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Targum and New Testament
Le Déaut, Roger

When, in the synagogue of Nazareth, after having been called by the head of the community to read the scroll of Isaiah, Jesus commented upon it (Lk 4:16-28), he was playing the part, familiar to the assembly, of reader-commentator. His proclamation of the Kingdom was undoubtedly grafted into the authentic tradition of the Synagogue. Here, we have a typical example of what the passage from the Jewish to the Judeo-Christian Bible might have been. Jesus inaugurated Christian exegesis by reading the Scriptures and explaining them in Emmaus. The pedagogical procedure of the evangelists is the direct issue of the teaching method of the Rabbi of Nazareth. They discovered Jesus and revealed him in the texts read, translated, meditated and commentated by a long synagogue tradition. They read his life and his action in the texture of the traditional tissue of the Bible.

It suffices to open the gospels to become convinced of this essential continuity between the Jewish and the Christian traditions. What is less well known, however, is the important role that the Targums can play in transmitting the biblical traditions, written and oral, that underlie the text of the gospels, the epistles and the apocalypse. We shall here quote certain examples where the Targum clearly helps the understanding of some verses of the New Testament. (1)

Thus, we can compare Luke 11:27, «Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that you sucked!», with the Palestinian Targum to Genesis 49:25: «Blessed are the breasts that you sucked and the womb in which you rested!» Jewish tradition seems to have stressed this expression (see Genesis Rabbah on 49:25) and even to have used it as a proverb. The Jewish woman who, in the midst of the crowd, is in admiration at the teachings of Jesus, quotes this proverb and perhaps remembers having heard it in the synagogue when the commentary on Genesis 49:25 was being read.

Luke 6:36 has an exact parallel in the Targum on Leviticus 22:28: «My people, children of Israel, be merciful on earth as your Father is merciful in heaven.»
When Jesus replies with apparent harshness to the Canaanite woman in Matthew 15:26, the real meaning of his words is understood in the light of a passage from the Targum Neofiti to Exodus 22:30:
You shall be a people of saints for my name; you will eat no flesh torn from an animal killed in the country; you will throw it to the dogs or else you will throw it to the pagan foreigner who is to be compared with dogs.

This way of speaking is simply an echo by Jesus of a formula, admittedly pejorative, but taken straight from tradition. Jesus repeats it because it is a popular cliché but, in all probability, without the polemic emphasis that the gospel text can suggest.
The famous dictum, «the measure you give will be the measure you get,» (Mt 7:2) is well attested in the Targums (as in that to Genesis 38:26 or Leviticus 26:43).

Three times in John’s gospel we read that the Son of Man must be «lifted up» (Jn 3:14; 8 :28; 12:32-34). Jesus explains that by this expression he is including in a single word his death, resurrection and elevation to glory : «‘… and I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself !’ He said this to show by what death he was to die.» The Greek word used in John’s gospel fits somewhat strangely into this meaning ( ). To prove that John’s commentary 12:32-34 is really the account of a debate between Jesus and the Jews, we must find in tradition an ambiguous Aramaic word that Jesus might probably have used. As M. McNamara has shown (op. cit. pp. 147-149), the Targum to Numbers 11:26 sheds some light here. «Now Moses the prophet is taken away from the midst of the camp ...» And farther on, in Numbers 21:1: «The Canaanite, King of Arad, who dwelt in the South, learnt that Aaron was dead (literally: had been taken away), that Miriam the prophetess was dead (literally: had been taken away).» These three instances clearly refer to the just, Moses, Aaron and Miriam, whose death according to the first meaning of the term reserved to this precise usage, is a «taking away».

Finally, from among many other examples, we emphasize that of the relationship between the Logos of John and the Memra (=Word) of the Targum. This Aramaic term is a kind of «attribute» used by the Targum to designate God or his presence, creative or liberating. Its usage can be compared with that of dabar, «word», of ruah hakodesh, «holy spirit», of ikar, «glory», in the Hebrew Bible; and of Shekhinah, «presence», in the rabbinic writings. This can be seen in many passages of the Targums, for example in the Pseudo-Jonathan to Exodus 15:25: «... the Memra of Yhwh imposed upon him the Sabbath precept ...»; or 15:26: «... if you listen to the Memra of Yhwh your God, and if you do what is just before him ...»; and again, 16:3: «... the children of Israel said to him: “Would to heaven we had died by the Memra of Yhwh in the land of Egypt”...». Thus the prologue of John brings together in one sentence the three terms word, dwelling and glory: «... and the Word became flesh and dwelt among us... we have beheld his glory».

To understand the meaning that this triple affirmation could have for a Judeo-Christian as it echoed in his ears, we have to go back to the meaning of the words in the Targum, where they are used in reference to God himself. Many other examples could be given.

To conclude: this last example helps us to measure the riches inherent in the reading of the Targums as an indispensable stage between the New Testament and the Hebrew Bible. It also helps us to measure the complexity of this reading if we study the questions raised by these textual comparisons.

What seems henceforth to have been gained is the light that the reader of the New Testament can very often find in a knowledge of the Targums. This light enables him to understand better the exegetical methods, literary forms and thought patterns of the evangelists. It then becomes clear that in the communication of the Christian message, the contribution of Greek culture has not obliterated the traditional heritage of Jewish experience and of the Jewish reading of the Bible. The texts of the New Testament have their origins in the confluence of these two currents, Greek and Jewish.

A very complex problem is raised by the rapidity with which it was possible for Jewish tradition and Judeo-Christian tradition, issue of the same stock, and at the beginning complementary, to become so radically opposed. The writings of Paul and John bear witness to this. Should we not reconsider with the help of the Targums and of Jewish tradition the history of religion at the time of Jesus? Should we not approach in this light such burning questions as, for example, the God-man relationship and the way in which Jesus lived this experience and announced it to his Jewish hearers? Would we not get closer to the mystery of the rupture between Jews and Christians if we realized that each of the groups facing each other, particularly the Pharisaic and the Christian sects, approached the problems by emphasizing distinct but complementary aspects? The two religions agree on such fundamental beliefs as the origin of the world, the end of time, and the final resurrection. Ought they not also to interrogate and enlighten each other on the mysterious presence of God in this world, on the Shekhinah of Jewish tradition, on the Memra of the Targums, on the Logos and the Holy Spirit in the Judeo-Christian Bible?


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* Father Roger Le Déaut of the Congregation of the Missionaries of the Holy Spirit died in 2000. He taught for many years, from 1964 to 1994, at the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Rome as professor for the Aramaic language and literature. He is the author of several books, including La nuit pascale : essai sur la signification de la Pâque juive à partir du targum d’Exode XII, 42 as well as Liturgie juive et Nouveau Testament : le témoignage des versions araméennes and Introduction à la littérature targumique, etc. He published numerous articles in specialized periodicals, including the article «Judaïsme» in the Dictionnaire de spiritualité. He was a long-time consultant for the Sidic review, which owes much to him.
This text is the last part of the article «The Targums, or the Aramaic versions of the Bible», published in Sidic, IX, 2 1976.
1. Cf. M. McNamara, The New Testament and the Palestinian Targum to the Pentateuch, Ch. 5, pp. 126-154.