er preserved so carefully as that
of the Hebrew, and in the days of Origen it had fallen into great
confusion. To meet the objections of the Jews, as well as to help
believers in their study of the Old Testament, Origen undertook first
the work called the _Tetrapla_ (Greek, _fourfold_), which was followed
by the _Hexapla_ (Greek, _sixfold_). To prepare himself he spent
twenty-eight years, travelling extensively and collecting materials. In
the Tetrapla, the text of the Septuagint (corrected by manuscripts of
itself), and those of Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus were arranged
side by side in _four_ parallel columns. In the Hexapla there were _six_
columns--(1) the Hebrew in Hebrew characters; (2) the Hebrew expressed
in Greek letters; (3) Aquila; (4) Symmachus; (5) the Septuagint; (6)
Theodotion. See Davidson's Bib. Crit., 1, p. 203; Smith's Bib. Diet., 2,
p. 1202. In some books he used two other Greek versions, and
occasionally even a third, giving in the first case _eight_, in the
second, _nine_ columns.

"The great work," says Davidson, "consisting of nearly fifty
volumes; on which he had spent the best years of his life, does
not seem to have been transcribed--probably in consequence of
its magnitude and the great expense necessarily attending a
transcript. It lay unused as a whole fifty years after it was
finished, till Eusebius and Pamphilus drew it forth from its
concealment in Tyre, and placed it in the library of the latter
in Caesarea. It is thought to have perished there when Caesarea
was taken and plundered by the Saracens, A.D. 653." Bib.
Criticism, 1, p. 206. Well did Origen merit by his vast
researches and labors the epithet _Adamantinus_ [_Adamantine_]
bestowed on him by the ancients. Fragments of the Hexapla,
consisting of extracts made from it by the ancients, have been
collected and published in two folio volumes by Montfaucon,
Paris, 1713, and reprinted by Bahrdt in two volumes octavo,
Leipzig and Lubeck, 1769, 1770. It is the hope of biblical
scholars that these may be enriched from the Nitrian
manuscripts. See further, Chap. 28, No. 8.

For the four "Standard Text Editions" of the Septuagint Greek version,
with the principal editions founded on them, the reader may consult the
Bibliographical List appended to the fourth volume of Home's
Introduction, edition of 1860.

III. THE CHALDEE TARGUMS.

13. The Chaldee word _Ta