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      3. RASHI METHOD: GRAMMAR
      BRIEF EXPLANATION: Rashi explains verses using grammar principles, that is, rules which relate reproducable word form to word meaning. Grammatical rules neatly fall into 3 categories
      • (a) the rules governing conjugation of individual words,Biblical roots,
      • (b) the rules governing collections of words,clauses, sentences
      • (c) miscellaneous grammatical, or form-meaning, rules.
      This examples applies to Rashis Ex08-22b
      URL Reference: (c) http://www.Rashiyomi.com/w35n3.htm
      Brief Summary: Behold [if] we sacrifice to God, which is an abomination to Egypt, will they not stone us?

Today, students of the Bible learn grammar from Biblical Hebrew grammar textbooks. These textbooks organize material by topics. Grammatical topics include a) verb mood and conjugation, b) plurality agreement, c) pronoun reference, d) subject-verb-object sequencing, e) sentence structure and type and many other topics.

However in Rashi's time gramamr was just beginning. There were no official grammatical textbooks and tables. One of Rashi's functions was to teach grammar. Rashi did not write a grammar textbook but instead left grammatical explanations appended to each verse.

In today's example Rashi explains rules governing the types of sentences. A recent book on Biblical Hebrew pointed out that a nifty way to teach Biblical grammar is to first study comparable gramamtical structures in English. Following this theme, in English there are three main sentence types: a) declarative sentences, b)commands and c) interrogative sentences. An interrogative sentence is indicated by a punctuation of a question mark at the end of the sentence. In Biblical Hebrew there are two main methods to indicate an interrogative sentence: 1st) One can append an interrogative hey to the beginning of the sentence. 2nd) One can, based on context, chose to interpret the sentence as interrogative. It emerges that Biblical Hebrew resembles English in one of its methods of indicating the interrogative - by using a punctuation sign (question mark or prefix hey in English and Hebrew respectively) and Biblical Hebrew innovates an additional method - interrogation based on context and interpretation - not resembling anything in English.

Applying this method to the translation of Ex08-22b we have the following translation And Moses said, It is not proper to do so; because our sacrificing to God is an abomination to the Egyptians; Indeed, if we sacrifice to God, which is abominable to the Egyptians, will they not stone us? Here Rashi avoids the declarative translation - they will not stone us and uses an interrogative translation - will they not stone us. The preference for the interrogative translation over the declarative translation is not dictated by punctuational means - a question mark or prefix hey - but rather is an interpretation choice which makes the meaning of the verse clearest. 


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