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A ''parashah'' (Hebrew: פָּרָשָׁה ''Pārāšâ'' "portion," plural: ''parashot'' or ''parashiyot'') formally means a section of a biblical book in the Masoretic Text of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible).〔In common usage today the word often refers to the Weekly Torah portion (a shortened form of ''Parashat HaShavua''). This article deals with the first, formal meaning of the word.〕 In the Masoretic Text, ''parashah'' sections are designated by various types of spacing between them, as found in Torah scrolls, scrolls of the books of Nevi'im or Ketuvim (especially megillot), masoretic codices from the Middle Ages and printed editions of the masoretic text. The division of the text into ''parashot'' for the biblical books is independent of chapter and verse numbers, which are not part of the masoretic tradition. ''Parashot'' are not numbered, but some have special names. The division of ''parashot'' found in the modern-day Torah scrolls of all Jewish communities is based upon the systematic list provided by Maimonides in Mishneh Torah, ''Laws of Tefillin, Mezuzah and Torah Scrolls'', chapter 8. Maimonides based his division of the ''parashot'' for the Torah on the Aleppo Codex.〔Though initially doubted by Umberto Cassuto, this has become the established position in modern scholarship. As Goshen-Gottstein, Penkower, and Ofer have shown, Cassuto's doubts were based upon apparent discrepancies he noted between the ''parashah'' divisions in the Aleppo Codex and those recorded by Maimonides. However, the most striking of these apparent discrepancies are rooted in the faulty manuscripts and printed editions of Maimonides that Cassuto consulted (as noted in his personal journals), while the remaining cases can be reasonably explained as differing interpretations of very small spaces in the Aleppo Codex. Furthermore, the best manuscripts of Maimonides describe highly unusual implementations of spacing techniques that are found in no other masoretic manuscript besides the Aleppo Codex. Full explanations of each individual discrepancy appear in the notes to this article.〕 The division of ''parashot'' for the books of Nevi'im and Ketuvim was never completely standardized in printed Hebrew bibles and handwritten scrolls, though important attempts were made to document it and create fixed rules. Incorrect division of the text into ''parashot'', either by indicating a ''parashah'' in the wrong place or by using the wrong spacing technique, halakhically invalidates a Torah scroll according to Maimonides.〔For more details see the section on Halakhic significance below.〕 == Purpose == A ''parashah'' break creates a textual pause, roughly analogous to a modern paragraph break.〔For a general description of the section divisions and their purpose, see Emanuel Tov, ''Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible'', 2nd revised edition (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2001), pp. 50-51.〕 Such a pause usually has one of the following purposes: #In most cases, a new ''parashah'' begins where a new topic or a new thought is clearly indicated in the biblical text. #In many places, however, the ''parashah'' divisions are used even in places where it is clear that no new topic begins, in order to highlight a special verse by creating a textual pause before it or after it (or both). #A special example of #2 is for lists: The individual elements in many biblical lists are separated by ''parashah'' spacing of one type or another.〔This phenomena often borders on "song" format. The various types and degrees of "song" format as a sophisticated expansion of the ''parashah'' spaces in the Tiberian masoretic manuscripts has been analyzed at length by Mordechai Breuer in ''The Aleppo Codex and the Accepted Text of the Bible'' (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook, 1976), pp. 149-165 (Hebrew).〕 To decide exactly where a new topic or thought begins within a biblical text involves a degree of subjectivity on the part of the reader. This subjective element may help explain differences amongst the various masoretic codices in some details of the section divisions (though their degree of conformity is high). It may also explain why certain verses which might seem like introductions to a new topic lack a section division, or why such divisions sometimes appear in places where no new topic seems indicated. For this reason, the ''parashah'' divisions may at times contribute to biblical exegesis.〔Tov, p. 51: "The subdivision into open and closed sections reflects exegesis on the extent of the content units... It is possible that the subjectivity of this exegesis created the extant differences between the various sources. What in one Masoretic manuscript is indicated as an open section may appear in another as a closed section, while the indication of a section may be altogether absent in yet a third source. Nevertheless, a certain uniformity is visible in the witnesses of M."〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Parashah」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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