Texts in Conversation
Isaiah 5 presents exile as a future consequence of the people's failure to understand, functioning as a warning. The Greek Septuagint translation changes the tone by describing the exile as a past event, removing its forward-looking urgency.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Isaiah 5:13
Hebrew Bible
11 Beware, those who get up early to drink beer, those who keep drinking long after dark until they are intoxicated with wine. 12 They have stringed instruments, tambourines, flutes, and wine at their parties. So they do not recognize what the Lord is doing, they do not perceive what he is bringing about. 13 Therefore my people will be deported because of their lack of understanding. Their leaders will have nothing to eat, their masses will have nothing to drink. 14 So Death will open up its throat, and open wide its mouth; Zion’s dignitaries and masses will descend into it, including those who revel and celebrate within her. 15 Men will be humiliated, they will be brought low; the proud will be brought low.
Date: 740–450 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
LXX Isaiah 5:13
Septuagint
11 Woe to those who rise up in the morning, and follow strong drink; who wait at it till evening: for the wine shall inflame them. 12 For they drink wine with harp, and lute, and drums, and pipes: but they do not regard the works of the Lord, and do not consider the works of his hands. 13 Therefore my people have been taken captive, because they do not know the Lord: and there has been a multitude of dead bodies, because of hunger and of thirst for water. 14 Therefore hell has enlarged its desire and opened its mouth without ceasing: and her glorious and great, and her rich and her pestilent men shall go down into it. 15 And the mean man shall be brought low, and the great man shall be disgraced, and the lofty eyes shall be brought low.
Date: 100–1 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... According to Barr many translators in antiquity were neither consistently literal nor consistently free in their way of translating but combined these two approaches in a rather inconsistent way. This image that Barr depicts of ancient Bible translations fits the Septuagint of Isaiah quite well. Also in this translation literal and free rendition are often closely and intricately intertwined. To make this rather technical exposition somewhat more concrete, let me now offer a few illustrations of rearranged texts in LXX Isaiah ..."
Mirjam van der Vorm-Croughs, The Old Greek of Isaiah: An Analysis of Its Pluses and Minuses, SCS 61 (Atlanta: SBL, 2014), 23.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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