the answers to your questions, in reverse order:
1. nothing;
2. nothing;
3. we cannot;
4. we should not;
5. because, the two documents purport to be the same document, albeit
in different languages. and in my un-scientific experience, the
substance of the two differs materially.
regards,
fred burlingame
On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 9:10 PM, Kevin Riley <[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
Why? They may be simply 2 recensions of the one text. If they
convey essentially the same message, why should we consider one
has 'failed'? Unless we know what the original said, how can we
compare the two in terms of accuracy to the original? If we
discover (or come to believe) neither is exactly as originally
written, what have we lost? And more importantly, what could we
do about it?
Kevin Riley
On 28/11/2010 12:21 PM, fred burlingame wrote:
well ...
1. if the masoretic text ("MT") and the septuagint remain
unrelated; like *gone
with the wind*; and tolstoy's *war and peace; *then there is
no "what."
2. but .... if MT and septuagint = two translations and/or
renderings of the
same book *war and peace*, then at least one errs and fails.
that is the
"what."
regards,
fred burlingame
On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 6:48 PM, Yigal
Levin<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
I ask again,
So what?
Yigal Levin
From: fred burlingame [mailto:[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>]
Sent: Sunday, November 28, 2010 2:31 AM
To: Yigal Levin
Cc: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] cognate alphabet
Hello Yigal:
I suppose that I consider it significant for the following
reasons.
1. As you note, this type of event occurs frequently. One
occurrence is
indeed insignificant. But frequent incidents like this
one, becomes
significant, because the entire book changes.
2. And the hebrew text meaning "changing names;" versus
the greek text
rendering "cities surrounded," seems substantively
different to me. The
omission of the שם from the greek text causes the greek
verb for "surround"
to relate directly back to the named cities, and
correspondingly imply the
missing object "walls."
regards,
fred burlingame
On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 6:14 PM, Yigal
Levin<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
Hi Fred,
Please note, that in the interlinear translation that you
cite, the words
"with walls" are in italics. This is the translators way
of indicating that
they are not in the original. So I repeat, the Greek says
"surrounded". It
makes sense that this means "surrounded with walls", but
this is an
interpretation, not a translation.
As for the word "shem", I do not know why the Greek
ignores it. It may not
have been in the Hebrew test that was translated, or the
translator may have
not understood it and so simply ignored it.
But I must confess, that I fail to see why you consider
this to be so
significant. So we have seen that there are two different
interpretations of
the same text, maybe caused by a very slight textual
variation. This is
nothing that scholars of the biblical text don't deal with
every day.
Yigal Levin
From: fred burlingame [mailto:[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>]
Sent: Sunday, November 28, 2010 1:47 AM
To: Yigal Levin
Cc: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] cognate alphabet
Hello Yigal:
I would ordinarily defer to your explanation.
I note however, in this particular instance, the word שם
succeeds the
hebrew verb מוסבת . The corresponding greek word for
"name" does not appear
adjacent to the corresponding greek verb for surround.
Hence, in the link, the translation changes to "being
surrounded by walls."
http://apostolic.interlinearbible.org/numbers/32.htm
Permit me to suggest that the omission of a greek word for
"name" from the
septuagint, becomes a significant difference here.
regards,
fred burlingame
On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 5:30 PM, Yigal
Levin<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
Fred,
The consonantal MT text of Num. 32:38 says MWSBT $M
($=Shin). The MT
vocalization is "musabot shem", a strange phrase, which is
usually
understood as "of changed names". The Septuagint says
"perikekuklomenas",
which simply means "encircled" or "surrounded", which is a
possible
translation of MWSBT. Your understanding of
"perikekuklomenas" as
"fortified" is a matter of interpretation, not what the
Septuagint actually
says.
So in this case, the Septuagint does show us that the
Hebrew text from
which it was translated was very similar, if not
identical, to the Hebrew
text which eventually became the MT. That text includes a
rather unusual
phrase, which apparently the 3rd century Alexandrian Jews
understood one
way, and others understood another way. The latter
interpretation was
preferred by Jerome, incorporated in the Vugate, and
became standard in
Western translations. It would be interesting to see how
the Russian
Orthodox, or the Coptic, or any other translation that is
based on the
Septuagint, handles this phrase. Anyone?
Yigal Levin
From: fred burlingame [mailto:[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>]
Sent: Saturday, November 27, 2010 11:36 PM
To: Yigal Levin
Cc: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] cognate alphabet
Hello Yigal:
Thanks for taking the time to respond. I appreciate your
clear explanation.
It sounds reasonable and historically accurate.
But permit me to suggest that the consequences of what you
state are a lot
larger than the print on this page.
Let me see if I understand you.
Returning to the original example in my initial post in
this thread
(numbers 32:38 and the word מוסנת ) :
a. the Jewish community generally accepts the "exchanging
names" rendering
of the phrase based on the masoretic text ("MT");
b. the Eastern Orthodox church community generally accepts
the "fortified
or walled cities" rendering of the phrase based on the
septuagint;
c. the Western Christian community generally accepts the
MT version of the
phrase for their old testament; and the septuagint
rendering for their new
testament; and
d. various traditions, rather than a factual line of
transmission, dictate
the choices in "a" - "c."
Please forgive me; but I am constrained to say again; that
is a profound
statement, about the biggest selling book yesterday, today
and tomorrow ...
and in the history of the human species; .... especially
since the process
described in respect of numbers 32:38 is frequently
repeated throughout old
and new testaments.
regards,
fred burlingame
On Sat, Nov 27, 2010 at 10:43 AM, Yigal
Levin<[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>>
wrote:
Fred, the answer to your questions are much simpler than
you seem to think.
Remember that most Bibles are printed primarily for an
audience of
synagogue
and church-going readers, and what they are interested in
is what their
tradition considers to be the "authoritative" text. For
Jews, this is
unquestionably the MT - the Septuagint has no authority
whatsoever. While
it
is true that the Septuagint was a Jewish translation,
after the demise of
the Greek-speaking diaspora, it was shunted aside and all
but ignored. For
Christians, the story is a little more complicated. The
Septuagint was the
Old Testament of the early church, and is still that of
most Eastern
churches. In the West, it was Jerome who basically decided
NOT to use the
Septuagint as the basis for his Vulgate, which does make
sense if one
considers the Septuagint to be "just" a translation. So he
used the Hebrew
text that Jews of his day were using, and considering the
very few
differences between the Vulgate and the MT, what he used
was basically the
forerunner of what became the MT (call it the "proto-MT -
of course it did
not include the vowel points or cantilation marks, and the
chapter and
verse
divisions were slightly different). He did consult the
Septuagint is many
places, but the main text is that of the "proto-MT". Since
the Vulgate
became the authoritative text of the Catholic church, once
again the
Septuagint became irrelevant in the West. Later,
post-reformation
translations into other Western languages follow the same
tradition - to
translate the OT from what is seen as the "authoritative"
Hebrew text - the
MT - and the NT from the "authoritative" Greek text - the
Septuagint.
Despite all this, many modern translations DO take some
Septuagint readings
into account, where they seem to provide a more "logical"
text than the MT.
Whether this is done without comment, or in a footnote, or
as a suggested
alternative reading, depends on what the publisher feels
his intended
readers would be comfortable with. So your no. 1 below is
not entirely
correct. Your no. 2 below is correct linguistically, but
as I've already
commented, the Septuagint can certainly be a useful
witness of: a.
alternative text-traditions, and b. the way in which 3-2nd
century Jews
understood the biblical text.
I partially agree with your no. 3.
Yigal Levin
From: fred burlingame [mailto:[email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>]
Sent: Thursday, November 25, 2010 7:46 PM
To: Yigal Levin
Cc: [email protected]
<mailto:[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] cognate alphabet
Hello Yigal:
Thanks for your clear and helpful explanation. Please
allow me to respond
in
inverse order, with my understanding of your remarks.
1. The septuagint language relates to the masoretic text
("MT") language,
but only in an approximate "rosetta stone" fashion. I
still do not
understand however, why modern english bible publishers
(and their scholar
consultants) unanimously (in my un-scientific experience),
accept the MT
rendering and reject the corresponding septuagint
rendering (in the case of
differing words or meanings).
2. Comparative linguistics identifies sufficient closeness
between aramaic
and MT languages (by way of example, and not limitation),
for the one to
explain the other, to a degree. No such proximity exists
between septuagint
greek and MT hebrew.
3. My reaction to "2" above mirrors my response to fred
putnam's comments
(in a separate post). I don't see the linguistic
distinction between:
a. vertical; and
b. horizontal,
languages; or, why does ancient aramaic inform
understanding of MT, but not
mishnaic hebrew? It seems to me a distinction without
difference; that
laterally related languages enjoy more closeness than
vertically related
languages. Perhaps this conclusion represents ignorance on
my part.
regards,
fred burlingame
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