The Jesus Blog: When God Spoke Greek

Monday, September 16, 2013

When God Spoke Greek—Chris Keith

I just had a copy of When God Spoke Greek: The Septuagint and the Making of the Christian Bible (Oxford University Press) by T. Michael Law land on my desk. Most of you will know Dr. Law from his unbelievable Marginalia website or incessant quoting of rappers on Facebook. I’m looking forward to reading this book. Readers of this blog may think Septuagint studies relate very little to Jesus studies, but they would be wrong. In some places, Jesus’ citations of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament look like he’s quoting from the LXX. In other places, it looks like he knows the MT. I’ll be interested to see if/how Dr. Law addresses these matters.

The back of the cover reads: “Many of the Hebrew scriptures were still evolving when they were translated into Greek, and these Greek translations, along with several new Greek writings, became Holy Scripture in the early Church.” In short, Law here offers a full account of the fact that, for the vast majority of the earliest Christians, the LXX was their OT, not the Hebrew texts upon which modern Bible translations are based.

2 comments:

scott caulleySeptember 16, 2013 at 11:52 AM
I read through it quickly-- I need to read it again, more slowly. But I appreciate the emphases: the reminder that the Jewish canon was not fixed by the time of Jesus, as is often assumed, is quite important for our understanding of what happened with the Christian writings, and with the so-called Apocrypha.

Laws points out that the NT writers cite various texts, not just the LXX. Sometimes they quote a Greek text close to the proto-Masoretic Hebrew. He notes that some of the arguments in the NT only "work" with the text type chosen. But he equivocates on the question of whether the writers did this consciously, purposefully. He says it doesn't matter.

I suspect that some of the choices of text type were in fact conscious. Some are related to the tendentious readings found in the LXX and Old Greek-- like "sojourners" in 1 Peter, probably reflecting OG Psalm 35:5(34:4)[the Lord delivered me from all my "sojourning" {instead of "fears" in the MT}].

Law's book looks very good. I look forward to hearing what you think. -- Scott Caulley
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LarrySeptember 16, 2013 at 4:57 PM
Good thing God speaks English now.
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James Crossley (PhD, Nottingham) is Professor of Bible, Society, and Politics at St. Mary's University, Twickenham, London. In addition to most things historical Jesus, his interests typically concern Jewish law and the Gospels, the social history of biblical scholarship, and the reception of the Bible in contemporary politics and culture. He is co-executive editor of the Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus.

Christine Jacobi studied protestant theology and art history in Berlin and Heidelberg. She is research associate at the chair of exegesis and theology of the New Testament and apocryphal writings. She completed her dissertation at the Humboldt-University of Berlin in 2014. She is the author of Jesusüberlieferung bei Paulus? Analogien zwischen den echten Paulusbriefen und den synoptischen Evangelien (BZNW 213), Berlin: de Gruyter 2015. Christine Jacobi is a member of the „August-Boeckh-Antikezentrum“ and the „Berliner Arbeitskreis für koptisch-gnostische Schriften“.

Chris Keith (PhD, Edinburgh) is Professor of New Testament and Early Christianity and Director of the Centre for the Social-Scientific Study of the Bible at St. Mary’s University, Twickenham, London.

Anthony Le Donne (PhD, Durham) is Associate Professor of New Testament at United Theological Seminary. He is the author/editor of seven books. He is the co-founder of the Jewish-Christian Dialogue and Sacred Texts Consultation and the co-executive editor of the Journal for the Study of the Historical Jesus.

Brant Pitre (PhD, University of Notre Dame) is Professor of Sacred Scripture at Notre Dame Seminary in New Orleans. Among other works, he is the author of Jesus, the Tribulation, and the End of the Exile (Mohr-Siebeck/Baker Academic, 2005), and Jesus and the Last Supper (Eerdmans, 2015). He is particularly interested in the relationship between Jesus, Second Temple Judaism, and Christian origins.

Rafael Rodríguez (PhD, Sheffield) is Professor of New Testament at Johnson University. He has published a number of books and essays on social memory theory, oral tradition, the Jesus tradition, and the historical Jesus, as well as on Paul and Pauline tradition. He also serves as co-chair of the Bible in Ancient and Modern Media section of the Society of Biblical Literature.

Baker Academic

Monday, September 16, 2013

When God Spoke Greek—Chris Keith

2 comments:

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