Guidelines for Poetic Verses:#8 of 10
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# 10 YEAR Ayelet DAILY-RASHI-YOMI CYCLE #
# Oct 24, 2000 #
# Rashis 366-367 Of 7800 (4.6%) #
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We finish this poetry series with a complicated example:
The farewell blessing by Moses to the Jews--Dt32-02:05.
We will find here 4 distinct stages to the God-Jewish relationship
* God sought to give the Torah to the Non Jewish nations
* Only Israel wanted the Torah
* The Torah was given eternally
* The Jews continually accept and renew the Torah
Because of the complexity these verses will take a few days
OVERVIEW:
--------
RULE: We have frequently indicated that POETIC verses are
governed by the Rabbi Ishmael rule of CONTEXT. Very often poetic
verses REPEAT the same theme several times. In interpeting these
verses the following guiding principles are helpful:
GUIDELINES FOR INTERPRETING POETIC VERSES
-----------------------------------------
* First, find the overall UNIFYING principle
* Next, try and recognize the WORDS that YOU do KNOW
* Further try and find the SPECIAL NUANCES in the words you know
* Then infer the meanings of other words using PARALLEL STRUCTURE
* Try and find all SUBCATEGORIES of the UNIFYING theme
* Make a ONE TO ONE CORRESPONDENCE between the subcategories of
The unifying theme and repeated stanzas of the verse based on
the nuances you recognize in the repeated words.
In a nutshell whereas legal language is analytic, poetic language
is evocative The phrases dont define properties by themselves but
rather evoke an image. BUT THE PHRASES IN CONTEXT DO DEFINE A
PRECISE MEANING.
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VERSE: Dt33-04 Dt33-05
In these two verses we use the principle of PARALLEL STRUCTURE
Here are the PARALLELISMS in these two verses
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Moses commanded to us the Torah
----- --------- Jacob their inheritance
*1 *2
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NOTES
*1 I have reversed the order of words so that the parallelism
can be clearly seen
*2 Rashi points out that the EMPHASIS is not so much on
receiving the Torah as it is on the fact that the torah is
an ETERNAL INHERITANCE (ie the Jews accepted the Torah
permanantly)
Here is the next verse
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And God was a King in Israel
when the elders gathered
*1 *2
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NOTES
*1 Again Rashi emphasizes the contrast: Not only was God
a King **in** Israel, but he was also a King ETERNALLY
(**whenever the Jews gathered)
*2 Rashi points out that acceptance of God was not a >herd
acceptance< but rather an >organized acceptance< with elected
representatives and the community.
We will finish this interpretation of this set of verses
tomorrow.
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