atare is comparable only with that of Maimonides.
Indeed, it was more wholesome than his. The Talmudic
codex established by Maimonides aimed at nothing
less than to shut off the discussions and to give the oral
law firm, solid shape. Rashi, on the contrary, safe-
guarded the rights of the future, and gave his successors
full play. Again, not having introduced into his work
philosophic speculations, he was shielded against criti-
cism, and his renown was therefore more immaculate
than that of the author of the Mishneh Torah, who had
to undergo furious attacks.

Rashi dominates the entire rabbinical movement in
France and Germany. Generally, the influence of a
writer wanes from day to day; but as for Rashi's, it
may be said to have increased by force of habit and as
the result of events, and to have broadened its sphere.
Limited at first to French, Lotharingian, and German
centres of learning, it soon extended to the south of
Europe, to Africa, and even to Asia, maintaining its
force both in the field of Biblical exegesis and of Tal-
mudic jurisprudence.

Since it is impossible to mention all the authors and
works following and preceding Rashi, it must suffice to
point out some characteristic facts and indispensable
names in order to bring into relief the vitality and
expansive force of his achievement, and to show how it
has survived the ravages of time, and, what is more, how
it has overcome man's forgetfulness--edax tempus,
edacior homo. We shall see that Rashi directed the
course of the later development at the same time that
he summed up in his work all that had previously been
accomplished.

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