The Many Faces of the Rylands’ Jewish Manuscripts

The Yemenite Jewish community has maintained Hebrew – Aramaic – Judeo-Arabic trilingualism until today. In Yemeni synagogues the Torah is recited verse by verse in all three languages. In this 19th-century trilingual Bible, the original Hebrew text in the middle of the page is surrounded in the margins by translations and commentaries in different languages.

In the upper and other margins, there is the Aramaic translation called Targum Onḳelos for the Torah and Targum Jonathan for the Prophetic Readings (Hafṭarot), with Saadia Gaon’s (882-942) Judeo-Arabic translation called Tafsir, in alternating verses. The lower and outer margins contain the commentary of the famous French rabbi, Rashi (Solomon ben Isaac, 1040-1105).

Hebrew Bible