koberstein
Active member
No you are embarrassing yourself. The OT Greek was copied from the original Masoretic Hebrew manuscripts.
IN MY DEFENSE: Biblical Christianity
- Thread starter jeremiah1five
- Start date
More history ignorance being spewed out by you.
"The translation of the Hebrew OT into the Koiné old Greek version [Septuagint] was done in stages by Jewish scholars in Alexandria, Egypt. It was begun circa (c) 270 BC and completed by 132 BC."
"The MT [Masoretic Text] is the Hebrew OT text in use today. It was copied by Jewish scribes/Masorétes in Jerusalem and Tibérius between 500–1000 AD"
Source:
Chronology: Septuagint versus Masoretic Text
This topic shows approximate BC dates for the Old Testament (OT) Patriarchs. It compares the Greek Septúagint/LXX timeline with the Hebrew Masorétic Text (MT) timeline. Their timelines aren’t the…
bibletopicexpo.wordpress.com
The Septuagint came into existence about 1000 years BEFORE the Masoretic Text!
The only way your statement is true is if the Masoretes had a time machine. Tell us about that time machine.
koberstein
Active member
Diaspora, the dispersion of Jews among the Gentiles after the Babylonian Exile or the aggregate of Jews or Jewish communities scattered “in exile” outside Palestine or present-day Israel. Although the term refers to the physical dispersal of Jews throughout the world, it also carries religious, philosophical, political, and eschatological connotations, inasmuch as the Jews perceive a special relationship between the land of Israel and themselves. Interpretations of this relationship range from the messianic hope of traditional Judaism for the eventual “ingathering of the exiles” to the view of Reform Judaism that the dispersal of the Jews was providentially arranged by God to foster pure monotheism throughout the world.
The first significant Jewish Diaspora was the result of the Babylonian Exile of 586 BCE. After the Babylonians conquered the kingdom of Judah, part of the Jewish population was deported into slavery. Although Cyrus the Great, the Persian conqueror of Babylonia, permitted the Jews to return to their homeland in 538 BCE, part of the Jewish community voluntarily remained behind.
The largest, most significant, and culturally most creative Jewish Diaspora in early Jewish history flourished in Alexandria, where in the 1st century BCE 40 percent of the population was Jewish. Around the 1st century CE an estimated 5,000,000 Jews lived outside Palestine, about four-fifths of them within the Roman Empire, but they looked to Palestine as the centre of their religious and cultural life. Diaspora Jews thus far outnumbered the Jews in Palestine even before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 CE. Thereafter, the chief centres of Judaism shifted from country to country (e.g., Babylonia, Persia, Spain, France, Germany, Poland, Russia, and the United States), and Jewish communities gradually adopted distinctive languages, rituals, and cultures, some submerging themselves in non-Jewish environments more completely than others. While some lived in peace, others became victims of violent anti-Semitism.
Jews hold widely divergent views about the role of Diaspora Jewry and the desirability and significance of maintaining a national identity. While the vast majority of Orthodox Jews support the Zionist movement (the return of Jews to Israel), some Orthodox Jews go so far as to oppose the modern nation of Israel as a godless and secular state, defying God’s will to send his messiah at the time he has preordained.
According to the theory of shelilat ha-galut (“denial of the exile”), espoused by many Israelis, Jewish life and culture are doomed in the Diaspora because of assimilation and acculturation, and only those Jews who migrate to Israel have hope for continued existence as Jews. It should be noted that neither this position nor any other favourable to Israel holds that Israel is the fulfillment of the biblical prophecy regarding the coming of the messianic era.
Although Reform Jews still commonly maintain that the Diaspora in the United States and elsewhere is a valid expression of God’s will, the Central Conference of American Rabbis in 1937 officially abrogated the Pittsburgh Platform of 1885, which declared that Jews should no longer look forward to a return to Israel. This new policy actively encouraged Jews to support the establishment of a Jewish homeland. On the other hand, the American Council for Judaism, founded in 1943 but now moribund, declared that Jews are Jews in a religious sense only and any support given to a Jewish homeland in Palestine would be an act of disloyalty to their countries of residence.
For this discussion, I would suggest that you read up on the history of the Greek OT. From that you will be enlightened with the following events:
- the Alexandrian Diaspora completed the Alexandrian Greek OT (LXX) about 132 BC,
- the Greek OT was distributed across the Empire by Diaspora Jews,
- Hellenized Greek-speaking Jews used the Greek OT to cross reference Paul's claims (example: Bereans),
- Hellenized Greek-speaking Jews became the first fruits of Paul's missions,
- Jews were expelled from Rome in 49 AD, causing Paul to refer in his Roman Epistle to the only Believers left at that time: Gentiles,
- The Greek OT was the entire Bible of the Early Christian Church until the NT was added to it afterwards,
- etc....
koberstein
Active member
More history ignorance being spewed out by you.
"The translation of the Hebrew OT into the Koiné old Greek version [Septuagint] was done in stages by Jewish scholars in Alexandria, Egypt. It was begun circa (c) 270 BC and completed by 132 BC."
"The MT [Masoretic Text] is the Hebrew OT text in use today. It was copied by Jewish scribes/Masorétes in Jerusalem and Tibérius between 500–1000 AD"
Source:
Chronology: Septuagint versus Masoretic Text
This topic shows approximate BC dates for the Old Testament (OT) Patriarchs. It compares the Greek Septúagint/LXX timeline with the Hebrew Masorétic Text (MT) timeline. Their timelines aren’t the…
The Septuagint came into existence about 1000 years BEFORE the Masoretic Text!
The only way your statement is true is if the Masoretes had a time machine. Tell us about that time machine.
Given that the language of much of the early Christian church was Greek, many early Christians relied on the Septuagint to locate the prophecies they claimed were fulfilled by Christ. Jews considered this a misuse of Holy Scripture and stopped using the Septuagint altogether; its subsequent history lies within the Christian church. The Greek text, not the original Hebrew, was the main basis for the Old Latin, Coptic, Ethiopic, Armenian, Georgian, Slavonic, and part of the Arabic translations of the Old Testament and has never ceased to be the standard version of the Old Testament in the Greek church. Indeed, St. Jerome used the Septuagint to begin his translation of the Vulgate Old Testament in 382 CE
In addition to all the books of the Hebrew canon, the Septuagint under Christian auspices separated the minor prophets and some other books and added the extra books known to Protestants and Jews as apocryphal and to Roman Catholics as deuterocanonical. The Hebrew canon has three divisions: the Torah (Law), the Neviʾim (Prophets), and the Ketuvim (Writings). The Septuagint has four: law, history, poetry, and prophets, with the books of the Apocrypha inserted where appropriate. This division has continued in the Western church in most modern Bible translations, except that in Protestant versions the Apocrypha are either omitted or grouped separately.
The text of the Septuagint is contained in a few early, but not necessarily reliable, manuscripts. The best known of these are the Codex Vaticanus (B) and the Codex Sinaiticus (S), both dating from the 4th century CE, and the Codex Alexandrinus (A) from the 5th century. There are also numerous earlier papyrus fragments and many later manuscripts. The first printed copy of the Septuagint was in the Complutensian Polyglot (1514–22).
Once upon a time there was a tribe living in the Middle East that had a collection of sacred texts written in Hebrew, Chaldean and Aramaic. It is the nature of sacred texts to be venerated and transmitted from generation to generation unaltered.
As time passed, members of this tribe emigrated to areas where Hebrew and Aramaic and Chaldean were not spoken. A large community settled and prospered in the city of Alexandria in Egypt. Greek replaced their tribal language. They needed an accurate translation of their venerated documents into Greek.
Around 250 B.C. seventy rabbis translated the sacred texts into Greek. This translation was not a bootleg edition. The project was approved by the High Priest and the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem. The Septuagint, the translation of the seventy, was an official document.
A Hebrew Bible exists today. It is used by Jews everywhere. It is called the Masoretic text. It was compiled around 700 A.D. It is almost one thousand years newer than the Septuagint. The rabbis who compiled the Masoretic text were not accountable to the High Priest in Jerusalem. There no longer was a High Priest. The rabbis who compiled the Masoretic text were not accountable to the Sanhedrin in Jerusalem. There no longer was a Sanhedrin.
The Septuagint predates the first appearance of the Masoretic text by almost ten centuries. The Septuagint is based upon Hebrew texts at least twelve centuries older than the texts upon which the Masoretic version is based. Yet, modern Christian translations of the Old Testament rely on the Masoretic Text, not the Septuagint.
koberstein
Active member
When was the MT written? This is a very important question to understand the history of the Bible. This video will provide a brief overview of the age of the text, at least as far back as we can date it. Before I go into that I feel that I have to set the record straight. I have seen it stated many times, that the oldest copy of the MT, or Masoretic text is the Leningrad Codex which dates to 1008.((https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin...ad_Codex#:~:text=The Aleppo Codex, against wh)) This is not true. The Aleppo Codex predates the Leningrad Codex and was written in about 920. In fact, the Leningrad Codex was corrected by using the Aleppo Codex. What the people making these videos really mean to say is that the Leningrad Codex is the oldest surviving complete text of the MT. The Aleppo Codex held that distinction until 1947, when the central synagogue of Aleppo where the codex was housed for 5 centuries was torched in anti Jewish riots. It is further claimed that the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and the Septuagint all predate the MT. Although this is technically true, the idea that the text which the Masorites worked on was their innovation is patently false. Here’s the background to the story.
The Masorites were a group of scribes that lived between the 6th and 10th centuries, predominantly in the cities of Tiberias and Jerusalem, but also in Babylonia. They sought to preserve and standardize, paragraph and verse divisions, and cantillation of the Hebrew Bible (the Tanakh) for the worldwide Jewish community.They composed gramatical guides, (called the mesorah), and were responsible for vowel points (nikudot). This system is still used today to teach Hebrew pronunciation.
The fact that the oldest masoretic documents date from the 10th century, does not mean that they originate in the 10th century. There are “masoretic texts” that predate the Masorites, for lack of a better term, these texts are called proto masoretic text. 25 scroll fragments have been found in the Judean Desert outside of the Qumran site that are 98% identical in their constants to the later Masoretic text. ((https://www.thetorah.com/article/judean-desert-texts-outside-qumran)) These texts make up about 5% of the Torah. It is presumed that the non surviving sections of scrolls are likewise identical. These fragments date from 50 BCE to 135 CE, and thus predate the Leningrad Codex by over a thousand years.((Ibid.))
Aside from the discoveries in the Judean Desert, we find many writings about the scribes of the proto MT, and the verses themselves throughout the corpus of Talmudic literature.The Talmud mentions scribes that were employed in the Temple to correct scrolls that were found to have mistakes. They would check off master copies located in the Temple.((https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-scribes-of-proto-mt-and-their-practices)) This ensured standardization. According to the Talmud, the kings of Israel were required to write a Torah scroll and keep it with them throughout their lives. After their death it was brought to the Temple to serve as a master copy. If anything can be said, the scribes of the proto MT were absolutely punctilious in copying from their Vorlagen, (i.e., the earlier texts from which the scribes were copying), precisely.
The scribes outside of Qumran were clearly copying the text that preceded them precisely. Talmudic literature tells us that there were scribes hired by public funds in the temple to correct mistaken texts. As such, I treat the proto-MT as authoritative, and contemporary with the LXX and DSS.
Of course the anti-Christian Jews were shocked to see that the Septuagint supported Christianity and they ditched it. On whose side are you on?
The Septuagint is older than the Masoretic Text. If you ditch the Septuagint on its dating then it would be hypocritical to not do the same thing to the Masoretic Text which is younger.
Exactly! This proves that the Septuagint is a totally legitimate translation of the prevailing Hebrew Text of that time by Jews themselves. I've heard from several anti-Christian Jewish sources that this was the greatest disaster that ever befell the anti-Christian Jewish religion.
They were accountable to squashing what they viewed as the abhorrent schism of the Jewish religion called Christianity. Are you on their side?
This is the greatest tragedy to ever befall the Christian Church within Western Europe and North America. There is a reawakening to the Septuagint going on now.
It is not clear on which side you're on? The Christian side or the anti-Christian Jewish side?
Which OT (Septuagint or MT/proto-MT) is the legitimate one? Let's consider these Septuagint facts:
- The Greek OT (LXX) was a gift by Hebrew-speaking Jews to the Hellenized Greek-Speaking Jews and by extension to the entire Gentile world,
- The preeminent legitimacy of the Greek OT (LXX) was made manifest when the Apostles predominately quoted the LXX instead of any Hebrew-based OT,
- The Greek-speaking Diaspora Jews were elected by God to be dispersed amongst the Roman Empire so that they can spread the Gospel across the Roman Empire (with their Greek OT in hand) upon their conversion,
- Greek, the Lingua Franca of the Eastern Roman Empire, was the language unanimously chosen over Hebrew by all Apostles for their Epistles, so that all people, not just Jews, would hear the Gospel and be converted,
Septuagint (LXX):
διὰ τοῦτο δώσει Κύριος αὐτὸς ὑμῖν σημεῖον· ἰδοὺ ἡ παρθένος ἐν γαστρὶ ἕξει, καὶ τέξεται υἱόν, καὶ καλέσεις τὸ ὄνομα αὐτοῦ ᾿Εμμανουήλ
Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign; behold, a virgin shall conceive in the womb, and shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name Emmanuel.
Current Masoretic Text:
לָכֵן יִתֵּן אֲדֹנָי הוּא, לָכֶם--אוֹת: הִנֵּה הָעַלְמָה, הָרָה וְיֹלֶדֶת בֵּן, וְקָרָאת שְׁמוֹ, עִמָּנוּ אֵל.
Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign: behold, the young woman shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel.
It is not clear on which side you're on? Are you on the Christian Septuagint side or the anti-Christian Masoretic Text side?
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101G
Well-known member
this defense, if a defense is poor, ....... very poor. well the Bible is about in, in, in, TIME. supportive scripture, Genesis 1:1 "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." IN, IN, IN, the Beginning of OUR CREATION. God has no beginning. this is why Genesis 1:1 starts by saying in the beginning, and not "AT" the Beginning. if one can understand the difference between "IN" vs "AT" the beginning then one can understand God.
so, get it RIGHT in, in, in, the Beginning, then one will end up RIGHT.
101G.
koberstein
Active member
My Complete Jewish Bible uses the Masoretic Manuscripts.
It is usual to think of the Christian Old Testament and the Jewish Tanakh as the same. Actually there are important differences,
and for the purpose of understanding the Complete Jewish Bible, these must now be addressed.
The most obvious difference, clear from the table of contents, is that the books of the Tanakh appear in an order different from
those of the Old Testament (OT), as any Christian looking for the book of Malachi at the end of the Tanakh will quickly discover.
As the acronym TaNaKh reminds us, the Hebrew Bible is divided into three parts: Torah (Law,Teaching), Nevi'im (Prophets), and
K'tuvim (Writings). But the Christians divide the OT into four parts: Pentateuch, Historical Books, Writings, and Prophets. Both the
OT and Tanakh have the five books of Moshe first, whether one calls them the Torah or the Pentateuch. The Prophets section of
the Tanakh is divided into the Early and Later Prophets. The Early Prophets correspond to the Historical Books of the OT minus
the books of Ruth, 1-2 Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, which are placed with the Writings. The Later Prophets are the
same as the "Prophets" section of the OT, except that the Hebrew Bible places Lamentations and Daniel with the Writings.
The Tanakh "Writings" section is larger than that of the OT, because it includes the eight books that in the OT are located elsewhere.
Finally, in the Tanakh the Later Prophets come immediately after the Early Prophets, but in the OT the Prophets come last.
Why these differences? Because the Christian OT follows the order found in the oldest manuscripts of the Septuagint, the translation
of the Tanakh into Greek made by Greek speaking Jews in Alexandria, Egypt, two or three centuries before Yeshua's birth; while
the Tanakh sequence was finalized in the land of Isra'el after the time of 'Ezra. This is the order Yeshua knew, as evidenced by his
referring in Luke 24:44 to "the Torah of Moshe, the Prophets and the Psalms" (by "Psalms" he referred to the Writings section, which
in the Tanakh begins with the book of Psalms, not Job, as in the OT).
The second difference is that by Jewish reckoning, the Tanakh consists of twenty-four books, whereas Christians count thirty-nine
in the OT. This is because the Tanakh considers each of the following to be a single book: 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, the
Twelve Minor Prophets (so called their books are short---Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah,
Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi), Ezra - Nehemiah, and 1 and 2 Chronicles. Thus what the OT counts as twenty books appears in
the Tanakh as five.
A third difference is in the names. Many of the Tanakh books are simply called by the first words. What the OT calls Genesis, the
Tanakh calls B'resheet ("In the beginning"). Exodus (the book about the Jewish exodus from Egypt) is called Sh'mot ("Names"),
because the book starts out, "These are the names...."
Nevertheless, there is good reason to think that several of the books of the New Testament were written in Hebrew or Aramaic,
or drew upon source materials in those languages; this case has been made by one scholar or another for all four Gospels,
Acts, Revelation, and several of the General Letters. Moreover, Sha'ul whose letters were composed in Greek, clearly drew on
his native Jewish and Hebraic thought-forms when he wrote. In fact, some phrases in the New Testament manuscripts make
no sense unless one reaches through the Greek to the underlining Hebrew expressions. Here is an example, only one of many.
Yeshua says in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 5-7) , literally, "If your eye be evil, your whole body will be dark" (Matt.6:23)
What is an evil eye? Someone not knowing the Jewish background might suppose Yeshua was talking about casting out spells.
In Hebrew, however, having an 'ayin ra'ah, an "evil eye," means being stingy, while having an 'ayin tovah, a "good eye" means
being generous. Yeshua is simply urging generosity against stinginess. And this understanding fits the surrounding verses:
"Where your wealth is, there your heart will be also......You can't be a slave to both God and money" (Matt. 6:21, 24)
The translation of the B'rit Hadashah is based primarily on the United Bible Societies' The Greek New Testament, 3rd edition
(New York: American Bible Society, 1975
Shalom
I see that you're learning Hebrew & Greek OT history. Take your time. When you finish could you just answer me this one question if you don't mind:
Are you on the Septuagint side whose Isa 7:14 verse (containing the word "virgin") is aligned with Matt 1:23 (containing the word "virgin") or are you on the Masoretic Text side whose Isa 7:14 verse (containing the word "young woman") clashes with Matt 1:23?
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koberstein
Active member
If you read my opening line. My Jewish Bible uses the Masoretic text/manuscripts and rightly so. Young woman (Heb. almah) refers
to a young unmarried woman or virgin.
Rabbi's states that the definite article ha-almah speaks not of "a virgin" but instead "the virgin " a special one God had in mind.
praise_yeshua
Well-known member
He doesn't know brother. He is copying and pasting content from other people as his own without giving them credit. He is largely quoting David Stern.
I've tried "calling him on it" before and he will just ignore you.
He has a rather rudimentary understanding of the subject. As you know, ,most do.
So who do Jews say is this special Virgin who did conceive a son and called him Immanuel?
praise_yeshua
Well-known member
David Stern's "Complete Jewish Bible" reads....
14 Therefore Adonai himself will give you people a sign: the young woman will become pregnant, bear a son and name him 'Immanu El [God is with us].
I knew many Emmanuels when I was growing up, born of young mothers. That "special" sign happened many times over. Who is @koberstein trying to fool?
praise_yeshua
Well-known member
I knew many Emmanuels when I was growing up, born of young mothers. That "special" sign happened many times over. Who is @koberstein trying to fool?
Evidence is definitely evidence....
koberstein
Active member
You haven't call me out on anything. I ignore you because you really don't know anything of biblical value.
koberstein
Active member
You need to read that Hebrew word for young woman and then maybe you might understand.I knew many Emmanuels when I was growing up, born of young mothers. That "special" sign happened many times over. Who is @koberstein trying to fool?
koberstein
Active member
Hey I'm impressed. I have other Messianic Rabbis and Orthodox rabbis books that I read and study.
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