Mission To Alexandria

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It often comes as a surprise to laypeople to learn that ancient copies of the Bible vary, sometimes in minor ways, but sometimes, also, in important ways. Variation exists between any two manuscripts of the Bible, even when they are written in the same language. But apart from minor variations among ancient manuscripts, when all the evidence from antiquity is compared, two important traditions of the biblical text emerge. They are the Masoretic text and the Septuagint. The Masoretic text (MT, for short) is the Hebrew text as standardized by Jewish scribes in the tenth century A.D. Although our oldest extant copy of the MT is about a hundred years later, the texts these scribes worked with were obviously much older than the tenth century A.D. and were directly linked to still earlier texts, as we now know from the Dead Sea Scrolls.

The Septuagint, often referred to as LXX, is a translation of one form of the Hebrew Bible into Greek. It is the source of this version with which we will be concerned in this article. The earliest surviving complete copies of this Greek Septuagint date to the fourth and fifth centuries A.D. As we shall see, the translation itself was made in the third century B.C., and the Hebrew manuscripts on which the translation was based are even earlier. Moreover, it is clear that the Hebrew texts on which the Septuagint was based varied considerably from the Hebrew Bible that has come down to us in the MT. Sometimes, scholars prefer the reading in the MT; other times, the reading in the LXX seems more reliable.

Our interest here, however, is not in the MT or even the LXX as such, but rather in a famous document, called the Letter of Aristeas, that tells us how the Septuagint came into being.

The Letter of Aristeas purports to be written in the Egyptian metropolis of Alexandria by a certain Aristeas to a certain philocrates, whom he calls his “brother.” The subject is how the Pentateuch—in Hebrew, the Torah, the Five Books of Moses—happened to be translated from Hebrew into Greek. According to the letter, the intellectually curious Ptolemy II (Philadelphus) (285–247 B.C.), who ruled his empire from Alexandria, wanted his librarian Demetrius to assemble a library containing a copy of every book in the world. When Demetrius had collected over 200,000 books, he so advised the king, adding 035that he hoped to increase the number soon to 500,000. Among the books still missing was “the lawbooks of the Jews [which] are worth translation and inclusion in your royal library” (verse 10).¹

The king replied, “What is there to prevent you from doing this? Everything for your needs has been put at your disposal” (verse 11).

Demetrius replied, “Translation is needed. They use letters characteristic of the language of the Jews, just as Egyptians use the formation of their letters in accordance with their own language.”

The king then ordered a letter to be written in his name to Eleazar, the high priest of the Jews in Jerusalem. At the same time, the king ordered the release of over 100,000 Jews forcibly removed to Egypt some years earlier by the king’s father. In Ptolemy’s letter to the high priest, Eleazar was requested to dispatch 72 men skilled in the law (six from each of the 12 tribes) to Alexandria to make an accurate translation of the law into Greek. The translators were to be “elders of exemplary lives, with the experience of the law and ability to translate it.”

In reply, Eleazar wrote:

“Eleazar the high priest to King Ptolemy, dear friend, greeting. Good health to you and to Queen Arsinoe, your sister and to your children … On receipt of your letter we rejoiced greatly because of your purpose and noble plan … we selected elders, honorable men and true, six from each tribe, whom we have sent with the law in their possession” (verses 41–42, 46).

When the translators arrived in Alexandria, they were accorded unusual honor:

“The king was anxious to meet the members of the deputation, so he gave orders to dismiss all the other court officials and to summon these delegates. The unprecedented nature of this step was very clear to all, because it was an established procedure that important bona fide visitors should be granted an audience with the king only four days after arrival, while representatives of kings or important cities are [were] rarely admitted to the court within thirty days. However, he deemed the present arrivals to be deserving of greater honor, having regard to the preeminence of him who had sent them. So he dismissed all the officials whom he considered superfluous and remained walking among the delegates until he had greeted the whole delegation” (verses 174–175).

The translators showed the king the Hebrew scrolls they had brought with them, “fine skins on which the law had been written in letters of gold in Jewish characters; the parchment had been excellently worked, and the joining together of the letters was imperceptible” (verse 176). In response, the king did obeisance about seven times, and said, “I offer to you my thanks, gentlemen, and to him who sent you even more, and most of all to the God whose oracles these are” (verse 177).

The king then held a week-long series of banquets for the translators and set them up in “the finest apartments … near the citadel” (verse 181).

Three days later the librarian Demetrius took the 72 translators across a jetty to an island a mile out into the Mediterranean Sea. There the translators were installed in a sumptuous building to begin their labors. They completed their work in exactly 72 days (verses 301–307).

The resulting translation was then read to the local community of Jews, who acclaimed it with a great ovation (verse 308). The king rejoiced greatly because his purpose had been accomplished (verse 312). When the translation was read to him, “he marveled profoundly at the genius of the lawgiver” (verse 312). On the departure of the translators, he gave “to each one three robes or the finest materials, two talents of gold, a cup worth a talent, and complete furnishing for a dining room” (verse 319).

Before asking how reliable this account is, we should first ask whether we are working from an accurate copy of Aristeas’s letter. The Letter of Aristeas has survived in about two dozen medieval manuscripts. The earliest of these is from the 11th century A.D., more than a millennium after the document’s composition. To bridge that gap, scholars have sifted through the works of ancient Jewish authors (such as Philo, Josephus and rabbinic sources) and Christian writers (Justin, Jerome and Eusebius, for example) for any wording that might be an authentic fragment of the Letter of Aristeas. They have also carefully compared the medieval manuscripts of the letter. In this way, they have arrived at a Greek text that 036approaches, if it does not precisely duplicate, the original letter of Aristeas.

Although Aristeas claims to be an eyewitness to, even a participant in, the events he describes (which would mean he lived and wrote about 270 B.C.), there is virtually no scholar today who would uphold that claim. Dates anywhere from the late third century B.C. to the first century A.D. have been proposed for this document’s composition. Most scholars, however, now agree on the mid-second century B.C. as the most likely period for the composition of the letter.

The entire letter, now divided into 322 verses, is not long—about the size of the Gospel of John. Although the subject of the letter is, broadly speaking, the translation of the Law for the king’s library, very little space is devoted to the translation itself, only verses 9–11, 28–50 and 301–317. The rest of the letter is, however, more or less tangentially related to the translation. For example, verses 51–82 contain a detailed description of the gifts sent by the king to the High Priest Eleazar, and about a third of the work—from verse 187 to verse 294—is given over to a display of each translator’s wisdom.

The third-century Christian leader Eusebius used the title “Concerning the Translation of the Law of the Jews,” and this may have been the letter’s original title.² At the very least, Eusebius’s title preserves the topic that was of greatest interest to almost all ancient and modern readers.

Note that Aristeas claims that the impetus for the translation came not from the Jews, but from royal Egyptian authority. In support of this claim, some contemporary scholars make reference to Ptolemy’s documented interest in all sorts of literature, especially of subject peoples like the Jews. In addition, in Greek translation, the Law could serve as a sort of constitution for the semiautonomous Jewish community of Alexandria.³

Other scholars—who are now in the majority—disagree.⁴ They contend that it is much more likely that the Jewish community itself instigated the translation to serve their own liturgical and pedagogical needs. When scholars holding this position reinvestigate Ptolemy’s supposed interest in a Greek translation of Jewish Law, the evidence begins to evaporate.

Moreover, it seems unlikely that a translation instigated by an outside force could have gained so authoritative a position within the Jewish community, as the Septuagint did.

On the other hand, if we accept, as most modem researchers do, that the Letter of Aristeas was in reality composed by a Jew for a primarily Jewish audience, what possible motive would there be to invent the story of Ptolemy’s instigation of the project? More likely, Aristeas put this in the letter because it was too well known to be omitted.

On this important issue, we have to say that the scholarly jury is still out.

What about the actual process of translation described in the letter? Does it have the ring of probability, or does it seem farfetched and unrealistic? A careful examination of the passages dealing with this question suggests that the procedure is not only probable, but eminently workable. The 72 translators were given excellent working conditions: Demetrius “assembled them in a house which had been duly furnished near the shore—a magnificent building in a very quiet situation—and invited the men to carry out the work of translation, all that they would request being handsomely provided … The business of their meeting occupied them until the ninth hour [that is, 3:00 p.m.] of each day” (verse 303).

They worked from Hebrew manuscripts that had the approval and authority of the chief Jewish religious functionary, the high priest in Jerusalem.

The translators were distinguished and knowledgeable:

“Eleazar selected men of the highest merit and of excellent education due to the distinction of their parentage; they had not only mastered the Jewish literature, but had made a serious study of that of the Greeks as well. They were therefore well qualified for the embassy, and brought it to fruition as occasion demanded; they had a tremendous natural facility for the negotiations and questions arising from the Law, with the middle way as their commendable ideal; they forsook any uncouth and uncultured attitude of mind; in the same way they rose above conceit and contempt of other people, and instead engaged in discourse and listening to and answering each and every one, as is meet and right. They all observed these aims, and went further in wishing to excel each other in them; they were, one and all, worthy of their leader and his outstanding qualities” (verses 121–122).

The work was apparently divided up, for we are told that the translators compared the results with one another: “They set to completing their several tasks, reaching agreement among themselves on each by comparing versions” (verse 302). when they could not reach agreement by consensus, the majority ruled; we are told in the librarian Demetrius’s memorandum to the king 037(quoted in the letter) that 72 translators (six from each tribe) would be used and that the “text [would be] agreed [to] by the majority” (verse 32). In this way, Demetrius concluded, the “achievement of accuracy in the translation” would be assured, and “we may produce an outstanding version in a manner worthy both of the contents and of your purpose” (verse 32).

This procedure—individuals working on their own tasks and then comparing their work in order to produce a finished product—is in general exactly the way translation committees operate to this very day. Only the palatial surroundings and the uninterrupted work schedule separate the Alexandrian translators from their modern counterparts! “Handsomely provided” with “all that they would require,” the Jewish elders maintained a rapid pace: “The outcome was such that in 72 days the business of translation was completed” (verses 301, 307).

Such an accomplishment in 72 days was certainly no mean feat but lest there be any misunderstanding, it is important to point out that this translation included only the Torah, or the Five Books of Moses. The letter repeatedly refers to “the lawbooks of the Jews (verse 10),” “the Law of the Jews (verse 30),” “legislation, as could be expected from its divine nature, [that] is very philosophical and genuine (verse 31).” This is unambiguous evidence that only the Pentateuch was involved. On this point, there is no uncertainty in the letter or disagreement among modern scholars. At a later date, the rest of the books of the Hebrew scripture, as well as the Apocrypha, were translated into Greek, and today references to the Septuagint often include the entire collection. (Early Christian writers were the first to use the term Septuagint in this more expanded meaning. Among them, Jerome (best known for his Vulgate, or Latin translation of the Bible) was virtually alone in maintaining the original Jewish understanding that the Pentateuch alone was the subject of the Letter of Aristeas.)

Returning to the Letter of Aristeas, the author apparently realized that it was more than a coincidence that 72 translators completed their task in exactly 72 days. It is, he says, “as if such a result was achieved by some deliberate design (verse 307).” The Letter of Aristeas goes no further than this. Later sources—both Jewish and Christian—do. In them we find numerous embellishments. Philo, a first-century A.D. Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria, identified the island where the translators worked as Pharos and referred to the translators as “prophets and priests of the mysteries,” who, as they worked “became as it were possessed, and, under inspiration, wrote, not each … something different, but the same word for word, as though dictated to each by an invisible prompter.”⁵ To commemorate this event, Philo tells us, an annual festival was held, for Jews and non-Jews alike, on Pharos. 040Unfortunately popularized accounts of the Letter of Aristeas often incorrectly attribute Philo’s embellished version to Aristeas.

On the Christian side, we also find numerous embellishments. Epiphanius, writing in the fourth century, tells us that the 72 translators were divided into 36 pairs. Each pair received, in turn, a single book of the Old Testament or Apocrypha. When they completed their rendering of that book, they were assigned another, so that each book was translated 36 separate times. When this mammoth task drew to an end, all of the copies were compared. The result: “There was found no discrepancy!” They were identical!

Although the Letter of Aristeas’s description of the translation process itself is plausible and attractive, it is, unfortunately, contradicted by internal evidence in the Septuagint Pentateuch itself. Careful examination of the Greek text of the five books of the Torah uncovers differences in style, grammar and word choice that are incompatible with the contention that this entire body of material was translated at one time by one cohesive group.⁶ One recent study, for example, concluded that “Numbers and Deuteronomy are the product of different translators.”⁷

While the Jewish tradition continued to ascribe the Greek text to 72 translators, in Christian tradition. It is sometimes suggested that the name simply rounds off the number of translators to 70. This is incorrect. The number 72—six representatives from each of the 12 tribes of Israel—was not meaningful for Christians. They took their lead from the 70 elders who were with Moses at Mt. Sinai and from the reference to the 70 whom Jesus commissioned in Luke 10.⁸

While there is reason to doubt many of the details in the Letter of Aristeas, a large number of scholars do agree with the letter’s contention that the Septuagint translation of the Pentateuch was produced in the early third century B.C. in Alexandria. An examination of manuscript material now available, especially the large caches of papyri that have been unearthed in Egypt over the past hundred years, establishes the first half of the third century as a congenial environment for the production of the Greek translation of the Pentateuch.⁹ Moreover, several recent studies that examine the names of each of the translators given in the letter conclude that they can all be dated to the early third century B.C. These individuals may not have been the actual translators of the Septuagint, but their names are authentic in the temporal context presupposed by the letter.

In addition, the author’s accurate descriptions of customs and conditions point to his overall familiarity with life in early Ptolemaic Egypt. In this respect, the letter can be compared to the novella about Joseph at the end of Genesis or the Book of Esther—all three are set in a milieu drawn from historical reminiscences into which an author has placed characters and events of a “legendary” or paradigmatic nature.

The overall purpose of the Letter of Aristeas was far broader than the specific questions we have been considering. The comparatively little space its author devoted to the description of the translation process underlines this. Nor was he interested simply in providing miscellaneous data about the Septuagint.

The author’s purpose was really to establish and defend the authority of this Greek translation of the Pentateuch. That purpose lies implicit in much of the letter. It comes to the fore, near the end, in the description of the public reading and ratification of the translation:

“Demetrius assembled the company of the Jews in the place where the task of the translation had been finished, and read it to all, in the presence of the translators, who received a great ovation from the crowded audience for being responsible for great blessings.… As the books were read, the priests stood up, with the elders from among the translators and from the representatives of the ‘Community,’ and with the leaders of the people, and said, ‘Since this version has been made rightly and reverently, and in every respect accurately, it is good that this should remain exactly so, and there should be no revision.’ There was general approval of what they said, and they commanded that a curse should be laid, as was their custom, on anyone who should alter the version by any addition or change to any part of the written text, or any deletion either. This was a good step taken, to ensure that the words were preserved completely and permanently in perpetuity” (verses 308–311).

What we have here is a close parallel to the Israelites’ ratification of the Torah at Mt. Sinai, as described in Exodus 19 and 24:

“Moses went and repeated to the people all the commands of the Lord and all the norms; and all the people answered with one voice, saying, ‘All things that the Lord has commanded we will do!’… Then he took record of 041the covenant and read it aloud to the people. And they said, ‘All that the Lord has spoken we will faithfully do’” (Exodus 24:3, 7).

For the author of the Letter of Aristeas, the Greek translation constituted Holy Writ as authentic and binding as the Hebrew text associated with Moses. The Hebrew text was divinely inspired; equally so was the Greek translation we call the Septuagint.¹⁰

There is a contemporary parallel to this in the way the King James Version, despite its many well-known errors, is regarded as sacred by many believers. One writer recently described what he called the “still widespread belief that the King James Version is the original Word of God and that any translation that differs from it is a perversion, a devil’s masterpiece produced by people with a low view of Scripture.”¹¹ That same attitude often plagues modem translators in their efforts to improve Bible translations.

Perhaps the author of the Letter of Aristeas, writing a hundred years or so after the Septuagint’s translation of the Pentateuch, felt the need to defend it against a rival translation or revision.¹² Perhaps this “rival” Greek text was produced by Jews for whom the Hebrew text retained a unique sanctity and authority. When they read the Septuagint, they noted—as do modern readers—many passages where it differed from the Hebrew text. And they felt it was their duty to revise the Greek so as to reflect this Hebrew truth.

Such rival Greek texts eventually led to a series of Jewish revisions of the Septuagint, culminating in the Greek rescensions attributed to Aquila, Theodotion and Symmachus. Although these three Jewish revisers were not active until the second century A.D., similar activity on the pan of others can be traced back to pre-Christian times. The appearance of one or another of these “antecedents” may have stimulated the author of the Letter of Aristeas to prepare his defense of an older, more original form of the Pentateuch, a defense that would later be expanded to cover the earliest Greek translation of the entire Old Testament.

Today, when scholars are confronted with differences between the Septuagint and the received, or Masoretic, Hebrew text, they seriously consider the possibility that the Greek reading may be superior because differences may result from the fact that the earliest Greek translators used a different Hebrew Vorlage (underlying text). Such an explanation, however, was far from the minds of the Jews being described here.

It would be nice if we knew more about the Letter of Aristeas and its author. But perhaps part of its fascination lies in its enigmas. In any event, it remains our chief ancient witness to the origins and nature of the Septuagint, the earliest translation of the Bible.

It often comes as a surprise to laypeople to learn that ancient copies of the Bible vary, sometimes in minor ways, but sometimes, also, in important ways. Variation exists between any two manuscripts of the Bible, even when they are written in the same language. But apart from minor variations among ancient manuscripts, when all the evidence from antiquity is compared, two important traditions of the biblical text emerge. They are the Masoretic text and the Septuagint. The Masoretic text (MT, for short) is the Hebrew text as standardized by Jewish scribes in the tenth century A.D. Although our […]