the "LXX as Christian-created" hypothesis, and Philo

[StephenGoranson]

mlinssen has claimed in
viewtopic.php?f=3&t=10620&start=160
that Christians created the LXX, proposing the following sequence:

"Coptic, Gospel of Thomas, anti-Judaism, *Ev, Chrestianity, Greek, Synoptics, Judaism, Christianity, Patristics, Marcion, LXX

It all started with Coptic, Thomas is the unwilling and unwitting source to it all. Marked by fierce anti-Judaism, *Ev continues that line and establishes what I label Chrestianity: a purely "Gentile" movement not only devoid of any and all Jewishness but even diametrically opposed to all of Judaism.
Greek is the language in which it all becomes mainstream, as well in which it gets countered by Romans with their military and cringing Greek: the Synoptics get created, most important aspect of which is linking it all to Judaism and even rooting it into it: Christianity. The Patristics come after, they invent Marcion in order to refute all of Chrestianity, and create the LXX in order to back up their fables and lies."
********
But Philo of Alexandria used the LXX, earlier than that sequence proposed.

Compare, e.g. Sarah J.K. Pearce, chapter 27, "Philo and the Septuagint," of The Oxford Handbook of the Septuagint (2021), online Abstract:

"This chapter deals with the fundamental place of the LXX in the writings of Philo of Alexandria, with particular attention to the treatment of the LXX text in the following: (1) the Questions and Answers on Genesis and Exodus; (2) the Allegorical Commentary; (3) the Exposition of the Law; (4) the Life of Moses Books 1–2. It also discusses questions of Philo’s citation practice; terminology applied to Jewish sacred books; the transmission history of Philo’s scriptural citations; his presentation of the translation of the books of Moses on the island of Pharos (Mos. 2.25–44); his use of etymologies; and his knowledge of Hebrew."

https://academic.oup.com/edited-volume/ ... m=fulltext

***********
The late hypothetical placement of the LXX is apparently one of the counterfactual (?) problems of that mlinssen-proposed chronological sequence.

[lsayre]

Extant copies of the Septuagint date to no further back than the 4th century CE.

[mlinssen]

Extant copies of the Septuagint date to no further back than the 4th century CE.

3rd CE is the earliest one found so far, one of Kenyon's Chester Beatty:

viewtopic.php?p=150146#p150146

I've also found some Greek that's not LXX, and it's on a scroll even, and it looks like an early LXX attempt. 50-150 CE? That could mean it contains the oldest ï in the book:

viewtopic.php?p=151688#p151688

Not every Greek Tanakh qualifies as Septuagint/ LXX; naturally it needs to disagree with the Tanakh on essential points so it can support the NT.
In addition to that it contains scribal signs that run across Chrestian and Christian writings from Coptic to Greek to Latin: ü, ï, apostrophe in between identical or similar consonants or after Judaic names, and last the superlinear replacing line-ending Nu - all of which can be found in the NHL, and Thomas

The superlinear highly likely stems from Demotic and can also be found in secular writings as well as magical papyri:

https://isac.uchicago.edu/research/publ ... dictionary

That's the full dictionary, the N is mid page

[lsayre]

The original LXX was comprised of only the Torah (Pentateuch). Any LXX which contains the books of the major Profits, minor Profits, the Apocrypha, etc... is fake. And any such LXX is likely intended to conform with corruptions found necessary to comply with the NT message.

[Steven Avery]

There was definitely Christian tampering with the "LXX".

That is easily seen by how Romans 3:13-18 was inserted in Psalm 14 (13 in "LXX").

[StephenGoranson]

The name "the Septuagint" or LXX can be misleading, in part because there is no good evidence that 70 or 72 people created it, and also because there is more than one Greek translation.

The point I was attempting to make is that the very first Greek translation of Torah was made before Christianity.

[MrMacSon]

The point I was attempting to make is that the very first Greek translation of Torah was made before Christianity.

• What evidence is there for that? (I don't doubt the statement, I'm interested in the evidence for it)
  
  mainly/just Philo and the Septuagint by Sarah J.K. Pearce (?)

[MrMacSon]

There was definitely Christian tampering with the "LXX".
That is easily seen by how Romans 3:13-18 was inserted in Psalm 14 (13 in "LXX").

• Could the vice versa happened?

• Is the Masoretic version [in Psalm 14] different to the LXX version [Palm 13 in "LXX"] ??
  Or are [they virtually the] same and reflect changes to correspond to Rom 3:13-18?

[MrMacSon]

From wikipedia

Origin and transmission

---

The oldest manuscript fragments of the final Masoretic Text, including vocalications and the masorah, date from around the 9th century. The oldest-known complete copy, the Leningrad Codex, dates from the early 11th century. The Aleppo Codex, once the oldest-known complete copy but missing large sections since the 1947 Civil war in Palestine, dates from the 10th century. However, codification of the base consonants appears to have begun earlier, perhaps even in the Second Temple period. In 2022, Codex Sassoon (or Codex S1, MS1, Codex Sassoon 1053, or Safra JUD 002) resurfaced after almost 600 years of obscurity. This is a codex comprising all 24 books of the Hebrew Bible, dated to the 10th century. It is considered as old as the Aleppo Codex and a century older than the Leningrad Codex (1006) ...

Second Temple period

The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls at Qumran, dating from c. 150 BCE – 75 CE, shows that in this period there was no uniform text. According to Menachem Cohen, the Dead Sea scrolls showed that "there was indeed a Hebrew text-type on which the Septuagint-translation was based and which differed substantially from the received MT." The scrolls show numerous small variations in orthography, both as against the later Masoretic Text, and between each other. It is also evident from the notings of corrections and of variant alternatives that scribes felt free to choose according to their personal taste and discretion between different readings.

The text of the Dead Sea Scrolls and Peshitta read somewhat in-between the Masoretic Text and the old Greek. However, despite these variations, most of the Qumran fragments can be classified as being closer to the Masoretic Text than to any other text group that has survived. According to Lawrence Schiffman, 60% can be classed as being of proto-Masoretic type, and a further 20% Qumran style with a basis in proto-Masoretic texts, compared to 5% proto-Samaritan type, 5% Septuagintal type, and 10% non-aligned.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masoretic ... ansmission

FWIW, the Pentateuch with Masoretic text and Samaritan Pentateuch in parallel : https://archive.org/details/HBOVTH_DBS_HS

[Steven Avery]

There was definitely Christian tampering with the "LXX".
That is easily seen by how Romans 3:13-18 was inserted in Psalm 14 (13 in "LXX").

• Could the vice versa happened?

• Is the Masoretic version [in Psalm 14] different to the LXX version [Palm 13 in "LXX"] ??
  Or are [they virtually the] same and reflect changes to correspond to Rom 3:13-18?

The evidence is so overwhelming (and includes Origen and Jerome) that even the scholars can understand. I have a review here:

Romans 3 Pauline wonderful scripture pastiche - interpolation into Psalm 14 (13 in LXX) of the "LXX" socalled
https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.ph ... alled.419/

And

Psalm 14 and Romans 3 in Vaticanus, Sinaiticus and Alexandrinus
https://www.purebibleforum.com/index.ph ... inus.2982/