Staffan Olofsson – författare

This cogent collection of essays reflects Olofsson’s Septuagint studies throughout the course of more than a decade, addressing methods for productive discussion of theology and translation technique in the Septuagint. The book displays the author’s engagement in debates among scholars surrounding the Septuagint in the modern era. Olofsson responds to the notion that an exclusive preoccupation with translation technique does not lead to a full understanding of the Septuagint translation; he concedes this but argues that exploring translation technique is the necessary foundation for a serious discussion of the theology of the translator(s) and the Vorlage. In addition to the theological assumptions of the Septuagint translators, Olofsson’s concerns in the essays herein include but are not limited to anti-anthropomorphism in the Psalms, Jewish interpretive tradition, Septuagint word order, Qumran texts, and law in the Septuagint Psalms. All of the essays are revised and corrected; some now include discussions of relevant literature that Olofsson was not able to incorporate in the original presentations. Throughout the work, Olofsson takes into account the contributions of fellow researchers on the Septuagint, bringing his unique perspectives to bear on a variegated and broad corpus of research literature.

This volume of the new DSI series is the most comprehensive investigation of Hebrew and Greek translation equivalents in Ps 42-43 in the Psalter and in the Septuagint as a whole currently available. This detailed study does not only include the translation equivalents in the Septuagint, the semantic meanings of the Hebrew and Greek words are also discussed and parallels in the LXX as well as in the Hebrew Bible are included. A systematic investigation of the translator's method must be carried out before one can use the manuscripts in a proper way. Accordingly, the extensive translation-technical emphasis and the discussion of text-critical matters make it possible to present a more accurate Old Greek text and this book may thus contribute to a new critical edition of the Greek Psalter. The book is also in some respects in itself a text-critical study, since all variants in Rahlfs' edition of the Septuagint Psalms, with the addition of Papyrus Bodmer XXIV (Rahlfs 2110), as well as Hebrew variants, are referred to and studied. This includes suggestions and evaluations of the Hebrew Vorlage behind the Septuagint text. It is also a commentary on the Hebrew and the Greek texts of Ps 42-43. Like other commentaries, it describes the position of the psalm, it presents the unity and form of the psalm, its structure and its relation to the close context. As a commentary on both the Hebrew Bible and the Septuagint, it gives an overall interpretation of the psalm in Hebrew and in Greek separately. The book can be read by the specialist in Septuagint studies as well as all scholars interested in translation, textual criticism, and in the book of Psalms, not least its use of metaphors and the reflection of temple theology.