The article compares two interpretations of God's self-definition in Exodus 3:14, namely (a) the traditional "ontological" interpretation ("I am the One Who really is"), which is represented in the Septuagint and patristic exegesis, as well as in the standard Russian (so-called Synodal) translation, and (b) the "apophatic" interpretation ("I am what I am"), which is predominant in modern exegesis and modern translations. Analysis of the Hebrew text suggests that the "apophatic" reading reflects the original understanding of Exodus 3:14 in its pre-Hellenistic context. The Septuagint rendering of the Hebrew text is often regarded as influenced by Greek philosophy, but it may well be explained as a translator's attempt to deal with the difficult text, namely

The study was carried out with the financial support of the Russian State Scientific Foundation (RGNF)."Reinterpretation of religious concepts of the Hebrew Bible in the Greek translation (Septuagint)", project N 14 - 01 - 00448). I would like to express my gratitude to the Katholischer Akademischer Auslander-Dienst (KAAD) and the University of Regensburg for providing me with the opportunity to get acquainted with modern biblical literature in the libraries of Regensburg.

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to retain the parallelism between two halves of verse Exodus 3:14 without violating the norms of the Greek grammar. If this is the case, the LXX translators did not invent the "ontological" understanding of this verse, but rather involuntarily prepared the way for it.

Keywords: Hebrew Bible, Greek Bible, Septuagint, Masoretic text, biblical translation, theology.

The SELF-DETERMINATION of God in Exodus 3: 14 (Heb. ekhye asher ekhye1; in the Russian Synodal translation "I am Who I Am"; in the New Revised Standard Version "I am who I am") is a cornerstone for the theological systems of the Jewish and Christian traditions. However, the two translations of this verse that we have just quoted perfectly illustrate two completely opposite directions in its understanding (of course, both of these directions are much older than the Synodal Bible and the New Revised Standard Version).

First interpretation: "I am Who I Am" ("I am Existing", "I am the one who has Being") - is represented, in particular, in the Fathers, in scholasticism, in some modern translations of the Bible. It can be considered traditional for Christian theology. God reveals Himself as the Possessor of Being and as the Source of Being. This "ontological" understanding of Exodus 3:14 is particularly clear in the English translation of Lancelot Brenton's Septuagint: I am THE BEING2. In this sense, Exodus 3: 14 is a fundamental revelation of God about Himself and His essence, a central metaphysical statement that should form the basis of any systematic theological discourse.

This traditional reading goes back to the Septuagint ( - "I Exist" - this is the reading of all the manuscripts of the Greek Bible without exception). Is there any basis for it in the original Hebrew? How plausible is it that Greek (Platonic) philosophy is reflected here?

1. Transliteration of the Hebrew text in Russian letters is not often found in Russian Hebraic studies. We use it in this article in order to convey a summary of biblical studies and discussions to religious scholars who do not have a special Hebraic education.

2. Brenton, L.C.L. (1851) The Septuagint with Apocrypha. London: Samuel Bagster & Sons. The capitalized selection belongs to Brenton.

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Or can the appearance of such a construction in the Septuagint be explained simply by the peculiarities of the translation technique, and it is not necessary to assume any special theological or philosophical intent here?

The second interpretation - " I am who I am "(among Russian translations presented primarily by the Bible of the Russian Bible Society (2011): "I am Who I am") - is the most common among Modern European translations. It assumes, in contrast to the first interpretation, that we are not faced with an answer, but with a refusal to answer. God refuses to tell man His name and thereby reveal His identity: "I am I; you can know no more." God cannot be described in any human terms whatsoever. This interpretation is held by the vast majority of Hebraists of the last century, although, as we will see below, there are exceptions.

Such an understanding - the fundamental indescribability of the Deity in human terms-is undoubtedly close to a number of major trends in twentieth-century theology. "The refusal to give a name is like a revelation of a Name "("Namensverweigerung als Namensoffenbarung") - this is how Karl Barth 3 comments on Exodus 3:14. Cardinal Ratzinger writes almost exactly the same thing about our verse:" It's more like refusing to give a name than telling a name "("Es sieht viel eher nach einer Namensverweigerung den nach einer Namenskundgabe aus")4. Protestant Barth and Catholic Ratzinger are just two examples of what has become mainstream in twentieth-century theology.

However, it is precisely this proximity of Hebraic exegesis to the trends of modern theology that leads us to ask: has the "theological fashion" of the last century influenced the interpretation of linguists? "and it makes you take a closer look at the works of those Hebraists who follow the traditional understanding of this place.

In this article, we will take a closer look at these two interpretations, paying attention, first of all, to the extent to which this or that understanding of Exodus 3:14 can be raised to the ancient original.

3. Barth, K. (1990) Unterricht in der christlichen Religion, Bd. II, s. 13. Zurich: Theologischer Verlag.

4. Ratzinger, J. (1968) Einfuhrung in das Christentum, s. 94. Munchen: Kosel-Verlag.

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The number of theological, philosophical, and religious studies publications devoted to this verse is enormous. In our twenty-first century alone, almost a dozen and a half monographs have already been devoted to him. Of course, our article does not and cannot claim to analyze all aspects of the understanding of this verse in the two-thousand-year history of Jewish and Christian exegesis, from Philo of Alexandria to postmodernism. But hundreds of volumes are actually based on one line in Hebrew and one line in Greek. The various interpretations in question differ from each other not only in philosophical and theological concepts, but, above all, at the most basic level, in the grammatical analysis of the text. It is precisely this aspect that our article is devoted to: it will not be about a philosophical or theological analysis of this or that interpretation, but about the extent to which these interpretations can be raised, from the point of view of such a mundane science as grammar, to the Hebrew and Greek originals. The first part of the article will be devoted to the Hebrew text of the Bible, the second - to the Greek in its comparison with the Hebrew.

1. Interpretations of the Hebrew text

In the third chapter of the book of Exodus, God sends Moses to Egypt to bring out the descendants of Jacob from Egypt. Moses hesitates, refuses, asks God: "Behold, I will come to the children of Israel and tell them: "The God of your fathers has sent me to you." And they'll ask me: "What's His name?" What will I tell them?"5 The implication is that the God of the Jews has an authentic, secret name. Only those who call this name can claim to be sent by God.

To Moses ' question, God gives three answers, which are clearly separated from each other, since each answer is entered in a separate group of introductory words: "And God spake unto Moses... And he said... And again God said to Moses..."

Exodus 3: 14a: And God said to Moses,: "I am Who I am "( ehye asher ehye).

5. Translations of Hebrew and Ancient Greek texts, unless specifically stated otherwise, belong to the author of the article.

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Exodus 3: 14b: And he said, "Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: 'I am' has sent me to you." Exodus 3: 15a: And again God said to Moses, " Thus ."

These responses, which follow one another and interpret each other, form an important sequence of meanings. One can argue whether this sequence appeared in one of the sources of the Pentateuch, or only at the stage of its final editing , but there is no doubt that the resulting text is deeply thought out.

God's first response (Exodus 3: 14a, to which our article is devoted) is, as most modern Hebraists believe, "proto-apophatic" in nature: "It is not given to you to know who I am." Subsequent responses, through wordplay, turn this response into a "proto-cataphatic" one.

The verb form used in the first answer (ehye, "I am") in the second answer (Exodus 3: 14b), suddenly, before our eyes, it is reinterpreted not as a verb form, but as a name-it becomes a proper name "I am". This kind of wordplay is often found in the Hebrew Bible. Its authors like it when a word or a whole phrase in the text can be read in two ways.

In the third answer (Exodus 3: 15a) , the newly formed name is Ehye ("I am") it is replaced by the name "Lord" (Yahweh). This substitution is again accompanied by wordplay: the name (Yahweh, "Lord") is consonant with the verb form (ihye, "He is"); it is even possible that the name Yahweh actually comes from a more archaic version of this verb form. Although there are at least a dozen alternative etymologies for the main name of the God of the Hebrew Bible, whatever modern linguists may think, the author of Exodus 3: 14-15 undoubtedly associated the name (Yahweh) with the verb form (ihye, "He is"). In this case, the transition from the name Ehye ("I am") to the name (Yahweh) in Exodus 3: 14-15 is quite logical: The one who says to Himself Ehye ("I am", in the first person), people call in the third person: "He is" ( ihye / Yahweh).

So, from answer to answer, as from one step of the ladder to another, the reader is guided by wordplay. At the "first step", God refuses to give his name. On the "second step".-

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It is clear that by refusing to give His name, He did give it. At the "third step" it turns out that this is nothing more or less than the main name of God in the Hebrew Bible.

1.1. Arguments for the "apophatic" interpretation of Exodus 3: 14a. Grammatical parallels

To better understand the Hebrew text of the "first step" of this ladder - Exodus 3: 14a-you need to look closely at the grammatical construction used here. This construction consists of three elements: (1) the verb-predicate of the main sentence ( ehye, "I am"), (2) the service word that introduces the subordinate clause ( asher, in Russian translation "The One who"), (3) the verb-predicate of the subordinate clause (ehye, "I am yes"). In this case, both verb forms: both the main and subordinate clauses are formed from the same lexeme and denote actions of the same subject related to the same time plan.

Such a grammatical construction (it is commonly called the Latin expression idem per idem - "defining the same thing by the same thing") occurs more than once in the Hebrew Bible, and where it occurs, its meaning can be described as follows: the speaker does not want (or cannot) clarify the details of what is being said speech 6. To make our argument clearer, let's look at these examples 7.

6. For the construction of idem per idem, see, for example, Jouon, P., Muraoka, T. (1991) A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, v. II, § 1580, p. 599. Roma: Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico. While the authors do not wish to enter into a theological debate, they do not specify whether they see this construction in Exodus 3:14 or not.

The interpretation of Exodus 3:14 as idem per idem became predominant in biblical studies, primarily due to Samuel Driver, according to whom this turn of speech is used in the Hebrew Bible where the speaker "has no means or desire to specify" (Driver, S. R. (1911) Exodus, p. 362-363. Cambridge: University Press).

From the subsequent, very abundant literature, it is necessary to note first of all the works: Vriezen, Th. C. (1950) "Ehje' aser 'ehje", in W. Baumgartner et al. (eds.) Festschrift Alfred Bertholet, pp. 498 - 512 (Tubingen: J.C.B. Mohr); Ogden, G. S. (1992) "Idem Per Idem: Its Use and Meaning", Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 53: 107 - 120; Lundbom, J. R. (1978) "God's use of the idem per idem to terminate debate", Harvard Theological Review 71 (3 - 4): 192 - 201; Beitzel, B.J. (1980) "Exodus 3:14 and the Divine Name: A Case of Biblical Paronomasia", Trinity Journal 1(1): 5 - 20.

7. To the examples discussed below, you can add a number of others, where the construction idem per idem is expressed somewhat differently, for example, with the omission of the service word

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Genesis 43: 13-14. Jacob, who is in danger of famine, sends his sons to Egypt to the ruler who distributes grain. Sends them, despite the fear of losing them. He says, " Take your brother with you and go back to that person... If I lose my children, I will lose them." "As I lost my children, so I lost them", ). Jacob doesn't know if he lost his children or not, but he made a decision: come what may!

Exodus 16: 23. Moses tells the people what to do with the manna that has fallen on the ground: "Bake what you bake, boil what you boil."It doesn't specify how much to bake or how much to cook. Bake and cook as much as you can (if you want).

1 Samuel (Heb. (1 Samuel) 23: 13. David, who is in the town of Keilah, is informed that Saul, who is pursuing him, is moving towards Keilah. Then David and his men, about six hundred strong, left Keilah and "wandered where they wandered" ( Synodal translation: "walked where they could"). The author of the story cannot or does not want to specify exactly where they wandered - yes, perhaps such a clarification is impossible at all: they themselves did not know where they were going, wandered wherever they had to.

2 Samuel 15: 20. " I go where I go, but you go back and bring your brothers back." David himself does not know where he is fleeing from the rebellious Absalom. He goes wherever you want.

4 Samuel (Heb. Bibles of 2 Kings) 8: 1. Elisha said to the woman whose son he had brought back to life, " Get up and go away from here with your family, and live where you will live for the Lord has called a famine-yes, a famine has come upon this land for seven years." Elisha does not specify where a woman should live: let her live where she has to ("live where you can";" live where you want"; Synodal translation: "live where you can live"). Live anywhere but in the land where the Lord has called the famine.

Esther 4: 16. " I will fast in the same way with my maidservants, and then I will go to the king, even though it is not according to the law. If I perish, then I perish" (Lit.: "As I perish, so I perish"). Esther doesn't know if she's dead or not, but she doesn't care; she's made up her mind: come what may!

the words asher: Exodus 4: 13, Zech 10: 8; or, on the contrary, in a more detailed form: Deut 1: 46, 2 Samuel 15: 20, and Eze 12: 25.

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Exodus 33: 19. The two closest parallels to Exodus 3:14 are found in the same book. After the Jews who left Egypt broke their covenant with God and made themselves a golden calf, God in anger tells Moses that He will not go any further with His people (Exodus 33: 1_3). The people weep and take off their ornaments as a sign of repentance (Exodus 33: 4-6). Moses asks God to show him "His way" (Exodus 33: 12-13), and then, having mercy, God still promises that He Himself will go with His people (Exodus 33:14). As proof that God has shown mercy, Moses asks that God "show him his glory" (Exodus 33:18). God says:

I am Merciful to those with whom I am merciful "I will spend all My splendor before you, and I will proclaim the name of the Lord (Yahweh) before you. I have mercy on those whom I have mercy on "(in the Synodal translation: "I will have mercy on those whom I have mercy on, and I will spare those whom I have mercy on").

God refuses to specify how, whom, or how much He forgave: It is not for you to know who I will pardon. There is a clear semantic and grammatical similarity to Exodus 3: 14. The words "I am who I am" mean "it is not given to you to know who I am." The words "I have mercy on those I have mercy on, I have mercy on those I have mercy on" mean "it is not given to you to know whom I will have mercy on, whom I will spare." There are other references between Exodus 3: 14 and Exodus 33: 19 that bring the two verses even closer together.

In the structure of the book of Exodus, two peaks and two climaxes are clearly distinguished. The miracles of Moses in Egypt, the departure of the Jews from Egypt, and the death of the Egyptians in the Red Sea all lead us to the first climax: the conclusion of the Covenant between the Jewish people and God (ch.19, 24). Then we read about the sin of the Jews - the golden calf; this sin leads to the breaking of the Covenant. After Moses destroyed the calf, after the repentance of the people and the requests of Moses, the second climax comes: the renewal of the Covenant (ch. 34). There are many similarities between the scenes of making and renewing the Covenant: in both scenes, Moses ascends Mount Sinai and no one must accompany him, in both scenes, God gives him two stone tablets on which the Ten commandments are inscribed. The conclusion of the Covenant is accompanied by a list of laws, ritual and household regulations (Chapters 20-23), and the renewal of the Covenant is also accompanied by a list of regulations (Chapters 34), which largely duplicate the data already given at the conclusion of the Covenant.

God's conversation with Moses in Exodus 3 begins a long series of events that culminate in the making of the Covenant. Conversation

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God's relationship with Moses in Exodus 33 becomes the prologue to the renewal of the Covenant. In other words, in the "two-top" narrative of the book of Exodus, there is a clear parallelism between the place that Exodus 3:14 occupies on the way to the first "top" and the place that Exodus 33:19 occupies on the way to the second "top".

In both of these key points in Exodus, the name of God comes to the fore. In Exodus 3: 14, the words "I am who I am" are an answer to the question about the name of God. In Exodus 33: 19, God says: "I will declare the name of the Lord before you. I have mercy on those I have mercy on, and I have mercy on those I have mercy on." It sounds as if the words "I have mercy on those I have mercy on, I have mercy on those I have mercy on" reveal the meaning of the name of the Lord just mentioned.

In a sense, Exodus 33: 19 comments on and clarifies Exodus 3: 14.

1.2. Arguments for the "apophatic" interpretation of Exodus 3: 14a. Semantic parallels

The grammatical parallels analyzed by us speak in favor of the "apophatic" interpretation: God refuses to specify who He is.

In the Old Testament, such a refusal has not only grammatical, but also precise semantic parallels.

This is, first, the Genesis account of how Jacob struggles with the Unknown and asks: "Tell me your name!" Jacob's nocturnal opponent refuses to give a name, answering with a question: "Why do you ask me about my name?" (Gen. 32: 298). Then Jacob realizes that he was fighting with God.

Second, the Book of Judges ' account of the angel's appearance to Manoah (Judges 13: 17-18). To Manoah's question "What is your name? We will thank you when your word comes true " the angel refuses to give His name and says: "Why are you asking me my name? It is incomprehensible." The angel ascends in the flames that rise above the altar, and Manoah realizes that he has seen God.

In other words, God's refusal to give his name is a characteristic topos of the Old Testament narratives. This is no coincidence: in the Old Testament world, as in many archaic cultures in general, knowing a name means knowing an entity. This is also connected with the apparent (for a person of our culture) discrepancy of the set value.-

8. Gen. 32: 30 according to editions of the Hebrew Bible.

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Here's the question and answer: Moses asks what God's name is, and God answers as if He were asked who He is. But in the Old Testament world, these are two interrelated things.

1.3. "I am Who I am" or "I will be what I will be"?

Strictly speaking, the vide-temporal form used in Exodus 3:14a (the so-called imperfect) can have the meaning of the present, future, and repeated past in Hebrew ("I am who I am" / "I will be what I will be" / "I was what I was"). byval" and under.).

We have translated Exodus 3: 14a in the present tense, but future translations are also known in the history of exegesis. The fact is that even in biblical Hebrew, the meaning of the future tense is found in the Hebrew "imperfect" more often than other meanings. In Mishnaic and modern Hebrew, this form in the indicative mood is used almost exclusively with the meaning of the future tense.

According to Origen's Hexameters, it is the future, not the present, that translates the words of Exodus 3: 14a ehye asher ehye in Aquila and Theodotus: "I will be what I will be."

In modern times, this translation of Exodus 3:14a was given by Martin Luther ("Ich werde sein, der ich sein werde"). English-language translations of the Bible, following the King James Version, prefer the present tense ("I am who I am"," I am that I am"), but some editions of 20th-century English translations (Revised Standard Version, New English Bible, New International Version) give the translation in the margins as an alternative in the future tense ("I will be who I will be", "I will be that I will be", "I will be what I will be"). French translations also prefer the present tense.10

Of the current studies supporting the translation of Exodus 3:14a in the future tense, it should be noted, first of all, the author of-

9. Field, F. (1875) Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt: sive veterum interpretum graecorum in totum Vetus Testamentum fragmenta, vol. 1, p. 85. Oxonii: e typographeo Clarendoniano. The only Greek manuscript that Field refers to (Cod. 64) simply says the Word is restored by publishers.

10.Traduction oecumenique de la Bible ("Dieu dit a Moise: "Je suis qui Je serai") offers an unusual combination of present and future tense.

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literary commentary by W. Propp and the works of the outstanding French biblical scholar R. de Vaux 11.

This interpretation sometimes gives the bible text an unexpected sound. B. S. Childs writes: "God declares that his intentions will be revealed in His future actions, which He now refuses to explain." 12 W. Arnold translates the Hebrew text with the words " I will be whatever I choose."13.

A. McNeil, who tends to see the future tense in Exodus 3:14a, gives this future tense a philosophical interpretation: "God will be what He will be at one time or another; each epoch will discover new properties of His Being" ("God would be what He would from time to time prove to be; each age would discover fresh attributes of His Being").14 Perhaps the most detailed translation is the interpretation of Exodus 3:14a in this vein by H. H. Davies: "I AM who and what, and where and when, and how and even why you will discover I AM"15.

Researchers and commentators who refer to God's self-determination in Exodus 3: 14a as a future tense often make a grammatical argument in favor of their interpretation: although in principle "imperfect" in Hebrew can mean both present and future, and even a repeated past,they believe this is not the case when applied to the verb "to be".

In the Bible, according to their observations,the" imperfect "verb" to be "always has only the future tense. This statement is repeated in a number of works (Abba, de Vaux, Propp).

As is often the case in biblical studies, the solution of exegetical questions here requires an appeal to the level of the elementary (gram-

11. Propp, W.H.C. (1999) Exodus 1 - 18: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, p. 204. New York: Doubleday. Ср. также Abba, R. (1961) "The Divine Name YHWH", JBL 80: 320 - 28; De Vaux, R. (1970) "The Revelation of the Divine Name YHWH", in J. Durham, J. Porter (eds) Proclamation and Presence: Old Testament Essays in Honour of Gwynne Henton Davies, p.48 - 75 (London: SCM Press); Ogden, G.S. (1971) "Time, and the Verb hyh in O.T. Prose", VT 21: 451 - 469; Pakozdy, L.M. (1956) "I shall be that which I shall be", The Bible Translator 7: 146 - 148.

12. Childs, B.S. (1974) The Book of Exodus, p. 76. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.

13. Arnold, W.R. (1905) "The Divine Name in Exodus iii 14", JBL 24: 128.

14. McNeile, A.H. (1908) The Book of Exodus with Introduction and Notes, p. 22. L.: Methuen & Co.

15. Davies, G.H. (1967) Exodus (Torch Bible Commentaries), p. 72. London: SCM.

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mathematical) analysis of the text and implies a careful analysis of the rules for using Hebrew constructions throughout the entire biblical corpus. Such an analysis, conducted by us, showed that examples of the use of the "imperfect" Hebrew verb "to be"in the meaning of the present tense, although rare, but there are. Such, for example, are the words of Ruth in Ruth 2: 13: "You have comforted me and spoken kindly to your handmaid, even though I am not worthy of any of your handmaidens "(literally, "even though I am not like one of your handmaidens").

Another example is Psalm 49 (Heb. 50): 21, where God says to the sinner, "I was silent, and you thought that I was just like you (literally, 'that I am just like you'). But I will expose you..."

In these examples, we are clearly not talking about the future tense, but about some timeless characteristic: in one case, Ruth (she is-in her self-abasement-not like Boaz's slaves, unworthy of them), in the other case, God (He is-in the sinner's mind-like the sinner himself).16.

Thus, the "grammatical" argument in favor of translating Heb. ekhye to the future tense disappears. As for the meaning, in the context of the question " Who are you?" It is more appropriate to see T. I. as a habitual present (i.e., a recurring present, a present that is also true in the past and future): "I am who I am (always, in general)."

1.4. Alternatives to the interpretation of idem per idem. Syntax Issues

The understanding of Exodus 3: 14a as a construction of idem per idem has become, as we have already said, dominant in the Hebraic writings of the last century. An alternative interpretation of the syntax of this couplet was proposed by E. Schild 17 and Y. Lindblom 18 (Schild and Lindblom had predecessors in the 19th century, 19 but their work went unnoticed).

16. Other examples of using the imperfect verb haya ("to be") in the present tense: 2 Samuel 19: 23, Job 12: 4, Job 17: 6, Gen 34: 10

17. Schild, Е. (1954) "On Exodus iii 14-'I AM THAT I AM'", VT 4: 296 - 302.

18. Lindblom, J. (1964) "Noch einmal die Deutung des Jahwe-Namens in Ex. 3,14", Annual of the Swedish Thelogical Institute 3: 4 - 15.

19. Schild mentions Eduard Ress, who translated the relevant passage "Je suis celui qui est" with the comment " On remarquera que nous traduisons: Je suis celui qui

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In the work of Schild, whose theses are developed by Lindblom, an attempt is made to see in the words ehye asher ehye "I am Who I am" the result of a kind of syntactic transformation of the statement "I am the One Who exists" ("I am the one who is"). In this case, the Hebrew verb ("to be") in a subordinate clause, it is understood not as a copula verb, but as a full-meaning verb "to be, to exist".

Here the solution of exegetical questions will again require us to turn to Hebrew grammar. If Schild and Lindblom's interpretation is correct, then we need to explain why in the Hebrew text of Exodus 3:14a, the subordinate clause "The one who exists" means"the one who is". it is not the form of the 3rd person, but the form of the 1st person ( ehye, "I am"). Schild and Lindblom believe that here the predicate in the subordinate clause agrees in person with the subject of the main sentence ("I"). Is this possible in the Hebrew language? Schild and Lindblom cite a number of similar examples from the Hebrew Bible, for example: 1 Par 21: 17.

I am the one who committed sin and truly did evil (Literally: "I am the one who I am-committed sin...").

This syntactic analysis was strongly criticized in an article by B. Albrektson [20], who draws attention to the fact that in all the examples referred to by Schild and Lindblom, the predicate of the subordinate clause is consistent with a certain name or pronoun that is explicitly present in the context. So, for example, in 1 Par 21:17 the predicates of the subordinate clause ("the one who I am has committed sin...")

est, et non pas: celui qui je suis. Cette derniere traduction provient de ce qu'on meconnait une regie de la syntaxe hebraique, d'apres laquelle la proposition relative se met a la meme personne que le sujet, par ex.: Je suis le Dieu qui t'ai fait sortir, etc. (Gen. xv 7)" (Reuss, E. (1879) La Bible: traduction nouvelle avec introductions et commentaires. Paris: Sandoz et Fischbacher). Lindblom also refers to the commentary of August Knobel (A. (1857) Die Bucher Exodus und Leviticus. Leipzig: Hirzel), who gave a similar interpretation of Exodus 3: 14. However, unlike the articles of Schild and Lindblom, the exegesis of Ress and Knobel went unnoticed and did not cause serious scientific discussion.

20. Albrektson, В. (1968) "On the Syntax of in Exodus 3:14", in: P.R. Ackroyd, B. Lindars (eds) Words and Meanings: Essays presented to David Winton Thomas, pp. 15 - 28. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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they match the person with the pronoun "I" in the main sentence.

Meanwhile, in the formula ehye asher ehye, if we follow the interpretation of Schild and Lindblom ("I am the one who is"), the predicate of the subordinate clause should be consistent not with the name, not with the pronoun, but with the implied (that is, in the Hebrew text itself, not expressed in any way) subject of the main sentence. This would make Exodus 3: 14a unprecedented in its syntactic structure in the Hebrew Bible, so most Hebraists, like Albrektson, believe that the analogies given by Schild and Lindblom are incorrect.

1.5. Alternatives to the interpretation of idem per idem. Problems with the meaning and use of the Hebrew verb"to be"

If we believe that in Exodus 3: 14a, we are not dealing with the construction of "evasion" (idem per idem), but with the complex sentence "I am the One who exists" ("I am the one who is") with the full-valued verb "to be", "to exist" in the subordinate clause, then the question arises as to what exactly the ancient author could have put into this "being" or "existence". Is it possible to use the Hebrew verb"to be" as a full-meaning verb in this context? What could be its meaning?

Looking through the numerous cases of using the verb "to be" in the Old Testament corpus, we see that it can be used to describe existence in a particular place, participation in a particular situation: "Giants were then on earth", "I will be with you", "It is bad for a person to be alone". The verb "to be" can also be used in the context of denial of existence: "Or I would not exist as a buried stillborn" (Job 3: 16). What we do not find in the Hebrew language of the Bible are examples of the use of the verb "to be" in contexts where the mere "existence" of an object is stated ("There is God", "There is good"). Statements of this kind imply an established philosophical discourse. In the Old Testament world, such a discourse has not yet developed.

Philo and the Greek Fathers (see 2.4 below) believed that God's words in Exodus 3:14a meant more than just existence, namely, "I am the One who truly exists." However, in order to-

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Such a "metaphysical" interpretation is highly questionable in the pre-philosophical world in which the book of Exodus was written. There is not the slightest hint of it in the Hebrew Bible, and it would be anachronistic to" absorb " it into the Hebrew text of Exodus 3:14a.

Twentieth-century exegetes rightly rejected the possibility of such an anachronism. The pendulum swung in the opposite direction,and mid-century exegetical works were characterized by a sharp contrast between" Jewish thought "("das hebraische Denken") and" Greek thought "("das griechische Denken"). At the same time," Greek thought "was attributed to a propensity for metaphysics, and" Jewish thought " - features characteristic of philosophical trends in the mid-20th century (for example, existentialism).

G. von Rad, the leading German Old Testament scholar of the middle of the last century, writes about Exodus 3: 14a: "Nothing can be further from the etymology of the name Yahweh given here than defining the Essence of Yahweh through a philosophical statement about being in the sense of indicating Its absoluteness and self-sufficiency. That would be totally out of character in the Old Testament... The Hebrew verb hayah should be understood - at least in this place - in the sense of "to be present", "to be-here", that is, not in the sense of absolute being, but in the sense of being relative and effective: "I will be-here with you (for you) "" 21.

The same idea is expressed by 3. Movinkel in the program article "The Name of the God of Moses": "This "being" is not an abstract Greek eivai "being in itself". For the Hebrew language, "to be" means not just to exist - as all other things and living beings exist-but precisely to be active, to express oneself in active being: "A God who acts"," I am what I am always and everywhere in My creative activity","I am a God who truly acts" " 22.

Starting point for such reasoning (besides the "zeitgeist") the exegetes of the mid-twentieth century had the idea that combinations of the verb haya ("to be") with prepositions (for example) indeed, in the Hebrew language they have such meanings as" to be present with someone"," to be with someone"," to help someone","to act for someone". For example:

21. Rad, G. von (1969) Theologie des Alten Testaments. Bd.1. Die Theologie der geschichtlichen Uberlieferungen Israels, s. 194. Munchen: Kaiser.

22. Mowinckel, S. (1961) "The Name of the God of Moses", Hebrew Union College Annual, 32: 127.

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"I will be with you" (Exodus 3: 12).

"I will be with your mouth and teach you what you should say" (Exodus 4: 12).

It is these verses, which are located in the immediate vicinity of Exodus 3:14, that M. Buber refers to in the article "Zu einer neuen Verdeutschung der Sennit", justifying his own translation of Exodus 3: 14a, in which the place of the verb "sein", which is familiar to the German reader, is replaced by "dasein", which reminds us of Heidegger ("Ich werde dasein, als der ich dasein werde")23.

Leaving aside the philosophical aspect of the above interpretations, we will limit ourselves to the linguistic aspect. From the point of view of lexical and grammatical analysis of Hebrew texts, such meanings as "to be present", "to influence", "to help", "to accompany" appear in the verb haya ("to be") only in prepositional combinations, and are explained by the semantics of prepositions, and not at all by hypothetical features of the Hebrew verb "to be". Note that completely similar prepositional turns occur in Russian ("I will be with you"), and in other European languages! It is methodologically incorrect to attribute to a verb as such the meanings that appear in it only in prepositional turns.

Since the mid-1960s, the concept of a special "Jewish thought", which is supposedly different from the European one and is reflected in the peculiarities of the Hebrew language, has generally fallen out of fashion. An important role was played by the scathing criticism of this concept in the works of J. Barr, especially in his famous "Semantics of the Biblical Language" 24.

Let's summarize. To think that Exodus 3: 14a means " I am the One who (truly) exists "(an ontological understanding) is to read the archaic Hebrew text through the lens of a later metaphysics that is alien to it, and to ascribe the Hebrew verb haya ("to be")to the original Hebrew text. uncharacteristic use of it. To think that Exodus 3: 14a means "I am the One who is near, who helps" is

23. Buber, M. (2012) "Zu einer neuen Verdeutschung der Schrift", in Martin Buber-Werkausgabe, Bd. 14 Schriften zur Bibelubersetzung (Herausgegeben von Ran HaCohen), S. 186-220. Gutersloh: Gutersloher Verlagshaus (first published in 1954 as a supplement to the first volume carried out by Buber and Rosenzweig translation of Scripture).

24. Barr, J. (1961) The Semantics of Biblical Language. Oxford: Oxford Univ. Press.

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it means reading a biblical text through the lens of a mid-twentieth-century philosophical discourse and attributing the Hebrew verb haya ("to be")to the Bible. those meanings that appear only in prepositional constructions.

We have to admit that the alternatives to reading idem per idem sound unconvincing both in terms of content and in terms of the use of the Hebrew verb haya ("to be") - not to mention the problems mentioned in 1.4. that arise when parsing Exodus 3: 14a if we refuse to interpret idem per idem.

Of course, the words of Exodus 3: 14a are linked by many intertextual connections and allusions both to their immediate context and to more distant passages. They are the first step of the" ladder " Exodus: 14a-3: 14b-3: 15a, which paradoxically leads the listener from the refusal of the Deity to give His name to the name of Yahweh (Lord). They echo the neighboring lines of Exodus 3: 12 ("I will be with you") and Exodus 4:12 ("I will be with your mouth"), in this respect Buber is right. The context is layered and multi-valued. But in itself-if we abstract from the semantic overtones that are induced by the context-the phrase ehye asher ehye means, apparently, simply "I am who I am" (evasion of the answer), see the analogs given above in 1.2.

However, the interpretation presented in the Septuagint completely changed the meaning of the translated Hebrew text.

2. How did the Greek text of Exodus 3:14a turn out? ?

Our analysis of the Septuagint will begin by looking at what possible strategies for transmitting Heb. ekhye asher ekhye were available to the translators.

2.1. Translation of the construction idem per idem in the Septuagint

The Hebrew syntactic construction of" evasion " (idem per idem) in the Greek Bible is almost everywhere, except for Exodus 3:14a, transmitted more or less verbatim: verb form + relative pronoun/adverb + repetition of the verb form. In this case, the repeated verb form is placed in the conjunctiva with a particlethat gives the subordinate clause a modal connotation. Cf.:

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Such phrases are foreign to classical Greek, but their meaning was undoubtedly clear to the reader. Could the translator have done with Exodus 3: 14a what he did with Exodus 33: 19, or what his colleagues did with 1 Samuel 23: 13 and 4 Samuel 8: 1-translate the Hebrew text verbatim, but using the conjunctiva? Probably, in this case, the Greek text (especially conjunctiva) would sound too strange. Literalism in the translation of an alien language phrase would be superimposed on the text, which is already difficult, even in the original.

2.2. Transmission of "avoiding clarification" in Classical Greek

In classical Greek, the meaning of "avoiding clarification" is conveyed by other means, for example, by a turn with the verb sr:

...before (before meeting Socrates) I went where I had to and thought I was doing something... (Symposium 173a)

...he has this habit: sometimes he will go to the side where he has to, and it's worth it ... (Symposium 175b)

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(Eros) of the vulgar Aphrodite truly gives water to himself; he does anything (Symposium 181b)

The Hebrew language, in all the cases cited, would probably use idem per idem phrases like "went where he went", "will go where he goes", "does what he does".

2.3. Translation as a syntactic transformation of a Jewish construction

Syntactically speaking, in the Septuagint Exodus 3: 14a, when translating the Hebrew "he who I am" into the Greek "Existing", a superficial syntactic transformation occurs: the subordinate clause ("he who I am") is turned into a participial turn ("Existing"). How legitimate is this transformation in this case?

Strictly speaking, any participial turn is nothing more than a" collapsed " subordinate clause. Therefore, when translating from language to language, participial phrases are often transmitted by subordinate clauses - and vice versa. Compare the Hebrew and Greek texts of Exodus 29: 46:

And they will know that I am Yahweh their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt...

And they shall know that I am the Lord their God, who brought them up out of the land of Egypt...

Translating Exodus 3: 14a as a translator, at first glance, made the same, quite legitimate syntactic transformation as in Exodus 29: 46-replacing the Hebrew subordinate clause with the Greek participle. In doing so, however, two things happened. First, the Hebrew idiom idem per idem, which required the obligatory repetition of two personal forms, was ignored. Secondly, from the point of view of logical analysis of the text, the Hebrew verb-copula "to be something" was used twice. In the Greek translation, the first use of this verbretained the character of a copula,

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but the second one, rolled up into a participle, turned from a copula verb into a full-meaning verb "to be, to exist".

This syntactic transformation enabled the subsequent exegetical tradition of Philo of Alexandria and the Christian Fathers to read Exodus 3: 14a in the spirit of Greek ontological philosophy.

2.4. Translation Influence of Greek philosophy?

The expressions "existing" or" essentially existing " mean in Plato a true, authentic Being, opposed to the impermanent world that is accessible to our senses. Cf., for example, Phaedrus 249c:

...our soul, which accompanied God, looked down on what we now call "being" and raised its head to true Being...

Plato has many examples of this use of the expression.25 However, Plato's Being is always neuter. It is not identical with any of the gods. The identification of the biblical God with the Existence of philosophers was first explicitly made by Philo of Alexandria, who writes-clearly starting from the fact that God is called in the Septuagint

... that there is, there is a God, and that He is the only truly existingOne, and that He created the world...

Philo takes the expression "Existing" (in the masculine gender, not in the neuter gender, as in Plato) from the Septuagint Exodus 3: 14; but reinterprets it in the spirit of Plato's Being becomes a Person.

As we have seen, in the original Hebrew text of Exodus 3:14a, God does not want to reveal anything about Himself. In the Septuagint, as it is called-

25. See, for example, Philebus 59d, Phaedrus 247e, Respublica 585d, Sophista 240b, Sophista 266e, Leges 894a.

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As Philo has read, God says that Genesis belongs to Him. It is interesting, however, that Philo still sees a kind of "apophatic" note in this answer - that God does not want to reveal anything about Himself other than that Genesis belongs to Him. In The Life of Moses, Philo recounts God's words to Moses in Exodus 3: 14:

First of all, "He said," tell them that I am an Existing One so that, by making clear the difference between existing and non-existing, they may also learn that no name can be used in the literal sense about Me , the only One to whom Being belongs.

The understanding we see in Philo has become a matter of course for Christian theology: God is the Existent, the Existent, the only one who truly exists; everything else exists only by virtue of what belongs to Him. But did the Septuagint authors themselves have this in mind?

2.5. TranslationInfluence of context?

Let's recall the context. Behind God's First "Apophatic" Response: "I am what I am" (Exodus 3: 14a)-the Hebrew text of the Bible gives the second answer: "Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel:' He hath sent me to you ,I AM '" (Exodus 3:14b). The verb form used in the first answer (ehye, "I am") becomes the proper name "I AM".

For Greek prose, unlike the Hebrew Bible, such wordplay is atypical. The translators of Genesis and Exodus generally tend to follow the Greek language norm. But how, without violating the norms of the Greek language, to keep the roll call between the verb form (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3: 14a ("I am who I am") and the name (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3:14b ("Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, He hath sent me unto you ,and I AM."?

Aquila and Theodotus, according to Origen's Hexaple, translated the Hebrew ehye asher ehye in Exodus 3:14a literally:

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"I will be who I will be" (the future tense of the Greek translation is explained by the fact that Aquila and Theodotus quite consistently strive to transfer the Jewish imperfect to the Greek future; see section 1.3. of our article). In order to preserve the wordplay we are discussing, they were forced to translate the Name of God (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3:14b, also literally-verbally - as the resulting translation of "I will have sent me to you" is beyond what is acceptable in Greek. The highly literalistic, non-Greek-style translation of Theodotus, as well as the even more literal, even more non-Greek-style translation of Aquila, could afford this. But not the translator of Exodus in the Septuagint.

It can be assumed that it was the need to preserve the roll call of the verb form (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3:14a with the name (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3:14b-and without violating the norms of the Greek language - that determined the translation strategy of the creators of the Greek version of the book of Exodus. This assumption is expressed in the textual commentary of J. R. R. Tolkien. Weavers is the author of the most detailed critical edition of the Greek book of Exodus to date:

"The verb form of the first person as the subject of the verb "sent" would be grammatical absurdity. Therefore, the translator has to [in Exodus 3:14b: "I AM sent to you"-M. S.] translate the words "I am" with the participle "I am sent to you ""28.

But the translation of" I am " by the participle in Exodus 3: 14b requires a similar translation of these words in Exodus 3: 14a:

The translators could not or did not want to destroy the roll call between the forms (ehye, "I am") in Exodus 3:14a and Exodus 3:14b. The translation (ehye, "I am") of the personal form of the verb was not acceptable in Exodus 3: 14b. The translation (ehye, "I am") of the participle in both halves of the verse was a remarkable way out from the point of view of Greek syntax: the participle, unlike the personal form, looks great in Exodus 3:14a and Exodus 3:14b. Apparently, the destruction of the idem per idem construct seemed translatable.-

26. Field, F. Origenis Hexaplorum quae supersunt, vol. 1, p. 185.

27. Ibid.

28. Wevers, J.W. (1990) Notes on the Greek Text of Exodus (Society of Biblical Literature Septuagint and Cognate Studies 30), p. 33 - 34. Atlanta: Scholars Press.

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kam is a lesser loss than destroying the roll call between two halves of a verse or violating Greek syntactic norms.

Weavers ' interpretation is followed by a number of recent studies and commentaries, such as D. Gurtner's commentary on the Greek book of Exodus in the authoritative Septuagint Commentary Series 29.

In the context of Weavers 'interpretation, the assumption of the influence of Greek philosophy on the translation of Exodus 3: 14a is superfluous:" It is doubtful that the expressionshould be understood here as anything more than a simple attempt to convey the Hebrew text in a way acceptable to the Greek language. This is not a philosophical statement, but a religious one. " 30
If Weavers ' interpretation is correct, then the connection between Exodus 3: 14 and Plato's Genesis-the correlation-does not arise in the minds of the Septuagint translators themselves, but centuries later.

Conclusion

Although an analysis of the grammatical constructions of the Hebrew and Greek texts cannot replace the hundreds of volumes devoted to the historical, philological, theological, philosophical, and religious studies of Exodus 3:14, it provides a starting point for determining whether a particular exegesis can be considered consistent with the intent of the ancient author or translator.

Analyzing the Hebrew text, we considered both the arguments of the proponents of the" apophatic " interpretation of idem per idem, and the possibility of alternative interpretations (this is especially important given the suspicion that the popularity of the "apophatic" interpretation in science in the last century may have been due to theological "fashions"). Our (hopefully unbiased) analysis of the pro et contra arguments clearly shows that in the context of the religious beliefs of the ancient Near East, taking into account the grammatical and semantic parallels in the Hebrew Bible itself, the "apophatic" interpretation is not a fashion statement, but an understanding that is most plausible from the point of view of historical and philological analysis of the Hebrew Bible.

29. Gurtner, D.M. (2013) Exodus: A Commentary on the Greek Text of Codex Vaticanus (Septuagint Commentary Series), p. 206 - 207. Leiden/Boston: Brill.

30. Wevers, J.W. (1990) Notes on the Greek Text of Exodus, p. 34.

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When analyzing the Greek text, we were primarily interested in the origin of the wording that we see in the Septuagint and which became the basis for a number of metaphysical interpretations of Exodus 3:14. One cannot, perhaps, completely discount the possibility of the influence of Greek philosophy on the Septuagint. However, there seems to be a simpler and more plausible explanation for the genesis of the Greek wording in Exodus 3: 14a: the translators did not want to lose the roll call between the two halves of the verse, and at the same time, they did not want to break the Greek syntax.

If this is true, this is yet another example of how the subsequent exegetical tradition imbues the text of the Septuagint with meanings that the translators themselves did not have in mind. This phenomenon - based on other material - was already discussed in our previous article "In Search of a 'Septuagint Theology': Methodological Aspects " 31.

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