Defending God’s honor and cultivating human sensibilities.

A medieval rabbi with “a love of language, dark humor, penchant for astrology, personal bitterness, and dour personality.”

The 11th-century rabbi balanced accessibility and sophistication.

When Rashbam talked Torah with monks.

How Ibn Ezra reinterpreted an ancient curse.

Can a verse in the Torah be interpreted in a way that contradicts Jewish law as defined by the talmudic rabbis? Two great medieval commentators disagree.

Almost every methodological approach used by modern Bible critics finds a parallel in the works of “traditional” Jewish exegetes in the Middle Ages.

To suggest that some verses in the Torah were not written by Moses, as does the medieval commentator Abraham ibn Ezra, is not in and of itself heretical.