Texts in Conversation
The Hebrew version of Isaiah 51:3 describes God's future actions to comfort Zion in third-person terms, presenting them as promises. The Greek Septuagint translation changes these to first-person speech, along with the tense of some of them, with God sometimes declaring what he did instead of what he will do.
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Isaiah 51:3
Hebrew Bible
1 “Listen to me, you who pursue godliness, who seek the Lord. Look at the rock from which you were chiseled, at the quarry from which you were dug. 2 Look at Abraham, your father, and Sarah, who gave you birth. When I summoned him, he was a lone individual, but I blessed him and gave him numerous descendants. 3 Certainly the Lord will console Zion; he will console all her ruins. He will make her wilderness like Eden, her arid rift valley like the garden of the Lord. Happiness and joy will be restored to her, thanksgiving and the sound of music. 4 Pay attention to me, my people. Listen to me, my people! For I will issue a decree, I will make my justice a light to the nations. 5 I am ready to vindicate, I am ready to deliver, I will establish justice among the nations. The coastlands wait patiently for me; they wait in anticipation for the revelation of my power.
Date: 7th-5th Centuries B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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LXX Isaiah 51:3
Septuagint
1 Hear me, you that pursue what is righteous, and seek the Lord. Look to the solid rock that you hewed and to the hole of the pit that you dug. 2 Look to Abraam your father and to Sarra who bore you; because he was but one, then I called him and blessed him and loved him and multiplied him. 3 And I will comfort you now, Sion; I comforted all her desolate places, and I will make her desolate places like the garden of the Lord; in her they will find joy and gladness, confession and the voice of praise. 4 Hear me; hear, my people, and you kings, give ear to me, because a law will go out from me, and my judgment for a light to nations. 5 My righteousness draws near swiftly; my salvation will go out, and the nations will hope in my arm; the islands will wait for me and hope in my arm.
Date: 1st Century B.C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Even God himself emerges from the shadows of reported deeds to speak directly to Zion for himself. In 51:3 three descriptions of divine activity are turned into first-person accounts ... Furthermore, the addition of vuv and the translation of the Hebrew perfect by the future tense ... raise the possibility that this report has been entirely contemporized, and is being applied in a more directly homiletical fashion to a contemporary audience that has not yet seen Zion comforted in its day ..."
Baer, David A.
When We All Go Home: Translation and Theology in LXX Isaiah 56-66
(p. 55) Sheffield Academic Press, 2001
* 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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