Quote:
Originally Posted by Scott Pitta
The LXX refers to any Greek translation of the Old Testament. It has a textual history of its own and none of the LXX manuscripts are identical in their wording.
I have not seen any data pointing out where Jews changed the text of the Hebrew OT for theological reasons.
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How would you understand the situation of
Psalm 22:16, for example? Either the original text was "they pierced my hands and my feet" or "like a lion, they are at my hands and feet." In the oldest Hebrew (the Dead Sea Scrolls), LXX, Syriac, and Latin Vulgate, the reading is "they pierced my hands and my feet"; the Masoretic text alone has "like a lion, they are at my hands and feet." Would you regard that as an accidental change, or perhaps could it have theological motives?
On another note, it seems that Greek-speaking Jews were willing to change Greek translations of the OT, at least in part, because of how Christians used the LXX. In
Isaiah 7:14, the later translation by Theodotion, changed the LXX's "parthenos," which Matthew quotes, meaning "virgin," to "neania," meaning "young woman." Some would say that this is just a more accurate translation of the Hebrew "almah," but the motive for changing it most likely was the Christian emphasis on the virgin-birth of Christ. From what I have heard, there are other examples of changes of messianic passages in later Greek versions of the OT away from the LXX readings for similar motives. Perhaps someone on this forum knows offhand if this is so.