Digression 11: New Testament Quotations From The Septuagint (As opposed to the Hebrew Old Testament)

The following evidence indicates that the Septuagint was in places accepted as a valid reflection of God’s word by the inspired writers of the New Testament. Yet as we know, there are many places where the LXX differs from the Masoretic text, and there are many instances where the NT writers appear to make a point of exposition based upon a fine point of textual reading. This raises many questions as to the nature of NT quotation from the Old Testament. Take Ps. 41:9,10. This is quoted from the LXX in Mk. 14:18,21. Yet Jn. 13:18 quotes the same passage from the Hebrew text, with a slight difference. Which was inspired? Surely, both sources of the original were accepted as worthy of quotation. So from this evidence alone we should be wary of concluding that the differences between LXX and the Hebrew text are mutually incompatible.

A note is perhaps necessary about how the NT writers quoted from the LXX. Because often it appears they don’t quote exactly from the LXX. The classic example would be the way Amos 9:11,2 is quoted in Acts 15:16-18. The argument of James actually hinges on the LXX reading as opposed to the Hebrew [Masoretic] text reading. ‘All the nations’ were to have God’s Name called upon them, whereas Is. 63:19 describes the Gentiles as people upon whom God’s Name had not [then] been called. Yet this ‘quotation’ is actually a merger of the Amos passage with several others (Is. 45:21; Jer. 12:15; Hos. 3:5). That’s why James introduces the quotation with the comment that he is quoting “the prophets” (plural). The quotation is more like an interpretation of the text- which was how the Jews were used to interpreting the OT texts. Their principle of exposition, called gezera shawa, linked together Bible texts which used the same language. One of the texts which James incorporates into his ‘quotation’ is Jer. 12:16 LXX, which speaks of how converted Gentiles will be “in the midst of my people”. Yet this very phrase occurs several times in Lev. 17 and 18, where we have the commands for how the Gentiles who lived amongst Israel should behave (Lev. 17:8,10,12,13; 18:26). They were told that there were four areas where their lifestyle had to conform to Jewish practice. And these are the very four areas, in the same order, which James asks the Gentile Christians to obey! Clearly, then, the decree of Acts 15, commanding the Gentile Christians to e.g. not eat blood, had as its context how Gentile Christians should live ‘in the midst of’ a Jewish Christian ecclesia. This is the limitation of the context. From this little exercise in exposition we learn how carefully and intricately the early brethren expounded the OT. Yes, they used the LXX, but they used it in such a way as to bring out practical points, searching always for Bible precedents for the situations they found themselves in. They set us quite some example, especially considering that James, the Lord’s brother, would have been a manual worker and artisan as the Lord was; perhaps he was scarcely literate. And yet he reached such heights of exposition and wisdom purely from a simple love of God’s word and attention to its detail.