his style but faulted his translation in two areas important to Christians, saying that he substituted the Greek word neanis (woman) for parthenos (virgin) in Isaiah 7:14 and . Symmachus' Greek translation of the Pentateuch appeared in Origen's Hexapla, in which he had written κεραύνιος (=onyx) for the precious stone known in Hebrew as bareḳet in . Lost works According to Eusebius, Symmachus also wrote commentaries, then still extant, apparently written to counter the canonical Greek Gospel of Matthew, his Hypomnemata; it may be related to the De distinctione præceptorum, mentioned in the catalogue of the Nestorian metropolitan Abdiso Bar Berika (d.1318). Eusebius also records Origen's statement that he obtained these and others of Symmachus' commentaries on the scriptures from a certain Juliana, who, he says, inherited them from Symmachus himself (Historia Ecclesiae, VI: xvii); Palladius of Galatia (Historia Lausiaca, lxiv) records that he found in a manuscript that was "very ancient" the following entry made by Origen: "This book I found in the house of Juliana, the virgin in Caesarea, when I was hiding there; who said she had received it from Symmachus himself, the interpreter of the Jews". The date of Origen's stay with Juliana was probably 238-41, but Symmachus's version of the Scriptures had already been known to Origen when he wrote his earliest commentaries, ca 228. Later traditions From the language of many later writers who speak of Symmachus, he must have been a man of great importance among the Ebionites, for "Symmachians" remained a term applied by Catholics even in the fourth century to the Nazarenes or Ebionites, as we know from the pseudepigraphical imitator of Ambrose, the Ambrosiaster, Prologue to the Epistle to the Galatians, and from Augustine's writings against heretics. See also Aquila of Sinope Theodotion Hexapla References External links Henry Wace, A Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature..., Symmachus, author O.T. in Greek (2) Catholic Encyclopedia: Symmachus the Ebionite Jewish Encyclopedia: Symmachus Wikisource: Catholic Encyclopedia (1913)/Symmachus the Ebionite Symmachus' version - The Greek text and English translation of Symmachus' version of the Greek Old Testament. Judaism-related controversies Translators of the Bible into Hellenistic Greek Translators to Greek 2nd-century writers 2nd-century translators 2nd-century Jewish theologians 2nd-century Christian theologians Hellenistic Jewish writers Converts to Judaism