Parallelism and Beyond: The Relationship between Targum Psalms and Rabbinic Literature

This study examines six manners in which rabbinic literature and Targum Psalms interact. 1. An earlier rabbinic tradition provides the backdrop against which the Targum’s translation must be understood. 2. The Targum applies a tradition it uses to translate one part of a psalm towards translating another verse in that same psalm. 3. The Targum revises earlier rabbinic traditions to suit its own ideological and literary concerns. 4. The Targum adapts interpretations that were originally generated well beyond the confines of the psalm being translated and even the Psalter as a whole. 5. The Targum inserts itself into popular late antique exegetical discourses of particular psalms. 6. It rejects a widespread interpretive trend attested to in rabbinic literature. Overall, by moving beyond the mere notation of parallelism, we gain a clearer portrait of the translator’s relationship with rabbinic literature, his working methods, and the ideologies that impelled his creative endeavours.