Language Studies

Aramaic Thoughts

Digging into the Peshitta! - Part 6

As we have seen in the past few weeks, the Peshitta translation of Psalm 110 shares characteristics with the Septuagint translation at points where the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew text. This is perhaps plainest in verse 1, where the Septuagint and the Peshitta both have "The Lord said to my lord." In this part of verse 1, the Peshitta and the Septuagint use a verb form for "said" rather than the noun "prophetic oracle" that the Hebrew uses. In addition, the Hebrew uses the divine name YHWH for the first "Lord" and then adonai for the second "Lord," whereas the Septuagint and the Peshitta both avoid using the divine name.

The Peshitta translation also shares characteristics with the Hebrew text at points where the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew text. This can be seen in verse 3, where the verse in Hebrew begins, "Your people are freewill offerings in the day of your power." The Septuagint reads "with you is dominion in the day of your power." The Peshitta follows the Hebrew more closely with, "your people are praiseworthy in the day of power." Though there is some difference between the Hebrew and the Peshitta, the latter is much closer to the former than the Septuagint is.

There are also places where the Peshitta differs significantly from both the Hebrew and the Septuagint text. An example of this is in verse 4, where the Hebrew and the Septuagint both have, "the Lord has sworn and will not change his mind … you are a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek." The Peshitta differs in two points, saying, "the Lord has sworn and will not lie … you are a priest forever in the likeness of Melchizedek." The differences are significant in part because Syriac had the vocabulary to reproduce both the idea of "will not change his mind" and of "the order of Melchizedek" and did not use that particular vocabulary.

What conclusions may be drawn from these observations? Most obviously, the translator of the Peshitta was not slavishly following either the Septuagint or the Hebrew text. Instead, it appears that he had access to both, and weighed them both in making his translation. In addition, he was not above making changes with his translation when in his mind the changes served the purpose of clarifying the meaning of the text.

Modern translators of the Bible, whether working in English or in some other language, generally operate on precisely these same principles. They have access to the Hebrew text (with its variant readings), the Septuagint text (with its variant readings), the Peshitta text (with its variant readings, now that a critical edition of the Peshitta is being produced), as well as the Aramaic Targums for some of the books of the Old Testament. The translator (or translation team) must take all this evidence into account and seek to reflect accurately the meaning of the original in English. All translators will not come to the same conclusions when weighing the evidence, and this accounts for most of the differences that appear among English versions. Some of the differences are also accounted for by the philosophy of translation adopted by the translators. Thus, The Bible in Basic English translates using a limited English vocabulary except in places where the translators consider the use of some technical term to be unavoidable. The matter of translation philosophy was probably not a real consideration in the day the Peshitta was done, as Bible translators of that day were operating in the very beginning stages of that enterprise, and were feeling their way along in the process of rendering the Word of God from one language into another.

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