Texts in Conversation
2 Peter and the Greek Septuagint translation of Ezekiel incorporate Greek mythology through their references to Tartarus and Hades. Ezekiel shows giant figures sent to Hades, and 2 Peter describes angels imprisoned in Tartarus for their rebellion.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
LXX Ezekiel 32:27
Septuagint
26 There were laid Meshech, and Tubal, and all their strength all around his tomb: all his men who were killed, all the uncircumcised, killed with the sword, who caused their fear to be in the land of the living. 27 And they are laid with the giants that fell of old, who went down to Hades with their weapons of war: and they laid their swords under their heads, but their iniquities were upon their bones, because they terrified giants in the land of the living. 28 And you shall lie in the midst of the uncircumcised, with those who have been killed by the sword.
Date: 100–1 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
2 Peter 2:4
New Testament
3 And in their greed they will exploit you with deceptive words. Their condemnation pronounced long ago is not sitting idly by; their destruction is not asleep. 4 For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but threw them into Tartarus16 and locked them up in chains in utter darkness, to be kept until the judgment, 5 and if he did not spare the ancient world, but did protect Noah, a herald of righteousness, along with seven others, when God brought a flood on an ungodly world,
Date: 120–130 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... The verbs “to cast into Tartarus,” and were almost always used with reference to the early Greek theogonic myths, in which the ancient giants, the Cyclopes and Titans, were imprisoned in Tartarus, the lowest part of the underworld, by Uranos, Kronos and Zeus. They are not used in the Greek version of 1 Enoch; though τάρταρος (“Tartarus”) is used of the place of divine punishment in 1 Enoch 20:2, as elsewhere in Jewish Greek literature (LXX Job 40:20; 41:24; Proverbs 30:16; Sibylline Oracles 4:186; Philo, Life of Moses 2.433). But Hellenistic Jews were aware that the Greek myth of the Titans had some similarity to the fall of the Watchers (though Philo, Gig. 58, rejects any comparison). Sometimes the Watchers’ sons, the giants (the Nephilim), were compared with the Titans (Josephus, Antiquities 1.73; compare LXX Ezekiel 32:27; Sirach 16:7) but in Judith 16:6 (and also the Christian passage Sibylline Oracles 2:231) the Watchers themselves seem to be called τιτᾶνες (“Titans”). Thus in using a term reminiscent of the Greek myth of the Titans the author of 2 Peter follows Hellenistic Jewish practice ..."
Richard Bauckham, Word Biblical Commentary: Jude-2 Peter (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1983), 249–250.
* 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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