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Old 12-17-2004, 02:54 AM   #1
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Default Demons in the Septuagint?

In English there are three possible mentions of demons in the OT

Leviticus 17:7
They must no longer offer any of their sacrifices to the goat idols [ Or demons ] to whom they prostitute themselves. This is to be a lasting ordinance for them and for the generations to come.'

Deuteronomy 32:17
They sacrificed to demons, which are not God- gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear.

Psalm 106:37
They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons.

Can someone track down the mentions in the Septuagint? How are these translated into the Greek?

Also, what is the greek term for "Rock" and "Savior" that appears in that passage in Deut 32

Vorkosigan
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Old 12-17-2004, 05:20 AM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Vorkosigan
In English there are three possible mentions of demons in the OT

Leviticus 17:7
They must no longer offer any of their sacrifices to the goat idols [ Or demons ] to whom they prostitute themselves. This is to be a lasting ordinance for them and for the generations to come.'
LXX: vain (thing)s mataios (=vain) -> mataiois (plural)

Quote:
Deuteronomy 32:17
They sacrificed to demons, which are not God- gods they had not known, gods that recently appeared, gods your fathers did not fear.
LXX: demons daimonion -> daimoniois (plural)

Quote:
Psalm 106:37
They sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons.
LXX: demons (as above)

Quote:
Can someone track down the mentions in the Septuagint? How are these translated into the Greek?

Also, what is the greek term for "Rock" and "Savior" that appears in that passage in Deut 32
LXX doesn't have "rock", but god (theos).

LXX: savior swthros (as in "soter")


spin
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Old 12-17-2004, 06:43 AM   #3
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There are two Hebrew words involved.

ShDYM (literally rulers) found only in Deuteronomy 32:17 and Psalms 106:37 where the LXX as Spin says translates as daimoniois

ShEYR (literally hairy rough or goat) is used for some object of pagan worship in Leviticus 17:7 and 2 Chronicles 11:15. 2 Chronicles 11:15 'and he ordained him priests for the high places and for the devils' is similar to the passage in Leviticus and is translated similarly as 'and he made for himself priests of the high places and for the idols and for the vanities', where 'vanities' is mataiois as in Leviticus and 'idols' (which may together with 'vanities' translate the Hebrew ShEYR) is eidwlois

ShEYR is also used in Isaiah 13:21 'and satyrs shall dance there' and Isaiah 34:14 'the wild beasts of the desert shall also meet with the wild beasts of the island and the satyr shall cry to his fellow' to refer to some type of supernatural being. Isaiah 13:21 is translated as 'and devils shall dance there' using daimonia and 34:14 'and devils shall meet with satyrs and they shall cry one to the other' using daimonia and onokentaurois for 'demons' and 'satyrs' respectively.

Andrew Criddle
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Old 12-17-2004, 06:48 AM   #4
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daimon = divine being
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Old 12-17-2004, 07:10 AM   #5
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Thanks, everyone. You've been a really big help. Next summer I am learning Greek, so I'll stop pestering you all with these questions.

Vorkosigan
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Old 12-17-2004, 08:00 AM   #6
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Originally Posted by Vorkosigan
Thanks, everyone. You've been a really big help. Next summer I am learning Greek, so I'll stop pestering you all with these questions.

Vorkosigan
No problem. Glad to be of help. :devil3: :devil1:
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Old 12-17-2004, 11:01 AM   #7
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Originally Posted by cweb255
daimon = divine being
Cweb255 is right. You have to be careful with the Greek word "daimon". It's not just a demon as we understand it, like a second-rate evil deity. A "daimon" is almost any kind of supernatural or devine being, good or bad, including the traditional Greek Gods. There are no "evil" connotations. Zeus is a "daimon".
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Old 12-18-2004, 07:03 AM   #8
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There are some other examples in the Septuagint of the use of daimonion

Pasalm 91:6 'nor for the destruction that wasteth at noonday'. is translated 'nor of calamity and the evil spirit at noon-day' using daimoniou

Psalm 96:5 'for all the gods of the nations are idols' using ALYLYM vanity is translated 'for all the gods of the heathen are devils' using daimonia

Ther are also references in the apocryphal/deuterocanonical books Tobit 6:17 & 8:3 and Baruch 4:7 & 4:35

Andrew Criddle
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Old 12-18-2004, 11:08 AM   #9
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I'm not sure what you're looking for--uses of "daimon" and its ilk? Or clear references to demons? It's not a terribly clear word, so the latter is difficult to come up with. For example, Is.65.11 uses "daimoni" in place "Meniy" which is, as near as I can discern, a Semitic equivalent to Fate or Fortune, or Is.13:21 uses "daimonia" to refer to sa'iyr, which Strong's (at least on Bibleworks) gives me as

Quote:
adj 1) hairy n m 2) he-goat, buck 2a) as sacrificial animal 2b) satyr, may refer to a demon possessed goat like the swine of Gadara (Mt. 8:30-32)
Every lexicon on Bibleworks is in fact in agreement with the last (demon possessed goat) as a probable meaning, but none seem quite certain of it, which just goes to show the ambiguity of the term.

Perhaps more helpful to your current query (though, again, I'm still not quite certain what it is you're looking for), sa'iyr, the word used in Is.13.21, and translated into the LXX as daimonia, is the same word used in Lev.17.7, there translated, as spin has noted, as mataiois. I must confess that I have no idea as to why the difference.

The HALOT lexicon for Bibleworks notes that the translation of "shed" (the Hebrew for Dt.32.17) as "daimonion" is one of the key points in favor of the translation of the Hebrew as "demon."

Lots of disjointed babbling, hopefully you can garner something useful from it.

Regards,
Rick Sumner
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Old 12-18-2004, 03:02 PM   #10
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Thanks. I was deliberately vague so as to cast as wide a net as possible. I have been puzzling lately over the origin of demons in Mark. Why are they there? Where did they come from? Since so much of Mark is OT in origin, I decided to start looking for OT references. The English Bible really only offers 1, because Psalm 106 simply doubles the reference in Deut. I am favoring the Deut 32 reference because it is pretty clear, and because Mark cites Deut 32 twice in Jesus' comments on the "wicked generation." But then Isa 13 is also cited in Mark, in the Little Apocalypse in Mark 13. And now you guys have raised some other references -- like Tobit, which there is a couple of weak references to. So I must retreat to my lair and puzzle over this a while longer.
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