''Palia de la Orăștie'' is the first known translation of the

Pentateuch The Torah (; hbo, ''Tōrā'', "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In that sense, Torah means the sa ...

Romanian Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditional ...

. The book was printed in 1582 in the town of

Orăștie Orăștie (; german: link=no, Broos, hu, Szászváros, la, Saxopolis) is a city in Hunedoara County, south-western Transylvania, central Romania. History 7th–9th century – On the site of an old swamp was a human settlement, now ...

, then a local center of reformation within the Principality of Transylvania, possibly under the patronage of

Stephen Báthory Stephen Báthory ( hu, Báthory István; pl, Stefan Batory; ; 27 September 1533 – 12 December 1586) was Voivode of Transylvania (1571–1576), Prince of Transylvania (1576–1586), King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania (1576–1586) ...

. It was written using the

Romanian Cyrillic alphabet Romanian may refer to: *anything of, from, or related to the country and nation of Romania **Romanians, an ethnic group **Romanian language, a Romance language ***Romanian dialects, variants of the Romanian language **Romanian cuisine, traditional ...

and is the earliest known translation, even partial, of the

Old Testament The Old Testament (often abbreviated OT) is the first division of the Christian biblical canon, which is based primarily upon the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh, a collection of ancient religious Hebrew writings by the Israelites. The ...

Name and contents

''Palia'' (gr. παλαιά "old") refers to the Old Testament. In the preserved preface it says that all five books of the

were printed but only the first two,

Genesis Genesis may refer to: Bible * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of mankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Book of ...

and

Exodus Exodus or the Exodus may refer to: Religion * Book of Exodus, second book of the Hebrew Torah and the Christian Bible * The Exodus, the biblical story of the migration of the ancient Israelites from Egypt into Canaan Historical events * Ex ...

, have survived.

Printing

The volume containing 164 pages was translated into Romanian by: Mihai Tordaș (Turdach Mihaly), the

protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

bishop of Banat and Hunedoara; Archirie Pamadopleu, protopop of Hunedoara; the pastor Stephen Herczeg; Ephrem Zacham Bar Ephraim, teacher of literature and

Biblical languages Biblical languages are any of the languages employed in the original writings of the Bible. Partially owing to the significance of the Bible in society, Biblical languages are studied more widely than many other dead languages. Furthermore, some ...

(Hebrew, Ancient Greek and Latin); and Moisi Pesahiel,

pastor A pastor (abbreviated as "Pr" or "Ptr" , or "Ps" ) is the leader of a Christian congregation who also gives advice and counsel to people from the community or congregation. In Lutheranism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and ...

. The expenses for translation and printing were covered by the nobleman Ferenc Geszti. The printing was done by the deacons Serban (the son of the printer Coresi) and Marian.

References

1582 books Romanian books Orăștie {{Bible-stub