#*#*#*#*# (C) 2001, RashiYomi Inc. Dr Hendel President #*#*#*#*#
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| Rashi is Simple Version 2.0 |
| (C) RashiYomi Inc., Dr Hendel President |
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VERSE: Ex20-02a
RASHIS COVERED: Ex20-02a Dt05-15a Dt16-12a Dt24-18a Lv22-33a
Lv11-45a Nu15-41c Ex20-02a Ex29-46a
Lv25-38a Lv19-36d
==================== DATABASE METHODS ===========================
VERY BRIEF SUMMARY
------------------
There are only a dozen commandments where it mentions
the EXODUS from Egypt--that is, it states DO THESE
COMMANDMENTS AND REMEMBER THAT I, GOD, TOOK YOU OUT
OF EGYPT. There are 4 reasons for mentioning the Exodus:
(1) BE NICE TO SLAVES AND ORPHANS (cf Dt15-15,Dt05-15
Dt16-12, Dt24-18); (2) SANCTIFY YOURSELVES by avoiding ritual
impurity; (cf Lv22-33, Lv11-45, Nu15-41, Ex29-46).(3) AVOID
ANXIETY PRODUCING BUSINESS PRACTICES (Cf Lv25-38, Lv19-36)
(4) SERVE THE TRUE ONE UNIQUE GOD: (cf Ex20-01,Ex29-46)
All these practices were intrinsic to Egypt.
-----------------------------------------
TODAYS RASHI RULE: DATABASE METHODS
TODAYS RASHI SUBRULE: DATABASE METHODS
-----------------------------------------
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF RULE
-------------------------
One of Rashis main goals was to function as a Masorite:
A scholar who preserves the accuracy of the Biblical
text.
A primary vehicle for preserving the Biblical text is
noting RARITY. RARITY simply means that in some domain
of knowledge, Biblical language rarely uses certain
words or terms.
Examples of Biblical rarity are (a) Grammatical conjugations
that do not occur that often in Tnach; (b) Special topics
that occur in only a FEW of the Biblical commandments; (c)
grammatical roots that only occur a few times in the Bible.
I have coined the phrase: TO RASHI A TEXT--which means to
especially note all RARITY that occurs in that text. Rashi
will frequently NOT EXPLAIN this RARITY but simply NOTE IT.
As indicated this is the task of the Masorite.
For those who are familiar with Database theory this can
be succinctly formulated (See footnote *10)
STANDARD EXAMPLE
----------------
There are 613 BIblical commandments. But only a dozen
or so mention the Exodus. Hence the EXODUS is a Biblical
Rarity relative to the commandments. The list below shows
the dozen or so verses containing Biblical commandments.
In most of them Rashi comments on the emphasis that
----------------------------------------
God took us out of Egypt (Exodus) on
condition that we perform these commandments
----------------------------------------
STUDENT EXERCISES:
------------------
- Gather/find all Biblical commandments that mention
the Exodus
- How many such commandments do you have?
- Are there common themes to these Biblical commandments
RASHIS SOLUTION
---------------
Rashi did NOT have a solution! Rashi simply notes
the Rarity. In each of the dozen or so commandments
mentioning Egypt he mentions this Rarity.
Nevertheless by seeking underlying themes in these
commandments we enrich our understanding of Rashi
STANDARD REFERENCES FOR THIS RULE
---------------------------------
http://www.RashiYomi.com/database.htm
A definitive scholarly paper on Database methods with
many examples.
Todays example may be found at
http://www.RashiYomi.com/dt05-15a.htm
One can also find this example at the Rashi calendar
See http://www.RashiYomi.Com/egypt-5.htm
Or visit the Rashi calendar at
http://www.RashiYomi.com/calendar1.htm
The Exodus series was presented in August 2000
HOW TO USE THESE LISTS FOR SCHOOL PROJECTS
------------------------------------------
You can use the LISTS referenced above for
school projects. Here is how. If you are a
teacher then you can present rarity themes
and ask the students to perform the
3 student exercises listed above.
The students can then compare their analysis with that
of Rashis. This leads to greater appreciation of Rashi.
TODAYS EXAMPLE
--------------
We present the dozen or so commandments where
the exodus is mentioned. Footnotes elaborate further
=================================================================
VERSE COMMAND Why this commandment mentions the Exodus
======== ========== ============================================
Dt05-15a Slavery*1 Remember how you were a slave in Egypt
Dt15-15a Slavery*1 Give gifts to your slaves(Like God gave you)
Dt16-12a Slavery Remember the orphan widow levite etc
Dt24-18a Slavery Remember the poor and leave food for them
Lv22-33a Holiness*2 Be Holy (avoid the impurity methods of Egypt
Lv11-45a Holiness*2 Be Holy (avoid the impurity methods of Egypt
Nu15-41c Holiness Do all commandments; Separate from impurity
Ex20-02a One God*3 I am the one God despite various appearances
Ex29-46a One GOd Dwell with ME(God); Not with Egypt
Lv25-38a Anxiety*4 Dont take interest on loans
Lv19-36d Anxiety Dont have bad weights
NOTES
-----
*1 In other words a standard Egyptian practice was CLASS
DISTINCTIONS. This destroyed initiative and muffled
individuality. Therefore the Bible especially emphasizes
Egypt on commandments showing compassion to slaves, poor
widows and orphans
*2 A classical humiliation technique of Egypt was exposure
to dead animals, eating blood, visiting graves, idolatry
etc. This destroyed the personality. The BIble counteracts
this by emphasizing holiness *11
*3 We could classify this set of commandments with holiness.
The idea here is that Egypt assigned everyone a PLACE
based on THEIR god. In Judaism there is one God and all
are equally accessible to Him
*4 A classic technique of Egypt was use of business anxiety
measures such as loaning on interest or use of bad
weights. This destroyed the desire for excellence.
The overall goal of Egypt was destroying individuality
and creating a machine of people. Towards this end
they needed to humiliate people enough to destroy
their individuality.
---------------------- LONGER FOOTNOTES -------------------------
*10 This is a slightly technical footnote for those who know
SQL the accepted database standard for all
databases
------------------ HENDELS RARITY ALGORITHM -----------------
Let B=Bible= database with fields BIblical words,Verses
Let C=Commandments = Any domain of expertise
We suppose C enumerates Commandments, Verses of occurence
Then B x C, the Left Join of B and C contains the fields
Biblical Words, Verses they occur in, Which commandment it is
We want to measure how frequently certain words occur in
certain verses.
Let W be all words that occur in any Biblical commandment
The SQL statement is: SELECT distinct w FROM b X c;
We can now count the number of commandment verses where
each Biblical word occurs. The SQL statement is
SELECT w, count(verse) FROM w X b X c WHERE w in W;
The last Query produces a list of all words that occur
in Biblical commandments as well as their frequency.
Certain words like DO NOT occur in hundreds of commandments
Certain words like REPRODUCE only occur in one or two
commandments.
Rashi is not interested in these.
But certain words like EGYPT, REWARD etc occur in a dozen
or so commandments. These words and verses are where you
will find Rashis.
In the above algorithm certain extra intermediate steps
may eg produce tighter distinctnesses. We omit details
Similarly certain steps may be combined with subqueries.
Note the extreme elegance of the Hendel algorithm With
only 5 lines of compact code we have succinctly
described several 100 Rashis.
Praise be Him who Chose Them and Their Learning
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*11 A beautiful comment by the University of Rabbi Ishmael
occurs on this verse which further illustrates the
database method.
Rabbi Ishmaels school points out that among the dozen
rare commandments that mention Egypt all use the term
I AM GOD THAT took YOU OUT OF EGYPT.
Lv11-45a however uses the expression, I AM GOD
WHO elevated YOU FROM EGYPT. Thus there is emphasis
on ELEVATION from impurity to Holiness.
=================================================================
RASHI RULE USED: DOUBLE PARSHAS
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WARNING: The following additional references may be too wordy
However they frequently contain additional information & lists
The hyperlinks only work on the main website
Volume 14 Number 3
#*#*#*#*# (C) 2001, RashiYomi Inc. Dr Hendel President #*#*#*#*#
Volume 14 Number 3