Studies in the Greek Bible: Essays in Honor of Francis T. Gignac

As noted in the subtitle of this work, the essays in this collection constitute a Festschrift for the Jesuit priest Francis T. Gignac. Keeping in mind his primary scholarly and pedagogical contributions, the editors of this volume have titled it Studies in the Greek Bible, intending thereby to cover material in the Septuagint and the New Testament. After a brief overview, I will highlight some of the contributions that are likely to be of greatest interest to readers of this journal.

Thirteen articles are divided into four parts: Genesis Creation Traditions, Later Septuagintal Books, New Testament Texts, and Linguistic Studies. A brief foreword and introduction precede these chapters, which are followed by a bibliography of Gignac, a list of contributors, and separate indexes devoted to ancient sources, authors, and subjects. The listing of Gignac’s scholarly publications, spanning almost fifty years, is particularly impressive.

The first essay in the book (and the initial contribution in part one) is Jennifer M. Dines’s elegantly written and closely argued “Creation under Control: Power Language in Genesis 1:1–2:3.” Although the LXX forms the main text of analysis for Dines, she correctly sets the context by first examining the MT. She explicates the significance of three Hebrew verbs (one in Gen 1:14–19 [ ] and two at verses 26–28 [ , ]) through which God bestows power on the luminaries and humans respectively. In the parallel passages of the LXX, only two different verbs are used ( and ); unlike the MT, the LXX passages share a “power” verb, thereby demonstrating for Dines that the Greek version draws together “the heavenly and earthly realms” (p. 15) more closely than does the MT. Both accounts do share an emphasis on “the two moments when God passes responsibility for the long-term maintenance of the cosmos to his creatures” (p. 16).

From the second part, I look at co-editor Jeremy Corley’s study, “Septuagentalisms, Semitic Interference, and the Original Language of the Book of Judith,” which is one of the longest in this collection. As noted by Corley, Carey Moore, in his well-regarded 1985 Anchor Bible commentary on Judith, was expressing the consensus view when he argued that the Greek text of Judith was a translation from the Hebrew. Moore constructed a detailed list to bolster his case, consisting of conjectured translation errors, Hebraic idioms, and Hebraic syntax. Before tackling this list, Corley observes that the past two decades have seen a shift in scholarly views or at least a willingness to consider Judith as an original Greek composition—which is the view Corley champions. Far from denying that the author of this Greek text was much influenced, directly and indirectly, by Hebrew, Corley looks to “Septuagintalisms” and Semitic interference as the key elements in explaining the Hebraic character of the Greek. Corley’s careful analysis must be taken into account in all further discussions of this and parallel occurrences. Moreover, as Corley points out, his conclusions are consistent with Gagnac’s understanding of much of the Greek of the New Testament.

The issue of Semitic interference also rises to the fore in one of the essays in part three: “‘Impersonal’ Plural Active of the Verb in the Synoptic Gospels and Acts: Semitic Interference?” by Elliott C. Maloney. Maloney takes as his starting point an observation by Gustav Dalman, in the late nineteenth century, that “at times in the Gospel sayings of Jesus the passive voice is used as a reverent circumlocution for the name of God” (p. 138). Dalman saw the influence of Aramaic in this expression, the analysis of which was considerably extended by later scholars to include the “impersonal plural.” Maloney systematically sorts through all of the proposed examples from the Gospels, allowing for Aramaic interference as the cause for a select group of passages. He is also able to discern patterns of usage among the Gospel writers for this construction that correlate with other characteristics of these authors.

In part four, the late M. O’Connor writes on “The Language of Creation in Ben Sira: .” O’Connor is drawn to the half dozen passages where the Greek word, which characteristically means “to create” in the LXX and the NT, appears to translate a Hebrew root that does not mean “to create” in Biblical Hebrew (where its most frequent meaning is “to divide”). In addition to a careful analysis of the relevant material in Ben Sira, O’Connor looks at the Qumran material for specific as well as general parallels to developments he traces for this particular Hebrew root.

As these four articles demonstrate, this Festschrift offers up a rich collection that is fully in keeping with Gignac’s reputation and interests.