Letter 745

To Isachar the Samaritan. Just as Abraham was named a king on account of his virtue (for the foreigners said to him, "You are a king among us" [Genesis 23:6, LXX]), so too the sons of Israel were called angels of God by Moses on account of their piety: "For when he scattered the sons of Adam, he established the boundaries of the nations according to the number of the angels of God" [Deuteronomy 32:8, LXX]. For since the sons of Jacob happened to number seventy, it is reasonably said that the nations of all the earth were arranged according to their number. For some say that seventy languages are found in the world.

Ὥσπερ διὰ τὴν ἀρετὴν ὁ Ἀβραὰμ βασιλεὺς ὠνομάσθη (φασὶ γὰρ πρὸς αὐτὸν οἱ ἀλλόφυλοι, ὅτι, Βασιλεὺς ὑπάρχεις ἡμῖν), οὕτως ἄγγελοι Θεοῦ διὰ θεοσέβειαν εἴρηνται ὑπὸ τοῦ Μωϋσέως οἱ υἱοὶ Ἰσραήλ · « Ὅτε γὰρ διέσπειρεν υἱοὺς Ἀδάμ, ἔστησεν ὅρια ἐθνῶν κατὰ ἀριθμὸν ἀγγέλων Θεοῦ. » Ἐπειδὴ γὰρ ἑβδομήκοντα υἱοὶ τοῦ Ἰακὼβ τυγχάνειν ἐχρημάτιζον, εἰκότως κατὰ τὸν ἀριθμὸν αὐτῶν τὰ ἔθνη πάσης τῆς γῆς διατετάχθαι λέγεται. Ἑβδομήκοντα γάρ τινές φασιν ἐν κόσμῳ τὰς γλώσσας εὑρίσκεσθαι.