The eighth, ninth and tenth days of the month of Tevet are each considered dark days in the history of Israel. At one time each of the three days was observed by a fast. Today we fast only on the tenth. What happened on these three days?
The 8th of Tevet marks the completion of the translation of the Bible into Greek, known as the Septuagint.
The 9th of Tevet marks the passing of Ezra and Nechemiah who led the Jews exiled in Babylon back to Jerusalem.
The 10th of Tevet marks the the beginning of Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in the year 586 BCE.
Ptolemy II ruled over the Land of Israel with a friendly attitude toward his Jewish subjects. He was a great friend of books, and his gigantic library contained hundreds of thousands of volumes of all the creative authors of ancient times.
At the suggestion of his librarians, he approached the Jewish people for a Greek translation of the books of the holy Bible. Eleazer, the High Priest, who was then at the head of the Jewish state in the Holy Land, sent him seventy of the greatest Jewish sages. They were well versed in the Greek language and knew all the meanings and interpretations of the text of the Bible in the Written and Oral tradition.
When the sages arrived at his palace, King Ptolemy gave them a royal welcome. He honored them with feasts and gifts. He then sent them off to a small island not far from Alexandria. There, each sage was placed in a separate room. "Write for me the Torah of Moshe, your teacher," he commanded each one. They were to translate the Bible into Greek while confined to their rooms. None of the sages was allowed to communicate with each other.
Miraculously, each individual translation agreed on every point, even on the most difficult passages in the Bible. There were a number of places where each sage intentionally altered the literal translation. Yet, in the end, all of the sages had made the same changes despite the fact that they could not communicate with each other.
For instance, the first verse of the Torah, "B'reishit Bara Elokim" could have been translated literally - "In the beginning created G-d." This might easily have been misinterpreted to mean that a deity "In the beginning created G-d." However, every sage translated the verse: "G-d created in the beginning...." They also translated "we will make man" to "I will make man," lest people say that G-d has a dual nature.
The Egyptian ruler and his scholars were amazed at the miraculous feat, and they rightly honored the scholars upon the completion of the translation. The "Septuagint" (Latin for seventy) became one of the most important documents of Jewish and world literature.
It contains not only all the books of the Bible, but also works not included in the Bible that were largely lost in their original Hebrew.
The Jews of Egypt were greatly elated by this translation of the Bible into Greek. For many centuries they celebrated the day of completion, the eighth of Tevet, as a Jewish holiday.
However, the sages of the Holy Land considered the eighth of Tevet as a day of sorrow for the Jewish people. They all saw an awesome act of G-d in it, yet the matter evoked general wonder in non-Jewish eyes. The day was nevertheless considered a day as tragic as the day on which the golden calf was made.
According to the Talmud, the matter was likened to a lion captured and imprisoned. Before his imprisonment, all feared the lion and fled from his presence. Once imprisoned, all came to gaze at him, saying, "Where is his strength now?"
As long as the Torah was in the hands of Israel and was interpreted by the Sages in its own language--Hebrew--it evoked reverence, and many feared to cast blemish upon it. Even a non-Jew who desired to study the Torah had no contact with the Torah until he had acquired a knowledge of the Holy tongue and the prescribed ways for understanding the Torah.
Once the Torah was imprisoned in Greek translation, it was as if the Torah were divested of reverence. Whoever wished could now come and gaze at her. Whoever wished to fault her, could now do so.
