text · B0101
Rashi on the Torah פירוש רש"י על התורה
The most studied Jewish book after the Tanakh itself: the commentary through which, for nine centuries, virtually every Jewish child has first met the Torah's meaning. Its method — peshat disciplined by the midrash that answers the verse's own difficulty — made the whole midrashic inheritance portable. Also a landmark of the chain's new medium: a Rashi commentary was the first dated printed Hebrew book.
I. Who
- Hebrew
- פירוש רש"י על התורה
- Also known as
- Perush Rashi al HaTorah
- Era
- rishonim
II. When
- Traditional
- written by 4865 AM
- Academic
- late 11th century, Troyes
- Duration
- ≈35 years
- Precision
- approximate
IV. What
- Language
- Hebrew
- Redaction
- Written by Rashi (Rashi) at Troyes; text transmitted with copyists' accretions, so editions vary
- Structure
- A running gloss on the entire Chumash (and nearly all of Tanakh), verse by verse — plain sense first, with the aggadah "that settles the words of the verse" woven in.
V. How do we know
| Claim | Evidence | Confidence | Sources |
|---|---|---|---|
| Its opening comment — R' Yitzchak's question of why the Torah does not begin from "This month is for you," answered by "the power of His deeds He told His people" — announces the program: Scripture read through the tradition that receives it. | rabbinic | ★★★★★ | |
| A Rashi Torah commentary (Reggio di Calabria, 1475) is the first dated printed Hebrew book — the moment this atlas's chain of persons becomes, visibly, also a chain of presses. | external | ★★★★☆ | |
| The attribution is contemporary and familial: his grandson the Rashbam writes of "Rabbeinu Shlomo, my mother's father, illuminator of the eyes of the exile, who explained Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim" — the basis of the authorship edge drawn here. | rabbinic tradition | ★★★★★ |