The Hebrew Bible says God told Moses, "Who gave man a mouth, or who makes a person dumb or deaf, seeing or blind? Is it not I—God?" (Exodus 4:11). Targum Onkelos translates this verse without alteration. No softening. No buffer. God claims direct responsibility for disability, for limitation, for the full range of human capacity and incapacity.
This is striking because Onkelos normally works to distance God from anything that might seem harsh or physical. But here, the theological point is too important to obscure. Moses has just protested that he is "clumsy of mouth and clumsy of tongue" (Exodus 4:10)—he cannot speak well enough to lead. God's response is not sympathy. It is a statement of absolute sovereignty. The God who made the mouth can make it speak.
The chapter's strangest episode—the attack at the inn—receives Onkelos's characteristically restrained treatment. The Hebrew says God (or an angel) "sought to kill him" (Exodus 4:24), referring either to Moses or his son. Zipporah circumcises their son with a flint and touches "his feet," and the attacker withdraws. Onkelos translates without significant deviation, preserving the passage's unsettling ambiguity.
Throughout Exodus 4, Onkelos renders God's promises to Moses with his signature phrase: "My Word will be with your mouth" (Exodus 4:12). Not "I will be with your mouth." God's Memra—His Word—serves as the active agent. Moses will speak, but the words will come from a source beyond Moses. The reluctant prophet's mouth will become a vessel for divine communication, and the Aramaic makes clear that the power behind the words is not human eloquence but divine speech.