Commemorating Rashi [Rachi]
Rabbi Shlomo (Solomon) Yitzchaki
900th Memorial Events & Resources

France is already into the middle of its Rashi 900th Memorial events: seminars, exhibitions, tours, academic and scholarly lectures and events, although the main events will be in the last week of June, in Troyes. The Zalman Shazar Centre is also holding a Memorial lecture session in July.

Rashi the Hebrew, Talmud and Torah scholar – rabbi – teacher - responsa giver has not bequeathed us a great deal of personal information about himself or his life. He was respected in his own time for his exemplary goodness and distinguished scholarship, and his life's work is the anchorage of Talmudic exegesis and Torah commentary. However, he was not a writer of books, putting the pieces together, nor was he a stylist, and his "pshat" or "natural" exegesis as a grammarian / lexicographer / commentator was compacted and devised for the purpose of elucidation. His expansion of this into midrashic and comparative exegesis was to enable the wider public to understand the text.

The dearth of adequate biographical material is probably why so many legends and inaccuracies can be found about when and where he lived or travelled, whom he met or consulted, and there are any number of fantastic stories about his life, responding to natural curiosity about this popular figure. However, he was essentially an eminently studious, simple, humble and essentially intellectual figure and that constituted his life. If you have the time to read the Gutenberg etext version of Maurice Liber's outstanding book, Rashi the man and the scholar will emerge with dignity from the confusion.

There is currently no full memorial website, but there are dedicated study websites in both English and Ivrit, as well as extensive biographies and support materials.

I. ENGLISH

Memorial & Biographical

1. Rashi memorial - Troyes: Partial biography, illustrated
   http://www.ot-troyes.fr/welcome/index406-uk.html or
   http://www.tourisme-troyes.com/welcome/index406-uk.html
2. Anniversary features planned by city of Troyes
   http://www.jta.org/page_view_story.asp?intarticleid=13039&intcategoryid=5
   and
   http://209.58.241.91/judaism/keystojudaism/?disp_feature=THfav1.var
3. Biography, suitable for elementary school
   http://www.learn.jtsa.edu/topics/diduknow/sources/rashi.shtml
4. Timeline of Sages, with brief details
   http://ohr.edu/judaism/survey/survey6.htm
5. A few lines placing Rashi in the sequence of scholars and Sages with links to major references
   http://www.jewfaq.org/sages.htm
6. Biography, couple of links
   http://pages.cthome.net/hirsch/rashi.htm
7. Biography, bibliography
   http://www.sephardicstudies.org/rashi.html
8. Biography, life and works
   http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=121&letter=R
9. Biography, life and works, R. Louis Jacobs
   http://www.myjewishlearning.com/history_community/Medieval/MedThoughtTO/Rashi.htm
10. Helpful biography, extent and limits of commentary, origin of Rashi script by printers
    http://rashi.biography.ms/
11. Another helpful biography
    http://www.jewishgates.org/personalities/rashi.stm
12. Family tree
    http://www.loebtree.com/rashi.html

Rashi Study Resources

1. Rashi resources
   http://www.rashiyomi.com/
2. Learning Rashi made easy
   http://reading.rashi.myjewishsoftware.com/learnhebrew.asp?id=110&name=reading+rashi
3. Script charts, flash cards, reading & writing exercises
   http://www.torahschool.co.uk/KeySkills/RashiReadingCrashCourse.htm
4. Rashi of the Week
   http://www.torahschool.co.uk/KeySkills/Rashi%20of%20the%20Week/Rashi%20of%20the%20Week.htm
5. Professor Eliezer Segal's page shows where the Rashi commentary sits on the Talmud page; helpful tools and explanation
   http://www.acs.ucalgary.ca/~elsegal/TalmudMap/Rashi.html
6. A good explanation of who Rashi was and what he did - even a sample case he resolved - with bibliography. Motivating to study Rashi.
   http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/1105rashi.html
7. Gutenberg e-text project, republished from 1906: Life, works, influence, exegesis, extensive footnotes
   http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext02/rashi10.txt
8. 8. Rashi, Maurice Liber, (137pp) Translated from the French, JPS. Kahn - Gutenberg e-text project, new pdf version. Comprehensive and erudite work, excellent resource for understanding the age, the personality, nature of Rashi's exegesis, examples
   http://www.hiddenmysteries.org/freebooks/studies/rashi.pdf
   Also available in pages as an ebook
   http://www.bookrags.com/ebooks/3165/43.html
9. About exegesis
   http://www.myjewishlearning.com/texts/bible/Oveview_Bible_Commentary/GreensteinRashi.htm
10. Rashi's influence
    http://www.myjewishlearning.com/ideas_belief/LandIsrael/medieval_landisrael/RashiPolemics.htm
11. Contribution to Talmud study
    http://www.sacred-texts.com/jud/t10/ht114.htm
12. Matan Torah, according to Rashi
    http://ohr.edu/yhiy/article.php/991
13. JWIT - Rashi webquest [2003 - select a more challenging biography!]
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/teachingguide.htm
    Teaching Guide, goals, content objectives...
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/teachingguide.htm
    Mission page
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/introduction.htm
    Task page
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/task.htm
    Process
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/Process.htm
    Task Menu [7 activities]
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/Process.htm#Start
    Resources/Links
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/resources.htm
    Sample commentary and about Pshat
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/rashiparshanut.doc
    Rashi in brief, exercise and worksheets:
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/IDENTIFICATION%20DOCUMENT.doc [English]
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/rash.doc [Hebrew]
    Making a ppt about Rashi
    http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/activity%207.htm
14. 14. Rashi is simple: non-indexed grammatical methodology charts for Rashi, with examples
    http://listserv.shamash.org/archives/rashi-is-simple/rashi-is-simple.v17.n23
    start with
    http://listserv.shamash.org/archives/rashi-is-simple/rashi-is-simple.notebook
15. 15. Intelligent search, online
    http://www.tachash.org/metsudah/intro.html

Bibliography

Primary sources lists:

http://www.sephardicstudies.org/rashi.html
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/1105rashi.html
http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=121&letter=R

Secondary sources:

Hebrew reference book
http://www.antiqbook.com/boox/she/000000000004285.shtml

English commentary explained
http://www.artscroll.com/Books/SRAHS.html

Rashi, Chaim Pearl
http://www.halbanpublishers.com/rashi.htm

Extract from a book about Rashi
http://www.shemayisrael.co.il/parsha/bonchek/index.htm

DataJEM search for educational resource reviews
http://www.datajem.com/visitor/SearchResults.asp?stype=typesearch&subAll=yes&subn=Rashi&tn=

Related:

Historical fiction, good map of Troyes
http://www.rashisdaughters.com/

Video

RASHI: A LIGHT AFTER THE DARK AGES (1999)
http://milechai.com/product/Rashi.html

About the film
http://jwit.webinstituteforteachers.org/~bavrahamkatz/webquest/activity3.htm

II. HEBREW

Israeli Coins & Medals - Memorial Coin
http://www.isragift.co.il/asp/prod_info_heb.asp?prodID=71640233&lang=eng

Biographies, etc.

1. Biography
   http://mikranet.cet.ac.il/pages/item.asp?item=530 or http://lib.cet.ac.il/Pages/item.asp?item=530
   with shorter version
   http://lib.cet.ac.il/Pages/item.asp?item=7991
2. Simply worded bio, full page, 4 sections on different aspects
   http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%A8%D7%91%D7%99_%D7%A9%
   D7%9C%D7%9E%D7%94_%D7%99%D7%A6%D7%97%D7%A7%D7%99
3. Unvocalised bio
   http://www.amit.org.il/learning/toshba/rashi.doc
4. Dedicated Rashi site
   Educational content, but Hebrew is not vocalised
   http://planet.nana.co.il/kuvachi/index.html ;
   long biography (4 pages) and short bio
   http://planet.nana.co.il/kuvachi/?????.html : stories (not yet ready - lots of titles only!); piyyutim; the synagogue (not ready);
   sources (with quotes); the Crusades
5. Biography, contribution to exegesis
   http://moreshet.co.il/web/drashot/drashot2.asp?Modul=10&id=4723&kod=2500&kind=m&c=58
6. Biography; Rashi script chart; related links
   http://www.ynet.co.il/yaan/0,7340,L-21206-MjEyMDZfMzI3MjcxNjc0XzIxMzUyNQeqeq-FreeYaan,00.html
7. Rashi and French Jewish commentators
   http://mikranet.cet.ac.il/pages/item.asp?item=8914&rel=1
8. Biography with explanation of terms, letter chart
   http://www.mikragesher.org.il/dev/encyclopedia/200/rashi.htm

Rashi Study resources

1. Evelina de Rothschild School, Jerusalem

Dedicated educational project Rashi site with animations, visuals, large fonts, alternate Word doc versions, short interactive question pages with graphics:
http://rashi2us.tripod.com/ptihaaa.htm

The really big and annoying nuisance for each page is the quantity of Tripod adverts and side frames generated - save the Word versions for everything!!!!

Booklets for all kinds of exercises and background can be downloaded from the Contents Page (ptihaaa.htm), or you can follow the text links at the bottom sub-pages.
rationale, questions about his biography (vocalised large print scan appears above questions),
Flow chart page (email for the flow chart) which is readable in easy Hebrew, but not vocalised
http://rashi5us.tripod.com/tarsim.htm

Questions and exercises about the script - two different sections on it: why and what (including goals and a scanned dual alphabet) (Word version available)
http://rashi5us.tripod.com/ktav.htm

interactive exercises on his abbreviations, vocabulary and explanation pages, contradictory quotes pages, superfluous terms pages (not vocalised),
match the explanation pages (not vocalised), Dikduk pages (mezzuzah and more - not vocalised, but really large fonts and clear)

Links page - for the feedback, test yourself (8 questions and answers), picture gallery
Parsha combinations, according to Rashi (with Word versions)
Syntactical sentence completion by Rashi (Word versions available)

2. Snunit

Rashi script
http://www.snunit.org.il/toshba/upload/expansion/rashiA.html

Alphabet and Transcription exercise
http://www.snunit.org.il/toshba/upload/expansion/rashi.html

Bibliography
Otzar Hale'azim Latanach, Moche Catane

III. FRENCH

Biography & Memorial

1. Troyes municipal website
   http://www.ville-troyes.net/rubrique.php3?id_rubrique=35
   27th June - Memorial events. Special events Jan-Jun 2005
   http://www.ville-troyes.net/article.php3?id_article=232
2. National commemoration: Rashi Memorial Medal
   http://www.monnaiedeparis.fr/actualite/rachi.htm
3. Biography
   http://www.ville-troyes.net/article.php3?id_article=90
4. Biography (short)
   http://www.facsimile-editions.com/nf_french_translation.html
5. Introduction to the Works of Rashi, Moshe Catane z"l: sources, works, his daughters...
   http://www.lamed.fr/judaisme/OdysseesSpirituelles/1717.asp
6. Christian newspaper: Rashi's life, contribution to exegesis, Jewish quarter of Troyes, calendar of events in 2005
   http://www.la-croix.com/article/index.jsp?docId=2195205&rubId=4078
7. Myths and facts about Rashi
   http://www.lamed.fr/judaisme/Histoire/1271.asp
8. Jews of the Yonne
   http://www.alliancefr.com/culture/viey/lyonne.html
9. Rashi's successors, the Tosafists
   http://perso.magic.fr/relet/StLoup/Les_Protagonistes/les_successeurs_de_rachi.htm
10. Other Jewish scholars
    http://www.alliancefr.com/culture/viey/lyonne.html

Rashi Study Resources

1. Language of Rashi
   http://www.modia.org/lev-gompers/commentateurs/langue-rachi.html
2. Detailed introduction to Rashi rules - deconstructing Rashi! (dozens of supporting files with examples); transliteration of Rashi terms inside French translation by parsha
   http://www.modia.org/tora/rachi/rachiregles.html

Bibliography

Jewish Life in XIth Century France, Moshe Catane z"l
http://www.kodechonline.com/index.html?p2266.html