Theodotion has been claimed as found in the apparent use of his version in the Trypho of Justin Martyr, a work written not later than 164, perhaps some 20 years earlier. But the fallacious character of this evidence is shewn in D. C. B. (4-vol. ed. 1887).
Theodotion's work was not so much an independent translation as a revision of the LXX, with its insertions usually retained, but its omissions supplied from the Hebrew—probably with the help of Aquila's version. Theodotion's was the version Origen usually preferred to the other two for filling omissions of the LXX or lacunae in their text as he found it; and from it accordingly comes a large part of the ordinary Greek text of Jeremiah, and still more of that of Job. Thus in these books we have fuller materials for learning the character of his version than that of either of the others; and still more in his version of Daniel, which has come down to us entire, having since before Jerome's time (how long before we are not told) superseded that of the LXX so completely that the latter was lost for centuries, and is now extant only in a single Greek copy, the Cod. Chisianus, and in the Syro-Hexaplar translation contained in Cod. Ambrosianus (C. 313 Inf.). Any one who compares this version with Theodotion's which is usually printed in all ordinary editions of the Greek O.T. must agree with Jerome (Praef. in Dan.) that the church chose rightly in discarding the former and adopting the latter. Indeed, the greater part of this Chisian Daniel cannot be said to deserve the name of a translation at all. It deviates from the original in every possible way; transposes, expands, abridges, adds or omits, at pleasure. The latter chapters it so entirely rewrites that the predictions are perverted, sometimes even reversed, in scope. We learn from Jerome (in. Dan. iv. 6, p. 646) that Origen himself ("in nono Stromatum volumine") abandoned this supposed LXX Daniel for Theodotion's. Indeed, all the citations of Daniel, some of them long and important passages in Origen's extant works, agree almost verbatim with the text of Theodotion now current, and differ, sometimes materially, from that of the reputed LXX as derived from the Chisian MS. He seems, moreover, to have found the task of bringing its text to conform to the original by the aid of Theodotion's a hopeless one, as we may judge by his asterisks, obeli, and marginalia in the two MSS. referred to. Yet that this is the version which Origen placed as that of the LXX in the penultimate column of the Hexapla and Tetrapla is certain.
Theodotion, though not an independent translator, was by no means an "unlearned" one, as Montfaucon (Praelimm. in Hexapla) calls him. The chief, and apparently the only, ground for this is his practice of frequently transliterating words of his original. Dr. Field, however, has well shewn (Prolegg. in Hexapla IV. iii.) that he guides himself mostly by definable rules—the words so dealt with being names of animals (as θεννὶν for σειρῆνες), plants (as ἀχὶ for βούτομον), vestments (as βαδδὶν for ποδήρης), or articles used in worship (as θεραφὶν for κενοτάφια or [Aq.] μορφώματα). In such cases, his choosing to transliterate, rather than adopt a conjectural Greek rendering from a former version or hazard a new guess of his own, indicates scrupulous caution, not ignorance. He proves at least that he diligently consulted the original, and often shews a wise discretion in forbearing to translate a word whose meaning cannot be determined, or for which the Greek language has no equivalent. As well might the English translators of 1611 be called "unlearned" for retaining such words as "teraphim," "Belial," or the revisers of 1881–1884 because they replace the "scapegoat" of A.V. by "Azazel," and for "hell" give "Sheol " in O.T. and "Hades" in N.T.
Theodotion's version included all the canonical books of O.T. except, probably, Lamentations. Of the apocryphal books, he is only known to have included Baruch and the additions to Daniel.
[J.GW.]
Theodotus (4) of Byzantium. Eusebius (H. E. v. 27) has preserved extracts from a treatise directed against the heresy of Artemon, who taught that our Lord had been mere man. Theodoret (Haer. Fab. ii. 5) says that this treatise was called the Little Labyrinth; and the author was doubtless Caius of Rome, and its date the end of the first quarter of cent. iii. [HIPPOLYTUS ROMANUS.] These heretics claimed to hold the original doctrine of the church which, they alleged, had continued incorrupt till the episcopate of Victor, the truth being first perverted by his successor Zephyrinus (c. 199). Their antagonist replies that, on the contrary, it was in the episcopate of Victor that this God-denying heresy had been first introduced, that Theodotus the shoemaker (σκυτεύς) was the first to teach that our Lord was mere man, and he had been excommunicated for this by Victor, and had then founded an organized sect, with a bishop (Natalius) to whom they paid a salary. Its leading men in the time of Victor's successor were Asclepiades and another Theodotus, a banker. These two undertook to clear the text of N.T. of corruptions, but our authority describes what they called "corrected" copies as simply ruined, the two not even agreeing as to their corrections.
Our sole other primary authority for this Theodotus is Hippolytus. The section on Theodotus in the lost earlier work on heresies by Hippolytus may be partly recovered by a comparison of the corresponding articles in Pseudo-Tertullian, Epiphanius, and Philaster; and Epiphanius, whose treatment (Haer. 54) is the fullest, almost certainly drew his materials altogether from Hippolytus. There is an article on Theodotus in the later treatise of Hippolytus (Ref. vii. 35). The influence of Theodotus did not extend much beyond his own generation; later church writers appear to have only known him from the two nearly contemporary authorities we have named.
The place in which the article on Theodotus came in the lost work of Hippolytus exactly corresponds to the date assigned to him in the Little Labyrinth. He comes immediately after Blastus, whom we otherwise know to have caused schism in Victor's time by endeavouring to introduce the Quartodeciman usage in Rome. Hippolytus stated that Theodotus was a native of Byzantium, who denied Christ in time of persecution—a fact which accounted
