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Translated by R. Payne Smith
St Cyril of Alexandria Resources Online and in Print
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This Part: 128 Pages
Page 6
I need scarcely mention after the above, that the Syriac translator does not take his quotations from the Peschito. Of course in the Old Testament this was impossible, as that version represents, not the Septuagint, but the Hebrew. For the same reason, the use of our own version was equally an impossibility to myself, since, as is well known, the Greek differs too considerably from the Masoretic text, of which ours is a translation, for one to be at all the equivalent of the other. I am by no means however prepared to join in the general condemnation of the Septuagint, stamped as it is by the approval of our Lord and His apostles; and though parts of it are done far less efficiently than the rest, yet whoever neglects it throws away one of the most important means for attaining to a knowledge of the original Scriptures; and I know of no more difficult question than the adjudication between the vocalising and arrangement of the Hebrew text as represented by the Septuagint, and that which gives us the subsequent tradition of the Jewish schools. Not that there is the slightest room for doubting the authenticity and genuineness in all substantial points of the Scriptures of the Old Testament; for the question affects only the vowels and the division of words; and the vowels in Semitic languages are not so important as in those of the Indo-Germanic family. To the present day no Jewish author ever expresses them in writing, though they have so far adopted modern customs as no longer to string their consonants together in one unbroken line. Necessarily, however, under such circumstances reading in ancient times was a matter of no slight difficulty, and hence the dignity of the profession of the scribe, and the wonder of the Jews at our Lord and His apostles possessing the requisite knowledge. The Septuagint therefore possesses especial value, as being both the first attempt at fixing the meaning of the uncertain elements in the Hebrew language, and as dating prior to the establishment of Christianity: and though Jewish tradition subsequently grew more exact, and eliminated many mistakes into which the authors of the Septuagint had fallen, still the fact that these subsequent labours of the Jewish schools first found their expression in the version of Aquila, who had deserted Christianity, and published his translation as a rival to the Septuagint, and certainly with no kindly intention towards the religion which he had abandoned, may well make us hesitate before we so unceremoniously decry a version, the mistakes of which can be ascribed to nothing worse than simple inefficiency. That from such hands and under such auspices the Masoretic text is so trustworthy, and so free from any real ground of suspicion, entirely as regards its consonants, and to a great extent as regards its vowels, is the result, under God's Providence, of the extreme reverence of the Jews for the letter of those ordinances which had been entrusted to their keeping, since the Christian Church was by no means aware of the importance of an exact inquiry into the true meaning of the earlier Scriptures, and contented itself with receiving what the Jews provided for its use; even Jerome himself scarcely giving us more than what his Jewish masters taught him, and Origen's knowledge of Hebrew being about as much as could be expected from the time it took him to acquire it.
In the New Testament the case was different: for of course it was just possible there to have used the words of our authorized Version. But so to have done would have brought me into constant opposition to my text; for I had not the Greek before me, but a Syriac rendering of it, punctuated to an extreme degree of nicety, and fixing the meaning to one definite sense. It seemed therefore my only honest course to reproduce as exactly as I could the version of the Syriac translator. Whether I should myself in all cases have given the same meaning to the original Greek is an entirely distinct thing; for the duty of a translator is not to give his own views, but those of his author. Still, as the memory naturally suggested the language of the authorized Version, it will no doubt be found to have exercised no little influence upon the words which I have used.
Reference address : https://www.elpenor.org/cyril-alexandria/luke-commentary.asp?pg=6
