Texts in Conversation
The Hebrew version of Habakkuk describes God shining with rays from his hand. The Greek Septuagint instead interprets this as horns in God's hands and reads the hidden power as a love of his strength, language the translators struggled to translate.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Habakkuk 3:4
Hebrew Bible
3 God comes from Teman, the Holy One from Mount Paran. Selah. His splendor has covered the skies, the earth is full of his glory. 4 His brightness will be as lightning; a two-pronged lightning bolt flashing from his hand. This is the outward display of his power. 5 Plague will go before him; pestilence will march right behind him.
LXX Habakkuk 3:4
Septuagint
3 God will come from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Pharan, shaded densely with trees. Musical interlude His virtue covered the heavens, and the earth is full of his praise. 4 And his splendor will be like a light; horns are in his hands. And he has established a strong love of his strength. 5 A word will go before his face, and it will come out into the plain at his feet.
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Notes and References
... This verse, consisting of three equal cola, has received an abundance of interpretations and explanations. Here are some of them. The Septuagint shows the following rendering: And his brightness shall be as light there were horns in his hands and he caused (lit. put) a mighty love of his strength. The Septuagint, followed by the Syriac version, turns נֹגַהּ, 'brightness,' into נגהו, 'his brightness,' meaning the brightness of God; קַרְנַיִם were interpreted here, as well as in the Vulgate, to mean the horns of an animal; and מִיָּדוֹ, 'from his hand,' was read by both as בידיו, 'in his hands' (pl.). שָׁם was assumed by the Septuagint, as well as the Vulgate, to derive from the root שׂים, meaning 'to put'; and חֶבְיוֹן to stem from the root חבב, 'to like, love.' The Septuagint rendering makes little sense, and indicates that even the Greek translators had difficulty with the enigmatic verse. ...
Shupak, Nili
The God from Teman and the Egyptian Sun God: A Reconsideration of Habakkuk 3:3-7
(p. 99) Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society, 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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