Questions on Ralbag Paper

Hi Rabbi,

I have a few questions on your Ralbag paper:

1) You said Ralbag remarks that his shift away from language focus was transformational in his own development.  Where does he say this?

2) You say the conventional approach's focus on small units of text does not demand that the reader have mastery of Torah literature as a whole.  This statement implies that Ralbag's approach does, in fact, demand that the reader have mastery of Torah literature as a whole.  But isn't that a catch 22?  Ralbag is an aid to gaining mastery of Torah literature, but at the same time one must have a mastery of Torah literature before understanding Ralbag's approach???  Which one is the means and which one is the end?

3) You speak of Ralbag's overall theory of Torah.  What is this theory and where does he state it?

4) You say Ralbag presents introductions that extend this theory to certain key Torah stories.  Which stories?  Where and how does he do this?

Thanks,
Dan