Septuagint (LXX), Publications

The Septuagint is the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, revered as Holy Scripture by both ancient Judaism and the early Christian Church.
Two editions of the Septuagint are available: a compact edition and a large-print edition. In addition, a two-volume reader’s edition offers useful translation aids for readers and students. Of particular importance to German-speaking audiences is the Septuaginta Deutsch, which provides a meticulous and faithful translation of the Greek text into German.

The widely esteemed edition of the Septuagint prepared by Alfred Rahlfs is nowadays available in a revised and updated version edited by Robert Hanhart.
Since its initial publication in 1935, Rahlfs’ Septuaginta has served as a foundational edition for Septuagint scholarship worldwide. To ensure its continued alignment with contemporary academic standards, the internationally renowned Septuagint scholar Robert Hanhart undertook a comprehensive revision of Rahlfs’ work. During this process, the Greek biblical text and the critical apparatus were corrected and expanded in more than a thousand individual instances. The resulting Editio altera, published in 2006, includes the complete text of the Greek Old Testament, an updated critical apparatus, and introductions in German, English, Latin, and modern Greek.

The Editio Altera: the Septuagint in the large format of the original edition, with high-quality linen binding.

The Reader’s Edition presents the complete text of the Septuagint as printed in the Rahlfs-Hanhart edition, accompanied by English translations of many Greek words in place of the traditional text-critical apparatus. These translations are provided according to their specific usage in their context and are supplemented, in the case of verb forms, with grammatical analysis.
An appendix offers translations for vocabulary not covered in the footnotes and includes notes on differences in linguistic usage between the Septuagint and the Greek New Testament.

In this edition, the Septuagint is presented in German for the first time. Each biblical book is accompanied by an introduction and concise notes on the textual history throughout the entire volume.
The reader-friendly layout features a two-column format, while poetic texts—such as the Psalms and the Song of Solomon—are printed in a single column for enhanced readability.