[Avodah] attitude to agadot

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Mar 08, 2007 at 10:24:29PM +0200, Eli Turkel wrote:
: The current issue of Hakirah (vol. 4) ...
:               there is another article about the Maharl MiPragueand aggadot.
: He points out that virtually EVERY Gaon and Rishon took aggadot with
: a big grain of salt many stating explicitly that they are no binding
: especially when they have no direct halachic portion. The first person to
: insist on their complete validity was the Maharal and he reinterpreted
: them so they were not to be taken literally.
: Until our times they has been almost no one that takes the position
: of R. Feldman that denying aggadot is kefirah.

Are you sure RAF says this? It is the exact opposite of what he says in
the preface to The Juggler and the King in the name of the Gra. And he
says nowhere that he personally follows another shitah.

On Thu, Mar 08, 2007 at 10:00:16AM -0500, Zev Sero wrote:
: 4, and this should satisfy the minimalists: Maybe the tail was "visible"
: only to Vashti.  It was all in her mind; or if RMB prefers, it existed
: in her private universe but not in anyone else's.  When she looked in
: the mirror, she saw a tail; when she felt behind her, she felt a tail,
: and so she refused to be seen like that.  There was no need for anyone
: else to see it, so they didn't, but *she* didn't know that.

I do not think the issue should be reduced to minimalism vs maximalism.

I'm trying to follow neither, but find how the overwhelming majority
of baalei mesorah treat this topic. In the case of time during maaseh
bereishis or the truth of aggadic stories, this leads me to a position
similar to that of the minimalists. WRT the mabul, I end up multiplying
miracles (or going to a very modern ontology) and sound like a maximalist.

Tir'u baTov!
-mi

-- 
Micha Berger             When you come to a place of darkness,
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