Jews, the Septuagint and Tradition

Contact between the Jews in Judea and peoples around them had increased, beginning with the military colonies Alexander had established at Samaria and Gaza and the Greek bureaucrats and soldiers who filled Palestine. Alexander's successors, Perdiccas, Antigonus, and Ptolemy from Egypt, also established cities in Palestine, and their armies frequently passed back and forth across Judah – called Judea by those speaking Greek. Some Jews were taken as slaves. Some of Judea's young men joined the invading armies as mercenaries, and Jews became soldier-colonists – mainly for Ptolemy. After Judea came under the rule of Ptolemy, many Jews emigrated to Egypt, especially to Alexandria. Some other Jews migrated along the Mediterranean and Black Seas and settled in Asia Minor.

Ptolemy interfered in Judea's affairs more than had the Persians. His tax collectors were more prevalent, but he allowed the Jews the freedom of worship and the same autonomy that they had enjoyed under the Persians. Judea's Jews continued to be governed by their High Priest and Council of Elders, and most Jews continued to worship Yahweh.

Many Jews, especially in rural areas, preferred their old ways, while many Jewish merchants, aristocrats and intellectuals came to admire Greek education, Greek schools and libraries. Some of them found wisdom in Greek philosophy, significance in Greek logic, and beauty in Greek art. Many were attracted by the excitement of the athletic games and tournaments, and in Jerusalem a Greek-style amphitheater and gymnasium were built. Many Jews adopted Greek dress. Many who traveled had a Hebrew name for use within their community and a Greek name for contacts with others.

Influenced by Hellenism, Jews began giving titles and honors to women. They tolerated the mixed marriages that Ezra had forbidden, and some Jews abandoned circumcision, restrictions on foods and other laws that their Hellenized neighbors thought barbaric. A few Jews decided that people everywhere worshiped the same god under different names and that religions could therefore be united. Some others decided that Yahweh was not just the god of the Jews but the god of the whole world. Some of these Jews wanted to convert non-Jews to their god. And in places outside Judea, where Jews and gentiles spoke Greek, some curious gentiles came to Jewish synagogues, listened, and were converted to Judaism.

Some Jewish writers in Egypt wished to instill in their fellow Jews a pride in their Jewish heritage, to counter the feelings of cultural inferiority that many felt. Near the end of the 200s, a Jewish scribe named Demetrius wrote a work describing Judean kings, and he tried to prove that all of Jacob's many children could have been born within seven years. Other Jewish writers attempted to describe Jewish culture as the oldest in the world and the Jews as teachers of other peoples rather than having been influenced by others.

Aramaic remained the language of most Jews - in Judea and Mesopotamia - and an effort was made to preserve Hebrew as the main language of literature and of religious gatherings. But Jewish scribes writing in Hebrew adopted Greek literary forms in their religious writings. Scholars believe that in these adoptions, Jewish scribes borrowed concepts that were not commonly known to Jews before Hellenization. And Greek translations of Persian also made Zoroastrian ideas more accessible to Jews.

The Septuagint

Perhaps because most literate Jews could no longer read Hebrew, Jewish scribes in Alexandria were put to work translating into Greek the Five Books of Moses. The finished product became known as the Septuagint. Demonstrating their conviction that the Septuagint was the final word on Jewish history, the high priests in charge of the work proclaimed a curse upon any changes that might be made to it. Judaic doctrine would hold that seventy-two translators had worked independently of each other on the translation and had produced exactly the same result, word for word - a miracle in keeping with the belief that the books were the works of divine intervention.

The Septuagint was written in a Greek that was difficult for Greek speakers to understand, and because Jews from different areas used words differently and interpreted what they read differently, when the Septuagint was distributed to Jews outside of Alexandria it created confusion. The curse on changes was ignored. For the sake of clarification, new words were inserted to fit local meaning, and with passing of decades the Septuagint was reproduced by hand and more changes were made. Then other writings were imperfectly translated into Greek and added to the Septuagint: Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Kings, Judges, Psalms, Ecclesiastes, and Daniel. The last book of the Old Testament, the Book of Esther, would be translated into Greek around 77 BCE.

It would be from the Septuagint that various other translations would be made: Latin versions, Coptic, Ethiopian, Armenian, Georgian, Slavonic, to the Old Testament part of the Holy Bible commissioned by England's King James in the year 1604 CE.

The Book of Ecclesiastes

The author of the Old Testament’s Book of Ecclesiastes called himself "the preacher." And he claimed to be a “son of David,” an expression used commonly to describe oneself as a Jew rather than as an actual son of David. But some in modern times would believe that Ecclesiastes was written by Solomon, despite it being unlikely that Solomon in his old age would have turned his view of the world upside down and written about futility and the evils of oppression. Some others estimate that Ecclesiastes was written several hundred years after Solomon: around 200 BCE.

"The Preacher" began Ecclesiastes by writing:

Vanity of Vanities! All is vanity... All things are wearisome... The eye is not satisfied with seeing. Nor is the ear filled with hearing.

The Preacher was not as optimistic as the writer of the Book of Proverbs, where it was written that if one honors the Lord "your barns will be filled with plenty, and your vats will overflow with new wine." The Preacher denied that people could apply themselves and better their lot. He suggested that there was no hope in this world. "That which has been," he wrote, "is that which will be." (Ecclesiastes 1:9) He held that knowledge was futile: "What is crooked," he wrote, "cannot be straightened, and what is lacking cannot be counted... in much wisdom there is much grief, and increasing knowledge results in increasing pain." (Ecclesiastes 1:15-18)

The Preacher described himself as having built houses for himself, as having planted vineyards, gardens and fruit trees and as having made parks for himself. He claimed that he had collected silver, gold, slaves and many concubines, and that all this had been in vain. Then he got to the heart of his message, a message that made it more likely that his writing would be included with the other writings that were scripture: Without Yahweh, he wrote, all is in vain, "For who can eat and who can have enjoyment without Him?" The Preacher described Yahweh as having power over everything. "There is nothing to add to it and there is nothing to take from it," he wrote. "That which will be has already been, for God seeks what has passed by." (Ecclesiastes 3:14-15)

Some Jews had been asking why unrighteous people were enjoying success while some who devoutly worshiped Yahweh were suffering hardship and deprivation. The Preacher had an answer for them: he wrote that in a world controlled by God there was wickedness because God was testing people "in order for them to see that they are but beasts." "All go to the same place," he wrote, and "all came from the dust and all return to the dust." (Ecclesiastes 3:18-20)

In Chapter 4, Verse 2, the Preacher congratulates the dead, whom he claimed were better off than the living. "But better off than both of them," he writes, "is the one who has never existed, who has never seen the evil activity that is done under the sun."

In Chapter 5, Verse 10 the Preacher denounces the incentives that make free enterprise work. "He who loves money," he writes, "will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves abundance with its income." Expressing a disbelief in rewards, he writes:

The race is not to the swift, and the battle is not to the warriors, and neither is bread to the wise nor wealth to the discerning, nor favor to men of ability. (Ecclesiastes 9:11)

In Chapter 8, Verse 2 the Preacher delivers an old, conservative message, which must have pleased the priestly authorities: he calls on his readers to obey their rulers, to "Keep the command of the king, because of the oath before God." Then, in Verse 5, he made an incongruently optimistic comment: "He who keeps a royal command experiences no trouble, for a wise heart knows the proper time and procedure."

Toward the end of his message, the Preacher contradicts what he wrote about the blessing of being dead or never having been born. Life, he claims is worth living: "Surely," he writes, "a live dog is better than a dead lion." "Go then," he continues. "Eat your bread in happiness, and drink your wine with a cheerful heart; for God has already approved your works." (Ecclesiastes 9:7) "Enjoy life with the woman whom you love all the days of your fleeting life which He has given to you under the sun, for this is your reward in life, and in your toil in which you have labored under the sun." (Ecclesiastes 9:9). Then, in his next verse, the Preacher advises to do what "your hand finds to do" and to do it "with all your might. Yet he claims (in 9:12), that man is "like fish caught in a net or birds trapped in a snare."

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