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LXX Exodus

Septuagint

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Chapter 14

1 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 Speak to the children of Israel, and let them turn and encamp before the village, between Migdol and the sea, opposite Baal Zephon: you shall encamp before them by the sea. 3 And Pharaoh will say to his people, As for these children of Israel, they are wandering in the land, for the wilderness has shut them in. 4 And I will harden the heart of Pharaoh, and he shall pursue after them; and I will be glorified in Pharaoh, and in all his host, and all the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord. And they did so. 5 And it was reported to the king of the Egyptians that the people had fled: and the heart of Pharaoh was turned, and that of his servants against the people; and they said, What is this that we have done, to let the children of Israel go, so that they should not serve us? 6 So Pharaoh yoked his chariots, and led off all his people with himself: 7 having also taken six hundred chosen chariots, and all the cavalry of the Egyptians, and captains of the third rank over all.⁠ 8 And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and of his servants, and he pursued after the children of Israel; and the children of Israel went forth with a high hand. 9 And the Egyptians pursued after them, and found them encamped by the sea; and all the cavalry and the chariots of Pharaoh, and the horsemen, and his host were before the village, over against Baal Zephon. 10 And Pharaoh approached, and the children of Israel having looked up, saw, and the Egyptians encamped behind them: and they were very greatly terrified, and the children of Israel cried to the Lord; 11 and said to Moses, Because there were no graves in the land of Egypt, have you brought us forth to kill us in the wilderness? What is this that you have done to us, having brought us out of Egypt? 12 Is not this the word which we spoke to you in Egypt, saying, Let us alone that we may serve the Egyptians? for it is better for us to serve the Egyptians than to die in this wilderness. 13 And Moses said to the people, Be of good courage: stand and see the salvation which is from God, which he will work for us this day; for as you have seen the Egyptians today, you shall see them again no more for ever. 14 The Lord shall fight for you, and you shall hold your peace. 15 And the Lord said to Moses, Why do you cry to me? speak to the children of Israel, and let them proceed. 16 And you, lift up your rod, and stretch forth your hand over the sea, and divide it, and let the children of Israel enter into the midst of the sea on the dry land. 17 And look! I will harden the heart of Pharaoh and of all the Egyptians, and they shall go in after them; and I will be glorified upon Pharaoh, and on all his host, and on his chariots and his horses. 18 And all the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I am glorified upon Pharaoh and upon his chariots and his horses. 19 And the angel of God that went before the camp of the children of Israel moved and went behind, and the pillar of the cloud also moved from before them and stood behind them. 20 And it went between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel, and stood; and there was darkness and blackness; and the night passed,⁠ and they did not come near to one another during the whole night. 21 And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the Lord carried back the sea with a strong south wind all the night, and made the sea dry, and the water was divided. 22 And the children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry land, and the water of it was a wall on the right hand and a wall on the left. 23 And the Egyptians pursued them and went in after them, and every horse of Pharaoh, and his chariots, and his horsemen, into the midst of the sea. 24 And it happened in the morning watch that the Lord looked forth on the camp of the Egyptians through the pillar of fire and cloud, and troubled the camp of the Egyptians, 25 and bound the axles of their chariots, and caused them to go with difficulty; and the Egyptians said, Let us flee from the face of Israel, for the Lord fights for them against the Egyptians. 26 And the Lord said to Moses, Stretch forth your hand over the sea, and let the water be turned back to its place, and let it cover the Egyptians coming both upon the chariots and the riders. 27 And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the water returned to its place toward day; and the Egyptians fled under the water, and the Lord shook off the Egyptians in the midst of the sea. 28 And the water returned and covered the chariots and the riders, and all the forces of Pharaoh, who entered after them into the sea: and there was not left of them even one. 29 But the children of Israel went along dry land in the midst of the sea, and the water was to them a wall on the right hand, and a wall on the left. 30 So the Lord delivered Israel in that day from the hand of the Egyptians, and Israel saw the Egyptians dead by the shore of the sea. 31 And Israel saw the mighty hand, the things which the Lord did to the Egyptians; and the people feared the Lord, and they believed God and Moses his servant.

Texts in conversation

Compare Exodus 14:20 and LXX Exodus 14:20

Hebrew Bible · Septuagint

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Summary

Exodus 14 describes the pillar of cloud as a "dark cloud" that "lit up the night," an odd pairing of darkness and light. The Greek Septuagint rewrites this to remove the light, describing only "gloom and darkness."

Passages

Exodus 14:20

Hebrew Bible
19 The angel of God, who was going before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them, and the pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them. 20 It came between the Egyptian camp and the Israelite camp; it was a dark cloud and it lit up the night so that one camp did not come near the other the whole night. 21 Moses stretched out his hand toward the sea, and the Lord drove the sea apart by a strong east wind all that night, and he made the sea into dry land, and the water was divided.
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Exodus

LXX Exodus 14:20

Septuagint
19 And the angel of God that went before the camp of the children of Israel moved and went behind, and the pillar of the cloud also moved from before them and stood behind them. 20 And it went between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel, and stood; and there was darkness and blackness; and the night passed, and they did not come near to one another during the whole night. 21 And Moses stretched forth his hand over the sea, and the Lord carried back the sea with a strong south wind all the night, and made the sea dry, and the water was divided.
300–201 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in LXX Exodus

References

"... Exod 14:20 ... LXX καὶ ἐγένετο σκότος καὶ γνόφος, καὶ διῆλθεν ἡ νύξ, καὶ οὐ συνέμιξαν ἀλλήλοις "and there was darkness and gloom and the night passed, and they did not mix with one another." ... Here Symmachus clearly reflects the common midrashic interpretation, that the cloud created darkness for the Egyptians and light for the Israelites. His reading is well attested in the manuscript sources, and is certainly not a close translation of the difficult Hebrew text. ..."
Alison Salvesen, “Midrash in Greek?” in On Stone and Scroll: Essays in Honour of Graham Ivor Davies (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co. KG, 2011), 530–531.
"... The translator was both faithful to his Hebrew text and also tried to make sense of it, introducing harmonisations within the book (Wevers, "How the Greek"; Gooding, Account). Sometimes such an approach shades into more theological or exegetical renderings. ..."
Alison Salvesen, “Exodus,” in The T&T Clark Companion to the Septuagint, ed. James K. Aitken, Bloomsbury Companions (London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015), 35.

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

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