Greek reading.

A “Completely Nonsensical” Septuagint Rendering

Concerning Isaiah 10:15, Michaelis wrote:

S. 181. klagt Herr K. über die LXX mit Recht, sie übersehten Jes. X, 15. ganz sinnlos … ich gebe ihm Recht.

Translation: “On p. 181 Mr. K. rightly complains about the LXX: they translated Isaiah 10:15 completely nonsensically … I agree with him.”

Michaelis therefore expressly endorsed the judgment that this particular Septuagint rendering was “completely nonsensical.”

Assessment

Michaelis distinguishes several possible causes of Septuagintal divergence: errors by the translators, additions made in translation, conjectural alterations without manuscript support, harmonizing changes, and later alterations by Greek copyists. He also explicitly attributes the chronological differences in Genesis to relatively late alteration of the Greek text and distinguishes the “present reading” of the Septuagint from an earlier textual form.

His testimony is particularly useful because he repeatedly refuses to assume that every divergent Greek reading reflects a different Hebrew exemplar. For Michaelis, differences could arise both in the original act of translation and through subsequent transmission of the Greek text.

Citation: Johann David Michaelis, Orientalische und exegetische Bibliothek, vol. 12 (Frankfurt am Main, 1777), pp. 33, 117–118; vol. 13 (Frankfurt am Main, 1778), p. 221; vol. 19 (Frankfurt am Main, 1782), p. 166; vol. 20 (Frankfurt am Main, 1782), pp. 22–23; vol. 21 (Frankfurt am Main, 1783), pp. 53, 80.

49. Robert Holmes (1748–1805)

Robert Holmes was an English clergyman and biblical scholar who became Canon of Christ Church and Dean of Winchester. In 1788 he began an extensive project to collate the manuscripts and other witnesses of the Septuagint. His work eventually resulted in Vetus Testamentum Graecum cum variis lectionibus, of which he completed the first volume before his death. Holmes’s own preface to that volume contains unusually explicit testimony concerning the textual condition of the transmitted Septuagint.

“Many Faults,” Especially Additions and Alterations

Holmes states that the Septuagint tradition had suffered substantial textual damage:

Et credibile est profecto, multis eam vitiis, additamentis praecipue et permutationibus, laborasse.

Translation: “And it is certainly credible that it suffered from many faults, especially additions and alterations.”

He explains that words and clauses had been written in the margins of Septuagint manuscripts, either to explain difficult expressions or to bring passages into closer agreement with the Hebrew. Such material could subsequently enter the text:

Et multae forsan de hoc genere lectiones in quosdam Codices irrepserant…

Translation: “And many readings of this kind had perhaps crept into certain manuscripts….”

Holmes observes that when such material entered without displacing the older reading, redundancies could result; when it replaced the older reading, the newer material could acquire the authority formerly belonging to the ancient reading.

Different Manuscripts Preserved Different States of the Text

Holmes rejects the supposition that the same omissions, additions, and alterations had affected all Septuagint manuscripts alike:

Credendum erat potius, non eandem omnium ubique Codicum fuisse conditionem, sed alios aliis fuisse sinceros magis et accuratos; nonnulla in aliquibus fuisse servata, quae a reliquis defecerant; et abfuisse a nonnullis aliqua, quae in caeteris redundabant; et ista, quae fuerant permutata in quibusdam, apud alios inviolata permansisse.

Translation: “It was rather to be believed that the condition of all the manuscripts was not everywhere the same, but that some were more sound and accurate than others; that some things had been preserved in certain manuscripts which were missing from the rest; that some things were absent from certain manuscripts which were redundant in others; and that things which had been altered in some remained inviolate in others.”

He immediately adds:

Atque ita rem sese revera habuisse, testari videntur Codices τῶν οʹ hodierni…

Translation: “And that the matter really was so, the present manuscripts of the Seventy appear to testify….”

Holmes therefore regarded the surviving manuscripts as preserving different textual conditions: material lost in some survived in others, while readings altered in some remained unchanged elsewhere.

Interpolation and Omission Obscured What the Seventy Had Written

In discussing Greek revision, Holmes raises the problem of determining what belonged to the older Septuagint text. Concerning Lucian, he writes that he would often have been unable to know:

quidnam οἱ οʹ revera scripsissent, et quidnam sive interpolationi sive praetermissioni alienae esset tribuendum.

Translation: “what the Seventy had actually written, and what should be attributed either to foreign interpolation or to omission.”

Holmes also maintains that material which ought to have remained in the Septuagint could subsequently be removed:

nonnulla, quae sane … debuerant in textu Septuagintavirali religiose conservari, ex eo tamen fuerunt eliminata.

Translation: “Some things which certainly … ought carefully to have been preserved in the Septuagint text were nevertheless eliminated from it.”

Interpolation and omission could therefore create genuine uncertainty concerning the original wording of the Greek translation.

No Single Manuscript or Edition Contained the Genuine Text

In 1800 Holmes summarized the textual problem directly:

“Its genuine Text is not, as the Learned well know, contained at present in any one Manuscript, or Edition: but lies dispersed in all the Copies, with more or less of Omission or Interpolation in every one.”

He continues:

“What has been omitted, and what interpolated, is likely to become more fully known, when those Readings, in which the several Copies differ, shall have been placed in one collected view.”

Immediately before this, Holmes refers to:

“The ALTERATIONS made in this Version by Editors”

and says that because of such alteration:

“what was at first its Own Genuine Text is become a question the more pressing and necessary.”

Holmes therefore states explicitly that no single manuscript or edition contained the genuine Septuagint text and that every copy contained some degree of omission or interpolation.

The True Text Had to Be Recovered from All the Witnesses

Holmes explains the purpose of his critical undertaking:

ut textus eorum verus pervestigaretur in monimentis ipsorum universis.

Translation: “That their true text might be investigated through all their surviving witnesses.”

He regarded variant readings as essential evidence because:

propriam diversorum exemplarium indolem a Variantibus passim commonstrari.

Translation: “The distinctive character of the different copies is everywhere shown by their variant readings.”

He therefore concludes:

Varias lectiones in eruditorum manus trado…

Translation: “I place the variant readings into the hands of learned men….”

For Holmes, the original Septuagint could not simply be identified with one manuscript, printed edition, or recension; its text had to be investigated through the surviving witnesses as a whole.

Assessment

Holmes provides unusually direct testimony concerning the textual instability of the transmitted Septuagint. He describes additions, alterations, omissions, and interpolations distributed differently among manuscripts and acknowledges that these could obscure what the Seventy had actually written.

Most importantly, he states that the “genuine Text” was contained in no single manuscript or edition, but was “dispersed in all the Copies,” each containing some degree of “Omission or Interpolation.” His testimony therefore presents the Septuagint as a text requiring reconstruction from a diverse manuscript tradition rather than one preserved intact in any single surviving witness.

Citation: Robert Holmes, Vetus Testamentum Graecum cum variis lectionibus, vol. 1 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1798), Praefatio ad Tomum I; Robert Holmes, The Septuagint-Version, printed at Rome in the year 1587, has been during eleven years past under collation with its Manuscripts… ([Oxford], 1800).

50. Sebastian Seemiller (1752–1798)

Sebastian Seemiller was a German Catholic theologian, scholar of Oriental languages, professor at the University of Ingolstadt, and university librarian. In his De Graecis Bibliorum V. T. Versionibus Dissertatio Historico-Critica (1787), he examined the origin, translation, corruption, revision, and transmission of the Septuagint, tracing successive alterations from its early circulation through Origen’s revision, later scribal contamination, competing recensions, and the printed editions.

Different Translators at Different Times

Seemiller argued that the books of the Greek Old Testament had been translated at different periods by different translators:

Cum ex hactenus dictis satis constet, graecam V. T. versionem septuaginta-viralem diversis temporibus, & diversorum quidem interpretum studio confectam esse, quis per se facile intelligit, eam in diversis libris diversam, accuratiorem in his, in illis minus accuratam esse.

Translation: “Since it is sufficiently established from what has been said thus far that the Greek version of the Old Testament called the Septuagint was produced at different times, and indeed through the work of different translators, anyone can easily understand that it is different in the different books, being more accurate in some and less accurate in others.”

Seemiller therefore rejected the conception of the Septuagint as the product of one uniform act of translation.

Corruption Already in the Apostolic Age

Under the heading De versionis Septuaginta-viralis corruptione, ejusdemque emendatione ab Origene facta (“On the corruption of the Septuagint Version and its correction by Origen”), Seemiller wrote:

Nemo igitur mirari debet, jam Christi & Apostolorum aetate scribarum partim negligentia, partim imperitia quosdam in versionem illam irrepsisse naevos; quamvis de corruptione illius studio, jam tum quidem facta nihil veteres memoriae prodiderint.

Translation: “No one therefore ought to wonder that already in the age of Christ and the Apostles certain blemishes had crept into that version, partly through the negligence and partly through the ignorance of scribes; although the ancient records have transmitted nothing concerning the corruption of it by design, which had already taken place at that time.”

He also discussed the evidence of Josephus and Philo:

Si quando Josephus, hac versione constanter fere usus, quaedam habet additamenta: non ea statim ex aliquo versionis illius exemplari hausisse censendus est. Nam ex traditione etiam judaica haurire potuit. Attamen quaedam loca jam Philonis aetate amanuensium negligentia vel imperitia fuisse corrupta, ex locis quibusdam a Philone citatis luculenter patet.

Translation: “If Josephus, who generally used this version consistently, sometimes has additions, he should not immediately be thought to have drawn them from some copy of that version. For he could also have drawn them from Jewish tradition. Nevertheless, it is clearly evident from certain passages cited by Philo that some places had already been corrupted in Philo’s time through the negligence or ignorance of copyists.”

Seemiller thus distinguished actual textual corruption from additions in ancient writers that might have originated elsewhere.

Corruption in the Second Century

Seemiller appealed to Justin Martyr as evidence of further alteration before Origen:

Seculo secundo textum hujus versionis non paucis in locis adulteratum fuisse, ex Justino M. probari potest. Is enim, saltem in Prophetis minoribus, loca complura vel aucta, vel diminuta, vel aliunde adulterata citavit.

Translation: “It can be proved from Justin Martyr that in the second century the text of this version had been corrupted in not a few places. For he cited, at least in the Minor Prophets, several passages which had either been enlarged, diminished, or otherwise corrupted.”

Origen Found the Text Corrupted “to an Astonishing Degree”

Seemiller described the condition of the Septuagint encountered by Origen:

Origenes vero Saeculo tertio textum versionis septuaginta-viralis mirum in modum adulteratum esse observavit, sive propter scribarum quorundam incuriam, sive propter nefariam aliquorum Scripturas emendantium audaciam, sive propter eos, qui, dum Scripturas emendant, pro arbitrio addunt vel detrahunt.

Translation: “Origen, however, in the third century observed that the text of the Septuagint version had been corrupted to an astonishing degree, whether through the carelessness of certain scribes, or through the wicked audacity of some who undertook to correct the Scriptures, or through those who, while correcting the Scriptures, added or subtracted according to their own judgment.”

Seemiller thus identified both ordinary copying errors and deliberate editorial alteration as causes of corruption before Origen.

Two Different Septuagint Editions after Origen

Seemiller distinguished the common Greek text from the revised Hexaplaric edition:

Ab eo tempore, quo Origenes Hexapla adornaverat, duae exstiterunt versionis septuaginta-viralis editiones, nimirum 1) editio κοινὴ seu vulgata, qualem nimirum exemplaria pleraque ante Origenis emendationem exhibebant, corruptam illam admodum, qualem & Tetraplae idem exhibebat; & 2) editio Hexaplaris, ad fidem hebraici textus ex aliis graecis versionibus ab Origene emendata.

Translation: “From the time when Origen had prepared the Hexapla, two editions of the Septuagint version existed: namely, 1) the koine or common edition, such as most copies exhibited before Origen’s correction—that very greatly corrupted text which the Tetrapla also exhibited; and 2) the Hexaplaric edition, corrected by Origen according to the Hebrew text from the other Greek versions.”

Seemiller therefore distinguishes the older common Septuagint from the revised text produced through comparison with the Hebrew and other Greek translations.

New Corruption after Eusebius and Pamphilus

Seemiller described a further stage of corruption:

Cum post Eusebii & Pamphili aetatem versio septuaginta-viralis cum asteriscis & obelis Origenianis, nec non selectoribus Origenis notis marginalibus; quin & versionum aliarum fragmentis, innumeris pene vicibus, & saepe quidem ab indoctis & negligentibus describentibus describeretur: sensim illa novis erroribus & magisque indies a primaeva puritate coepit recedere.

Translation: “Since after the age of Eusebius and Pamphilus the Septuagint version, together with Origen’s asterisks and obeli, as well as selected marginal notes of Origen and even fragments of other versions, was copied almost innumerable times, and often indeed by ignorant and negligent men, it gradually became disfigured by new errors and departed more and more every day from its original purity.”

Other Greek Versions Entered the Septuagint Text

Seemiller explains how material from other Greek translations entered the text:

Saepe enim imperiti, aut negligentes codicum scriptores Obelorum loco asteriscos, aut asteriscorum loco obelos posuerunt. Saepe cum hos, tum illos omiserunt penitus. Interdum fragmenta Aquilae, Symmachi, & Theodotionis, aliorumque in margine positae textui ipsi τῷ septuaginta inseruerunt.

Translation: “For ignorant or negligent copyists often put asterisks in place of obeli, or obeli in place of asterisks. Frequently they omitted both entirely. Sometimes they inserted into the text of the Septuagint itself fragments of Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and others which had been placed in the margin.”

Thus readings from other Greek versions could become incorporated into manuscripts subsequently transmitted under the name of the Septuagint.

The Pure Pre-Origenic Septuagint Was No Longer Recoverable

Seemiller reports Bernard de Montfaucon’s judgment:

Montefalconio judice editio septuaginta interpretum pura, & qualis erat ante Origenem frustra quaeratur hodie.

Translation: “In Montfaucon’s judgment, the pure edition of the Septuagint interpreters, such as it was before Origen, is sought in vain today.”

This is Montfaucon’s judgment as reported by Seemiller, not Seemiller’s own statement in those words.

Later Corruption of Quotations in Ancient Writers

Seemiller also reports Johann Gottfried Eichhorn’s observation:

Eichhornius illud quoque animadvertit, sequentibus saeculis ex corruptis codicibus τῶν LXX. Manuscriptis citationes quoque versionis illius in scriptoribus Origene anterioribus, Philone & Justino, correctas aut, verius, corruptas fuisse, adeo, ut Philo & Justinus in hodiernis editionibus citent graecas Aquilae, Symmachi aliorumque versiones, sua aetate aut nondum existentes, aut ipsis certe incognitas.

Translation: “Eichhorn also observed that in subsequent centuries the citations of this version in writers earlier than Origen, Philo and Justin, were corrected—or, more truly, corrupted—from corrupted manuscripts of the Septuagint, so that Philo and Justin in present-day editions cite the Greek versions of Aquila, Symmachus, and others which either did not yet exist in their own age or were certainly unknown to them.”

The argument was that later transmission could also alter the surviving evidence for the earlier Septuagint text.

Different Ancient Recensions

Seemiller discussed the recensions associated with Lucian, Hesychius, and Basil. Concerning Lucian, he wrote:

Hic quoque ex Hebraico textu, tanquam fonte, versionem illam studuit emendare.

Translation: “He too endeavored to emend that version from the Hebrew text as his source.”

He observed:

Atque ea quoque diversae recensiones textus septuaginta-viralis ampla criticis antiquioribus subministrarunt.

Translation: “And these different recensions also supplied the ancient critics with an abundance of textual material.”

The existence of these recensions further complicated the history of the Greek text.

The Printed Editions Were Themselves Composite

Concerning the Aldine edition, Seemiller wrote:

Textus ex codicibus Msscriptis, quos tamen editores non nominarunt, expressus est, idem vero ex aliis graecis versionibus, maxime Theodotionis, interpolatus.

Translation: “The text was taken from manuscript codices, which, however, the editors did not identify; but it was also interpolated from other Greek versions, especially that of Theodotion.”

Seemiller therefore regarded the Aldine edition as containing material from other Greek translations rather than reproducing a single uncontaminated Septuagint text.

The Roman Edition Altered Readings According to Editorial Judgment

Seemiller criticized the editors of the Roman edition for departing from their manuscript source:

Non recte factum est ab editoribus, quod non modo orthographiam ejusdem in editione mutarint, sed & lectiones, quae menda scribarum ipsis videbantur, hinc inde pro arbitrio correxerint.

Translation: “The editors acted improperly in that they not only altered its orthography in the edition, but also corrected here and there, according to their own judgment, readings which appeared to them to be scribal errors.”

He also discussed Grabe’s Alexandrian edition, whose editors sometimes supplied readings they considered preferable when the manuscript appeared defective and altered its orthography.

The Need for Manuscript Collation

Seemiller concluded by emphasizing the necessity of examining the manuscripts behind the printed editions and variant readings:

Qui de editionum & variantium lectionum versionis septuaginta-viralis pretio judicare volunt, codices norint, necesse est, manuscriptos, ex quibus editiones haustae, ac variae lectiones excerptae sint.

Translation: “Those who wish to judge the value of the editions and variant readings of the Septuagint version must necessarily know the manuscripts from which the editions were drawn and from which the various readings were extracted.”

Assessment

Seemiller presents the Septuagint as a text altered at successive stages of its history. He identifies scribal corruption already in the apostolic and second centuries, describes the text encountered by Origen as corrupted “to an astonishing degree,” and traces further contamination through Origenic revision, the confusion of critical signs, the incorporation of other Greek versions, and competing ancient recensions.

He also identifies interpolation and editorial alteration in printed editions and insists upon manuscript collation for judging the Greek text. His testimony therefore presents the Septuagint not as a single uniformly preserved text, but as a complex textual tradition repeatedly altered in transmission and revision.

Citation: Sebastian Seemiller, De Graecis Bibliorum V. T. Versionibus Dissertatio Historico-Critica, Programma I, De Versione Septuaginta Interpretum (Ingolstadt, 1787), §§II, IV, VI, VII, IX–XI, especially pp. 12–28.

51. Johann Gottfried Eichhorn (1752–1827)

Johann Gottfried Eichhorn was a German theologian and biblical critic associated with the Lutheran Protestant tradition. He taught at the universities of Jena and Göttingen and became a leading representative of the historical-critical study of the Old Testament. In his Einleitung in das Alte Testament, Eichhorn traced successive stages of textual corruption in the Septuagint, from early copying errors and deliberate alterations to contamination of the Hexaplaric tradition and competing regional recensions. He maintained that earlier forms of the Septuagint had to be recovered through textual reconstruction.

Errors Already Present in the Earliest Period

Eichhorn attributed some of the earliest corruption to the widespread circulation of the Septuagint:

Der allgemeine Gebrauch der Septuaginta machte viele Abschriften nothwendig und die häufigen Abschriften erzeugten viele Fehler.

Translation: “The general use of the Septuagint made many copies necessary, and the frequent copying produced many errors.”

He observed that some such errors were already reflected in Philo and Josephus and continued to accumulate in subsequent centuries.

The Septuagint Was “Miserably Disfigured” Before Origen

Eichhorn described the deterioration of the Greek text between the birth of Christ and the time of Origen:

Hierauf aber, in den Zeiten nach Christus Geburt bis auf Origenes, wurde der Text der Alexandrinischen Version durch willkührliche Aenderungen, Einschiebsel, Auslassungen und Schreibfehler jämmerlich entstellt.

Translation: “But afterward, in the period from the birth of Christ to Origen, the text of the Alexandrian version was miserably disfigured by arbitrary alterations, insertions, omissions, and scribal errors.”

Eichhorn therefore placed extensive textual corruption before Origen’s critical work.

Manuscripts Had Already Been Altered Before Justin Martyr

Eichhorn argued that some Septuagint manuscripts had undergone deliberate revision against the Hebrew before Justin Martyr:

Kurz, vor Justin gab es schon Handschriften der 70 Dollmetscher, die wenigstens in einigen Büchern des A. T. mit dem Hebräischen Original verglichen und hie und da geändert waren.

Translation: “In short, even before Justin there were manuscripts of the Seventy interpreters which, at least in some books of the Old Testament, had been compared with the Hebrew original and altered here and there.”

This distinguishes intentional correction against the Hebrew from accidental scribal corruption and places such revision well before the formal recensions of later centuries.

By Origen’s Time the Septuagint Was in a “Most Lamentable Condition”

Eichhorn writes:

Endlich zu Origenes Zeit war der Text der 70 Dollmetscher durch Nachlässigkeit der Abschreiber und Kühnheit unberufener Kriticaster, die nach Belieben änderten, zusetzten, ausließen, versetzten und trennten, in den kläglichsten Zustand gerathen.

Translation: “Finally, by Origen’s time the text of the Seventy interpreters, through the negligence of copyists and the audacity of unauthorized critics, who altered, added, omitted, transposed, and divided according to their pleasure, had fallen into the most lamentable condition.”

Eichhorn also identified additions in Daniel, Job, and other books, explanatory scholia that had entered the text, and material absent from the Greek in comparison with the Hebrew.

A “New Corruption” of the Septuagint

Eichhorn introduced the next stage under the heading:

Neue Corruption der 70 Dollmetscher.

Translation: “New corruption of the Seventy interpreters.”

He explained:

Seit Eusebius und Pamphilus Zeit schrieb man also die hexaplarische Recension der Alexandriner mit allen ihren kritischen Zeichen im Text, und den Fragmenten der übrigen Uebersetzer am Rande in eigenen Handschriften ab, und nun entstanden unzählige neue Verwirrungen.

Translation: “From the time of Eusebius and Pamphilus, therefore, the Hexaplaric recension of the Alexandrian version was copied into separate manuscripts, with all its critical signs in the text and the fragments of the other translators in the margin, and now innumerable new confusions arose.”

Eichhorn thus distinguished corruption already present before Origen from further disorder arising through transmission of the Hexaplaric recension.

Material from Other Greek Translators Entered the Septuagint Text

Eichhorn described how scribes confused or omitted Origen’s critical signs and the names identifying other Greek translators:

Bald ließen sie die kritischen Zeichen und Namen der alten Uebersetzer, aus denen etwas eingeschoben war, ganz weg, und schrieben in einem fort, als wenn alles von der Hand der Septuaginta wäre.

Translation: “At other times they omitted altogether the critical signs and the names of the ancient translators from whom something had been inserted, and wrote continuously as though everything were from the hand of the Septuagint.”

He continued:

Endlich nahmen sich aberkluge Abschreiber die Freyheit, Stücke anderer Griechischen Uebersetzer am Rande in den Text der Septuaginta einzuflicken, als wäre es ihr Eigenthum.

Translation: “Finally, overwise copyists took the liberty of inserting pieces of other Greek translators from the margin into the text of the Septuagint, as though they were its own property.”

Eichhorn summarized the result:

Daraus entstand ein Cento, den nun erst die Kritik wieder aus einander trennen soll.

Translation: “From this arose a cento which criticism must now separate again into its constituent parts.”

His description therefore concerns not merely variant readings but the incorporation of material from distinct Greek translations into the Septuagint text.

Even Earlier Writers Were Corrupted from Later Septuagint Manuscripts

Eichhorn argued that later contamination could also affect the surviving quotations of early writers:

Mit solchen interpolirten Handschriften verglich man die Citata der 70 Dollmetscher in den Schriftstellern, welche lange vor Origenes, und vor den übrigen Griechischen Uebersetzern geschrieben haben, und corrigirte frisch weg ihre Citata des antehexaplarischen Textes aus dem durch neue Interpolationen verdorbenen hexaplarischen.

Translation: “Such interpolated manuscripts were used to compare the quotations of the Seventy interpreters in writers who had written long before Origen and the other Greek translators, and their quotations of the pre-Hexaplaric text were freely corrected from the Hexaplaric text corrupted by new interpolations.”

Consequently, quotations preserved in later copies of Philo, Justin Martyr, and other early writers could not automatically be assumed to reproduce their original Greek wording.

The Hexapla Produced the “Most Lamentable Confusions”

Eichhorn expressly distinguished Origen’s intentions from the consequences of later transmission:

Da die Hexaplen ohne Schuld des trefflichen Origenes die kläglichsten Verwirrungen im Text der Septuaginta angerichtet haben, so wird ihr ohnehin schon schmerzlicher Verlust für die biblische Kritik noch bitterer.

Translation: “Since the Hexapla, through no fault of the excellent Origen, caused the most lamentable confusions in the text of the Septuagint, their already painful loss becomes still more bitter for biblical criticism.”

Eichhorn therefore attributed the confusion to the later transmission and misuse of Origen’s critical apparatus rather than misconduct by Origen himself.

Different Regions Possessed Different Septuagint Texts

Eichhorn described the geographical distribution of the principal recensions:

So hatte denn die damalige christliche Welt verschiedene Texte von der Alexandrinischen Version: die Palästinischen Gemeinen hatten den hexaplarischen, die Aegyptischen den Hesychischen, die von Antiochien bis Constantinopel den Lucianischen canonisirt.

Translation: “Thus the Christian world of that time had different texts of the Alexandrian version: the Palestinian congregations had canonized the Hexaplaric, the Egyptian the Hesychian, and those from Antioch to Constantinople the Lucianic.”

His account therefore represents the Christian world as possessing several regionally established forms of the Greek Old Testament rather than one universally uniform text.

Corruption Caused by the Different Recensions

Eichhorn introduced the subsequent discussion under the heading:

Corruption, die diese verschiedenen Recensionen im Text der Septuaginta angerichtet haben.

Translation: “Corruption which these different recensions caused in the text of the Septuagint.”

He observed:

Auch diese neuen verbesserten Ausgaben mögen das Ihrige zur Verschlimmerung der 70 beygetragen haben.

Translation: “These new, improved editions may also have contributed their share to the deterioration of the Seventy.”

He then raised the possibility of cross-contamination among the regional recensions:

Zwar herrschte jede nur in einem gewissen Lande: aber da es einmal Herkommens war, an den alten Uebersetzern immer zu flicken; wird nicht ein District aus den Handschriften des andern Lesarten, Besserungen und Verschlimmerungen geborgt haben?

Translation: “Each, it is true, prevailed only in a particular country; but once it had become customary continually to patch the ancient translators, would not one district have borrowed from the manuscripts of another readings, improvements, and deteriorations?”

Eichhorn therefore suggested that the recensions could influence one another through the borrowing of readings.

The Septuagint Text Required Reconstruction

Eichhorn proposed reconstructing earlier stages of the Greek text in chronological order:

Zuerst müßte man den antehexaplarischen, und dann den hexaplarischen Text wieder herzustellen suchen, um die von Zeit zu Zeit entstandenen Verwirrungen chronologisch übersehen zu können.

Translation: “First one would have to attempt to restore the pre-Hexaplaric text, and then the Hexaplaric text, in order to survey chronologically the confusions that arose from time to time.”

He recommended comparing quotations in Philo, Josephus, and the Church Fathers with Greek manuscripts, scholia, catenae, fragments of other Greek translations, and ancient translations made from the Septuagint.

He also assigned a role to conjectural criticism:

Endlich würde der Scharfsinn der Conjecturalkritik auch versuchen müssen, wie viel er vermöge, Glossen und eingeschlichene Fragmente andrer Uebersetzer aus dem Text der Septuaginta zu entfernen.

Translation: “Finally, the acumen of conjectural criticism would also have to attempt, as far as it was able, to remove glosses and intrusive fragments of other translators from the text of the Septuagint.”

Eichhorn thus regarded the transmitted Greek text as requiring critical reconstruction to distinguish earlier Septuagint readings from subsequent additions and alterations.

Assessment

Eichhorn presents the Septuagint as a text subjected to successive stages of corruption and revision. He describes it as “miserably disfigured” before Origen and in a “most lamentable condition” by Origen’s time, followed by a “new corruption” as the Hexaplaric tradition introduced further confusion and material from other Greek translators entered the text.

He also identifies distinct regional recensions and argues that earlier textual forms had to be reconstructed critically. His testimony therefore directly opposes the conception of the Septuagint as a single Greek text continuously preserved in one uniform form.

Citation: Johann Gottfried Eichhorn, Einleitung in das Alte Testament, 4th ed., vol. 1 (Göttingen: Carl Eduard Rosenbusch, 1823), §§167, 173–174, 178–179.

52. Adam Clarke (1762–1832)

Adam Clarke was a British Methodist minister, theologian, and biblical commentator whose extensive Commentary and Critical Notes became one of the most influential English-language biblical commentaries of the nineteenth century. His examination of the Hebrew Scriptures and their ancient versions led him to identify additions, omissions, transpositions, translation errors, and alterations introduced during the transmission of the Septuagint.

Extensive Alterations in the Septuagint

In his Introduction to Proverbs, Clarke makes one of his strongest general statements concerning the Greek translation:

“But the Septuagint takes greater liberty with the sacred text than any of the rest: it often transposes, changes, and adds; and all these to a very considerable extent.”

He continues:

“This is the version which is quoted in the New Testament. Several of these additions, as well as the most important changes, the reader will find noticed in the following notes; but to mark them all would require a translation of almost the whole Greek text.”

Clarke therefore regarded the differences between the Hebrew text and the Septuagint of Proverbs as extensive rather than occasional.

Scribal Glosses Incorporated into the Greek Text

In the General Preface to his commentary, Clarke explains how marginal and interlinear explanations could enter the biblical text when later copyists failed to distinguish them from the original wording:

“Comments written in this way have given birth to multitudes of the various readings afforded by ancient manuscripts; for the notes of distinction being omitted or neglected, the gloss was often considered as an integral part of the text, and entered accordingly by succeeding copyists.”

He expressly applies this explanation to the Septuagint:

“In the Septuagint also, traces of this custom are easily discernible, and to this circumstance many of its various readings may be attributed.”

Clarke thus recognized textual change in the Septuagint through the incorporation of explanatory material during manuscript transmission.

Additions, Omissions, and Rearrangements in Proverbs

Clarke’s notes on Proverbs illustrate the departures he described in his introduction. At Proverbs 9:11 and 9:18, he records substantial additional material in the Greek version, and at Proverbs 18:22 an expansion concerning marriage and adultery absent from the corresponding Hebrew text.

In Proverbs 20 he notes that several verses are omitted from their expected position and other material relocated, raising the possibility that the arrangement arose through displacement of manuscript leaves. Elsewhere he records verses missing from certain Greek witnesses and distinguishes among different printed editions of the Septuagint, recognizing variation within the Greek tradition itself.

“This Ancient Version Is All Confusion”

Clarke also identified cases in which he believed the translators had misunderstood or mishandled the Hebrew.

At Job 39:13, he concludes that the translators had produced “a sentence without sense.”

In his sermon on Proverbs 30:4, he similarly writes:

“But in the commencement of this chapter, this ancient Version is all confusion.”

These criticisms concern the intelligibility and accuracy of particular Greek renderings rather than merely manuscript variation.

Additional Material in the Historical and Prophetic Books

Clarke records substantial differences outside Proverbs. At Judges 4:8, he identifies a “remarkable addition” to Barak’s speech, and at Joshua 24:30–33 he notes additional Greek material concerning Joshua and the subsequent history of Israel.

He also examines significant differences in the narrative of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17–18, where the surviving Greek witnesses themselves differ. Among the prophets, he discusses a suspected interpolation at Isaiah 5:30 and a substantial addition in Hosea 13:4.

Clarke’s judgments were not uniformly adverse to the Greek. In some cases he allowed that material preserved in the Septuagint might represent wording absent from the surviving Hebrew manuscripts.

Assessment

Clarke combines a broad judgment concerning substantial alteration in the Septuagint with specific examples of additions, omissions, transpositions, translation errors, and variation among Greek witnesses. He also attributes many variant readings to glosses incorporated by later copyists.

His testimony therefore presents the Septuagint known to him as neither textually uniform nor free from significant alteration, while still allowing that particular Greek readings could sometimes preserve valuable evidence.

Citation: Adam Clarke, The Holy Bible, Containing the Old and New Testaments, with a Commentary and Critical Notes, New York: G. Lane and C. B. Tippett, 1843–1846, vol. I, General Preface; vol. II, notes on Joshua 24:30–33, Judges 4:8, 1 Samuel 17:12–31 and 18:1–5; vol. III, notes on Job 39:13, Introduction to Proverbs, Proverbs 9:11, 9:18, 18:22, and 20:10–30; vol. IV, notes on Isaiah 5:30 and Hosea 13:4; Miscellaneous Works, vol. VI, Sermon XXVII, “The Prayer of Agur,” p. 267.

53. Thomas Hartwell Horne (1780–1862)

Thomas Hartwell Horne was an English biblical scholar and author of the widely used An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures. His examination of the Septuagint was principally historical and textual-critical. He documented differences among its manuscripts and printed editions, identified editorial alterations, and emphasized the need to distinguish the ancient Greek translation from changes introduced during its transmission.

The Different Printed Texts of the Septuagint

Horne distinguishes among the Complutensian, Aldine, Roman or Vatican, and Alexandrian editions of the Septuagint, showing that the printed Greek Old Testament existed in several distinct textual forms.

Concerning the Complutensian edition, he writes:

“The text of this edition was composed after several manuscripts which the editors neglected to describe; they have frequently been charged with having altered the Greek text, to make it harmonise with the Hebrew, or rather with the Vulgate version, and with having filled up the chasms in the Alexandrian or Septuagint version from other Greek [sources].”

Horne thus reports allegations that the Complutensian editors altered the Greek text to bring it into agreement with other textual authorities, without presenting the accusation as his own independently established conclusion.

Alterations in the Roman or Vatican Edition

Horne explains that the Roman or Sixtine edition, although based principally upon Codex Vaticanus, was not an exact reproduction of that manuscript. He reports that its editors:

“did not exclusively adhere to that MS., having changed both the orthography and readings whenever these appeared to them to be faulty.”

He also records that passages missing from the Vatican manuscript were supplied from other manuscripts.

The printed Roman edition therefore incorporated editorial decisions and supplementary material rather than reproducing a single ancient manuscript without alteration.

Deliberate Alterations in the London Edition of 1653

Horne gives an especially explicit account of the London edition of 1653:

“It professes to follow the Sixtine edition: but this is not the fact; the editors having altered and interpolated the text in several places, in order to bring it nearer to the Hebrew text and the modern versions. The errors of this edition have been retained.”

Horne thus identifies deliberate alterations and interpolations in a printed Septuagint edition, intended to bring the Greek into closer agreement with other textual authorities.

Corrections to the Alexandrian Text

Horne also discusses Grabe’s edition of the Alexandrian manuscript. Where the manuscript was considered sound, its readings were retained; but:

“where it was defective and incorrect”

passages were supplied and readings corrected from the Vatican and Complutensian editions, while readings regarded as erroneous were placed in the margin.

This was therefore an edited text rather than an unaltered reproduction of its principal manuscript.

Extensive Manuscript Variation

Horne’s account of the critical edition prepared by Robert Holmes and James Parsons illustrates the extent of variation among surviving Septuagint manuscripts. He reports that the editors collated 311 manuscripts and recorded their variant readings beneath the Greek text.

Such extensive collation was necessary because the manuscripts did not preserve an identical text and their readings had to be compared critically.

The Vatican and Alexandrian Manuscripts Represent Different Textual Traditions

Horne distinguishes between a manuscript’s proximity to Origen’s Hexaplaric recension and its possible preservation of the older Greek translation:

“If, however, that manuscript be most respectable which comes the nearest to Origen’s Hexaplar copy of the Septuagint Old Testament, the Alexandrian manuscript seems to claim that merit in preference to its rival [the Vaticanus]: but if it be thought a matter of superior honour to approach nearer the old Greek version, uncorrected by Origen, that merit seems to be due to the Vatican.”

Horne therefore recognizes that the principal Greek witnesses reflect different textual histories and that agreement with a later corrected text is not the same as proximity to the older translation.

“We Ought Not to Rely Implicitly on Any One Translation”

In discussing the proper use of ancient versions in biblical criticism, Horne warns:

“As, however, some of the ancient versions have been altered or interpolated in many places, great care must be taken to distinguish the modern amendments from the genuine text of the original ancient translator.”

He further states:

“As no version can be absolutely free from error, we ought not to rely implicitly on any one translation.”

These principles apply to the Septuagint along with other ancient versions: the surviving text must be critically examined and later alterations distinguished from the work of the original translator.

Assessment

Horne documents substantial textual diversity among Septuagint manuscripts and printed editions. He records editorial alteration in the Roman, Alexandrian, and London editions, extensive manuscript variation requiring large-scale collation, and different textual histories represented by the Vatican and Alexandrian witnesses.

His broader warning that ancient versions may be altered or interpolated reinforces the need to distinguish the original translation from later textual and editorial changes rather than treating any surviving Septuagint manuscript or edition as an unchanged representation of the ancient Greek text.

Citation: Thomas Hartwell Horne, An Introduction to the Critical Study and Knowledge of the Holy Scriptures, sections on the principal editions and manuscripts of the Septuagint and “On the Use and Application of Ancient Versions”; A Manual of Biblical Bibliography, sections on the Complutensian, Roman or Sixtine, Alexandrian, and London (1653) editions of the Septuagint, and the critical edition of Holmes and Parsons.

54. Edward Bouverie Pusey (1800–1882)

Edward Bouverie Pusey was an Anglican theologian and biblical scholar associated with the University of Oxford. In Daniel the Prophet (1864), he subjected the Old Greek translation of Daniel to detailed examination, accusing its translator not merely of misunderstanding the Hebrew but, in important passages, of deliberately altering the prophetic text.

Distortion of the Historical Prophecies

Pusey argues that the Greek translator repeatedly distorted the historical material contained in Daniel. Discussing the prophecies concerning the period preceding Antiochus Epiphanes, he writes:

“In the whole previous prophecy, from the successors of Cyrus to Antiochus Epiphanes, at every stage, in every step of every stage, he shews himself to be ignorant of the history.”

He observes that a literal translation would often have prevented these errors:

“A literal translation would, of course, have guided him aright, wherever there was no uncertainty of construction; but, on whatever ground, down to the time of Antiochus Epiphanes, he almost always distorts the facts, because he would not trust himself with a literal translation.”

Pusey further accuses the translator of adding historical material in some places and altering what stood before him in others:

“In this case, he added real facts to those foretold by Daniel, as, in other cases, he perverted the facts which lay before his eyes in the prophet.”

Deliberate Falsification of the Seventy Weeks

Pusey’s strongest criticism concerns the Greek translator’s treatment of Daniel 9. He maintains that the translator deliberately manipulated the chronology of the Seventy Weeks prophecy to make it apply to the period of Antiochus Epiphanes:

“In the prophecy of the 70 weeks, the translator again repeatedly falsifies the time, in order to make it fit in with that of Epiphanes.”

He explains how the translator altered the chronological terminology:

“Apparently, he meant the first date of ‘seventy weeks’ to be literal weeks, since he renders, as if Daniel himself were to see them; in his next numbers he supplied ‘years,’ capriciously effacing the word ‘weeks;’ and then, at the end, under the ‘week,’ ‘weeks,’ means again literal ‘weeks of days.’”

According to Pusey, these alterations changed the meaning of the prophecy:

“Thus he makes the later part of the prophecy a prophecy of the chequered but successful resistance to Antiochus, ending not in the destruction of the city and of the sanctuary, but in a second rebuilding of the city.”

He then explicitly accuses the translator of manipulating the text:

“And this he does, altering and transposing the words of the text as suited his purpose, repeating of the later time what belonged to the earlier, so that it has even been thought that we had a confusion of different translations.”

Pusey describes the resulting translation as a deliberate encouragement to resistance against Antiochus:

“He did, in effect, make his translation, what a modern school has accused the writer of making the book, a direct but fraudulent encouragement in the Maccabee struggle.”

His judgment is unequivocal:

“But he effected it by falsifying the text of the Prophet; whence the Church rejected his translation alone out of the LXX.”

He further contrasts the original purpose of Daniel with the altered Greek rendering:

“The book of Daniel, as written, was an encouragement to persevere under trial; as falsified, it became a stimulus to religious, which ended in becoming a political, resistance.”

Finally, he charges the translator with removing the Messianic significance of the prophecy:

“It is remarkable that, in the prophecy of the 70 weeks, it effaces the doctrine of the Messiah, teaching people, as far as its influence went, to look for nothing beyond the present.”

Assessment

Pusey’s criticism is directed specifically against the Old Greek translation of Daniel rather than the Septuagint as a whole. Within that scope, however, his testimony is exceptionally strong.

He accuses the translator of distorting historical facts, adding material, altering and transposing words, manipulating chronology, and ultimately “falsifying the text of the Prophet.” His testimony therefore provides explicit nineteenth-century evidence for extensive and, in Pusey’s judgment, deliberate alteration within an important portion of the Greek Old Testament.

Citation: Edward Bouverie Pusey, Daniel the Prophet: Nine Lectures, Delivered in the Divinity School of the University of Oxford, with Copious Notes (Oxford: John Henry and James Parker, 1864), discussion of the Old Greek translation of Daniel, particularly the historical prophecies and Daniel 9:24–27.

55. Frederick Field (1801–1885)

Frederick Field was an English biblical and patristic scholar whose principal contribution to Old Testament textual criticism was his monumental two-volume Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt (1875), an attempt to collect and reconstruct the surviving remains of Origen’s Hexapla. His work required him to distinguish the older Septuagint text from readings introduced through other Greek translations, Origen’s critical recension, and subsequent manuscript transmission.

Origen Found the Copies “Differing from One Another and Corrupt”

In his Prolegomena, Field describes Origen’s critical work against the background of an already disturbed Greek textual tradition. He cites Jerome’s description of the copies confronting Origen:

diversa inter se exemplaria reperiret, et vitiosa

Translation: “he found copies differing from one another and corrupt.”

Field explains that Origen attempted to address these differences by comparing the Septuagint with the Hebrew text and other Greek translations. He employed asterisks to identify material supplied where the Greek lacked corresponding Hebrew material and obeli to mark Greek material without a Hebrew counterpart.

The textual difficulties confronting Origen therefore included discrepancies among Greek copies as well as differences between the Greek and Hebrew texts.

Material from Other Greek Versions Entering the Septuagint

Field’s reconstruction documents how readings from Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and other Greek translators became associated with the Septuagint through Origen’s Hexaplaric work.

Origen introduced supplementary readings under critical signs intended to distinguish them from the older Greek text. During subsequent manuscript transmission, however, these signs were not always preserved. Material originally marked as supplementary could consequently enter later copies without any visible indication of its different origin.

Similarly, Greek passages marked by obeli because they lacked corresponding Hebrew material could remain in subsequent manuscripts after the identifying signs disappeared.

Field’s apparatus repeatedly distinguishes Septuagint readings from those derived from other translators or the Hexaplaric tradition, demonstrating the difficulty of determining whether a reading in a surviving Greek manuscript belongs to the older translation or entered through subsequent correction and supplementation.

Different Recensions of the Greek Old Testament

Field distinguishes the Hexaplaric form of the Septuagint from other textual recensions, including that associated with Lucian.

His reconstruction required comparison among Greek manuscripts, ancient versions, patristic citations, and especially the Syro-Hexaplaric version. These witnesses preserved evidence of different stages in the development and transmission of the Greek Old Testament.

The existence of distinguishable recensions, together with the incorporation of readings from other Greek translators, meant that the surviving manuscript tradition could not be treated as a single uniform textual form.

The Loss of Origen’s Critical Distinctions

A central difficulty addressed by Field was the imperfect preservation of the critical signs used in Origen’s Hexaplaric recension.

The disappearance, displacement, or misunderstanding of asterisks and obeli obscured distinctions between the older Septuagint text and material added or marked during Origen’s editorial work. Passages originally accompanied by signs identifying their textual status could subsequently appear as ordinary portions of the Greek biblical text.

Field’s reconstruction therefore involved recovering distinctions that had become obscured during manuscript transmission.

Assessment

Field’s importance lies chiefly in his reconstruction of the textual history of the Greek Old Testament rather than in general criticism of the original Septuagint translators. His work documents a tradition in which Greek copies already differed and were described as corrupt before Origen, readings from other Greek translators entered the Hexaplaric tradition, critical signs were imperfectly preserved, and different recensions circulated afterward.

His Hexapla therefore provides substantial nineteenth-century evidence that the surviving Greek Old Testament cannot simply be identified with one fixed and continuously preserved Septuagint text. Recovering its earlier forms requires distinguishing among different translators, recensions, editorial corrections, and later manuscript alterations.

Citation: Frederick Field, Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt; sive Veterum Interpretum Graecorum in totum Vetus Testamentum Fragmenta, 2 vols. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1875), vol. I, Prolegomena, discussion of Origen’s critical recension, the asterisks and obeli, and the transmission of Hexaplaric readings; vols. I–II, critical apparatus documenting readings of Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion, and other Greek translators.

56. Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg (1802–1869)

Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg was a German Lutheran theologian and professor at the University of Berlin. A prominent defender of the authority and integrity of the Old Testament, he made extensive use of the Septuagint but strongly criticized the negligence, ignorance, and arbitrary alterations that he believed characterized the work of its translators.

Negligence, Ignorance, and Arbitrariness of the Septuagint Translators

In his Christology of the Old Testament, Hengstenberg discusses Jeremiah 33:14–26, a substantial passage absent from the Septuagint. Some critics maintained that this omission indicated that the passage had not existed in the Hebrew text used by the Greek translators. Hengstenberg rejects that conclusion:

“Proceeding upon the altogether gratuitous assumption of a double recension of the prophecies of Jeremiah, people imagine that, by the omission in the Alexandrian version, they are entitled to suppose that, in that recension which the LXX. followed, this section was not contained. But the arguments are most unsatisfactory, by which the attempt is made to establish that many portions, not translated by the LXX., were not found by them in their manuscripts.”

He then gives his general assessment of the translators:

“Where there notoriously prevail negligence, ignorance, arbitrariness, entire want of a clear conception of the task of a translator, those inferences are out of place which suppose just the opposite of all these.”

Hengstenberg argues that inability to identify the reason for a particular omission does not establish that the omitted material was absent from the Hebrew:

“Although we cannot sometimes discover and state the reason which induced the LXX. to make any omission, in case that that which was omitted was really in the text, what is it that is thereby proved? Could we, a priori, expect anything else, since we are on the territory of accident and whim?”

He further emphasizes that such omissions and alterations were not isolated:

“It is quite sufficient that in a multitude of passages we can point out the most insufficient reasons which induced them to make omissions, alterations, transpositions; for it is just these which show that we are in the territory of accident and whim, where it is unreasonable every where to expect reasons.”

Omissions Caused by Failure to Understand the Text

Hengstenberg proposes that the omission of Jeremiah 33:14–26 arose partly from the translators’ failure to appreciate the significance of material repeated elsewhere in Jeremiah:

“It is certain that the LXX. often omitted that which had occurred previously, because they were unable to perceive the deeper meaning of the repetition, and transferred their own ignorance to the Prophet.”

He also argues that the distinctive promise contained in the passage would have been objectionable to translators unable to understand its prophetic significance:

“In that which was peculiar to the passage before us, it was just the principal thought … which must have been most objectionable to the LXX., who were incapable of perceiving the deeper meaning.”

He concludes:

“The omission in the Alexandrian version, therefore, does not prove any thing, except that even 2000 years before J. D. Michaelis, Jahn, Hitzig, and Movers, there were men who were as little able to understand the text as these expositors.”

Assessment

Hengstenberg did not reject the Septuagint indiscriminately and elsewhere sometimes defended its renderings. Nevertheless, he explicitly characterized its translators as displaying “negligence, ignorance, arbitrariness” and maintained that “a multitude of passages” exhibited omissions, alterations, and transpositions made for inadequate reasons.

He therefore rejected the assumption that omissions in the Septuagint necessarily reflected a different Hebrew text. In his judgment, the translators’ demonstrated freedom in handling their source, including omissions arising from misunderstanding or arbitrary decisions, made such conclusions unreliable without further evidence.

Citation: Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg, Christology of the Old Testament, and a Commentary on the Messianic Predictions, 2nd ed., trans. Theodore Meyer, vol. II (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1861), pp. 460–462.

57. Samuel Davidson (1806–1898)

Samuel Davidson was an Irish biblical scholar and textual critic who taught biblical literature at Lancashire Independent College. He devoted considerable attention to the textual history of the Old Testament, including the character, accuracy, and critical value of its ancient translations.

“The Version Considered as a Whole Is by No Means Good”

In The Text of the Old Testament Considered (1856), Davidson examines the origin, character, and critical value of the Septuagint. After discussing differences in the quality of its individual books and translators, he gives this general judgment:

“The version considered as a whole is by no means good.”

He explains:

“With an aiming at literality there is much arbitrary procedure by virtue of which tropical expressions are changed, anthropomorphic resolved into unfigurative ones, objectionable words and ideas avoided. Much is brought into the text by way of explanation, much is left out. Transpositions are not unfrequent.”

Davidson thus identifies explanatory additions, omissions, transpositions, and alterations of figurative or otherwise objectionable expressions.

Freedom in the Treatment of the Text

Davidson further characterizes the Septuagint translators as exercising:

“more subjectivity and freedom in the treatment of the text than Palestinians would have exhibited—such latitude as is quite consonant with the Alexandrine spirit.”

His criticism therefore concerns not merely isolated mistakes but the translators’ general freedom in modifying, supplementing, and omitting material.

Assessment

Davidson’s judgment is both explicit and general. He concludes that “the version considered as a whole is by no means good” and identifies arbitrary alterations, explanatory additions, omissions, transpositions, and substantial freedom in the translators’ handling of their text.

His criticism concerns principally the character of the original translation rather than later manuscript corruption. He therefore provides clear nineteenth-century testimony against treating the Septuagint as a consistently faithful representation of the Hebrew Old Testament, while recognizing differences in quality among its individual books and translators.

Citation: Samuel Davidson, The Text of the Old Testament Considered, with a Treatise on Sacred Interpretation, and a Brief Introduction to the Old Testament Books and the Apocrypha (London: Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, & Roberts, 1856), pp. 50–52.

58. Carl Friedrich Keil (1807–1888)

Carl Friedrich Keil was a German Lutheran theologian and biblical commentator, best known for his extensive Old Testament commentaries, many published in association with Franz Delitzsch. Although he frequently consulted the Septuagint, he strongly criticized its departures from the Hebrew text, attributing many to scribal corruption, misunderstanding, and arbitrary alterations introduced by the translators themselves.

Numerous Departures from the Hebrew Text

In his Manual of Historico-Critical Introduction to the Canonical Scriptures of the Old Testament, Keil gives a general assessment of the Septuagint’s differences from the Hebrew:

“The numerous and strongly marked deviations from the Massoretic text have arisen partly at a later time, out of the carelessness and caprice of transcribers. But in so far as they existed originally, almost in a mass they are explained by the uncritical and wanton passion for emendation, which led the translators to alter the original text (by omissions, additions, and transpositions) where they did not understand it, either from their own defective knowledge of the language, or from its having been already corrupted, or where they regarded it as unsuitable or offensive in a historical, chronological, dogmatic, or other respect.”

Keil thus distinguishes later scribal alterations from changes originating with the translators themselves, which he attributes to misunderstanding, arbitrary correction, and deliberate modification.

The Unreliability of the Septuagint of Jeremiah

Keil considers the Septuagint of Jeremiah particularly unreliable as evidence for a supposedly different Hebrew recension. He writes:

“Still greater are the discrepancies in detail; and they are of such a sort as to bring plainly out on all hands the translator’s arbitrariness, carelessness, and want of apprehension.”

He continues:

“All but innumerable are the cases in which gender, number, person, and tense are altered, synonymous expressions interchanged, metaphors destroyed, words transposed; we find frequently inexact and false translations, erroneous reading of the unpointed text, and occasionally, when the Hebrew word was not understood, we have it simply transcribed in Greek letters, etc.”

Keil consequently rejects the inference that these differences necessarily establish a distinct Hebrew recension:

“Such being the character of the Alexandrine version, it is clearly out of the question to talk of the special recension on which it has been based.”

His criticism therefore extends beyond differences in length or arrangement to numerous errors and alterations in the translation itself.

Arbitrary Omissions and Additions in First Samuel

The Vatican Septuagint omits substantial portions of 1 Samuel 17–18. Some critics regarded these omissions as evidence that the corresponding Hebrew passages were later interpolations. Keil rejects this argument:

“But the notion, that the sections in question are interpolations that have crept into the text, cannot be sustained on the mere authority of the Septuagint version; since the arbitrary manner in which the translators of this version made omissions or additions at pleasure is obvious to any one.”

His original German statement is equally emphatic:

Die Meinung, daß die fraglichen Abschnitte durch Interpolationen in den Text gekommen seien, hat an dem Fehlen derselben in der Alex. Version keine haltbare Stütze, da die Willkür dieser Uebersetzer in Weglassungen und Zusätzen nach subjectivem Gutdünken offen zu Tage liegt.

Translation: “The opinion that the sections in question entered the text through interpolations has no tenable support in their absence from the Alexandrian version, since the arbitrariness of these translators in omissions and additions according to subjective judgment lies plainly open to view.”

Keil therefore regards the absence of material from the Septuagint as insufficient by itself to establish interpolation in the Hebrew text.

Arbitrary Alterations in First Kings

Discussing the differences between the Hebrew and Septuagint accounts of Hadad and Rezon in 1 Kings 11, Keil concludes:

“Consequently all the alterations of the LXX. in this section are simply the result of an arbitrary treatment of the Hebrew text, which they did not really understand.”

Keil attributes the differences to misunderstanding of the Hebrew narrative, resulting in rearrangements, alterations, and interpolations.

Assessment

Keil attributes Septuagintal departures from the Hebrew both to later “carelessness and caprice” among copyists and to the translators’ own “uncritical and wanton passion for emendation.” His discussion of Jeremiah identifies widespread grammatical alterations, transpositions, destroyed metaphors, and inaccurate translations, while his treatment of Samuel and Kings charges the translators with arbitrary omissions, additions, and alterations.

Although Keil sometimes accepted Septuagint readings when he believed they preserved evidence of an error in the transmitted Hebrew, he rejected the assumption that Greek differences or omissions necessarily reflected an older or superior Hebrew text. His testimony therefore bears upon both the character of the original translation and the subsequent transmission of the Septuagint.

Citation: Carl Friedrich Keil, Manual of Historico-Critical Introduction to the Canonical Scriptures of the Old Testament, trans. George C. M. Douglas, vol. II, p. 306; The Prophecies of Jeremiah, Introduction; Biblical Commentary on the Books of Samuel, commentary on 1 Samuel 17; Biblischer Commentar über die Bücher Samuels, 2nd ed. (Leipzig, 1875), p. 141 n.; The Books of the Kings, commentary on 1 Kings 11:14–25.

59. Joseph Addison Alexander (1809–1860)

Joseph Addison Alexander was an American Presbyterian theologian, biblical scholar, and professor at Princeton Theological Seminary. He wrote extensively on biblical interpretation and textual criticism. Although he valued the Septuagint as an important ancient translation, he rejected claims that it possessed inspiration or authority equal or superior to the Hebrew Old Testament and identified serious defects in its translation and transmission.

The Corruption and Preservation of Ancient Versions

In his 1850 review of Edward Grinfield’s Apology for the Septuagint, Alexander addressed the argument that the Septuagint preserved a purer Old Testament text than the existing Hebrew. He maintained that any version proposed as superior to its original would first have to meet demanding requirements:

“In opposition to this new view of the matter it was afterwards unanswerably argued, that in order to entitle any version to the preference above even a corrupted original, it must be proved to have been made before the alleged corruption, with strict correctness and fidelity, and to have been itself preserved from all corruption; requisitions which can never be complied with by this or any other ancient version. Whatever reasons, therefore, may exist for considering the Hebrew text corrupt, the very same reasons must forbid the substitution of a version for it.”

He further stated:

“we have every reason to believe, that the Hebrew text has undergone less change than that of any ancient version, preserved in the ordinary way, without that extreme and almost superstitious scrupulosity, with which the Jews are known for ages past to have watched over their original scriptures.”

Alexander also described the position of scholars who continued to respect the Septuagint while recognizing subsequent corruption of its text:

“those who admitted the validity and force of the reasons just recited, but still cherished a traditional respect for the most ancient and most highly honoured of all versions, were obliged to harmonize their views on both points by maintaining that the Septuagint, although at first a perfect or at least a masterly translation, had itself been corrupted by the lapse of time, and was only entitled to consideration so far as it could be shown to have escaped this alterative process.”

Alexander presents this last position as one adopted by earlier scholars rather than as an assertion that the original Septuagint was necessarily perfect.

Against the Septuagint Superseding the Hebrew

Alexander traced the historical elevation of the Septuagint to an authority that, in some Christian traditions, displaced the Hebrew Old Testament:

“the Septuagint became established in the Greek Church, either in theory or practice, as the very word of God, to the virtual if not the nominal exclusion of the Hebrew text.”

He later characterized this position as:

“the error of the Fathers who regarded the Septuagint version as a second revelation, by which the first had been legitimately superseded”

Alexander nevertheless rejected the opposite extreme of treating the Septuagint as an “impious abomination.” His objection was not to the existence or legitimate use of the Greek translation, but to assigning it an authority that superseded the Hebrew original.

Irreconcilable Discrepancies Between the Hebrew and Greek

Alexander’s most direct objection to Grinfield’s theory that the Hebrew and Greek texts possessed coordinate inspiration was the existence of substantial disagreements between them:

“If, on the other hand, he really believes, that the Hebrew and Greek texts are co-ordinate parts of the inspired canon, how can he account for the irreconcileable discrepancies between them? That such discrepancies exist is as notorious to all who have compared them, as that Greek and Hebrew are written in opposite directions. If their existence is accounted for by assuming a corruption of the text, on which side are we to assume it? Why should the inspired original be suffered to become corrupt any more than the inspired version? Or why should a version be inspired and then abandoned to corruption, so as to defeat its very purpose? And if either is essentially corrupted, what assurance have we that the other is not?”

He concluded that Grinfield’s hypothesis was:

“of all conceivable hypotheses, in reference to the mutual relation of the Greek and Hebrew text of the Old Testament, this is the most improbable a priori, as well as the most destitute of proof a posteriori; the most irrational in theory, as well as the most inconvenient, useless, and unsafe in practice.”

The Unequal Quality of the Septuagint Books

Alexander recognized substantial differences in the quality of the books comprising the Septuagint. In his lectures on New Testament literature, he singled out the Greek translation of Daniel:

“the lowest place is unanimously given to the book of Daniel, which is so defective or absurd, that another version (that of Theodotion) was early substituted for it in the copies of the Septuagint version.”

This identifies a particularly serious instance of defective translation, sufficiently notorious that another Greek version came to replace it in the commonly transmitted Septuagint text.

An Inexact Septuagint Rendering Quoted in the New Testament

Commenting on Psalm 8:5, Alexander distinguished the New Testament’s use of a Septuagint rendering from an endorsement of its exactness:

“Hence it is sometimes rendered angels in the Septuagint, which version, although inexact, is retained in the New Testament (Heb. 2:7), because it sufficiently expresses the idea which was essential to the writer’s argument.”

He nevertheless affirmed that:

“the application of the words in Heb. 2:7, is entirely legitimate”

Alexander thus regarded the Septuagint rendering as inexact while maintaining that its New Testament use was legitimate for the apostolic argument.

A Christian Interpolation in the Septuagint Psalter

At Psalm 14:3, Alexander identified an interpolation in the transmitted Septuagint text. Explaining that Paul’s description of human depravity in Romans 3 draws upon several Old Testament passages, he wrote:

“Under the false impression that he meant to quote a single passage, some early Christian copyist appears to have introduced the whole into the Septuagint version of this psalm, where it is still found in the Codex Vaticanus, as well as in the Vulgate, and even in one or two Hebrew manuscripts of later date. The interpolation is also retained in the Anglican Psalter. It is evident, however, that the apostle’s argument is strengthened by the fact of his proofs being drawn, not from one, but several parts of the Old Testament.”

This concerns corruption introduced during manuscript transmission rather than an error committed by the original Greek translator.

The Proper Use of the Septuagint

Despite these criticisms, Alexander considered the Septuagint valuable as an ancient textual and interpretive witness:

“In the first place, it is an important aid in determining the text of the Old Testament [though often misapplied in this way], by showing how these old translators read it. In the next place, it affords assistance in determining the sense, by showing how these old translators understood it. In other words, it is, when properly employed, a help both in Criticism and Interpretation.”

He also recognized its importance for understanding New Testament quotations:

“These quotations, which occupy a larger space than careless readers may imagine, are sometimes made directly from the Hebrew by original translation, but more frequently borrowed from the Septuagint version, as the one in common use, with or without modification.”

Alexander therefore distinguished the legitimate historical and interpretive use of the Septuagint from claims that it possessed independent inspiration or authority superior to the Hebrew original.

Assessment

Alexander rejected the elevation of the Septuagint to the status of an independently inspired or superior Old Testament text and emphasized that no ancient version could simply be assumed to have been both perfectly translated and preserved without corruption.

He also identified specific defects: “irreconcileable discrepancies” between the Hebrew and Greek, the severely defective Old Greek Daniel, an inexact rendering of Psalm 8:5, and an interpolation in the Greek Psalter attributed to an early Christian copyist. At the same time, he valued the Septuagint as an important witness for textual criticism, interpretation, and New Testament quotation. His testimony therefore distinguishes its legitimate critical use from claims of uniform accuracy, superior authority, or incorrupt preservation.

Citation: Joseph Addison Alexander, “An Apology for the Septuagint,” Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review 22 (1850), pp. 547–550, 555–556; Notes on New Testament Literature and Ecclesiastical History, ed. H. C. Alexander (New York: Charles Scribner, 1861), §§ 99, 106, 108; The Psalms Translated and Explained, vol. I (New York: Baker and Scribner, 1850), commentary on Psalms 8:5 and 14:3.

60. John William Burgon (1813–1888)

John William Burgon was an Anglican clergyman, biblical scholar, and textual critic known for his defense of the traditional Greek text of the New Testament. His writings contain both a general criticism of the Septuagint and a detailed argument concerning alterations in its transmitted text.

“Licentious Handling” Characteristic of the Septuagint

In The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, Burgon writes:

“The licentious handling so characteristic of the Septuagint Version of the O. T.,—the work of Alexandrian Jews,—points in the same direction, and leads me to suspect that Alexandria was the final source of the text of B-א.”

Burgon thus regarded “licentious handling” as characteristic of the Septuagint and cited it among his reasons for suspecting an Alexandrian origin for the textual tradition represented by Codices Vaticanus and Sinaiticus.

Isaiah 29:13 — An Earlier, Shorter Septuagint Text

In The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, Burgon argues that the Septuagintal form of Isaiah 29:13 known in the Apostolic age was shorter than the fuller form subsequently transmitted:

“The established Septuagintal rendering of Isa. xxix. 13 in the Apostolic age proves to have been this,—Ἐγγίζει μοι ὁ λαὸς οὗτος τοῖς χείλεσιν αὐτῶν τιμῶσί με: the words ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν, καὶ ἐν being omitted. This is certain. Justin Martyr and Cyril of Alexandria in two places so quote the passage.”

Burgon further appeals to an ancient commentary and manuscript evidence:

“Procopius Gazaeus in his Commentary on Origen’s Hexapla of Isaiah says expressly that the six words in question were introduced into the text of the Septuagint by Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. Accordingly they are often observed to be absent from MSS. They are not found, for example, in the Codex Alexandrinus.”

The attribution to Procopius is Burgon’s own and has not been independently established from the surviving commentary. His argument also rests upon quotations in ancient Christian writers and the manuscript evidence he cites.

Ancient Quotations and Burgon’s Conclusion

Burgon observes that the opening words of the passage were also omitted in quotations by several ancient Christian writers, including the author of the Second Epistle attributed to Clement of Rome, Clement of Alexandria, Chrysostom, and Theodoret.

He summarizes:

“Two facts have thus emerged, which entirely change the aspect of the problem: the first, (a) That the words ἐν τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν, καὶ ἐν, were anciently absent from the Septuagintal rendering of Isaiah xxix. 13: the second, (b) that the place of Isaiah was freely quoted by the ancients without the initial words ἐγγίζει μοι.”

He further rejects the suggestion that the shorter Greek reading arose through abbreviation of an originally fuller text:

“It has been shewn in answer to the learned critic that in the ancient Greek text of the prophet the ‘amplification’ he speaks of did not exist: it was the abbreviated text which was found there.”

Burgon applies this conclusion to the textual variation in Matthew 15:8:

“The essential point is that the omission from St. Matthew xv. 8 of the words τῷ στόματι αὐτῶν, καὶ, is certainly due in the first instance to the ascertained Septuagint omission of those very words in Isaiah xxix. 13.”

He therefore distinguishes between an earlier Septuagintal form of Isaiah and the fuller form represented by other witnesses, while arguing that the earlier form influenced the transmission of the New Testament.

The Antiquity of Textual Corruption

Burgon acknowledges that numerous early Christian writers and ancient versions support the New Testament reading he considers corrupt. He regards this as evidence of the antiquity of the alteration:

“But this does but prove at how extremely remote a period the corruption must have begun. It probably dates from the first century.”

He warns against placing excessive confidence in the oldest surviving authorities when their readings conflict with the larger body of manuscript evidence:

“Especially does it seem to shew how distrustful we should be of our oldest authorities when, as here, they are plainly at variance with the whole torrent of manuscript authority. This is indeed no ordinary case. There are elements of distrust here, such as are not commonly encountered.”

These observations concern the transmission of Matthew 15:8 rather than an additional corruption of the Septuagint. Their relevance lies in Burgon’s argument that an early Greek Old Testament reading influenced the subsequent transmission of the Gospel text.

Assessment

Burgon explicitly describes “licentious handling” as characteristic of the Septuagint. His examination of Isaiah 29:13 further demonstrates his conviction that different forms of the Greek Old Testament circulated, with ancient quotations and manuscripts preserving evidence of a shorter earlier reading than that found in other witnesses.

His testimony therefore supports a distinction between the ancient Septuagintal text and the varying forms in which its readings were subsequently transmitted, while his discussion of Matthew 15:8 illustrates how an early Greek Old Testament reading could also influence New Testament textual transmission.

Citation: John William Burgon, The Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, arranged, completed, and edited by Edward Miller (London: George Bell and Sons, 1896), p. 235; The Causes of the Corruption of the Traditional Text of the Holy Gospels, arranged, completed, and edited by Edward Miller (London: George Bell and Sons, 1896), chap. X, § 5, pp. 141–144.

61. William Henry Green (1825–1900)

William Henry Green was an American Presbyterian theologian and professor of Old Testament literature at Princeton Theological Seminary. He defended the integrity and superior textual authority of the Hebrew Old Testament while recognizing the usefulness of ancient versions for textual criticism. His writings contain extensive criticisms of the Septuagint’s translation, textual alterations, manuscript corruption, and limitations as a witness to the original Scriptures.

The Hebrew “Immeasurably Superior” to the Septuagint

In an 1885 discussion of the divergent account of Jeroboam in the Septuagint, Green expressed his judgment of the relative textual value of the Hebrew and Greek:

“Conceiving, as I do, that the latter is immeasurably superior to the former in all respects, that the substantial correctness of the Hebrew Scriptures is incapable of being impeached, while the Septuagint shows numerous and evident marks of arbitrary alterations, I have not the slightest hesitation in believing that the true original narrative is that which is found in our ordinary Bibles, and that the account in the Septuagint is a garbled modification of it.”

He added:

“The alterations and transpositions, for the sake of removing imaginary incongruities in the sacred text, find very frequent parallels in the course of that version.”

“Numerous Instances of Mistranslation”

In General Introduction to the Old Testament: The Text (1899), Green emphasized that the Septuagint was not a single translation produced with uniform competence or fidelity:

“The rest of the books of the Old Testament were translated subsequently at different times and by different hands. . . . The different books indicate a great diversity in the character and ability of the translators. The Pentateuch, particularly in Leviticus and Deuteronomy, is the best for general fidelity. The version of Daniel was so incorrect that it was in ecclesiastical usage laid aside, and another version by Theodotion substituted in its place. Ecclesiastes is slavishly literal, to the disregard of the plainest rules of Greek construction. In Jeremiah and Proverbs especially, and sometimes elsewhere, verses, and even whole chapters are transposed from their proper order.”

Green explained the freedom with which the translators sometimes handled the Hebrew:

“The liberties which the translators allowed themselves with the text are best explained by remembering the purpose which they had in view. This was not to make a scholarly version with the rigorous accuracy that would be demanded in modern times, but to make the meaning intelligible to plain and ordinary hearers and readers. Hence they are more concerned to reproduce the sense than the form.”

He also identified errors and deliberate numerical alterations:

“There are also numerous instances of mistranslation due to ignorance or negligence, or perhaps inaccuracies or defacements of the manuscript used by the translator. One very remarkable variation between the LXX. and the Hebrew is the systematic alteration of the ages of the patriarchs in Gen. v. and xi.”

Every Manuscript Had “a Distinct Text”

Green distinguished deficiencies of the original translation from corruption introduced during subsequent transmission:

“In the course of repeated transcription the text of the Septuagint suffered greatly, until in the early part of the third century Origen complains that every different manuscript contained a distinct text. To remedy this evil . . . he undertook the labor of removing the discrepancies in the copies of the Septuagint.”

He explained that Origen was not simply attempting to recover the original Greek translation:

“The aim of Origen in this work was not so much critical as exegetical and polemic. His purpose was not to bring the text of the Septuagint back to its pristine state, but to make it adequately represent the original.”

Nor did subsequent revisions establish a uniform text:

“These labors certainly did not result in establishing a uniform text; on the contrary, they seriously increased the divergence already existing. Jerome complains of great diversity in the copies and corruption in the text in his day. And the errors which have since arisen in the course of transcription during so many centuries have immensely aggravated the difficulty.”

Septuagint Divergences “More Naturally Explicable” by the Translators

Green addressed the contention that divergences between the Septuagint and the received Hebrew might reflect a different Hebrew textual tradition:

“It is of course quite possible that there may have been very inaccurate and carelessly written copies of the Old Testament Scriptures, and that these may have gained considerable circulation particularly among Egyptian Jews and others outside of the Holy Land, and may have been used by the Septuagint translators. But if this were so, it would not warrant the inference that there was no settled and authorized Hebrew text at the time, and no standard copies in which it was to be found, and from which it was transmitted. Reverence for the Scriptures and regard for the purity of the sacred text did not first originate after the fall of Jerusalem.”

He argued that many divergences were more naturally explained by the translators themselves:

“On the other hand, these divergences are as easily and more naturally explicable if attributed to the translators than to copyists of the original. The same causes which lead to a modification of the text in transcription would be operative in a translation in an aggravated form. A freedom might be used in rendering the Scriptures into another language which would not be thought of in transcribing the original. A measure of discretion must be allowed in a translator for which a copyist has no occasion, and which would not be permissible in him. And in this first attempt at making a work of such magnitude intelligible to those of a different tongue, no such rigorous rendering could be expected as would be demanded from a modern translator. The sacredness and authority of the original would not attach to an uninspired version. Accordingly, accurate precision was not aimed at so much as conveying the general sense, and in this the translators allowed themselves a large measure of liberty. When to this is added an imperfect knowledge of Hebrew, conjectural renderings or paraphrases of words and passages not understood, slips arising from want of care and the like, it is easy to understand how the general correctness of the Septuagint might consist with very considerable deviations from the original text.”

“A Figment Unsupported by a Particle of Evidence”

Green had made a similar argument in his earlier study, “The Text of Jeremiah” (1860). Rejecting the hypothesis that the distinctive features of the Greek Jeremiah reflected a separate Egyptian recension of the Hebrew text, he described the supposed recension as:

“a figment unsupported by a particle of evidence.”

He maintained that the differences were more naturally attributed to alterations made by the Greek translator. He also identified “many errors in translation” and observed that:

“some passages seem to be translated at random.”

The Hebrew “Vastly Superior” to the Septuagint

Green opposed the practice of freely correcting the Hebrew text on the authority of the Septuagint:

“Some critics still inordinately exalt the critical value of the Septuagint, and are disposed to make frequent changes in the Hebrew text on its authority. But there is a general agreement among careful scholars that, while this version is to be highly esteemed for its antiquity, and the general testimony which it renders to the integrity of the existing text, and the aid which it furnishes in the rendering of obscure and doubtful passages, the Massoretic text is on the whole vastly superior to it, and should not be corrected by it, except where there are stringent reasons for so doing; and that in the great majority of cases where a divergence exists, the presumption is strongly in favor of the correctness of the Hebrew and against the Septuagint. Neither the original character of the latter, nor the history of its preservation, nor the present state of its text entitles it to the precedence. Only in cases where there are independent reasons for suspecting the accuracy of the Hebrew, can emendations by the Septuagint be reasonably admitted.”

The “Superior Accuracy of the Hebrew Text”

Green applied his principles to the numerical differences in Genesis 5 and 11. In “Primeval Chronology” (1890), he argued that the systematic character of the differences indicated deliberate alteration in the Septuagint:

“The Septuagint proceeds on the assumption that patriarchs of such enormous longevity should be nearly two centuries old at the birth of their son. Accordingly, when, in the Hebrew, they fall much below this standard, one hundred years are added to the number preceding the birth of the son and the same amount deducted from the number following his birth; the total length of each life is thus preserved without change, the proportion of its different parts alone being altered.”

After comparing the numerical systems, Green maintained “the superior accuracy of the Hebrew text in this instance, as well as generally elsewhere,” concluding that this superiority “can be incontrovertibly established.”

On the Septuagint: The Apostles “By No Means Sanction Its Inaccuracies”

Green denied that New Testament quotations from the Septuagint amounted to apostolic endorsement of its inaccuracies:

“In making use of the Septuagint, as the New Testament writers frequently do, they by no means sanction its inaccuracies of text or of translation, nor the spurious additions made to the canon, even if it be admitted that the apocryphal books were then already incorporated with this version, of which there is no certain proof.”

Rather:

“They employ its familiar words, so far as they are adapted to the purpose which they have in view, without pedantically correcting unessential departures from the Hebrew original which do not affect their argument or their line of remark.”

On the Hebrew: “No Other Work of Antiquity Has Been So Accurately Transmitted”

Green contrasted the history of Hebrew manuscripts with that of the Septuagint:

“The sum of the whole matter is this. The Hebrew manuscripts cannot compare with those of the New Testament either in antiquity or number, but they have been written with greater care and exhibit fewer various readings. In fact the various readings obtained from an extensive collation of the Hebrew manuscripts are of little importance, for they all represent substantially what is known as the Massoretic text.”

He compared the Hebrew with the ancient versions:

“The same is freshly confirmed by the Latin version of Jerome, the Syriac Peshito, the Jewish Targums and the Greek versions of the second century, all which agree substantially with the text as we possess it at present. Their deviations are of minor consequence, though affording material for its correction in some individual cases. The Septuagint in the third century B.C., and the Samaritan Pentateuch diverge from it much more widely; but neither of them offers a text that is now regarded by scholars as comparable in accuracy with the Hebrew. And their divergence, whether laid to the account of inaccurate Hebrew sources or to liberties taken by Greek translators and Samaritan copyists, does not prove that there was not at the same time an authorized and reliable text represented in standard copies. The Septuagint may be of service in correcting the Hebrew text in certain cases.”

Green did not claim that the received Hebrew text was entirely free from scribal errors. He acknowledged “some manifest errors,” but regarded their preservation as evidence of scribal fidelity:

“There are indeed some manifest errors which may in part be corrected by parallel passages; the rest must be left to critical conjecture. The retention of the former class, however, though the remedy was so close at hand, is a fresh evidence of that rigid adherence to the letter, which has so remarkably safeguarded the Old Testament. It may be safely said that no other work of antiquity has been so accurately transmitted.”

Assessment

Green distinguishes defects arising from the Septuagint translators from corruption introduced during later manuscript transmission. He regards the version as valuable for its antiquity and occasionally useful in textual criticism, but maintains that its liberties, mistranslations, deliberate alterations, and unstable textual history make it substantially inferior to the Hebrew.

He also rejects the assumption that Septuagintal differences necessarily demonstrate a competing authoritative Hebrew text. For Green, divergences could arise from translator freedom, imperfect understanding, conjectural rendering, scribal corruption, or deliberate alteration, while the Hebrew remained presumptively superior unless independent evidence justified correction.

Citation: William Henry Green, “The Text of Jeremiah,” Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review, vol. 32 (January 1860), pp. 69–89; “The Septuagint and Jeroboam,” The Sunday School Times, vol. 27, no. 25 (June 20, 1885); “Primeval Chronology,” Bibliotheca Sacra, vol. 47 (April 1890), pp. 285–303, especially pp. 300–303; General Introduction to the Old Testament: The Canon (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1898), p. 145; General Introduction to the Old Testament: The Text (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1899), pp. 87–88

62. Paul de Lagarde (1827–1891)

Paul de Lagarde was a German biblical scholar and orientalist whose work helped establish modern Septuagint textual criticism. A major objective of his research was to reconstruct the earliest recoverable text of the Greek Old Testament. He maintained that the surviving manuscripts represented a mixed and altered textual tradition rather than an unchanged preservation of the original Greek translation.

All Septuagint Manuscripts as the Result of an “Eclectic Process”

In Anmerkungen zur griechischen Übersetzung der Proverbien (1863), Lagarde formulated principles that became foundational to his Septuagint research. His first principle stated:

die manuscripte der griechischen übersetzung des alten testaments sind alle entweder unmittelbar oder mittelbar das resultat eines eklektischen verfahrens: darum muß, wer den echten text wiederfinden will, ebenfalls eklektiker sein.

Translation: “The manuscripts of the Greek translation of the Old Testament are all, either directly or indirectly, the result of an eclectic process; therefore whoever wishes to recover the genuine text must himself also be an eclectic.”

By an “eclectic process,” Lagarde meant the selection and combination of readings from different textual sources. He therefore regarded the surviving manuscripts as witnesses from which the genuine Greek text had to be reconstructed rather than as unchanged copies of that text.

Corruptions Originating within the Greek Text

Lagarde continued:

sein maaßstab kann nur die kenntniss des styles der einzelnen übersetzer, sein haupthilfsmittel muß die fähigkeit sein, die verschiedenen lesarten auf ihr semitisches original zurückzuführen oder sie als original-griechische verderbnisse zu erkennen.

Translation: “His standard can only be a knowledge of the style of the individual translators; his chief aid must be the ability to trace the various readings back to their Semitic original or to recognize them as corruptions originating within the Greek itself.”

Lagarde thus distinguished between readings traceable to the underlying Semitic text and corruptions arising within the Greek textual tradition.

The Septuagint Altered and Corrupted

Lagarde also explained how he believed the Greek Old Testament had undergone alteration:

die griechische übersetzung des alten testaments ist zuerst von den Judenchristen geändert worden, welche ihre ideen in dieselben hineintrugen; später wurde sie durch die vergleichung mit den jüngeren versionen verdorben.

Translation: “The Greek translation of the Old Testament was first altered by Jewish Christians, who introduced their ideas into it; later it was corrupted through comparison with the later versions.”

The later versions included those associated with Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. Lagarde believed that comparison with such translations introduced additional readings into the Septuagint tradition, further obscuring its original form.

Recovering the Original Septuagint Before Using It to Correct the Hebrew

Lagarde opposed using the transmitted Greek text indiscriminately as an authority against the Hebrew:

es versteht sich selbst heutzutage leider noch nicht von selbst, daß die LXX nur in ihrer ursprünglichen gestalt zur kritik unsrer masoretischen diaskeuase angewandt werden darf.

Translation: “Unfortunately, even today it is still not taken for granted that the LXX may be employed for criticism of our Masoretic recension only in its original form.”

He stated the necessary preliminary task:

wollen wir über den hebräischen text ins klare kommen, so gilt es zunächst die urform der griechischen übersetzung zu finden.

Translation: “If we wish to reach clarity concerning the Hebrew text, we must first recover the original form of the Greek translation.”

And he continued:

ehe diese vorliegt, darf die aegyptische recension nicht zur kontrolle der palästinischen benutzt werden.

Translation: “Until this has been obtained, the Egyptian recension must not be used to control the Palestinian.”

Lagarde did not reject the use of the Old Greek in Hebrew textual criticism. Rather, he insisted that its original form first had to be established.

The Multiple Recensions of the Septuagint

Lagarde devoted much of his subsequent work to reconstructing ancient recensions, or revised textual forms, of the Greek Old Testament. His program sought to recover these different forms separately and compare them in order to approach the original Greek translation.

This undertaking was developed in works including Ankündigung einer neuen Ausgabe der griechischen Übersetzung des Alten Testaments (1882), Librorum Veteris Testamenti canonicorum pars prior Graece (1883), and Septuaginta-Studien (1891–1892). His investigations of books preserved in substantially different Greek forms reinforced his conviction that the surviving manuscript tradition could not simply be identified with the original Septuagint.

Assessment

Lagarde’s testimony is particularly important because his work was devoted to reconstructing the Greek Old Testament itself. He maintained that all surviving Septuagint manuscripts were products of an eclectic process, that corruptions had arisen within the Greek tradition, and that later Greek versions had further affected its transmission.

Although he recognized the potential value of the Old Greek for Hebrew textual criticism, he insisted that the original form of the Greek translation first had to be recovered. His reconstruction program therefore rested upon a clear distinction between the original translation and the varied and altered forms in which it had subsequently been transmitted.

Citation: Paul de Lagarde, Anmerkungen zur griechischen Übersetzung der Proverbien (Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus, 1863), p. 2 and subsequent discussion; Ankündigung einer neuen Ausgabe der griechischen Übersetzung des Alten Testaments (1882); Librorum Veteris Testamenti canonicorum pars prior Graece (1883); Septuaginta-Studien (1891–1892).

63. Frederic William Farrar (1831–1903)

Frederic William Farrar was an English Anglican clergyman, biblical writer, and Dean of Canterbury. His numerous works on Scripture include History of Interpretation, The Bible: Its Meaning and Supremacy, and commentaries on Kings and Daniel. Although Farrar recognized the historical importance and textual value of the Septuagint, he also spoke plainly about its errors, alterations, additions, and textual variation.

A Translation “Abounding with Errors”

In History of Interpretation, Farrar criticizes the use made of the Septuagint by Alexandrian interpreters and describes it as:

“a translation abounding with errors”

Elsewhere in the same work he says that the Septuagint contains admitted errors arising from the theological bias of translators. His criticism therefore extends beyond accidental scribal corruption to interpretive and theological influences upon the translation itself.

Translators Who “Tamper with” the Original

Farrar gives a broader assessment in The Bible: Its Meaning and Supremacy. He emphasizes that the Septuagint was produced at different times and by different translators, without uniform execution or authoritative revision. He then states:

“In many places they have not understood the original; in others they tamper with it; in others they follow a text unknown to us.”

He therefore identifies several possible causes of divergence: misunderstanding, deliberate modification in translation, and readings derived from a Hebrew textual form different from the one subsequently transmitted.

“Additions and Variations” and the Corruption of Transcription

In his commentary on First Kings, Farrar writes that the Septuagint:

“presents many additions and variations in the Books of Kings.”

He also appeals to variations in the Septuagint and Samaritan Pentateuch as evidence of the ordinary effects of repeated copying:

“changes and corruptions which always arise in the course of constant transcriptions.”

Farrar illustrates this from Kings by noting changes of order, omissions, transpositions, and material found in some Greek witnesses but absent from others.

At the same time, he regarded some Septuagint variants as valuable evidence for recovering an earlier form of the Hebrew text. His criticism was therefore not a wholesale rejection of the Greek version.

The Septuagint Daniel

Farrar’s assessment of the Greek Daniel is particularly severe. He refers to:

“The badness of the Alexandrian version, and the apocryphal additions to it”

and notes that this Greek form was eventually displaced in Christian use by Theodotion’s version.

Earlier in the same work he argues that:

“the text of Daniel has not been very carefully kept”

and connects this conclusion with the liberties taken by the Septuagint translators. The Greek Daniel therefore supplied Farrar with a conspicuous example of substantial divergence between the Greek and Hebrew forms of a biblical book.

Assessment

Farrar describes the Septuagint as a translation “abounding with errors,” says that its translators sometimes misunderstood or “tamper with” the original, identifies numerous additions and variations in Kings, and acknowledges “changes and corruptions” arising through repeated transcription.

His position was nevertheless qualified rather than indiscriminately hostile. He recognized that Septuagint readings could sometimes preserve valuable evidence for an earlier Hebrew text. His testimony therefore supports the conclusion that the Greek Old Testament was neither uniformly translated nor textually untouched, but contains mistranslation, interpretive alteration, additions, omissions, divergent readings, and subsequent textual corruption.

Citation: Frederic William Farrar, History of Interpretation: Eight Lectures Preached before the University of Oxford in the Year MDCCCLXXXV (London: Macmillan and Co., 1886), Lecture III, especially pp. 116–125, 147; Farrar, The Bible: Its Meaning and Supremacy (London: Longmans, Green, and Co., 1897), pp. 109–112; Farrar, The Expositor’s Bible: The First Book of Kings (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1893), pp. 26–27; Farrar, The Expositor’s Bible: The Book of Daniel (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1895), pp. 16, 93.

64. Henry Barclay Swete (1835–1917)

Henry Barclay Swete was an Anglican theologian, Regius Professor of Divinity at Cambridge, and a leading Septuagint scholar. He edited the three-volume Old Testament in Greek According to the Septuagint and wrote An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek, a comprehensive examination of the Greek Old Testament’s origins, translation, manuscripts, and textual history. Although he regarded the Septuagint as an invaluable witness to the pre-Christian Old Testament, he also identified serious deficiencies in its translation and subsequent transmission.

The Septuagint as a Collection of Unequal Translations

Swete cautioned against treating the Septuagint as a single translation produced according to a uniform standard:

“Strictly speaking the Alexandrian Bible is not a single version, but a series of versions produced at various times and by translators whose ideals were not altogether alike.”

He emphasized the considerable differences in quality among the translations:

“The Pentateuch is on the whole a close and serviceable translation; the Psalms and more especially the Book of Isaiah shew obvious signs of incompetence.”

He added:

“The translator of Job was perhaps more familiar with Greek pagan literature than with Semitic poetry; the translator of Daniel indulges at times in a Midrashic paraphrase.”

A Large Number of Actual Blunders

After examining the translators’ methods and departures from the Hebrew, Swete warned:

“Lastly, the reader of the Septuagint must expect to find a large number of actual blunders, due in part perhaps to a faulty archetype, but chiefly to the misreading or misunderstanding of the archetype by the translators.”

He identified several causes of these errors:

“Letters or clauses have often been transposed; omissions occur which may be explained by homoioteleuton; still more frequently the translation has suffered through an insufficient knowledge of Hebrew or a failure to grasp the sense of the context.”

Homoioteleuton refers to an accidental omission caused when a copyist’s eye skips from one occurrence of a similar ending to another, leaving out the intervening text.

Swete consequently cautioned:

“It follows that the student must be constantly on his guard against errors which may easily result from too ready an acceptance of the evidence offered by the Alexandrian version.”

Using the Septuagint with Caution and Reserve

Swete nevertheless recognized the historical and textual importance of the Septuagint:

“Taken as a whole, and judged in the light of the circumstances under which it was produced, it is a monument of the piety, the skill, and the knowledge of the Egyptian Jews who lived under the Ptolemies, and it is an invaluable witness to the pre-Christian text of the Old Testament.”

But this favorable judgment did not remove the need for caution:

“But whether for textual or for hermeneutical purposes it must be used with caution and reserve, as the experience of the Ancient Church shews.”

“Textual Corruption Began Before the Christian Era”

Swete distinguished deficiencies in the original translations from corruption introduced during subsequent transmission. He concluded:

“it is certain that textual corruption began before the Christian era.”

He found evidence of this early corruption in the writings of Philo, indicating that alterations had entered the Greek textual tradition long before the production of the great surviving Christian manuscripts.

The Lack of a Uniform Septuagint Text

Swete’s examination of the Greek Old Testament’s textual history describes the effects of copying, correction, revision, and the development of different recensions, or revised textual forms. The resulting manuscript tradition contained readings from different stages of transmission rather than preserving a single unchanged Greek text.

His account therefore distinguishes the work of the original translators from subsequent textual alteration and from the various forms in which the Greek Old Testament circulated.

Assessment

Swete combined a high estimation of the Septuagint’s historical importance with explicit recognition of its defects. He regarded it not as one uniform translation but as a collection of versions of unequal quality, some displaying serious incompetence, mistranslation, transposition, and omission.

He warned that the Septuagint must be used “with caution and reserve” and concluded that textual corruption had begun before the Christian era. His testimony therefore distinguishes both deficiencies in the original translations and subsequent corruption of their transmitted text.

Citation: Henry Barclay Swete, An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek, 2nd ed., revised by Richard Rusden Ottley (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1914), pp. 314–315, 329–330, 478; see also the discussions of manuscripts, recensions, and textual history in the same work.

65. William Inchbold Phillips (1853–1934)

William Inchbold Phillips was an English Anglican clergyman. In 1918 he published The Septuagint Fallacy: An Indictment of Modern Criticism, a sustained argument against using differences between the Septuagint and the Hebrew text as evidence for reconstructing a different underlying Hebrew text. His case rests heavily upon what he regarded as serious defects both in the translation and in the transmitted Greek text itself.

“The Mistakes and Blunders of a Very Bad Translation”

Phillips rejects the inference that differences between the Septuagint and the Hebrew necessarily arose from a different Hebrew exemplar. He writes:

“these variations are actually nothing but the mistakes and blunders of a very bad translation”

and immediately describes the Septuagint as:

“the Greek translation (or rather ‘mistranslation’) of the Seventy”

Phillips therefore attributes many differences directly to the translators rather than to a different Hebrew text.

In developing the argument, he emphasizes the Septuagint’s unequal character, unintelligible renderings in some passages, amplifications, omissions, interpretive renderings, and transpositions. He concludes:

“the LXX is a very poor translation”

and says that its differences from the Hebrew:

“may only prove the badness of its translation and nothing more.”

For the textual-critical use he opposes, he describes it as:

“so untrustworthy as not to be worth troubling about at all.”

Origen Found the Septuagint “Corrupt”

Phillips also distinguishes defects of translation from corruption in the subsequent Greek tradition. In his account of Origen’s work he writes:

“He found LXX corrupt and tried to restore it to an agreement with the Hebrew text”

Phillips explains that Origen found clauses in the Greek absent from the Hebrew, omissions of material present in the Hebrew, and differences in order. He summarizes:

“In innumerable places the LXX was seen to yield a version more or less at variance with the current Hebrew through misapprehension of the translators.”

This is Phillips’s historical account of Origen rather than an independent description based upon manuscripts he had himself collated. It nevertheless forms part of his broader argument that the Greek tradition could not simply be treated as an intact and uniformly reliable representation of the original text.

“The Utterly Unreliable Nature of the LXX”

Near the conclusion of the book Phillips summarizes his own judgment:

“These variations, however, cannot be used as any argument, because of the utterly unreliable nature of the LXX as a translation.”

He attributes the variations largely to what he calls:

“the woeful incompetence of the translators”

and points to:

“paraphrases, lacunae, doublets, etc.”

as evidence of the difficulties involved.

Phillips’s point is not merely that the Septuagint contains occasional mistranslations, but that its character as a translation makes it unsafe to assume that differences from the Hebrew necessarily represent a different underlying Hebrew text.

“Its Own True Text Is Not Yet Determined”

Most important for the textual history of the Septuagint itself is Phillips’s judgment concerning the surviving Greek text. He writes:

“Its own true text is not yet determined, and perhaps may never be”

and adds that its:

“translations and emendations are often so hopeless as to be almost meaningless time after time.”

He consequently speaks of:

“the dubious LXX text itself”

and questions how extensive textual conclusions concerning the Hebrew can safely be based upon a Greek tradition whose own true text remained uncertain.

This statement goes beyond criticism of the original translators. Phillips expressly maintains that the genuine form of the Septuagint text available to modern scholars had not itself been securely determined.

Assessment

Phillips is one of the collection’s most openly critical twentieth-century witnesses. He calls the Septuagint a “mistranslation,” attributes many of its variations to the “mistakes and blunders of a very bad translation,” and describes it as “utterly unreliable” for the textual-critical use he opposes.

More importantly for the history of the transmitted Greek text, he states that its “own true text is not yet determined, and perhaps may never be,” and refers to “the dubious LXX text itself.” His testimony therefore addresses both the quality of the ancient translation and the uncertainty surrounding the form of the Greek text transmitted under its name.

Citation: William Inchbold Phillips, The Septuagint Fallacy: An Indictment of Modern Criticism (London: Robert Scott, 1918), pp. 37–47, 65–70.

66. Robert Dick Wilson (1856–1930)

Robert Dick Wilson was an American Presbyterian Old Testament scholar who taught at Princeton Theological Seminary and later Westminster Theological Seminary. He was known for his extensive study of ancient Near Eastern languages and his defense of the historical reliability and textual integrity of the Old Testament. In textual criticism, he maintained that the received Hebrew text should be the starting point and warned against assuming that differences in the Septuagint necessarily represented a superior Hebrew original.

The Hebrew Text Must Be the Starting Point

In “The Textual Criticism of the Old Testament” (1929), Wilson stated his fundamental principle:

“Since the Hebrew was undoubtedly the original (in all but a few chapters of Daniel and Ezra), the Textus Receptus is always to be taken as the starting-point of any investigation of the text of the Old Testament documents. It ought never to be changed when the evidence against it is not conclusive, or merely conjectural.”

He emphasized that differences in ancient versions must be examined before they can be attributed to a different original:

“We should always approach the study of any passage with the resolve to find out, if possible, if the apparent variation of the version is a real variation based on a different original; or if it may be due to the ignorance of the translator, or to his desire to improve, or comment upon, the text he is translating. And, further, we ought to consider whether, or not, the variation arises from a corruption in the text of the version itself.”

The Septuagint Was Produced by Different Translators

Wilson rejected the conception of the Septuagint as a single translation of uniform character:

“The most important of these versions is one in Greek called the Septuagint, made in the second and third centuries, B.C. It was made by different translators and at different times, probably over a period of more than one hundred years, beginning probably at about 280 B.C. Some of the books were translated with a high degree of accuracy, whereas others are rendered more or less paraphrastically; but all give a tolerably fair view of the doctrines and substance of the original.”

Thus, although Wilson regarded the Septuagint as the most important ancient version, he recognized substantial differences in the accuracy and methods of its translators.

Differences from the Hebrew Often Reflect Interpretation

Wilson argued that many apparent differences between the Masoretic Hebrew and the Septuagint arose from interpretation rather than from a substantially different Hebrew original:

“The differences to be noticed between the Massoretic Hebrew and that from which the Greek Septuagint was translated, in regard to the division of words, clauses, verses, and so forth, are due, not to variations in the original text, but to different interpretations of the same.”

After examining numerous textual phenomena, he concluded:

“I think, also, that I have shown that a large part of the variations in the Old Testament text, which have hitherto been called mistakes, are to be explained as debatable interpretations of that text. Such variations and interpretations do not really affect the historicity and inspiration of the original text; but simply its correct transmission and this only in respect to matters of minor importance.”

The Differences Are “Often Grossly Exaggerated”

In A Scientific Investigation of the Old Testament (1926), Wilson challenged exaggerated claims concerning the divergence between the Greek and Hebrew texts:

“The differences between the Hebrew Masoretic text and the Greek Septuagint are often grossly exaggerated.”

He explained many variations by differences in vocalization or interpretation, confusion of similar letters or sounds, abbreviations, transpositions, repetitions, omissions, and additions introduced during translation. Concerning the additions, he observed:

“Most of the additions seem to have been for elucidation of the original.”

The Hebrew Is “Presumptively the Original Text”

Wilson described the received Hebrew text as “substantially reliable” and maintained that it should be regarded as “presumptively the original text” unless sufficient evidence demonstrated otherwise.

This presumption did not mean that every difference in the Septuagint was necessarily erroneous. Rather, Wilson required evidence that a proposed Greek reading reflected a different and more reliable original rather than an interpretive rendering, paraphrase, explanatory addition, or corruption introduced during transmission of the version.

Assessment

Wilson regarded the Septuagint as an important ancient witness and acknowledged that portions of it were translated accurately. Nevertheless, he rejected the assumption that its divergences from the received Hebrew necessarily represented superior readings and maintained that the Hebrew should remain the starting point of textual investigation.

His testimony is particularly useful for distinguishing genuine textual differences from variations arising through interpretation, translation, explanatory additions, and corruption within the versions themselves. He also recognized that the Septuagint was produced by different translators over an extended period and varied considerably in accuracy and method.

Citation: Robert Dick Wilson, A Scientific Investigation of the Old Testament (Philadelphia: Sunday School Times Company, 1926), pp. 65, 68–72; “The Textual Criticism of the Old Testament,” The Princeton Theological Review, vol. 27 (1929).

67. Richard Rusden Ottley (1864–1946)

Richard Rusden Ottley was an English biblical scholar whose work concentrated extensively on the Septuagint. His principal publications included The Book of Isaiah according to the Septuagint, A Handbook to the Septuagint, and his revision of Henry Barclay Swete’s An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek. His examination of the Greek Old Testament led him to recognize its textual value while identifying serious defects in both translation and transmission.

“Mistakes … Obvious Beyond All Doubt”

In A Handbook to the Septuagint (1920), Ottley emphasized that many differences between the Hebrew and Greek texts resulted from mistakes by the translators rather than from a different Hebrew original:

“Mistakes can be found, often obvious beyond all doubt, in the LXX.’s renderings.”

He described how an initial misunderstanding could lead a translator progressively farther from the Hebrew:

“When once the translator has been led astray by some such confusion, he may, if not guided back by the context, wander quite off the true track for a verse or two: one mistake leads to another, or to a desperate guess, until scarcely a word tallies with the original.”

Ottley compared the resulting translation to an unsuccessful student’s exercise:

“In such straits as this, his attempt is like a schoolboy’s exercise.”

When other methods failed, the translator:

“may in the last resort guess wildly.”

“Changed Beyond Recognition”

Discussing Isaiah 17:9–11, Ottley explained how the translators misunderstood the Hebrew and then attempted to construct a meaning from their mistaken reading. They:

“divided words wrongly”

and subsequently:

“guessed the rest, endeavouring to make sense on the false track they had followed.”

Consequently:

“parts of 9 and 11 have been changed beyond recognition.”

This example illustrates how an initial error could produce extensive departures from the Hebrew without requiring a substantially different Hebrew original.

The Septuagint as Hardly a Possible Text

In assessing the textual value of the Septuagint, Ottley rejected the assumption that its numerous differences from the Hebrew necessarily represented superior readings:

“But the LXX. as it stands is hardly to be regarded as a possible text; even if certain obvious mistakes and misreadings are corrected, it is still impracticable.”

He added:

“There are generally numerous small points (of number, person, etc.) in which there is, as a rule, no reason to think that the LXX. are right, or indeed anything but simply mistaken.”

Ottley summarized the pattern he had observed:

“We have seen, in the examination of various passages, how they misread and misinterpreted, losing the clue, and straying farther and farther from the right track, until an easier sentence gave them a fresh start.”

Against Following the Septuagint “Blindly”

Ottley warned against treating a Septuagint reading as intrinsically authoritative merely because it differed from the Hebrew:

“On the smaller points, which after all form the great majority, the LXX.’s evidence is really of no importance; and to appeal to it as ‘authority’ is an absolute misnomer.”

His objection was not to using the Septuagint as textual evidence, but to accepting its readings without sufficient critical examination. He therefore cautioned against attempts:

“to follow the LXX. blindly, or to attribute fictitious ‘authority’ to its readings.”

Corruption in the Transmitted Greek Text

Ottley also distinguished mistakes made by the original translators from corruption introduced during subsequent manuscript transmission. He observed:

“Many ‘corrupt’ passages may, of course, remain in our texts unsuspected, and therefore untouched.”

Although copyists and revisers sometimes attempted to correct difficult passages, their interventions did not necessarily restore the original reading. Ottley warned that:

“it may be feared in most, it may only have ended in departing further from it.”

Thus, the surviving Greek text could contain both errors inherited from the original translation and additional alterations introduced during transmission.

Assessment

Ottley’s criticism arose from detailed study of the Septuagint itself. He identified mistranslations, mistaken divisions of Hebrew words, conjectural renderings, and passages changed “beyond recognition.” He also recognized that attempts to correct the transmitted Greek text could introduce further departures from its original form.

Although he acknowledged the Septuagint’s value as an ancient textual witness, he strongly opposed treating its divergent readings as inherently authoritative. His testimony therefore shows that differences between the Greek and Hebrew may arise from translator error or subsequent corruption within the Greek tradition, rather than necessarily from a different Hebrew original.

Citation: Richard Rusden Ottley, A Handbook to the Septuagint (London: Methuen & Co., 1920), pp. 113–116, 214–215; discussion of corruption and attempted correction of the transmitted Greek text.

68. Alfred Rahlfs (1865–1935)

Alfred Rahlfs was a German Old Testament scholar and a leading figure in modern Septuagint textual criticism. He directed the Göttingen Septuaginta-Unternehmen from its establishment in 1908 until his death and produced the widely used critical hand edition of the Septuagint published in 1935. His research demonstrated the complexity of the Greek Old Testament’s transmission and the necessity of reconstructing its earliest attainable text from manuscripts affected by revision, correction, and mixture.

The Degeneration and Recension of the Septuagint Text

In his 1907 plan for a new critical edition of the Septuagint, Rahlfs stated:

Der ursprüngliche Text der Septuaginta ist im Laufe der Zeit entartet und hat dann im 3. Jahrh. n. Chr. drei Überarbeitungen, s.g. ‘Rezensionen’, erfahren.

Translation: “The original text of the Septuagint degenerated in the course of time and then, in the third century A.D., underwent three revisions, so-called ‘recensions.’”

Rahlfs thus distinguished the original Greek translation from its later transmitted forms. His editorial program sought to reconstruct earlier textual forms behind the surviving manuscripts rather than simply reproduce an existing manuscript or recension.

Continued Alteration After the Ancient Recensions

Rahlfs rejected the assumption that the history of the Septuagint could be reduced to the three ancient recensions associated with Origen, Lucian, and Hesychius. In his study of Ruth, he wrote:

Denn die Geschichte des LXX-Textes ist mit jenen drei Rezensionen nicht abgeschlossen. Auch spätere Geschlechter haben noch an ihm gearbeitet.

Translation: “For the history of the LXX text is not concluded with those three recensions. Later generations also continued to work on it.”

He therefore cautioned against assigning every manuscript rigidly to one ancient recension. Different textual forms could occur within the same biblical book, requiring investigation of the transmission of individual books.

The Oldest Attainable Text

In his critical edition of Ruth, Rahlfs described the object of textual criticism as:

den ältesten erreichbaren Text

Translation: “the oldest attainable text.”

This formulation distinguishes a critically reconstructed text from the readings preserved in any particular manuscript. The objective was to determine the earliest text recoverable from the surviving evidence rather than simply reproduce Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, Alexandrinus, or one of the ancient recensions.

Origen’s Alteration of the Septuagint

Rahlfs emphasized that Origen did not merely preserve the Septuagint while recording differences from the Hebrew. He wrote:

Aber auch sonst ändert Origenes die LXX an sehr vielen Stellen nach dem Grundtexte und den mit ihm übereinstimmenden jüngeren Übersetzungen.

Translation: “But elsewhere also Origen alters the LXX in very many places according to the original text and the later translations agreeing with it.”

Rahlfs further observed that Origen sometimes introduced such alterations without marking them. The Hexaplaric tradition could therefore contain secondary readings that did not belong to the earlier Septuagint text.

Lucian’s Revision of the Greek Text

Rahlfs likewise regarded the Lucianic text as a revision rather than an unchanged preservation of the original Septuagint. He explained that Lucian sometimes followed the Hebrew and later Greek translations, but also modified the Greek on grammatical and stylistic grounds.

In Lucians Rezension der Königsbücher (1911), Rahlfs identified characteristic Lucianic readings as secondary modifications, including harmonizations, simplifications, stylistic improvements, and other alterations of an earlier Greek text. His analysis therefore distinguished the older translation from changes introduced during subsequent revision.

Assessment

Rahlfs explicitly stated that the original Septuagint text had “degenerated,” recognized major ancient recensions and continued alteration by later generations, and identified secondary changes introduced through the work of Origen and Lucian.

His research therefore distinguishes the original translation from the varied forms preserved in later manuscripts. For Rahlfs, textual criticism required reconstructing from those witnesses the “oldest attainable text” rather than identifying any single surviving manuscript or recension with the original Septuagint.

Citation: Alfred Rahlfs, “Plan einer neuen Ausgabe der Septuaginta,” August 19, 1907, quoted in Christian Schäfer, Alfred Rahlfs (1865–1935) und die kritische Edition der Septuaginta: Eine biographisch-wissenschaftsgeschichtliche Studie (Berlin/Boston: De Gruyter, 2016), p. 139; Lucians Rezension der Königsbücher, Septuaginta-Studien III (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1911), especially p. 190 and accompanying analysis; Das Buch Ruth griechisch als Probe einer kritischen Handausgabe der Septuaginta (Stuttgart: Privilegierte Württembergische Bibelanstalt, 1922), I, p. 49; II, p. 14; “Geschichte des Septuaginta-Textes,” in Septuaginta, id est Vetus Testamentum graece iuxta LXX interpretes, 2 vols. (Stuttgart: Privilegierte Württembergische Bibelanstalt, 1935), vol. I, Prolegomena.

69. Henry St. John Thackeray (1869–1930)

Henry St. John Thackeray was an English scholar of Hellenistic Greek and a leading Septuagint specialist of the early twentieth century. He served as Grinfield Lecturer on the Septuagint at Oxford and devoted extensive study to the language, translators, and textual history of the Greek Old Testament. His A Grammar of the Old Testament in Greek according to the Septuagint (1909) remains an important contribution to Septuagint scholarship.

The Hebrew Original Often Imperfectly Understood

In explaining the purpose of his grammar of Septuagint Greek, Thackeray characterized the translation and its relationship to the Hebrew original:

“Why write a Grammar of a translation, in parts a servile translation, into a Greek which is far removed from the Attic standard, of an original which was often imperfectly understood?”

“Literal or Unintelligent Versions”

Thackeray emphasized that the books conventionally grouped together as the Septuagint differed substantially in translation quality and method. In his classification, he placed a considerable group under the heading:

“Literal or unintelligent versions”

Among these he included the latter portion of Jeremiah, the B text of Judges with Ruth, portions of Kingdoms, the Song of Solomon, Lamentations, Daniel according to Theodotion, 2 Esdras, and Ecclesiastes.

A Translator Ignorant of the Meaning of the Hebrew

Thackeray identified particularly striking examples of mistranslation in part of the Greek Jeremiah:

“Jeremiah β contains the most glaring instances in the LXX of a translator who was ignorant of the meaning of the Hebrew, having recourse to Greek words of similar sound.”

He illustrated this practice with examples in which the translator apparently substituted Greek words resembling the sounds of Hebrew words whose meaning he did not understand.

Free Paraphrase, Omissions, and Additions

Thackeray identified the same translator behind portions of 1 Esdras and the Old Greek version of Daniel:

“Lastly the hand that has produced the partial and paraphrastic rendering of the story of the Return from the Exile (Esdras α) may, with confidence, be traced in the earlier chapters of the Chisian text of Daniel, a book which this paraphrast handled with just the same freedom as he had employed upon Chronicles-Ezra-Nehemiah.”

He observed that these renderings were subsequently replaced or supplemented:

“In both cases it was subsequently found necessary to incorporate in the Greek Bible a more accurate version.”

Discussing this class of translations, Thackeray described:

“free renderings of extracts with legendary additions”

and explained that:

“more accurate and complete renderings were required.”

He characterized 1 Esdras as:

“a free rendering of parts of Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah grouped round a fable”

and Daniel as:

“a similar paraphrase of parts of Daniel, also with legendary additions.”

Thackeray also identified omissions and additions in other books. Concerning Job, he wrote:

“The original version of Job omitted large portions of the original.”

Of Proverbs, he observed:

“The Greek Book of Proverbs includes maxims and illustrations derived from extraneous sources, and metrical considerations sometimes outweigh in the translator’s mind faithfulness to his original.”

“Where Is the True ‘Septuagint’ Text to Be Found?”

Thackeray distinguished the original work of the translators from the surviving manuscript tradition. At the beginning of his discussion of grammar and textual criticism, he asked:

“Where is the true ‘Septuagint’ text to be found?”

After examining the available manuscript evidence, he acknowledged:

“But we are still far from the period when we shall have a text, analogous to the New Testament of Westcott and Hort, of which we can confidently state that it represents, approximately at least, the original work of the translators.”

He consequently asked:

“Is it, then, premature to attempt to write a Grammar, where the text is so doubtful?”

And conceded:

“It is true that no final grammar of the LXX can be written at present.”

His concern was not merely that individual Greek readings were uncertain, but that the original form of the translations had not yet been recovered with sufficient confidence to provide a definitive textual basis for grammatical study.

Assessment

Thackeray recognized substantial differences in the quality and methods of the Greek Old Testament translators. He regarded some translations favorably, particularly the Pentateuch, but identified others as “literal or unintelligent versions” and described translators who misunderstood the Hebrew, paraphrased freely, omitted substantial material, or introduced additions from other sources.

His testimony is also important for distinguishing the original Greek translations from their surviving textual forms. He expressly acknowledged that the original work of the translators could not yet be reconstructed with confidence and that the uncertainty of the transmitted text prevented the production of a definitive Septuagint grammar.

Citation: Henry St. John Thackeray, A Grammar of the Old Testament in Greek according to the Septuagint, vol. 1 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1909), pp. vii, 1–2, 12–16.

70. Joseph Ziegler (1902–1988)

Joseph Ziegler was a German Roman Catholic priest, Old Testament scholar, and one of the principal editors of the Göttingen Septuagint. He devoted much of his scholarly career to reconstructing the earliest attainable Greek text of the Old Testament. His critical editions included the Twelve Prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Wisdom of Solomon, Sirach, and Job. His research repeatedly distinguished the original Greek translations from corruptions and revisions preserved in the surviving manuscript tradition.

“Corruptions Have Obscured the Entire Manuscript Tradition”

In his critical edition of the Twelve Prophets, Ziegler acknowledged that some corruptions had spread throughout the surviving Greek tradition:

Manche Verderbnisse haben die ganze hsl. Überlieferung verdeckt und sind nur durch Konjektur wiederherzustellen.

Translation: “Some corruptions have obscured the entire manuscript tradition and can be restored only by conjecture.”

Ziegler explained that earlier scholars had attempted to repair various corruptions, although many proposed conjectures remained doubtful. He therefore admitted into his critical text only those conjectures he considered most convincing.

He had previously devoted a study to the subject under the title:

Innergriechisch und innerlateinisch verderbte Lesarten im Dodekapropheton.

Translation: “Corrupted Readings within the Greek and Latin Traditions in the Twelve Prophets.”

“Complete Certainty Can Never Be Attained”

Ziegler encountered similar difficulties in Isaiah. Although he considered its Greek text generally well preserved, he acknowledged:

Im allgemeinen hat die Überlieferung den Text gut bewahrt; aber an verschiedenen Stellen ist der ursprüngliche Text durch innergriechische Verderbnis verdeckt.

Translation: “In general the tradition has preserved the text well; but at various places the original text is obscured by corruption within the Greek tradition.”

Such passages could require conjectural restoration when the surviving manuscripts failed to preserve the original reading. Ziegler acknowledged the limitations of this process:

eine volle Sicherheit kann niemals erreicht werden.

Translation: “Complete certainty can never be attained.”

Corruption and Senseless Readings in Codex Vaticanus

Ziegler did not regard even the major ancient Greek manuscripts as immune from corruption. Comparing Codex Vaticanus (B) with Codex Marchalianus (Q) in Ezekiel, he wrote:

Deutlich zeigen zwei Stellen, daß die Verderbnis in B schon weiter geschritten ist als in Q.

Translation: “Two passages clearly show that the corruption in B had already progressed further than in Q.”

Ziegler commended Alfred Rahlfs for rejecting these corrupt readings of Vaticanus. By contrast, because Swete’s edition followed Vaticanus as its base text, it retained what Ziegler called:

die unsinnigen Lesarten

Translation: “the senseless readings.”

Corruption Already Present in the Great Ancient Uncials

In his study of the Greek textual sources underlying the Old Latin Psalters, Ziegler observed:

Viele Lesarten von Ro (und den übrigen altlat. Psalterien) gehen auf eine verderbte griech. Vorlage zurück.

Translation: “Many readings of Ro (and of the other Old Latin Psalters) go back to a corrupted Greek exemplar.”

He identified passages:

an denen frühzeitig bereits innergriech. Verderbnisse ihren Einzug hielten, so daß sie bereits in den alten Unzialen B S A stehen.

Translation: “in which corruptions within the Greek tradition had already entered at an early date, so that they already stand in the ancient uncials B, S, A.”

Thus, even agreement among Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, and Alexandrinus did not necessarily establish that a reading belonged to the original Greek translation.

Incorrect Readings from Faulty Greek Exemplars

In the same study, Ziegler distinguished errors arising from defective Greek exemplars from those resulting from incorrect interpretation:

Oftmals sind unrichtige Lesarten bezeugt, die auf eine fehlerhafte griech. Vorlage zurückgehen oder auf einer falschen Ausdeutung beruhen.

Translation: “Frequently incorrect readings are attested which go back to a faulty Greek exemplar or are based on an incorrect interpretation.”

Scribal Errors Producing Meaningless Greek Forms

In his study of Greek manuscript 493 of Sirach, Ziegler described copying mistakes that produced forms having no existence in the Greek language:

Gelegentlich sind es Schreibversehen, die eine neue Vokabel entstehen lassen. An einigen Stellen bezeugt 493 auch fehlerhafte, verstümmelte Varianten, die Vokabeln bringen, die in der griech. Sprache nicht existieren.

Translation: “Occasionally scribal errors cause a new word to arise. At some places 493 also attests faulty, mutilated variants which produce words that do not exist in the Greek language.”

Only “the Most Probable Original-Septuagint Reading”

Ziegler did not identify any surviving manuscript with the original Septuagint. In the preface to his critical edition of Sirach, he described the editor’s objective as determining:

schlechthin die wahrscheinlichste Urseptuaginta-Lesung.

Translation: “simply the most probable original-Septuagint reading.”

He acknowledged that difficult editorial decisions could remain uncertain even after the critical text had been prepared:

Gerade beim Lesen der Korrekturen steigen manchmal Zweifel auf, ob wirklich der Text richtig gestaltet ist; man gerät in eine beklemmende ἀπορία und möchte am liebsten (bei manchen schwierigen Stellen) noch einmal von vorn anfangen.

Translation: “Precisely while reading the proofs, doubts sometimes arise whether the text has really been established correctly; one falls into a distressing perplexity and would prefer, at some difficult passages, to start all over again.”

Assessment

Ziegler’s testimony is particularly important because his conclusions arose from decades of editing the Greek Old Testament. He recognized corruptions within the Greek tradition, defective exemplars, meaningless readings, and alterations already present in major ancient manuscripts.

Most significantly, he acknowledged that some corruptions affected the entire surviving manuscript tradition and could be restored only by conjecture. His work therefore sharply distinguishes the original Greek translations from their surviving textual forms and illustrates the necessity—and occasional uncertainty—of reconstructing the earliest attainable Septuagint text.

Citation: Joseph Ziegler, Beiträge zum griechischen Dodekapropheton (1943), “Innergriechisch und innerlateinisch verderbte Lesarten im Dodekapropheton,” reprinted in Sylloge: Gesammelte Aufsätze zur Septuaginta (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1971), pp. 106–126; Antike und moderne lateinische Psalmenübersetzungen (Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1960); study of Greek manuscript 493 of Sirach (1962); ed., Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum, XVI/1, Ezechiel (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1952), introduction; XII/2, Sapientia Iesu Filii Sirach (1965), preface; XIV, Isaias, 3rd ed. (1983), p. 99; XIII, Duodecim prophetae, 3rd ed. (1984), p. 121.

71. Sidney Jellicoe (1906–1973)

Sidney Jellicoe was a British-Canadian Anglican priest, biblical scholar, and professor of Divinity at Bishop’s University in Quebec. A leading twentieth-century specialist in Septuagint studies, he was a founding figure in the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies. His major works included The Septuagint and Modern Study (1968) and the posthumously published Studies in the Septuagint: Origins, Recensions, and Interpretations (1974), which contained an extensive Prolegomenon written by Jellicoe.

Uncritical Use of the Septuagint Can Be Positively Misleading

In his 1969 survey of Septuagint scholarship, Jellicoe warned that commentators frequently cited the Greek Old Testament without adequately examining the textual evidence:

“While this is indisputable it must be stated—though there are exceptions—that the adduction of LXX has far too often been of such insufficiently informed and uncritical a nature that the results have been positively misleading. Two observations must suffice. Before citing the version the commentator must first pose to himself Ottley’s question, ‘What is the Septuagint?’ and to answer this his hand must reach much further than the manual edition of a Tischendorf, van Ess, Swete, or Rahlfs. Again, the inference underlying the familiar critical note ‘read with LXX,’ namely, that the version reflects a Hebrew text differing from, and supposedly superior to, MT, has been demonstrated over and over again to be mistaken.”

Supposed Hebrew Variants May Be Corruptions Within the Greek Tradition

Jellicoe acknowledged genuine differences between the Hebrew used by the Greek translators and the subsequently transmitted Hebrew text, but warned against exaggerating their extent:

“That there are differences—and these are not confined to Samuel—between the Hebrew as used by the Greek translators and as known to us today is not in doubt, but the supposed extent of these differences must be considerably modified in the light of a more careful and judicial analysis on the part of those who have made first-hand acquaintance with the actual text their fundamental concern, foremost among whom stand the Göttingen editors and their collaborators, along with the late Dr. Walters (Peter Katz) on the one side of the Atlantic, and on the other Professors Orlinsky and the late Max L. Margolis. Among the supposed variants some have been shown to be inner-Greek corruptions; others are explicable by ‘hibernation,’ that is, equivalents of Hebrew words which were in current usage, and were rendered accordingly by the Greek translators but which later fell into desuetude, have tended to be construed either as mistranslations or as indicative of a different Hebrew term.”

His explanation distinguishes genuine Hebrew textual variants from corruptions arising within the Greek tradition and from translation equivalents whose original meaning had subsequently become obscure.

The Hebrew Underlying the Septuagint Often Approximated the Masoretic Text

Jellicoe described two opposing approaches to differences between the Septuagint and the Masoretic Text:

“There were those who, assuming that where LXX appeared to differ from MT it represented an earlier and superior Hebrew Vorlage, gave preference to ‘LXX’; on the other side were the staunch defenders of MT, who saw LXX renderings as corruptions, misunderstandings, paraphrases, or even as deliberate alterations on the part of the translators arising from theological predilections.”

He then described an intermediate position:

“The mean between the extremes was the endeavour—and to this comparative philology, as already noted, has made a noteworthy contribution—to show that the Vorlage was, in fact, identical with, or approximated closely to, MT. Indeed, over the last generation, a growing respect for MT has been evident in Old Testament scholarship, but it is only to a limited extent that this finds support from Qumrân. LXX has been no less clearly vindicated: the faithfulness of the translators to their Hebrew exemplar at every stage has been well attested.”

Jellicoe thus recognized both substantial agreement between the underlying Hebrew and the Masoretic Text and the general faithfulness of the Greek translators to their exemplars.

Modern Editions Must Not Be Identified with the Septuagint Itself

Jellicoe warned against treating a convenient printed edition as though it represented a single established Septuagint text:

“Attention should be directed to what is written below in Essays 1, 2, and 12 on the use and misuse of the ‘Septuagint’ in textual criticism and the hazards of reliance upon an unverified critical apparatus. Akin to this, and due largely to the lack of a complete critical edition of the Old Testament in Greek, is the common error of taking the manual edition of Swete or Rahlfs as ‘the Septuagint’, a practice which has been well nigh universal with commentators.”

The Septuagint Is Not a Uniform Translation

In evaluating the early history of the Greek and Hebrew texts, Jellicoe identified an important principle:

“It demonstrates the fact, widely overlooked, that LXX is not a uniform translation. No manuscript is self-consistent in witnessing throughout to a single text type. Each group of books (e.g. the Octateuch, Minor Prophets, etc.), and even single books in whole or in part, are independent translational units and must be studied as such.”

His observation concerns both the differing character of the original translations and the mixed textual character of the surviving manuscripts.

Divergent Greek Texts Could Differ Substantially

Jellicoe illustrated the complexity of the Greek tradition by discussing the alternative Greek text of Esther associated with Lagarde’s reconstruction of the Lucianic text. He observed that it:

“differs so much from it that both Cambridge and Göttingen print the texts separately.”

He then reported Hanhart’s assessment:

“Hanhart regards it not as Lucianic, nor a recension of the O (i.e. LXX), but as ‘a new edition’ (Neugestaltung) of the traditional Greek version, dependent in large measure on the O-Text.”

The example demonstrates that some divergent Greek textual forms differed sufficiently to require separate treatment rather than being regarded merely as collections of minor variants.

The Transmission History Required Reconstruction

Jellicoe also recognized that the traditional account of the Greek Old Testament’s transmission required reconsideration:

“Long before the era of the Scrolls it had become evident that the accepted transmission-history of the Greek Old Testament stood in need of modification. What formerly could have been but speculative, Qumrân has rendered at least more tangible, and has, in fact, evoked an attempted reconstruction of the history of both the Hebrew text and the Septuagint.”

Complete Critical Editions Were Still Lacking

Jellicoe emphasized that the basic scholarly work of establishing the Greek text remained unfinished:

“We are, in fact, still very much in the process of acquiring the ‘tools for the job’—a term savouring of utility rather than elegance! We are still without complete critical editions of the LXX itself….”

His warning reinforces the distinction between the surviving Greek textual evidence, available printed editions, and the original work of the translators.

Assessment

Jellicoe was an advocate of Septuagint scholarship who recognized both the general faithfulness of the translators and genuine differences between their Hebrew exemplars and the Masoretic Text. His criticism was directed particularly against uncritical use of Greek readings as evidence for an earlier and supposedly superior Hebrew original. He identified inner-Greek corruptions and warned that modern printed editions could not simply be equated with “the Septuagint.”

He also stressed that the Septuagint is not a uniform translation and that no surviving manuscript consistently represents a single text type throughout. The existence of divergent Greek forms, unresolved transmission history, and incomplete critical editions therefore requires distinguishing the original translations from the varied manuscript tradition through which they have survived.

Citation: Sidney Jellicoe, “Septuagint Studies in the Current Century,” Journal of Biblical Literature 88 (1969), p. 192; “Prolegomenon,” in Studies in the Septuagint: Origins, Recensions, and Interpretations (New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1974), pp. XVI–XVII, XLV–LI.

72. John William Wevers (1919–2010)

John William Wevers was a leading twentieth-century Septuagint scholar and the principal editor of the Greek Pentateuch for the Göttingen Septuagint project. He devoted much of his career to reconstructing the earliest attainable Greek text from the surviving manuscripts and other ancient witnesses. His research demonstrated that the surviving Greek tradition contains secondary readings, scribal errors, revisions, and mixtures that must be distinguished from the original translations.

No Surviving Manuscript Is Simply “the Septuagint”

In “An Apologia for Septuagint Studies” (1985), Wevers emphasized the mixed character of the surviving Greek manuscripts:

“Lagarde long ago called attention to the fact that all LXX MSS were eclectic texts.”

He warned against treating even important manuscripts such as Codex Vaticanus or Codex Alexandrinus as though they necessarily preserved the original Septuagint:

“Simply citing a diplomatic text, such as the text of Codex Vaticanus or of Codex Alexandrinus, is basically misleading, since it gives the impression that the LXX is being cited; it may, however, be merely a fourth or fifth century variant within the LXX tradition.”

Likewise:

“The printed text is itself an eclectic text, it is mixed, it contains secondary as well as original elements. The text may well be that of the oldest MS, it may well be the best MS witness, but it is not, nor did the editors ever pretend that it was, the original text.”

Even Codex Vaticanus could preserve later readings. Wevers observed:

“I too value the witness of Cod Vaticanus highly, but often it is not original.”

He particularly regretted that:

“users tend to quote the printed text as LXX uncritically.”

Full Restoration “an Impossible but Laudable Goal”

Wevers distinguished a critical reconstruction from the text of any surviving manuscript:

“It should be fully clear at the outset what is meant by the printing of a critical text. It is the presentation by an editor after weighing all the textual evidence at his disposal of the earliest reconstruction of the text possible, an approximation to the original insofar as that is reasonable.”

In Genesis, the surviving evidence was separated from the original translation by centuries:

“For the text of the Greek Genesis this means working with materials which are in the main at least 400 years later than the autographa.”

Indeed:

“the first half millenium is an almost complete blank as far as the textual history of Genesis is concerned.”

Wevers acknowledged the limits of reconstruction. Reflecting on his editorial work, he stated:

“I was under no illusions that one could fully restore such”

a text, and described the ideal of a reconstructed text containing no secondary readings as:

“an impossible but laudable goal.”

Scribal Corruption in Ancient and Later Manuscripts

Wevers repeatedly documented copying errors and secondary readings throughout the Greek tradition. In Leviticus he warned:

“one cannot simplistically follow the A B text since their text is at times demonstrably secondary.”

His judgment of the Byzantine tradition of Numbers was severe:

“The above list represents various types of errors which are to be found in the Byzantine text type. This tradition concerning proper names is on the whole quite untrustworthy; it represents a late and often corrupt textual tradition.”

In Exodus he similarly concluded:

“In summary it may be stated that the Byzantine text is on the whole expansionist. It has been the object of a great deal of carelessness in the transmission, at times resulting in indefensible readings and even occasionally in readings which make little sense. The text has been considerably influenced by the hex recension.”

Nor did great antiquity guarantee accuracy. Concerning Papyrus 963, Wevers cautioned:

“Not that one should exhibit undue reverence for 963 just because of its age. The copyist was not overly careful as the following list of unique readings shows.”

After examining those readings, he concluded:

“None of these unique readings needs to be taken seriously. Most of them represent careless errors on the part of the copyist, often resulting in an impossible text.”

He found similar carelessness in early Greek fragments among the Dead Sea Scrolls. Of one Greek manuscript of Leviticus he wrote:

“The general impression with which the text of the fragment leaves one is that of carelessness on the part of the scribe. It does not inspire me with a great deal of confidence.”

Deuteronomy presented particular difficulties because its recurring formulas encouraged assimilation between parallel passages:

“The book is filled with phrases and clauses which recur again and again with slight modification. Copyists were of course thoroughly familiar with these formulaic expressions with the result that parallel passages have played havoc with the textual transmission.”

Consequently:

“one is by no means certain that the original LXX has been recovered.”

Origen’s “Corrections” Were “All in the Direction of Error”

Wevers found evidence that deliberate revision of the Greek text had begun before Origen:

“When the evidence had been gathered and considered it was clear that the possibility of some kind of preOrigen recensional activity had been established.”

Origen’s subsequent work exercised extensive influence. Concerning Genesis, Wevers concluded:

“The influence of the Hexapla was remarkably widespread and all later mss. and Versions show some traces of its influence.”

Yet Origen’s attempts to correct the Greek toward the Hebrew could themselves introduce errors. Wevers wrote of certain such changes:

“These ‘corrections’ are all in the direction of error”

and attributed some to:

“faulty understanding of the Hebrew text on the part of Origen’s Hexapla”

He also explained Origen’s procedure when the Hebrew contained material lacking in the Greek:

“If the Hebrew text lacked an equivalent in the Greek he added an equivalent from one of The Three, usually θʹ, whether that made sense or not. At times this created a weird text, which might violate ordinary rules of Greek syntax, and as Greek, made little or no sense.”

In Wevers’s study of the Byzantine text of Deuteronomy, of 558 readings examined he attributed 163, approximately 29.2 percent, to the Greek text associated with Origen’s work. He described such readings as:

“typical of Origen’s interference in the text tradition of the Pentateuch.”

This figure concerns the particular readings examined in that study, not the entire text of Deuteronomy.

Patristic Quotations “Probably the Least Satisfactory Evidence”

Wevers also warned that biblical quotations preserved in early Christian writers were not necessarily reliable witnesses to the precise Greek text originally used by those authors. He described patristic quotations as:

“Probably the least satisfactory evidence which the LXX editor must collect”

One difficulty was that the Fathers:

“often, if not usually, quoted from memory”

Another was subsequent manuscript transmission. Copyists:

“often corrected the biblical quotations from contemporary biblical texts”

Consequently, the surviving quotation might preserve:

“not the text used by the Father in question, but a later form with which the copyist was familiar.”

Thus even a quotation attributed to an early Christian writer may reflect a later form of the Greek biblical text.

Assessment

Wevers’s testimony is especially significant because it arose from decades of reconstructing the Greek Pentateuch. He showed that no surviving manuscript can simply be equated with “the Septuagint,” that ancient and later witnesses contain secondary readings and serious scribal errors, that deliberate revision affected the Greek tradition both before and after Origen, and that even patristic quotations may have been altered during transmission.

For Wevers, a critical Septuagint edition was therefore a scholarly reconstruction from imperfect and conflicting evidence rather than the reproduction of a single intact Greek text continuously preserved from antiquity. Although he regarded reconstruction as necessary and valuable, he acknowledged that complete restoration of the original Greek translations was an unattainable ideal.

Citation: John William Wevers, Text History of the Greek Genesis (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1974); Text History of the Greek Deuteronomy (1978); Text History of the Greek Numbers (1982); “An Apologia for Septuagint Studies,” Bulletin of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies 18 (1985), pp. 16–38; Text History of the Greek Leviticus (1986); Text History of the Greek Exodus (1992); “Apologia pro Vita Mea: Reflections on a Career in Septuagint Studies,” Bulletin of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies 32 (1999), pp. 65–96.