Targum
[1] Some subsequent Jewish traditions, beginning with the Jews of Lower Mesopotamia, accepted the written targumim as authoritative translations of the Hebrew scriptures into Aramaic.
As translations, the targumim largely reflect midrashic interpretation of the Tanakh from the time they were written and are notable for favoring allegorical readings over anthropomorphisms.
In 1541, Elia Levita wrote and published the Sefer Meturgeman, explaining all the Aramaic words found in the Targums Onqelos, Jonathan, and pseudo-Jonathan.
[3][4] Targumim are used today as sources in text-critical editions of the Bible (Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia refers to them with the abbreviation đť”—).
The noun "Targum" is derived from the early semitic quadriliteral root תרגם (trgm), and the Akkadian term targummanu refers to "translator, interpreter".
This scribal practice is rooted in the public reading of the Targum and the requirement for private study.
Nevertheless, scholars believe they, too, originated in Syria Palestina because of a strong linguistic substratum of Jewish Palestinian Aramaic.
For instance, it serves as a major source in Shlomo Yitzhaki's Torah commentary, "Rashi," and has always been the standard fare for Ashkenazi Jews onward.
The Talmud stories state:[7] The Targum of the Pentateuch was composed by Onkelos the proselyte from the mouths of R. Eleazar and R. Joshua.
The Targum of the Prophets was composed by Jonathan ben Uzziel under the guidance of Haggai, Zechariah and Malachi,[8] and the land of Israel [thereupon] quaked over an area of four hundred parasangs by four hundred parasangs, and a Bath Kol (heavenly voice) came forth and exclaimed, "Who is this that has revealed My secrets to mankind?"
[9]Nevertheless, most books of Ketuvim (with the exceptions of Daniel and Ezra-Nehemiah, which both contain Aramaic portions) have targumim, whose origin is mostly Palestinian rather than Mesopotamian.
From Palestine, the tradition of targum to Ketuvim made its way to Italy, and from there to medieval Ashkenaz and Sepharad.
An important one of these was mistakenly labeled "Targum Jonathan" in later printed versions (though all medieval authorities refer to it by its correct name).
The history of the manuscript begins 1587 when the censor Andrea de Monte (d. 1587) bequeathed it to Ugo Boncompagni—which presents an oddity, since Boncompagni, better known as Pope Gregory XIII, died in 1585.
It was translated and published during 1968–79, and has since been considered the most important of the Palestinian Targumim, as it is by far the most complete and, apparently, the earliest as well.
[15] The Peshitta is the traditional Bible of Syriac Christians, who speak several different dialects of Aramaic.
