Annotatio CCXX

”For he is reputed high.” — Isaiah 2:22

Jerome wonders at the Seventy Interpreters, that they left this sentence untouched;¹ for thus he writes at the end of the first commentary on Isaiah: “Handling it silently in my mind, I cannot find the reason why the Seventy were unwilling to translate into Greek so perspicuous a prophecy concerning Christ. For the others [Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion], who did indeed translate [it], but drew the ambiguous phrase to a sense of impiety — [it is] no wonder why they translated ill, and were unwilling to say anything glorious concerning Christ, in whom they did not believe — namely, as Jews, or half-Jews, that is, Ebionites.”