Leningrad Codex carpet page, 1010 CE · public domain

Judaism

Tradition·Founded c. 1000 BCE·est. ~15 million worldwide

Judaism → 8 branches

Branch
Scripture of Judaism

Rashi.

He answers the question a reader is about to ask, and writes I do not know when he does not. His grandsons became the Tosafists who argue with him in the outer margin, so the family disagreement is printed around every page.

LanguageHebrew, with about a thousand Old French glosses now used as a source for medieval French
Composed1040–1105, Troyes; a wine grower by trade
What it holdsCommentary on the whole Tanakh and on almost the entire Talmud
How it is usedPrinted on the inner margin of every page. A child's first commentary and a scholar's last
Understanding it — context, not catechism: how this passage is held

Shlomo Yitzchaki of Troyes wrote the commentary that every Jewish child meets first and every scholar keeps open, and its power is its restraint. He explains the word the reader has just stumbled on, gives the plain sense before the homiletic one, quotes midrash selectively and says when he is doing so, and — famously — writes that he does not know the meaning of a passage rather than manufacturing one. Around a thousand Old French words appear in Hebrew letters as glosses, and Romance philologists use them as evidence for eleventh-century French pronunciation. He made his living from vineyards. His three daughters were learned and their husbands and sons became the Tosafists, who printed their objections to him in the outer margin of the Talmud page, so that the standard page a student opens has Rashi arguing with the text on one side and his own grandsons arguing with him on the other. The first dated Hebrew book ever printed, in 1475, was Rashi on the Torah.

The same ground, other faiths

claims that share this one's ideas
T The great disciples. Buddhism · figure Meet them →
The Shatkhandagama, and the lost canon. Jainism Open the book →
The hafiz. Islam Open the book →
The Guru now lives in the book and the body. Sikhism · core tenet Go deeper →
Z Zhu Xi. Confucianism · figure Meet them →
Motoori Norinaga's commentary. Shinto Open the book →

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