4.  It has been a question whether the Hebrew Scriptures were translated at one time, or in successive portions.  The tradition above considered speaks only of the law, or, in the plural, the laws.  These might, perhaps, be understood as comprehensive terms for the whole Old Testament, but they probably mean the Pentateuch alone, in which both the Egyptian king and the Jews of his realm would feel a special interest.  It is probable that the Pentateuch—­the Law in the proper sense of the term—­was first translated, and afterwards the remaining books.  But how long a period of time was thus occupied cannot be determined.  Respecting the incorporation into this version of the apocryphal book, see in the appendix to this Part, No. 2.

When the translator of the Wisdom of Jesus, son of Sirach (Ecclesiasticus), says in his prologue, in immediate connection with his residence and labors in Egypt, that “the law itself and the prophets, and the rest of the books have no small difference [as to force] when read in their own tongue,” he plainly refers to the Septuagint version as complete in his day.  He visited Egypt “under Euergetes.”  But to which of the two monarchs who bore that title he refers is uncertain.  If to the former, it was between 246-221 B.C.; if to the latter, between 145-116 B.C.

5.  The version varies so much in its different parts that it is not easy to give its character as a whole.  It is agreed among biblical scholars that the translators of the Pentateuch excelled in ability and fidelity, according to the well-known judgment of Jerome—­“which [the books of Moses] we also acknowledge to agree more than the others with the Hebrew.”  Among the historical books the translations of Samuel and Kings are the most faulty.  Those of the prophets are in general poor, especially that of Isaiah.  That of Daniel was so faulty that the Christians in later times substituted for it the translation of Theodotion.  See below, No. 10.  Among the poetical books that of Proverbs is the best.  As a whole the Septuagint version cannot for a moment enter into competition with the Hebrew original.  Yet, as the most ancient of versions and one which also represents a text much older than the Masoretic, its use is indispensable to every scholar who would study the Old Testament in the original language.

6.  Independently of its critical value, the Septuagint must be regarded with deep interest from its close connection with the New Testament.  In the days of Christ and his apostles it was known and read throughout the whole Roman empire by the Hellenists; that is, by those Jews and Jewish proselytes who had the Greek civilization and spoke the Greek language.  As the Alexandrine Greek, in which this version was made, was itself pervaded throughout with the Hebrew spirit, and to a great extent also with Hebrew idioms and forms of thought, so was the language of the New Testament,