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Their presence in Rashis on Parshath VaYeChi Volume 17, Number 17 This weeks Weekly Rashi with Hebrew/English source tables will be accessible, on Sunday, at http://www.Rashiyomi.com/rule1717.htm (c) RashiYomi Incorporated, Dr. Hendel, President, Jan 5 2012 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.
Rashi uses Gn48-09, discussing the blessing of Grandpa Jacob to his grandchild Ephraim, as the basis for a pun interpretation on Ho10-15,Ho11-01:03 which discusses the blessings that the prophets heaped on the newborn Israelite kingdom (which is called the Ephraim kingdom.)
The actual verse texts are as follows. Gn48-09 states And Joseph said to his father, They are my sons, whom God has given me in this place. And he said, Bring them, I beg you, to me, and I will bless them...Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel’s left hand... And he blessed them that day, saying, By you [as a model] shall Israel bless, saying, God make you as Ephraim Verses Ho10-15 - Ho11-01:03 state as follows (Note that the Rashi puns are given as parenthetical inserts for clarity:) So shall Beth-El[Israelite Kingdom] do to you because of your great wickedness; at dawn shall the king of Israel be cut off completely. When Israel was a child [New in world like Ephraim], then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt. As they called them, so they went from them; they sacrificed to the Baalim, and burned incense to carved idols. I gentled Ephraim,[pun on Ephraim=Jacob's son; Ephraim=Israelite Kingdom] taking him on his arms; [pun on Moses bearing Jews like nursemaid (Nu11-12)] but they knew not that I healed them. I drew them with human cords, with bands of love; and I was to them like those who take off the yoke from their jaws, and I laid food to them.
Advanced Rashi: There is an interesting twist: Typically Rashi explains the current verse in light of another verse while today Rashi explains another verse using the current verse. Note: Rashi has not deviated from the simple meaning of the Hosean verse. Rather Rashi correctly points out that the language chosen conjurs overlaying images of grandpa Jacob taking Ephraim and blessing him as an analogy to the gentle treatment that God had given Ephraim (and for which they are being punished for double crossing God). In other words Rashi sees pun nuances in the Hosean verses and defends this perspective using references.
When Rashi uses, what we may losely call, the hononym method, Rashi does not explain new meaning but rather shows an underlying unity in disparate meanings. Rashi will frequently do this by showing an underlying unity in the varied meanings of a Biblical root. In my article Peshat and Derash I advocate enriching the Rashi explanation using a technique of parallel nifty translations in modern English. Today's examples show this. The Hebrew root Nun-Sin-Aleph can mean a) lift b) King c) stature, d) fire, e) donate f) pray g) cloud and several more meanings. Rashi explains the underlying meaning as lift-height. Hence the meanings of a) lift, c) stature, d) fire (which lifts upward), f) prayer towards the God above, g) clouds on high and the b) King who stands above the nation. We suggest the punchy English translation stature to capture the nuances in verses such as Jb13-11, Shall not his stature make you afraid? or Jb31-23, ...and because of his stature I could do nothing. This punchy English translation captures the Rashi intuition of Nun-Sin-Aleph=height and relates it to modern English nuances. Rashi further explains stature / strength as referring to the priesthood / monarchy. To understand this we must use rule 7, format. Please read below for further insights into this Rashi.
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 the construct form. Languages must have a way of indicating belonging. In English this is done through the word of. In Hebrew it is done through a terminal Hebrew Tauv. Biblical Hebrew introduced the idea of an unspecified construct. The unspecified construct indicates a new concept. The list below gives some examples. Here is a simple example: The Hebrew Rayshith means head of. So the head of a nation would be indicated by the construct-head of - followed by the item it refers to - head of nation. When head of occurs by itself - a construct without the noun it modifies - it takes on a new meaning. It refers to the head of anything and hence means the choicest and best - that which is a head over everything. This basic idea of unspecified construct helps explain many of the examples in the list below.
We apply the above list to the translation of Gn49-22: Joseph is a branch fruitful in all locations; as fruitful as a branch by a well; whose shoots creep over the wall. Here the Patriarch Jacob praises Joseph for being fruitful - both socially and professionally - even in a non-Jewish environment. There is a subtle point here. Joseph was successful in Jewish matters- interpretation of dreams. Yet he remained successful even in a non-Jewish environment. And it wasn't just a matter of success but of extreme success as if he was flourishing among people who based their life on dreams and prophecy. Advanced Rashi: Rashi simply says The suffix Tauv is an elegance of language. Rashi does not give the elaborate explanation we give above. Why then did I inject into Rashi what I did? Why do I act as if my ideas really originated from Rashi? The answer is that this is not the only Rashi on terminal Tauv. Other Rashi's on terminal Tauvs such as the Rashis on Gn01-01 or Dt22-11 - beginning-of means choicest; woman-of means married woman - show us a general pattern and attitude of Rashi toward terminal tauv. Therefore, we feel justified in extending this approach of Rashi, found explicitly in other verses, to the present verse where Rashi is not as detailed. We believe this approach to Rashi - extending techniques and methods, explicitly stated in other verses to new situations - is proper, deep, and authentic to what Rashi really believed and meant.
The table below presents an aligned extract of verses or verselets in Gn49-27, Gn49-14 Both verses/verselets discuss relations of Jacob's children to animals. The alignment justifies the Rashi comment that: Other tribes are either compared to animals or blessed to be compared to animals. Benjamin however is told He will tear the wolf. Thus he himself is not a wolf but will destroy non-Jewish enemies who are like wolves.
The table below presents two contradictory verses/verselets. Both verses speak about the conquest of Schem The underlined words highlight the contradiction. One verse/verselet says Shimon and Levi came on the city by sword, killed the people and saved Dinah while the other verse/verselet says Jacob acquired Schem with his sword and bow. We see the contradiction Which is it? Did Jacob acquire the city or did Shimon and Levi acquire the city. Rashi simply resolves this using the 2 Aspects, 2 Stages method: 1st, the entire family, Jacob and his children, conspired to weaken the city by requiring circumcision (Gn34-05:18). 2nd, the city being weakened, Shimon and Levi came and saved Dinah from the city which couldn't fight back because they were helpless 3rd, Additionally, (not part of the original plan to weaken the city and save Dinah) Shimon and Levi without family consent decided to take revenge and kill the city where there sister was raped.(Gn34-25:26) 4th, although Jacob cursed Shimon and Levi for destroying the city (Gn34-30,Gn49-06), he did approve of weakening the city and presumably the city would have died out (at the hands of God) without Shimon and Levi taking the law into their own hands.
Advanced Rashi: Notice that both methods of resolving contradictions - two stages as well as two aspects - are used here. (1)Jacob's delegating authority to his (2) children who implemented the actions represents two aspects of the decision to make the Schemites circumcise. On the other hand (1)Jacob's approval of weakening the city by circumcision in order to be able to save Dinah, and (2) Shimon and Levi's taking revenge on the whole city are two stages, - the first stage was approved (weakening and saving) while the second stage (revenge) was not approved. It is interesting that the contradictions we have been citing are brought in a gloss addition to Rashi by the Raam. The Raam's comments form the basis for classifying this Rashi as contradiction. Rashi literally says With my sword and bow: With my wisdom and prayer. This has erroneously led people to think that Rashi is interpreting sword, bow as wisdom, prayer. By contrast I have interpreted Rashi as meaning: With my wisdom and prayer I waited for the whole family and organized the family so that we required circumcision for Dinah's marriage; the original plan was to weaken the city so that we could save Dinah and leave. Undoubtedly God would have killed off the city because of their weakened state. I however never authorized the slaying of innocent helpless people in an act of vengenance. So it follows that Jacob's sword refers to the ruse of weakening the city. We can even pun and note that sword is a male symbol and therefore my sword could refer to the requirement of circumcision by which the city was weakened. In summary: The main point is that Jacob did participate in initial discussions and had plans to weaken the city and save Dinah. Shimon and Levi went further and killed off the city. Jacob disapproved of this but did not disapprove of the initial plan. Since Jacob approved of the initial plan he can take credit for acquiring Schem.
Certain Biblical paragraphs are stated in a Theme-Development form. In other words a broad general idea is stated first followed by the development of this broad general theme in specific details. The Theme-Detail form creates a unified paragraph. The style rule requires that we interpret the general theme with special focus on the attributes of the illustrative detail selected. Today's example illustrates this as shown below.
Rashi comments: The two sentences form one paragraph. That is the statement in the theme sentence and his sons did to him according as he commanded them refers to the details mentioned in the second sentence his sons carried himm to Canaan and buried him. The Davka English translation facilitates this Rashi interpretation by inserting the underlined, subordinating conjunction, for which explicitly connects the two sentences. The use of such punchy textual interpolations hi-lighting Rashi translations was first advocated in my article Peshat and Derash.
An author who wishes to communicate several similar ideas will use a paragraph as a vehicle or container to collect these ideas. The paragraph is a formatting technique. By using a paragraph - for example by surrounding the paragraph with white space or by using indentation - the author thereby indicates that all items in the paragraph are related, reflecting a common theme.
We ask the following database query: How are oaths taken in the Bible. 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: Oaths are accompanied by symbolic expressions of seriousness such as for example: a) bonding parties, b) symbolic borders, c) transfer of ownership, d) nearness to holy objects. The list below presents the results of the database query and shows examples.
Verse Gn48-17a discussing Joseph's removal of his father's hand from his son's head states And when Joseph saw that his father was laying his right hand upon the head of Ephraim, it displeased him, and he supported his father's hand, to remove it from Ephraim's head unto Manasseh's head.
Verse Gn49-27a states Benjamin, is a wolf about to prey, .... Before citing Rashi we note that wolves are animals that are symbolic of a strong socially structured group that protects its young. In other words, while other animals are better at preying, wolves are noted for their strong protection of their young and for their very strong social hierarchy. Hence the Rashi: King Saul was a Benjamenite. He was a prototype wolf. He was the head of the hierarchy, the King. He also protected his children the children of Israel by winning many wars for them (1S14-47.)
Conclusion
This week's special issue contains examples of all Rashi methods. Visit the RashiYomi website at http://www.Rashiyomi.com for further details and examples. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||