Texts in Conversation
In Exodus 3, Moses leads the sheep “to the far side of the wilderness,” an unusual place to take sheep. The Aramaic translation in Targum Onkelos adds that he brought the sheep to a “good grazing site,” to remove any hint that Moses was a bad shepherd.
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Exodus 3:1
Hebrew Bible
1 Now Moses was shepherding the flock of his father-in-law Jethro, the priest of Midian, and he led the flock to the far side of the desert and came to the mountain of God, to Horeb. 2 The angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire from within a bush. He looked, and the bush was ablaze with fire, but it was not being consumed! 3 So Moses thought, “I will turn aside to see this amazing sight. Why does the bush not burn up?”
Date: 5th Century B.C.E. (Final composition) (based on scholarly estimates)
Source
Onkelos Exodus 3:1
Targum
1 And Mosheh tended the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the rabba of Midian, and he led the flock to the place of the best pastures of the wilderness, and came to the mountain on which was revealed the glory of the Lord, unto Horeb. 2 And the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire in the midst of a bush. And he gazed, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, but the bush was not consumed. 3 And Mosheh said, I will now turn and see this great sight, why the bush is not burned up.
Date: 100-200 C.E. (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... 'Good grazing site' ... This phrase is missing in the Bible and added by Onkelos to clarify why Moses took the flock into the desert, a problem that troubled biblical commentators. The Hebrew phrase achar hamidbar, which the targumist translates as 'to the wilderness,' is more accurately translated by Saadiah, in his Arabic translation, as 'to the edge of the wilderness' ..."
Drazin, Israel, and Stanley M. Wagner
Onkelos on the Torah, Exodus: Understanding the Bible Text
(p. 13) Gefen, 2006
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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