During a recent camping holiday, I sat every morning in front of our tent with my espresso pot of coffee and a copy of Isaiah in the Septuagint version; as one does.
The Septuagint is interesting for various reasons. According to the stories it was translated by 70 (hence LXX) or possibly 72 scholars from Hebrew into the Greek of the day in the 3rd Century BC. It differs somewhat from the Masoretic Text (MT) – the version of the Hebrew OT we have now; but the MT was only finalised between the 6th and 10th Centuries AD, so potentially the LXX reflects a Hebrew manuscript tradition that is 1000 years older than the MT.
And of course we just don’t know – are the differences just translation artefacts, or were the scholars translating a Hebrew text that was a little different? All we do know is that differences in biblical texts are real and creep in for all kinds of reasons – tired copyists being the most easy one to understand.
But yesterday I was prompted to go back to my holiday running translation of Isaiah 54 – and this time I noticed something I hadn’t noticed at the time.
In the MT of Isaiah 54.2, the whole verse appears to be about a tent: enlarge the place of your tent, stretch your tent curtains wide, don’t hold back, lengthen your cords, strengthen your stakes. Sitting in front of my tent I guess I wasn’t predisposed to see anything else. But the LXX is a little different.
πλάτυνον τὸν τόπον τῆς σκηνῆς σου καὶ τῶν αὐλαιῶν σου πῆξον μὴ φείσῃ μάκρυνον τὰ σχοινίσματάσου καὶ τοὺς πασσάλους σουκατίσχυσον
“Make broad the place of your tent” sounds pretty much like the Hebrew, but makes the notion of tents needing flat space more overt – πλάτυνον relates to the word for street, a broad flat space between houses.
The next phrase is a little different though. The verb πῆξον is about “driving in”; τῶν αὐλαιῶν σου could be “your curtains”, but how do you drive in curtains? The more natural reading is “screens” – usually woven out of some lightweight but strong material such as reeds or flax, and designed to stop or deflect missiles from hitting the tent or building behind them. “Drive in your screens” makes sense, as does “don’t spare yourself”- ie do this work with diligence.
What about the cords and stakes? Here they are not the cords and stakes of a tent, but rather about establishing and maintaining territory.
μάκρυνον τὰ σχοινίσματάσου is “lengthen” – but not simple cords. σχοινίσματάσου is the land measured out specifically by a cord of set length. So it is “lengthen the cords with which you are measuring out your land”.
And τοὺς πασσάλους σουκατίσχυσον ? I can’t find any references to πασσάλους as tent pegs; they are boundary pegs; and the verb σουκατίσχυσον is strengthen, but so as to prevail over anyone who might oppose.
So the picture is not just “here’s how to set up your tent”, which is kind of how the Hebrew of the MT comes across; it is much more about how to set up your claim on a place to live; make a broad place for your tent, drive in the defensive screens, don’t spare yourself, use longer ropes to measure your plot, and put in your boundary pegs like you mean it.
The context is the same in both the MT and the LXX; the barren woman rejoicing because she has more children than the woman who has a husband; and they are going to need somewhere to live – especially as they are going to “unfurl” (the LXX verb) to the right and the left, inherit companies of men, and dwell in desolated cities.
And as Paul says in Galatians 4, this is a picture of the Kingdom and of the heavenly Jerusalem, as opposed to the old covenant under the Law.
Oh, and did I mention; when Jesus and the Apostles and Evangelists quote scripture, they largely seem to use the LXX. I don’t have any big point to make here (because this all defies simplistic judgements); but I did find the LXX version of Isaiah 54.2 personally helpful.
Enjoy!
Seeing the Kingdom 