Language Studies

Aramaic Thoughts

Aramaic Literature - Part 1 - The Primary Targums

The most important of the current targums if Targum Onkelos. It consists of a translation of the Pentateuch. The name is probably derived from Aquila. While the differences between Aquila and Onkelos are obvious in English, those differences are more apparent than real. The rendering of Greek into Aramaic, or of Aramaic into Greek, frequently produces odd differences, due to the fact that the two languages have different consonants. For example, Greek has no equivalent to the Hebrew/Aramaic consonant ayin. As a result, an Aramaic word containing that consonant may lose it entirely when rendered into Greek, or it may appear in a changed form. For example, the city Gomorrah begins in Hebrew with and ayin, but it begins in Greek with a gamma.

The place and time of origin of Targum Onkelos are both uncertain. There are some similarities in the style of Onkelos when compared with the later Babylonian Talmud, suggesting an eastern origin for the targum. Additionally, the Jerusalem Talmud cites Targum Onkelos only once. Again, this suggests either an unfamiliarity with Onkelos, or an opposition to it because of its eastern origins. Against this view is the supposition that the targum originated in Palestine in the period contemporary with the writing of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Similarities with the Babylonian Talmud are then explained as due to the later editing of the text in the east. It should be clear to the reader that there is really no way to prove either position.

As to the date of Onkelos, that too is uncertain. It clearly originated before the Talmud, but since the Talmud arose in the third to the fifth centuries of the Christian era, the possibilities for the time of the origin of Onkelos are quite broad. One thing that may be said with certainty about Onkelos is that it is a fairly literal rendering of the Hebrew Pentateuch into Aramaic. The question then becomes whether the literal character of the translation is a characteristic of late origin or of early origin. Some contend that the earlier the targum, the more literal its rendering. Others contend that the more paraphrastic the rendering, the earlier the targum. At this point, there is really no satisfactory answer to the question. Even those who argue for an early date for Onkelos do not place it much before the third century AD.

In saying that Onkelos is a quite literal translation, it must be remembered that Aramaic is not the same language as Hebrew, even though they are related. Hence, some differences arise due simply to the nature of language. With this in mind, however, Israel Dravin says in his study of Targum Onkelos of Deuteronomy "over 1,600 Targumic deviations from the MT [Masoretic text-the standard Hebrew text] are noted and discussed." These deviations occur even though "MT’s Hebrew is generally rendered by its Aramaic equivalent word for word. When the Aramaic permits, the Targumist translates every letter." (See Targum Onkelos to Deuteronomy: An English Translation of the Text with Analysis and Commentary (KTAV Publishing House, 1982.)

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