Texts in Conversation
Zechariah 9 says God will “appear” above his people, suggesting a physical encounter. The Septuagint changes this to “be” over them, likely reflecting an earlier Hebrew form that had already softened the physical implication before translation.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Zechariah 9:14
Hebrew Bible
13 I will bend Judah as my bow; I will load the bow with Ephraim, my arrow. I will stir up your sons, Zion, against your sons, Greece, and I will make you, Zion, like a warrior’s sword. 14 Then the Lord will appear above them, and his arrow will shoot forth like lightning; the Sovereign Lord will blow the trumpet and will proceed in the southern storm winds. 15 The Lord of Heaven’s Armies will guard them, and they will prevail and overcome with sling stones. Then they will drink and will become noisy like drunkards, full like the sacrificial basin or like the corners of the altar.
Date: 500–401 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
LXX Zechariah 9:14
Septuagint
13 For I have bent you, Judah, for myself as a bow, I have filled Ephraim; and I will raise up your children, Zion, against the children of the Greeks, and I will handle you as the sword of a warrior. 14 And the Lord shall be over them, and his arrow shall go forth as lightning: and the Lord Almighty shall blow with the trumpet; and shall proceed with the tumult of his threatening. 15 The Lord Almighty shall protect them, and they shall destroy them, and overwhelm them with sling-stones; and they shall swallow them down as wine, and fill the altar as bowls.
Date: 100–1 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Also in this issue, we regard inconsistencies within the Septuagint, even within one and the same book. The phrase “I saw the Lord standing on the altar” in Amos 9:1 has been rendered with precise equivalency (“I saw the Lord standing on the altar”) whereas “and the Lord shall appear over them” in Zechariah 9:14 has been reconfigured as “and the Lord shall be upon them.” The translation of the whole book of the Twelve Prophets is the work of only one translator. Why would he avoid the prospect of seeing God in Zechariah 9:14 but not in Amos 9:1? I think we should keep in mind that sometimes a Septuagint translator is not the initiator but only the witness to a process of reformulation. Perhaps in Zechariah 9:14 “He will appear” was changed to “He will be” before the integration of Zechariah 9 into the whole book of the Twelve Prophets took place, and the translator faithfully rendered what he found in his Vorlage. He did not dare to change the meaning of Amos 9:1 ..."
Martin Meiser, The Septuagint and Its Reception: Collected Essays (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022), 16.
* 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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