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The Targums or Aramaic translations of the Old Testament also belong to the Rabbinical Literature, inasmuch as expression is given in them likewise to the traditional understanding of the Scripture text. This is especially true of those which are not strictly literal, but rather free paraphrastic renderings of the original.—We mention here only the Targums on the Pentateuch and on the Prophets, for the Targums on the Sacred Writings or Kethubim can scarcely come under consideration by us owing to their late origin.

1. ONKELOS ON THE PENTATEUCH. The few notices about the person of Onkelos that are to be found in the Talmud describe him sometimes as a scholar and friend of the elder Gamaliel, according to which he must have lived about the middle of the first century after Christ, sometimes as a contemporary of R. Elieser and R. Joshua, according to which he must have lived in the first half of the second century. They agree only in this one particular, that he was a proselyte. The Chaldaic translation of the Pentateuch which has been ascribed to him is distinguished from all other Targums by its almost painful literalness. Only in a few, and those mostly poetic, passages (Gen. 49; Num. 24; Deut. 32–33), does it incline towards the Haggada by fanciful exposition. In other places departures from the text have been occasioned simply by a desire to avoid anthropomorphisms and expressions or modes of representation that seemed to be unworthy of God. The dialect of Onkelos is, according to Geiger and Frankel, the East Aramaic or Babylonian. Nöldeke in his earlier writings described it as “a somewhat later development of the Palestinian Aramaic already represented in some of the books of the Old Testament;” but latterly he has adopted the more definite view, that Onkelos is a Palestinian production re-edited in Babylon, “in general conformed in respect of language to the Old Palestinian dialect, but in respect of particular phrases very decidedly coloured by the dialect of Babylon.” At a very early period Onkelos secured a great reputation. The Babylonian Talmud and the Midrashim frequently quote passages from it. And in later times, indeed, it had an entire Masora devoted to itself. It has been often printed, e.g. in the rabbinical Bibles of Bomberg and Buxtorf, and in the London Polyglott. Berliner has issued a critical edition.

2. JONATHAN ON THE PROPHETS. Jonathan ben Uzziel is said to have been a scholar of Hillel, and must therefore have lived during the first decades of the Christian era. The Targum ascribed to him embraces all the Prophets, Nebiim, that is, the historical books and the prophets properly so called. It is distinguished from the Targum of Onkelos by its decidedly more paraphrastic character. “Even in the case of the historical books Jonathan often acts the part of an expositor; in the case of the prophetical books again, such a style of exposition is uninterruptedly pursued as makes it really a Haggadic work.” In respect of dialect, what was said above of Onkelos is equally applicable here. Jonathan also soon attained a high reputation, and is very frequently quoted in the Talmud and Midrashim. Like Onkelos, it has been often printed; e.g. in the rabbinical Bibles of Bomberg and Buxtorf, and in the London Polyglott. Lagarde issued a small critical edition on the basis of a codex Reuchlinianus.

According to the traditional views which we have thus reported, the Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan were written somewhere about the middle of the first century after Christ. Zunz and many recent scholars still are inclined to set them down to that period. But this opinion has been ably contested, especially by Geiger. A series of circumstances strongly supports the idea that both works must have been wrought up in Babylon, where a rabbinical school had been first established during the third century after Christ. Geiger therefore assumes that both Targums were composed, or rather revised and edited, in Babylon not before the fourth century. Frankel agrees with him in all essential points, only putting Onkelos a little earlier, as belonging to the third century. This latter opinion might be supported by the fact that Onkelos seems to have been made use of by Jonathan. The idea that the Targum on the Prophets was edited in the fourth century is also confirmed by tradition, for the Babylonian Talmud quotes it as the “Targum of R. Joseph,” a Babylonian teacher of the fourth century. But as to Onkelos, nothing whatever is known of his existence save that he composed the Targum that is named after him. For the notice which the Babylonian Talmud (Megilla 3a) gives of Onkelos and his Chaldaean translation of the Pentateuch, is to be found in the parallel passage in the Jerusalem Talmud attached to the name of Aquila and his Greek translation (Jer. Megilla i. 9). And the latter is undoubtedly the original form of the statement. Elsewhere, too, the names אונקלוס and עקיִלס are interchanged. It seems therefore that in Babylon the old and correct statement about a translation of the Pentateuch by the proselyte Aquila was erroneously attached to the anonymous Chaldaean Targum, and that the name Onkelos therefore is merely a corruption of the name Aquila. But even if the two Targums were first issued during the third and fourth centuries, it cannot be doubted that they are based upon earlier works, and only form the conclusion of a process that had been going on for several centuries. Even the Mishna speaks of Chaldee translations of the Bible. The New Testament is sometimes found in its rendering of Old Testament passages in striking agreement with the Targums (e.g. in Eph. 4:8),—a clear proof that the latter in respect of their materials reached back to the Apostolic age. Also express mention is made of a Targum on Job in the period preceding the overthrow of the temple. Fragments even from the time of John Hyrcanus are preserved in our Targums. From all this it is evident that in our Targums materials are made use of which had been gradually amassed during many generations, and that the works which we now possess were preceded by earlier written treatises. The linguistic character of the Targums, as Nöldeke has quite correctly maintained, testifies to the history of their origin. For in spite of their being revised and issued in Babylon, the Palestinian character of their language is unquestionable.

3. PSEUDO-JONATHAN AND JERUSALMI ON THE PENTATEUCH. Besides Onkelos, there are other two Targums on the Pentateuch, one of which contains the whole of the Pentateuch, while the other comprises only separate verses, and gives often only renderings of isolated words. The former is ascribed to Jonathan ben Uzziel; the latter is designated by the editors “Targum Jerusalmi.” That the former cannot have been written by the author of the Targum on the Prophets has long been generally admitted. But Zunz has also shown that Pseudo-Jonathan and Jerusalmi are only two different recensions of one and the same Targum; that both are quoted by older authorities (Aruch and Elia) under the name “Targum Jerusalmi;” and that even the recension now existing only as a fragment had been before the older authors in its complete form. The last statement may be questioned. Geiger thinks that the fragmentary Targum was from the beginning only “a collection of detached glosses,” not probably on the Pseudo-Jonathan but on the primary recension. According to Seligsohn and Volck, the Jerusalmi was “not a fragment of what had originally been a complete paraphrase, but a Haggadic supplement and a collection of marginal glosses and various readings on Onkelos; but Pseudo-Jonathan, on this basis and, upon the whole, with the same tendency, composed a later redaction of the Jerusalmi.” Bacher regards the fragmentary Targum as a collection of portions from the oldest Palestinian Targum. On the basis of the latter arose on the one side Onkelos, on the other side Pseudo-Jonathan, who already made use of Onkelos. At any rate, Pseudo-Jonathan and Jerusalmi are most intimately related to one another, and might best be designated as Jerusalmi I. and II. The attributing to Jonathan of the more complete issue is probably due to an erroneous interpretation of the abbreviation תי, which means תַּרְנּוּם יְרוּשַׁלְמִי. This Jerusalem Targum transmitted in its twofold recension is related to the Targum of Onkelos as “a midrash for the simple explanation of words. Onkelos is only sometimes an expositor; the Jerusalemite is only sometimes a translator” (Zunz, p. 72). “His language is a Palestinian dialect of the Aramaic; hence we must pitch upon Syria or Palestine as its author’s native country; and this assumption is confirmed by the oldest examples we have of the way in which the work was referred to—תַּרְנּוּם אֶרֶץ יִשְׂרָאֵל” (Zunz, p. 73). As to the date, Pseudo-Jonathan, seeing that in his work there occur the names of a wife and daughter of Mohammed, cannot have composed it before the seventh or eighth century. But besides those later portions it contains, like the other Targums, and perhaps even to a greater extent than these, fragments from a very early period, so that it may justly be styled “a thesaurus of views from various centuries.”—Both recensions have often been printed, as, e.g., in the London Polyglott.

For the literature on the Targums and their editions, see: Wolf, Bibliotheca Hebraea, ii. 1189 sqq.—Le Long, Bibliotheca sacra, ed. Masch, Part ii. vol. i. 1781, pp. 23–49.—Fürst, Bibliotheca Judaica, ii. 105–107, iii. 48.—Steinschneider, Catalogus libr. hebr. in Bibliothec. Bodlei. col. 165–174.—Berliner, Targum Onkelos, 1884, ii. 175–200.—Volck in Herzog, Real-Encyclopaedie, xv. 1885, pp. 375–377.