Targum Jerusalem

Book excerpt: The title accurately designates the Palestinian provenance of this Aramaic version of the Torah (though "Jerusalemite" should not be taken literally, since the city of Jerusalem did not exist as a place of Jewith habitation at the time that this text was composed). In light of the discovery of many manuscripts containing similar works, it can be recognized that the Targum Yerushalmi that appears in the Mikra'ot Gedolot is but one representative of a larger family of Aramaic texts that are designated in the scholarly literature as "Fragmentary Targums." Dates: Although the known manuscripts of these Targums are from the 11th-13th century, it appears that their contents originated hundreds of years earlier. Place: Israel Description: The "Targum Yerushalmi" does not provide a complete Aramaic translation of the Torah, but is confined to specific verses (or sometimes just individual phrases or words). There is no evidence that this Targum was intended to provide alternative readings for one of the complete Targum texts.