[Avodah] Medrash

[Micha Berger]

I am going to make comments across a number of threads ("Esther and Virgins",
"Vashti", "Bizmaneihem" and "Malbim on 19th century politics") that I think
can be unified with a single observation -- we are using "medrash" "derashah"
in a number of different ways, and I think it is leading to both
miscommunication and errors of homonym (proving something for one meaning of
the word and using the conclusion with another meaning).

My rav's Shabbos morning derashah is different than the kind of derashah
performed with middos shehaTorah nidreshes bahem. Derashos using middos is
called "medrash", and is found in medrashei halakhah, but we also use the word
"medrash" to refer to stories in medrashei aggada. All of the above are found
in shas.

In SAT order (addressing the simplest first):

An LOR will generally make his derashah about an issue of import to his
kehillah. Therefore, a contemporary LOR talking about Migdal Bavel might focus
on the society's rebelliousness. RSRH and the Netziv chose to write about
their fascist totalitarian attitude -- placing more value on the gov't
building project and a fallen brick than on the individual. Neither are wrong
-- but the topic of the time and locale defines what lesson one is motivated
to draw out.

If the Malbim is very aware of an issue because of contemporary politics and
therefore sees a lesson about it in the megillah, then his devar Torah will be
both a real devar Torah and a political observation.


Second, middos shehaTorah nidreshes bahem (MTNB):

On Tue, March 6, 2007 3:05 pm, Zev Sero wrote:
:> So the question is whether divrei Soferim and derashah mesh, and the answer
:> may be a one-off of our case. The nafqa minah would be whether the
:> conclusion
:> is also divrei soferim (derashah) or or derabbanan (asmachta).
:
: Again, for the question to begin there must be some reason to suppose
: that we don't darshen Nach.  And again I ask: ver zogt?   AFAIK not only
: do we darshen Nach, but we darshen Mishna.

We are medaqdeqim belshon haMishnah -- or even the Mishneh Torah -- but we do
not apply MTNB to them. Not every diqduq belashon is dershah (in this sense of
the word), as the existence of asmachtos shows.

MTNB are a means of deriving halakhah, which means that for every case but
these four mitzvos. DeOraisos must come from chumash, regardless of the
question of MTNB. And there are no other divrei Soferim in Nakh. This one
derashah would be the only example for us debate.

I do not think MTNB are meaningful for anything the A-lmighty didn't dictate
letter for letter. I have no maqor, but it's mistaber to me. Derashah is a
means for HQBH adding a second legal layer to a text that is more concerned
with precision in mussar than precision in din. As per "ayin tachas ayin",
where Chazal use the peshat to teach guilt, and a gezeirah shavah to show that
"tachas" refers to payment.

But here it seems obvious for a totally different reason: It refers to a din
that couldn't have existed when Yom Nikanor was added to megilas ta'anis. The
din post-dates the text. Even if MTNB were a meaningful term WRT divrei
Soferim in theory, how can we apply it to a din derabbanan centuries after the
text?

With the one nafqa mina eliminated, the theoretical difference between us
becomes moot.


Last, looking at medrash as a term for aggadic stories:

On Mon, March 5, 2007 10:53 pm, Zev Sero wrote:
:> Of course, if medrashim that are "fantastical" are meshalim, then
:> those aren't ra'ayos either. [...] The question of whether a private
:> lema'alah min hateva miracle defies hesteir panim is an interesting one.

: Aren't you rather putting the cart before the horse?  The idea that
: the Purim Miracle was characterised by "hester panim" is itself
: merely a drasha, of no better pedigree than these midrashim....

I gave a list of rishonim and acharonim who state that we are not supposed to
assume that "fantastic" aggadic stories are meant as historical statements.
(Admittedly on this iteration I got tired of it and didn't truck out the list
of citations and quotes again.)

Thus, such medrashim taken as history have worse pedigree than statements
about the meaning of the Purim story, or even aggadic stories that do not
involve large claims. I also question your characterization that "hesteir
panim" is a late notion, but that's tangential to the broader issue.

We're not discussing the pedigree of the aggadita, we're discussing the
pedigree of the mashal. The nimshal is true whether the mashal was written for
the nimshal, or drawn from a historical event. None of us question the
authority of the TSBP in the story in terms of the values it teaches.

In none of our iterations have we had anyone post a maqor that is choleiq with
the sources for saying they aren't necessarily historical.

For that matter, it's hard to even prove anyone discusses the historical event.

When they darshen the story, the fact that the story is presented means that
you can assume some things about it. The behavior ascribed to the righteous
will fit almost always fit halakhah. A historical medrash would not repeat LH
about a tzadiq if the point could be made otherwise. And if the story was
invented to teach, it would not be done at the expense of a tzadiq's name. Not
when evil people can be used to teach the definition of evil. See the Maharetz
Chajes pereq 20.

So the medrash would be dealt with by latter baalei mesorah with no regard to
history. You are fleshing out the medrash to get the lesson, not the history.

On Tue, March 6, 2007 1:52 pm, Zev Sero wrote:
: BTW, that she was his wife is definitely to be taken literally;
: the gemara and *all* the rishonim and acharonim take it literally
: and seriously, and learn halachot from it.  I think treating it
: as some metaphoric medrash would come very close to the edge of
: the acceptable range of hashkafa.

Given the above, the fact that the story exists means that there it is a way
it  is possible without ascribing aveiros to Esther.

People discuss medrash within its own terms. The issue of history doesn't and
shouldn't come up.

Similarly, when Rashi says that the one frog coming from the Nile doesn't fit
peshat. It was we who jumped to the question of what does that mean about what
really happened. Rashi simply doesn't care.

Which is the whole reason why we shouldn't assume anything about the
historicity of these aggadic stories to begin with! The people who told and
retold them weren't teaching history, the subject of what really happened
wasn't on their radar.

Instead, they were interested in making a point in a way that keeps students'
attention, or in a poetic way that gives emotional depth and a metaphor for
the mind to analyze, or in a way that minimizes the writing of TSBP -- to give
some of the various reasons given for aggadic points to be relayed by mashal.


As for the dangers of teaching children these stories, speaking as someone who
believes that the overwhelming majority of baalei mesorah did not expect these
stories to be taken as history....

We are now having a debate, where those of us who take them as historical are
expected to prove this claim for what I believe is the 5th time since the
founding of this list. Despite the fact that there are meqoros saying that are
not always (and some hold: ever) historical, and no one cited a statement
saying they are choleiq.

So, the default assumption of our generation's masses is different than that
of most baalei mesorah. (Again, as I see the issue.) And this belief is deeply
entrenched to the point of requiring extraordinary proof to uproot, if
anything can.

Second, regardless of what one feels about "fantastic" aggadic stories,
doesn't peshat come first? Combined with our lack of focus on learning Tanakh,
people don't know what's in the pasuq and what isn't.


I would have thought that the topic is a non-starter until someone actually
finds a maqor that says "I am choleiq with the Rambam, aggadic stories that
seem like tall tales are historical", or with the Ritva, the Rashba, the
Maharsha, the Maharal, the Gra, the Maharitz Chajes, RSRH, RYSalanter... And
for that matter someone who is maximalist WRT another famous topic, R' Feldman
in his overview to The Juggler and the King (pg xxii), said besheim haGra.

That would be enough to say there are two sides to the matter. I do not see
how an idea with such a list of supporters could ever be dismissed altogether.

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             Spirituality is like a bird: if you tighten
micha at aishdas.org        your grip on it, it chokes; slacken your grip,
http://www.aishdas.org   and it flies away.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            - Rav Yisrael Salanter