Trinitarian and multiplicity polemics in the biblical commentaries of Rashi, Rashbam, and Bekhor Shor.

Abstract

The Old Testament was the single most important source for proof-texts in Jewish-Christian polemics of the High Middle Ages. Christians attempted to show that doctrines such as the Trinity and virgin birth were implicit and sometimes even explicit in Biblical verses. Moreover, the Old Testament foretold the suffering to be endured by the Jews following their repudiation of Jesus, and the ultimate salvation that Jesus would bring to his followers. The use of the Old Testament in this manner was not an innovation of the Christian polemicists in the High Middle Ages. Since the days of the Church Fathers, leading Christians had adduced Old Testament verses as proofs for their doctrines and had even collected them in literary form.1