The Aramaic Bible · the Torah
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan Genesis · chapter 6
Aramaic public domain · English by Etheridge (1862)What is the Aramaic Bible?
After the exile, most Jews spoke Aramaic, not Hebrew, so in the synagogue each Scripture reading was followed by an Aramaic translation read aloud, so ordinary people could follow. Those translations are the Aramaic Bible. Scholars call them the Targums.
Why it’s worth reading: a Targum doesn’t just translate, it quietly explains as it goes. So it’s a window into how the first Jewish readers actually understood a passage. Famously, the Aramaic of Isaiah 53 names the servant “the Messiah” outright.
Why it reads differently from your Bible: a Targum doesn’t just translate, it interprets as it goes, so its wording often expands or differs from the plain Hebrew. That difference is the window into how the first readers understood it.
Tap any Aramaic word to trace it to its Jastrow dictionary entry.
And it was when the sons of men began to multiply upon the face of the earth, and fair daughters were born to them;
and the sons of the great saw that the daughters of men were beautiful, and painted, and curled, walking with revelation of the flesh, and with imaginations of wickedness; that they took them wives of all who pleased them.
And the Lord said by His Word, All the generations of the wicked which are to arise shall not be purged after the order of the judgments of the generation of the deluge, which shall be destroyed and exterminated from the midst of the world. Have I not imparted My Holy Spirit to them, (or, placed My Holy Spirit in them,) that they may work good works? And, behold, their works are wicked. Behold, I will give them a prolongment of a hundred and twenty years, that they may work repentance, and not perish.
Schamchazai and Uzziel, who fell from heaven, were on the earth in those days; and also, after the sons of the Great had gone in with the daughters of men, they bare to them: and these are they who are called men who are of the world, men of names.
And the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and all the imagery of the thought of his heart was only evil every day.
And it repented the Lord in His Word that He had made man upon the earth; and He passed judgment upon them by His Word.
And the Lord said, I will abolish by My Word man, whom I have created upon the face of the earth, from man to cattle, to the reptile, and to the fowl of the heavens; because I have repented in My Word that I have made them.
But Noah, who was righteous, found favour before the Lord.
These are the genealogies of the race of Noah. Noah was a just man, complete in good works in his generation, (and) in the fear of the Lord walked Noah.
And Noah begat three sons, Shem, Cham, and Japheth.
And the earth was corrupted through the inhabitants thereof, who had declined from the ways of righteousness before the Lord; and the earth was filled with rapine.
And the Lord beheld the earth; and, lo, it was corrupt; for all flesh had every one corrupted his way upon the earth.
And the Lord said to Noah, The end of all flesh cometh before Me, because the earth is filled with rapine by their evil works; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
Make thee an ark of the wood of cedars; a hundred and fifty cells shalt thou make to the ark in its left side, and thirty and six in its breadth; and ten cabins in the midst, to lay up in them provision; and five repositories on the right, and five on the left; and thou shalt protect it within and without a pitch.
Go thou unto Phison, and take from thence a precious stone, and fix it in the ark to illuminate you: with the measure of a cubit (or span) shalt thou complete it above. And a door shalt thou set in the side of the ark; and with dwelling-places, inferior, second, and third, shalt thou make it.
And I, behold, I bring a flood of waters upon the earth to swallow up all flesh which hath in it the spirit of life from under the heavens: whatever is upon the earth shall be swept away.
But I will establish my covenant with thee; and thou shalt go into the ark, thou, and thy sons, and thy wife, and the wives of thy sons with thee.
And of all that liveth of all flesh, two of every (kind) shall go into the ark, to be preserved alive with thee: male and female shall they be.
Of the fowl after its kind, and of all cattle after its kind, and of every reptile of the earth after its kind, two of every (sort) shall enter to thee by the hand of the angel, who will take and cause them to enter to thee, to be preserved.
And thou, take to thee of all food that is eaten, and let it be to thee and to them for food.
And Noah did according to all that the Lord had instructed him.
Aramaic. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, Aramaic: 'Targum Jonathan on Genesis' (public domain), served by the Sefaria v3 API (sefaria.org)
English. English: J. W. Etheridge (1862) (Public Domain) — an established translation of the Targum itself, joined by verse number. Never an AI rendering (BB-42).
We show the license-cleared original Aramaic and an established English translation, each Aramaic word traceable to a public-domain lexicon. We never machine-translate a primary text.