Aristobule et Hécatée d'Abdère

A fragment of a book dedicated by Aristobulus to king Philometor is often mentioned by scholars to prove the existence of a legend of the translation of the Torah into Greek in the time of king Philadelphus. This fragment is transmitted in two different ways by Clement of Alexandria (Stromata 1,150,1-3) and Eusebius of Caesarea (Praeparatio Evangelica XIII, 12,1-2). It actually does not refer to a word to word translation of the law of the Jews as can be read in the Septuagint, but more probably to the description of the Jewish institutions by Hecataeus of Abdera, which was the source of Diodorus Siculus's Excursus on the Jews, copied by Photius in his Library (codex 244). Therefore the second sentence in Eusebius' version must be considered as an interpolation

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