The Septuagint in Greek and English

Name and pronunciation

Septuagint comes from the Latin word for seventy. You will also see the abbreviation LXX, the Roman numeral for seventy. In English, pronounce it “SEP-too-uh-jint.” The name recalls the ancient account of the translators who rendered the Law of Moses into Greek.

Jewish translators produced the Greek Scriptures before the New Testament was written. The work began in the centuries before Christ, as Greek-speaking Jews read and taught the Scriptures in Greek. Christians inherited these Greek texts and read them alongside the writings of the apostles. B. H. McLean describes this history in Hellenistic and Biblical Greek, published by Cambridge University Press.

Read Brenton's translation

Sir Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton translated the Greek Old Testament into English in the nineteenth century. Read his English column when you want to follow the passage without reading Greek. Use the Greek column to examine the wording itself. Both columns preserve the source text, including older spellings and names.

The English text translates the Septuagint. A difference from an English Bible translated from Hebrew can reflect a different Greek reading, a translator's choice, or a difference in the underlying Hebrew text. Compare the actual words and their context before drawing a conclusion about a passage.

Brenton's English translation appeared in 1844. Bagster published a Greek edition in 1851, and later editions paired Greek and English. The International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies records the publication history. Berean Blue uses the public-domain Brenton transcriptions distributed by eBible.org.

Chapter and verse numbering

Greek and Hebrew chapter numbers sometimes differ, especially in Psalms and Jeremiah. Check the opening words when you move from a Hebrew-based English Bible to the Septuagint.

Each chapter here keeps its received verse labels. The Greek and English columns stand separately, so a missing verse or source heading stays visible in its own edition. When the source contains no Greek text at a chapter, the reader says so and retains the English text.

Open the Hebrew and Greek comparison guide for a worked example, or return to the Bible book index to read the Berean Standard Bible. The list below a Septuagint chapter links related New Testament passages from the project's historical quotation table.

Books in this edition

This reader includes the books and additions present in its Brenton sources. The collection includes works such as Tobit, Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, and Maccabees. Christian traditions differ over the canonical status of these books. Their presence here records the contents of the source edition.

Browse the complete book list and choose a chapter. You can read the text without an account or a script running in your browser.