Jews and the Septuagint

Athetotheist wrote: Sat Sep 02, 2023 12:08 am The Jews have never relied on the Septuagint

Many dispute this claim:

otseng wrote: Wed Oct 20, 2021 7:22 am “Greek scriptures were in wide use during the Second Temple period, because few people could read Hebrew at that time. The text of the Greek Old Testament is quoted more often than the original Hebrew Bible text in the Greek New Testament[10][11] (particularly the Pauline epistles)[12] by the Apostolic Fathers, and later by the Greek Church Fathers. ”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint
“300 years before Christ was born, the Hebrew bible, which Christians consider the Old Testament, was translated into Koine Greek. The title of this translation was called the Septuagint. It is this translation that was used by the Paul, the Apostles, and the early church. ”
http://theorthodoxfaith.com/article/the … ly-church/
“Since Greek was the common language of the Roman Empire, the Septuagint was popular among Jews living under Roman rule. Many of the early Christians didn’t know Hebrew, so they naturally embraced this popular Greek translation as well.”
https://overviewbible.com/septuagint/

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1130530#p1130530

Athetotheist wrote: Sun Sep 03, 2023 1:20 pm Despite advantages to teaching the non-Jewish world the Written Torah, the Torah Sages did not welcome the opportunity. “The day when the Torah was written in Greek was as unfortunate for Israel as the day of the Golden Calf” (Soferim 1:7). They even decreed that the day the Septuagint was completed, the eighth day of the month of Teves (in the winter), was to be marked on the Jewish calendar as “a day of darkness” (Megillas Taanis).

https://www.jewishhistory.org/the-10th-of-tevet/

Not only did the Gentiles use the Septuagint, Jews did as well.

Few people could speak and even fewer could read in the Hebrew language during the Second Temple period; Koine Greek and Aramaic were the most widely spoken languages at that time among the Jewish community. The Septuagint therefore satisfied a need in the Jewish community.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1130624#p1130624

Athetotheist wrote: Mon Sep 04, 2023 6:29 pm They may have read it, but it wasn’t considered authoritative.

Of course it was authoritative. It was used as a source for quotations in the New Testament and it was used as a source for translations into other languages.

In about 90 instances, the Septuagint is quoted literally.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quotation … _Testament

With the spread of Early Christianity, this Septuagint in turn was rendered into Latin in a variety of versions and the latter, collectively known as the Vetus Latina, were also referred to as the Septuagint[30][31][32] initially in Alexandria but elsewhere as well.[17] The Septuagint also formed the basis for the Slavonic, Syriac, Old Armenian, Old Georgian, and Coptic versions of the Christian Old Testament.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1130669#p1130669

Athetotheist wrote: Tue Sep 05, 2023 8:55 pm Being authoritative for Christians didn’t make it authoritative for Jews.

Of course it was also authoritative for the Jews. The Septuagint was written by Jews and also hundreds of years before the first Christians even existed.

Biblical scholars agree that the first five books of the Hebrew Bible were translated from Biblical Hebrew into Koine Greek by Jews living in the Ptolemaic Kingdom, probably in the early or middle part of the third century BCE.[8] The remaining books were presumably translated in the 2nd century BCE.

Few people could speak and even fewer could read in the Hebrew language during the Second Temple period; Koine Greek and Aramaic were the most widely spoken languages at that time among the Jewish community. The Septuagint therefore satisfied a need in the Jewish community.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint

It is only after Christianity came along have the Jews rejected the Septuagint.

While the Septuagint appears to have been widely accepted by Jews of the Second Temple period, it has been largely rejected as scriptural by mainstream Rabbinic Judaism since late antiquity for several reasons….
Finally, the rabbis also wanted to distinguish their tradition from the emerging tradition of Christianity, which relied heavily on the Septuagint.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1130738#p1130738

Athetotheist wrote: Thu Sep 07, 2023 12:34 am If that’s the case, maybe it’s because Jesus’s failure as Messiah disillusioned them on the Septuagint.

As wikipedia says:
“the rabbis also wanted to distinguish their tradition from the emerging tradition of Christianity, which relied heavily on the Septuagint.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septuagint

https://debatingchristianity.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1130802#p1130802