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Is There a Raison D'être for an Aramaic Targum in a Hebrew-Speaking Society?

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Is There a Raison D'être for an Aramaic Targum in a Hebrew-Speaking Society? Abraham TAL Tel-Aviv University IS THERE A RAISON D'ÊTRE FOR AN ARAMAIC TARGUM IN A HEBREW-SPEAKING SOCIETY? RÉSUMÉ L'opinion traditionnelle selon laquelle le Targum araméen était une nécessité sociale, destinée aux masses qui ne maîtrisaient plus l'hébreu, est actuellement contestée par les découvertes récentes qui ont prouvé la vitalité de l'hébreu et son usage extensif aux temps où le premier Targum fut conçu. Cet article propose la thèse que le Targum du type Onqelos n'avait pas comme but d'exposer aux masses ignorantes la Loi de Moïse dont la langue originelle ne leur était plus accessible. Au contraire, son dessein était de protéger l'original de l'inclination à le «moderniser» en accord avec le langage et les idées contemporaines. Comme on l'apprend des rouleaux de la mer Morte, du Pentateuque samaritain et même des sources rabbini- ques, de tels exemplaires harmonisants de la Loi existaient durant les premiers siè- cles de l'ère chrétienne. L'emploi du Targum à côté de l'original permettait de la moderniser, sans altérer le texte sacré. SUMMARY The traditional view considering the Aramaic Targum as a social necessity aimed at the masses that no longer understood Hebrew is challenged by the recently dis- closed testimonies that Hebrew was in active use among the common people by the time the first Targum was conceived. The present article submits the thesis that the Onqelos type Targum was not destined to expose the ignorant masses to the Law, whose language was inaccessible to them. It was rather directed against the ten- dency to “modernize” the text of the holy writ in accordance with the contempo- rary linguistic habits and ideological trends. As we learn from the Dead Sea scrolls, the Samaritan Pentateuch and even rabbinical testimonies, such harmonizing exem- plars of the Law existed in the first centuries C.E. The use of the Targum along with the original made possible the modernization, without altering the sacred text. Introduction1 Recent research has raised crucial questions regarding the position of Hebrew vis-à-vis Aramaic during the Second Temple period, producing 1. Unless otherwise stated, all translations from Hebrew and Aramaic are mine - A. T. The following abbreviations are frequently used: b.: Babylonian Talmud; Kutscher: Revue des Études juives, 160 (3-4), juillet-décembre 2001, pp. 357-378 358 IS THERE A RAISON D'ÊTRE FOR AN ARAMAIC TARGUM? some embarrassment among scholars involved in Aramaic studies, particu- larly among those interested in the Targum. The cardinal discoveries in the Judean Desert, which clearly, anchor the vitality of Hebrew in Palestine during the Second Temple period, are apparently incompatible with the existence of a contemporary Aramaic Targum in the same area. For if everyone speaks Hebrew, who needs an Aramaic translation of the Torah? More than a hundred years ago, considerable consensus existed among scholars with regard to the position of Hebrew in the linguistic environment of Palestine during the Second Temple period, based upon a somewhat ro- mantic belief about the return of the exiles from Babylon, that took place under the benevolent auspices of the Persian emperors. The prevailing view was that the return from Babylon was animated by religious enthusiasm. It was there, in exile, that their strong devotion to the Law evolved. Upon their return to the homeland, they established a firmly crystallized society, grounded in scrupulous adherence to the prescriptions of the holy Torah. The returned exilees, rebuilders of Jerusalem and the Temple, born mainly in exile, had their educated in Babylon, and, naturally, no longer spoke He- brew. Their vernacular, obviously, was the language they acquired in exile: Aramaic. Nevertheless, one essential fact could not be ignored: the large majority by far of this period’s Jewish literary output was written in He- brew, generally termed as “Mishnaic Hebrew”. To explain this “anomaly”, the well-known theory regarding the status of Hebrew in the new Jewish society was generated. First formulated by S. Lewisohn in his pamphlet Essay on the Grammar of the Language of the Mishna (Vienna 1815 [Hebrew]), it was further enunciated by A. Geiger in the introduction to his Lehr- und Lesebuch zur Sprache der Mischnah (Breslau 1845): Seit der Zeit des zweiten Tempels war bereits die Volksprache der Juden in Palästina das Aramäische; damals began daher schon das Uebersetzung der im Gotteshaufe vorzulesenden Stücke aus den Pentateuch, und zum Theil auch aus den Propheten, in das Aramäische… Das Hebräische hatte somit auf- gehört, eine lebendige Sprach zu sein, dennoch aber blieb es, wie das Latei- nische im Mittelalter, eine religiöse Gelehrtensprache während der Zeit des zweiten Tempels… Die Sprache der Mischnah ist demnach ihren Wesen nach die hebräische, nur eine spätere Ausbildung derselben, nachdem sie bereits aufgehört hatte, in dem Munde des Volkes zu leben (pp. 1-2). E. Y. KUTSCHER, The Language and Linguistic Background of the Isaiah Scroll (1QIsaa), Leiden, 1974; LOT: The Literary and Oral Traditions of Hebrew and Aramaic among the Samaritans, vols. I-V, Jerusalem, 1957-1977 (Hebrew); m.: Mishnah; Segal: M. H. SEGAL, A Grammar of Mishnaic Hebrew, Oxford, 1927; MT: Masoretic Text; SP: The Samaritan Pen- tateuch; t.: Tosephtah; y.: Yerushalmi Talmud. IS THERE A RAISON D'ÊTRE FOR AN ARAMAIC TARGUM? 359 Although Geiger’s position was criticized by H. Graetz, who character- ized it “Grundirrthum”2, it continued to influence scholars until the turn of the century, when M. H. Segal’s research led him to the following quite dif- ferent conclusion3: The answer, therefore, which grammar has to offer to the question whether MH was a natural, living and popular dialect, developed gradually and system- atically out of old Hebrew or merely an artificial and mechanical scholastic jargon,… is… unequivocally in favor of the former alternative… (p. 735). Since then, a new factor has entered the debate, one that changed the general attitude vis-à-vis the position of Second Temple Hebrew consider- ably: the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Nahal Îever and Wadi Muraba¨at docu- ments. The multitude of compositions discovered, extremely rich in literary style and linguistic innovations, attest to Hebrew productivity during the Second Temple period. Moreover, many of these documents reveal that the use of Hebrew was not restricted to literary expression; rather it was a living language used in non-literary documents as well, such as lists of — real or imaginary — hidden treasures and letters written by military leaders to various addressees. I refer to the Copper Scroll on one hand and to the Bar-Cochba’s letters on the other. Both represent a linguistic register very similar to Mishnaic Hebrew4. The discovery of Hebrew letters along with Aramaic and Greek ones, casts a new light on R. Jonathan of Bet Guvrin’s ארבעה לשונות נאים שישתמש בהן העולם ואילו הן: לעז לזמר, רומי לקרב, :dictum Four languages are appropriately used in the“ סורסי לאילייא, עברי לדיבור. world and these are: La’az [= Greek] for song, Latin for battle, Syriac [= Aramaic] for wailing, Hebrew for speech (y. Megilla 71b)”5. This evidence for the active use of Hebrew ostensibly put an end to the dispute regarding its position during the period treated in this paper. How- ever, some hesitations still remained, as seen from J. A. Fitzmyer’s conclu- sion to his article on the languages of Palestine: 2. Orientalistische Litteraturblatt 1845, pp. 14-15. 3. M. H. SEGAL, “Mishnaic Hebrew and its Relation to Biblical Hebrew and to Aramaic”, Jewish Quarterly Review, O. S. XX (1908), pp. 648-737. See also A Grammar of Mishnaic Hebrew, Oxford, 1927, passim. 4. J. T. Milik, the editor of the text, expressed his belief: “The thesis of scholars like Segal, ben-Jehuda and Klausner, according to whom Mishnaic Hebrew was a language spo- ken by the population of Judaea during Persian and Greco-Roman periods, is no longer a hy- pothesis; it is an established fact” (Discoveries in the Judean Desert II, p. 70). See also J. M. GRINTZ, “Hebrew as the Spoken and Written Language in the Last Days of the Second Temple”, Journal of Biblical Literature 79 (1960), pp. 32-47. 5. On this matter, see E. Y. KUTSCHER, “The Hebrew and Aramaic Letters of Bar Koseba and his Contemporaries”, Leshonenu 26 (1962), p. 8. 360 IS THERE A RAISON D'ÊTRE FOR AN ARAMAIC TARGUM? I should maintain that the most commonly used language in Palestine in the first century A. D. was Aramaic… But pockets of Palestinian Jews also used Hebrew, even though its use was not widespread. The emergence of the targums supports this6. Fitzmyer finds support for his opinion about the limited use of Hebrew in the existence of the Aramaic Targum. This position differs from the traditional view mentioned above only in its admission of the existence “pockets of Palestinian Jews” among whom Hebrew was still a living language. Such a view is, of course, admissible, as far as the transitional period from Hebrew to Aramaic is concerned, i. e., most of the second century C.E., but questionable with regard to the Second Temple period. Standard Literary Aramaic Discoveries of Aramaic documents at Qumran shed new light on the Aramaic used during the Second Temple period. These documents, which represent a range of subjects, are written in an Aramaic that differs from Biblical Aramaic and the language of the archives of Elephantine on one hand, and from the Aramaic of the “Palestinian” Targums on the other, a fortiori from the Aramaic of the Talmud and Midrash. This Aramaic resem- bles in many respects the prevalent language preserved in many documents in the region from Palmyra in the desert to Palestine and the Sinai peninsula and to the northern part of the Arabian peninsula.
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