1 Kings 22:19

Hebrew Bible

18 The king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, “Didn’t I tell you he does not prophesy prosperity for me, but disaster?” 19 Micaiah said, “That being the case, listen to the Lord’s message. I saw the Lord sitting on his throne, with all the heavenly assembly standing beside him on his right and on his left. 20 The Lord said, ‘Who will deceive Ahab, so he will attack Ramoth Gilead and die there?’ One said this and another that.

Jonathan 1 Kings 22:19

Targum

18 And the king of Israel said to Jehoshaphat, 'Did I not tell you that he would not prophesy good concerning me, but evil?' 19 And Micaiah said, 'Therefore hear the word of the Lord: I saw the glory of the Lord resting on his throne, and all the host of heaven standing by him on his right hand and on his left. 20 And the Lord said, Who shall persuade Ahab, that he may go up and fall at Ramoth-Gilead? And one said on this manner, and another said on that manner.

 Notes and References

"... when God is the object, not the subject, of bodily actions, the targumists were faced with a problem. It was obvious that the human actions themselves could not be metaphorical; but the object of them had to be understood in a different way. For instance, when the Bible says that someone saw God, it is clear that they saw something, and that something had to be identifiable as God, without suggesting that God himself was visible in bodily form. One solution to this is to introduce God’s “glory”, understood as a visible bright light ... The concept of the visible “glory” of God had already been introduced in the Bible itself: “You shall see the glory of God” (Exodus 16:7), “the appearance of the glory of the Lord was like a consuming fire” (Exod 24:17), “the glory of the Lord will appear to you” (Lev 9:6), and so on; compare also 1 Enoch 14:20: “The great glory sat on the throne” (see also Testament of Levi 3:4). It also appeared previously in other translations; compare the Septuagint rendering to the Targum ..."

Cook, Edward M. "The Interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in the Targums" in Henze, Matthias (ed.) A Companion to Biblical Interpretation in Early Judaism (pp. 92-117) William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2012

 User Comments

Do you have questions or comments about these texts? Please submit them here.