Thank you so much for your encouragement, Buggman!
kosta50: You are presuming that it was there to be translated. You are presuming that the Pharisaical Hebrew text is the only "true" text and if it appears in the Masoretic it must have been in all of them.
You cannot read my mind. Nor can I read your mind and declare that you presume it was not. The evidence that the apostles understood tzur (ha tzur) to be a proper name of God is in the New Testament, for instance.
Moreover, brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant, how that all our fathers were under the cloud, and all passed through the sea; And were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea; And did all eat the same spiritual meat; And did all drink the same spiritual drink: for they drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them: and that Rock was Christ. – 1 Cor 10:1-4
This is no small matter, for the name is specially announced in the Torah (emphasis mine)!
Give ear, O ye heavens, and I will speak; and hear, O earth, the words of my mouth. My doctrine shall drop as the rain, my speech shall distil as the dew, as the small rain upon the tender herb, and as the showers upon the grass: Because I will publish the name of the LORD: ascribe ye greatness unto our God. [He is] the Rock, his work [is] perfect: for all his ways [are] judgment: a God of truth and without iniquity, just and right [is] he. – Deu 32:1-4
The Torah is unlike any other manuscript, God breathed and supreme as Christ underscored here:
For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled. – Matt 5:18
Jewish tradition holds that the Torah existed before the world, that every letter of it is a living creature and that altogether it, too, is a name of God. It is their – and by their hand to the world – greatest gift (since they don't receive Christ.) It is also their mission.
Ye worship ye know not what: we know what we worship: for salvation is of the Jews. - John 4:22
Christ used the term Rock in two very important passages. If one misunderstands the Rock to mean something common or someone other than God, then it can lead to grievous error.
Therefore whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock: And the rain descended, and the floods came, and the winds blew, and beat upon that house; and it fell not: for it was founded upon a rock. – Matt 7:24-25 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona: for flesh and blood hath not revealed [it] unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven. And I say also unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. – Matt 16:17-18
kosta50 continued:
You are also suggesting that the Apostles, knowing that tzur was 'erased' by the scholars who translated the OT into Greek 300 years before Christ, would use LXX nonetheless almost exclusively! You are suggetsing that the Apostles would have used a book that 'defaces' the name of God! Good Lord, A-G, this one takes the cake!
I am not just suggesting it, I am declaring it. The Apostles and Christians to this very day have been quoting and translating out of a translation (LXX) which erased a specially announced name of God! Moreover, I declare that has lead to millennia of misunderstanding and lost spiritual joy – not only of the two passages from Christ’s testimony above but also in understanding the Old Testament.
Consider anew, with the Spiritual eyes of Christ, this passage – understanding God is the Rock, Jesus on the Cross, Living Water (John 4, 7:38):
Behold, I will stand before thee there upon the rock in Horeb; and thou shalt smite the rock, and there shall come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the LORD, saying, Is the LORD among us, or not?– Exodus 17:6-7
Or perhaps this one:
And the LORD said, Behold, [there is] a place by me, and thou shalt stand upon a rock: And it shall come to pass, while my glory passeth by, that I will put thee in a clift of the rock, and will cover thee with my hand while I pass by: And I will take away mine hand, and thou shalt see my back parts: but my face shall not be seen. – Exodus 33:21-23
Nevertheless, I am also very, very sure that missing the mark on this name of God is also part of God's plan.
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to [his] purpose. - Romans 8:28