Notes on the Greek Text of Leviticus (review)

Hebrew Studies 40 (1999) 307 Reviews tions not only with, but also against the grain of Ancient Near Eastern sacral ideology. William S. Morrow Queen's Theological College Kingston. Ontario. Canada morroww@post.queensu.ca NOTES ON THE GREEK TEXT OF LEVITICUS. By John William Wevers. SBLSCS 44. pp. xxxix + 519. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1997. Cloth, $44.95. Wevers continues his monumental contribution to Septuagint studies by publishing notes on the Greek text of another book of the Pentateuch after he had previously edited that book for the Gottingen Septuagint series (previous notes covered Genesis [1993], Exodus [1990], and Deuteronomy [1995]). The notes are aimed at serious students of the Pentateuch who want to use the LXX text with some confidence, but who are themselves neither specialists in LXX studies nor in Hellenistic Greek. The Greek text presupposed is that of the Gottingen Septuagint, published by Wevers in 1986, and comments on Aquila and other later translations are relegated to footnotes. Wevers assumes that the parent text was the consonantal text of MT, but he also compared other ancient translations and the Qumran evidence. The problem faced by the translator was how to render the intent of the Hebrew text into a Greek fonn which his synagogal audience would understand . Wevers characterizes the translation as "isolate," meaning that the translator chose a set of equivalencies for Hebrew lexemes in the Greek with little regard for the context in which they were used. This means that Hebraisms abound and that words like Bla9t{KTh here and throughout the LXX, are not used in the Greek sense of the word, but as ways to represent the word n,.,:J in the parent text. The translator employed neologisms, showed a lack of certainty on cuitic matters and a love for variation, and often clarified or even corrected the parent Hebrew text. At times the translator also misunderstood the Hebrew text (Lev 14:10; 19:16; 21:5; 22:9). He, nevertheless, showed reverence for the sacred text and apparently put into Greek what he thought God meant to say. The theological point of view of the translators is evident here and there. In Lev 7:1, for example, the Hebrew states that the worshiper presents the sin offering and slaughters the animal, but the Greek translation insists on the priestly slaughtering of the sin offering. Elsewhere the trans- Hebrew Studies 40 (1999) 308 Reviews lator was apparently offended by the idea that God would draw a sword from its sheathe to chase after his people ("And I will unsheathe after you a sword:' Lev 26:33), and so translates "and the sword being drawn shall destroy you." Wevers believes that the Greek translation of Leviticus should be studied primarily as an exegetical tool. It represents the understanding of the biblical text by Diaspora Jewry in Alexandria in the third century B.C.E. The point of view of the translator is not always clear, of course; it is not always what the original writers of the Hebrew parent text intended. Wevers seeks to describe the attitudes, theological prejudices, and cultural environment of the Jewish translators. Those interested in how Josephus, Philo, and the church fathers interpreted the LXX are referred to P. Harle and D. Pralon, La Levilique: Traduction du lexte grec de fa Septante, Introduction et Notes. La Bible d'Alexandrie 3 (paris: Editions du Cerf, 1988). Wevers' approach means that those who use the LXX to reconstruct an earlier or superior Hebrew text will find little support here. He takes the parent text as the consonantal text of the MT except where the evidence makes such a parent text unlikely. He does recognize that the long Greek addition in Lev 17:4 (see note 4a in BHS), supported by both the LXX and the Samaritan Pentateuch (compare 4QLevd) is original, and that MT has been affected by parablepsis due to homoioarcton. He states that the longer Greek text in Lev 15:3 (see note 3b) is probably dependent on the Samaritan Pentateuch (better: "a longer Hebrew reading also attested by the Samaritan Pentateuch"), but in this case both the Greek and Samaritan are a secondary doublet of MT. After 482...