Tuesday, August 15, 2023

Notes on Targum Jonathan

  

At least since the time of Abraham Geiger (1857) the view that the final redaction (Schlussredaction) of Targum Jonathan took place in the Babylonian Academies sometime in the id-Amoraic period, i.e., 4th century CE, has become the generally accepted position. Quotations of Targum Jonathan in the Talmudim and on the magic bowl from Nippur (c. 300-600 CE) confirms that Targum Jonathan achieved something of an ‘official’ status around this time. (Hector M. Patmore, Ada, Satan, and the King of Tyre: The Interpretation of Ezekiel 28:11-19 in Late Antiquity [Jewish and Christian Perspectives 20; Leiden: Brill, 2012], 81)

 

Examples of quotations of Targum Jonathan in the Talmudim:

 

e.g. b.Ber 28a; b.Shab 26a; b.Pes 68a; b.Yoma 32b, 77b; b.Rosh Hash 22b, 23a; b.Meg 3a; b.M.Qat 2a, 26a, 28b; b.Ned 38a; b.Qid 13a, 72b; b.B.Qam 3b; b.Sanh 44a, 63b, 94b, 95a; b.Abod.Zar. 4a, 44a; b.Men 110a; y.Sanh 20b, 23b, 28a; y.Meg 72c; y.Qid 61a; y.Abod. Zar. 42cd; y.Shab 8b; y.Taan 65b, 69b; y.Sheq 50a; y.Ket 31d. (Ibid., 81 n. 4)

 

. . . the identification of early strata is always clouded by the suspicion that we may be dealing not with an authentically antique tradition but rather a later retrospection. Equally historical allusions are often difficult to substantiate, and where accepted as plausible at a particular locus within the text, the dating can be applied only to the particular example in question and cannot be extrapolated to include the entirety of Targum Jonathan.

 

The date at which Targum Jonathan took written form therefore remains an open question, though a consensus of opinion supports the assumption that the text began to take recognizable shape in (roughly) the 15 years following the destruction of the Second Temple (i.e. the tannaitic period), yet contains some traces of earlier material. The extent to which this earlier material can be identified with certainty, and the quantity and extent of later modifications, remain a matter of debate. (Ibid., 83)