At 07:27 PM 5/23/96 -0400, you wrote:
>At 5:31 PM 5/23/96, ...drew wrote:
>> Greetings:
>>
>> My name is drew o. odegaard. I am new to this mail-list and
>>by way of introduction, I have a question on a book I found - The Septuagint.
>>
>> In 1988, I obtained a copy of the Septuagint Version of the Old
>>Testement with "An English Translation; and with various readings and
>>critical notes." It was published by S. Bagster and Sons Limited.
>>London. (and New York: James Pott & Co.)
>>
>> I found it at an estate sale in Duluth, Minnesota, and I am
>>wondering if it is a good work to use and study from? And, does anyone on
>>this list know the year of publication of this book - or where I might
>>find out when it was published? (for it fails to list this information.)
>
>Hi Drew
>
>This is the translation of the Septuagint by Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton.
>It was originally published by S. Bagster in 1851. (A Greek/English
>"interlinear" edition of this book is currently published by Hendrickson
>for about $50 --although one can almost always find it on sale for ~$25.)
>
>The Septuagint is the "standard" ancient translation of the Hebrew
>Scriptures into Greek (it is almost certainly the version of the OT/HB that
>were known to and used by the majority of the authors of the NT).
>
>There are two things you should be aware of. First the text of the
>Septuagint [usally abbreviated LXX] differs in many places from the current
>standard Hebrew text, in some books quite significantly. (In short, the
>text that underlay the translation of the LXX and the text underlying what
>was later to become standard "Masoretic" text of the Hebrew Scriptures
>appear to have differed quite a bit.)
>
>If you are goint to pursue this topic, you may want to do some additional
>reading. For example, check out the section on the Septuagint in Bruce
>Metzger's _The Early Versions of the NT_. (Two other, deeper books are
>Kenyon's _Text of the Greek Bible_ and Emmanuel Tov's _The Text-Critical
>Use of the Septuagint in Biblical Research_.)
>
>Second, Brenton's translation is quite old; both in the sense that his
>English style seems rather dated now (as I'm sure you're aware ;-) and that
>the underlying text he used is now well over a century out of date by
>modern critical standards. OTOH, unfortunately Brenton's seems to be the
>only translation of the entire Septuagint into English.
>
>So in answer to you question "is it useful", yes it can be in the sense
>that it will give you an view into an earlier, alternative textual history
>underlying our current OT. However as an "interpretive" tool, it is
>probably less useful. In any case, this particular edition needs to be
>approached with some caveats.
>
>Nichael
>nichael@sover.net __
>http://www.sover.net/~nichael Be as passersby -- IC
>
>
>
>
Kevin W. Woodruff
Reference Librarian
Cierpke Memorial Library
Temple Baptist Seminary
Tennessee Temple University
1815 Union Ave.
Chattanooga, TN 37404
423/493-4252
Cierpke@utc.campus.mci.net