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| Aquila of Sinope | |
|---|---|
| Name | Aquila of Sinope |
| Birth place | Sinope, Bithynia |
| Era | Late Antiquity |
| Region | Roman Empire |
| Main interests | Bible translation, Hebrew language, Septuagint |
Aquila of Sinope was a second‑century translator and scholar from Sinope in Pontus who produced a literal Greek version of the Hebrew Bible for Jews and Jewish Christians. Active during the reign of Hadrian and the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt, Aquila’s work engaged with traditions represented by the Septuagint, Philo of Alexandria, Flavius Josephus, and early Christian Church Fathers such as Origen and Eusebius of Caesarea. His translation and its reception intersect with communities in Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, Rome, and Byzantium.
Aquila is attested in sources ranging from Josephus and Epiphanius of Salamis to Eusebius of Caesarea and Hippolytus of Rome, which place him in the context of Hadrianic policies and the post‑Second Temple Jewish diaspora. Accounts identify him as a convert from Hellenistic paganism to Judaism—linked by some to the conversion narratives associated with figures like Titus Flavius Josephus and the milieu of Philo of Alexandria—and as a native of Sinope who later worked in Aelia Capitolina (Jerusalem), Alexandria, or Antioch. Later historiography, including Clement of Alexandria and Origen, debates his chronology relative to translators such as Theodotion and the anonymous revisers of the Septuagint active in Alexandrian circles. Medieval Jewish authorities, for example Saadia Gaon and Rashi, treat Aquila as a pivotal figure in the transmission of a precise Hebrew text against Septuagint variants discussed by scholars like Benjamin Kennicott and Giovanni Bernardo De Rossi.
Aquila produced an extremely literal, word‑for‑word Greek rendition of the Hebrew Bible, often characterized as a "glossed" or "revised" version in the tradition examined alongside the Septuagint, Aquila's recension (as cited in patristic literature), and the versions attributed to Symmachus and Theodotion. Patristic testimony from Origen (in the Hexapla), Jerome, and Eusebius records that Aquila’s method prioritized morphological and syntactic fidelity to Hebrew forms, paralleling contemporary practices in Syriac renderings like the Peshitta and rivaling literal tendencies found in Targum Onkelos. His lexical choices and translational techniques have been analyzed in modern works by scholars such as Paul de Lagarde, Gaston Wirth, Hermann Strack, Emmanuel Tov, and Francis Watson. Manuscript traditions preserved in Codex Sinaiticus, Codex Vaticanus citations, and quotations in John Chrysostom demonstrate Aquila’s influence on exegetical readings of prophetic books such as Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Daniel.
Within Judaism, Aquila is associated with movements toward a Hebraizing of Greek scriptural texts, often invoked in polemics with Christian interpreters over messianic passages like those in Isaiah 7 and Psalm 22. Rabbinic and medieval sources including the Talmud (as cited in later commentaries), Midrashim, and later authorities such as Maimonides and Nahmanides reference trends that Aquila exemplifies: literal translation and anti‑Septuagint sentiment. Early Christian writers—Origen, Eusebius, Jerome, Athanasius of Alexandria, and Augustine of Hippo—engaged Aquila’s text in critical apparatuses, especially in comparative study within the Hexapla. Aquila’s work thus became a touchstone in debates over textual authority involving parties such as Melito of Sardis, Irenaeus of Lyons, and later Byzantine exegetes concerned with canonical formation and Christological interpretation.
No complete manuscript of Aquila’s translation survives; knowledge rests on quotations and fragments preserved in patristic writings, medieval manuscript marginalia, and a small number of papyri and inscriptions. Key witnesses include citations in Origen’s Hexapla (as summarized by Eusebius), glosses in Greek biblical manuscripts used by Jerome and Theodoret of Cyrus, and excerpts preserved in Syriac and Georgian translations. Modern discoveries—cataloged by scholars like Wolfgang Kraus, Emanuel Tov, and Sidney Jellicoe—have added papyrological support from collections in Oxyrhynchus, Vienna, Paris, and Jerusalem. Critical editions and reconstructions appear in the works of Paul Kahle, Albert Pietersma, Hermann von Soden, and Jean‑Dousset; comparative studies employ materials from the Masoretic Text, Septuagint codices such as Codex Alexandrinus, and the Dead Sea Scrolls where relevant lexical correspondences are explored.
From late antiquity through the modern era, Aquila has been central to discussions of textual criticism, translation theory, and Jewish‑Christian relations. Renaissance and Enlightenment scholars—Johann Jakob Reiske, Richard Simon, Johann David Michaelis, and Benjamin Kennicott—examined Aquila’s fragments in reconstructing the history of the Greek Old Testament. Nineteenth‑ and twentieth‑century philologists including Paul de Lagarde, Brooke Foss Westcott, Fenton John Anthony Hort, Emanuel Tov, and Frank Moore Cross assessed Aquila’s role relative to discoveries such as the Cairo Geniza and the Dead Sea Scrolls. Contemporary research in textual criticism, exemplified by projects at institutions like The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Cambridge University, Oxford University, École Biblique, and the Institut d'Études Augustiniennes, continues to explore Aquila’s methodology, his relation to Rabbinic Hebrew and Biblical Hebrew traditions, and his impact on later translations such as the Vulgate and Massoretic‑based editions. Aquila remains a focal point for interdisciplinary work involving papyrology, patristics, and historical linguistics.
Category:Translators Category:Hebrew Bible