Hexapla

This work is being carried out as The Hexapla Project[3] under the auspices of the International Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies,[4] and directed by Dr Neil McLynn.

[5]The text of the Hexapla was organized in the form of six columns representing synchronized versions of the same Old Testament text, which placed side by side were the following: At the end of his life, Origen prepared a separate work called the Tetrapla (a synoptic set of four Greek translations), placing the Septuagint alongside the translations of Symmachus, Aquila, and Theodotion.

However, in a number of cases, the names of "Hexapla" and "Octapla" (in the Book of Job from the manuscripts of the Syro-Hexapla and the hexaplar Psalms) are also applied to the work of Origen.

According to Eusebius, the Hexapla contained three more translations of the Greek Psalms (Quinta, Sexta and Septima), which, however, have not been preserved (for a total of 9 columns, a so-called Enneapla).

[9] The so-called "fifth" and "sixth editions" were two other Greek translations supposedly discovered by students outside the towns of Jericho and Nicopolis: these were later added by Origen to his Hexapla to make the Octapla.

The inter-relationship between various ancient versions of the Old Testament, between ca. 400 BC and AD 600, according to the Encyclopaedia Biblica . Origen's Hexapla , here labelled with the adjectival Hexaplar , is shown as the source of the Codex Sinaiticus (א), Codex Alexandrinus (A) and Codex Vaticanus (B), three of the oldest extant manuscripts of the Greek Old Testament, as well as of two early Syro-Aramaic translations, the Harklean and Palestinian versions.
Text from the Hexapla showing Proverbs 3 .
Origen with his disciples. Engraved by Jan Luyken , c. 1700
Hexapla fragment ( Taylor-Schechter 12.182 ). The text of the Hexapla is the faint text visible in the upper part of the page; the page has been overwritten by a younger Hebrew text (shown upside down in this image).