Dissertation Seventh.

THE SEPTUAGINT ORDER.

Ezekiel 7:3-13

These verses are much confused in the Septuagint, and this seems to have been the case in Jerome’s time. The Greek Codexes of the Alexandrian version do not agree, as we find from Theodoret and the Arabic version. Theodoret and the Chaldee paraphrast follow the Hebrew order; and the latter, from גיני, gnini, “my eye,” puts מימרי, mimri, “my word,” for the sake of avoiding “these anthropomorphic phrases.” The thirteenth verse evidently refers to the year of jubilee. Both Theodoret and the Vulgate translate correctly, and Jerome explains it satisfactorily. There is a difference in reading between the Hebrew and the Septuagint here also; the last clause is sufficiently important to note these differences. Jerome explains it thus’ “Non proderit homini iniquitas sua, nec ei praebebit aliquam similitudinem.” The translation of the Syriac is, “et vir iniquitate sua non conservabit vitam suam;” and of the Chaldee paraphrast, “quisque sibi in peccatis suis sibi placet, et dum viri permanent, poenitentiam non apprehendent.” The Syriac reading makes the sense as follows: “Neither shall any strengthen his life by his iniquity.”