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A History of Bible Translation: Chapter 1 - The Greek Translation of the Old Testament

In the fourth century BC a king called Ptolemy the 2nd decided it would be a good idea to get the Hebrew Bible translated into Greek. He, as the story goes, appointed seventy translators who were told to sit in separate booths and work alone, and at the end of the process all seventy miraculously produced identical translations of the Hebrew Bible. What a way to check for accuracy![1] This translation became known as the Septuagint, and is one of the most reliable texts of the Old Testament we have, along with the Masoretic Text (10th century AD), and the Dead Sea Scrolls (1st century BC). Sometimes the Dead Sea Scrolls line up with the Septuagint rather than the Masoretic text, showing that the Septuagint represents an earlier and more reliable Hebrew text than the Masoretic text, despite the latter’s authority in the Judeo-Christian world.

The main reason to be thankful for this translation, is that it is the main text alluded to by the writers of the New Testament. By then Greek had established itself as the language of education in the Mediterranean region, despite Roman[2] military dominance, and the use of Aramaic by Jews in the home and on the street, and the use of Hebrew in the synagogues.[3] Why do I say ‘alluded to’ not ‘quoted’? Because the New Testament writers, like Winnie the Pooh,  often ‘used’ the Septuagint to mean what they wanted it to, not what it originally communicated in the Hebrew. They felt they had a divine calling to write, and in doing so were writing not just ordinary words, but Scripture. The world had changed after both the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, and destruction of the temple, and they had a message to share.

This means that the Bible we read is itself dependent on a translation of the older, Hebrew Bible, what we as Christians call the Old Testament. It uses that translation as a stepping stone to move into new territory. Therefore, some missiologists such as Lamin Sanneh have talked about the ‘translatability of Scripture’ – the Bible is inherently a translation, contains translated material, and focusses on a person, Jesus the Messiah, who himself became incarnate, involving a ‘translation’ from heavenly to human.


[1] The Soviet Union apparently used to use a word count to check translations were accurate. Perhaps they were from the same stable.
[2] The Romans spoke Latin, but were themselves educated in Greek.
[3] Most of the New Testament was written after the destruction of the temple in AD 70, so synagogues were the only meeting places for Jewish believers.
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