[B-Greek] Why does GNT Hebrews quote from LXX and not proto-MT?
Philip Engmann
phil-eng at ighmail.com
Wed Mar 17 09:44:27 EST 2004
Dear B-Greekers,
I guess I have had the erroneous idea that since the Greek New Testament
writers (being native Hebrews), specifically the Writer to the Hebrews,
quoted from the LXX and not from the proto-MT texts, then the LXX was
somehow a more preferred or accurate or authentic text, in the writers
view, than the proto-MT texts available to the writer at the time.
But this theory fails for several reasons which many of you have kindly
pointed out (and I quote in some cases);
1. "it's because both the authors of NT works and the
target audiences of those works did not read/speak Hebrew and knew/read
the Hebrew Scriptures only in Greek translation". i.e., "The author of
Hebrews was probably a Hellenistic Jew who may not have known much
Hebrew".
2. The differences between the LXX and the proto-MT are
fairly minor, specifically for the OT quotations in the GNT book of
Hebrews; and LXX was adequate.
3. Ancient translations of the New Testament such as the
Syriac, usually quote from their translation of the Old Testament rather
than the Hebrew. This suggests that it was simply the custom to use the
version the readers were most accustomed to.
Thanks,
Philip Engmann (phil-eng at ighmail.com)
As your examples show, the author of Hebrews used the LXX, but do not
jump
to the conclusion that this necessarily holds for other NT books. The
author
of Hebrews was probably a Hellenistic Jew who may not have known much
Hebrew.
Iver Larsen
More information about the B-Greek
mailing list