Note 33 — INTRODUCTION.

550, A.D.—The Targum or Chaldee paraphrase is the first entire commentary upon the Song of Songs which has been handed down to us. The author is unknown. Kitto erroneously affirms, that it was “made several centuries before the time of Christ, and probably before the traditionary interpretation of the author himself (i.e. the author of this Song) would entirely be lost.”33 The inferior style in which it is written, the copious use it makes of legends of a very late date, and especially the mention it makes of the Gemara (Ch. i. 2), which was not completed till nearly the middle of the sixth century, prove most distinctly that this paraphrase was made in the sixth century. Hävernick,34 however, is equally wrong in affirming that the Mahomedans are mentioned in Ch. i. 7. That the sons of Ishmael here alluded to are not the Mahomedans, is evident from Ch. vi. 7. of the same paraphrase, where we are told that these ‏בְּנוֹי דְיִשְׁמָעֵאל‎ headed by Alexander the Great, came to wage war against Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabees.