The Special Language of Shavuot

When the army of Sennnacherib of Assyria was besieging Hezekiah's Jerusalem:

Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebna, and Joah replied to the Rabshakeh, “Please, speak to your servants in Aramaic, for we understand it; do not speak to us in Judean in the hearing of the people on the wall.” But the Rabshakeh answered them, “Was it to your master and to you that my master sent me to speak those words? It was precisely to the men who are sitting on the wall...” And the Rabshakeh stood and called out in a loud voice in Judean: “Hear the words of the Great King, the King of Assyria. Thus said the king: Don’t let Hezekiah deceive you, for he will not be able to deliver you from my hands.

(5) You shall then recite as follows before your God ה׳: “My father was a fugitive Aramean. He went down to Egypt with meager numbers and sojourned there; but there he became a great and very populous nation.

(47) Laban named it Yegar-sahadutha, but Jacob named it Gal-ed.

an anti-Jewish letter to the king of Persia

(7) And in the time of Artaxerxes, Bishlam, Mithredath, Tabeel, and the rest of their colleagues wrote to King Artaxerxes of Persia, a letter written in Aramaic and translated Aramaic: (8) Rehum the commissioner and Shimshai the scribe wrote a letter concerning Jerusalem to King Artaxerxes as follows:

Rashi: 'written in Aramaic' - Aramaic letters

'translated in Aramaic' - written in the Aramaic language

Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, and the Levites explained the Teaching to the people, while the people stood in their places. They read from the scroll of the Teaching of God, translating it and giving the sense; so they understood the reading.

The Gemara asks: Was the translation of the Torah really composed by Onkelos the convert?

Didn’t Rav Ika bar Avin say that Rav Ḥananel said that Rav said: What is the meaning of that which is written with respect to the days of Ezra: “And they read in the book, the Torah of God, distinctly; and they gave the sense, and they caused them to understand the reading” (Nehemiah 8:8)?

The verse should be understood as follows: “And they read in the book, the Torah of God,” this is the scriptural text; “distinctly,” this is the translation, indicating that they immediately translated the text into Aramaic, as was customary during public Torah readings.

§ The Gemara cites another ruling of Rabbi Yirmeya or Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba. Rabbi Yirmeya said, and some say that it was Rabbi Ḥiyya bar Abba who said: The Aramaic translation of the Torah used in the synagogues was composed by Onkelos the convert based on the teachings of Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua. The Aramaic translation of the Prophets was composed by Yonatan ben Uzziel based on a tradition going back to the last prophets, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi. ...

(4) One who reads from the Torah in the synagogue should not read fewer than three verses. And when it is being translated, he should not read to the translator more than one verse at a time, so that the translator will not become confused.

And with regard to the Prophets, one may read to the translator three verses at a time. With respect to the Torah, an incorrect translation might lead to an error in practice, but this concern does not apply to the Prophets. If the three verses constitute three separate paragraphs, that is to say, if each verse is a paragraph in itself, one must read them to the translator one by one. ...

...Rebbi Ḥaggai said, Rebbi Samuel bar Rav Isaac went to a synagogue. He saw a teacher delivering the translation from a book. He said to him, this is forbidden to you; matters which were said orally, orally, matters which were said in writing, in writing.

See also Rambam, Hilchot Tefillah 12:11

s.v. Ve'im hayu...: The reason why we read the Targum (metargemin) the Haftarot of [the Seventh Day of] Pesach and [the Second Day of] Atzeret (=Shavuot) is because these Haftarot treat the miracle of the day. [Reading the Targum] publicizes the miracle (of the splitting of the Red Sea). Similarly with the Giving of the Torah, [reading the Targum] publicizes the miracle.

See also Bach, Orach Chaim 145:1

Meir beRabbi Yitzchak of Worms, later 11th c.

(1) Before reciting the Ten Commandments,

(2) I first ask permission and approval

(3) To start with two or three stanzas in fear

(4) Of God who creates and ever sustains.