Hexapla

HEXAPLA (in Greek Τὰ Ἑξαπλά, in Latin Hexapla; less common is the singular Τὸ Ἑξαπλῶν). - With this word, which means "sixfold," Christian antiquity designated the colossal work of Origen (v.), who transcribed, or had transcribed, the entire Old Testament six times in six parallel columns, containing in order: 1) the Hebrew text in Hebrew characters; 2) the Hebrew text transcribed in Greek characters; 3) the Greek version of Aquila; 4) of Symmachus; 5) the most ancient one called that of the Seventy (v.); 6) that of Theodotion.

In this immense labor Origen proposed a twofold aim, at once scientific and practical, the one in the service of religious controversy, the other of biblical exegesis. Since the Greek version of the Seventy, then in official use in all the Christian Churches, differed here and there from the Hebrew text (having more, having less, having a different sense), it often happened that in religious controversies with the Jews the Christians, citing in Greek some passage of the Old Testament in proof of the messiahship of Jesus of Nazareth and of the truth of the Christian religion, found themselves answered that this passage is not found in the original text and therefore is worthless. So that Christian apologists might know what the Jews admit and what they do not, in order to convince them with an authority they recognized, Origen showed it to them in the H. in two ways: 1) already by the simple fact of placing the version of the Seventy opposite the Hebrew text and the versions made from it; 2) in the same 5th column (of the Seventy) marking in the margin with an obelus (a small horizontal line, usually with a point above and below) what was found in Greek but not in Hebrew, and inserting with the mark of an asterisk what was in Hebrew and not in the Greek of the Seventy (he took the Greek expression for it mostly from the version of Theodotion).

At the same time in that 5th column Origen pursued the second aim: to give the Christian Churches a biblical text at once corrected and uniform. The Greek codices of the Seventy of his time presented divergences among themselves and a good number of errors. He, having chosen a good codex of the type (as a careful comparative study shows) of the famous Codex Vaticanus III (with some exceptions), corrected its faults against the Hebrew text with the help of the other Greek versions. Thus correctness was attained to a notable degree. Uniformity would also have been obtained if all the Churches had adopted Origen's textual recension. But it is certain to us, from the authoritative testimony of St. Jerome and from other indications, that the use, at least public use, of the hexaplaric text was restricted to the Churches of Palestine, in whose civil capital, Caesarea, the gigantic work was completed and kept.

Much deeper and broader influence, on the other hand, did the H. have on biblical studies, among the learned. A complete copy was never made of it (it is calculated that it must have filled 50 large volumes of atlas format); but, in compensation, many partial copies were made, of two kinds: 1) a single book was copied separately (for instance, the Psalter, as in the fragments of Cairo and of the Ambrosiana) with all the columns set out in full, at least the Greek ones; 2) only the 5th column (the Seventy) was transcribed in full and alongside it a selection of good readings from the other columns was reported, that is, from Aquila, Symmachus, Theodotion. From copies of this sort come the many citations of hexaplaric readings that were handed down to us in the commentaries of the Greek Fathers (for example, of St. John Chrysostom and of Theodoret on the Psalms) and in the margins of codices of the Seventy. From a similar copy was then made (in 616-617) the Syriac version, called for that reason Syro-Hexaplar, of which a good half is preserved in a precious codex of the Biblioteca Ambrosiana (the other half was in the hands of the Belgian Andreas Masius, but with his death [1573], that codex disappeared) and other fragments in codices of Paris and of London.

From the H. are not to be separated, indeed not even properly distinguished, the Heptapla and the Octapla, of which some codices and writers speak. Origen, in his searches for biblical manuscripts, found, besides the three mentioned complete versions of the Old Testament, three other partial ones, that is, of certain books only (Job, Psalms, minor prophets) and anonymous; these too, with the names of fifth, sixth, seventh (version), he incorporated into his H., thus bringing the columns, in those books, to seven or eight.

Distinct works, on the other hand, are the Tetrapla, extracted from the H. with the omission of the two Hebrew columns, not without some variant or improvement introduced into the column of the Seventy. Some special readings from them reached us in codices and writers; the original was swept away, like the H., in the Arab invasion and domination.

Alberto Vaccari