Exodus 33:7

Hebrew Bible

6 So the Israelites stripped off their ornaments by Mount Horeb. 7 Moses took the tent and pitched it outside the camp, at a good distance from the camp, and he called it the tent of meeting. Anyone seeking the Lord would go out to the tent of meeting that was outside the camp. 8 And when Moses went out to the tent, all the people would get up and stand at the entrance to their tents and watch Moses until he entered the tent.

Onkelos 33:7

Targum

6 And the children of Israel removed their usual ornaments (on their return) from Mount Horeb. 7 And Moses took a tent, and pitched it for himself outside the camp, at a distance from the camp, and called it the Tent of the House of Study: and it was that everyone who sought instruction from the Lord went out to the Tent of the House of Study outside the camp. 8 And it happened that when Moses went out to the tent, all the people rose up, and stood, every man at the door of his tent, and watched Moses until he had entered into the tent.

 Notes and References

"... When the Romans destroyed the Second Temple in 70 C.E., Rabbinic Judaism placed special emphasis on Torah study as the means for personal religious and intellectual growth, and as a sine qua non for national survival. Our targumist inserted the study ideal into his translation on many occasions, when he felt that this was the scriptural intent. In Exodus 33:7, for example, he renders 'the house of assembly' that Moses pitched outside the Israelite encampment as 'the tent of the house of study.' The midrashic Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, which elaborates on the biblical text in its translation more than Onkelos, adds to this phrase another emphasis of Rabbinic Judaism, namely the centrality of the synagogue, by stating that the people would study and pray there ..."

Drazin, Israel, and Stanley M. Wagner Onkelos on the Torah, Exodus: Understanding the Bible Text (p. 234) Gefen, 2006

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