Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Timothy Lawson <lostntym8 AT hotmail.com>]

Dear Stephen,

  Thank you for your reply!

You say: "Style (or "poor grammatical construction") is a perilous basis for this kind of argument - especially in a case like this, where we are talking about a highly special word/construction, which the author is likely to treat with particular reverence. That is, (1) how are we to know just how awkward-sounding a particular Greek phrase would have been to a Second Temple bilingual Jewish ear? and (2) Even if it was awkward grammar in certain contexts, mightn't that have been considered appropriate for such a sacred phrase?"

It is not clear to me what you mean by "perilous" but I think you help me along in my observation that there is something special going on in these clunky phrases that include κύριος ο θεός. And the fact that the Tetragrammaton appears in the MT where the hand of the scribe/translator is applied at these points should draw our attention. BDAG and other great minds intimate that κύριος seems to have the status of a personal name - יהוה. If there is truth in this, if it has such a meaning then what is wrong in translating as such?

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From: sshead.email AT gmail.com
Date: Mon, 10 Jun 2013 10:32:23 +1000
Subject: Re: G. Geroux and the Name
To: lostntym8 AT hotmail.com
CC: bjwvmw AT com-pair.net; rolf.furuli AT sf-nett.no; b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Dear Scott,

You said to Bryant:
>>    The information you present is interesting but seemingly not directly related to the point I made that κύριος ο θεός by its poor grammatical construction which also appears in the NT text. This may be a possible indication that YHVH has been removed from the Greek of the LXX.

Style (or "poor grammatical construction") is a perilous basis for this kind of argument - especially in a case like this, where we are talking about a highly special word/construction, which the author is likely to treat with particular reverence. That is, (1) how are we to know just how awkward-sounding a particular Greek phrase would have been to a Second Temple bilingual Jewish ear? and (2) Even if it was awkward grammar in certain contexts, mightn't that have been considered appropriate for such a sacred phrase?

The fact that the LXX is a translation makes it even more perilous. Either the original translators chose κύριος ο θεός, or a later copyist did. Either way, the person who made this choice was at least a Greek speaker (maybe native, maybe bilingual, maybe not). If it's clunky grammar, presumably they could have picked a grammatically smoother construction, but chose not to, for whatever reason. Why is it more likely that a later copyist would have made this choice, rather than an earlier translator?

Best regards,

Stephen.