4. Beyond these the letter originates all kinds of theories. (6) Kahle s thesis has not been sustained.

Transcription

1 I. FROM ORIGIN TO ORIGEN. A. The Letter of Aristeas contains a few accurate facts. 1. Translation began in 3d century. 2. Egypt was the place of origin. 3. Pentateuch done first. 4. Beyond these the letter originates all kinds of theories. a. Kahle: Questioned value of the LXX in reconstruction of Heb text. (1) Believed there never was a proto-lxx. More specifically, argued several translations were made to meet the practical needs. (2) As evidence, he pointed to the way the LXX was cited by Philo, Josephus, NT, and Justin Martyr. (3) He saw Aristeas letter as a revision (a Targum) which is no longer extant. (4) He concluded that the LXX is of minimal value as a comparative of the Heb text. (5) This theory raises question of whether there was an original ( official ) translation from the Heb to the Gr which was recognized as authoritative. 1 (6) Kahle s thesis has not been sustained. (a) (b) The discovery of the Minor Prophets from Nahal Hever in the wilderness of Judea, which was identified as a revision of the LXX from the turn of the era. S. P. Brock has argued that the letter of Aristeas is 2 a defense of the Old Greek and not a revision. 1 Sidney Jellicoe, The Septuagint and Modern Study (Oxford: University, 1968; Rep. ed., Ann Arbor: Eisenbrauns, 1978), S. P. Brock, "The Phenomenon of the Septuagint," OTS 17 (1972):

2 (c) Barthelemy and Cross (based on the Dodekapropheton and the Rylands Papyrus [Gr 458]) have disproved Kahle's thesis. 3 B. Second century revisions were made which were based on the kaige recension. 1. The kaige recension is "A revision of the Greek text toward the MT, made in Palestine, shortly after the turn of the era. The name kaige comes from its peculiar translation of the Hebrew particle gam (also). Identical with proto-theodotion." 4 C. Origen s Hexapla. a. More will be said about it later. b. Its revisions include: (1) Aquila: characterized by extreme literalness. Aquila removed expressions favorable to Christianity. (2) Symmachus: Less value for textual critic. Basic text kaige. Substituted idiomatic Gr renderings for wooden Heb construction. Jerome used this in the Vulgate. (3) Theodotion: Transliteration instead of a translation. (4) These three revisions were available to Christians by the end of the 2d century AD Arranged the Hebrew and Greek into 6 columns: Hebrew, Hebrew transliteration, Aquila, Sym, LXX, Theodotion. a. Expressions in the LXX which were not in the Heb began with an obelus ( ) and ended with a metobelus(:). b. Those not in the LXX but in the Hebrew began with an asterisk (*) and ended with a metobelus. 2. Origin's intentions have been variously interpreted. 5 a. Jellicoe and Driver: attempting to restore the LXX to purity. 3 Cf. Jellico, The Septuagint, Ralph Klein. Textual Criticism of the Old Testament: The Septuagint after Qumran (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1974), xi. 5 Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism, 7ff. 2

3 b. Kleine: This runs counter to his theological attitude; he considered the LXX the church's inspired scripture. c. Brock: a tool for Christians in debate with Jews. Thus part of a larger controversy; thus the significance of the above signs. d. Whatever the reason, Origin's Hexapla is part of a larger theological problem which textual critics should keep in mind. 3. The Hexapla had an adverse effect on LXX studies. Many Gr Mss neglected; became customary to copy only the 5th column. When the signs were dropped a mixed text was the result. 4. Editions and their uses. a. Origin's Hexapla used in Palestine. b. Hesychius' edition used in Egypt. Little is known of this edition. Some scholars doubt that it has survived. c. Lucian's edition in Antioch. It has been identified with certainty. d. Since the early Syrian church fathers Chrysostom ( ) and Theodoret ( ) frequently cited the Greek Bible, those manuscripts whose text agrees with their citations can be considered Lucianic. It has often been noted that Lucian filled in various kinds of omissions, preserved both readings (conflation) in cases where Mss had variants, replaced pronouns with proper nouns, and made various grammatical changes. 6 e. Lagarde thought if the above 3 could be reconstructed from the extant Mss, then the original LXX would be attainable 7 f. But the problem is more complicated than that as the Dead Sea Scrolls show. II. THE LXX AND THE SCROLLS. A. Despite the late date of the MT (900) many scholars thought these represent the text of the 2d century AD. 6 Klein, Textual Criticism, 9. 7 Klein, Textual Criticism, 9-10; cf. Paul Anton de Lagarde, Septuaginta Studien (Göttingen: Dieterichische, 1891). 3

4 1. Lagarde argued that there was one master codex from which the others descended. 2. Others have modified this and argued that one recension received preeminence in 2d century. B. To "jump this MT gap" scholars translated the LXX back into Heb in an attempt to reach the Vorlage; this produced difficulties. 1. It was not always possible from the reconstruction to determine if the differences are the result of differences in the Heb Vorlage or to the translators' paraphrastic style. 2. It was not clear whether the divergences are a series of variants, or whether different text types existed prior to the emergence of the MT. C. The Dead Sea Scrolls resulted in new hypotheses. 1. Many LXX readings resulted from variants instead of free translations. 2. This answered the 2d difficulty above and helped to sort out the various revisions through which both the Heb and Gr texts have passed. 3. There was a renewed confrontation of Lagarde's proto-lxx theory vs. Kahle's Targum theory. 4. The result is a new theory which originated with Albright and culminated with Cross. a. "Any reconstruction of the biblical text before the establishment of the traditional text in the first century A.D. must comprehend this evidence: the plurality of text types, the limited number of distinct textual families, and the homogeneity of each of these textual families over several centuries of time. We are required by these data... to recognize the existence of local texts which developed in the main centers of Jewish life in the Persian and Hellenistic age." 8 b. Cross also argued that these were not properly "recensions" as Albright had proposed, but were the result of natural growth. 9 c. According to Cross' new theory: 8 IEJ 16 (1966), 85, cited by Shemaryahu Talmon, "The Old Testament Text," in CHB, 3 vols., P. R. Ackroyd and C. F. Evans, eds. (Cambridge: University, 1976): 1: IEJ 16 (1966), cited by Talmon, CHB, 1:194, n

5 Three textual families appear to have been developed slowly between the fifth and first centuries B.C., in Palestine, in Egypt, and presumably Babylon. The Palestinian family is characterized by conflation, glosses, synoptic additions..., and can be defined as `expansionistic.' The Egyptian text type is often but not always a full text. In the Pentateuch, for example, it has not suffered the extensive synoptic additions which mark the late Palestinian text, but is not so short or pristine as the third or Babylonian family. The Egyptian and Palestine families are closely related. Early exemplars of the Palestinian text in the Former Prophets, and Pentateuchal texts which reflect an early stage of the Palestinian tradition, so nearly merge with the Egyptian, that we are warranted in describing the Egyptian text types as a branch of the Old Palestinian family. The Babylonian text type when extant is a short text. Thus far it is only known in the Pentateuch and former prophets. In the Pentateuch it is a conservative, often pristine text, which shows relatively little expansion, and a few traces of revision and modernizing. In the books of Samuel, on the contrary, it is a poor text, marked by extensive haplography and corruption Talmon makes the following critical observations of this new theory. a. It is a synthesis of previous theories. (1) It is not opposed intrinsically to the one recension/mss theory. (2) Only the Pal family can be recognized as a clear circumscribed entity. (3) The so-called Egyptian recension is regarded as broken off from the Old Pal while the third "is not too clear and its locale can be defined only as being `presumably Babylon.'" 11 b. Resembles Sperber s parallel-transmission system. Both assume different locales for the emergence of the different tradition: here post-exilic Palestine and Babylon; there pre-exilic and South Palestine." Thus "purely hypothetical statements arrived at by deductions and reconstructions which lack any material, i.e., manuscript basis IEJ 16 (1966), cited by Talmon, CHB, 1: CHB, 1: CHB, 1:

6 c. The idea local underlies Liebermann s 3 mss types with different localities. 13 d. Kahle had differentiated in value between standard/received and vulgar texts. (1) Liebermann had taken this up as "inferior local school texts," "Jerusalem vulgar mss," and "the most exact copies of the temple." (2) These value judgments can be seen in Cross when he describes the Pal text as "conflate and expansionistic," the Egyptian as "predominately full text," and the Babylonian as "a short pristine text." (3) The weakness of the argument may be seen when observing the individual books of the families. It then transpires that, as if refusing to submit to the scholar's natural quest for order, in the books of Samuel, for example, the Babylonian, somewhat unexpectedly, "is a poor text, marked by extensive haplography and corruptions. 14 e. This tripartition of the OT echoes the widely tripartition of the NT text into Pal, Antiochian, and Egyptian. f. Because of differences in transmission (the synagogue strove to abolish variants, whereas the church strove to accommodate variants), such "an unqualified application of a theory which arises from an investigation into the history of the New Testament text to the history of the Old Testament text perforce results in a distortion of the issue and in yet-to-be proved, or unprovable, hypothesis." 15 g. Talmon then concludes: "... the 'three local texts' theory cannot explain satisfactorily the 'plurality of text types' at the end of the pre-christian era. It could indeed account for the 'limited number of distinct textual families' extant at that time. But one is inclined to attribute this feature of the text transmission to two factors: (a) historical vicissitudes which caused other textual families to disappear; (b) the necessary socio-religious condition for the 13 CHB, 1: CHB, 1: CHB, 1:

7 preservation of a text-tradition, namely its acceptance by a sociologically integrated and definable body." 6. Finally, Talmon offers his own solution: 16 a. These last two aspects are what safeguarded the (proto-)mt, the SP, and the LXX. b. "The question to be answered with regard to the history of the Old Testament text does not arise from the extant 'plurality of the texttypes' but rather from the disappearance of other and more numerous textual traditions." c. While he does not accept unequivocally Kahle's thesis of a "textus receptus and vulgar texts," he does argue "the extant evidence imposes on us the conclusion that from the very first stage of its mss transmission, the Old Testament text was known in a variety of traditions which differentiated from each other." 17 d. As some of these were eliminated, the Textus Receptus resulted. D. The data which point to such conclusions: 1. The Scrolls, the LXX, and the SP. a. Ca variants the SP shares with the MT; 1600 of these are also shared by the LXX. b. Some of these are Sectarian Readings: (1) Shechem rather than Jerusalem (2) Sacrifice of Isaac shifted from Moriah to Moreh (3) "Place where God will choose" changed to "chosen" (4) After the last commandment in Exod 20:17 the commandment added to build the sanctuary in Mt. Gerizim. c. Some of these are Expansions: In Exod 7:18b, the SP repeats the MT 7: (1) Such expansions are valuable relative to the dating of the Samaritan Schism. 16 CHB, 1: CHB, 1:

8 (a) (b) (c) No reason for such orthodox writers/works as Jubilees, Chronicles, etc, who in LXX share these variants, to cite from a sectarian product like SP. Thus scholars now believe the split occurred ca. 1st century B.C., i.e., much later. Till then the 3 groups shared the same text. (2) Thus the rule that when SP and LXX agree they are preferred over MT is modified. "Since it was a... Palestinian text which was... eventually used for the LXX, many agreements between LXX and SP reflect only a secondary reading..., whereas the original reading has been preserved in the isolated text behind the MT." The Scrolls and the text of the Prophets. a b a. 1QIsa and 1QIsa : The "A" scroll is the famous long mss at Qumran, while the "B" scroll is the shorter fragmentary scroll from the 2d temple period. Their characteristics include: (1) Much in common with MT, revealing arbitrary nature of previous scholars' many emendations. (2) At the same time, it appears that there are also numerous divergences. (3) Harrison observes: a It appears that 1QIsa furnished a contemporary phonetic spelling designed to make the reading of the Hebrew text considerably easier without at the same time actually altering the time-honored pronunciation.... There are a numerous textual divergences in 1QIsa from the Massoretic tradition, and while some perhaps constitute improvements upon the textus receptus, others are quite clearly the result of textual error and corruption. Of the thirteen readings adopted in the RSV on the basis of the a text of 1QIsa, five of them are entirely without support b from other ancient versions. The 1QIsa scroll contained a few readings that disagreed with the Massoretic text, and it b is interesting to note that to of them (1QIsa 53:11, 12) reinforce the LXX tradition as against that of the Massoretes. Even more notable is the fact that 1QIsaq a 18 Klein, Textual Criticism, 18, cf. Harrison, Introduction,

9 followed the reading preserved by the LXX in both these passages, since such a circumstance might well point to the possibility of error in the transmission of the Massoretic text itself. Apart from the two instances mentioned above b there are nine other textual divergences in 1QIsa, all of which appear capable of explanation on grounds other than that they constitute genuine variants. The list collated by Loewinger contained about three hundred alleged divergences, but most of these were concerned with the insertion of the consonants (w) and (y) (4) Thus when the additions of these scrolls, particularly the "A" scroll, are not the same as those in the MT and LXX, we can compare and see where supplements have been made. If the variant is genuine, a shorter text in Qumran a 1QIsa or LXX = an expanded MT. b. Jeremiah: Much shorter in LXX. (1) The debate is whether LXX reflects a more abbreviated text or abbreviated Vorlage. b (2) Qumran reveals that 4QJer 10:4-11 is short precisely where LXX is. (3) Thus the LXX Jer probably results from a shorter more original Heb text. 3. Qumran and the text of Samuel. a. Wellhausen and Driver argued that the best way to recover the Sam text was through the LXX. b. This has been confirmed because: (1) LXX preserves a better text. Many of its departures from the MT are a result of different Heb Vorlage. (2) Several different mss which can be correlated with a corresponding Heb text type are in Gr mss. Thus 4QSam = L B Lxx while MT = LXX. c. This has resulted in the hypothesis that the Old Gr was revised in pre-christian times to conform to a divergent Heb text represented in Qumran. More precisely: 19 Harrison, Introduction,

10 (1) Old Gr was based on Heb text in Egypt often superior to MT. (2) Proto-Lucian was a revision of Old Gr to bring it in line with the Heb Text in Palestine. (3) The Lucian recension (while much like the MT) was based on proto-lucian recension. (4) B. J. Roberts summarizes: 4. The kaige Recension ): a. 5 observations it has long been agreed that the parent text of the Septuagint Samuel contained recensional divergences from the Massoretic Text, but the extent of the many of the textual differences... reflect Hellenistic tendencies. The present discovery [Dead Sea Scrolls] obviously supports the second alternative, demonstrably a fairly literal translation of its Hebrew parent text the presence of interpretation elsewhere, at least in the historical books, should be admitted only where no other explanation is possible. 20 (1) Dates to 1st half of 1st century. (2) Its Heb Vorlage related to proto-mt. (3) R is revision of Old Gr. (4) Employs unusual translation techniques. (5) Resembles Origin's Quinta, citations of Justin Martyr ( AD), and lies behind certain readings in the Sahidic Coptic version and the Gr Codex Washingtonias. b. These similarities have revolutionized approaches to other books. According to Klein, Barthélemy was able to show that the kaige recension is in parts of Sam-Kgs, the LXX Lam, Ruth, the "B" mss family of Judges, the Theodotionic text of Daniel, the Theodotionic 20 CHB, 2: Klein, Textual Criticism,

11 supplements to LXX of Jer and Job, and the Quinta of the Psalms. 22 (1) Thackery demonstrated in Sam-Kgs the major uncial mss were not uniform. Sections a (1 Sam), bb (2 Sam 1:1-9:13), and gg (1 Kgs 2:12-21) were by one hand, while bg (2 Sam 10:1-1 Kgs 2:11) and gd (1 Kgs 22-2 Kgs) by another. (2) Barthélemy built on this and proposed that the LXX bg and gd were revisions of the Old Alexandarian Version. c. The result is that Qumran has led to a complex analysis of Gr mss of Sam. Further we have access via Old Gr to Heb text type for a, bb, and gg. The kaige stands in sections bg and gd. d. Thus the history of Heb and Gr text in Samuel and Kgs due to evidence provided by kaige is as follows: Ca. 4th century a Heb copy was taken to Egypt. A copy of this text was translated in 3d and 2d centuries. This is the Old Gr preserved in uncials for sections a, bb, gg. The text as transmitted in Palestine is represented in Qumran. In the 2d/1st centuries BC the Old Gr was revised to conform to this Palestinian text. The Old Gr or proto-lucian was revised at the turn of the era on the basis of a different Heb text. This revision is the kaige revision which preserves bg and gd. This recension underwent further development at the hands of Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion. 23 III. THE LXX, DOES IT MAKE A DIFFERENCE? A. The above hypotheses indicate that the many variant readings in the LXX reflect a different Heb text. This probably indicates that there are distinct text types behind the Old Gr, Proto-Lucian, kaige, and Hexapla B. Haplography in 1 Sam. 1. The LXX in 1 Sam is basically the Old Gr 2. The MT is basically Haplographic: 3:15-41; 10:1; 12:8; 14:41; 29:10. C. Expansions in the MT of Jer 22 Klein, Textual Criticism, Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism,

12 1. Preference ordinarily given to LXX 2. Conflations in Jer include: 25:6-7; 26:22; 41:10; 42:2; 44:3; 52: A special kind of conflation behind doublets in Jer MT. LXX omits the 2d of the doublet, but in 30:10-11 // 46:27-8 and 48:40b, 41b // 49:22 the LXX omits the first. a. The message formula hw"hy> rm;a' hko k h mar Yhwh: 25 (1) "Thus says Yhwh" (MT 85; LXX 119) (2) "Thus says Yhwh God of Israel" (MT 14; LXX 14) (3) "Thus says Yhwh of hosts" (MT 19; LXX 4) (4) "Thus says Yhwh of hosts the God of Israel" (MT 31; LXX 0) (5) Thus says Yhwh the God of hosts (MT 1; LXX 0) (6) Thus says Yhwh the God of hosts the God of Israel (MT 3; LXX 0) (7) Thus says the Lord Yhwh (MT 1; LXX 0) (8) Thus says the Lord God (MT 0; LXX 1) (9) Klein concludes: It will be noted that this messenger formula occurs some 154 times in MT, but only 138 times in LXX, indicating sixteen probable expansions. Even where both texts attest the formula the MT has frequently expanded the divine name. In items 3-7, for example, the MT has a longer divine name fifty-five times; the LXX, only four times. 26 b. "Johanan the son of Kareah," according to Klein, "... occurs fourteen times in chapters always with his father's name, except for 41:15 where only the name Johanan is used. The LXX has the name thirteen times in the same contexts, but only four 24 Klein, Textual Criticism, Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism Klein, Textual Criticism,

13 times does it have the patronymic. Significantly, it lacks the simple reference to Johanan in 41:15 as well. Judging by the expansionist tendency of MT noted above, we believe these ten shorter LXX readings reflect an unexpanded Hebrew base text." 27 c. The name of King Nebuchadnezzar is "... one of the most convincing demonstrations that personal names were consistently added to MT.... In 27:6 to 29:3 MT this name occurs eight times, and each time it is lacking in the corresponding passage in LXX. The secondary character of these occurrences of the name Nebuchadnezzar is also suggested by the `n' in the fourth syllable. Normally, the form Nebuchadrezzar. Whoever added the name Nebuchadnezzar spelled it in a way that is atypical for this book. His spelling habits lend support to our text critical judgment." 28 D. Additions from elsewhere in Jer indicates that the Heb text was expanded from glosses drawn from parallel passages. 29 E. Deuteronomistic additions (?). Some passages came into existence through transmission. Two are 11:7-8; 27: F. Variant chronologies: 1. Thiele's work assumed: a. Figures in MT were original b. Several kings served co-regencies 2. But Shenkel showed that there were no major chronological shifts from L OG in the Proto-LXX. This fact seems to give evidence for OG references to Jehoshaphat in MT are anonymous in Lucianic text. Probably all references to Jehoshaphat were originally anonymous, but L were subsequently added by LXX. G. Jeroboam's rise to power--the LXX allows tentative reconstruction Kgs 12:20--Jeroboam is absent. 27 Klein, Textual Criticism, Klein, Textual Criticism, Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism, Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism,

14 2. In 2-3a and 12 he is present a and 12 are not in proper place in LXX. 4. Perhaps, therefore, not in original Heb text. 5. "Then the whole chapter would be perfectly consistent. The people negotiated with Rehoboam while Jeroboam was still in exile. Only after the negotiations had broken down and violence against Adoram had been perpetrated did Jeroboam return and accept the invitation to kingship." 31 H. New views of "Redaction." 1. Cannot always attribute Chronicler's deviations to a theological or political bias. 2. Many "biases" disappear when "Chronicler's" text is compared to Palestinian Text of Sam-Kgs. a. This is because the Pal text which the "Chronicler" used is different from the MT. Comparisons of Sam-Kgs and Chronicles in Pal text types eliminate those biases. b. This explains and substantiates W. E. Lemke's observation that detailed comparisons of the MT in Sam-Kgs with the MT of Chronicles is methodologically unsound. 32 IV. THE GREEK AND HEBREW EVIDENCE. A. The editions of the LXX include: 1. The Cambridge LXX: The OT in Gr according to the text of Codex Vaticanus ( ): a. Vaticanus printed at top, but this text and the Old Gr are not identical. b. While Vaticanus is the single best witness it contains many secondary readings. c. Its value, as well as its weakness is that it collects a vast amount of evidence. 31 Klein, Textual Criticism, "The Synoptic Problem in the Chronicler's history," HTR 58 (1965), , esp., 362f; cf. J. R. Porter, "Old Testament Historigraphy," in Anderson, G. W. Tradition and Interpretation (Oxford: Clarendon, 1979),

15 d. Köhler: The Cambridge LXX "gives all the material and is indispensable for the master mariner of LXX research; for the cabin boy, however, and also for the seaman, it is but a roaring sea of variants in which he perishes." Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum graecum anctoritate Societatis (Academiae) Litterarum Gottingensis editum (The Göttingen LXX, incomplete, ): a. Different volumes in different years. b. Original plan: to reconstruct recensions of Origin, Lucian, and Hesychius in order to find the original LXX. c. Though this impossible, it represents best possible approximation of what the Old Gr must have been Septuaginta, id est Vetus Testamentum Graece iuxta LXX Interpretes (Rahlfs, 1935): Only serve a limited purpose since it is based on a narrow survey of mss (4th-5th uncials: Vaticanus, Sinaiticus, and Alexandrinus) Libri synoptici Veteris Testamenti (1931-4, edited by Primus Vannuteli): Best in isolated passages from the Psalms, Isaiah, Jer. But prints both MT and LXX making it very valuable in this sense. 36 B. LXX Mss include: 1. Papyri: Papyrus (10th century, cursive) ; Rylands Papyrus, Gr 458 (perhaps earliest copy of LXX, 2d century AD); Papyrus Fouad 266 (1st or 2d century BC). 2. One of its most interesting features is the tetragrammaton is not rendered by kurios, but instead by the Hebrew letters hwhy the so called Aramaic script Cf. Klein, Textual Criticism, Klein, Textual Criticism, Klein, Textual Criticism, Klein, Textual Criticism, Klein, Textual Criticism,

16 3. Uncials: 14th to 10th centuries. Codex Vaticanus (B); Codex Sinaticus (Aleph or S); Codex Alexandrinus (A); Codex Bodleianus (I); Codex Marchalianus (Q); Codex Washintonianus (W). 4. Ancient Versions: Early translations of Greek into other languages. These "daughter" translations are a help but for most students too difficult. They have two other weaknesses: (1) are available only in adequate editions; (2) the translation may either be too literal or too free. Include: a. Old Latin or Itala: Help identify pre-hexaplaric readings. b. Coptic: Dialects of late Egyptian. Oldest, 3d c., kaige. c. Syro-Hexaplar: 5th column of Hexapla, translated into Syriac. C. Reconstructing the LXX. 1. The Gottingen LXX is one of the great achievements of biblical research in 20th century. 2. For books unavailable in this edition, students use Rahlfs or reconstruct using the Cambridge LXX. V. GENERAL PRINCIPLES IN DOING TEXTUAL CRITICISM. A. Should not automatically resort to LXX when MT seems difficult. 1. The Heb text may have been difficult to the translators. 2. The LXX has superior readings for clear MT passages. B. The MT and textual criticism Problems with BHK and BHS Both do not cite all the variants. 2. Both have textual notes based on an assumed corrupt MT. 3. The notes often focus only on one word or expression. 4. BHK has numerous errors. 5. The critical apparatus must be used critically. 6. These problems have elicited the following responses from B. J. Roberts: For overview of the problem see Harrison, Introduction, 250ff. 39 "Textual Transmission," in Tradition and Interpretation,

17 a. "When we realize that so much trouble has been taken with procuring a true Ben Asher text for the Hebrew, and that the notoriously complicated Massoretic notes are so carefully added, and that another additional volume of Massora is to be published, one is dismayed at the way the all important apparatus criticus is cavalierly treated." b. "The task of producing an edited text should surely be entrusted to scholars (preferably a board of scholars) expert in the Versions and able to manipulate them, both as historical documents and in their relationship with the Massoretic text and its antecedents." c. "Critical editions of the Septuagint and New Testament text are scrupulously worked over by specialist boards; the Old Testament could also be vastly improved by a similar procedure." C. The LXX and textual criticism--problems. 1. The original text must be reconstructed. 2. Variations arising from translators must be eliminated. 3. When it is determined an LXX translator knew an alternate Heb text, it must then be determined whether his or MT is superior. 4. Must make allowances for departures from strict literalism. a. Question whether or not the translator had access to a different text from the MT b. LXX has errors due to faulty Heb Mss, misunderstanding of a text, or inadequate knowledge of Hebrew. 5. An added difficulty in producing the Vorlage. a. A Hebrew word can be translated by many Greek words. b. But, also, one Greek word can stand for several Hebrew words. c. Must determine whether variations are true variants or due to translators "ineptitude." d. Hatch and Redpath can determine all Greek words used for any Hebrew equivalent. 6. Must watch for paraphrastic style that does not presuppose a different Heb text. 17

18 7. Which reading is preferred? a. Pent Sp assumed to be local Palestinian type. (1) The Lxx shows relationship to this text type. (2) The MT had a separate history--babylonian? (3) The Babylonian--selected for the Pentateuch. (a) (b) Reading in LXX and SP against MT is not necessarily superior. But agreement between LXX and MT against SP is important. b. Samuel MT is poor, but its reconstruction is facilitated by access to other local text traditions. c. Isaiah The LXX Isaiah is from a different textual tradition than MT. (1) Yet it shows expansionist tendencies. The LXX translators had tendency to expand and paraphrase. (2) Thus difficult to be sure of what the Vorlage was. 8. External considerations A variant in Dead Sea Scrolls, SP, or LXX is more valuable than a targum--the MT should be changed cautiously. 9. Internal considerations. a. Choose the reading which best explains the others. b. Shorter reading is preferred. c. The more difficult reading is preferred. 10. Errors in transmission. a. Unintentional: confusion of letters, words, etc., omissions such as homoeoteleuton (= similar ending), homoeoarchton (= similar beginning), haplography (= single writing), Dittography, etc. b. Intentional: changes in spelling, grammar, harmonization, conflation, filling out names, expansions, removal of difficult expressions, replacement of rare words with common ones. VI. SUMMARY. 18

19 A. Generally speaking, before the Dead Sea Scrolls. B. Attitudes have varied with progress. C. The relation of the LXX to the traditional HT was not presupposed before Origen. 1. Origen took a middle of the road, while Jerome, being bolder, based his Vulgate on the Heb. 2. The Reformation and the decline of the Vulgate reopened critical studies in the OT. 3. In the 17th century textual critics recognized the importance of the agreement of the LXX and the SP against the HT. 4. Gesenius' conclusion was accepted by scholars of Swete's time, viz., that such agreement indicated a common origin earlier than the MT; while their disagreement indicated that the text of the Law existed in more than one recension. 5. The conclusion now drawn: while the Heb Bible represents a textus receptus fixed before the middle of the 2d century, no official text was held in undisputed possession in the 1st century. Mulder elaborates:... if different text-forms are found within the community of Qumran, one may assume that comparable situations may have existed outside that community in the centuries before and in the century after the beginning of the Common Era. The variety of text-forms may even point in the direction of a variety of texts. It is a remarkable fact that the biblical texts originating from other places in the Judaean desert, which are for the most part younger than the writings of Qumran, almost exclusively reflect... the tradition of the MT. These pre-masoretic texts demonstrate that the MT as we now know it was already developing in the last centuries before the beginning of the Common Era. An Urtext of the biblical books has never existed.... Textual criticism can therefore never aim at reconstructing an Urtext. It highest achievable end is the reconstruction of the biblical text in the form in which it was current during a certain period. During every period there have been text-forms which differed from each other qualitatively.... The text which we now call the MT is 67 undoubtedly--in Tov's words the best Hebrew representative of one of the texts that was current in the fourth-third century B.C. Another representative of a similar text is the LXX. `These texts can be considered accurate in the sense that after a certain point in time (4th-3rd century B.C.?) relatively few changes were introduced. By contrast, such changes were made in less accurately transmitted traditions that were open to changes, such as the Samaritan Pentateuch, several Qumran scrolls..., and the Severus Scroll Thus Tov considers the MT, the sampent and the LXX not merely as types of texts but texts. According to him... 19

20 there were at Qumran not only the text-forms of the LXX, the SamPent and the MT, but at least one and perhaps as many as three others. The relation between these four (or six?) texts is characteristic of the relation between all early witnesses. In other words: the Qumran finds can no longer be reduced to the triple relationship of the MT, SamPent and LXX either, even although many (Western) scholars are inclined to do so. What we now call the masoretic text appears to have been a Hebrew text which as authoritative in many respects and whose transmission was surrounded with great care in the Jewish world, even in sectarian groups, several centuries before the beginning of the Common Era, and thus also several centuries before the beginning of the activities of the actual Masoretes.... In addition to it, other texts have existed, sometimes diverging greatly from the MT, which must have been authoritative in certain circles or in certain places, even alongside the official versions (Qumran) Tove, The Text, 184ff. 6. The textual critic must do two things. a. Must get behind the official text and recover the various recensions. b. The textual critic must assume that the differences between the Gr and Heb text can no longer be accounted for in terms of the LXX rendering the true reading. D. More specifically, after the Dead Sea Scrolls. 1. While the LXX can be used to translate back into the Vorlage as a comparative, it is no longer considered superior to MT in every case. a. The Dead Sea Scrolls changed that by revealing that many departures rest on real variants. b. It is now a more complicated problem, for the MT is held in greater esteem than before. 2. Lagarde's hypothesis of the possibility of reconstructing the original LXX through the various recensions, proved to be an over-simplification, though it is still accepted in certain fundamentals. 3. Kahle and Sperber, due to their belief that there was not a variety of recensions of a single translation, but a variety of independent translations 40 Martin Jan. Mulder, "The Transmission of the Biblical Text," in Mikra, M. J. Mulder, ed. (Philadelphia-Assen-Maastricht: Van Gorcum/Fortress, 1988),

21 (targums), believed that the LXX was of little value in reconstructing an early Heb text. 4. The Dead Sea Scrolls and further research has proven Kahle's thesis wrong. a. Cross argues in a modified way that there were 3 textual families. (1) Palestine characterized by conflations, is expansionistic. (2) Babylonian short, conservative, few revisions, etc. (3) Egyptian not always a full text, not as short as Bab. b. But Talmon criticizes the above: (1) A synthesis of previous theories and a yet to be proved, or unprovable, hypothesis. (2) Asserts the question to be answered with regard to the history of the OT does not arise from the plurality of text types but from the disappearance of other and more numerous textual traditions. (3) The OT text was known in a variety of traditions which differentiated from each other. As some of these were eliminated the TR emerged. 5. The value of the Dead Sea Scrolls: a. New respect for the MT--furnish evidence for a text type close to the MT. b. Offers new possibilities for reconstruction of factors underlying textual variations. c. Allow scholars to verify principles which before were established by inference. d. The problems of textual criticism are intricate and variable due to the diversity and Kaleidscoping textual traditions. e. In short, the Scrolls have forced new issues, the changing of hypotheses, and the redevelopment of tools for textual criticism. f. The use of the LXX is now a much more complicated critical task than here-to-fore. 21

22 6. Should remember that the various recensions were attempts to bring the current Gr translation into closer harmony with the Heb original Why not, Jellicoe asks, view the LXX as literature in its own right? a. "A fresh approach to the LXX studies might be occasioned by viewing the LXX as literature in its own right rather than a mere translation. The `translational' approach, all too common in the past, has tended to reduce the LXX to the status of a tool in the hand of the philologist and exegete. Consciously or unconsciously the study of the versions has become a means to an end rather than an end in itself, and ability to satisfy the equation `LXX = MT' or `LXX = a reading superior to MT,' has been in large part the determinant of success." b. "Could we, for a time, set aside the conception of the LXX as a translation... and treat it, like the New Testament, as a piece of Greek literature in its own right, applying to it the same canons of criticism as obtain for the New, we should proceed on sounder lines, and ultimately be more successful in establishing the archetype than by supposing that we must seek the sources of recensions and variants in accommodation to a changing Hebrew text." VII. PRACTICING TEXTUAL CRITICISM: A SUMMARY. A. Must sift and criticize the textual evidence. B. Do this by employing 13 guiding principles in determining the original text all of which balance each other The age of the text a mss is more significant than the age of the manuscript itself. 2. Readings supported by ancient witnesses, however, especially from different groups, are generally preferable. 3. The reconstruction of the history of a variant is basic to judgment about it. 4. The quality rather than quantity of witnesses is more important in determining a reading. 5. Identity of readings, particularly in errors, implies identity of origin. 41 Jellicoe, The Septuagint, 352, Price, Ancestry, 221, cf. ISBE,

23 6. The shorter reading is generally preferable. 7. The more difficult reading is generally preferable. 8. Readings which bear the earmarks of stylistic or other improvements are suspect. 9. Readings which bear the earmarks of doctrinal controversy are suspect. 10. Variants combining the appearance of improvement with the absence of its reality are suspect. 11. The reading is preferred which best suits the author's characteristic tendencies. 12. The reading is preferred which best explains the origin of all other variants in a given passage. 13. In parallel texts differing readings are preferred. C. The family, genealogy, of a Mss also must be taken into consideration with these 13 rules. D. Summary of the process is as follows: 1. Individual readings and the authorities for them are studied. 2. An estimate is formed of the character of the various authorities. 3. Effort is made to group the sources as descendants of a common ancestor. 4. Individual readings are then studied in the light of their ancestry and relationship to each other. E. Textual criticism is necessary because, due to the providence of God, we have not till this point, nor probably shall we ever, retrieve a single autograph. 1. Human nature being what it is, people would worship the thing! 2. E.g., the Shroud of Turin! 3. And yet, the word of God is recovered, studied, proclaimed. 4. We must remember: a. All copies of Bible outside the original languages are translations. b. In particular, even the original Greek in the NT is but a "copy" of God's covenant with us (Jer 31:33)! 23