Go to Related Reading
About this book

LXX Deuteronomy

Septuagint

About this book
Chapter 5

1 And Moses called all Israel, and said to them, Hear, Israel, the ordinances and judgments, all that I speak in your ears this day, and you shall learn them, and observe to do them. 2 The Lord your God made a covenant with you in Horeb. 3 The Lord did not make this covenant with your fathers, but with you: you are all here alive this day. 4 The Lord spoke to you face to face in the mountain out of the midst of the fire. 5 And I stood between the Lord and you at that time to report to you the words of the Lord, (because you were afraid before the fire, and you did not go up to the mountain) saying, 6 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. 7 You shall have no other gods before my face. 8 You shall not make to yourself an image, nor likeness of anything, whatever things are in the heaven above, and whatever are in the earth beneath, and whatever are in the waters under the earth. 9 You shall not bow down to them, nor shall you serve them; for I am the Lord your God, a jealous God, visiting the sins of the fathers upon the children to the third and fourth generation to those who hate me, 10 and doing mercifully to thousands of those who love me, and that keep my commandments. 11 You shall not take the name of the Lord your God in vain, for the Lord your God will certainly not acquit him that takes his name in vain. 12 Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord your God commanded you. 13 Six days you shall work, and you shall do all your works; 14 but on the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord your God: you shall do in it no work, you, and your sons, and your daughter, your man-servant, and your maidservant, your ox, and your donkey, and all your cattle, and the stranger that sojourns in the midst of you; that your man-servant may rest, and your maid, as well as you. 15 And you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand, and a high arm: therefore the Lord your God appointed you to keep the sabbath day and to sanctify it. 16 Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you;⁠ that it may be well with you, and that you may live long upon the land, which the Lord your God gives you. 17 You shall not commit adultery. 18 You shall not commit murder. 19 You shall not steal. 20 You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. 21 You shall not covet your neighbor's wife; you shall not covet your neighbor's house, nor his field, nor his man-servant, nor his maid, nor his ox, nor his donkey, nor any beast of his, nor anything that is your neighbor's. 22 These words the Lord spoke to all the assembly of you in the mountain out of the midst of the fire; there was darkness, blackness, storm, a loud voice; and he added no more, and he wrote them on two tables of stone, and he gave them to me. 23 And it happened when you heard the voice out of the midst of the fire, for the mountain burned with fire, that you came to me, even all the heads of your tribes, and your elders: 24 and you said, Look, the Lord our God has shown us his glory, and we have heard his voice out of the midst of the fire: this day we have seen that God shall speak to man, and he shall live. 25 And now let us not die, for this great fire will consume us, if we shall hear the voice of the Lord our God any more, and we shall die. 26 For what flesh is there which has heard the voice of the living God, speaking out of the midst of the fire, as we have heard, and shall live? 27 Draw near, and hear all that the Lord our God shall say, and you shall speak to us all things whatever the Lord our God shall speak to you, and we will hear, and do. 28 And the Lord heard the voice of your words as you spoke to me; and the Lord said to me, I have heard the voice of the words of this people, even all things that they have said to you. They have said well all that they have spoken. 29 If only there were such a heart in them, that they should fear me and keep my commands always, that it might be well with them and with their sons for ever. 30 Go, say to them, Return to your houses; 31 but stand here with me, and I will tell you all the commands, and the ordinances, and the judgments, which you shall teach them, and let them do so in the land which I give them for an inheritance. 32 And you shall take heed to do as the Lord your God commanded you; you shall not turn aside to the right hand or to the left, 33 according to all the way which the Lord your God commanded you to walk in it, that he may give you rest; and that it may be well with you, and you may prolong your days on the land which you shall inherit.

Texts in conversation

Compare LXX Leviticus 20:9 and LXX Deuteronomy 5:16 and Mark 7:10

Septuagint · New Testament

Share:

Summary

Mark draws on Leviticus, which is rarely used in the gospels or Acts, and pairs it with Deuteronomy in a legal debate between Jesus and Pharisees. The quote is unusual because it does not match the Greek translation of Leviticus.

Passages

LXX Leviticus 20:9

Septuagint
7 And you shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. 8 And you shall observe my ordinances, and do them: I am the Lord that sanctifies you. 9 Every man who shall speak evil of his father or of his mother, let him die the death; has he spoken evil of his father or his mother? he shall be guilty. 10 Whatever man shall commit adultery with the wife of a man, or whoever shall commit adultery with the wife of his neighbor, let them die the death, the adulterer and the adulteress.
300–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Leviticus

LXX Deuteronomy 5:16

Septuagint
15 And you shall remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand, and a high arm: therefore the Lord your God appointed you to keep the sabbath day and to sanctify it. 16 Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God commanded you; that it may be well with you, and that you may live long upon the land, which the Lord your God gives you. 17 You shall not commit adultery.
300–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Deuteronomy

Mark 7:10

New Testament
9 He also said to them, “You neatly reject the commandment of God in order to set up your tradition. 10 For Moses said, ‘Honor your father and your mother,’ and, ‘Whoever insults his father or mother must be put to death.’ 11 But you say that if anyone tells his father or mother, ‘Whatever help you would have received from me is corban’ (that is, a gift for God), 12 then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother.
60–75 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Mark

References

"... Despite the fact that the book of Leviticus is not frequently quoted among those from the Pentateuch by Mark, Matthew and the Lukan writings, at least one clear allusion and five explicit quotations from Leviticus are to be found in the Synoptic Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles ... Besides the quotation of the 5th commandment from LXX Deuteronomy 5:16 in Mark 7:10, the author of Mark’s gospel links it with καί to a second quotation in Mark 7:10. The gospel of Matthew utilizes the same Markan material and links the quotation of the 5th commandment from LXX Exodus 20:12 / Deuteronomy 5:16 in Matthew 15:4 to Mark’s second quotation in Matthew 15:4. Whereas the first quotation is a statement which expresses a positive command (τίμα), the second quotation is a statement which expresses a negative command and contains the punishment when the first is not executed or violated (θανάτῳ τελευτάτω). But the textual origin of this second quotation which “Moses said” (Mark 7:10; Matt 15:4), is unclear. There seem, however, to be two possibilities that closely resemble the wording of the quotation in Mark and Matthew, namely Exodus 21:15 / Leviticus 20:9, 56 on the one hand, and Exodus 21:16, on the other hand. The last possibility seems to be more likely and matches the wording the closest. Especially three striking differences between the versions of LXX Leviticus 20:9 / Exodus 21:15 and 21:16 are pointing in this direction ..."
Gert J. Steyn, “The Text Form of the Leviticus Quotations in the Synoptic Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles,” in The Text of Leviticus: Proceedings of the Third International Colloquium of the Dominique Barthélemy Institute, ed. Innocent Himbaza (Leuven: Peeters, 2020), 205–242.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

Your feedback

LXX Leviticus 20:9 and LXX Deuteronomy 5:16 and Mark 7:10

Leave a comment

Your questions and comments are welcome!

Comments

Glossary

Search the Library