Introduction
I. Technique
and Content
Among
the hundreds of supercommentaries that have been written on Rashi’s commentary
on the Torah, we can see a great dividing line between two kinds of
commentaries. Some commentators focus on questions of Rashi’s technique, such as: How did Rashi derive and prove his comment
from the Scriptural text? Other commentators devote more energy to
questions of content:
What are the translation, meaning, and
implications of Scripture according to Rashi’s interpretation?
One of the few supercommentaries that treats both areas fully is Gur Aryeh, by Maharal of Prague. I make no claim that the quality of this book is even remotely close to that of the great Maharal; I do, however, make a bold claim that I have learned from Maharal that in explicating Rashi’s commentary one must pay full attention to both technique and content. Indeed, I believe that Rashi’s content cannot fully be appreciated if one does not understand Rashi’s technique. In other words, if you don’t understand how Rashi derived his comment from Scripture, you also don’t really understand his comment’s implications.
II.
Structure
The
structure of this book follows the desire to explicate both Rashi’s technique and content. On each week’s Torah reading there is an attempt to
present a meaningful, content-filled
d’var Torah about one Rashi comment. Each
d’var Torah contains a “Relevant Principle” for
understanding Rashi’s commentary; among these principles, there are some that
guide the reader to understanding Rashi’s technique,
and others that provide guidance in understanding Rashi’s content.
More specifically, the essay on each week’s Torah reading contains the following elements.
THE TEXT: The Scriptural text, in the original Hebrew and in English translation. This may seem obvious, but it reinforces the idea that Rashi’s comments cannot be fully understood without identifying their source within the Scriptural text. One of my mentors used to say that a verse of Scripture without Rashi is not Scripture; I suggest the corollary that a Rashi without Scripture is not Rashi.
RASHI: The text of a Rashi comment, in Hebrew and
in English translation.
QUESTION: A question about the
Rashi comment.
THE RELEVANT PRINCIPLE: A general principle that guided the author toward an answer to his question, and, it is hoped, that will guide the readers to formulate their own answers to other questions.
Many of the classic supercommentators have already formulated kelalim, or general principles, regarding Rashi’s commentary on the Torah. The author of Devek Tov formulates 26 kelalim. Based on the work of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Kelalei Rashi lists 207 kelalim! The common denominator of most of these “rules” is that they describe Rashi’s tendencies in his commentary. For example, Devek Tov states that Rashi “did not come in his commentary to give legal decisions, but rather to interpret the Torah”; for another example, Kelalei Rashi states that when Rashi quoted from Talmud and Midrash, he "did not flinch from changing the wording of his source in order to harmonize it with the simple meaning of Scripture.”
The novelty of this book’s Relevant Principles is not so much in their content as in their presentation. The Relevant Principles are not presented as descriptions of Rashi’s modus operandi, but rather as directives to the student. Thus, Devek Tov’s observation that Rashi does not concern himself with halachah will be stated here as a directive: When Rashi discusses halachah, ask if the halachah is implicit in the wording of the Torah itself. Kelalei Rashi’s observation about Rashi’s willingness to modify a source will be stated here as: Check Rashi’s sources to see if he has altered them in order to harmonize them with his own commentary. The author hopes that this attempt to speak directly to the student will be helpful.
One further note on the Relevant Principles: although they generally follow the Question, they occasionally precede it. This is because some questions would not be asked without knowledge of the Relevant Principle. We would not ask, for example, “Why does Rashi involve himself here with halachah?” if we did not already know that Rashi does not generally do so, and that it must be investigated when he does.
AN ANSWER: An answer to the question that has been posed, using the Relevant
Principle as a guide. The indefinite article — an
— is deliberate; the author makes no claim that his answer is the only answer, or that it is irrefutable.
CONCLUSION: A brief conclusion, often repeating and elaborating on the Relevant Principle.
III. List of Relevant Principles
1. Rashi prefers to
explain the text according to its simple meaning; only when necessary does he resort to Midrashic
interpretations, and even then, he seeks those that are closest to the the
simple meaning of the text. Therefore, investigate any
Rashi comment that seems to deviate from the simple meaning of the text. A corollary to this rule concerns Rashi’s use of the
Aramaic translation of Onkelos. Since Onkelos, like Rashi, prefers to explain
Scripture according to its simple meaning, Rashi generally follows Onkelos’s
translation of Scripture. Therefore, analyze why Rashi
sometimes strays from his usual reliance on the Aramaic translation of Onkelos.
2. Make every effort to
explain Rashi’s commentary so that there will be no contradictions within it. A corollary to this principle: If Rashi establishes a general principle, check to see if this
principle holds true throughout the Torah.
3. Examine carefully how
everything that Rashi writes on a verse, or small group of verses, harmonizes.
4. When faced with a difficult
Rashi comment, look for clarification in other Rashi comments that touch on
related topics.
5. Pay careful attention to
Rashi’s translation and derivation of specific words in the Torah, because they
reveal his opinion about the simple meaning of Scripture.
6. Use the Tanach, with Rashi’s commentaries
when possible, as a dictionary.
7. When faced with a difficult
or unclear word or phenomenon, trace it back to its first appearance in the
Torah.
8. Rabbi Menachem
HaMe’iri, the great Talmudic commentator, writes that Rashi’s true greatness is
not widely appreciated, because “with one word he often includes answers to
bundles of questions.” Therefore, examine Rashi’s choice of words very
carefully.
9. Check Rashi’s sources to
see if they really do prove what Rashi claims about them.
10. Unless
necessary, Rashi concerns himself exclusively with the verse that is in front
of him; if there is something to be learned from a later verse, Rashi waits
until he gets to that verse. Therefore, pay careful
attention to Rashi’s placement of his comments.
11. Pay careful attention to Rashi’s headings — the words from Scripture
that he quotes before presenting his commentary.
12. In every Rashi comment, analyze its two primary elements: the proof, and the content.
13. Pay attention to “nicknames.” For example,
analyze why Noach is referred to as ish
ha’adamah — the man (or
master) of the earth (Bereishis 9:20)
and why Moshe is referred to as hamitrzri
— the Egyptian (Shemos 2:19).
14. Dr. Avigdor Bonchek, in his new book, Rashi: The Magic and the Mystery, differentiates between two types of Rashi comments.
Most Rashi comments are Type I Comments, in which Rashi resolves a difficulty in the Scriptural text, such as a contradiction, an obscure phrase, or a seemingly unreasonable statement. Since Rashi does not usually identify the difficulty, but merely resolves it, we must ask ourselves, “What in the text was bothering Rashi?”
A Type II Comment,
explains Dr. Bonchek, does not a address a difficulty in the text, but rather
comes to “prevent students from making a likely error” about the meaning of the
text. Type II Comments are usually no
more than two or three words inserted by Rashi between the words of the Torah.
Regarding a Type II comment, ask: “What misunderstanding is Rashi warning us about and helping us avoid?”
15. When faced with a difficult Rashi comment, examine Rashi’s Midrashic or
Talmudic source.
16. When Rashi makes a comment about the reason for one of the Torah’s
commandments, ask the following:
*Is the reason implicit in the wording of the Torah itself?
*Will knowledge of the reason answer a difficulty in the text?
*Will an understanding of the reason support Rashi’s explanation of
the simple meaning of the verse?
17. When Rashi discusses halachah, ask the following:
*Is the halachah implicit in the wording of the Torah itself?
*Will knowledge of the halachah answer a difficulty in the
text?
*Will an understanding of the halachah support Rashi’s explanation
of the simple meaning of the verse?
18. Do not ask, “Why did a Scriptural character do a particular act or make
a particular statement?” Rather, ask: “Why (and how) did Scripture tell us about this act or statement?”
19. To clarify a difficult Rashi comment, consult other verses in Tanach, other early commentators,
passages in the Talmud, and even the writings of authors who lived much later
than Rashi.
20. Pay careful attention to the way that the Torah conveys an
idea, because this is sometimes as important as the idea itself.
21. Pay careful attention to Rashi’s grammatical explanations, because they
are always part of his interpretation of the simple meaning of Scripture.
22. Carefully consider the profound spiritual and intellectual content that
is hidden in many of Rashi’s comments.
23. Check Rashi’s sources to see if he has altered them in order to
harmonize them with his own commentary.
24. Rashi considers
the cantillation marks (also known as ta’amei
hamikra or trop) to be part of
the simple meaning of Scripture. Therefore, consider the
possibility that Rashi’s comment is influenced by the cantillation marks.
25. At every stage of the process of analyzing a Rashi comment, engage in a
task we will call “reprocessing” of the previous stages. After reading a Rashi comment, we must reprocess the Scriptural text itself,
to see how it meshes with Rashi’s comment; after studying the words of one of
Rashi’s supercommentators, we must reprocess
Rashi’s own words, to see how they mesh with those of the
supercommentator.
26. Investigate alternate readings of the text of Rashi’s commentary.
Parashas Bereishis
THE TEXT
(The Torah describes the state of the Earth just
after the moment of Creation ex nihilo.)
(א:ב) וְהָאָרֶץ הָיְתָה
תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ...
(1:2)
And the earth was without form, and void...
RASHI
(Rashi focuses on the words תֹהוּ וָבֹהוּ
— tohu va’vohu, which are commonly translated as “without form and
void.” Rashi agrees that “vohu” means “void” or “empty,” but has a
different opinion about the translation of “tohu.”)
תֹּהוּ לָשׁוֹן תֵּמָה וְשִׁמָּמוֹן, שֶׁאָדָם
תּוֹהֶה וּמִשְׁתּוֹמֵם עַל בֹּהוּ שֶׁבָּהּ.
The word תֹהוּ — tohu is an
expression of wonderment and desolation, that a person wonders and is
astonished at the emptiness therein.
According to Rashi, the translation of the verse should
be:
The earth was astonishingly empty...
Even though, at that time, there were no people or creatures of any kind who could actually have been astonished at the emptiness, we can say that the Torah is describing the desolation in the terms that a person would use, if there had been a person there to experience it: if a person had been present, he or she would have been astonished at the emptiness.
QUESTION
Why does the Torah describe the emptiness at the time of Creation in terms of how a person, then non-existent, would react to it? Why doesn’t the Torah describe the phenomenon according to its actual essence?
RELEVANT PRINCIPLES
a. Pay careful attention to Rashi’s translation
and derivation of specific words in the Torah, because they reveal his opinion
about the simple meaning of Scripture.
b. When faced with a difficult Rashi comment, look for clarification in other Rashi comments that touch on related topics.
AN ANSWER
Regarding the
fourth day of Creation, the Torah says:
"Let
there be luminaries in the expanse of the heavens...” (Bereishis
1:14)
Rashi comments:
They
were created on the first day, and on the fourth day He commanded them to be
suspended in the sky, and similarly, all the creations of heaven and earth were created on the first day,
and each one was fixed in its place on the day that was decreed upon it. This is what is written: es hashamayim — with the heavens, to include their
products, and v’es ha’aretz
— with the earth, to include its
products.
According to Rashi, in reality there was no emptiness on the first day of creation! Everything was created with the first utterance of “Bereishis.” Subsequently, there was only an appearance of emptiness, which would have been astonishing to a human observer, had a human been there to observe it. This is why the Torah said that the earth was “astonishingly empty” rather than simply saying that it was empty.
CONCLUSION
There are two important lessons that can be learned from the Torah’s choice of the words “astonishingly empty.”
a.
Although the Torah contains many
esoteric secrets, it has a level that is entirely for us, with our limited abilities and perceptions. This level is
called peshuto shel mikra, the simple
meaning of Scripture, and this is the level on which Rashi wrote his
commentary.
b.
There is no true emptiness in
this world! Even when the Torah describes the Earth’s primordial state, it does
not say that it was empty; it says only that it would have appeared to be empty to a limited human observer. This indicates an
important homiletical lesson. Inevitably, we all have moments when everything
seems to have failed, when our lives seem to be empty of success and joy. We
must remember that emptiness in Hashem’s world is an illusion. Even in
difficult times, everything that is necessary for us is available; it is just
temporarily hidden, waiting to be “fixed in its place on the day that was
decreed upon it.”
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