Texts in Conversation
The Letter of Aristeas has the translators work together and compare drafts until they agree. In City of God, Augustine has each one work apart and still produce the same text, proof to him that the Greek Septuagint translation came from God.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Letter of Aristeas 1:302
Letter of Aristeas to Philocrates
Pseudepigrapha, Hebrew Bible Expansions
Three days later Demetrius took the men and passing along the sea-wall, seven stadia long, to the island, crossed the bridge and made for the northern districts of Pharos. There he assembled them in a house, which had been built on the sea-shore, of great beauty and in a secluded situation, and invited them to carry out the work of translation, since everything that they needed for the purpose was placed at their disposal. So they set to work comparing their several results and making them agree, and whatever they agreed on was suitably copied out under the direction of Demetrius.
Augustine, City of God 18.42
On the City of God Against the Pagans
Early Christian
It is reported, indeed, that there was an agreement in their words so wonderful, stupendous, and plainly divine, that when they had sat at this work, each one apart (for so it pleased Ptolemy to test their fidelity), they differed from each other in no word which had the same meaning and force, or, in the order of the words; but, as if the translators had been one, so what all had translated was one, because in very deed the one Spirit had been in them all. And they received so wonderful a gift of God, in order that the authority of these Scriptures might be commended not as human but divine, as indeed it was, for the benefit of the nations who should at some time believe, as we now see them doing.
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Notes and References
“... In the light of all this, it is easy to see why Jerome's claim that the Hebrew text should form the basis for new translations because it was earlier and more authentic than the LXX, was so shocking (and even seen as a sell-out to the Jews, Brock 1972: 25), and why it drew such opposition from Augustine. These two giants of the fourth to fifth centuries crystallize the issues. For Augustine (354-430), the unanimity of the translators was essential: there was no collaboration; all were individually inspired to produce identical versions, and so the whole LXX was inspired and infallible (City of God 18.42-4 (not 17 as Swete 1914: 13 states); cf. Christian Doctrine 2.2). ...”
* 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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