ABSTRACT
In his commentaries to the Hebrew Bible, Rashi of Troyes (ca. 1040–1105) generally did not write any introductions. There are three exceptions: the beginning of the Pentateuch, the Book of Zachariah, and the Song of Songs. If one asks why he wrote some kind of introductory comments on just those three books, it appears that each of them deals with an aspect of Jewish history viewed as a theosophical statement. Arranged in the sequence, Pentateuch, Song of Songs, and Zechariah, the three comments provide a statement about God’s loving relationship to the Jewish people from the creation of the world, throughout historical time, and towards the messianic future. Though written as part of a biblical commentary, Rashi’s introductory remarks and may be compared to those written by such eleventh-century northern French Christian historians as Radulphus Glaber who placed his local history within a framework of Christian Heilsgeschichte.
