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Their presence in Rashis on Parshath Lech LeChaH Volume 17, Number 8 This weeks Weekly Rashi with Hebrew/English source tables will be accessible, on Sunday, at http://www.Rashiyomi.com/rule1708.htm (c) RashiYomi Incorporated, Dr. Hendel, President, Nov 3, 2011 Visit the Rashi website http://www.Rashiyomi.com The goal of this Weekly Rashi Digest is to use the weekly Torah portion to expose students at all levels to the ten major methods of commentary used by Rashi. It is hoped that continual weekly exposure to these ten major methods will enable students of all levels to acquire a familiarity and facility with the major exegetical methods. Although I frequently use my own English translations of biblical verses and Rashi comments, the Hebrew and English translations in the source tables are derived from online parshah files at chabad.org who in turn acknowledges the Judaica Press Complete Tanach, copyright by Judaica Press.
Verse Gn16-12a discussing Ishmael states And he shall be a wild human his hand shall be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the face of all his brethren.' Rashi notes that the underlined words, a wild human references verses Gn21-20 discussing Ishmael's dwelling in the deserts where he was known as a hunter. Hence the Rashi comment The angel's promise to Hagar, Gn16-12a that her son Ishmael would be a wild man references Gn21-20:21 which describes Ishmael as a desert archer.
Most people know that the Biblical meaning of a word is determined by its underlying three-letter root. The Biblical root can be conjugated in different a) persons, b) tenses, c) pluralities, d) genders, e) constructions and f) modalities. For example I watched has a different conjugation then I will be watched even though both phrases will use the same 3 letter Hebrew root. Additionally, a three letter root can take on new meaning based on the connective preposition used with it. For example the Hebrew root Ayin-Beth-Resh normally means pass over. However when this root is used with the Hebrew connective, Beth which means in, it means pass through. Hence the Rashi-suggested translation of verse Gn12-06a which states And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Shechem, unto the terebinth of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land. There are many Biblical verses illustrating this usage: For example verse Nu14-07 discussing the evaluation of the spies of Israel states the land we passed through is very very good. Similarly verse Nu20-18 is translated Edom told Israel 'Don't pass through my land...'. Many other examples can be found with standard search engines or Biblical Konkordances.
Rashi lived before the era of Grammatical textbooks. Hence one of his functions was to teach the rules of grammatical conjugation similar to modern textbooks. A fundamental principle in all languages is agreement. Subjects and verbs must agree in gender and plurality. Changing agreement between subjects and verbs can often indicate supplemental meaning. Verses Gn12-14:16 discussing Abraham's arrival in Egypt with his beautiful wife Sarah illustrates this. The verse(s) state And it came to pass, that, when Abram came to Egypt, the Egyptians, they saw the woman that she was very pretty. The princes of Pharaoh, they saw her, and they praised her to Pharaoh; and the woman was taken to Pharaoh’s palace. And he [Pharoh] treated Abram well for her sake; and he had sheep, and oxen, and male asses, and menservants, and maidservants, and female asses, and camels. Rashi, commenting on the changing plural-singular comments as indicated in the bracketed phrases, states that It was Pharoh himself who treated Abraham nicely. Perhaps there is a subtle hint here that the Egyptian people knew that attractive women were taken as wives and their male relatives treated nicely. The Egyptian people did not participate in treating Abraham nicely because they didn't like this custom. After all, if their wife was attractive they were next for such treatment. Rather the driving force of all this behavior came form the King himself.
The table below presents presents two contradictory verses. Both verses speak about Abraham's relationship with his father. The underlined words highlight the contradiction. One verse says leave ...the house of your father while the other verse states you will return peacefully to your fathers Which is it? Was Abraham's father something to avoid or something to join with? Rashi simply resolves this using the 2 Stages method: Abraham's father was initially a sinner. At that time God told Abraham to leave his father. But later in life Abraham's father repented at which point God promised him You will peacefully return to your fathers.
Background: Certain Biblical verses are written with one text but read with an alternate text. We call such verses read-written verses. The Masters of the Masoretic Text carefully preserved these written-read verses. We treat these written-read verses as two readings of the same Biblical text. The following Rashi shows how this is applied. The table below presents presents two contradictory verses (Actually two contradictory ways of reading the same verse). Both verses speak about leaving the Ark The underlined words highlight the contradiction. One reading of the verse says let the animals out of the Ark while the other verse states force them out of the Ark. Which is it? Were the animals let out of the Ark or were they forced out of the Ark. Rashi simply resolves this using the 2 Stages method: Noah first let the animals leave. But if they didn't voluntarily leave Noah forced them to leave.
Certain Biblical paragraphs are stated in a example form. In other words an example of a law is stated rather than the full general rule. The reader's task is to generalize the example. The idea that all Biblical laws should be perceived as examples (unless otherwise indicated) is explicitly stated by Rashi (Pesachim 6.). This is a rule of style since the rule requires that a text be perceived as an example rather than interpreted literally. The Rabbi Ishmael style rules govern the interpretation of style. Verse Gn16-03b discussing Abraham's actions due to lack of children states Now Sarai Abram’s wife bore him no children; and she had a maid servant, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said to Abram, Behold now, the Lord has prevented me from bearing; I beg you, go in to my maid; it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. And Sarai Abram’s wife took Hagar her maid the Egyptian, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife. The Rabbi Ishmael example rule requires generalization of this passage. In this case we simply generalize from Abram to all people: afer any person lives 10 years without children they should take another wife. Advanced Rashi: Some participants on my list demur to my using the Rabbi Ishmael style rules on non-legal passages. But as the example above shows this is justified. Interestingly, it would consequently appear, that this 10-year rule is Biblical in authority and derived from this passage.
We have explained in our article Biblical Formatting located on the world wide web at http://www.Rashiyomi.com/biblicalformatting.pdf, that the Biblical Author indicated bullets by using repeating keywords. That is, if a modern author wanted to get a point across using bullets - a list of similar but contrastive items - then the Biblical Author would use repeating keywords. Today's verse illustrates this principle.
We ask the following database query: When God prophesies does he use accompanying symbols? The reader is encouraged to perform the query using a standard Biblical Konnkordance or search engine. This database query yields the list below. The list justifies the following Rashi inference: When God prophesies he uses accompanying symbols reinforcing the prohpetic message. For example God prophesied to Abraham about the exile and alien status of his children in foreign lands. God accompanied this prohpecy with a dark dream to symbolize the darkness of exile. The list below presents the results of the database query.
Certain groups of words may reflect one geometric model. Several examples are presented below.
As the year progresses we will expand this list.
The so-called convenant of the cuts between God and Israel Gn15-09:20 required Abraham to take 3 animals - 3 calves, 3 goats and 3 rams - and two birds. Abraham cut the animals in half but did not cut the birds. These 3 animals symbolized nations involved in power whether nations known for their work and productivity (calf-ox family), nations known for their leadership capacity (ram vs. sheep), or nations known for their stubbornness and tenacity in sticking to their traditions and culture (goat.) By splitting these animals in half Abraham symbolized that the nations of power would ultimately split up and vanish. On the other hands nations of the spirit (birds, creatures of the winds and spirit) despite their lack of power, were not split, symbolically affirming they would survive. And indeed historically, the Jews, a people of the spirit, have survived, while many more powerful nations have been split up. The secret of the Jews is that they are bonded by a spiritual commonality rather than by a geo-cultural-political commonality.
Conclusion
This week's parshah contains examples of all the Rashi methods. Visit the RashiYomi website at http://www.Rashiyomi.com for further details and examples. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||