11 - Jewish–Greek literature of the Greek period

Summary

The origin of Jewish–Greek literature can be traced back to the translation of the Hebrew Torah (the Pentateuch) into Greek, the socalled Septuagint. This is the source which nourished the greater part of the literary production of the Hellenistic Jews. Originally the legend of the 70 (or 72) translators who were said to have rendered the Hebrew Bible into Greek in the reign of Ptolemy II Philadelphus (285-246 b.c.e.) – whence too the name ‘Septuagint’ – referred only to the Torah, the first and properly speaking the canonical part of the Hebrew Bible, or rather its Greek version. This traditional story contains at least a core of truth: shortly after 300 b.c.e. the Jews of the Diaspora, especially in Egypt, felt the need for a Greek translation of their Holy Scripture, because obviously only a minority of Jews in that Greek-speaking environment were still capable of reading and understanding Hebrew. However, some scholars are inclined to follow the legendary narrative of the Pseudo-Aristeas letter. The Ptolemaic kings may be supposed to have had a certain interest in the literature of the peoples incorporated into their kingdom (the Jews of Palestine being subjected to the Ptolemaic reign in the third century b.c.e.), so that the initiative for the translation of the Pentateuch might have come from the Ptolemaic court itself.

The literary critic may well conclude that the Greek of the Septuagint, and to some extent the language of subsequent Jewish–Greek literature as well, was rather ‘uncouth’ and in places ‘quite unintelligible’, so that it must have at times appeared somewhat ‘ridiculous’ to a cultured Greek reader.