This Rashi is continued from above in rule #1, references.

Today Hebrew grammar is well understood and there are many books on it. Rashi, however, lived before the age of grammar books. A major Rashi method is therefore the teaching of basic grammar.

Many students belittle this aspect of Rashi. They erroneously think that because of modern methods we know more. However Rashi will frequently focus on rare grammatical points not covered in conventional textbooks.

There are many classical aspects to grammar whether in Hebrew or other languages. They include
• The rules for conjugating verbs. These rules govern how you differentiate person, plurality, tense, mode, gender, mood, and designation of the objects and indirect objects of the verb. For example how do you conjugate, in any language, I sang, we will sing, we wish to sing, she sang it.
• Rules of agreement. For example agreement of subject and verb, of noun and adjective; whether agreement in gender or plurality.
• Rules of Pronoun reference.
• Rules of word sequence. This is a beautiful topic which is not always covered in classical grammatical textbooks.

Today we cover the rule of euphemism which allows change of person and plurality in pronouns for reasons of social discretin.

Verse Nu11-15b, discussing Moses' reaction to God's anger on the behavior of the Jewish people's complaints states If you [God] do this to me [to make me alone deal with all national complaints] then please kill me if I find grace in your eyes so that I don't see my suffering. We have shown above in rule #1, references, based on analogy with similar statements in other verses, that the Bible really intended please kill me if I find grace in your eyes so that I don't see their suffering.

Here Rashi uses the universal rule of euphemism. Euphemism allows substitution of different persons in pronouns to place distance from a bad thought. Here their suffering a first-person-plural phrase is replaced with my suffering a first-person-singular phrase. By not uttering the word their Moses places distance from the expected punishment that will befall the Jews.

Euphemism is a universal grammatical rule. A simple well known example in English is use of the plural they for the singular his/her. Similarly in speaking about personal problems one might use the third person.

Advanced Rashi: Rashi notes that there are 18 uses of euphemism in the Bible. The Hebrew idiom for euphemism literally means the fix of the scribes. This literal translation has suggested to some people that the original biblical text was different but the Rabbis changed it.

But euphemism is not a biblical midrashic category! It is a universal grammatical rule used in all languages. To assume that the original biblical text did not use it is to assume God is coarse but the Talmudic sages fixed God's coarseness. This is rediculous. The truth of the matter is that God in the Bible uses all rules of grammar including euphemisms.

Here is another way of looking at this. There are several rules governing use of person - I, you, he. One rule deals with who is using it. But another rule deals with deliberate deviations to avoid emotionally painful statements. Both these approaches are valid! Therefore we need not see any problem in God using euphemism.

On a very deep philosophical level this use by God of euphemism points to a controversy between Judaism and Kant. Judaism believes that Peace is God's name while truth is only God's seal. Kant however believed that truth is paramount. But then we immediately see that the Jewish world view sees nothing wrong, on the contrary, sees something right, in God deviating from the rules of pronouns for the sake of peace. By contrast Kant, to whom truth was paramount, doesn't "understand" how a perfect God could chose peace over Truth. Thus our affirmation that the original Bible was written with these euphemism's is simply an affirmation that Judaism sees peace as taking precedence over truth.