[Avodah] Rabbi Michael Rosensweig - Kedoshim Tihiyu: The Obligation to Internalize Halachic Values and Adopt a Halachic World View

[Richard Wolpoe]

Just a few comments interspersed.



On Sun, May 4, 2008 at 8:01 PM, Micha Berger <micha at aishdas.org> wrote:

> I was asked offlist for a clearer description of my problem with RMR's
> devar Torah.
>
> IMHO, halakhah is made by analyzing the sources to obtain what
> possibilities exist. Then, one weighs the pros and cons of the various
> options. I described the criteria for such assessment as falling
> into three categories:
> - textual arguments: Ideas such as the majority of sources, whether the
>  idea appears in a code or in a teshuvah, the bredth of acceptance of
>  the author, etc... (IOW, sevara doesn't simply tells us what options
>  exist, some options exist more or less.)
> - mimetic weight: what did my father and grandfather do?
> - hashkafic value: does one or the other fit my general approach to
>  avodas Hashem or otherwise help me relate to the mitzvah?
>
> #1 The Gra favored the book sources (at least for his own practice),


For the GRA himself this method had boundaries. For thothers the slippery
slope allows people to use that GRA to justify paskening new Halacha from
the Gmara.  This is also attributed to the Rambam but in HIS time the Gmaar
was stil lrealtively NEW



> #2 Yekkes
> will accept much textually weaker arguments if they justify halakha
> as received.


Yekkes have a boundary, too - namely time- honored tradition.   You don't
monkey with halachah OR minhag w/o major justification and ONLY in a way
that conforms in both sytle and content

Any change I enforced in my shul had SOME precedent, I never made up new
stuff at all.




> Whereas Chassidum changed numerous practices to fit the
> Chassidic worldview.


This imho is dangerous. the hashkafa dictates the way to behave instead of
an objective read of the sources [mimetis are imho an alterante form of
source]

When Rackman radicalizes afkin'yu he is taking Aggdic hashkafa [the poor
Agunah! let's do ALL We can to help and over-rides precedent.   [I think
Rackman was well-meaning to propse this but it does not take a LOT of da'as
Torah to see he went too far!]

notice his technique does NOT really violate #1 as HE sees #1  and it
certainly does not violate #3, viz. the agenda supercedes the technical
halacha.

BTW at least TWO Rashi's I just learned in Kesubbos [daf 2: daf 3.]  are
very clear implications taht afkin'u is about making a FLAWED GET work, not
about  undoing  kiddushin w/o a GET.

I have hear this Sevara in someone else's name [iirc RASBA] but it is
clearto me that Rashi would hold afkin'u only re: a flawed GET...




>
>
> Brisker derekh is in the first camp. I'm not sure this is where R'
> Chaim Brisker himself was, as he fought being a poseiq lemaaseh, but
> the approach his derekh halimud fostered in further generations is
> highly textualist.
>

R. Gorleick A'H refused to teach Hullin because he avoided halacha lema'aseh
stuff bedavka. He THOUGHT Brisker but behaved like a regular Agudah type
Rosh Yeshiva - at least as far as I could tell.  I respected this. I sensed
he felt that the Rav  was a  bit too  radical  for his taste in his
Halachic  innovations, but he would never say it



>
> I believe that both RRW and I lament this shift.
>
> RRW mourns the loss of consideration of minhag avos, and the loss of
> inertia it creates.
>
> My concern is more on the hashkafic plane -- pesaq is increasingly
> divorced from anything that can create passion.
>

I think one can have a passion for being medakdeik in the  sources and their
real meaning
I was passionate that Zli Keidar on Seder night is a mistaken humra based
upon months of learning issur v'heter b'iyyun. B"H I was mechavein to the
AhSonthis.

But when I observe Kitniyyos, I am pasioante about minhag avos NOT about
Humra. I feel that this is an ashkenaic elegacy taht has been sanctified by
700 years of observance

I am native Litvak and an adopted Yekke.

I hold by the Litvisher passion for analysis and yekkisher passion for
precision and a MUCH higher sophistication in musical liturgy kri'a etc.

I think we should learn like the AhS and be noheig mostly like
Rema/Levush/Maharil in practice.

 I actually liked Brinbaum's apporaach to text. Fix the lower critical
errors and respect the Tradition and history behind the Liturgy. I think
Baer and Ya'avetz were similar in that vein.


>
>
> Tir'u baTov!
> -Micha
>


-- 
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/20080507/33a7fb1d/attachment-0001.htm>