HistoricalChristian.Faith

Epiphanius of Salamis on the Origin of the Septuagint

Dates: c. AD 392 · On Weights and Measures §9–12
Summary: The cells re-engineered into pairs, the seventy-two named, and the divergences from the Hebrew defended as inspired. Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis, gives the legend its most elaborate antique form in his Treatise on Weights and Measures: he keeps the full Aristean frame and the physical cells of the Cohortatio, but rebuilds the architecture — thirty-six cells, the translators shut in two by two, one book to each pair — lists all seventy-two by name, and, uniquely, turns the legend to a new use: the places where the Greek differs from the Hebrew are not errors but Spirit-guided additions that mend a "lame" original (his demonstration from Psalm 140). The same treatise's later notice on Aquila turns that premise against the synagogue's rival Greek.

Claims & evidence

The paired cells: thirty-six chambers, two by two, one book each

"For, having constructed the thirty-six cells already mentioned, over on the island, and formed them into pairs, Ptolemy shut them up in them two by two, as I have said… To every pair one book was given. That is to say, the book of the Genesis of the world to one pair, the Exodus of the Israelites to another pair, that of Leviticus to another, and the next book in order to the next."

— On Weights and Measures §11, source. This is Epiphanius's distinctive rebuild of the legend's machinery. Irenaeus had the king merely "separate" the elders; the Cohortatio housed each man alone in his own cot and gave each "the whole Scriptures"; Cyril kept the same one-man-one-cell form. Epiphanius instead pairs them — thirty-six cells, two translators to a cell — and assigns each pair a single book, so the agreement to be proved is not seventy-two whole Bibles matching but the cross-checking of pair against pair on the shared text. He keeps the proof itself intact: when the king's readers compared the copies "no disagreement was found," the work was recognized as the gift "of the Holy Spirit, because they agreed in translation."

The seventy-two named, and why seventy-two and not seventy

"Thereupon the seventy-two translators above mentioned the teachers of the Hebrews chose and sent, according to the example that Moses once set when he went up the mountain at the command of the Lord, having heard: 'Take with thee seventy men and go up the mountain.' But for the sake of peace among the tribes, that he might not take five men from some and six from others and create discord among the tribes, he made up his mind rather to take seventy-two and to add to the number."

— On Weights and Measures §10, source. Epiphanius is the first of these witnesses to explain the round-vs-precise number that drifts through the tradition — Irenaeus, Clement, and the Cohortatio all said "seventy," while Aristeas, Tertullian, and Cyril kept the exact seventy-two. He harmonizes the two by appeal to Moses's seventy elders (Numbers 11), the extra two added so that six could come evenly from each of the twelve tribes. He then does what no earlier teller had: he sets down the full roster — six names per tribe, "as Aristeas has transmitted it in his work" — Reuben's Josephus, Hezekiah, Zechariah, Johanan, Hezekiah, Elisha, and so on through all twelve.

The divergences from the Hebrew defended as inspired additions

"And wherever they had added a word all of them had added the same, and where they had made an omission all alike had made the omission… how marvelously, under the guidance of God and in the harmony of the Holy Spirit, they translated harmoniously and were not at variance with one another… In the one hundred fortieth Psalm… the Hebrew does not have 'of my request.' Behold, then, how lame it is found to be! So the seventy-two translators, when they added 'of my request,' made the line unhalting and translated: 'O Lord, I have cried unto thee; answer me; consider the voice of my request.'… the words are well added in explanation and for the advantage of the peoples about to be called to the faith of God."

— On Weights and Measures §12, source. This is Epiphanius's most consequential move. The earlier tellers proved inspiration by identity — the seventy-two matched the Hebrew and each other word for word. Epiphanius openly concedes that the Greek differs from the Hebrew — the translators "added a word," "made an omission" — and turns the difference itself into the proof: because all of them added or omitted the same thing, and because the additions improve a Hebrew that without them is "lame," the divergence is itself the Spirit's work, "well added in explanation and for the advantage of the peoples about to be called to the faith of God." The legend that began as a guarantee of a perfectly faithful copy has become a warrant for the Septuagint reading against the Hebrew where the two part — the exact premise the same treatise then turns on Aquila.

Notes

• Companion to the Aquila notice. The origin legend (§9–12) and the attack on Aquila (§15–16) are two halves of one treatise. Here Epiphanius builds the inspired-Septuagint premise; there he draws the conclusion — the proselyte Aquila, revising the Greek "embittered in mind," is charged with distorting on purpose the very words "testified to about Christ." The defense of the LXX's divergences from the Hebrew (this page) and the indictment of a rival Greek's divergences from the LXX (the rabbinic-corruption page) are the same logic facing two ways.
• The through-line: the cells re-paired. On the timeline the physical separate cells, made concrete by the Cohortatio and kept by Cyril, are here re-engineered into thirty-six paired cells with one book per pair. The detail is unique to Epiphanius and harder to reconcile with the older "each man translated the whole Scripture alone" form; it shows the legend still being actively rebuilt, not merely copied, as late as the 390s.
• The additions doctrine. The Psalm 140 (141) demonstration is the most theologically loaded development in the whole timeline: it converts the inspiration claim from a guarantee of fidelity into a license for the Greek to stand over the Hebrew where they differ. This is precisely the premise that, turned against the synagogue's later Hebrew and its rival Greek, becomes the corruption charge — which is why Epiphanius is a witness on both doctrines.
• Date and text. The Treatise on Weights and Measures (De mensuris et ponderibus) is conventionally dated 392. It survives complete only in Syriac; the English above is from the standard translation of that Syriac (the Tertullian Project text). Epiphanius is placed on the timeline at c. 392, after Cyril of Jerusalem.