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Pseudo Jonathan Exodus

About this book
Chapter 3

But Mosheh was keeping the flock of Jethro his father-in-law, the rabba of Midian; and he had led the flock to a pleasant place of pasturage which is behind the desert, and had come to the mountain on which was revealed the glory of the Lord, even Horeb. And Zagnugael, the angel of the Lord, appeared to him in a fame of fire in the midst of the bush. And he gazed, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, yet the bush was neither burned nor consumed with fire. And Mosheh said, I will turn aside now and consider this great sight, why the bush is not burned. I will look at this great sight, wherefore the bush is refreshed and not burned. And when it was seen before the Lord that he turned to look, the Lord called to him from the midst of the bush and said, Mosheh, Mosheh ! And he said, Behold me. And He said, Approach not hither, take the shoe from thy feet, for the place on which thou standest is a holy place; and upon it thou art to receive the Law, to teach it to the sons of Israel. And He said, I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Izhak, and the God of Jakob. And Mosheh covered his face; for he was afraid to look upon the height of the glory of the Shekinah of the Lord. And He said, The oppression of My people who are in Mizraim is verily manifest before Me, and heard before Me is their cry on account of them who hold them in bondage; for their affliction is known before Me. And I have revealed Myself to thee this day, that by My Word they may be delivered from the hand of the Mizraee, to bring them up out of the unclean land, unto a good land, and large in its boundaries, a land yielding milk and honey, unto the place where dwell the Kenaanaee, and the Hittaee, and the Amoraee, and the Pherizaee, and the Hivaee, and the Jebusaee. And now, behold, the cry of the sons of Israel cometh up before Me, and the bruising of the Mizraee wherewith they bruise them is also revealed before Me. And now, come, and I will send thee unto Pharoh, and thou shalt bring forth My people, the sons of Israel, out of Mizraim. And Mosheh said before the Lord, Who am I, that I should go to Pharoh, and bring forth the sons of Israel out of Mizraim? But He said, Therefore My Word shall be for thy help; and this shall be the sign to thee that I have sent thee: when thou hast, brought the people forth from Mizraim, ye shall worship before the Lord, because ye shall have received the Law upon this mountain. And Mosheh said before the Lord, Behold, I will go to the sons of Israel, and say to them, The Lord God of your fathers hath sent me to you: and they will say to me, What is His Name ? What shall I say to them ? And the Lord said unto Mosheh, He who spake, and the world was; who spake, and all things were.⁠ And He said, This thou shalt say to the sons of Israel, I AM HE WHO IS, AND WHO WILL BE, hath sent me unto you. And the Lord said again unto Mosheh, Thus shalt thou speak to the sons of Israel, The God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Izhak, and the God of Jakob, hath sent me unto you. This is His Name for ever, and this is His Memorial to every generation and generation. Go, and assemble the elders of Israel, and say to them, The Lord God of your fathers hath appeared unto me, the God of Abraham, Izhak, and Jakob, saying, Remembering, I have remembered you, and the injury that is done you in Mizraim; and I have said in My Word, I will bring you up out from the oppression of the Mizraee into the land of the Kenaanaee, and Hittaee, and Amoraee, and Pherizaee, and Hivaee, and Jebusaee, to the land that yieldeth milk and honey. And they will hearken to thee: and thou and the elders of Israel shall go to the king of Mizraim and say to him, The Lord God of the Jehudaee hath called us; and now let us go a journey of three days into the wilderness, to sacrifice before the Lord our God. But it is manifest before Me that the king of Mizraim will not let you go, (no,) not from fear of Him who is Mighty, until that by My Word he shall have been punished with evil plagues. And ye will be hindered there until I have sent forth the stroke of My power, and have smitten Mizraee with all My wonders, that I will do among them; and afterward he will release you. And I will give this people grace in the eyes of the Mizraee; and it shall be that when ye go free from thence, ye shall not go empty. But a woman shall ask of her neighbour, and from those next to the wall of her house, vessels of silver, and vessels of gold, and vestments; and you shall set them as crowns upon your sons and your daughters, and make the Mizraee empty.

Texts in conversation

Compare Revelation 1:4 and Pseudo Jonathan Exodus 3:14

New Testament · Targum

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Summary

Revelation describes God with language of past, present, and future existence, similar to the Aramaic translation of Exodus in Targum Pseudo-Jonathan. Revelation may follow a tradition, either Greek or Aramaic, that was later preserved in the Targum.

Passages

Revelation 1:4

New Testament
1 The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must happen very soon. He made it clear by sending his angel to his servant John, 2 who then testified to everything that he saw concerning the word of God and the testimony about Jesus Christ. 3 Blessed is the one who reads the words of this prophecy aloud, and blessed are those who hear and obey the things written in it, because the time is near! 4 From John, to the seven churches that are in the province of Asia: Grace and peace to you from “he who is,” and who was, and who is still to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5 and from Jesus Christ—the faithful witness, the firstborn from among the dead, the ruler over the kings of the earth. To the one who loves us and has set us free from our sins at the cost of his own blood
92–96 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Revelation

Pseudo Jonathan Exodus 3:14

Targum
And Mosheh said before the Lord, Behold, I will go to the sons of Israel, and say to them, The Lord God of your fathers hath sent me to you: and they will say to me, What is His Name ? What shall I say to them ? And the Lord said unto Mosheh, He who spake, and the world was; who spake, and all things were. And He said, This thou shalt say to the sons of Israel, I AM HE WHO IS, AND WHO WILL BE, hath sent me unto you. And the Lord said again unto Mosheh, Thus shalt thou speak to the sons of Israel, The God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Izhak, and the God of Jakob, hath sent me unto you.
300–1200 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Pseudo Jonathan Exodus

References

"... This designation is an interpretation of the divine name YHWH. In the Old Testament itself, the only interpretation of the name is found in Exodus 3:14, which associates it with the verb 'to be', and interprets it first by the enigmatic phrase 'I am who I am' (or: 'I will be who I will be'), and then simply as 'I am'. Later Jewish interpretation understood these interpretations as statements of the divine eternity. Thus it understands the divine name to be 'the one who is', which expresses the divine eternity in Hellenistic philosophical fashion as timeless being. Alternatively, the meaning could be unpacked in terms of past, present and future existence. This is how the Palestinian Targum (Pseudo-Jonathan) paraphrased the divine name: 'I am who I was and will be' (Exodus 3:14) or 'I am who is and who was, and I am who I will be' (Deuteronomy 32:29; compare also Sibylline Oracle 3:16). Formulae asserting existence in three tenses were also used of Greek gods or the supreme God of philosophy, and this usage may well have influenced the Jewish interpretation of the divine name. But it must be on the latter that Revelation is directly dependent ..."
Richard Bauckham, The Theology of the Book of Revelation, New Testament Theology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993), 28–29.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Revelation 1:4 and Pseudo Jonathan Exodus 3:14

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