Biblical Hebrew Forum

[c stirling bartholomew <cc.constantine AT worldnet.att.net>]

on 11/11/01 9:50 PM, Walter Mattfeld wrote:

> I have the book, Did Moses Speak Attic ? It DOES NOT address the claim that
> the Greek written Septuagint was the first bible and that the Hebrew is a
> later version of a Greek original.

Walter,

This does not surprise me. I have never seen *that* question addressed in
exactly that form. It does sound sort of like a joke, does it not?

> From some cursory investigations into the Septuagint on my own, I note that
> many professional scholars who have studied the Septuagint have noted that
> it does differ from the Hebrew text. But careful investigations and
> comparisons suggest that the Septuagint is a "paraphrasing" of a Hebrew
> original and not vice-a-versa.

The relationship between the LXX and the MT is intriguing. Have read a lot
of what E. Tov has had to say about it.  I have his MT/LXX database
(Accordance) which I always use when working in the LXX. I think that the
question really needs to be addressed book by book. Certainly Genesis and
Jeremiah have little in common.Then there is LXX Daniel (OG), a book I have
recently studied. Comparing the readings in Daniel OG to the MT and
Theodotian was a very educational process. Most of the standard remarks made
in the textbooks about LXX Daniel (OG) don't really stand up well under
close scrutiny. It isn't just a "bad" translation, the problem is a lot more
interesting than that.

Thanks for explaining what  "Did Moses Speak Attic ?" is all about. The
title is obviously a ruse but if your description is correct the titles of
some of the articles are a bit misleading as well.
 
Greetings, 

Clay


--  
Clayton Stirling Bartholomew
Three Tree Point
P.O. Box 255 Seahurst WA 98062