The Aramaic Bible: Targums in their Historical Context

346 The Aramaic Bible: Targums in their Historical Context
N as the sole source for the printed texts this lacuna can only be
explained as resulting from an error on the part of the editor, or
typesetter, of the first printed edition. The alternative is that we look
for a manuscript identical to N but lacking this half verse.
I think we can see why N commended itself as the source of what
was to become the textus receptus: 13 its representation of the biblical
text, with its inclusion of ]'rns» where the Hebrew has D'rna» and 'an 1
where the Hebrew has D'atov, and so on, must have made it appear
more authentic than other manuscripts in which it might sometimes be
difficult to discern the connection of the Targum with its original.
Five hundred years on it has a different importance. It shows that the
policy of revising the Targum by 'restoring' words apparently omitted
at an earlier stage, by revising the translation in accordance with
current understanding of the meaning of the Hebrew, and by introducing
'improvements' in the Aramaic, substituting Ktn for KQPI and R'D
for 'ID, and the like, was already being practised in the thirteenth
century. Perhaps such knowledge is not entirely inimical to identifying
the historical context of this particular Targum.
13. However, the lack of any indication that any other manuscript was consulted
in the preparation of the printed editions might suggest that this manuscript was
chosen on a priori grounds, without specific reference to Targum Ruth. Bernard
Grossfeld, The Two Targums of Esther (The Aramaic Bible 18; Collegeville, MN:
The Liturgical Press, 1991), p. 6, thinks that 'N may well have served as one of the
manuscripts that Felix Praetensis used in editing the First Rabbinic Bible (Venice,
1515)', and adds that, according to M. Klein, The Fragment-Targums of the
Pentateuch According to Their Extant Sources, I (Rome: Biblical Institute Press,
1980), p. 26, the Fragmentary Targum as contained in the First Rabbinic Bible is a
direct copy of the Niirnberg manuscript. In the discussion which followed the
presentation of this paper, several members of the conference observed that they had
noticed strong similarities between N and the printed text of various other Targums.