CHAPTER 18
verse 17 The question whether Isaac was named because of Abraham's or Sarah's laughter is addressed again in In Gal. 2.
MHG on this verse links Isaac's name to the laughter of both Abraham and Sarah, suggesting that there may have been debate in Jewish circles on the question raised by Jerome. Certainly Josephus,
1. 198, 213, says that he was named because Sarah had laughed: Jerome rejects this outright, possibly because he knew the tradition still extant in Rashi's commentary on this verse that Sarah's laugh was in fact a derisive sneer. Sarah's laughter is related in Gen. 18: 12. For the same four men whose names were given before birth, see jer. Ber. 1: 6; Isaac is named in this verse, Ishmael in Gen. 16: 11; Solomon in 1 Chron. 22: 9; and Josiah in x Kgs. 13:
2. See also Mekh. de R. Ishmael Pisha 16: 82—91 and Sekhel Tov on Gen. 16: 11 for the three whose names were given by God, to whom Ishmael among the Gentiles may be added. Similar are Gen.
Rab. 45: 8 and PRE 32: 1, but in the latter source the number of persons has increased to six.
CHAPTER 18 verse 6 For the word translated by LXX as 'measures', the Hebrew has s"i#m: Aquila and Symmachus rendered it as sata, the word used in Matt.
13: 33 in the parable of the leaven. The 'mystery' (see above, 14: 18) to which Jerome refers is the doctrine of the Trinity, as he explains in his Comm. in Matt. on this verse.
His understanding of the Hebrew word as saton is presumably mediated either through Aquila and Symmachus, or through Josephus, Ant. 9. 71, 85-6, who states that this measure equals one and a half Italian modii. Jerome is thus stating that this Hebrew word speaks of the 'mystery' of the Trinity, since it prefigures the three 'measures' which feature in Christ's own teaching. In this comment, he undermines any claim that LXX alone holds 'mysteries'; it is the Hebrew itself which contains these things. LXX state that the flour is to be made into cakes, egkruphias, a word which derives from the verb krupté, 'hide': it was therefore possible to apply the cakes to some 'hidden thing' or mystery. Philo had done correctly, and records no variant MS readings: in view of the numerous mistakes in Greek and Hebrew orthography to be found in the CCSL edition of QHG, we may suggest that Burstein may be mistaken in this matter.
Commentary that very thing, the 'mysteries' being God Himself and His two 'powers' (OG 4. 8, where the matter is discussed at length; De Sac.
59-60). So this interpretation was ripe for exploitation by Clement of Alexandria, Stromateis 5. 80. 3; Origen, Hom. in Gen. 4. 1,
Hom. in Lev. 13. 3; and others.! Jerome, however, uncovers the mystery of the Trinity by quite different means. verse ro The Hebrew has: 'I shall surely return to you at about the time of life', an obscure expression which occurs again in verse 14; cf. 2. Kgs. 4: 16. Jerome's explanation of it, which he includes in Vg here and in the other two verses quoted, does not correspond precisely to other ancient versions; but see TO, 'as at this time when you are alive', and Sekhel Tov on this verse, 'at about this time next year, when all of you are alive and enduring'. Perhaps Jerome has adapted this Jewish explanation, which is found also in PJ and FTV. He notes that the angel is using human terminology to address human beings, employing a Greek technical term to describe the manner of speech." verse 12 Symmachus seems to have translated Hebrew loti, 'I have become worn out,' euphemistically in the manner of TO, PJ,
TN, FTV, Pesh, and Vg which put 'I have become old'. Aquila had no such qualms, and translated quite literally. LXX seem to have taken the Hebrew as bilti, and the following 'ednah as 'adéndah for 'ad hénah, 'up until now'.? On the sense of 'ednah, 'pleasure', see the comments on 'eden 2: 8 and 2: 15, and the discussion in Gen. Rab.
48: 17, where one of the five meanings there listed is 'youth', preferred by Symmachus, TO, TN, FTV, and Pesh. Rab Hisda in b.
BM 87a records that Sarah's flesh became young again when she conceived.' Jerome's rendering of the word as 'pleasure' here and in Vg is reminiscent of Aquila's 'luxury'.
1 See also Ambrose, De Abr. 1. 37; Rufinus, In Gen. 4. 1; In Lev. 13. 3; Harl, Bible d'Alexandrie, i. 174, and W. T. Miller, Mysterious Encounters at Mamre and Jabbok (Brown Judaic Studies, 50; Chico, Calif., 1984), 66, 187.
2 For discussion of anthropopathés, see Jay, L'Exégése de saint Jér6me, 162-3, whose observations are confirmed by Jerome's use of the word in this verse.
3 This verse is another of those traditionally said to have been altered in LXX for King Ptolemy: see above, comments on 2: 2. Quite what constituted the change from the Hebrew in LXX translation is difficult to determine, unless it is the matter discussed here, a view which is commonly held today: see E. Tov, 'The Rabbinic
Tradition concerning the "Alterations" inserted into the Greek Pentateuch and their Relation to the Original Text of the LXX', JSJ 15 (1984), 65~89, esp. 78-9.
4 See Miller, Mysterious Encounters, 34.