Concepts of Scripture in the School of Rashi 107distinctions to be made between the hermeneutics of ancient midrashim
and early medieval midrashim, these are merely distinctions of degree, and
they are by and large quite similar. However, by “leaping” — vertically — out
of the midrashic frame of mind (or by “thinking outside the midrashic
box,” if you prefer), the peshat exegetes forged a completely new universe of
contextual, literary (and occasionally historical) discourse. Indeed, within
a generation, Rashi’s distinction paved the way for a fully contextual exege-
sis ( peshat) practiced by R. Yosef Kara, Rashbam, R. Eliezer of Beaugency,
and others.
Whereas the midrash-generating rabbis of the ancient and early medi-
eval world envisioned Torah as an omnisignifi cant message encompassing
God’s will as revealed through both Written and Oral Torah, what might be
said of contextual-peshat exegetes who imagined a “plain meaning” level of
Scripture that embodied no necessary or inherent relationship to rabbinic
tradition? Would their conception of Scripture be in essence a medieval
precursor to modern historical-critical and/or literary biblical scholarship,
or would it develop some degree of religious sensibility? If the latter, to
what degree would it be in conversation with ancient rabbinic imagination,
and to what degree would it forge its own unique contribution to the pano-
ply of conceptions of Scripture that have manifested themselves since an-
tiquity and continued into modern times? Let us survey some of the most
prominent peshat commentators in an eff ort to answer these key questions.
One European peshat exegete was R. Yosef Kara (c. late 11th century),
who actually hailed from Provence and moved north to Champagne coun-
try to study with Rashi. Becoming part of Rashi’s immediate circle, Kara
was one of the principal architects of the new peshat exegesis. As we shall
see, he envisioned what has been termed by the contemporary Israeli bibli-
cal scholar Uriel Simon a “religious signifi cance of the peshat.”18 Kara is
well aware of the distinction between midrashic and peshat exegesis and
suggests that a reader can fi nd religious meaning also in the latter. Con-
sider for a moment Kara’s interpretation of 1 Samuel 1:17. Kara’s long com-
ment is ultimately contextual in nature; the following excerpt is essentially
a brief aside that is likely rooted in an oral response to a student who had
suggested a midrashic interpretation of the passage:
Know well, that when Scripture was written, it was written completely,
with every explanation and need taken care of, so that future generations
would not stumble in it. In its place, it lacks nothing. Moreover, one does
not need to bring proofs from another place, and certainly not midrash,