I had once supposed that the Greek version of the Old Testament called the Septuagint (LXX) was primarily an anomaly of history, like the Latin Vulgate, which may lead to some interesting insights but was for the most part of less use than the "original" Hebrew text.
But one day, I went to a little Christian bookstore and picked up an old copy of the Bagster edition of Morrish's Concordance of the Septuagint. When I got this item home, I immediately began to peruse it. One would expect a word-for-word concordance of the Old Testament to be larger than 284 pages, but they managed to squeeze it all in. Strangely, it refers to the books by the English names and it omits the Apocrypha. Nevertheless, it was very inexpensive and the Hatch-Redpath is usually quite expensive.
You'll never guess the first thing it did.
It convinced me that the Hebrew texts relied upon by all the
English translations are corrupt.
Now, I'll not yet speculate on the degree and significance of the corruption. But I had always had a pretty good trust that the Israelites had so carefully preserved their text that, allowing for a few minor scribal errors, the Hebrew was as it had always been. I was aware of a particular comparison that an unbeliever once brought me which showed an apparent "Bible contradiction" where three years was seven years. The context in the Hebrew, (as well as the comparison with the LXX), said it should have been three years in both places, but it was such a minor point, I paid it no mind.
But in this case, the corruption is seen to be more substantial and unlikely. 1 Kings 4:6 in the Hebrew version (and therefore ALL the English versions) leave out the names of two persons and their assignments who are recorded in the LXX. It is a sizeable portion of text which is missing from the Hebrew and it is clearly not the sort of "scribal accretion" which I had thought the LXX differences were largely composed of.
While I had long heard that the New Testament authors apparently quoted from the Septuagint, it had not occurred to me that it might have been because it was more accurate.
I now need to reevaluate that position.
Among Eastern Orthodox Christians, the Septuagint has never ceased being revered and respected. One wonders why their testimony to the content of the Holy Scriptures has been so firmly rejected.
ADDENDUM:
Recently it was called to my attention (through most unfortunate circumstances) that certain modern sects, who claim to highly prize the King James Version to the exclusion of every other English translation, similarly reject the testimony of the Septuagint as to the content of the Holy Bible. One self-important fellow even goes so far as to claim that the Septuagint doesn't actually exist! This is a classic case of the modernist and revisionist tendencies of the present evil age which give lip-service to history in favor of their particular pet doctrines.
It is an historical fact that the original KJV Bible contained the Apocrypha, as did subsequent editions until comparatively recently. The Apocrypha, as you may or may not know, exist ONLY in the Septuagint. These were works written in Greek by the Jews of the Diaspora before the birth of our Lord Jesus. The King James translators in 1611 felt that the LXX was of sufficient importance to include at least part of its text right along with the rest of the 66 books we are familiar with. They might have considered it something less than "Scripture" but they didn't think it was "mythological".
Thus, to accept the KJV but to reject the LXX is logically inconsistent. Either the KJV translators are worthy of our honor for their skill and wisdom or they aren't.
Those who pretend to highly value the KJV but utterly discount the Septuagint prove themselves for what they are.
As for me, I'm with the KJV translators!
More information on the Septuagint
is available here:
Septuagint Info
More information on the Apocrypha is available here: A Brief History of the Apocrypha
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versions of the LXX for sale in
