Its Simplicity
Genesis Rabba contains many simple explanations of words and sentences, often in the Aramaic language, suitable for the instruction of youth. It also contains varied haggadic expositions popular in the public lectures of the synagogues and schools. The editor of the midrash has strung together various longer or shorter explanations and haggadic interpretations of the successive passages, sometimes anonymously, sometimes citing the author. The editor adds to the running commentary longer haggadic disquisitions or narratives, connected in some way with the verse in question, or with one of the explanations of it — a method not unusual in the Talmud and in other midrashim. The first chapters of Genesis, on the creation of the world and of man, furnished especially rich material for this mode of exegesis. Whole sections are devoted to comments on one or two verses of the text. Many references to contemporary philosophical thought are made with the purpose of refuting the opinions of nonbelievers. References to contemporaneous conditions and historical events also occur. It is characteristic of the midrash to view the personages and conditions of the Bible by the light of the contemporary history of the time. Though the stories embraced in Genesis furnished little occasion for comments on legal topics, Genesis Rabba contains a few short legal (or halakic) sentences and quotations taken from the Mishnah and other sources. This midrash is rich in sublime thoughts and finely worded sentences, in parables, and in foreign words, especially Greek.
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Famous quotes containing the word simplicity:
“Both Socrates and Jesus were outstanding teachers; both of them urged and practiced great simplicity of life; both were regarded as traitors to the religion of their community; neither of them wrote anything; both of them were executed; and both have become the subject of traditions that are difficult or impossible to harmonize.”
—Jaroslav Pelikan (b. 1932)
“It may be said that the elegant Swann’s simplicity was but another, more refined form of vanity and that, like other Israelites, my parents’ old friend could present, one by one, the succession of states through which had passed his race, from the most naive snobbishness to the worst coarseness to the finest politeness.”
—Marcel Proust (1871–1922)