David Shepherd, «The Case of The Targum of Job in the Rabbinic Bible and the Solger Codex (MS Nürnberg)», Vol. 79 (1998) 360-380
It is a well-known fact that even in its earliest edition, an Aramaic translation or targum was amongst the vast and varied material assembled for inclusion in the Rabbinic Bible. But in contrast to the comparative wealth of information we possess regarding the circumstances surrounding its publication, we possess little knowledge with regard to the sources used by Felix de Prato when he took up the task of editing the 1517 Rabbinic Bible for the Venetian publisher Daniel Bomberg. While prior research has shown the importance of the targum text preserved in the Solger Codex (Stadtbibliothek Nürnberg) in any attempt to solve the puzzle of the pre-history of the Rabbinic Bible's targum text, many pieces of this puzzle remain as yet unexamined. The present study locates the targum text preserved in MS Nürnberg (Solger Codex) within the stemmatological framework proposed by D. Stec in the introduction to his critical edition of the Targum of Job. More importantly, the present paper presents decisive evidence (through the detection of editorial errors) that the editor of the first Rabbinic Bible (Felix de Prato) copied his targum text of Job directly from Codex Solger preserved in the Stadtbibliothek Nürnberg.
to this verse, when the following verse is examined it becomes apparent that T3 has been mistakenly attached to verse 20. One might well imagine that marginal material has played a role in this dislocation and indeed on the basis of Nürnberg, we see that this is the case. The unusually crowded margin includes first a variant reading followed by two alternative targumim (T2 and T3). While the marginal variant to verse 19 increases the length of the verse, the version contained in the body is rather short. This combination of too much material and a short verse proved to be de Prato's downfall. While T2 begins in the margin adjacent to the end of the targum contained in the body (T1), T3 is shunted down so that it is in fact slightly below the beginning of the targum to verse 20. Without an insertion mark, it would seem harsh to fault de Prato too much for mistakenly attaching 19T3 to verse 20.
A similar case is that of 28,17 where again most witnesses preserve three targumim to the verse (See Illustr. 3). As was the case in chapter 24, Bomberg's text has 28,17 T3 erroneously positioned following the 28,18 T1 (the sole targum to this verse in all other witnesses). And here again, a look at the margins of Nürnberg provide an explanation for the dislocation. While the reference mark indicating the insertion point for the marginal material (T2 and T3) is provided following 28,17 T1, the Hebrew text of 28,18 is again quite short and its corresponding Aramaic translation (28,18 T1) begins in the body of the text adjacent to the beginning of the second of the two alternative targumim (T3) in the margin. Again, the dislocation is explained by de Prato's confusion regarding the correspondence of marginal material and the body of the text.
Although of a slightly different sort, one final example related to multiple targumim should be brought forward in favour of Bomberg's dependence on Nürnberg. In verse 36 of chapter 38, Stec notes that Bomberg includes only half of T2 while other witnesses preserve the entire targum. The reason for this otherwise inexplicable omission of the first half of the verse seems to lie again in the margin of Nürnberg. Because the first half of both T1 and T2 are substantially similar, the marginal hand in Nürnberg has here and elsewhere saved a repetition of the similar portion by providing an insertion mark referring to the marginal targum only at the point where the two targumim diverge. De Prato apparently misunderstood the intention and cited the last half of T2 contained in the margin of Nürnberg as a complete, self-contained targum. While the