The "Septuagint" Useful in the Past and the Present

Made for the Greek-Speaking Jews


In 332 B.C.E., when Alexander the Great marched into Egypt after destroying the Phoenician city of Tyre, he was greeted as a deliverer.  There he founded the city of Alexandria, a center of learning in the ancient world.  Desiring to spread Greek culture to people living int he conquered lands, Alexander introduced common Greek (Koine) throughout his vast realm.

In the third century B.C.E., Alexandria came to have a large population of Jews.  Many Jews who after the Babylonian exile had been living in scattered colonies outside Palestine migrated to Alexandria.  How well did these Jews know the Hebrew  language?   McClintock and Strong's cyclopedia states:  "It is well known that after the Jews returned from the captivity of Babylon, having lost in great measure the familiar knowledge of the ancient Hebrew, the readings from the books of Moses in the synagogues of Palestine were explained to them in the Chaldaic tongue . . .The Jews of Alexandria had probably still less knowledge of Hebrew; their familiar language was Alexandrian Greek."  Evidently, in Alexandria the climate was right for a translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek.

Aristobulus, a Jew who lived in the second century B.C.E., wrote that a version of the Hebrew law was translated into Greek and was completed during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus (285-246 B.C.E.). Opinions vary as to what Aristobulus meant by the "law." Some think that  he was referring merely to the Pentateuch, while others say that he may have had in mind the entire Hebrew Scriptures.

In any case, tradition has it that about 72 Jewish scholars were involved in that first written translation of the Scriptures from Hebrew into Greek.  Later, the round figure 70 began to be used.  Hence, the version was called the Septuagint meaning "70," and is designated LXX, the Roman numeral for 70.  by the end of the second century B.C.E., all books of the Hebrew Scriptures could be read in Greek.  Thus, the name Septuagint came to refer to the entire Hebrew Scriptures translated into Greek.

Next time: Useful in the First Century

Watchtower, 2002