Targum Pseudo-Jonathan: Genesis (Aramaic Bible) By Michael Maher Michael Glazier, 1992, 208 pages ISBN-10: 0814654924 ISBN-13: 978-0814654927

Reviewed by Israel Drazin - July 22, 2010

The Targums are Aramaic translations of the Hebrew Bible. This is one of the three complete Targums to the Pentateuch, the Five Books of Moses. The three currently existing full Targums were composed by different translators with different agendas during the first millennium for Jews who no longer understood biblical Hebrew. The Michael Glazier series of nineteen books offers scholars who know little Aramaic an English translation of the Targums. This is the second book in the series, the first on Pseudo-Jonathan.

The Targum translators made many changes in their writings for over a dozen reasons, such as to clarify Scripture, to offer a more elevated portrayal of Israelite ancestors, to remove some portrayals of God having human features and performing human-like actions, and to clarify of some biblical figures of speech.

Scholars differ as to when exactly Pseudo-Jonathan was composed. Some see references to Mohammad's wives in the Targum and, therefore date it around 700-900. The Targum's name is based on the fact that it was originally thought that Jonathan ben Uzziel wrote the translation in the second century. Since it was later discovered that this is untrue, the Targum was title Pseudo (fake) Jonathan. This Targum is the most imaginative and prolific of all the Targums on the Five Books of Moses in inserting inventive material into the translation.

The following are some examples:

In 3:15, Eve is told that because she ate the forbidden fruit, offspring in the future will fight against their parents until the messiah comes, when there will be peace.

The translator frequently inserted the superstition that people have within them an evil-inclination that causes them to act improperly. He identifies this evil inclination with Satan in 3:6.

In 4:1, he states that Satan had sexual intercourse with Eve, and was the father of Cain.

In 22:20, Satan tells Abraham's wife Sarah that her husband sacrificed her son Isaac, and the shock of this false disclosure causes her death.

• Targum Neofiti 1: Genesis, by Martin McNamara.
  The Aramaic Bible, Volume 1A - Translated, with Apparatus and Notes.
  
  
• Targum Neofiti 1: Exodus/Targum Pseudo-Jonathan: Exodus, by Robert Hayward and Michael Maher.
  Aramaic Bible - Translated, with Apparatus and Notes.