[Avodah] Tzinius and the ILG

[Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer]

I have an ongoing debate with one of my colleagues at MTA. Were he not 
Jewish, he would be Catholic, and he believes that a la Catholicism, 
mitzvos are meant to have a salvational effect on us.


On this basis, he justifies the teaching of Gemara b'Iyun to lower-track 
students - viz., it has a salvific effect even if they gain little 
enlightenment from it.


I, OTOH, believe that mitzvos are meant to have a refining impact on us 
- and that applies even to the most obscure and mystical rites we possess.


As such, I have great difficulty justifying the almost pointless 
instruction of the lower levels in Gemara b'Iyun. Better to teach them 
Sefer HaChinuch.


YGB


Micha Berger wrote:

> Anyone notice how many of our threads lately revolve around the question of
> the relationship between halakhah and aggadic moral imperatives? Not that I'm
> really sure they are aggadic, I think it's more the vagueness of mitzvos about
> being tov, yashar, and qadosh -- TYQ.
>
> We have the discussion about slavery, the question of whether we are
> mechuyavim to speak up about the Sudan, or whether such interest may be
> assimilationism from liberal Judaisms that distracts us from more central
> priorities, the issue of avaq ribis being close enough to ribis to be wrong
> but not prohibited...
>
>   
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