Commentators:R. Yosef Kara's Torah Commentary/1/en

R. Yosef Kara's Torah Commentary

Introduction

Open Text of Commentary

Impact of R. Yosef Kara as Exegete

R. Yosef Kara was the foremost representative of the transitional stage between Rashi and Rashbam, and he played a pivotal role in the development of the peshat school and its methods of exegesis in 12th century Northern France. R"Y Kara was a younger contemporary and student/colleague of Rashi, and the two interacted extensively. R. Yosef Kara's commentaries build upon Rashi's and incorporate copious portions of them,¹ but there was significant influence exerted also in the reverse direction. We possess evidence of several cases in which R. Yosef Kara's peshat interpretations impacted Rashi, even causing him to reverse course and modify the content of his commentaries.²

Sources for Reconstruction of the Commentary

The extant Torah interpretations of R. Yosef Kara have been preserved in three types of sources:

• Individual pages of the commentary found in the "Italian Genizah" – These include seven folios containing pieces of a running commentary on twelve chapters of Shemot and nine chapters of Devarim³ as well as an additional folio containing a collection of individual interpretations from all of Torah.⁴ Most of these are only partial leaves which require significant reconstruction. The identification of R"Y Kara as the author of this commentary will be discussed below.
• Glosses in various manuscripts of Rashi's commentary – These assorted comments frequently dispute Rashi's exegesis⁵ while offering R. Yosef Kara's own alternatives. In a minority of manuscripts,⁶ these interpretations appear as marginalia and are signed with a "ר' יוסף"‎⁷ or "ר' יוסף קרא", making it relatively simple to distinguish these additions from Rashi's own words.⁸ In most manuscripts, though, R. Yosef Kara's interpretations were incorporated into the main text of Rashi. Generally, they are still readily identifiable as they are explicitly attributed to "ר' יוסף"‎, "ר' יוסף קרא", or "ר' יוסף בר' שמעון"‎.⁹ In some instances, however, these identifying headings or signatures were not preserved.¹⁰
• Citations of R. Yosef Kara in Tosafist commentaries – These include Rashbam (4x), R. Yosef Bekhor Shor (8x), Sefer HaGan (6x), R. Chayyim Paltiel (8x), Peshatim UPeirushim of R. Yaakov of Vienna (3x), Paneach Raza (10x), Daat Zekeinim (12x), Hadar Zekeinim (7x), and various other works and manuscripts.¹¹ The content of R"Y Kara's interpretations found in these citations is generally unrelated to Rashi's commentary.

The most ambitious effort until now to collate material from the second and third categories was made by Avraham Berliner almost 150 years ago.¹² Fortunately, we now have access to several additional manuscripts containing numerous heretofore unpublished glosses and citations of R. Yosef Kara¹³ in addition to all of the folios of his freestanding commentary discovered in the Italian Genizah. Together, these provide the opportunity to significantly augment our collection of R"Y Kara's Torah interpretations and greatly enhance our understanding and appreciation of his exegetical contributions. Given the large number of manuscripts containing relevant material and the painstaking nature of the reconstruction, the accompanying online electronic edition will both facilitate collaborative work and allow for continuous updating as additional material is discovered and processed.¹⁴ This edition also includes a Neviim Glosses section with the glosses R. Yosef Kara penned on Rashi's commentaries, and an Appendix section which will be discussed below.

Discovery of the Torah Commentary

Despite R. Yosef Kara's stature, only a small portion of his Torah commentary has survived.¹⁵ In fact, until the late 20th century, all that was known from R"Y Kara's literary output on Torah was the cameo appearances in the glosses found in a few manuscripts of Rashi's commentary and the occasional Tosafist citations of his interpretations.¹⁶ Unsurprisingly, many scholars incorrectly concluded that R"Y Kara had penned only marginal glosses on Rashi's commentary, and not his own independent commentary.

The existence of a stand-alone commentary was conclusively established only with Prof. Avraham Grossman's identification¹⁷ of R. Yosef Kara as the author of several folios discovered by Prof. Mauro Perani in the "Italian Genizah".¹⁸ Most of these folios were sliced up when used in book bindings, and thus they contain only halves, thirds, or quarter columns of the original text. The fragmentary state of these folios and the resulting difficulty of reconstructing their original text have impeded their publication until now,¹⁹ and there are still parts of them whose reconstruction is incomplete or needs improvement.

The preliminary online publication of the extant material from R. Yosef Kara's Torah commentary will hopefully facilitate a better appreciation of his unique exegetical contributions and pave the way for improved readings and the reconstruction of other portions of his commentary. In addition, the analysis below briefly highlights some of the important issues which this new material illuminates.

R. Yosef Kara and His Text of Rashi

An analysis of the heretofore unpublished folios of R"Y Kara's commentary reveals that there is a fundamental difference between his commentaries on the books of Shemot and Devarim. The twelve extant chapters from the Shemot commentary (6-10, 19-25) are marked by wholesale incorporation of broad swaths of Rashi's commentary.²⁰ Approximately one-third of the extant Shemot commentary²¹ was apparently lifted almost verbatim²² from Rashi, and this phenomenon parallels the similar one found in R"Y Kara's commentary on much of Neviim. In stark contrast, the nine chapters of the commentary on Devarim (12-14, 24-29) display no influence whatsoever of Rashi. It is unclear what accounts for this remarkable divergence, though it is possible that R"Y Kara's exegetical independence grew over the course of the writing of his commentary.²³

It is possible that the heavy indebtedness of R. Yosef Kara's commentary to Rashi contributed to its diminished popularity, as it rendered a significant portion of the commentary basically redundant for most of its medieval audience (at least for those who already had a copy of Rashi). However, this phenomenon is a great boon for those attempting to establish the original text of Rashi, as the precise nature of the "borrowing" means that for parts of Shemot we essentially possess a text very close to the version of Rashi which was copied (presumably from Rashi's personal copy) by R. Yosef Kara.²⁴ This makes R. Yosef Kara's commentary an extremely important textual witness for reconstructing the original text of Rashi's commentary on these chapters. Additionally, identifying the Rashi manuscripts which preserve readings in these chapters similar to those of R. Yosef Kara's text, can help provide important data for the rest of Torah. This analysis is currently ongoing as part of AlHaTorah.org's Rashi project.²⁵

Appendix to the Commentary and Relationship to Rashbam

The seven folios discovered from R. Yosef Kara's Torah commentary were part of a larger manuscript which encompassed his commentaries also on books from Neviim and Ketuvim. Seven additional folios from this manuscript have survived, five of which contain remnants of his commentaries on Yeshayahu, Terei Asar (a bifolio), and Tehillim (a bifolio).²⁶ The final bifolio is perhaps the most intriguing, as the folio on its right side contains (on both recto and verso sides) an assortment of interpretations of verses from all over Torah²⁷ plus a few from Nakh,²⁸ while the left side folio contains a commentary on Iyyov 5:1 – 6:11.²⁹ The assorted interpretations from the right side folio can be viewed here.

This miscellaneous collection includes interpretations which are cited in other sources in the name of R. Yosef Kara,³⁰ and it shares other characteristics of R. Yosef Kara's exegesis.³¹ This leaves little reason to doubt that the interpretations in this collection were also authored by R. Yosef Kara, but it raises the question of why they were recorded separately rather than in their proper places in his Torah commentary. Interestingly, this collection contains some of R"Y Kara's most creative exegesis, and numerous interpretations in this collection parallel exegesis found also in Rashbam.³² This may support the tentative suggestion that this collection constitutes a "קונטרס אחרון" or an appendix to R. Yosef Kara's commentary,³³ in which he recorded additional interpretations which he had become aware of only after completing his commentary. Some of these interpretations may very well have originated in R. Yosef Kara's conversations with Rashbam,³⁴ and they may provide us with a window into their relationship.

Chizkuni's Extensive Use of R. Yosef Kara's Commentary

A significant quantity of the interpretations from R"Y Kara's Torah commentary were later incorporated by Chizkuni in his eclectic commentary.³⁵ In many instances, Chizkuni even preserves almost the exact language of R"Y Kara.³⁶ In fact, it appears that Chizkuni's use of R"Y Kara is so extensive that it would be proper to include R"Y Kara (along with Rashi, Rashbam, Ibn Ezra, and R"Y Bekhor Shor) on the short list of the main sources of Chizkuni's work.³⁷ This knowledge assists us in two ways:

• It enables the restoration of many of the fragmentary passages of R"Y Kara's commentary by judicious use of the text of Chizkuni.
• It allows for a reconstruction of some of the non-extant portions of R"Y Kara's commentary through the mining of Chizkuni for peshat material not derived from one of Chizkuni's other major sources. In cases where this material also contains content, method, and language parallels to known interpretations of R"Y Kara, the likelihood is high that it is derived from the lost sections of R"Y Kara's Torah Commentary.³⁸

Relationship Between Commentary, Glosses, and Citations

With the discovery of portions of R. Yosef Kara's commentary in the "Italian Genizah", in great measure, the question has now become: Did R"Y Kara write only an independent commentary or also a set of glosses on Rashi's commentary? Or, in other words: Were the interpretations cited in his name found in the glosses of Rashi manuscripts adapted by later scribes from R"Y Kara's freestanding commentary, or were they glossed by R"Y Kara himself on his personal copy of Rashi's commentary (and then recopied by many later scribes)?³⁹ [A similar question exists regarding the glosses of Rashbam found in a very small number of Rashi manuscripts.]⁴⁰

There are two factors which make it appear likely that the glosses were penned by R"Y Kara himself, as a work distinct from his commentary:⁴¹

• In a few glosses, in the context of his offering an alternative interpretation to Rashi's, R. Yosef Kara refers to himself as "אני המעתיק, יוסף ב"ר שמעון"‎.⁴² This appears to indicate that at least these particular interpretations were originally written as glosses when R"Y Kara was copying Rashi's commentary.⁴³
• While the content of some glosses⁴⁴ parallels that of the commentary, there are other glosses which are not found in the commentary.⁴⁵

A slightly different question exists regarding the Tosafist citations of R"Y Kara. In some cases, these parallel content found in R"Y Kara's commentary,⁴⁶ and it is likely that most of them are derived from the commentary.⁴⁷ However, in one case (Shemot 20:1), the Tosafist citations of R"Y Kara are not to be found in the commentary, and it is likely taken from R"Y Kara's piyyut commentary.

Acknowledgments and Manuscript List

We thank Archivio di Stato di Bologna and Biblioteca e Archivi Storici del Comune di Pieve di Cento for granting permission to publish the texts of R. Yosef Kara's commentary found in the Italian Genizah (MSS Bologna 302.2, 469.1,2, 509.1,2, Imola 17.2, Pieve di Cento 1). We also gratefully acknowledge several other libraries for allowing us to present here the glosses from R. Yosef Kara found in their assorted manuscripts of Rashi and Tosafist commentaries. The following is a list of these additional libraries and their manuscripts:

• Berlin Or. fol. 121, Or. fol. 122, Or. fol. 1221, Or. fol. 1222 – Property of Staatsbibliothek Zu Berlin – Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Orientabteilung
• Budapest Kaufmann A33 – Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
• Cambridge Add. 377/3, 404, 1870 – by permission of the Syndics of Cambridge University Library
• Frankfurt hebr. Qu. 19, hebr. Oct. 133/5 – Universitätsbibliothek Johann Christian Senckenberg Frankfurt am Main
• Hamburg Hebr. 32, Hebr. 235 – Staats und Universitaetsbibliothek Hamburg
• Leiden Cod. Or. 4718 / Scal. 1 – Leiden University Library
• Leipzig – Universitätsbibliothek Leipzig, B.H.1
• London - British Library Add. 22092, 22122, 26878, 26917, 26924 – © The British Library Board
• Moscow Guenzburg 1628, Guenzburg 1827 – Russian State Library⁴⁸
• Munich 5, 50, 52, 252 – Bayerische Stadtbibliothek
• Oxford Opp. 31 (Neubauer 271/1,2,8), Opp. 34 (Neubauer 186), Opp. 225/4 (Neubauer 970/4), Opp. Add. Qu. 103 (Neubauer 2344), Marsh 225 (Neubauer 284), 2646 (Heb.d.18) – Oxford - Bodleian Library
• Oxford CCC MS 165 – By permission of the President and Fellows of Corpus Christi College, Oxford
• St. Petersburg Evr. II A 118.1, II A 363 – National Library of Russia
• Vienna Cod. Hebr. 220 (Schwarz #23), Cod. Hebr. 3 (Schwarz #24) – Oesterreichische Nationalbibliothek
• Weimar Q 651, 652 – Thuringsche Landesbibliothek

Finally, we express our appreciation to the staff of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts for all of their assistance.⁴⁹

Open Text of Commentary

¹ See the discussion in the "R. Yosef Kara and His Text of Rashi" section below regarding some of the implications of this.

² See, for example, the glosses of R"Y Kara on Bereshit 19:9 and Bemidbar 17:5, and the resulting changes in Rashi's commentary. In each of these glosses, as well as in a third case in Bereshit 28:17, Rashi apparently acknowledges the correctness of R"Y Kara's interpretation ("והמאור הגדול נר ישראל מודה לו"). See also Rashi Yeshayahu 64:3: "כך שמעתי מר' יוסף והנאני".

³ The folios cover Shemot 6:3 – 10:11, 19:3 – 20:10, 21:20 – 22:9, 23:13 – 25:29 and Devarim 12:11 – 14:23, 24:13 – 29:28. These folios have text on both the recto and verso sides of the parchment, and two of the seven (Devarim 24-29) are actually a bifolio. For a full description of the physical characteristics of these folios, see M. Perani, "Yosef Ben Shim῾on Kara’s Lost Commentary on the Psalms", The Words of a Wise Man's Mouth are Gracious (Stemberger Festschrift), Berlin 2005: 402.

⁴ See below that these folios were part of a commentary which contained also books from Neviim and Ketuvim (from which six additional folios are extant). Their description as well as the text of the Tehillim folio can be found in M. Perani's article noted above.

⁵ Sometimes the contrast to Rashi is made explicit (see the examples noted below where R"Y Kara speaks of himself as "המעתיק" or "הכותב" in contrast to Rashi), but many times it is only implicit. There are also numerous cases where there is little or no connection to Rashi's commentary.

⁶ This is generally the case in MS Vienna 23, but only for Sefer Bereshit.

⁷ The identification of "ר' יוסף" as R. Yosef Kara can be made based on a comparison of some of these glosses with what is cited in the full name of R. Yosef Kara in other sources on those verses (see for example: Bereshit 14:13, Bereshit 20:16, Bereshit 21:22-25, Bereshit 28:17).

⁸ In some cases (e.g. Bereshit 29:14), though, the marginalia combine two different comments, and it is unclear whether both are from R. Yosef Kara.

⁹ In some of these cases, though, it is not always entirely clear where R"Y Kara's interpretation begins or ends (e.g. Bemidbar 17:5) and whether the attribution applies to the prior or subsequent content (e.g. Bereshit 21:22-25).

¹⁰ This is frequently the case in later printings of Rashi's commentary. In most such instances, the identification with R"Y Kara can still be made based on manuscripts which did preserve the signature. However, in cases where none of the textual witnesses preserved a signature (see the examples of Bemidbar 22:9-12, Bemidbar 22:41 - 23:7, and Bemidbar 23:23), the identification process is more complicated and debatable.

¹¹ In some cases (especially when the comment is attributed merely to "ר' יוסף"), it is hard to determine whether the source of the interpretation is R. Yosef Kara or a different R. Yosef.

¹² Berliner collected 87 interpretations of R"Y Kara in his פליטת סופרים (Mainz, 1872): 12-25, 49. [This superseded the far smaller earlier collections by S. Heilberg, נטעי נעמנים (Breslau, 1847): 1, and A. Geiger, פרשנדתא (Leipzig, 1855): 21-23.] J. Gad later incorporated Berliner's collection in his חמשה מאורות הגדולים (Johannesburg, 1952): 7-37, to which he added passages from R"Y Kara's commentaries on Nakh which discuss verses from Torah, along with material authored by other R. Yosef's which bears no connection to R"Y Kara. In some cases, Gad also amended the texts as he saw fit, so caution must be exercised when using both this volume and the derivative citations found in the volumes of the תוספות השלם set.

¹³ These include:

• The Vienna 23 manuscript of Rashi's commentary which contains marginal glosses from R. Yosef Kara, Rashbam, and other anonymous sources.
• A manuscript of Rashi whose folios became separated and now exist as four separate collections in two different libraries – St. Petersburg Evr. II A 118.1, St. Petersburg Evr. II A 363, Moscow Guenzburg 1628, and Moscow Guenzburg 1827. This manuscript incorporates (signed) interpretations of R"Y Kara in the main body of its Rashi text, and it does so from Bereshit through Devarim. Approximately half of the R. Yosef Kara glosses contained in the largest of the four portions of this manuscript (St. Petersburg Evr. II A 118.1) were published by Prof. Hananel Mack, "קטעים חדשים מפירוש ר' יוסף קרא לתורה", Tarbiz 63:4 (1994): 533-553.

¹⁴ This online edition presents the interpretations of R"Y Kara found in all three types of sources. Although it is likely that R"Y Kara wrote the glosses and commentary as two separate works (see below), when both are extant, their content frequently overlaps. Thus, in most cases where we possess only a gloss and no commentary, the gloss likely constitutes a helpful guide as to what R"Y Kara may have written in his commentary.

¹⁵ R. Yosef Kara's commentaries on most of Neviim and parts of Ketuvim fared better. Most of them were published already in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

¹⁶ See below for more details regarding these sources and a discussion of the relationship between the glosses and the freestanding commentary.

¹⁷ For the basis of this identification, see Prof. Avraham Grossman, חכמי צרפת הראשונים, (Jerusalem, 1995): 290-300. Prof. Grossman notes that in R"Y Kara's commentary on Shemuel I 1:3 he references his commentary on Bereshit, and he also adduces parallels between distinctive interpretations found in the Italian Genizah material and both R"Y Kara's own commentaries on Nakh and R"Y Bekhor Shor's citations of R"Y Kara (see examples of Shemot 19:8-9, Devarim 14:1, Devarim 25:17-19, and Devarim 28:68).

¹⁸ With the greatly expanded corpus of R"Y Kara material presented here from both the Italian Genizah and other Rashi and Tosafist manuscripts, we can now add further evidence. See the striking parallels between interpretations from the Italian Genizah of: Shemot 13:16, Shemot 19:16-17, Shemot 25:15, and Devarim 28:26, and the corresponding interpretations signed with the name "ר' יוסף" found in the St. Petersburg Evr. II A 118.1, St. Petersburg Evr. II A 363, and Moscow Guenzburg 1628 manuscripts of Rashi's commentary. [See also Shemot 24:11, Bemidbar 16:1, and Devarim 26:11.]

¹⁹ Some individual interpretations from this material were presented by Prof. A. Grossman in חכמי צרפת הראשונים, (Jerusalem, 1995): 290-305, and in an earlier article in Peamim 52, but the vast majority of the text of these folios remained unpublished until now.

²⁰ In most of the cases, the content is simply assimilated into the commentary without explicit attribution. Rashi is cited by name ("רבנא שלמה") on only two occasions (Shemot 19:8-9, Shemot 19:15), when R. Yosef Kara contrasts his own exegesis with that of Rashi (cf. M. Ahrend's Introduction to פירוש רבי יוסף קרא ספר איוב (Jerusalem, 5749): 30). See, similarly, R"Y Kara's commentary on Melakhim where he cites Rashi on only seven occasions (R"Y Kara Melakhim I 2:5, 7:7, 8:12, II 8:21, 11:2, 16:14, 19:25), despite much of the commentary being borrowed from Rashi.

²¹ See R"Y Kara's commentary on Shemot 6:(12),26, 7:19,(25),(29), 8:2,13-15,17,21-22,26, 9:3-4,8-9,14-16,19,24,29-33, 10:3-4, 19:8-9,15,18,20-25, 20:4-5, 21:20-25,28-36, 22:1,3-9, 23:12-13,15-19,21,24,26-28,31,33, 24:6,11, 25:4-5,7-9,11-13,29.

²² A similar phenomenon exists in the commentary on Devarim 1-4 found in MS Berlin 121 and published by A. Berliner in פליטת סופרים (Mainz, 1872): 6-11. In contrast, Rashbam's commentary also has significant overlap with Rashi, but is rarely identical. For more on Rashbam and Rashi, see A. Carmel, 'הפירושים החופפים – עיון ביחס שבין פירושי רש"י ורשב"ם לתורה', MA Thesis, Bar Ilan University (Ramat Gan, 5768).

²³ R"Y Kara's referencing of his commentary on Bereshit in his commentary on Shemuel I 1:3 would appear to indicate that his Torah commentary was written earlier.

²⁴ The manuscript from the Italian Genizah is dated to the 13th century, so it is clearly not an autograph of R"Y Kara's commentary. Thus, while it is presumably close to R"Y Kara's version of Rashi, it may not be completely identical to it, and hence our formulation "very close to the version of Rashi which was copied by R. Yosef Kara".

²⁵ The R"Y Kara commentary coupled with MS Leipzig 1 give us testimony from two of Rashi's closest students, R"Y Kara and R. Shemayah, both of whom were intimately involved in the transmission of his commentary.

²⁶ Like the pages from the Torah commentary, these folios have text on both the recto and verso sides of the parchment. For more details, see M. Perani's article cited above.

²⁷ It consists of interpretations of thirty-five units from Torah (primarily from Shemot, Vayikra, and Bemidbar, but also one from each of Bereshit and Devarim), as well as six units from Nakh.

²⁸ It appears that the miscellaneous collection began on an earlier folio (or folios) which we do not possess. The extant folio begins with a discussion of a number of verses from Yeshayahu and other books before it gets to a somewhat lengthier discussion of a cluster of verses from the second to last chapter of Mishlei. It thus does not appear to contain the end of a systematic commentary on Mishlei. [Cf. M. Perani, "Yosef Ben Shim῾on Kara’s Lost Commentary on the Psalms", The Words of a Wise Man's Mouth are Gracious (Stemberger Festschrift), Berlin 2005: 402.]

²⁹ This bifolio was likely not the central bifolio of the quire, as there was at least one more bifolio in the quire which would have been comprised of approximately an additional folio worth of the miscellaneous collection of verses and the initial folio of the commentary on Iyyov (Chapters 1-4). [Regarding this also, compare to the differing opinion of M. Perani in his article linked to in the note above.]

³⁰ See: Shemot 13:16, Bemidbar 3:10, and Bemidbar 16:1.

³¹ These include: exegetical methods, language such as "פתרונו" and "יגיד עליו ריעו", and the incorporation of several of these interpretations by Chizkuni.

³² A few of the distinctive ones are: Bereshit 49:10, Bemidbar 13:2, and Bemidbar 21:14-17.

³³ Note also his comment regarding Bemidbar 14:17-18 which appears to reference his earlier commentary ("‏לפ' שפ'‏").

³⁴ See Rashbam Bereshit 10:15 (from MS Munich 252), 24:60, and 37:13.

³⁵ See R. Yosef Kara's interpretations of: Shemot 6:9-12,13, 7:15,17, 9:32, 10:10, 12:26, 19:3,4,8-9,12-13,22, 20:1,2,7-10, 21:8, 23:13,25, 24:5,11, 25:15, 32:24, Vayikra 24:17, Bemidbar 5:6, 21:30, Devarim 12:8, 12:15, 14:23, 28:23. This list includes a number of interpretations found in the "Appendix" to the commentary. See also Bereshit 1:11,14-15,16, 3:1-7, 9:16 and many others noted in our apparatus of R"Y Kara's commentary.

³⁶ For examples, see Shemot 6:13, 7:15, 19:12-13, 20:1, 24:5, 25:15.

³⁷ Interestingly, the influence appears to be much less pronounced in Sefer Devarim.

³⁸ See for e.g. Chizkuni Shemot 12:27 (cf. R"Y Kara Shemot 12:26) and Vayikra 17:4 (cf. R"Y Kara Devarim 12:15-16).

³⁹ The case of Shemot 15:26 is also an interesting one, as there are two different versions of R"Y Kara's gloss on that verse, and they do not appear to come from the same source.

⁴⁰ See the discussion of E. Touitou, הפשטות המתחדשים בכל יום, (Ramat Gan, 2003): 189-195, regarding the glosses found in MS Vienna 23. One of these glosses appears also in MS St. Petersburg 118.1.

⁴¹ Either which way, the words "‏ואאלפך...‏" in Bemidbar 17:5 indicate that R"Y Kara intended for these glosses to be read by others, and was not merely writing them as personal notes.

⁴² See Bereshit 25:22, Vayikra 11:43-44, Bemidbar 17:5, Bemidbar 23:21, and Devarim 32:50.

⁴³ It is perhaps possible to argue that "המעתיק" here is simply being used as a synonym for "הכותב" (cf. R"Y Kara's comments on Shemot 34:9, Vayikra 16:16, Bemidbar 24:14, Bemidbar 27:20-23).

⁴⁴ See the cases of: Shemot 13:16, Shemot 19:16-17, Shemot 25:15, and Devarim 28:26. See also the glosses found in the Neviim section of the Vienna 23 ms. on: Shofetim 11:9, Shemuel I 1:24, Shemuel I 19:13, and Shemuel I 20:30.

⁴⁵ There is only limited overlap in Torah between the glosses and the extant commentary, and Devarim 26:17-18, 27:9-10 may be one of the few examples of this. However, many of the Yeshayahu glosses present completely different interpretations than those found in R"Y Kara's commentary on Yeshayahu.

⁴⁶ See the examples cited above as evidence that R. Yosef Kara is, in fact, the author of the commentary found in the "Italian Genizah".

⁴⁷ Despite the fact that there are also parallels between the Tosafist citations and the glosses (see Bereshit 14:13, Bereshit 20:16, Bereshit 25:30), it is difficult to determine whether any of these citations are based on R"Y Kara's glosses on Rashi, as much of the content of the glosses was likely duplicated in the commentary. A similar question exists regarding the parallels between Chizkuni and R"Y Kara's glosses on Rashi (such as: Bereshit 1:15, Bereshit 27:28, Bereshit 49:15).

⁴⁸ It should be noted that these two manuscripts and the two St. Petersburg manuscripts numbered Evr. II A 118.1 and II A 363, are four parts of the same manuscript of Rashi whose leaves were separated and wound up in different collections.

⁴⁹ Special thanks to Yisrael Dubitsky for collecting all of the helpful manuscript links.