On the Use of Greek Translations in Dating the Shift from Targum Proto–Jonathan to Targum Yerushalmi in Ezekiel

Abstract

It is generally believed that there was a shift in Eretz Israel from an Ur-targum to the Prophets (“Targum Proto-Jonathan”) to a later Palestinian offshoot (“Targum Yerushalmi”), whose precise character and origin are controversial. In each of these two targumim, the Aramaic term used to render Hebrew קֶסֶת (Ezek 9:2, 3, 11) is of Greek origin. Proto-Jonathan’s rendering, preserved as פִינקַס in TargumJonathan, comes from a Greek term (πίναξ) related to Symmachus’s Greek rendering (πινακίδιον). Targum Yerushalmi’s rendering, preserved as קלמרין in MS Sassoon 368, is equivalent to the Greek rendering (καλαμάριον) attributed to “one of the Hebrews” by Origen in his commentary on Ezekiel. These correspondences, taken together with other evidence, suggest that Targum Proto-Jonathan to Ezekiel was still being used in Eretz Israel during Symmachus’s time (late second century CE), and that the shift from Proto-Jonathan to Targum Yerushalmi in Ezekiel had at least begun by the time that Origen completed his commentary on Ezekiel (fifth decade of the third century CE).