Add to bookbag
Title: Septuagint
Original Title: Septante, version des
Volume and Page: Vol. 15 (1765), pp. 66–15:70
Author: Louis, chevalier de Jaucourt (biography)
Translator: Susan Emanuel
Subject terms:
Sacred criticism
Original Version (ARTFL): Link
Rights/Permissions:

This text is protected by copyright and may be linked to without seeking permission. Please see http://quod.lib.umich.edu/d/did/terms.html for information on reproduction.

URL: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.631
Citation (MLA): Jaucourt, Louis, chevalier de. "Septuagint." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Susan Emanuel. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2013. Web. [fill in today's date in the form 18 Apr. 2009 and remove square brackets]. <http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.631>. Trans. of "Septante, version des," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, vol. 15. Paris, 1765.
Citation (Chicago): Jaucourt, Louis, chevalier de. "Septuagint." The Encyclopedia of Diderot & d'Alembert Collaborative Translation Project. Translated by Susan Emanuel. Ann Arbor: Michigan Publishing, University of Michigan Library, 2013. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/spo.did2222.0000.631 (accessed [fill in today's date in the form April 18, 2009 and remove square brackets]). Originally published as "Septante, version des," Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, 15:66–15:70 (Paris, 1765).

Septuagint version, Greek translation of the Books of Moses, of which the Jews no longer understood the original language; as this version was made for the use of the synagogues of Egypt, and as it is the first and most famous of all, it is important to discuss it with the breadth that it merits.

The oldest book that speaks of it bears the name of Aristeas and has come down to us. The purpose of this letter is only to give its history and to this effect the author Aristeas is characterized as officer of the guards of Ptolemy Philadelphius. Here is a short summary of his tale.

Ptolemy Philadelphius, King of Egypt, had close to his heart the beautiful library that he formed at Alexandria, which he filled with all sorts of books, so he gave its direction to an illustrious Athenian whom he had at court, Demetrius of Phalere, whom he charged with drawing from everywhere in the world everything to do with the interests of books. Demetrius, performing this commission, learned that the Jews had a book that contained the laws of Moses; he told the king of it, and this prince, having consented to have a copy sent from Jerusalem, along with the people who would translate\ it into Greek, ordered Demetrius to draw up a memorandum on this affair, and to write about it to the sovereign sacrificer [chief priest].

Aristeas, the so-called author of this story of the seventy [= septante ] interpreters, Sosibius of Tarenta, and Andrew, all three of them people of quality in Ptolemy’s court and friends of the Jewish nation, took this occasion to ask the king for grace for those of this nation who had been put into slavery by Ptolemy and been sent into Egypt; the king granted their demand. Then Demetrius submitted a memorandum to obtain from the Jews the book of the Law of Moses that he wanted. According to the plan of this memorandum, the king asked Eleazar, the [chief priest] at Jerusalem, for the book of Moses and six persons from each tribe to translate it into Greek.

Aristeas and Andrew were the bearers of this letter, with immense presents that won them all sorts of honors upon their arrival in Jerusalem. They came back to Alexandria furnished with a good copy of the Law of Moses written in letters of gold, and accompanied by six elders of each tribe, that is to say 72 interpreters, to translate it into Greek.

The king having seen these 72 deputies was very satisfied with them, made them a present of 3 talents to each, and sent them to the Isle of Pharos, near Alexandria, to execute their enterprise. Demetrius led them there via Heptastadium that joins this island to the continent, and lodged them in a house that had been prepared for them. They started right away to work on their version; and when the period was over, after a general conference took place, Demetrius wrote it all down. The book was finished in 72 days. It was read and approved in the presence of the king, who again had presented to each translator three magnificent robes, two gold talents, a cup of one gold talent, and then he sent them back to their country. This is a summary of Aristeas’ tale.

Aristobulus, a Jew of Alexandria and a peripatetic philosopher, is the second to speak of this version of the Septuagint He lived around 188 of the 'era of contracts,’ that is to say 125 years before Jesus Christ; for one finds a letter that mentions it in this time of the Jews of Jerusalem and Judea, as it appears in the Second Book of the Maccabees . It is said that this Aristobulus had composed a commentary on the five books of Moses, and that he had dedicated it to King Ptolemy Philometor, whose tutor he had been; and it is claimed that he speaks there of this version made under the direction of Demetrius of Phalèra, by the express order of Ptolemy Philadelphius, king of Egypt. This book is lost; all that remains are a few fragments cited by Eusebius and Clement of Alexandria.

After Aristobulus comes Philo, another Jew of Alexandria, who lived in the time of Our Lord; for shortly after his crucifixion, he was sent as deputy by the Jews of Alexandria to Caïus Caesar, the Roman Emperor. In the story he tells of the Septuagint version, one finds the same things as in that of Aristeas: he embroiders only some new traits, to be able to conclude that the translators were men inspired by the spirit of God.

Josephus who wrote his Jewish antiquities around the end of the first century, agrees in parallel with Aristeas; and what he says, ( antiq. jud. xii. 2 .) Is only an abbreviation of this author. Except in Josephus, the cost of the redemption of the Jews is different from that of Aristeas; for where Aristeas says twenty drachmas per head and the total sum of six hundred sixty talents, Josephus puts one hundred twenty drachmas per head, and makes the total sum rise to 460 talents; for the rest, they agree with each other.

After Josephus, the first person to speak of the Septuagint version and the way it is read, is Justin Martyr, who lived around the middle of the second century, about a hundred years after Philo. He had been in Alexandria, and informed himself about the Jews of the country. He tells us what he learned from them, and what was regularly accepted among them as true; and what he says about it proves that which goes way beyond what Philo had written of the miraculous conformity of the translations: they had added different cells, and each translator had one in which he was enclosed, and where he had to do his individual translation of the whole work; and that when they came to compare these translations with each other, not a single word of difference was found. This good father takes all that at face value.

Ireneas, Clement of Alexandria, St. Hilaire, St. Augustine, Cyril of Jerusalem, Philastre of Bresse, and most of the Fathers who lived since Justin, all have these cells and the marvelous accord of all the versions. Some moderns defend the story with the same ardor, and cannot consent to let go a miracle that would confirm so well the divinity of the Holy Scripture against all contradictors. It is a shame that objections are made without any reply.

In the time of Epiphanus, who was bishop of Salamine in Cyprus in 368, false traditions had even more corrupted this story; in effect, the way he tell it is different form that of Justin, as well as from that of Aristeas; and yet he calls Aristeas as witness to the very fact s that he reports otherwise: which proves that in his day there was another Aristeas, and that the one we have today is the same that Josephus and Eusebius had.

After this historical account of the Septuagint version, we ought to say what we think about the matter.

I. It cannot be doubted that a Greek translation of the sacred Hebrew books was made in the time of the Ptolemies in Egypt; we still have this translation; and that it is the same that was possessed in the time of Our Lord, since almost all the passages that the holy writers of the New Testament cite from the Old in the original Greek are found word-for-word in this version. Nor can one doubt, given the passion the princes of the race of Ptolemies had to fill their library at Alexandria with all sorts of books, a passion about which all the historians of this time speak, one cannot doubt, I say, that this translation was done as soon as it was mentioned.

II. The letter that bears the name of Aristeas , who is the foundation of all that is retailed on the way in which this translation was done by the 72 ancients, sent expressly from Jerusalem to Alexandria in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphius, is a manifest fiction invented to give credit to this version. The Jews, from their return from captivity in Babylon until the time of Our Lord, were extremely given to [ donner dans ] novels of religion, as is shown in their apocryphal books that are conserved down to our day. The work that we still have under the name of Aristeas, is one of these novels written by a Hellenist Jew; and this is evident for several reasons.

1.° Although the author of this book calls himself a pagan Greek, he speaks everywhere as a Jew; and as soon as he speaks of God or the religion of the Jews, he speaks of them in terms that are only suited to a Jew, and he makes Ptolemy, Demetrius, André, Sozibius, and the others he introduces onto the stage speak in the same way.

2°. He makes Ptolemy spend a prodigious sum to have this version. It costs him to ransom the captives 660 talents: in vases of silver send to the temple, 70 talents: in vases of gold, 50: and in precious stones for these vases, five times the value of the gold; that is to say, 250 talents: in sacrifices and other articles used in the temple, 100 talents. Apart from that, he presents each of the 72 deputies with 3 talents of silver upon their arrival, that is to say in all 216 talents; and when he dismisses them, with 2 talents of gold to each and a cup of gold of the weight of one talent. All that put together gives the sum of 1,046 talents of silver, and 1,600 talents of gold, which, reduced to the currency of England, makes 1,918,537 pounds sterling, 10 shillings, by counting the talent on that of Athens, as Doctor Bernard sets the value. If one takes talents for the talents of Alexandria, where the scene is set, it would be much more, for it would be the double.

If one adds to this largesse several other slight presents that Aristeas has the prince give the deputies, apart form the cost of their trip and and the expenses of their stay in Egypt, then it would be found that Ptolemy, to have this book of Moses in Greek, would have spent more then two millions [pounds] sterling, that is to say about twenty times as much as the Alexandrian Library could be worth. How can we imagine that Ptolemy could make this prodigious expenditure for a book about which neither he nor his court could have been very curious?

3°. The questions put to the 72 deputies and their responses, have no less the air of a novel. The sending of the elders of Jerusalem to Alexandria for this translation, and that six to six [sic] were drawn from each tribe, are the invention of a Jew, who is thinking of the Sanhedrin and the number of twelve tribes of Israel; but it is not even apparent that there were then in all of Judea six men who would have the competence for this book, and who understand enough Greek to do it. This is not all: they also had to understand the Hebrew that was the language of the original: but Hebrew was then no longer their language, for since the return from Chaldea, it was Chaldean.

4°. In Aristea’s story there are other facts that cannot be adjusted with the history of this era. In particular, this Demetrius of Phalere whom he represents as the favorite of Philadelphius, far from being in favor at this prince’s court, had been disgraced for having tried to discourage his father from placing the crown on his head; and immediately after the death of the father who had protected him, Demetrius was put in prison where he died shortly after, as Diogenes of Laërce says. But those who are curious to deepen the fable of Aristeas can read what is written by MM. Dupin, Simon, and especially Dr. Hody in his scholarly book Bibliorum versionibus groec .

III. Aristobulus does not merit much attention, because his tale is drawn from Aristeas, whose tale was already in vogue among the Jews of Alexandria. What Second Maccab. 54 reports of this Aristobulus who was Ptolemy’s tutor in 188 of the era of contracts, is against all appearances. It was Ptolemy Physeon who reigned then; and the year 188 of the era of contracts is the 21 st of his reign, and the 56 th after the death of his father. Therefore he would have to be almost sixty years old at the least; and one does not have a tutor at that age.

It is also said that this Aristobulus had written a commentary on the five books of Moses and that he had dedicated it to Ptolemy Philometor; but everything makes us suspect that this commentary was the work of some Hellenist Jew, composed long after the date it bears; and what strengthens this suspicion is that Clement of Alexandria is the first to speak of it, and Eusebius the last. Still, this observation proves that this commentary, whatever it was, did not last long.

IV. As for Philo, his additions to the story of Aristeas are drawn from traditions accepted in his day among the Jews of Alexandria The principal one and accessory come from the same source, that is to say, both were invented to promote the Jewish religion, to make it respected among foreigners, and to attach to this version a veneration and particular authority common among their own people. Once this occurred, it was not difficult to introduce the solemnity of an anniversary to make a commemoration, such as Philo saw being practiced in his day.

V. It appears that the difference in the price of ransom of the Jews found between Josephus and Aristeas is visibly a mistake, either by the author or the copyists; for the total sum does not agree with what results from adding the individual sums. The number of Jews ransomed, says Josephus, was 120 thousand, at 20 drachmas per head, as Aristeas recounts, which is precisely the 400 talents, the same sum as Aristeas’; but Josephus says that the ransom was 120 drachmas per head, i.e. six times as much, and yet his total sum is only 460 talents. Thus there is an error in the numbers: either the ransom was smaller or else the sum was larger.

VI. As regards Justin Martyr and other fathers who followed him, they were persuaded too easily that what they wished was indeed true; for, that 72 persons shut up in different cells to make a translation of Scripture, should without any communication manage to all translate word by word in the same manner would be a miracle that would prove incontestably, not only the authority of the version, but the truth of the scripture of the old Testament; and Christians of those days would also have been interested in these two things, just as much as the Jews.

Justin Martyr thus finding in Alexandria this received tradition gave it his full belief, and used it even against the Pagans to defend the religion that he professed. Then Ireneas and other Church Fathers tasted in turn such a flattering idea. But to be convinced of the slight foundation that the authority of Justin Martyr merits in this affair, one has only to glance at the errors of his narration. According to him, Ptolemy sends to ask Herod for the book of the law. Justin could not imagine that not only was Ptolemy Philadelphius to whom he wanted to speak, but all the other Ptolemies his successors were in fact dead before Herod came to the throne in Judea. This blunder gives no credit to the rest of his story.

Let us add that this Father of the Church was very credulous; and that when he embraced Christianity, he let himself be too easily carried away by his zeal for the religion, and gave himself too easily to what appeared to favor it, Here is an telling example. Being in Rome, he saw a statue consecrated to Simon Sancus, an old demi-god of the Sabins. He imagined that it was dedicated to Simon Magus or the magician; and with no other foundation than this vision, he reproached the Roman people for making a god out of an imposter. The same facility made him lend faith to the discourses of the Jews of Alexandria, who by showing him the ruins of some old houses on the Island of Pharos, assured him that they were the hovels of the cells of the Seventy.

VII. The narration that Epiphanus gives of this version is so different from all the others that it seems drawn from another history than that from which Josephus and Eusebius drew. Apparently some Christian since Justin Martyr had gathered all that he could find on this subject, and had composed the Letter of Aristeas, from which Epiphanus took what he wrote. It is at least sure that Aristeas of Epiphane appeared after the time of the claimed author of this piece; for the second letter that Epiphanus cites of his, as written by Ptolemy Philadelphius to Eleazar, begins with this maxim:

“A hidden treasure, and a blocked spring, of what use can they be?”

This sentence is visibly taken from the Book of Ecclesiasticcus, ch. xx. 30 . and ch. xli. 14 . which was not published by the son of Sirach until around the year 132 before Jesus Christ, and 115 years after the death of Ptolemy Philadelphius, by the order of whom, according to this author, the version of the Septuagint was made.

Finally, the detail that we have just read sufficiently proves, I believe, that all that Aristeas, Philo, Justin Martyr, Epiphanus, and all those who followed them have retailed as the version of Septuagint , is a pure fable that has no foundation, unless that under the reign of Ptolemy Philadelphius, a version of the law of Moses was made in Greek by the Jews of Alexandria.

VIII. To better understand, it must be observed that when Alexander built Alexandria, he attracted to it a quantity of Jews. Ptolemy Soter also made his capital in this city and brought all his effort to embellish it; consequently he attracted a great number of other Jews by granting them the same privileges as Macedonians and Greeks; so that they made a very considerable portion of the inhabitants of this great city. The continual commerce they had with the citizens of the place soon obliged them to learn the dominant language which was Greek, and to speak it among themselves. What happened on this occasion was similar to what happened to them in Babylon; I mean to say that they forgot their language, and and gradually took that of the country. No longer understanding Hebrew, in which they formerly had the custom of reading the text, nor Chaldean, in which explanation was given in the synagogues, they made a Greek version for themselves. This is the true reason they produced this Greek version, to which the Aristeas’ letter gave the name Septuagint .

At first they only translated the law into Greek, the five books of Moses. Then in the time of Antiochus Epiphanius, those of Alexandria, who then conformed to all the usages of Judea and Jerusalem for spiritual matters, translated the prophets into Greek. Finally, some individuals translated the rest for their domestic use, so that the version to which is given the name S eptuagint , found itself complete; and this version was the one the Hellenist Jews used in all places of their dispersal where Greek was spoken.

1 st That only the Law was translated into Greek in the time of Ptolemy Philadelphius is a fact clearly marked in all the authors who began to speak of this version: in Aristeas, Aristobulus, Philo and Josephus, this is said expressly. 2 nd That it was in Alexandria that this version was made; the dialect of Alexandria that reigned everywhere is sufficient proof of this. 3 rd That it was done over several periods and by various people. The difference in style of various books, the different manner in which one finds the Hebrew words and the same phrases translated, finally the care that was apparently taken with the translation of certain books and the negligence that is seen in some others, or rather the exactitude of some of these translations and the lack of exactitude of others, are an irrefutable demonstration.

IX. The passion of Ptolemy Philadelphius to fill his fine library with all sorts of books permits no doubt that when this version was made in Alexandria, no copy was put there that remained until this rich storehouse of the sciences was consumed by a fire caused by Julius Caesar. A copy would have to have been badly neglected, since not one of the Greek writers who have come down to us, nor the ancient Latin writers, has ever said the slightest word about it.

Curiosity about this Greek version of Scripture was confined to the Jewish nation alone; they used it in public in synagogues, to read in it the lessons prescribed by their canons; and no doubt they also had individual copies in their families: but until the time of the New Testament, it did not appear that they showed them to strangers. When the Gospel was spread to all nations, then this version spread with it everywhere the Greek language was heard; it was no longer confined to the Hellenist Jews, it was in the hands of all those who wanted to have it, and copies multiplied. We also see, some time after Our Lord, that the pagans began to know the Old Testament; while before Christianity, very few – or rather not one of them – had known it.

X. As the Christian religion spread, this Greek version of the Septuagint was also more sought after and more esteemed. The evangelists and apostles who wrote the books of the New Testament cite it ; the fathers of the primitive Church also cite it All the Greek churches used it; and until St. Jerome, the Latins had only one translation based on this version. All the commentaries took this version for the text, and adjusted their explications to it. And when other nations converted and embraced the Christian religion, in order to have Scripture in their language, versions were based on the Septuagint, like the Illyrian, the Gothic, the Arabic, the Ethiopian, the Armenian and the Syriac.

XI. Nevertheless, as the Septuagint version gained credit among Christians, it lost it among Jews. As they found themselves pressed by various passages of this translation that the Christians used against them, they dreamed of procuring a new one that was more favorable to them. Aquila, a Jewish proselyte, was the first to answer this need. Soon after Aquila, two other Greek versions of the Old Testament were made, one by Theodotion, and the other by Symmachus, as we will discuss at length under Greek Versions .

It is enough here to note that Origen gathered in his hexapla the three last versions that we have just mentioned, along with that of the Septuagint Pamphilus and Eusebius around the end of the 2 nd century discovered Origen's hexapla in the library at Caesarea and made some copies of the Septuagint version and communicated them to the churches of these areas that accepted them from Antioch to Egypt.

About the same time two other editions of the Septuagint were made : the first by Lucian, church father of Antioch, which was found after his death in Nicomedia in Bithynia. It was this edition that was accepted afterward in all churches from Constantinople to Antioch. The other was made by Hesychius, bishop of Egypt, and was accepted first in Alexandria and then in all the churches of Egypt. These two correctors understood Hebrew and therefore made several corrections to the version.

The authors of these three editions of the Septuagint all suffered martyrdom in the tenth persecution; this event gave so great a reputation to their editions that every Greek church used them, one in one place and another in another. The churches of Antioch and Constantinople, and all others between them took that of Lucian. Those between Antioch and Egypt, that of Pamphilus, and in Egypt that of Hesychius. This is what leads St. Jerome to say that they divided the world into three ; because in his time no Greek church used any other than these three, which it regarded as an authentic copy of the Old Testament. These three editions, to judge by the manuscript copies that still remain, differ in no considerable way, provided one takes into account the errors of the copyists.

In the same way as the ancients had three principal editions of the Septuagint , it happens that the moderns also have three principal editions since printing, of which all the others are copies. The first is that of Cardinal Ximenes, printed in Complutens, or Alcala of Henarès in Spain; the second that of Aldus in Venice, and the third that of Pope Sixtus V in Rome.

That of Cardinal Ximenès was printed in 1615 in its polyglot, known under the name Bible of Complutens , which contains 1°. The Hebrew text; 2°. The Chaldean paraphrase of Onkélos on the Pentateuch; 3°. The Septuagint version of the Old Testament, and the new Greek original, and 4°. the version of both. It was the theologians of the university of Alcala and a few others who prepared the materials for printing; but as it was Cardinal Ximenes who had the plan for it, who directed them, and who made the expenditure, this polyglot has retained his name. The design proposed in this edition of the Septuagint was to choose from all the copies that had the lesson the one that most approached the Hebrew, and it was found that what they gave was a new Greek version rather than the old Septuagint , or the version that under this name had been of such great use to the fathers of the primitive Church. It is upon this edition of the Septuagint that those of the polyglots of Antwerp and Paris were based the former appearing in 1672 and the other in 1645. That of Commelin, printed in Heidelberg with a commentary by Vatable in 1699, is also based on this edition.

II. Aldus’s edition in Venice dates from 1578. It was André Asulanus, father-in-law of the printer, who prepared the copy by collecting several ancient manuscripts. It is from this one that issued all the German editions, except that of Heidelberg just mentioned.

III. But the Rome edition is preferred to the two others by all scholars, although Vossius condemned it as the worst. Cardinal de Montalte, who later came to the pontificate, had begun it. Since he bore the name Sixtus V when it appeared in 1687, this edition is also known under the same name. He began by recommending this work to Gregory XIII, representing to him that it had been ordered by a decree of the Council of Trent; and his opinion being followed, the task was given to Antoine Caraffa, a scholarly man of a famous Italian family, who was then made cardinal and the pope’s librarian. With the assistance of some scholars who worked under him, he completed this edition.

In almost everything an ancient manuscript of the Vatican Library was followed, which was all in capital letters without accents, without periods, and without distinction of chapters or verses. It was believed to be from the time of St. Jerome. But it lacked some pages, and they were obliged to have recourse to other manuscripts, of which the principal ones where the one from Venice of the library of Cardinal Bessarion, and another they had sent from Calabria, which was so close to that of the Vatican, that it was believed that one was a copy of the other, or that both were made from the same original.

The following year was published in Rome a Latin version of this edition, with notes by Flaminius Nobilius. Morin printed them both together in Paris in 1628. It is on this edition that were based all those of the Septuagint that were published in England: that of London in octavo in 1653, the polyglot of Walton in 1657, and Cambridge’s in 1665, where the scholarly preface by Bishop Pearson, and which gives the Rome edition much more faithfully than that of 1653, although both depart from each other on some things.

But the oldest and best manuscript of the Septuagint , in the judgment of those who have examined it carefully, is the Alexandrian that is in the Library of the King of England at St. James. It is all in capital letters, without distinction between chapters, verses, or words. It was a present made to Charles I by Cyril Luçar, then the patriarch of Constantinople; previously he was in Alexandria: when he left this patriarchate for that of Constantinople, he took away this manuscript and then had it sent to London by Sir Thomas Roe, ambassador of England to the Port, and put in this apostil that tells us the history of this manuscript:

Liber iste Scripturae sacroe n. and v. Testamenti, prout ex traditione habemus, est scriptus manu Thecloe nobilis foeminoe aegyptioe, ante mille and trecentos annos circiter, paulo post concilium Nicoenum. Nomen Thecloe in fine libri erat exaratum; sed extincto Christianismo in AEgypto à Mahometanis, and libri unà Christianorum in similem sunt redacti conditionem; extinctum enim est Thecloe nomen and laceratum; sed memoria and traditio recens observat.

- Cyrillus, patriarcha constantinopolitanus.

“This book that contains the Holy Scripture of the Old and New Testament, according to what tradition teaches us, is written in the hand of Thekla, woman of quality of Egypt, who lived almost thirteen hundred years ago, shortly after the Council of Nicea. The name of Thécla was written at the end; but the Christian religion having been abolished by the Mohammedans in Egypt, the books of the Christians had the same fate. The name of Thécla was thus torn off, but the memory was not lost, and tradition very well conserved it.”

- Cyril, patriarch of Constantinople.

Doctor Grave, a Prussian scholar, who lived several years in England, had undertaken to give an edition of this copy, and Queen Anne even gave him a pension for this purpose; he had already published two volumes when death prevented him from issuing the two others that would complete the work. If some capable man really wants to give the rest to the public, and take as much care over it as this doctor, we will have a fourth edition of the Septuagint , which will certainly be approved, and regarded henceforth as the best one of all; but that of Lambert Bos is not to be deprecated.

This is what history allows us to say of this ancient version of the Old Testament, and the ancient and modern editions based on it. If someone is curious to see disputes and remarks of criticism that this subject has caused, and and what scholars have written about them, he may consult Usserii syntagma de groecâ LXX. interpretum versione. Morini exercitationes biblicoe I. pars , and the préface he placed in front of his édition of the LXX. Wower, de groeca and latina Bibliorum interpretatione; the Prolegomena of Walton’s polyglot, ch. jx . Vossius, de LXX. int . the critical history of the Old Testament by Simon; the history of the canon of the Old Testament by Dupin; the Prolegomena by Grave placed in front of the two parts of the LXX that he did; and especially the scholarly book by Doctor Hody, de Biblior. version groec . — for it is he who has delved most deeply into this subject and dealt with better than all others who have written on it.