The Hebrew Bible says the serpent told Eve, "You will be like God, knowing good and evil" (Genesis 3:5). Targum Onkelos changes one word: "You will be like great ones." Not God. Great ones. The theological implication is enormous.
Onkelos will not allow the serpent's lie to stand even as reported speech. If the Aramaic said "like God," a listener might momentarily entertain the possibility that humans could become divine. Onkelos shuts that door. The serpent promised greatness, not godhood. The temptation was ambition, not theology.
The Fall unfolds with Onkelos tracking the Hebrew closely—Eve sees the tree is good for food, takes the fruit, gives it to Adam. Their eyes open. They sew fig leaves. But when they "hear the voice of God moving in the Garden," Onkelos renders it as "the voice of the Word of God." God does not walk. God's Word moves through the Garden. Again: divine transcendence is protected. God acts through intermediaries—His Word, His Presence—never through a body.
The most striking divergence comes at the curse of the serpent. The Hebrew says the woman's offspring "shall strike you on the head, and you shall strike him on the heel" (Genesis 3:15). Onkelos renders it: "He will remember you, what you did to him from the beginning, and you will expect him at the end." This is not a battle scene. It is a statement about memory and justice. Humanity will never forget the serpent's original deception, and the serpent will await its reckoning at the end of days.