[Avodah] Torah study vs. other contributions to society

[Chana Luntz]

This topic has resulted in a lot of further discussion, and I don't know
that I will be able to respond to everything, so I am going to jump
around a bit in this and subsequent posts:

RDB writes:

> In response to Rn Luntz:
> 
>  I'm not at all sure I agree that ability to be Mechadesh, or 
> even intellectual capacity, is the determining factor here. A 
> person who is a big Mechadesh might find that his learning is 
> with less Amal baTorah than one who is average, and the Torah 
> of the latter person may be more valuable to Hashem, and to 
> protect the world (and perhaps, this is why it is greater 
> than Hatzalas Nefashos - who knows?)  than that of the former.

This, oddly enough, links in with the discussion we have been having on
areivim (and which has also sort of crossed into Avodah) about the
extent to which it is appropriate to judge people.

One could certainly take this view - but it does have consequences which
lead to a certain degree of anarchy.

For example, somebody I know was apparently standing in a queue to do
something in connection with the Israeli beaurocracy (it being one of
these things that one had to do in person, and could not send somebody)
when somebody generally regarded as a gadol also showed up.  This person
felt that the gadol's time was unquestionably more valuable than his
time, and kovod hatorah and all that, and so gave the gadol his place in
the queue.  According to the RDB approach listed above, however, how did
he know that in fact that wasn't more amal batorah than the gadol, and
that his learning might not be more valuable to Hashem and of greater
protection to the world?

Similarly, on what basis should one follow the advice of those generally
recognised as gadolim, as opposed to one's neighbour who always has an
eitza for everything - maybe the gadol has learnt with less amal batorah
than one's neighbour?  

We cannot know what it is that Hashem values, but we can and do
recognise intellectual capacity and we can and do recognise the ability
to be mechadesh on a high level.  Whether the key criteria for producing
those who are mechadesh is intellectual capacity plus dilligence, or
dilligence alone is, as I indicated, something of a machlokus.  But to
deny that the ability to be mechadesh on a high level is the hallmark of
a gadol seems to me rather difficult to maintain.  In which case, you
end up effectively saying that we have no way of judging whether gadolim
are any better than the rest of us.

And RZL writes:

> I'm not involved in this discussion, but I would just like to 
> point out that it is not so poshut to go from the classical 
> cases of temporarily interrupting one's learning for doing an 
> immediately necessary deed that required no training, to the 
> kind of training and more permanent time commitment that 
> preparing for Zaka requires, and certainly to the time and 
> effort needed to become a medic in preparation for situations 
> not yet in existence (although of course predictably they 
> will be). In the first case, Talmud Torah remains the kevius, 
> as opposed to in the other two cases.

Absolutely.  The one is at best a form of hecsher mitzvah (ie the
training) as opposed to the mitzvah itself (the doing). That is why the
fact the Gra's father might not have wanted the Gra to study practical
medicine does not mean that there was a conflict between talmud torah
and pikuach nefesh, as RMSS tries to argue, with talmud torah trumping
pikuach nefesh.  All there was was at most a heksher mitzvah, and the
Gra's father felt that the Gra's talmud torah trumped that.  What I also
tried to show was that this is not something that is a TUM versus Torah
only debate - if somebody studies English Literature (a la Rav
Lichtenstein) or Philosophy (a la RYBS) they are also choosing a secular
subject above medicine.  Why did they not study medicine?  Same issue
arises, why does literature or philosophy for these individuals trump
studying medicine when after studying medicine one could go out and save
lives?

But there is also a different debate in our (ie halachic) society which
is who, if anybody, does those jobs that do require training before any
mitzvah can be performed (ie where it can become difficult to have the
talmud torah dominate one's day if one is to do the training properly).
I gave Zaka as a classic example precisely because it does require
training, and training without ever knowing if it will be needed (please
G-d there should be no further need of a Zaka).  In the classical
sources there is no discussion of a Zaka, but there is of a chevra
kaddisha. A chevra kaddisha is also an example of a situation where
training and organisation is needed before there is actually a meis in
front of one, triggering the mizvah.  And one is required to be set up.
The question becomes, how is this done, who should participate?  

Now RMSS's response to this is:

> I don't see where "society" comes into this. There are 
> explicit halacha's that deal with this, and one is supposed 
> to make burial society's etc. If the only people available to 
> do this are people learning (a far-fetched occurrence, which 
> even in Lakewood - the town that most probably has the 
> highest percentage of full time learners - this doesn't 
> occur...), then they are the ones who need to take care of 
> this, "Society" doesn't enter the picture.

See this is a particular ideological viewpoint - ie that these things
will sort of happen by themselves - somebody will presumably see a need,
and somebody will do something about it and form a chevra kadisha or a
Zaka or whoever (although it is not really clear whether it is mutar or
not to do this if the participants would otherwise be in learning).
There are in this piece also hints to the idea that those who fail to be
able to maintain themselves as learners will fall into this role as a
form of second best (ie that is how you get to it being mutar, but only
for those who cannot manage to sit in yeshiva full time).

However many people don't believe in this extreme atomised idea of
decision making.  Certainly in the classical cases it was assumed that
the beis din of the town or the tovei hair or somebody would be
organising such things (ie, in other terms, society).  But the deeper
philosophical question is as to how such people (theoretically or
actually) should make a decision that X should spend his time doing such
things, including therefore any training necessary to do it properly,
and Y should not.  Is it that in theory everybody should be learning and
the failures to sit in yeshiva all day end up being fingered to do such
things (and what if there are no failures?), or are there other criteria
(eg ability in learning compared to others as determinable by other
human beings eg the rigourous selection criteria of the great Lithuanian
yeshivos in Lithuania, economics, etc).

It is not a TUM versus Torah only debate exactly, although somebody with
a TUM perspective is more likely to see what those not in yeshiva do as
being of value to themselves as well as to society and hence the
decision making becomes easier.   But the idea that those who should
stay in yeshiva is predicated on intellectual ablitity plus diligence
(ie the classic Lithuanian yeshiva approach) as demonstrated by a range
of factors but with the key one being the ability to be mechadesh is not
necessarily a TUM approach - it could be, or it could be that somebody
from a TUM approach would say that it should be based on what people
like doing - so (at an extreme) if somebody is brilliant and capable of
becoming the next gadol hador, but they really like English literature,
and somebody else who is only average but really wants to spend the rest
of his life in yeshiva, and there is only funding for one, then it
should be the guy who wants to spend the rest of his life in yeshiva who
should be funded.  Whereas one can have a torah only approach and insist
that the next gadol hador should stay, or take a torah only approach and
toss a coin, because perhaps the ordinary fellow's Torah is more valued
by HaShem, or take a torah only approach and take the ordinary guy as he
is demonstrating more fidelity to the Torah and really if he tries hard
maybe even he can be the next gadol hador, or maybe it doesn't matter if
we produce what we consider gadolim or not, as it is up to Hashem to
judge.

Regards

Chana