Stranger said:
And I asked you to tell me where is the oldest copy of the Septuagint.
If you believe the letter of Aristeas is true, then your the first one I've come across. The sad thing is that those who recognize it as a fraud, still hold to the existence of a 'Septuagint'.
(The New International Dictionary of the Christian Church, Douglas, 1981, p.897) " In the Letter of Aristeas (second century B.C.), it is alleged that seventy-two Jewish translators sent from Jerusalem produced the version for Ptolemy II...for his library. This cannot be accepted as historically true, but it contains reliable indications...."
(A General Introduction to the Bible, Geisler and Nix, 1976, p.307-308) "The Letter of Aristeas relates that the librarian at Alexandria persuaded Ptolemy Philadelphus to translate the Torah into Greek for use by Alexandrian Jews. As a result, six translators were selected from each of the twelve tribes, and the translation was completed in just seventy-two days. The details of this story are undoubtedly fictitious, but the letter does relate the authentic fact that the LXX was translated for the use of Greek-speaking Jews of Alexandria."
(The Canon of Scripture, F.F. Bruce, 1988, p.44) " In the course of time a legend attached itself to this Greek version of the law, telling how it was the work of seventy or rather seventy-two elders of Israel who were brought to Alexandria for the purpose. It is because of this legend that the term Septuagint...came to be attached to the version."
So, you see. The idea of a Septuagint is based on a fraudulent letter. As to why these men want to still hold to a Septuagint is beyond me. Rylands Papyrus 458 is no proof of a Septuagint. It is certainly a Greek translation of a small portion of Deuteronomy. But that in no way indicates it came from a 'Septuagint'.
Im not asking for a full manuscript dating back to 2nd century B.C. Im asking where is the oldest copy of the Septuagint?
Stranger
Truth is 'Stranger' than fiction!
I note a couple of things in your post:
(1) You are selective in what you quote from resources.
Take this one example from Geisler & Nix which you quoted. I happen to have a hard copy of this excellent book in my library, but mine is a 1986 edition and your quote is on pp 503-504 of this edition. You wrote:
(A General Introduction to the Bible, Geisler and Nix, 1976, p.307-308) "The Letter of Aristeas relates that the librarian at Alexandria persuaded Ptolemy Philadelphus to translate the Torah into Greek for use by Alexandrian Jews. As a result, six translators were selected from each of the twelve tribes, and the translation was completed in just seventy-two days. The details of this story are undoubtedly fictitious, but the letter does relate the authentic fact that the LXX was translated for the use of Greek-speaking Jews of Alexandria."
While admitting that this Letter of Aristeas is fictitious, Geisler & Nix stated, ‘the letter does relate
the authentic fact that the LXX was translated for the use of Greek-speaking Jews of Alexandria’. Did you miss that emphasis?
What else did Geisler & Nix state about the LXX that you left out of the pages from which you quoted?
Just as the Jews had abandoned their native Hebrew tongue for Aramaic in the Near East, so they abandoned the Aramaic in favor of Greek in such Hellenistic centers as Alexandria, Egypt….. It was during the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphus that full political and religious rights were granted to the Jews…. It was in that period (c. 250 – c. 150 B.C.), that the Hebrew Old Testament was being translated into Greek – the first time it had ever been extensively translated. The leaders of Alexandrian Jewry had a standard Greek version produced, known as the LXX, the Greek word for “seventy”. It was undoubtedly translated during the third and/or second centuries B.C. and was purported to have been written as early as the time of Ptolemy II in a Letter of Aristeas to Philocartes (c. 130-100 B.C.) [Geisler & Nix 1986:503].
I find it amazing that you want to deny the existence of the Septuagint and try to use Geisler & Nix to support your view, but these 2 authors affirm the authenticity of the LXX. Could you have a blind spot for the context when you quoted from these authors?
(2) What does the research say about the authenticity of the Letter of Aristeas?
The Catholic Encyclopedia’s article on the ‘
Septuagint Version’ provides this criticism of the Letter of Aristeas:
(1) The letter of Aristeas is certainly apocryphal. The writer, who calls himself Aristeas and says he is a Greek and a pagan, shows by his whole work that he is a pious, zealous Jew: he recognizes the God of the Jews as the one true God; he declares that God is the author of the Mosaic law; he is an enthusiastic admirer of the Temple of Jerusalem, the Jewish land and people, and its holy laws and learned men.
(2) The account as given in the letter must be regarded as fabulous and legendary, at least in several parts. Some of the details, such as the official intervention of the king and the high priest, the number of the seventy-two translators, the seventy-two questions they had to answer, the seventy-two days they took for their work, are clearly arbitrary assertions; it is difficult, moreover, to admit that the Alexandrian Jews adopted for their public worship a translation of the Law, made at the request of a pagan king; lastly, the very language of the Septuagint Version betrays in places a rather imperfect knowledge both of Hebrew and of the topography of Palestine, and corresponds more closely with the vulgar idiom of Alexandria. Yet it is not certain that everything contained in the letter is legendary, and scholars ask if there is not a historic foundation underneath the legendary details. Indeed it is likely — as appears from the peculiar character of the language, as well as from what we know of the origin and history of the version — that the Pentateuch was translated at Alexandria. It seems true also that it dates from the time of Ptolemy Philadelphus, and therefore from the middle of the third century B.C. For if, as is commonly believed, Aristeas's letter was written about 200 B.C., fifty years after the death of Philadelphus, and with a view to increase the authority of the Greek version of the Law, would it have been accepted so easily and spread broadcast, if it had been fictitious, and if the time of the composition did not correspond with the reality? Moreover, it is possible that Ptolemy had something to do with the preparation or publishing of the translation, though how and why cannot be determined now. Was it for the purpose of enriching his library as Pseudo-Aristeas states? This is possible, but is not proven, while, as will be shown below, we can very well account for the origin of the version [of the Septuagint] independently of the king (emphasis added).
So this article points to a possible ‘historic foundation’ of the apocryphal letter an the can account for the origin of the Septuagint. My, oh, my that bursts your anti-Septuagint balloon.
(3) As for the earliest copy of the Septuagint.
I’ve already provided you with that information and I won’t be saying it again as you refuse to accept that evidence. Your presupposition is that the Septuagint does not exist, so matter what evidence others and I provide, you refuse to accept it.
If you want the earliest full copy of the Septuagint, you are erecting a straw man fallacy. Your claim is that ‘the idea of a Septuagint is based on a fraudulent letter’. This is false. The Letter of Aristeas is only one piece of evidence and scholarship supports some historical background to this apocryphal letter. There is further evidence in Philo and Josephus.
In fact, ‘It should be noted that the term
Septuagint applies strictly to the Pentateuch, which was probably the only portion of the Old Testament translated during the time of Ptolemy II Philadelphus’ (Geisler & Nix 1986:503, n 26).
F F Bruce wrote that
the Jews might have gone on at a later time to authorize a standard text of the rest of the Septuagint, but … they lost interest in the Septuagint altogether. With but few exceptions, every manuscript of the Septuagint which has come down to our day was copied and preserved in Christian, not Jewish, circles. The latest exceptions to this general rule have been fragments of the Septuagint from the Dead Sea caves. The fourth cave at Qumran has yielded pieces of two manuscripts of Leviticus and one of Numbers, while the seventh cave has yielded pieces of the Septuagint text of Exodus and of the Epistle of Jeremiah (Bruce 1963:150).
Bye, bye,
Oz
Works consulted
Bruce, F F 1963.
The books and the parchments: Some chapters on the transmission of the Bible, rev ed. Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company.
Geisler, N L & Nix, W E 1986.
A general introduction to the Bible, rev ed. Chicago: Moody Press.
