Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Steve Miller" <smille10 AT sbcglobal.net>]

> From: Shoshanna Walker
> 
> Romans is not the word of G-d, it doesn't even allege that.
[Steve Miller] 
2 Peter 3:16 says that Paul's writings are Scripture.

Shoshanna,
Thank you for writing. Where do the Talmud, Mishnah and Rashi commentaries
claim to be the word of God? 

I was raised Orthodox and went to Hebrew school and Hebrew college, and I
was not taught that the Talmud, Mishnah or Rashi were part of the word of
God. My mother told us that the Talmud was written by sages much wiser than
us, but we did not believe that it was the word of God like the Tanach is.
I have talked to many rabbis, and I have never met any who believe like you
seem to, that Rashi's commentary is the authoritative explanation of the
Tanach. 

Here is a previous post on the subject by Yitzhak Saphir:
>>The idea that there is an oral law equally as authoritative as the
>>written law is highly dubious to me. You say that this prevents
>>mistranslation, but it allows the importation of every kind of merely
>>human idea and even perversion of God's word. God warns against adding
>>to his word, and a proposed "oral law" does just that. It presents
>>something as having the same authority as the written word, from what
>>you say, and thereby adds to God's word.

>However, Shoshanna's interpretation of Rashi and Midrash as part of this
>oral law is not shared by all Jews.  It is an extreme interpretation that
>essentially says that Rashi or the Rabbis of the Midrash whom he often
>quotes was not a great scholar but simply a scribe who wrote something
>handed down to him from the days of Moses.  While that may describe
>much of his work (much of Rashi is effectively quotes from the Midrash),
>he was also a great scholar and a true understanding of Rashi can only
>be achieved by seeing all his quoted sources (which are many!) and
>identifying which parts he chose to quote, which he chose not to quote,
>what he chose to add of his own, and answering why he chose to do what
>he did.
>>    

Thanks,
-Steve Miller
Detroit
www.voiceInWilderness.info