“So when he came into the world, he said, ‘Sacrifice and offering you did not desire, but a body you prepared for me'” (Hebrews 10:5-6).
This passage features a quotation of Psalm 40:6 from an ancient translation known as the Septuagint. This translation is sometimes abbreviated as LXX (the Roman numeral for seventy) when it is referenced within a contemporary Biblical translation. The Septuagint is a Jewish translation of the Old Testament Scriptures from Hebrew and Aramaic into Greek that predated the life of Christ by about 200 years. It gets its name from the traditional belief that seventy scholars took part in its translation.
However, some significant differences emerge when we compare this reference to the Hebrew text from the Book Of Psalms. The following sources identify those issues and help provide us with an explanation…
“Psalm 40:6 cites the Messiah as saying ‘My ears You have opened,’ but the writer of Hebrews quotes it as ‘a body You have prepared for Me’ (10:5). There is no similarity whatsoever in these quotations. The NT seems to totally distort this OT passage…
The solution may lie in the fact that Hebrews is a loose rendition, and Psalms is a more literal translation of the same idea, namely ‘You have fitted me for obedient service.'” (1)
“The Hb. text of Ps. 40:6 reads, ‘God has opened my ear’ (cf. Is. 50:5). Hebrews follows the Septuagint, which speaks of the readiness of the whole person (‘the body’) and not only a representative part (the ears). Thus, Hebrews understands the ‘ears’ of the Hb. text to be a part of the body that represents the whole body, which is a typical Hb. figure of speech called ‘synecdoche.’ The ‘body … prepared for me’ is the humanity assumed by Christ in the course of His full obedience to the Father (2:14; 5:8).” (2)
“Psalm 40:6 reads, ‘My ears you have opened.’ This does not represent a significant alteration in the meaning of the psalm, as indicated by the fact that the writer quoted the LXX version of the Heb. idiom, which was an accurate representation for Greek readers. The Greek translators regarded the Heb. words as a figure of speech, in which a part of something signified the whole, i.e., the hollowing out of ears was part of the total work of fashioning a human body.” (3)
These explanations thus allow us to focus upon the essence of this passage: God has provided a sacrifice in the form of His Son, a sacrifice that is both well-pleasing and acceptable to Him (Romans 8:32, Ephesians 5:2-2).
(1) Geisler, N. L., & Howe, T. A. (1992). When critics ask : a popular handbook on Bible difficulties (p. 521). Wheaton, Ill.: Victor Books.
(2) Sproul, R. C. (Ed.). (2015). The Reformation Study Bible: English Standard Version (2015 Edition) (p. 2213). Orlando, FL: Reformation Trust.
(3) MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (2006). The MacArthur study Bible: New American Standard Bible. (Heb 10:5). Nashville, TN: Thomas Nelson Publishers