Jensens survey of the old testament adam 324
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CHART 9: THE GREEK SEPTUAGINT AND THE
CHRISTIAN GREEK BIBLE
Some of the signi cant contributions of
the Septuagint to the New Testament setting
are:
(1) The New Testament writers had a
Greek theological vocabulary to work with
as they wrote their books in Greek. For
example, the Hebrew word Torah, which
referred only to God’s Law, had been
translated nomos in the Septuagint, even
though in those days nomos referred to the
whole range of codi ed custom, not
exclusively to God’s Law. For almost two
hundred years Jews reading nomos in the
Septuagint gradually began seeing it as
meaning only God’s Law in those passages
where it should be so interpreted. So by the
time the New Testament writers did their
composing, the word nomos very adequately
served the theological purpose, and their
readers identi ed the word with God’s Law,
without having to make a mental adjustment
to a secular word. In other words, the Greek
nomos theou (law of God), as in Romans
7:22, was perceived precisely the same as
the Hebrew torah haElohim (law of God), as
in Nehemiah 8:8.
(2) When the New Testament canon was
complete, the Septuagint Old Testament and
the Greek New Testament formed a unity,
the Greek Bible.
(3) The Greek Bible made God’s whole
written revelation accessible to the whole
world, where Greek was the lingua franca.
(4) This “modern version” of Scripture
prepared the way for the Jews’ acceptance
of God’s revelation in a language other than
the revered Hebrew language. The barrier of
Scripture being rejected in a so-called
unholy language was not a problem during
the first centuries after Christ.
b. Greek language. By New Testament
times Koine Greek was the international
language,
an
ideal
channel
for
communication in the world-wide program
of the early church. Christ, the apostles, and
early disciples of Palestine spoke Greek (as
well as Aramaic); the Scriptures were in
Greek; and the audiences of the preached
gospel throughout the Roman Empire
understood and spoke Greek.
c. Greek philosophy and mystery religion.
During the silent years the mind of the
Greek thinkers was reaching out to discover
the secrets of life and the universe. Because
of that, it might be concluded that the
Greeks were a ready audience for the
message of Christianity. But they were not
that prepared, as G. T. Manley writes:
We must not, of course, exaggerate
the preparedness of the GraecoRoman world for the acceptance of
Christianity. It needed three
centuries
of
intensive
evangelization and heroic witnessbearing to overcome the pride and
self-satisfaction begotten of so
mighty and dazzling a civilization.
But its external order, its deep
spiritual aspirations, and its
groping after truth, all assured the
presence in it of good soil when
the Sower came with His seed
which is the word of God.17
The answers to the questions of the
searching Greeks were in the Hebrew
