[Avodah] history

[Eli Turkel]

.
<<A refined version of your hypothesis would have to include the
caveat that some stories do come down for the purpose of teaching
something not to emulate, and would have to include a method for
identifying those stories.  One simple suggestion would be that the
only such stories are the ones with a critical component already,
but this does bring us back to the question as to when that
criticism was attached and who is able to make such criticism.>>

Again the question that was raised was not learning musar from these stories
but learning halachot.  A simple example is that if eliyahu was
Pinchas then this implies
that a Cohen gadol can resign his position and then not be bound by
all the restrictions.
Eliyahu obviously did not live in Jerusalem, left for Samaraia and
even outside of
the borders of Israel raising questions of tumah. Could eliyahu marry a widow?

On this level the original question of the status of the avot is a
little less disturbing.
The assumption was that the avot realized they were safek gerim and
acted accordingly.

-- 
Eli Turkel