[Avodah] Just what ARE the rules of p'sak anyway?

[Micha Berger]

On Tue, Nov 06, 2007 at 05:27:35PM -0500, Yitzhak Grossman wrote:
: By "Hokol modim they didn't", I understand you to mean that all agree
: that Rishonim do not have the authority to nullify Kiddushin.  This is
: not correct; the most sensational account of a post-Talmudic afke'inhu,
: and the only one I know to have occurred without a preexisting edict,
: and justified solely by a perceived Rabbinic fear of a potential future
: socio-religious catastrophe, is this one of the Darkei Moshe [0]:
...
: Austreich they [women who had been captured by gentiles - see the
: previous section of the DM] were permitted, on the authority of
: Gedolim, to their husbands too, even to Kohanim ...
: 
: [The DM himself:] And it seems to me that perhaps the Gedolim who
: permitted did not do so Mi'dina but for a Zorech Sha'ah, for they saw
: that we must be concerned for future women, that if they were to know
: that they would be unable to return to the husbands of their youth,
: they might sin, and so they were lenient.

So, it would seem that hakol modim that rishonim do not have the
authority to nullify qiddushin, at least at the level of DM's
"midinah".

On Thu, Nov 08, 2007 at 06:57:27PM -0500, Richard Wolberg wrote:
: This is just the opposite of an old saying: "An expert is someone who comes
: from more than 50 miles away to give advice." I'm not sure from where that
: comes. " 

This is because the issue is legal authority, not factual expertise. And
legal authority goes to the person who best know how the laws fit the
people involved.

Cases where the laws aren't well known, and one needs to bring in an
expert on the fact, we do so. E.g. RYGB gets calls from around the world
from communities looking to set up an eiruv /anyone/ (who would use a
community eiruv at all) could use.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             A pious Jew is not one who worries about his fellow
micha at aishdas.org        man's soul and his own stomach; a pious Jew worries
http://www.aishdas.org   about his own soul and his fellow man's stomach.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                       - Rabbi Israel Salanter