Old Greek

Several medieval texts tell the story of an imaginary voyage of Charlemagne to Jerusalem and Constantinople. Among them, the Latin Descriptio qualiter... (11th-12th century) contains several odd features, analyzed in the present paper: two curious letters, one of them containing a sequence of gobbledygook phrases. The present paper revisits the Descriptio qualiter...’s already known sources of inspiration, the Translatio Sanguinis Domini from the Benedictine abbey of Reichenau and an account by a certain monk Benedict from the monastery saint Andrew on Mount Soracte (both of them dating back to the 10th century). The analysis then explores the transliteration of Greek texts in the various manuscript variants of the Descriptio qualiter..., the use of voces magicae and rudiments of spoken Greek, as well as the possible misreading of a real 9th century Byzantine imperial letter on papyrus kept in the monastery of saint-Denis.

This commentary on LXX Psalm 5 studies the meaning of the Old Greek text as produced by its translator from its Hebrew source text, focusing on the translation process and the verbal makeup of the translation, in distinction from the meaning of the text as read by Jewish and Christian interpreters in its reception history.

The Septuagint translation of Daniel circulated in antiquity in two Greek versions, known as the Old Greek and Theodotion. Intriguingly, not only that in this book the latter text has displaced the former in their transmission histories but also the personality of Theodotion and the version associated with his name are shrouded in mystery. Furthermore, the ancient patristic sources perpetuate this mystery by both offering contradictory comments with regard to the provenance, time, and religious appurtenance of Theodotion and documenting a change of perception within the Christian church regarding his version, namely, from suspicion to a positive appreciation of its merits, leading to its acceptance. Consequently, the goal of this paper is twofold: (1) it discusses all patristic references that directly or indirectly refer to the person of Theodotion in the works of Irenaeus of Lyons, Origen, Eusebius of Caesarea, Epiphanius of Salamis, and Jerome of Stridon; (2) it attempts to explain the change towards the positive reception of Theodotion’s version within the Christian church that ultimately led to the complete supplanting of the Old Greek of Daniel in the vast majority of the Septuagint manuscripts.

Localization of the Temple of the Ancient Tyra.
Location of the temple of the ancient Tyra has been unknown. The author of this article firstly suggests that the remains of the temple are located in the northeast corner of the Military Court of the medieval fortress, and has not yet been excavated. This conclusion is based on the comparison of the results of three expeditions of different time: the citadel excavation under the direction of G. Avakian in 1929, georadar shooting expedition in 2010 by S. A. Belyaeva, and the excavations in the territory of the fortress in 2011 under the leadership of T. L. Samoylova.

This book examines the two portraits of Jeroboam (in the TM and in the LXX), and compares them with their parallel witnesses (the Antiochian Text and the Vetus Latina [VL]), as well as with historiographical reworking of Flavius Josephus. In fact, variants of the Lucianic manuscripts, if confirmed by the VL and Josephus, can attest the protolucianic, textual form that reflects closely the Old Greek, and is therefore very close to the original text. Literary criticism then allows you to also study the nature of theological reading of the Deuteronomistic editors, who produced an ideologized historiography, which should therefore be checked carefully.

In the Masoretic Text of the 1-2 Kings there is one formula for expressing the synchronisms of the regnal formulas of the kings of Israel and Judah in Hebrew: ( שָׁ נָה ) [year] בִ שְׁ נַת , and two more formulas for expressing the supplementary synchronisms: [year] ב ַ ש ׁ ָ נ ָ ה ה ַ֠ and שָׁ נָה year בִ . However, these three expressions are represented by four expressions in Greek (LXX): ἐν ἔτει [year] (ἔτει); ἐν τῷ ἔτει τῷ [year]; ἐν τῷ [year] ἔτει; ἐν τῷ ἐνιαυτῷ τῷ [year]. Our purpose is threefold: firstly, to find out why there are three different formulas in hebrew to express synchronisms; secondly, to explain why only one is used in the regnal formulas; and finally, to determine the relationship between the Hebrew and the Greek formulas to verify whether the Hebrew source of the Old Greek text (OG) was different or not.

One of the most intriguing textual problems in studying the Book of Daniel relates to the history of the Septuagint text which was transmitted in two complete, parallel versions, known as the Old Greek (LXX-Dan) and Theodotion (Th-Dan) translations. Naturally, this phenomenon gives rise to the question of their relationship. Furthermore, intrinsic to a translation-revision theory is the validation of the criterion for whether the two texts share a common textual basis. The goal of this study is to determine whether the LXX-Dan and Th-Dan meet this criterion. Towards such a goal, the study attempts to single out, classify, and evaluate significant agreements that point to a common basis. Specifically, this investigation addresses the following essential questions: Are there agreements that demonstrate a close textual relationship between Th-Dan and LXX-Dan? In the eventuality of a positive answer, which types of agreements support at best a claim for a shared basis between the two texts? In order to assess how Th-Dan relates to LXX-Dan and to ascertain the necessity of our study, it is of great importance to set the stage for our analysis by surveying the scholarly literature that bears on the current state of research. After presenting the major trends that have influenced the textual investigation of Danielic literature, the study will detail the methodology employed. This presentation concludes with a description of both the categories of the significant agreements and some examples which demonstrably indicate a genetic relationship between the two textual traditions.

Notwithstanding that in the Christian doctrine God at the beginning “has made and arranged things according to His logos”, according to the stoicism’s ideas for a divine Logos, He has not left Himself without any witnesses from the pagan world. Eschatology with heaven and hell, the idea of a sin, purgatory and forgiving trespasses, pessimistic valuation of the earth’s life, disrespecting the body that is holding the soul in bondage, the evolved rites where the priests take the main part, learning about the Logos and the belief in suffering of God, the recognition of the Tropos as a legal right to become a God from a mortal, whereas “Virginal comes out of the pureness“ as indicated in the gold orphic tablets, dogmatism with certain henotheistic additions, are some of the main doctrines of the Orphism as determined at the time of Pisistratus offering different analogies in the later Christian beliefs. The texts in the secret orphic papyrus and gold tablets, the image of Orpheus depicted as the Good Shepherd, Orpheus charming (and wild) beasts, the Allegory of Christ as Orpheus discovered in the early Christian catacombs in Rome, as well as the sarcophagus discovered in Ostia depicting Orpheus with the Christian symbols a fish and a fisherman, are one of the most remarkable proofs for the secret orphic doctrines, which in some places correspond to a great extent to the Christianity and the Christian burial symbolism. The holy orphic phrase: “I swear in the Logos (i.e., in the voice and breath of God)”, provides certain explanation on how the Christian interpolation found its way within the spirit of the missionary diplomacy,  and has caused the early Christian Church with a prudent tolerance to transform the local pagan gods – which were then in phase of extinction – into Christian Saints.

This volume represents a comparative analysis of the Greek and Hebrew text forms of Jer 10:1-18. The Hebrew text’s ancient battle hymn has been transformed by the Greek text form (and Qumran’s 4Q71) into an apotropaic incantation against evil spirits. The two text forms of chapter 10 hinge upon the interpretation of verse 11. Does one find exorcistic magic in the obscure Aramaic words? Or, can one make sense of Jeremiah’s enigmatic condemnation of idolatry in the Hebrew text form’s more elaborate arrangement? We shall see that Masoretic text’s organization proves to evidence a more ancient poetic tone and structure in comparison to the Septuagint’s modified content.
ISBN: 978-90-429-3368-2