Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 23.djvu/74

Rh be found in the Gospels, it gradually lost its authority and the greater portion of its original matter, and is now in our hands what it is. It certainly never was part of the T. Onḳelos, nor was the T. Onḳelos part of it, though the two are closely related. As regards its age, several of the pieces formerly found in it (now in T. Yonathan) were in the 2d and 3d centuries distinctly quoted with disapprobation. But like Onḳelos it cannot have been written down before the Mishnah and other parts of the oral Law.

(γ) The Targum Yonathan, or T. of Jonathan, on the Pentateuch is also Palestinian. This Targum was no doubt undertaken, as Dr Bacher has shown (Z.D.M.G., xxviii. p. 69), to combine the finest parts of what early T. Onḳelos and T. Yerushalmi contained. This attempt could not have been made without both these Targums lying in writing before the compiler of the third Targum. The Targum Yonathan on the Pentateuch is a product, at the earliest, of the 7th century, to which conclusion internal evidence also points. The author is, of course, not the Yonathan b. 'Uzziel, principal of the eighty disciples of Hillel (T. B., Sukkah, 28a), who, according to T. Bab., Megill., 3a, composed a Targum on the Prophets from the traditions of Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi.

II. Targum Yonathan on the Prophets.—It has been known from early quotations, as from (q.v.) and others, but notably from  (q.v.), that, in addition to the complete extant Targum on the Prophets, there existed other Targums or fragments of them. These are now known from the marginal additions to the Reuchlinian Codex of the Targum on the Prophets published by Lagarde (Leipsic, 1872), and have been discussed by Bacher (ut sup.). As regards the complete Targum on the Prophets, no mistake can be greater than to believe that Rab Yoseph, a teacher of the 3d and 4th centuries, and head of the academy of Pumbaditha (see ), was the author of this Targum in whole or in part. This mistake has its origin in the repeated phrase of the Babylonian Talmud, נרמתרכסרניוםף ("as Rab Yoseph targumizes"); but then a similar phrase exists with regard to Rab Shesheth, נרמתרכסרניוםף ("as Rab Shesheth targumizes"). And in like manner the expression נרמתרכסרניוםף ("as we targumize") is of frequent occurrence. In this last instance the words mean "as we are in the habit of translating certain passages in Holy Writ according to a Targum we have received." As applied to Rab Yoseph and Rab Shesheth the phrase may certainly mean more and yet not imply that these teachers were in any way authors of the Targum on the Law, the Prophets, or Hagiographa. Rab Yoseph and Rab Shesheth were both blind, and as such were not allowed to quote in extenso the written word of the Law, which it was forbidden to recite orally. They therefore committed to memory the oral Targum, and so were, of course, appealed to as Targumic authorities, &c. That Rab Yoseph was not the author of the Targum on the Prophets will be clearly seen from the following Talmudic passage (B., Megillah, 3a; Mo'ed Katan, 28b):—"Were it not for the Targum of that verse [Zechar. xii. 11] I should not know the meaning of the prophet." This verse is from the last but one of all the Prophets; and we see that Rab Yoseph must have had the Targum on the Prophets before him. In the opinion of the present writer this Targum was composed by Yonathan; and, not being on books of the Law, there was no reason why it should not have been there and then written down. Although the traditions it embodies came originally from Babylonia and returned to Babylonia, its language has yet a more marked colouring of the Palestinian idiom than that of Onḳelos, because it was not studied so much and therefore not so much modified and interpolated. Some of the Agadoth occurring in this Targum are ascribed in the Talmud and Midrash to later men, but this is no conclusive argument against an early date. It can be shown that many laws and sayings supposed to be of the 2d, 3d, and 4th centuries of the Christian era are actually of pre-Christian times, and, indeed, certain explanations, figures of speech, &c., had been, so to say, floating in the air for centuries. Certain passages in the Septuagint contain Agadoth which reappear, seemingly for the first time, in the Talmudic literature. The Prophets themselves knew Agadoth which only reappear in what are believed to be late Midrashim (comp., e.g., Isaiah xxix. 22 with T. B., Synh., 19b; Isa. xxx. 26 with Targum on Judges v. 31, Ber. Rab., xii.; Ezek. xxii. 24, &c., with. Ber. Rab., xxxiii.).

III. Targum on the Hagiographa.—No author’s name is attached to this Targum in whole or in part. The Psalms must have had one or two Targums; the book of Proverbs at least two; the book of Job at least three. There must have been two Targums on Canticles, Ruth, Ecclesiastes, and Esther, and probably theeethree [sic] on Lamentations, the earliest of which was, no doubt, simultaneously coming into existence with the earliest on the book of Job. For Ezra-Nehemiah no Targum exists. Daniel only in part wanted a Targum, and it is supposed to have had one; and the books (or rather the book) of Chronicles have a by no means late one, although it is not by Rab Yoseph, of the 4th century.