Texts in Conversation
Exodus 14 describes an unusual moment where a dark cloud illuminates the night. The Aramaic translation in Targum Onkelos attempted to explain this by specifying that the Israelites experienced it differently than the Egyptians did.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Exodus 14:20
Hebrew Bible
19 The angel of God, who was going before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them, and the pillar of cloud moved from before them and stood behind them. 20 It came between the Egyptian camp and the Israelite camp; it was a dark cloud and it lit up the night so that one camp did not come near the other the whole night. 21 Moses stretched out his hand toward the sea, and the Lord drove the sea apart by a strong east wind all that night, and he made the sea into dry land, and the water was divided.
Date: 750–400 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Onkelos Exodus 14:20
Targum
19 And the angel of the Lord, who went before the camp of Israel, moved and went behind them; and the pillar of cloud moved from in front of them and stood behind them. 20 And it came between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel; and was a cloud and darkness to the Egyptians, but to Israel it was a light all the night: and the one did not come near the other all night. 21 And Moses stretched out his hand over the sea; and the Lord drove the sea back with a strong east wind all night, and made the sea dry land, and the waters were divided;
Date: 50–500 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... Onkelos clarifies a very unclear biblical description of this event that reads: 'And there were cloud and darkness and it illuminated the night' ..."
Israel Drazin and Stanley M. Wagner, Onkelos on the Torah, Exodus: Understanding the Bible Text (Jerusalem: Gefen, 2006), 82–83.
* 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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