Targum Onkelos


image:Hebrew Pentateuch.jpg|right|thumb|Interlinear text of Hebrew Numbers 6.3-10 with Aramaic Targum Onkelos from the British Library.
Targum Onkelos is the primary Jewish Aramaic targum of the Torah, accepted as an authoritative translated text of the Five Books of Moses and thought to have been written in the early second century CE.

Authorship

Authorship of the Targum Onkelos is traditionally attributed to Onkelos, a famous convert to Judaism in Tannaic times. According to the Talmud, the essential content of Targum Onkelos was already known in the time of Ezra. However, it was later forgotten by the masses, and rerecorded by Onkelos.
While the Aramaic translation of the Torah is traditionally attributed to Onkelos, a translation of the Torah into Greek is mentioned in the Jerusalem Talmud as being made by Aquila of Sinope. However, most scholars hold these to be one and the same person. According to Epiphanius of Salamis, the Greek translation was made by Aquilas before he converted to Judaism, while the Aramaic translation was made after his conversion. This is said to have been under the direct guidance and instruction of the tannaim Joshua ben Hananiah and Eliezer ben Hurcanus. Indeed, the same biographical stories that the Jerusalem Talmud attributes to Aquila, the Babylonian Talmud attributes to Onkelos.
The overwhelming similarities between the biographies of Aquila and Onkelos has led many to conclude they are the same person. Zvi Hirsch Chajes identified the Aramaic "Targum Onkelos" as Aquila's Greek translation, translated once again into Aramaic. Likewise, A.E. Silverstone has shown quite consummately that Aquilas wrote both the Greek and the Aramaic versions, insofar that "both versions betray the same outstanding characteristics."
A modern scholar has argued that the Aramaic translation must date to the late fourth-early fifth centuries, due to reusing language from other midrashim composed at that time, and thus could not have been composed by Aquila/Onkelos, who lived in the second century. Others, dissenting, have concluded that Onkelos' Aramaic translation originated in Syria Palaestina in the first or early second centuries CE, but that its final redaction was done in Babylonia probably in the fourth or fifth century CE. Onkelos' revised translation became the official version used in translating the Torah on each Shabbat, displacing the texts of the earlier Palestinian Aramaic tradition which had been widely used. The Babylonian Talmud refers to the Torah's Aramaic translation as "targum didan", as opposed to that of the more ancient Palestinian Targum tradition. The earliest text samples appear on two incantation bowls discovered at Nippur, Babylonia.

Ritual use

In Talmudic times, readings from the Torah within the synagogues were rendered, verse-by-verse, into an Aramaic translation. To this day, this old custom survives with the Yemenite Jews, who still read the Torah and the Haftara with the Aramaic translation. The custom to read the Aramaic Targum each Shabbat in the synagogue during the reading of the weekly Torah portion was eventually abandoned by other communities, and eventually codified in the Shulhan Arukh who did not encourage its practice, saying that they do not understand the meaning of its words.
Where the custom is to read the Aramaic Targum during the public reading of the Torah on Sabbath days, the story of Reuben and the second "Golden Calf" episode are read but not translated, as they involve shameful events. Similarly, the Priestly Blessing is read but not translated, since the blessings are only to be recited in Hebrew.
The reading of the Targum, verse by verse, in conjunction with the Torah that is read aloud on Shabbat is not to be confused with a different practice, namely, that of reviewing the entire Torah portion before the commencement of the Shabbat, and which practice has its source in the Babylonian Talmud, and which the codifiers of Jewish law have ruled as Halacha. Berakhot 8a-b states, "Rav Huna bar Yehuda said that Rabbi Ami said: A person should always complete his Torah portions with the congregation. The congregation reads a particular Torah portion every Shabbat, and during the week prior to each Shabbat, one is required to read the Bible text of the weekly portion twice and the translation once." Here, the reference is to completing the reading of the Torah portion at home or in the beth midrash, along with others, reading in tandem, during which reading each verse is repeated twice; once by the reader himself, followed by a repetition of the same verse by the entire group, and lastly by the initial reader himself, who cites the Aramaic Targum of Onkelos.
The days in which the Torah portion was read depended largely upon custom. Some had it as their custom to break down the reading into two days. Among Yemenite Jews, Wednesday mornings were given over to the first half of the Torah portion, while Thursday mornings were given to the second half. Others read the entire Torah portion on Thursday mornings, while others on Thursday nights.

Methodology

Onkelos' Aramaic translation of the Five Books of Moses is almost entirely a word-by-word, literal translation of the Hebrew Masoretic Text, with very little supplemental material in the form of aggadic paraphrase. However, where there are found difficult biblical passages, Onkelos seeks to minimize ambiguities and obscurities. He sometimes employs non-literal aggadic interpretations or expansions in his translated text, usually in those places where the original Hebrew is marked either by a Hebrew idiom, a homonym, or a metaphor, and could not be readily understood otherwise.
The translator is unique in that he avoids any type of personification, or corporeality, with God, often replacing "human-like" characteristics representing God in the original Hebrew with words that convey a more remote and impersonal sense. For example, "my face" is replaced by "from before me", while "beneath his feet" is replaced by "under his throne of glory", and "The Lord came down upon Mount Sinai" by "The Lord manifested himself upon Mount Sinai". Samuel David Luzzatto suggests that the translation was originally meant for the "simple people". This view was strongly rebutted by Nathan Marcus Adler in his introduction to his commentary to Targum Onkelos Netinah La-Ger. He often updates the names of biblical nations, coinage and historical sites to the names known in his own post-biblical era.
In matters of halakha, the targum entirely agrees with Rabbi Akiva's opinions. Some authors suggest that Akiva provided for a revised text of the essential base of Targum Onkelos.
Some of the more notable changes made by Onkelos, in which he attempts to convey the underlying meaning of a verse, rather than its literal translation, are as follows:
  • , instead of "...and the earth was without form and void."
  • , instead of "...and man became a living soul."
  • ,, instead of "...and you shall be like gods."
  • , instead of "he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel."
  • , instead of "Cain went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of Nod to the east of Eden."
  • ,, instead of "...and he stood by them under the tree, etc."
  • , the house of my father..."], instead of "And when God caused me to wander from my father's house, etc."
  • and having controlled you; and for my having seen you and everything that is with you, and how that you have been proven in all the things you have spoken"], instead of "I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, he is to you a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with you, and with all other: thus she was reproved."
  • "And Abraham worshiped and prayed there in that place, and said before God, 'Here shall coming generations worship the Lord.' Wherefore, it shall be said on that day, 'In this mountain Abraham worshiped before God'."], instead of "And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah-jireh: as it is said to this day, In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen."
  • , instead of "...and Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents."
  • , instead of "...'Let your curse be on me, my son, etc."
  • , instead of "...and Jacob sware by the fear of his father Isaac."
  • ,, instead of "...and he said, 'She has been more righteous than I', etc."
  • , instead of "And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphenath-paneah."
  • , instead of "...for these men shall dine with me at noon."
  • , instead of "...the spirit of Jacob their father revived."
  • governor he shall be in the beginning, but in the end he shall be anointed king from the House of Judah"], instead of "Judah is a lion's cub"
  • , instead of "And he saw that rest was good, and the land that it was pleasant"
  • ,, instead of "And there arose a new king in Egypt who knew not Joseph."
  • ,, instead of "...and she said, 'Surely a bloody husband are you to me'."
  • ,, instead of "...and the children of Israel went up out of the land of Egypt equipped for battle."
  • ,, instead of "...and the children of Israel went out with an high hand."
  • ,, instead of "...Blessed be the Lord, who has delivered you out of the hand of Egypt, and out of the hand of Pharaoh, who has delivered the people from under the hand of Egypt."
  • , instead of "You shall not revile the gods."
  • with him."], instead of "...and you would forbear to help him, you shall surely help with him."
  • ,, instead of "...You shall not seethe a kid in its mother's milk."
  • ,, instead of "And rams' skins dyed red, and badgers' skins and shittim wood."
  • let one cry Be not defiled ! Be not defiled!"], instead of "...and he shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean."
  • , instead of "You shall stand up before the gray head..."
  • , instead of "That your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, etc."
  • ,, instead of "...and also for the stranger that sojourns with you."
  • ,, for the beautiful woman whom he had taken he had distanced."], instead of "...spoke out against Moses concerning the Ethiopian woman whom he had married, etc."
  • ,, instead of "...for the tree of the field is man's life to employ them in the siege."
  • ,, instead of "and you shall bring her home to your house, and she shall shave her head and pare her nails."
  • , instead of "A woman shall not wear that which pertains unto a man."
  • , instead of "There shall be no whore of the daughters of Israel, nor a sodomite of the sons of Israel."
  • , instead of "Let Reuben live, and not die, etc."