[Avodah] ikkarim redux

[Micha Berger]

I was going to let this go, but there were a couple of points on which I think
RMS misunderstood me in a way that didn't let me let go.

On Tue, March 27, 2007 8:58 pm, R Meir Shinnar wrote:
: However, ikkarim per se - have rarely been used in a halachic process - in :
the sense that so far, you have not been able to cite a detailed process.

I explicitly listed what I saw as two objections from you on this point:

First, that no one really applied the process to decide on the ikkarim,
Second, that even those who used the words "13 ikkarim" used it idiomatically
to mean emunah, and not this particular list.

IIRC, you gave me the 2nd response when I cited teshuvos about meshichtsin and
stam yeinam. (Both were lehaqeil, FWIW.)

But to this I question whether teshuvos are written that ca

: Remember, historically, until the 19th century, it was quite simple - it was
: quite easy to determine who were us and who were them - because it was an :
act of conscious identification or conscious rebellion.  All discussions of :
the ikkarim are tempered by this.

Now you have me confused... The ikkarim you were saying weren't discussed in a
halachic context you are now saying were discussed with an assumption of
conscious rebellion? Are you referring to discussion in a different context?
If so, how does the assumption of rebellion impact our discussion?

: this is why, to choose an ikkar which is less controversial that it is :
frequently violated - the fifth ikkar, even though there were many poskim :
who worried about the fifth ikkar halacha lema'ase  - and insisted on :
changing or omitting piyuttim - I am not aware of any posek, even those who :
nominally accepts the ikkarim as defining a kofer or a mumar - who views :
anyone who says machnise rachamim as a kofer whose wine can't be drunk.

Because few (outside of the Darda'im and extreme Granikim) would hold that
narrow definition of the 5th ikkar. But we all agree that worshipping Moshe
Rabbeinu, the eigel (to replace him), the keruvim, the Chaldean deity Kerub
(an ox whose wagon carried messages between earth and heaven), the two oxen
outside Malkhus Yisrael's temples, or Yeishu, is not Jewish.

...
: To go back to one of your examples, the size of a zayit I can find multiple
: debates in the literature. When someone uses a term in a specific halachic :
sense - it means that the term has a known meaning to which one can refer : -
and that the posek is referring to a known meaning.  Halacha is not open :
ended - and halachic terms have specific meaning - although poskim can :
debate about which particular meaning to give a term in a given context.

: You concede that one is talking about the ikkarim in some loose sense - and
: I am saying that that statement means that one is not talking about the :
ikkarim in a halachic sense. ...

While we all agree about the 5th ikkar's application to the above examples.

I am convinced the Chaldean deity Kerub was keruv worship. (I made the
argument here in the past, also touching on the eigel and the Temples in
Malkhus Yisrael <http://www.aishdas.org/avodah/vol08/v08n121.shtml#12>. Kerub
had a parallel in Mitzrayim called Apis, with Temples at either end of the
country with bulls in front of them.) As per Rambam's description of dor
Enosh, they worshipped part of the real angelic enteurage. So just how does it
differ from those who say Machnisei Rachamim?

But the same could be argued in the reverse: We ask people to say tehillim for
us, or a rav to give us a berakhah. Not considered violating the 5th ikkar.
What if the rav is deceased, is it so different to ask his neshamah for the
same berakhah? And is a niftar's neshamah so different than asking a mal'akh?
Don't you say "Borchuni leshalom mal'akhei hashalom"?

(As a point of fact, I don't. Not until I have this figured out. It's too
distracting. I use "Shivtikhem leshalom", an equally ancient nusach used by
those Sepharadim and Chassidim who have 5 verses. 4 verses is keneged the 4
rungs of Yaaqov's sulam. 5, keneged Nara"n Ch"ai. I couldn't just say three,
as that would leave the mal'achim with Nara"n, down in the lower olamos. The
basis of Shalom Aleikhem is Qabbalah, I can't say it like a rationalist.)

So, the 5th ikkar's edges, like those of many dinim, are blurry. We can all
agree that violating the 5th ikkar in some fundamental way crosses the line,
but beyond that -- we all have our own lines.

That's how this "loose sense" is typical halakhah. It's like agreeing that
someone who eats a kezayis bemeizid on YK is oveir, without being able to
agree whether the amount a particular person ate was a kezayis. The CI would
be meiqil on him.

We accepted the ikkarim to the extent of incorporatingd it into the siddur in
two places. For that matter, to the extent that two poets thought it central
enough to warrant poetry. Well before the modern era in which RMShapiro thinks
we erred on this point. And even those who objected to limiting the doxology
just to the ikkarim (not looser restrictions, tighter!) only managed to get
rid of Ani Maamin -- Yigdal remains in every siddur from Frankfurt to Teiman.

A change in the siddur too requires halachic process.

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