Texts in Conversation
In Jeremiah 36, officials question Baruch about the scroll’s origin, and he states that Jeremiah dictated the words to him. The Greek Septuagint translation of Jeremiah shortens this and omits the mention of dictation, perhaps to remove repetition.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Jeremiah 36:17
Hebrew Bible
16 When they had heard it all, they expressed their alarm to one another. Then they said to Baruch, “We must certainly give the king a report about everything you have read!” 17 Then they asked Baruch, “How did you come to write all these words? Do they actually come from Jeremiah’s mouth?” 18 Baruch answered, “Yes, they came from his own mouth. He dictated all these words to me, and I wrote them down in ink on this scroll.”
Date: 500–401 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
LXX Jeremiah 43:17
Septuagint
16 And it happened, when they had heard all the words, that they took counsel each with his neighbor, and said, Let us by all means tell the king all these words. 17 And they asked Baruch, saying, Where did you write all these words? 18 And Baruch said, Jeremiah told me from his own mouth all these words, and I wrote them in a book.
Date: 100–1 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... The questions seem perfunctory, but the princes need to know something about the scroll's preparation in case the king should ask them. The LXX omits "tell us, would you," and "from his dictation." It also translates the interrogative as "from where?". The Septuagint reading is also perfunctory: "From where did you get these words?" Did they really not know where Baruch got the words? Did they think Baruch was the prophet? The Septuagint deletions should certainly not be defended because "from his dictation" is repeated in Baruch's answer (verse 18). Repetitions of this sort are precisely what we expect in Hebrew discourse, in which questions are not answered by a simple "Yes" or "No." Jones says that the repetition gives emphasis; Weippert believes this double question elicits the double answer in verse 18. The Masoretic text should then be read ..."
Jack R. Lundbom, Jeremiah 21-36: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, AB 21B (New York: Doubleday, 2004), 602.
* 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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