[Avodah] Minhag Yisroel and Gra on 2 Matzos vs.3 Matzos/Rabbi shopping

[Chana Luntz]

RAF write:

> R'n CL wrote:
> > I thought that, to the contrary, I suggested
> > that for some people, a particular question may be so important to 
> > them that it shapes their whole hashkafic outlook on life, 
> and hence 
> > they would indeed categorically exclude choosing someone 
> based on the 
> > particular desired answer to a particular question.
> 
> Well, I do have an issue with that. Our actions should flow 
> forth from our principles, don't you think so?

While this sounds like some sort of platonic ideal - we sit an
philosophise and develop principles and then act in accordance with
them, I don't think this is how things work for many people (maybe it
works that way for the people of the Rambam's ideal).  If you don't want
to hold by the idea that most people are therefore a write-off (in which
case, I suspect, whatever you posken for them probably doesn't matter),
then maybe you need to legitimise the actual way people end up drawing
hashkafic conclusions, which would seem to be a bit more bottom up than
that.

>
> I will be less likely to post in the coming three weeks. 
> Please do not feel 
> offended by my silence.

No problem.
 
> Arie Folger


And then RRW wrote:

 
> See YD 1:1 BY and Schach
> Not exploiting a textual heter is by no means a slam dunk in 
> either direction. The levuch posits the reaons women were 
> excluded for Shechita was due to faintin?

I agree that it is not a slam dunk.  If anything, the question goes
deeper than just minhag, and gets into the issues that eg the Aruch
Hashulchan discusses in relation to the prohibition of clapping and
dancing on shabbas.  Can you, where Chazal gives a specific reason why
they instituted a particular gezera, no longer keep to that gezera if
circumstances (such as the ability of individuals to fix instruments)
chances, as Tosphos and hence the Rema seem to posit.  Now even if you
agree with the Aruch HaShulchan that one cannot in the case of a
specific rabbinic gezera, then maybe you can if it is just a minhag or
the failure to take advantage of a particular heter.  So there could be
many grounds for disagreeing with RHS.  But I didn't see any value in
overstating the case that he appears to be making - because if you do
that, then you will end up constructing straw men just to be knocked
down (which is what I felt the kohen boxes probably were).

On another topic RRW writes:

> I have a bitter fed with a colleague of mine - let's call him 
> Rabbi ABC. Regarding the issue of women and kerias Megillah 
> Rabbi ABC posits the
> following:
> 
>    1. The Tosefta in the place of a conflicting Bavli is NOTHING
>    2. The Bahag and Tosafos use the Tosefta to override the 
> the Bavli in
>    ARachin 3-4 that permits women to read megillah for men. 
> [af hein hayu b'oso
>    haneis ipmlies that like ner Hanukkah, they can do Negillah]
>    3. Ergo  Behag and Tsoafos themselves are NOT playing by 
> the rules of
>    Halacha themselves
>    4. And therefore they really are not doing Halachah, but playing
>    games  C"V
>    5. And [to add insult to insult] they are pursuing a consistently
>    misogynist agenda
> 
> let's recap:
> He claims that the Bavli trumps all and THAT is a rule of pesak:
> 
>    1. is that a fact?  is the Bavli the final arbiter of pesak?
>    2. Or is the the decisiveness of the Bavli a matter of debate?
>    3. are there sources to prove one side or the other? 
> [believe me I am
>    looking at this ll the time?
> 
> Toby claims that R&C rabbis decide the issue first and find 
> support in texts that suits their agenda.  But Rabbi ABC 
> posits that Behag, Toafos and many Orthodox rabbis do this 
> frequently, too. That a decision is mad on some agenda and 
> sources are mustered to make the argument plausible, or 
> cogent post facto.  First comes a minhag afterwards come the 
> rationale.
> 
> How can  I answer Rabbi ABC? As a jew in need I request YOUR help!
> 
> Disclaimer: I do not consider Rabbi ABC an honest broker of 
> the facts of how Halachah works. But in the interest of da 
> mah lehashiv, I need something that can be "makheh es shinav".

The irony of this discussion is that if you were only analysing the
halachic aspect of this (and leaving out the cries of misogyny) this Rav
sounds like a Sephardi.  Funnily enough on the particular topic in hand,
in his single days my husband asked whether he could hear megilla read
by a woman, and was told he could.  Not that he has ever availed himself
of this psak, but every year he says - Oh maybe I should go to the
women's reading at Yakar (or wherever) I got this psak ... 

Of course the Sephardi halachic analysis is precisely this - the Bavli
trumps the Tosephta, and we don't follow Tosphos and the Rema.  And
while highly I doubt misogyny would be something that would be raised,
one of the Sephardi criticisms of a lot of Ashkenazi psak is precisely
about using what seem to be external sources and dubious minhagim to
trump the Bavli (and some of it might be argued to be not that polite -
I think I have read some pretty strong things about not sitting in the
sukkah on shmini atzeres).

Now of course, if you want to talk about women making brochos on mitzvos
aseh shehazman grama ... 

So, actually, I think there are lots of sources to support Rabbi ABC's
position - but I suspect that on other topics (such as women making
brochos) he is not going to want to switch what I suspect is an
Ashkenazi allegiance.  Now it is presumably a very interesting question
as to whether if one were Ashkenazi, but became convinced that the
Sephardi method of halachic analysis was correct (or even more so - if
one decided that the greatest talmid chacham of the day was Sephardi,
and went to learn by him and made him one's rebbe) - or of course, vice
versa, could one do so?  And where does minhag end and halacha begin and
end in such a case?  What about taking positions in a community?  I can
think of two cases here - one is that one of the Rabbis at Aish here is
Sephardi in origin (Syrian from the US, son of a Rav there), and very
steeped in the Sephardi tradition.  But he is working with, on the main,
Ashkenazi not yet frum, and within an Ashkenazi organisation.  He has in
general chosen to put on a united front - including, for example,
dancing and clapping on shabbas - to raise my earlier topic - where all
the sources on which he has to rely are Ashkenazi.  Is he picking and
choosing?  You can certainly see exactly why he is picking and choosing
if he is, but it does seem to be making him a bit neither fish nor fowl?
Another case is a Sephardi Rav who is now a Dayan of the London Beis Din
(OK that pretty much identifies him) and has recently become a Rav of
what is very much a predominantly Ashkenazi congregation.  I have no
idea how he is dealing with these issues - I suspect there would be some
fascinating material if he were to give some insight into his thought
processes and how he is poskening for his congregation.  He certainly is
taking an attitude that differences in minhagim, even as wide as this
should not be a bar to having a unified community.  But it seems to me
that the difference in psak methodology would be even more fundamental.
Oh and yet another example the other way.  As the gedolim of the last
few generations pass away, I seem to be hearing more and more reports of
Ashkenazi rabbaim looking to ROY when they have a case too difficult for
them.  The whole thing boggles my mind.  Having read now quite a lot of
ROY teshuvos, I would be really surprised if you would get a psak from
him where the Mechaber would be trumped by a Tosphos.  Does it matter?
Does the quality of the gadol matter more than their derech even when it
is so far away from what one might expect their tradition to produce?
Can one pick and choose if one has (like this case of megilla) the
Sephardi tradition on which to rely - especially if one really believes
that that is the "right" answer.


Shabbat Shalom

Chana