Our journey begins with a letter—the Letter of Aristeas—a fascinating, and some would say embellished, account of just how this monumental translation project unfolded.
Imagine Egypt, centuries ago, under the rule of Ptolemy II Philadelphus. He wasn't just a king; he was a collector, a patron of the arts and sciences, obsessed with knowledge. He wanted to fill his magnificent library in Alexandria with all the wisdom of the world.
But there was a problem. Ptolemy’s librarian, Demetrius of Phaleron, pointed out a significant gap in the collection: the laws of the Jews. According to the Letter of Aristeas, Demetrius told the king that these Jewish laws "deserved to be translated and to find a place in your library." A reasonable request, right? But there was a catch.
Before any translation could even begin, there was a more pressing matter at hand: the plight of Jewish captives in Egypt. See, Ptolemy's father, in his conquest of Coele-Syria and Phoenicia, had brought a massive number of Jews – a staggering one hundred thousand according to Aristeas – to Egypt as prisoners.
Aristeas, a courtier in Ptolemy's court, explains that he’d been urging Sosibius of Tarentum and Andreas, the chief of the bodyguard, to address this very issue. He felt it was time to push for their emancipation, to free them from their bondage. It’s interesting, isn’t it, that the story of translating the Torah begins not with a scholarly pursuit, but with a plea for justice and freedom?