[B-Greek] EI in Heb 3:11 & Psa 94:11 LXX

Elizabeth Kline kline_dekooning at earthlink.net
Tue Mar 25 00:01:56 EDT 2008


On Mar 24, 2008, at 2:30 PM, Albert Pietersma wrote:

> On Mar 24, 2008, at 4:38 PM, Elizabeth Kline wrote:
>> HEB. 3:11 hWS WMOSA EN THi ORGHi MOU: EI EISELEUSONTAI EIS THN
>> KATAPAUSIN MOU.
>>
>> Here we see an example of translation according to habit rather than
>> according to meaning. EI is often used to translate the hebrew 'im
>> when it functions as a conditional particle. However, in the cases
>> where 'im is used as a negative particle EI is used not because it
>> renders the meaning of 'im in that context. Apparently the translator
>> of the PSA 94 LXX used EI because it was the "stereotypical"
>> translation equivalent for 'im. This sort of translation technique
>> explains a lot of the semantic idiosyncrasies of the LXX.
> To complicate matters further, EI also appears very often for  
> Hebrew interrogative "H", which some regard as evidence for EI  
> introducing a direct question.
> Al

Thank you Al. All of this supports the notion that 'semitisims' is  
too broad a category for any useful discussion of LXX idioms. What is  
required is an understanding how the translators the particular LXX  
book in question went about doing their work. I think Tov has  
addressed this in several of his works. It is also interesting to  
look at the translation process of Greek to Syriac in the gospels. I  
seem to recall a professor from St Andrews, Peter Williams (??) did a  
dissertation on this but I don't have the title handy.

Elizabeth Kline







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