A New English Translation of the Septuagint: And the Other Greek Translations Traditionally Included Under That Title

I love this. Very enjoyable to read

This is a lovely translation of the Septuagint. It is relatively easy to read. This copy also includes scriptures found in the apocrypha and offers an alternative translation of such scriptures which I have otherwise found difficult to source. I find that the Septuagint, in some instances, challenges some traditional teachings of mainstream institutions. I would recommend that anyone who is actively searching for God finds the time to read through the Septuagint.

Great to have a copy of this. Does what it says on the tin.

I would like to give a non-technical review for those perhaps interested in the Septuagint for non-scholarly reasons. The book itself is a beautiful hardback. The pages are very fine quality, with a silky smooth feel. The type is easy to read and look at. The downside for me is that the book appears to be written for scholars or scholarly types. The introduction was hard to get through, as I found it to be a technical breakdown of the translation processes used and why. The personal and places names have been retained from the Greek and are hard to pronounce sometimes and it's hard to remember who exactly it is. You sometimes find yourself stopping to think, and then saying "Oh, yeah that's Joseph" etc. I also get the impression that the translation is a slightly liberal one, which I personally do not like. I do not like that the translator of Genesis chose divine wind over Holy Spirit in Genesis 1. I would also like to see this edition of the Septuagint OT bound with the NRSV NT in a fairly economical edition. Overall, I like this book as there is a sparsity on translations of the Septuagint; the Bible that Jesus (probably the Hebrew parent version and not the Masoretic which is another text family), the Apostles and the Early Church quoted from. Update 20th September 2012: I also read the Early Church Fathers. Currently I am reading Justin Martyr's 2nd Apology, his dialogue with Tryhpo the Jew. Justin quotes a lot of the OT to this Jew, but what is interesting is he quotes almost exclusively from the LXX. There was one quote I just read the other day I couldn't put anywhere. It was quite an unusual reading, and it was in the context of a messianic passage. The version he read was far more messianic I believe than the versions we have today. Anyway, at one point he read Psalm 19 (it's Psalm 18 in the LXX), and as I read his version of it I thought I had never read it quite like that before. It seemed that this Psalm was messianic in nature too. But I had never heard any Bible scholar or apologist pull this one out. So I read it in my Orthodox Study Bible which also utilizes a version of the LXX, but that didn't seem messianic. So I read from my NETS translation, and lo and behold there it was! It reads just like Justin Martyrs version from 160AD. A few other texts that Justing read from were just the same; NETS was the closest and the most messianic in nature. I'll leave it up to you to buy a copy of the book and read it for yourself. I would also counsel you to buy the Ante Nicene Fathers: 10 Volumes (Early Church Fathers) . But there was one thing I noticed that bugged me again. The first line goes "The heavens are telling of divine glory". It is my understanding that even Hellenistic Jews would not have meant it to be understood this way. The heavens are telling of God's glory, I believe, is more faithful to the text and to the people of the text. Both Jews and Christians. One reviewer on the US site, said the reason the translators said "divine wind" in Genesis 1 was because there were Jews on the translation committee, but surely no Jew would reject "God's glory" over "divine glory" in this psalm? I stand by my original assertion that this is a liberal translation by liberal scholars. Still very useful though as has just been shown, and worthy or every interested layperson's library.

Great

Excellent read and a great study tool.

This appears to be a very useful translation for anyone wishing to do in depth study and comparison with various translations of the bible.

Excellent.

The NETS is the single best translation of the Septuagint on the market (at least at the moment). The translation follows an ultra-literal method of translation they call "interlinear". The reason for this is that the LXX follows the same pattern and is very jarring. So, where the Hebrew and LXX agree, they translate the Hebrew text and translate it as literally as possible following the LXX at the same time. Where it disagrees, they follow the LXX. It has as a "boiler-plate" the NRSV, but it eschews many NRSV translation principles like gender-inclusive language. All gender-inclusive language except when the LXX's language is itself gender-inclusive (and this happens). The method of translation further removes it from its English parent. In the end, the only way you can know that it started as an NRSV would be to read the introduction. It really only has a few drawbacks. First, because the Bible is written for scholarly study, it is not useful for liturgical use or for private devotional use. Its language would also be too hard for the average reader because of its audience. This, however, is its stated goal. It may be a draw-back, but that's a side-effect of what it set out to do. I do not like the way they translated "pnevma theou" as "divine wind" in Genesis. It's justifiable to a point (it means "breath" and "wind" as much as it does "spirit), but everywhere else I checked they translated translated "pnevma" as "spirit". It should be consistent. The reason for this is plainly obvious: it was produced by an inter-religious committee of Christians and Jews. Since Jews are not Trinitarians, and that would be a valid understanding of the Hebrew and to a degree of the Greek, they would naturally not want anything like this. Christians, almost from the beginning, have made the connection between "Spirit of God" in Genesis and "Holy Spirit". The connection is further exasperated in English, because "spirit" for us does not have the same range of meaning as it does in Greek or Hebrew. So, the only fault I can give them is that it is an inconsistent translation, not that it's an invalid one. The prefaces also almost invariably favor the theory that the LXX is a translation with liberties over that it has a different parent text. Both are truly present, but we generally cannot tell when the LXX reading cannot be derived from repointing or re-dividing the Hebrew words (at that time, they had not yet pointed the text or put spaces in it, and so there were more ways to interpret the consonants than in its current form). Again, however, they do not say anything that is invalid regarding the relation of the LXX and its parent text. I simply divide the text differently than they do and so do not always like the introductions' emphasis. Going back to its strengths, its production standards were exceptional. The binding is excellent, the font is excellent, and it has generous margins. It even does this by being as cheap as the "cheap" Bibles. Short of going back to rag paper, this is about as good as I would normally expect. Overall, if you have good reading skills, I would reccomend this translation hands-down over any other English translation.

The Septuagint is by far one of the most important foundations to our faith ( in Christ) It's interesting to see how the Septuagint flows neatly into the gospels, as many early Christian writers believed as well. The font is a perfect size, and the language used is perfect for understanding what the authors meant to convey. I recommend this book to all my fellow Christians and readers a like.

Excellent Book and very fast delivery 🚚 i am Impressed 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

Tydlig bok men jag köpte den i onödan eftersom jag inte behövde någon mer översättning till engelska av Septuaginta. Men andra kanske har användning av en sådan bok.

L'une des principales traductions scientifiques de la Septante en langue moderne. Si on lit le français, on pourra préférer la Bible d'Alexandrie (même si tous les volumes ne sont pas encore parus). De plus, la traduction n'est pas forcément élégante. Mais il est pratique d'avoir tout en un volume. Les introductions aux livres bibliques, décrivant notamment les techniques de traduction, sont très riches et utiles.