Rashi

Rashi — Rabbi Shlomo Yitzchaki of Troyes in northern France — is simply *the* commentator of Jewish tradition. His commentaries on the Tanakh and the Babylonian Talmud are printed in nearly every edition of both, and no one begins the study of either without him.

The commentary on the Torah Rashi's [commentary on the Torah](/judaism/commentary) is a marvel of concision: he selects, from the vast sea of midrash and the plain sense (peshat), exactly what illuminates the verse, and no more. His opening comment on [Genesis 1](/judaism/tanakh/genesis/1) — asking why the Torah, a book of law, begins with creation rather than the first commandment — set the tone for a thousand years of study. His clear Hebrew and his French glosses (*la'azim*) also make his work a treasure for the history of language.

The commentary on the Talmud Equally indispensable is Rashi's running commentary on almost the entire Babylonian Talmud, which explains its terse, difficult Aramaic phrase by phrase. It is no exaggeration to say that without Rashi the Talmud would be closed to most students; with him it is opened. His grandsons and their circle — the Tosafists — built the next great layer of Talmud commentary upon his foundation.

Life and times Rashi lived through the massacres of the First Crusade (1096), which devastated the Jewish communities of the Rhineland; his later writings bear the grief of that time. He earned his living, by tradition, as a vintner, and taught without seeking office or wealth.

Legacy Rashi is honoured across every stream of Judaism as the gateway to the sources. The semi-cursive typeface in which his commentary is traditionally printed is still called "Rashi script." His fusion of peshat and midrash, learning worn lightly, remains the model of the Jewish teacher.