Septuagint, The (Greek Translation of Torah)

The Septuagint refers to the (Koine) Greek translation of Scripture, thus named because Scripture was rendered by a group of seventy (or 72) elders into Greek.

In the fortieth year, on the first day of the month of Shevat, Moses began translating the Torah into the various languages of his time. What is the significance of Moses' translation? Is translating the Torah always a good thing, or can it also have nega...

Why did Moses translate the Torah into 70 languages and what did it accomplish?

The Midrash tells us that Moses taught the Torah in Seventy languages, the seventy primary languages of the world. The Talmud relates that when King Talmi asked the sages to translate the Torah into Greek it was deemed a tragedy. What is the tragedy Moses...

In a second attempt to translate the Torah into Greek (after an unsuccessful attempt 61 years earlier), the ruling Greek-Egyptian emperor Ptolemy gathered 72 Torah sages, had them sequestered in 72 separate rooms, and ordered them to each produce a transl...

Translation is a sensitive and possibly dangerous process. Our sages commented that the day the Torah was translated into Greek “was as difficult for the Jewish people as the day when the Golden Calf was made.”

Often, an extremely fine line distinguishes between the purest truth and the most distortive falsehood. Why was the Golden Calf the gravest of sins and the most perfidious of betrayals, while the golden cherubs in the Sanctuary were the epitome of holines...

There is so much translation of Torah nowadays. In fact, Moshe was instructed to translate the Torah into all seventy language. Yet, it was problematic when the Sages needed to translate the Torah into Greek for the king Talmi. So is translating the Torah...

Why were the rabbis so hostile to the idea? Translating the Torah into other languages was nothing new!