Rashi’s Citations of Moshe ha-Darshan

Among the contemporaries Rashi cites in his commentaries, Moshe ha-Darshan is quoted a relatively few, yet still significant, number of times: Rashi cites him by name 17 times in his Tanakh commentary¹ and twice in the Talmud commentary.² Moshe ha-Darshan was a scholar active in Provence in the first half of the 11th century, in the generation before Rashi. Though Provence was connected culturally to Tzarfat (northern France) where Rashi lived, especially in the 11th and 12th centuries, it was a distinct community. Rashi’s repeated citations of Moshe ha-Darshan point to the latter’s prominence. Moshe ha-Darshan’s beit midrash in the city of Narbonne, one of the oldest Jewish Provençal communities, apparently produced works that were influential and well-circulated.³ Most, though not all, further citations of Moshe ha-Darshan are made through citations of Rashi.⁴

There are essentially two ways Rashi uses what he knows of Moshe ha-Darshan: as a source for derash (homiletical interpretation) and as a linguistic tool. Both usages have implications for understanding Rashi’s method and for hints about Moshe ha-Darshan’s cultural world.

Moshe ha-Darshan as a source of derash

The primary way Rashi references Moshe ha-Darshan is as a source of derash. Rashi cites Moshe ha-Darshan’s midrash in one of three ways:

1. Generally, as in “from Moshe ha-Darshan,” (מ/ב/כדברי ר׳ משה הדרשן);
2. Specifically, as coming from Moshe’s work the Yesod (“Foundation”) (ומיסודו של ר׳ משה הדרשן [העתקתי]; ראיתי ביסודו של רבי משה הדרשן);

Methodologically, Rashi seems to have acquired his knowledge of Moshe ha-Darshan both textually (“through the words of” or “from the Yesod“) and orally (“in the name of”). It’s possible that Rashi specifies the Yesod because he was familiar with that work as a text, and the rest of the Moshe’s derashot he learned orally. Or it may be that Rashi simply doesn’t specify from other works he’s citing.

On Devorah, Rivkah’s nurse

A representative example of the way Rashi uses Moshe ha-Darshan’s derash is in explaining the identity of the Devorah mentioned in Bereshit 35:8.⁵ In that pasuk, it’s mentioned that Rivka’s nurse dies and is buried at Beit-El. Rivka’s nurse appears also in Bereshit 24:59, but her name, Devorah, is first given in Bereshit 35:8.⁶ Rashi asks, as he is wont to do, why this Devorah is associated (at the time of her death, at least) with the house of Ya’akov. The answer Rashi provides is that Devorah is none other than the trusted person whom Rivka sent to inform Ya’akov that he could return home from his stay with Lavan in the wake of Esav’s anger, as Rivka promises to do in Bereshit 27:45. Rashi adds to the explanation: מדברי ר׳ משה הדרשן למדתיה (“I learned this from the words of Moshe ha-Darshan”).⁷ In this case, he brings in Moshe ha-Darshan’s midrash to aptly respond to questions raised by the text. A potentially lost midrash provides a cogent answer to why Devorah, Rivka’s nurse, is mentioned in this pasuk.

I think it’s significant that Rashi considers Moshe ha-Darshan an authoritative transmitter of midrashic traditions: while there were classic collections of midrash, midrash as a genre was still open (within certain parameters) in Rashi’s time. Paradoxically, Rashi’s invocation of Moshe ha-Darshan’s authority simultaneously underscores the textualization of parshanut. Rashi uses both written and oral versions of Moshe ha-Darshan’s teachings, and preserves them in his own written commentaries. Apart from being of historical interest, more broadly, this helps us appreciate Rashi’s training, process, and reception.

Moshe ha-Darshan on language

Rashi also references Moshe ha-Darshan as a linguistic resource, similar to the way he refers (much more frequently) to Menachem b. Saruk and Dunash b. Labrat.⁸ Two of these involve Arabic cognates. The first is in his comment on Tehillim 45:2, in which the word mahir, which in the Hebrew of the Mikra, as in modern Israeli Hebrew, denotes speed, hastening, or swiftness, but in this verse seems to connote another meaning:

רָ֘חַ֤שׁ לִבִּ֨י ׀ דָּ֘בָ֤ר ט֗וֹב אֹמֵ֣ר אָ֭נִי מַעֲשַׂ֣י לְמֶ֑לֶךְ לְ֝שׁוֹנִ֗י עֵ֤ט ׀ סוֹפֵ֬ר מָהִֽיר׃

My heart stirs with pleasant words; I tell my deeds to a king; my tongue is the pen of a scribe who is mahir.⁹

Rashi on Tehillim 45:2

Rashi interprets the entire verse in the context of a poet presenting his poetry. Rashi then comments on the adjective mahir:

לשוני – צח בשירים כעט סופר מהיר, ראיתי ביסודו של רבי משה הדרשן מהיר בלשון ערבי בקי.

My tongue – Skillful at poetry as the pen of a scribe who is mahir; I have seen in the Yesod of Rabbi Moshe ha-Darshan that mahir in the Arabic language means knowledgable (baki).

In fact, this is exactly the meaning of the Arabic cognate (ﻣﻬﺮ): according to Hans Wehr, the standard classical Arabic to English dictionary, “to be skillful, adroit, dexterous, skilled, adept, proficient, expert, experienced, seasoned.”¹⁰ Compare this to what Jastrow has for the Hebrew baki: “expert, versed, familiar.”¹¹It’s interesting that Rashi sees froeign languages as having import for the understanding of Biblical Hebrew,¹² and uses the sources at his disposal to inform himself about them. Here, the effort aptly supports his reading of the pasuk.

The second time Rashi uses Arabic, via Moshe ha-Darshan, to inform his understanding is in his comment to Tehillim 68:17. The verse reads:

לָ֤מָּה ׀ תְּֽרַצְּדוּן֮ הָרִ֪ים גַּבְנֻ֫נִּ֥ים הָהָ֗ר חָמַ֣ד אֱלֹקים לְשִׁבְתּ֑וֹ אַף־ה’ יִשְׁכֹּ֥ן לָנֶֽצַח׃

Why lie in wait (teratzdun), protuberous mountains, for the mountain Gd desired as His seat, Hashem shall dwell there forever.

The verb in question here, teratzdun, occurs only once in Tanakh, in this verse.¹³ As part of his reading of the verse, Rashi comments:

ראיתי ביסודו של רבי משה הדרשן רצד הוא מארב בלשון ערבי, אבל מנחם פירש תרצדון כמו תרקדון אף אותו לשון נופל על השיטה הזאת.

I saw in the Yesod of Rabbi Moshe ha-Darshan that ratzad [the root of teratzdun] means to lie in wait in the Arabic language, although Menahem explained teratzdun as tarkidan [“to cause to dance”],¹⁴ yet that language [Arabic] supersedes that [Menahem’s] method.

Here again, Rashi is absolutely correct: the Arabic cognate (ﺭﺻﺪ) in fact means “to watch or wait, to lie in wait,”¹⁵, or, as Rashi says, the equivalent of Hebrew maarav. With this knowledge, there is no need for Menachem’s tenuous suggested reading. The pasuk also makes more sense this way; why would the other mountains be jubilant at having been overlooked?

Did Moshe ha-Darshan know Arabic?

If Rashi was getting accurate information on Arabic from Moshe ha-Darshan, does this imply that the latter knew Arabic (or Judeo-Arabic)? From the paucity of examples, I would guess that Moshe ha-Darshan received his knowledge indirectly. In and of itself, it’s notable that information about Arabic was filtering in a way at least partially accessible by non-Arabic speakers (such as word of mouth from emigres who did know Arabic) in early 11th century Provence and France. And it’s remarkable that it would reach Rashi in so clear a form.¹⁶

Rashi’s use of Moshe ha-Darshan shows how he marshals, with startling perspicacity and accuracy, sources that he knows to fill in lacunae in the standard midrash collections. He valued both midrash and grammar, and applied them where the text called out for explanation. It appears that Rashi studied directly from Moshe ha-Darshan’s Yesod as well as receiving teachings in his name, indicating the relatively close connection between the Rhineland communities where Rashi was educated (Ashkenaz in the more specific sense of the term) and Jewish communities on the southern coast of Provence. Moshe ha-Darshan’s method, though clearly midrashically oriented, includes linguistic peshat as well, presaging Rashi’s.

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Image: Medieval Narbonne, in southern France, where Moshe ha-Darshan was active. Image credit: “Narbonne” by Jexweber.fotos is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

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1. Bereshit 35:8 and 48:7; Bemidbar 7:18-19, 23, 8:7, 11:20, 21, 15:41, and 19:22; Devarim 27:24; Tehillim 45:2, 60:4, 62:12, 68:17, and 80:6; Mishlei 5:19; and Iyyov 36:1.
2. Ketubot 75b s.v. כהה טהור and Niddah 19a s.v. כהה טהור. However, these two citations are of the same material.
3. It may be that the title ha-darshan relates to the dissemination of midrash that characterizes the work of his school, although it could also mean, more conventionally and not incongruently, that he was known as a preacher. There is a recent book on Moshe ha-Darshan by Hannanel Mack, The Mystery of Rabbi Moshe Hadarshan [Hebrew] (Jerusalem: Mossad Bialik, 2010), as well as Menahem Zohori, דברי משה הדרשן ופיוטי אלעזר הקלירי בפירושי רש״י [“The Statements of Moshe ha-Darshan and the Piyyut of Elazar ha-Kaliri in the Commentary of Rashi”] (Jerusalem: Carmel, 1995), which I’ve not yet been able to get a hold of.
4. Notable among the exceptions are the extracts from Moshe ha-Darshan, especially Bereshit Rabbati, copied in the Christian polemical manual Pugio fidei.
5. Although, it’s worth noting, Rashi most frequently cites Moshe ha-Darshan on Bemidbar (where Rashi’s primary source of midrash is Tanchuma) and Tehillim.
6. Chizkuni says that the nurse is mentioned in 24:59 so that we can appreciate the significance of her death as mentioned here in 35:8; and both he and Ibn Ezra read “Rivka’s nurse” to mean the woman who nursed Rivka in Rivka’s infancy.
7. Rashi ad loc. s.v. ותמת דבורה
8. This is the context in which Moshe ha-Darshan is mentioned in Rashi’s Talmud commentary, where in both instances Rashi uses Moshe ha-Darshan to clarify the phrase כהה טהור.
9. As with a lot of pesukim, though easily translated literally, this verse is difficult to translate in terms of its meaning without interpreting it already. The JPS translation here relies on Rashi’s reading and it would be impossible to understand what Rashi is commenting on using it.
10. A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, 4th ed., ed. and rev. J. M. Cowan (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1979; US edition, Ithaca, NY: Spoken Language Services, 1994), p. 1089. The root also has other connotations, related to dowery. It should be noted that Hans Wehr is a deeply problematic source, but there is no replacement. Despite the “modern” in the title, this was the standard reference in courses on fusha and Quranic Arabic.
11. Marcus Jastrow, A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (London: 1903; Reprint, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2005), pp. 185-186.
12. As pointed out by reader Yosef Kerman (see his insightful comments below), Rashi probably saw the Torah as occasionally borrowing foreign words, including Arabic, rather than, as I had written earlier, implying that Rashi understood Arabic to be cognate to Hebrew.
13. It also occurs in Ben Sira, 14:22, which Rashi would not have known.
14. In the Machberet, an early lexicon of Biblical Hebrew which Rashi had in hand. In his entry on רצד, Menachem cites this verse and then explains, “כמו תרקדון, וכמו וירקידם כמו עגל (שם כט ו)” – in the Filipowski ed., p. 166.
15. Hans Wehr, p. 396. Retzad from the same root also occurs in Vayikra Rabba 26:2, אָזַל וּרְצַד עֲלוֹי, “he went and lay in wait for him.”
16. On Rashi’s contact with Jewish communities in the Islamicate world, see Avraham Grossman, “The Treatment of Lexicon and Grammar in Rashi’s Commentaries: Rashi’s Ties with the Islamic Lands” [Hebrew], Lĕšonénu: A Journal for the Study of the Hebrew Language and Cognate Subjects, no. 73 (2011): 425–36. He includes examples from manuscript evidence of translations of Arabic-language works into Hebrew reaching Ashkenaz, and lists the other instances, via Dunash b. Labrat, that Rashi references Arabic in his commentaries on pp. 432-33.