Aquila of Sinope

Aquila (α')

Only fragments of this translation have survived in what remains of fragmentary documents taken from the Books of Kings and the Psalms found in the old Cairo Geniza in Fustat, Egypt, while excerpts taken from the Hexapla written in the glosses of certain manuscripts of the Septuagint were collected earlier and published by Frederick Field in his momentous work, Origenis Hexaplorum quæ Supersunt, Oxford, 1875. Epiphanius (De Ponderibus et Mensuris, chap. xiii-xvi.; ed. Migne, ii. 259-264) preserves a tradition that he was a kinsman of the Roman emperor Hadrian, who employed him in rebuilding Jerusalem as Aelia Capitolina, and that Aquila was converted to Christianity but, on being reproved for practicing astrology, 'apostatized' to Judaism. He is said also to have been a disciple of Rabbi Akiva (d. ca. 132 CE).

In Jewish writings he is referred to as עקילס (Aquilas). Aquila's version is said to have been used in place of the Septuagint in Greek-speaking synagogues. The Christians generally disliked it, alleging that it rendered the Messianic passages incorrectly, but Jerome and Origen speak in its praise. Origen incorporated it in his Hexapla.

It was thought that the Hexapla were the only extant fragments of the work, but in 1897 fragments of two codices were brought to the Cambridge University Library. These have been published: the fragments Aq^Burkitt containing 1 Kings xx. 7-17; 2 Kings xxiii. 12-27 by Francis Crawford Burkitt in 1897, those containing parts of Psalms xc.-ciii. (signed as Aq^Taylor) by C. Taylor in 1899. See F. C. Burkitt's article in the Jewish Encyclopaedia.

The surviving fragments of this translation, and of other Greek translations forming part of Origen's Hexapla, are now being re-published (with additional materials discovered since Field's edition) by an international group of Septuagint scholars. This work is being carried out as The Hexapla Project under the auspices of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies, and directed by Peter J. Gentry (Southern Baptist Theological Seminary), Alison G. Salvesen (University of Oxford), and Bas ter Haar Romeny (Leiden University).

Aramaic Targum

The leading Aramaic Targum (translation) of the Pentateuch, as appended to most printed Hebrew texts of the Five Books of Moses, is known as Targum Onkelos. The name "Onkelos" is thought to be a corruption of "Aquila", and sometimes similar legends are told about both translations (and both translators, if they were different). It is not clear how much (if any) of the Aramaic translation was based on the Greek.