The Aramaic Bible: Targums in their Historical Context

52 The Aramaic Bible: Targums in their Historical Context
return from exile'. 2 Among traces of early Targumim are the following:
(a) it is believed that behind the quotation from Ps. 22.2 in
Mt. 27.47 and Mk 15.34 we have a Targum of the Psalter, which
would have been in existence in NT times; in the same way, the quotation
in Eph. 4.8 may come from a Targum of Ps. 68.19; (b) a
Targum of Job is mentioned during the days of Gamaliel I, although
some authors refer this Targum not to an Aramaic version, but to that
of the LXX; (c) the Mishnah 3 makes reference to the Targumim: 'If an
Aramaic version was written in Hebrew, or if Hebrew Scripture was
written in Aramaic, or in Hebrew (Canaanite) script, it does not
render the hands unclean. The Holy Scripture renders the hands
unclean [i.e. are holy], only if they are written in Assyrian characters,
on leather, and in ink'; (d) in the LXX translation of Job we read about
Job's personal history: 'This man is described in the Syriac book' (i.e.
the Targum).
The New Situation
Two discoveries in this century have changed our view of targumic
studies: the Qumran Aramaic MSS and the MS Neophyti, both of which
have opened a new era in the study of the Targums. 4 As a matter of
fact M. Black 5 affirmed that the Neophyti's discovery was second only
in importance to the discovery of the Qumran MSS. The researchers
in Jewish studies related these discoveries one to the other. Black
wrote to A. Diez Macho: 'I hope that your edition (like Professor
Millar Borrows' Facsimile edition of the Manual of Discipline) will
appear very soon and be available to all of us who are so excited about
2. B.J. Roberts, The Old Testament Text and Versions. The Hebrew Text in
Transmission and the History of the Ancient Versions (Cardiff: University of Wales
Press, 1951), p. 197.
3. m. Yad. 4.5
4. The history of targumic research can be seen in M. McNamara, 'A Brief
Sketch of Targumic Studies', in The New Testament and the Palestinian Targum to
the Pentateuch (Rome: FBI, 1966), pp. 5-66; idem, 'Half a Century of Targum
Study', IrBiblSt 1 (1979), pp. 157-68; idem, 'Some Recent Writings on Rabbinic
Literature and the Targums', Milltown Studies 9 (1982), pp. 59-101; R. Le De"aut,
'The Targums: Aramaic Versions of the Bible', SIDIC 9 (1976), pp. 4-11;
E. Levine, 'La evolucion de la Biblia Aramea', EstBib 39 (1981), pp. 223-48;
idem, The Biography of the Aramaic Bible', ZAW94 (1982), pp. 353-79.
5. M. Black, 'Die Erforschung der Muttersprache Jesu', Theologische
Literaturzeitung 82 (1957), p. 664.