Elie Wiesel on Rashi, the Great Premodern Commentator
Most readers of this blog will be familiar with Rashi, the great biblical and Talmudic commentator of the Middle Ages. Not too long ago I posted a link to Rashi's classic commentary on the Hebrew Bible available online (click here). Today I received the news that Elie Wiesel has a new book on Rashi (click here). Here is a short video, in which Wiesel makes a few comments about Rashi's significance. Enjoy!
Rashi by Elie Wiesel from Tablet Magazine on Vimeo.
posted by S and C at 12:37 PM
1 Comments:
Beautiful! Though I don't know why it's always important for people to conceive of Rashi as a Biblical commentator as well. He wrote a commentary on the Bible and, while it is certainly "simple enough for a child", it could hardly be classed as "profound enough for scholars". Somehow, Rashi gained a reputation for always clearly elucidating the text, but the majority of his Biblical commentary is midrashic and, to my thinking, irrelevant.
Ah, but Rashi's Talmudic commentary! Now, that is a masterpiece. And to think that he was able to work his way through the Babylonian Talmud without Rashi's commentary to guide him...
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