[Avodah] R' Berkovits = Conservative halacha??

[Richard Wolpoe]

On Wed, Apr 2, 2008 at 3:58 PM, Micha Berger <micha at aishdas.org> wrote:

> On Sun, Mar 30, 2008 at 02:32:25PM IDT, Michael Makovi wrote:
> : The topic moved to discussing Rabbi Berkovits's halachic approach,
> : compared to Conservative.
>
> "Compared to" doesn't mean equated, despite your choice of new subject
> line.
>

I have only read a smattering of R.E. Berkovits

My general impression is that either he is advocating or better yet perhaps
some are saying in his name the following:

> "So long is one is sincerely a frum ma'amin, halachah is quite plastic"
> Or iow the problem with C playing with Halacha is their lack of emunah in
> the ikkarim, But O's armed with a solid emunah  would imply and  any valid
> interpretation is still Halachic [iow there is no Ortopraxy].
>

For many years I have ben advocating a converse postion:  Namely:

> So long as one is Orthopractic and accepts a minimal set of emunah Axioms,
> thenbelief is quite plastic
>


This is largely simlar to the late Professors Feldblum's defense to me
one-on-one on his methodolgy:

So long as one is loyal to the Sshulchan Aruch, one can use all the modern
> scientific methods to understand the original meaning of the Talmud and not
> worry that the new conclusions will underminee existing Halachic practice-
> just the theoretical Torah lishma will be changed.
>

It is my understanding that Rav David Weiss halivni is more-or-less of a
like mind, that scientific method is about being intellectually honest and
NOT about altering halachic praxis

It is quite clear to me that [aftere reading the bio of Rabbiner Hirsch]that
RSR Hirsch would NOT buy any sort of cognitive dissonance and I would
venture the GRA [and perhaps Rambam] would never accomodate this dichotomy
between theory and practice. But I would venture that many WOULD. That would
probably include not only many of the Hildesheimer and YU universe but also
probably Tosafos and many others in Ashkenaz who lived with a divergence
between text and mimetics.  Sephardim and the Gra [and many yekkes] seem to
find this untanble.

I think R. Berkovits had a point though. Halachah is SO far removed from its
orgins that some flexibility seems reasonable.

Example, explain why does hag'alah require boiling nowadays when a
dishwashwer with soap will poseil any ta'am absorbed in any kasherable keili
[kli cheres exempted].  I cannot give a solid halachic reason except
inertia.

[As regarding ein mevatlin issur lchatchila lets' face it: if you are
allowed to do hag'al in keilim why should it matter HOW?]

So even I - who is in a sense a polar opposite of R. Berkovits could concur
on such an issue.
Kol Tuv / Best Regards,
RabbiRichWolpoe at Gmail.com
see: http://nishmablog.blogspot.com/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.aishdas.org/pipermail/avodah-aishdas.org/attachments/20080402/19d46dc2/attachment-0001.htm>