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    9. RASHI METHOD: SPREADSHEETS
    BRIEF EXPLANATION: The common denominator of the 3 submethods of the Spreadsheet method is that inferences are made from non textual material. The 3 submethods are as follows:
    • Spreadsheet: Rashi makes inferences of a numerical nature that can be summarized in a traditional spreadsheet
    • Geometric: Rashi clarifies a Biblical text using descriptions of geometric diagrams
    • Fill-ins: Rashi supplies either real-world background material or indicates real-world inferences from a verse. The emphasis here is on the real-world, non-textual nature of the material.
    This example applies to Rashis Dt21-02b
    URL Reference: (c) http://www.Rashiyomi.com/rule1305.htm
    Brief Summary: Measure FROM the corpse (FROM his head FROM his nose) TO each of the nearby cities.

Verse Dt21-02 discussing the ceremony when a dead body with unknown killer is found states Then your elders and your judges shall come forth, and they shall measure to the cities which are surround the corpse; The word measure refers to a mathematical function requiring two arguments, the two points (a) from which you measure and (b)to which you measure. But as the underlined words indicate the above verse only indicates one of the two mathematical arguments: the place to which you measure. It does not explicitly indicate the place from which you measure. Hence Rashi clarifies The elders measure from the corpse to the surrounding cities. Since this Rashi clarifies a mathematical requirement we classify it as a NonVerse-Spreadsheet Rashi.

    Advanced Rashi: Rambam, Laws of Murder, Chapter 9, gives further mathematical details which supplement Rashi:
  • If the corpse is beheaded you measure from the head not from the rest of the body. (Furthermore, if the corpse is beheaded you first reunite the body and head and then measure).
  • In any event you measure from the nose (the indicator of life and death).
  • If multiple bodies were found one on top of the other we measure from them as they are.

Rashi inferred that we measure from the corpse since Dt21-03 indicates that the purpose of the measurement is to find the distance from the corpse to the city. Rambam inferred that we measure from the head and from the nose based on logic since the head and nose are the points by which life can be recognized and it makes most sense to measure from them.


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