Question about Orthodox Bibles

[puzzleannie]

Cleveland and Detroit where I come from, home to many Orthodox congregations, have ample sources for Orthodox bibles and litugical texts, maybe you just need to search harder. the office of your church should be able to tell you where they purchase texts, and may even order for you at a discount.

there are other threads debating the contents of the Orthodox bible, but this is not one of them.

 

[Bible_Reader]

But to get back to my question is it that you couldn’t find an Orthodox Bible until very recently?

** English Orthodox versions have heretofore been hard to find, but NT versions did exist.

The Orthodox Study Bible is the first readily availble translation of the LXX OT.**

In fact, this is not correct – Brenton’s translation of the Septuagint has been continuously in print since 1851 (and is still in print today). And the New English Translation of the Septuagint preceded the Orthodox Study Bible.

 

[bpbasilphx]

In fact, this is not correct – Brenton’s translation of the Septuagint has been continuously in print since 1851 (and is still in print today). And the New English Translation of the Septuagint preceded the Orthodox Study Bible.

**Brenton’s translation, AKA the Bagster LXX, is not based on the Orthodox text, but one printed Vatican MS.

I’m not familiar with the New English Translation of the Septuagint. Is this an Orthodox translation (which is what the original post is about)?

There was a translation of the LXX based, oddly enough, on the short canon by Charles Thompson, secretary to the Continental Congress at the time of the Revolution, called THE SEPTUAGINT BIBLE.**

 

[Isa_Almisry]

**Brenton’s translation, AKA the Bagster LXX, is not based on the Orthodox text, but one printed Vatican MS.

I’m not familiar with the New English Translation of the Septuagint. Is this an Orthodox translation (which is what the original post is about)?**

Yes.
orthodoxstudybible.com/about

There was a translation of the LXX based, oddly enough, on the short canon by Charles Thompson, secretary to the Continental Congress at the time of the Revolution, called THE SEPTUAGINT BIBLE.

 

[Publisher]

As I understand the Orthodox Study Bible is now available. Prior to it’s publication the “Oxford Study Bible with Deuterocanical/Apocrypha Expanded Edition” has been available for a number of years. Originally published in the 70’s as “The Common Bible” in the RSV and recently in the last several years the 3rd edition includes some of the writings in the Syriac Bible(?).

I have used the Oxford Study Bible RSV for over twenty years, while my reading of the “extra books” have not brought any deep religious insight…I have enjoyed their inclusion in my personal volume of scripture.

 

[Bible_Reader]

Brenton’s translation, AKA the Bagster LXX, is not based on the Orthodox text, but one printed Vatican MS.

I’m not familiar with the New English Translation of the Septuagint. Is this an Orthodox translation (which is what the original post is about)?

There was a translation of the LXX based, oddly enough, on the short canon by Charles Thompson, secretary to the Continental Congress at the time of the Revolution, called THE SEPTUAGINT BIBLE.

Bpbasilphx, I think you have some confusion on these points.

Actually both Codex Vaticanus (B, 4th century) and Codex Alexandrus (A) are complete Orthodox manuscripts (although, as I show below, they are not necessarily the best manuscripts we have). The problem is that the translators have not always translators have not always translated

I am surprised you mentioned Thomson’s 1808 translation (which is still in print) Thomson’s translation omits the Deuterocanon, but includes Psalm 151, and follows the order of the Hebrew canon. His work was based indirectly (through J. Field’s 1665 edition and and the sixtine edition of 1587 on the well known fourth century AD manuscript Codex Vaticanus (B).

Brenton’s work, although it appeared some 35 years later than Thomson’s acknoledges only cursory and indirect acquaintance with it. As the title indicates, it too is (indirectly) based on Codex Vaticanus. Brenton mentions the Valpy edition of 1819 as his immediate source, which in tern was based on the Sixtine edition. Like Thomson, Brenton translated only the books of the Hebrew canon, plus Psalm 151, and ordered them accordingly. For Esher, however, he did not exise the Additions, as Thomson had done. However, I think you have not actually read the text, because Brenton includes notes throughout the text including variants from the fifth century Codex Alexandrinus (A), as well as comments on the Hebrew and Greek text.

Since then, however, our knowledge of the Septuagint text has advanced considerably. We’ve made advances in Greek lexicography and numerous ancient manuscripts have come to light. While thomson and Brenton were based on (essentially) diplomatic editions of a single manuscript, the critical edition of the Göttingen Septuagint of Genesis rests on a foundation of some one hundred and forty manuscripts (nine clearly predating the Codex Vaticanus.) Now, one thing you should know is that in developing the Göttingen Septuagint the editors drew on the Hebrew text, as the parent in the diglot, to help them with text critical decisions. Now the Göttingen Septuagint project will soon reach its anniversary mark, but the full completion of the Göttingen Septuagint probably will not occur for about a hundred more years.

Absent the Göttingen Septuagint, scholars general depend on Rahlfs 1935 eclectic text. This was the source used by the Orthodox Study Bible (OSB) translators. The New English Translation of the Septuagint (NETS) used Göttingen when it existed and in other cases used Rahlfs.

Now it is important to know that virtually no translation presents the Greek text as it appeared in the original. For example, rather than include a full translation of the Book of Odes, which is a canonical text in the Greek, readers must refer to the original source material, namely (using their Greek names), Exodus 15:1-19; Deuteronomion [Deuteronomy] 32:1-43; 1 Reigns [1 Samuel] 2:1-10; Psalms 118:12, 144:2;Prayer of Manasses [Psalm 151]; Ionas [Jonah] 2:3-10; Habakoum [Habakkuk] 3:2-19; Esais [Isaiah] 5:1-9, 26:9-20, 38:10-20; Daniel 3:26-45, 52-88; and Luke 1:46-55, 68-89, 2:14, 29-32. In this sense, there is NO (Orthodox) Septuagint translation into English today – although one can easily reconstruct the Book of Odes from other material in the Bible.

Now, one of the unique and good attributes of the New English Translation of the Septuagint is that it translates different source material. Sometimes the Old Greek version is paired with the version by Theodotion, as in the case of Sousanna [Susanna], Daniel, and Bel et Draco [Bel and the Dragon]. Other times, the divergent texts of the great pandects Alexandrinus and Vaticanus are included, as in the case of Iesous [Joshua]. In the NETS, all the various divergent versions are translated. The usefulness for students of this act of simultaneous scholarly integrity and translational generosity can hardly be exaggerated. The books provided with multiple translations are: Iesous [Joshua] (Alexandrinus and Vaticanus for several chapters), Judges (again, A and B), 1-4 Reigns [1-2 Samuel & 1-2 Kings] (Old Greek and Kaige), Esther (Old Greek and Alpha), Tobit (GII/Sinaiticus and GI/Alexandrinus & Vaticanus), Habakoum [Habakkuk] 3 (majority text and the Barberini text), and Sousanna [Susanna], Daniel, and Bel and the Dragon (Old Greek and Theodotion). In Iob [Job], the Theodotionic additions from Origen’s Hexaplaric text are included in brackets. In Sirach numerous verses from the Greek II text (not the Hebrew) are included in brackets.

The translation is made by the leading academic scholars in the area, and preceded the Orthodox Study Bible by a year.

[continued]

 

[Bible_Reader]

[continued]

Now, I must comment on the Orthodox Study Bible. Anyone with even a slight fluency in Greek will immediately recognize its flaws. It is not, in fact, a translation from the Greek, but a modification of the NKJV text – often ignoring the Greek to slavishly follow the Hebrew. Furthermore, in several cases, one finds that the Orthodox Study Bible (OSB) translators, some of whom were mere graduate students, in many cases failed to understand the underlying Greek. Production errors abound. The order of the books follows the traditional Orthodox order, except in mysteriously placing the Prayer of Manasseh not after the Psalms, where the Odes would normally be, but as the last column on the last page of 2 Chronicles, where it appears to be a part of chapter 36. Then there is the confusion of the two Ezra books and Nehemiah. In the Septuagint, it is usually the case that there is 1 Esdras, the alternate partial Chronicles/Ezra-Nehemiah book, and then the Hebrew Ezra and Nehemiah books are combined as 2 Esdras, with 23 chapters. The OSB inexplicably has 1 Ezra (the 1 Esdras above), 2 Ezra (Hebrew Ezra), and Nehemiah. Though I do recall this as an option among Greek treatments of the titles of these books, it’s not as common as the other. In Daniel there is a serious problem with the page headers. At the beginning of Daniel is, as is proper, the book of Susanna, and at the end, Bel and the Serpent. Unfortunately, the page headers take the verse of Susanna as the chapter of Daniel, so the header on page 1237, the second page of Susanna/Daniel, reads “Daniel 41″ and the next page “Daniel 42.” At the end of the book, page 1261 has the header “Daniel 21″ and the next page “Daniel 22.”

Looking more closely at the source text, we find problems with the Orthodox Study Bible. On Tobit. There are two texts of Tobit, the short text as found in the majority of manuscripts (Hanhart’s GI, found in Codices Alexandrinus, Vaticanus, and others, as well as represented in Jerome’s Vulgate translation), and the long text (Hanhart’s GII, found in Codex Sinaiticus with lacunae, and a few fragments otherwise, but well-represented in the Old Latin translation). The GII text is universally recognized to the be the older of the two, with GI representing a later reworking of the text. In such a case, the presentation of both versions or the longer alone (perhaps with an indication of which passages are lacking in the shorter version) would be preferable. While it is known that the text of Codex Alexandrinus is the Old Testament in favor on Mount Athos, and so the shorter version of Tobit will be preferred there, there is no canonical statement finding for either ancient text. The fuller text does tell the story better, however, and for that reason alone it might be preferred. But it appears that the Revised Standard Version was the boilerplate in the books called anaginōskomena (”readable”) among the Orthodox and “apocrypha” generally, and the RSV used the shorter text. Again, the NETS actually provides translations of both texts in parallel, as it does for the case of all such divergent texts in the Septuagint tradition: in Iesous [Joshua], Judges, Esther (giving the Old Greek and the Alpha text, which is a bonus!), Tobit (the GII and GI texts), Sousanna [Susanna], Daniel, Bel and the Dragon (all three have both Old Greek and Theodotion). The approach of NETS is preferable.

Now I’d like to look at the two Septuagint translations in comparison. The NETS is, of course, a scholarly effort of great erudition, designed for use as an academic tool. The OSB is designed for use as devotional reading. For this reason, the OSB doesn’t include translations of the variant texts in Joshua, Judges, Esther, and Daniel, for instance, but rather opts for what is (more or less) the Ecclesiastical text. As I mentioned above, the OSB used the NKJV as a base for its translation, just as the NETS used the NRSV. In this first comparison, therefore, I’ve chosen Sirach 44.1-5, as something not contaminated by boilerplate usage of the NKJV.OSB Sirach 4.1-5:
Let us now praise honored men and our fathers.
The Lord established His great glory
And majesty from the beginning through them.
There were those who ruled in their kingdoms
And were men renowned for their power,
Giving counsel through their understanding
And proclaiming prophecies.
There were leaders of the people by their counsels
And understanding of learning for the people,
Wise in their words of instruction.

NETS Sirach 44.1-5
Let us now praise famous men
and our fathers by descent.
The Lord created much glory,
his majesty from eternity.
When they ruled in their kingdoms,
men also became noteworthy through power;
when they counseled with their intelligence,
when they announced through their prophecies,
when they led the people by deliberations
and with understanding of a people’s scribal art—
wise words there are in their instruction
Notice how the OSB simply does not flow, and only really makes sense after having read the NETS version. This is caused by relying too strictly on a very literal translation method. See how with very little change, the NETS flows so much better. What, for instance, is “understanding of learning for the people” in the OSB supposed to connote? The Greek is και συνεσει γραμματειας λαου, which is much better rendered by NETS as “understanding of a people’s scribal art.” The issue in the OSB appears to lie in the RSV being used as a base text in this instance (”understanding of learning for the people”) rather than the more clear NRSV (”knowledge of the people’s lore”), which is informed not merely by Greek Sirach, but the Hebrew fragments, the key phrase here being חכמי שיח בספרתם. NETS is the best of the set on this front.

[continued]

 

[Bible_Reader]

[continued]

Now we’ll go to an old favorite, Psalm 22 (23 in the Masoretic and English numbering tradition), and see what the OSB and NETS have done. I provide the Greek text first, so you can compare for yourselves. Greek Psalm 22 (23)
Κύριος ποιμαίνει με, καὶ οὐδέν με ὑστερήσει.
εἰς τόπον χλόης, ἐκεῖ με κατεσκήνωσεν,
ἐπὶ ὕδατος ἀναπαύσεως
ἐξέθρεψέν με,
τὴν ψυχήν μου ἐπέστρεψεν.
ὡδήγησέν με ἐπὶ τρίβους δικαιοσύνης
ἕνεκεν τοῦ ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ.
ἐὰν γὰρ καὶ πορευθῶ ἐν μέσῳ σκιᾶς θανάτου,
οὐ φοβηθήσομαι κακά,
ὅτι σὺ μετ’ ἐμοῦ εἶ·
ἡ ῥάβδος σου καὶ ἡ βακτηρία σου, αὐταί με παρεκάλεσαν.
ἡτοίμασας ἐνώπιόν μου τράπεζαν ἐξ ἐναντίας τῶν θλιβόν των με·
ἐλίπανας ἐν ἐλαίῳ τὴν κεφαλήν μου,
καὶ τὸ ποτήριόν σου μεθύσκον ὡς κράτιστον.
καὶ τὸ ἔλεός σου καταδιώξεταί με πάσας τὰς ἡμέρας τῆς ζωῆς μου,
καὶ τὸ κατοικεῖν με ἐν οἴκῳ κυρίου εἰς μακρότητα ἡμερῶν.

OSB Psalm 22 (23)
The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death
I will fear no evil, for You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell in the house of the Lord to the end of my days.

NETS Psalm 22 (23)
The Lord shepherds me, and I shall lack nothing.
In a verdant place, there he made me encamp;
by water of rest he reared me;
my soul he restored.
He led me into paths of righteousness
for his name’s sake.
For even if I walk in the midst of death’s shadow,
I will not fear evil, because you are with me;
your rod and your staff—they comforted me.
You prepared a table before me over against those that afflict me;
you anointed my head with oil,
and your cup was supremely intoxicating.
And your mercy shall pursue me all the days of my life,
and my residing in the Lord’s house is for length of days.
First one notices, shockingly, that the OSB does not translate the Greek at all. It is, in fact, the precise text of the New King James Version for Psalm 23, a translation of the Hebrew psalm, of course. The only alteration toward the Septuagint is at the very end, and even there it is quite wrong: “to the end of my days.” εἰς μακρότητα ἡμερῶν does not mean “to the end of my days” but rather, as NETS rightly has it “for length of days,” a circumlocution for “forever.” The intention seems to be “not to rock the boat” by providing a translation that is too different from what people are accustomed to, even when the (supposedly) underlying text of the Septuagint is quite different than the Hebrew.

[continued]

 

[Bible_Reader]

[continued]

Now, of course, one special feature of the Orthodox Study Bible is that it contains notes – it is, after all, a study Bible. But here too there are problems: I thought I’d take a look at something which would naturally have occurred to a good editor: to make certain that the points made in the articles about various texts were also included in the notes to those texts. Here too the OSB makes a failing grade. Take, for example, the article “Types of Mary in the Old Testament.” Firstly, why just “Mary” and not a properly Orthodox reference to the Champion of the Faithful like “The Virgin Mary Theotokos”? How about even “Mary, Mother of God”? Oh, that’s right, I forgot that this OSB is actually directed at Protestants, not Orthodox, so we couldn’t possibly call her what we actually call her in what is supposed to be our own Bible! Secondly, of the eighteen Scriptural references given in the article, ten are not represented in the notes to those texts. That is, at those points in the notes, where a reader is most likely to be looking for information on how the Orthodox Church reads the verse, there is no notice that these various ten verses are read to reflect the Theotokos. Even aside from this, and it really is unforgivable, Isaiah 7 and 9 are not included in the article! How can the primary prophecy of the Theotokos in Isaiah 7.14, recognized even in the Gospels, not be included in an article on the subject?

Likewise, there are many other references which were not included. The author of the article could simply have sat down with an annotated copy of the services for the Church’s Feasts, like The Festal Menaion put together by Bishop Kallistos, and made a list of all the Scripture readings and allusions therein and made sure the editor would ensure appropriate commentary in the notes for each. This would’ve taken mere minutes, not hours or days. In addition to this shortcoming in this particular article, there is another shortcoming, a more literal one: the text of no article fills the page dedicated to it. It appears that the font of the articles was changed along the line somewhere so that it is smaller and no longer fills the page. This is sloppy. The extra space could’ve been used to better the articles. Randomly flipping through the OSB, I found that a number of notes are problematic in historical or factual matters. A note to Isaiah 22.1-5 indicates “Jerusalem fell to the Assyrians.” This is not the case. A note to 2 Kingdoms 15.7-12 (the text of 15.7 begins “Four years later…”) reads “After four years (the LXX has “forty”)….” So, this quite apparently answers our question as to whether this is a translation of the Septuagint or not. Clearly it is not! It is guided by other motivations, which allowed some of the translators to adjust their text toward the Hebrew. This is not in itself a bad idea, but it is not what the Old Testaement of the OSB proclaims itself to be.

The note to Judith 1.1 places the entire book in the wrong light: “This opening verse is anachronistic in that the father of Nebuchadnezzar, Nebopolassar, destroyed Nineveh in about 607 BC.” Aside from the error that Nineveh was not destroyed in “about 607″ but 612 BC, with no “about” about it, and the oddly spelled Nebopolassar rather than the standard Nabopolassar, this misses the entire point of the book in its parabolic masking of various historical characters with names drawn from the rest of the Old Testament, of which Judith is a part. Nineveh represents Seleucia, and Nebuchadnezzar the Seleucid king, and so on. Reading this as a straight historical account is as much a mistake as reading it as an entirely allegorical one.

A relatively good note appears at Daniel 5.2: “St. Jerome remarks that ‘vice always glories in defiling what is noble.’ He sees in Belshazzar’s blatant misuse of the holy vessels a type of the misuse and twisting of Scripture by heretics for the purpose of drawing others into false doctrine and worship.” Now that is on the right track, at least. Yet there is no way to find out where St Jerome elaborates on this, as there is no reference to his undoubtedly pithy statement on the matter. It would perhaps have been preferable to leave out the vast number of inane notes in preference for more substantial patristic quotations which included references to the works (at the very least) in which they appear.

[Note, this response includes points and text first suggested by K. Edgecomb.]

 

[Isa_Almisry]

**Brenton’s translation, AKA the Bagster LXX, is not based on the Orthodox text, but one printed Vatican MS.

I’m not familiar with the New English Translation of the Septuagint. Is this an Orthodox translation (which is what the original post is about)?
**
My bad: no.
ccat.sas.upenn.edu/nets/

 

[Isa_Almisry]

Bpbasilphx, I think you have some confusion on these points.

Actually both Codex Vaticanus (B, 4th century) and Codex Alexandrus (A) are complete Orthodox manuscripts (although, as I show below, they are not necessarily the best manuscripts we have). The problem is that the translators have not always translators have not always translated

I am surprised you mentioned Thomson’s 1808 translation (which is still in print) Thomson’s translation omits the Deuterocanon, but includes Psalm 151, and follows the order of the Hebrew canon. His work was based indirectly (through J. Field’s 1665 edition and and the sixtine edition of 1587 on the well known fourth century AD manuscript Codex Vaticanus (B).

Brenton’s work, although it appeared some 35 years later than Thomson’s acknoledges only cursory and indirect acquaintance with it. As the title indicates, it too is (indirectly) based on Codex Vaticanus. Brenton mentions the Valpy edition of 1819 as his immediate source, which in tern was based on the Sixtine edition. Like Thomson, Brenton translated only the books of the Hebrew canon, plus Psalm 151, and ordered them accordingly. For Esher, however, he did not exise the Additions, as Thomson had done. However, I think you have not actually read the text, because Brenton includes notes throughout the text including variants from the fifth century Codex Alexandrinus (A), as well as comments on the Hebrew and Greek text.

Since then, however, our knowledge of the Septuagint text has advanced considerably. We’ve made advances in Greek lexicography and numerous ancient manuscripts have come to light. While thomson and Brenton were based on (essentially) diplomatic editions of a single manuscript, the critical edition of the Göttingen Septuagint of Genesis rests on a foundation of some one hundred and forty manuscripts (nine clearly predating the Codex Vaticanus.) Now, one thing you should know is that in developing the Göttingen Septuagint the editors drew on the Hebrew text, as the parent in the diglot, to help them with text critical decisions. Now the Göttingen Septuagint project will soon reach its anniversary mark, but the full completion of the Göttingen Septuagint probably will not occur for about a hundred more years.

Absent the Göttingen Septuagint, scholars general depend on Rahlfs 1935 eclectic text. This was the source used by the Orthodox Study Bible (OSB) translators. The New English Translation of the Septuagint (NETS) used Göttingen when it existed and in other cases used Rahlfs.

Now it is important to know that virtually no translation presents the Greek text as it appeared in the original. For example, rather than include a full translation of the Book of Odes, which is a canonical text in the Greek, readers must refer to the original source material, namely (using their Greek names), Exodus 15:1-19; Deuteronomion [Deuteronomy] 32:1-43; 1 Reigns [1 Samuel] 2:1-10; Psalms 118:12, 144:2;Prayer of Manasses [Psalm 151]; Ionas [Jonah] 2:3-10; Habakoum [Habakkuk] 3:2-19; Esais [Isaiah] 5:1-9, 26:9-20, 38:10-20; Daniel 3:26-45, 52-88; and Luke 1:46-55, 68-89, 2:14, 29-32. In this sense, there is NO (Orthodox) Septuagint translation into English today – although one can easily reconstruct the Book of Odes from other material in the Bible.

Now, one of the unique and good attributes of the New English Translation of the Septuagint is that it translates different source material. Sometimes the Old Greek version is paired with the version by Theodotion, as in the case of Sousanna [Susanna], Daniel, and Bel et Draco [Bel and the Dragon]. Other times, the divergent texts of the great pandects Alexandrinus and Vaticanus are included, as in the case of Iesous [Joshua]. In the NETS, all the various divergent versions are translated. The usefulness for students of this act of simultaneous scholarly integrity and translational generosity can hardly be exaggerated. The books provided with multiple translations are: Iesous [Joshua] (Alexandrinus and Vaticanus for several chapters), Judges (again, A and B), 1-4 Reigns [1-2 Samuel & 1-2 Kings] (Old Greek and Kaige), Esther (Old Greek and Alpha), Tobit (GII/Sinaiticus and GI/Alexandrinus & Vaticanus), Habakoum [Habakkuk] 3 (majority text and the Barberini text), and Sousanna [Susanna], Daniel, and Bel and the Dragon (Old Greek and Theodotion). In Iob [Job], the Theodotionic additions from Origen’s Hexaplaric text are included in brackets. In Sirach numerous verses from the Greek II text (not the Hebrew) are included in brackets.

The translation is made by the leading academic scholars in the area, and preceded the Orthodox Study Bible by a year.

Some reviewer, non-Orthodox, of the OSB stated that at least it came across that it was translated by believers for believers to read, not a bunch of academics dissecting a dead text.

 

[Bible_Reader]

Some reviewer, non-Orthodox, of the OSB stated that at least it came across that it was translated by believers for believers to read, not a bunch of academics dissecting a dead text.

That sounds like raw anti-intellectualism to me. But, as a glance at the portion of Sirach quoted above shows, the OSB simply doesn’t flow as a text – not only is it unfaithful to the Greek, but the quality of the English is poor.

I wonder how many people will actually read the OSB.

 

[jblake]

Bible Reader;:

I wonder how many people will actually read the OSB.

How good are the footnotes?

If they are very good, people will buy it, even if they disagree with both the translation, and the footnotes. (Think NET Bible here.)

xan

jonathon