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The Septuagint and Its Literary-Critical Value

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The Septuagint and Its Literary-Critical Value 475 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXI N° 5-6, september-december 2004 476 THE SEPTUAGINT AND ITS LITERARY-CRITICAL this article a concise critical introduction to the complete edi- VALUE ACCORDING TO EMANUEL TOV*) tion. The third contribution “A Computerized Database for Sep- MICHAËL N. VAN DER MEER**) tuagint Research” originally formed a presentation of work in progress during the Septuagint conference held in Madrid One of the leading authorities in the field of the history of 1983. Now, twenty years later, it is published again in an the text of the Hebrew Bible, its ancient manuscripts (partic- extensively revised and updated form. The chapter offers a ularly those from Qumran) and translations (especially the manual to the parallel-aligned Hebrew-Greek database in the Old Greek or Septuagint version) is Emanuel Tov, professor Computer Assisted Tools for Septuagint Studies (CATSS) emeritus of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem. Well-known now available in the Macintosh computer-program Accor- and widely used among biblical scholars are his standard dance. works on Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible (second, In chapter 4 “Glosses, Interpolations, and Other Types revised edition Minneapolis / Assen 2001) and on The Text- of Scribal Additions in the Text of the Hebrew Bible” Critical Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research (revised (1994), Tov discusses the textual elements in the Hebrew and enlarged second edition Jerusalem 1997). The Greek and Bible that are usually regarded by biblical scholars as Hebrew Bible offers a companion volume to these handbooks Glosses or interpolations in the text, which were at a later and contains a collection of thirty-eight essays on the Septu- stage integrated into the main text, comparable to the agint written by Tov over a period of three decades. Many glossa and scholia in Sumerian and Akkadian texts and essays have had a great impact on the study of the Septuagint Classical Greek and Latin manuscripts. While the Greek and the history of the text of the Hebrew Bible, especially the and Latin texts provide only very rare evidence for this essays dealing with the literary history of biblical books such alleged process of text accretion, the Hebrew biblical man- as Jeremiah, Samuel, and Joshua. uscripts do not provide such evidence at all. The many Like the aforementioned handbooks the essays have been interlinear textual elements in the Qumran scrolls are not revised, enlarged and updated. Unfortunately, Tov has not clarifications, but corrections. Although many explanatory marked his editorial improvements. The essays have not been elements in the Hebrew text (such as geographical clarifi- arranged chronologically, but are grouped around certain top- cations) may be regarded as secondary elements, they are ics, such as lexicography (section II), translation technique not to be regarded, according to Tov, as isolated instances and exegesis (section III), the text-critical and redaction-crit- of interpolations, but as elements of a comprehensive re- ical value of the Septuagint (sections IV and V) and the revi- edition of a given book (Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Joshua). The sions of the Septuagint (section VI). Given the importance of present essay thus plays an important role in Tov’s double these studies and their impact on Septuagint research, a care- editions theory with respect to the literary history of the ful and critical discussion of each of these essays is justified. Hebrew Bible. The first essay “The Rabbinic Tradition concerning the In his review article of G. Veltri’s “Eine Tora für den ‘Alterations’ Inserted into the Greek Translation of the Torah König Talmai” (1995), Tov critizes Veltri — among other and Their Relation to the Original Text of the Septuagint” things — for not discussing the pre-Christian revisions of the (previously published in 1984) offers a discussion of some Septuagint in his thesis that the rejection of the Septuagint fifteen passages in the Pentateuch where, according to vari- by the rabbi’s took place only at a relatively late date. ous rabbinic sources, the rabbis altered the original Greek text. A study of these rabbinical emendations of the Septu- The second section, ‘Lexicography’, contains three stud- agint is hindered by the fact that the lists are not uniform and ies dealing with the prolegomena of a Lexicon of the Septu- therefore require a study of their own. Furthermore not every agint, one of the many projects Tov has been involved in. In retroverted Hebrew text in the rabbinic lists corresponds to “Some Thoughts on a Lexicon of the Septuagint” (chapter an extant Greek version of the same passage. Tov argues that 7, 1976), Tov explores the need for a Greek lexicon devoted these variant Hebrew readings in rabbinic literature in fact particularly to the literature of the Greek Old Testament, the reflect the original Old Greek text as opposed to all extant scope, and the intended public of such a lexicon. witnesses to the Septuagint text, a thesis that has found little Tov argues that “Three Dimensions of Words in the Sep- support in Septuagint scholarship. According to Tov, the tuagint” (chapter 6, 1976), should be discerned: [1] the alleged changes are in fact due to the translation technique meaning of the Greek word in secular Greek literature, [2] of the Greek translators or, alternatively, are misinterpreta- the meaning attached to it by the Greek translators who often tions of the Greek text by the rabbis. used the same Greek lexeme for various senses which rather The second contribution contains the introduction to “The reflect the semantic of the Hebrew than their natural Greek Fifth Fascicle of Margolis’ The Book of Joshua in Greek” meaning and reflect the stereotyping concordant translation (1981). This last fascicle of the critical edition of the Septu- technique of most Greek translations, and [3] the post-Sep- agint of Joshua by Max Margolis was prepared between 1931 tuagintal meaning attached to the word in patristic literature and 1938, but due to the Second World War was never pub- and daughter translations. In Tov’s approach to Septuagint lished and afterwards considered lost. Tov rediscovered it in lexicography full emphasis is placed on the second stage. 1980 in the Archives of the Dropsie College and provides in The problem of “Greek words and Hebrew meanings” is explored in a contribution to the ‘Melbourne Symposium on Septuagint Lexicography’ (chapter 8, 1990). Tov studies the *) E. TOV, The Greek and Hebrew Bible. Collected Essays on the Sep- meanings of four groups of Greek Septuagint lexemes tuagint. (Supplements to Vetus Testamentum, LXXII) E.J. Brill Publishers (dikaíwma, ömologéw and derivatives, êpifanßv and N.V., Leiden / Boston / Köln 1999. (24 cm, xxxviii, 570) ISBN 90 04 11309 ôrqríhwn) and makes clear that reference to the underlying 6; ISSN 0083-5889. $ 199.00 / / 169.00. tpwm edve arvn jkwe **) Leiden University. Hebrew lexemes ( , , , ) is indispensable 477 THE SEPTUAGINT AND ITS LITERARY-CRITICAL VALUE ACCORDING TO EMANUEL TOV 478 for a proper understanding of the otherwise unusual meaning For a long time scholars had postulated a certain amount of the Greek equivalents. of “Impact of the Septuagint Translation of the Torah on the Translation of the Other Books” (chapter 12, 1981). By The third section offers various contributions to the field means of long computer-generated lists of vocabulary shared of translation-technique and exegesis in the Greek Old Tes- by the Greek Pentateuch and later Greek translations, Tov tament. The history of this type of research is discussed in substantiates this impression. The cumulative strength of the chapter 16 “The Nature and Study of the Translation Tech- large number of examples and especially the examples of nique of the Septuagint” (1987) ‘in the past and present’ with influence on the exegetical level gives the essay its convinc- special attention to the pioneer studies published in 1841 by ing force. Thiersch and Z. Frankel. In chapter 18 Tov explains his reluctant attitude to alleged As argued by Tov, text-critical use of the Septuagint “Theologically Motivated Exegesis Embedded in the Septu- should start with distinguishing between variants and non- agint” (1990): a theology of the Septuagint as envisaged by variants. Non-variants may result from limitations in the com- Ziegler and put into practice in the Theologisches Wörter- petence of the Greek translators, as studied by Tov in chap- buch zum Neuen Testament fails to do justice to the fact that ter 14 “Did the Septuagint Translators Always Understand the Greek Old Testament is a very heterogeneous collection Their Hebrew Text?” (1984). of different translations. Nevertheless, several theologically Other examples of non-variants are the renderings of the motivated renderings can be detected within the individual Hebrew text for the sake of interpretation or theological con- translation units, and Tov provides a number of examples, cerns. In chapter 10 “Midrash-Type Exegesis in the Septu- such as the messianic interpretations in LXX-Numbers 24, agint of Joshua” (1978), Tov examines a number of exam- the theologoumena in LXX-Isaiah, and the avoidance of ples of exegesis in the Greek Joshua, introduced either by the antropomorphic renderings, with respect to the metaphor of Greek translator or earlier on the Hebrew level. Yet, the ques- God as rock. tion arises whether it is legitimate to separate these instances of interpretative renderings in the Greek Joshua from the The fourth and fifth sections deal with ‘The Septuagint and many other examples and whether it is necessary to postulate the Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible’ and ‘The Septu- an additional Hebrew exegetical layer between the original agint and the Literary Criticism of the Hebrew Bible’ respec- Hebrew as preserved in the MT and the Greek version. tively. In order to reduce the amount of subjectivity inherent to In chapter 19 “The Textual Affiliations of 4QSama” the distinction between variants and non-variants, Tov and (1979), Tov presents an extensive review article of Eugene others have developed computer-assisted tools that help quan- Ulrich’s The Qumran Text of Samuel and Josephus (1978).
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