For example, Isa 7:14 (written circa 700 B.C.E.) describes a pregnant young woman (Hebrew ’almah). However, New Testament quotations from the Hebrew Bible usually follow the Greek of the Septuagint. Jesus would have heard his Scriptures in Hebrew, perhaps accompanied by an Aramaic paraphrase ( targum). The Christian Old Testament and the Jewish Tanakh are also distinct from each other in terms of punctuation, canonical order, and emphases. And some Orthodox communions only use the Greek translation of the Hebrew (the Septuagint)-which varies in word choices and length from the Masoretic (Hebrew) Text. For example, Catholic, Anglican, and Orthodox Christian Old Testament canons include additional books, either written or preserved in Greek (Judith, Wisdom of Solomon, Maccabees, etc.), that are not in the Jewish canon.
It is understandable if Christians think the Old Testament and the Tanakh are one and the same thing, but a closer look reveals important distinctions. However, the new language confuses more than it clarifies by erasing distinctions between the Christian Old Testament and the Jewish Tanakh. Well-intended academics thus offered Hebrew Bible as a neutral alternative. The term Old Testament, with its implication that there must be a corresponding New Testament, suggests to some that Judaism’s Bible and by extension Judaism are outdated and incomplete.
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