Texts in Conversation
Exodus 23 forbids siding with a crowd and giving testimony that unjustly favors that crowd. The Aramaic translation in Targum Onkelos turns the second half around into an instruction, telling judges to decide the case by majority.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Exodus 23:2
Hebrew Bible
1 “You must not give a false report. Do not make common cause with the wicked to be a violent6 witness. 2 “You must not follow a crowd in doing evil things; in a lawsuit you must not offer testimony that agrees with a crowd so as to pervert justice, 3 and you must not show partiality to a poor man in his lawsuit.
Date: 750–400 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
Onkelos Exodus 23:2
Targum
1 You shall not accept a false report, nor join hands with the wicked to be a false witness for him. 2 You shall not follow the majority to do evil, nor shall you hold back from teaching what seems right to you in judgment; you shall carry out judgment according to the majority. 3 And you shall not show pity to the poor man in his judgment.
Date: 50–500 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
“... 2. TO DO EVIL. The Aramaic converts the biblical noun leraot, ‘for evil,’ into a verb. [...] DO NOT RESTRAIN YOURSELF FROM TEACHING WHAT IS [CORRECT] IN YOUR EYES. Our targumist elucidates the biblical verse, which has a difficult, even cryptic, construct, ‘you shall not answer [testify in] a dispute to turn aside [the judgment].’ [...] CONCLUDE THE LAWSUIT LIKE THE MAJORITY. Bible: ‘after the multitude to pervert.’ The latter word also means ‘incline,’ ‘turn aside,’ and ‘decide.’ Onkelos inverts the verse into a positive statement. Ibn Ezra writes that the Babylonian Talmud (Bava Metzia 59b) deduces from this verse that the majority rules when deciding upon Jewish laws (p. 362). ...”
Israel Drazin and Stanley M. Wagner, Onkelos on the Torah, Exodus: Understanding the Bible Text (Jerusalem: Gefen, 2006), 151–152.
* 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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