Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Jewish Revisionism and Attempted Corruptions

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: shella <shella AT cswnet.com>
  • To: old-school-baptist AT onelist.com, baptist AT MyList.net, Biblical Hebrew <b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu>
  • Subject: Jewish Revisionism and Attempted Corruptions
  • Date: Sat, 23 Oct 1999 10:34:09 -0700

Dear Brothers and Sisters, newer friends and older friends: I am very thankful  to be studying this important subject.  The history of Old Testament Textual Criticism is almost a forgotten subject among modern Christians, esp., the conservatives among the modern Baptist groups.  However, I am happy to know that there some who are willing to view the larger and more general picture of Old Testament textual criticisms and its relationship to the recensions and translations from the ancient Hebrew Text in early Christian history and how these texts have come to us today and from whom..

Since this is the weekend, I will not post up any additional remarks on this important subject, except this one which will not add anything to what I have already said, but merely summarize and give a brief over view of the subject as I understand it and have presented it.

1. I have given a brief history of the development of the ancient Hebrew into the Mishnaic Hebrew of the post exile period, and still later into the Masoretic Hebrew of the post Christian era; 
2. In this development of Mishnaic Hebrew I have given some of the Aramaic reasons for this evolution in the Hebrew language and the influence of the Hellenistic Greek culture because of the Dispersa, esp. those who were among the leaders in civil and religious life in Alexandria.  Because of these, the Hellenistic or ancient Pre Christ LXX became a reality. However, this pre Christ Lxx, the same one Ben Sira first published and later his grandson published by at least 132 B.C. (see The Jewish Encyclopedia, Ktav edition, volume dealing with Bible Translations, page 186,) soon became a curse to the Jewish and Hebrew people due to two reasons:
  1.) It did not agree in many cases with the newer recension from the ancient Hebrew text (gathered by Ezra and the other members of the Great Assembly) known as the Text of the Sopherim; (the Sopherim is not the later MT but was one of the texts used to develop the MT)
  2) The New Religion (Christianity) adopted it as their official Old Testament Text, and as the Gentile Church at Antioch translated the Old Testament into other languages most notably the old Italic or what later is known as the Waldensian Bible in distinction from Jerome's Latin Vulgate which came from the Alexandrian Texts developed later under Origin's influence and those of his friend and helper, Ambrose, used the pre Christ LXX for this purpose. The Pre Christ LXX became the foundational Old Testament for the entire Christian world, both West in Latin and East in Greek, among the dissenters, up to the time of the Protestant Reformation and the growing influence of Puritanism. The established Christian Churches, both East and West did not use the pre Christ LXX but the corrupted LXX's based upon Origin's adoption of Aquila and later Jerome's adoption of the Alexandrian Aquila-Origin Old Testament, a corrupted LXX.

Therefore because the new Religion used the pre Christ LXX in its debates with the Jewish apologists, Jewish and Hebrew leaders became aware of the need to do two things:

1)  Corrupt or change the existing LXX, the Pre Christ LXX.  This they did starting with Aquila (about 140 AD) and then three others up to the fourth century;

2) Produce a new Hebrew Text to replace the older Greek LXX and serve as a standard text for all the Jewish and Hebrew people. The Text of the Sopherim was no longer usable it seems because it was not generally available for the Jewish and Hebrew people. This text is what we know today as the Masoretic Text or the M T.

3) Reclaim the Hebrew and Jewish people away from all Helenistic infleunce and began a very closed ethnic existence that would have very little interchange with the Gentiles and other languages.  This would also result in a new attitude toward Old Testament tranlsations, there would be no more.  This held true until later attempts following the Protestant Reformation when certain persons began to translate the Hebrew text, now the M T, into other languages.

As I go onward, the Lord Willing, I will show the attempted Jewish corruptions of the LXX and then also the development of the newer Hebrew Text called the Masoretic Text.  I will also show from the Jewish scholars how that the Masoretic text was changed in several places from the older Hebrew and the ancient LXX as well, and by whom.  This was for the purpose of providing the Jewish apologists with a foundation to deal with the Christian writers and defenders of the New Religion in the many and often severe debates between the Jews and Christians during the first three centuries of the Christian era.

So to conclude so far here is what I am saying:

1) During the second century onward, the Jewish leaders tried to corrupt the historic LXX by producing new and corrupted versions of the LXX and lead their people away from all Hellenistic influence;

2) Provide a newer Hebrew Text which would differ considerably from both the LXX and the ancient Hebrew Text canonized by the Great Assembly, when dealing with the prophetic expectations of a promised personal Messiah, His kingdom and His relationship with and Conversion of the Gentiles.

This is going to finalize in our treatment of the Book of Daniel and in particular his predictions of the 70 weeks in chapter nine.  Has the 69th and the 70th weeks been separated or not?  Additional expectations must be considered as they are quoted in the New Testament and as they came either from the ancient Hebrew Text, not the MT, or the ancient LXX.

My purpose is not to reject the M T, but to realize its value and its short comings along with those of the historic LXX and bring in as many historic Old Testament Texts as we have available to us, including these two and the historic old Italic and the Samaritan Pentatuch as well.

May the Lord bless us all in our studies of these important subjects.
 

Debtor.
 



Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page