178: The Logos and Targum Onkelos

The Biblical Unitarian Podcast · Jun 24, 2021 · 49m

This episode explores how the "Word of God" (Aramaic: "memra") was used to explain the activity of the God of Israel in the Jewish Targum Onkelos. After organizing the various ways that Onkelos understands and uses the "memra" of God in the Torah, we look at John 1:1-18 to see if our reading of that passage is illuminated by the Jewish context created by Targum Onkelos. We conclude that the memra of God in Targum Onkelos is not a preexisting, conscious person alongside the God of Israel.

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