Though Rashi, as I said, had not a creative intellect, he yet had all the qualities of a commentator. First of all, he possessed clearness, the chief requisite for a commentary, which undertakes to explain a work unintelligible to its readers. "To write like Rashi" has become a proverbial expression for "to write clearly and intelligibly." Rashi always or nearly always uses the expression one expects. He finds the explanation that obtrudes itself because it is simple and easy; he excels in unravelling [unraveling sic] difficulties and illuminating obscurities. To facilitate comprehension by the reader Rashi resorted to the use of pictures and diagrams, some of which still appear in his Talmudic commentary, though a number have been suppressed by the editors. Once, when asked for the explanation of a difficult passage in Ezekiel, he replied that he had nothing to add to what he had said in his commentary, but he would send a diagram which would render the text more intelligible. It is remarkable with what ease, even without the aid of illustrations, he unravelled [unraveled sic] the chapters of Ezekiel in which the Prophet describes the Temple of his fancy; or the equally complicated chapters of Exodus which set forth the plan of the Tabernacle. Essentially this power of exposition is the attribute of intelligent insight. Rashi's was the clearest, the most transparent mind-no clouds nor shadows, no ambiguities, no evasions. He leaves nothing to be taken for granted, he makes no mental reservations. He is clearness and transparency itself. But Rashi's language is not merely clear; it is extremely precise. It says with accuracy exactly what it sets out to say. Rashi did not hesitate sometimes to coin new words for the sake of conveying his thought. He always heeded the connotation of a word, and took the context into account. Once, in citing a Talmudic explanation of a verse in Jeremiah, he rejected it, because it did not square with the development of the thought; and often he would not accept an interpretation, because a word in the text was given a meaning which it did not have in any other passage. He grasped, and rendered in turn with perfect accuracy, shades of meaning and subtleties of language; and the fine expression of relations difficult to solve surprises and charms the reader by its precision.