[Avodah] Rosh Hashanah 32b There's Hope For Everyone

[Michael Makovi]

> 1 - ...
> ...
> As proof, look at your own sources: There is a chiyuv, keeping it is your
> own problem. Saying they weren't designed for chu"l, or more correctly
> (in keeping with the direction of cause-and-effect of histakeil beOraisa
> ubarei alma) that chu"l wasn't as designed to fit observance, is very
> different than saying that observance has no real role there (short of
> keeping the memory alive). The Dor 4 is simply saying that nothing is
> in there to make chu"l specific loopholes. Which actually presumes that
> the Torah is concerned with Shabbas in chu"l bifnei atzma.
>
> 2- But to draw the parallel, the chiyuv in EY and chu"l of ve'ahavaa
> lerei'akha would be identical, just that in chu"l feasibility is your
> problem, not G-d's or the Torah.
>
> Your conclusion doesn't follow from the premise.

> R' Micha Berger

In truth, my idea is merely inspired by the Dor Revi'i, and not what I
think he himself meant. He says that the Torah is not concerned if a
mitzvah is feasible in chu"l (i.e., it's your problem, not G-d's), and
he says this only to say that any difficulties of keeping Shabbat in
chu"l, practically, are our problem and not G-d's (and therefore, we
should all get on El Al and...).

I've extended this to say that the Torah doesn't even legislate for
chu"l at all, in the first place, except to say that it is a chiyuv in
chu"l as a remembrance and preparation for when we are redeemed.
(Question: Why then don't we do korbanot today as a similar zecher?
Perhaps, the theological problems of offering outside the beit
ha-mikdash are greater than any benefit of zechira.)

The Dor Revi'i speaks of practical feasibility, while I speak of the
very basis of the legislation and the very geographic scope of the
Torah's chiyuvim.

So the Dor Revi'i would simply say that with vehavta l'reacha (R'
Micha's example) that feasibility is your own problem, while I take
this one step further and say that it is really outside the Torah's
purview, except as a remembrance.

Saying that, I can say (with everyone else disagreeing with me) that
there is no command to love a gentile in chu"l simply because the
Torah's purview is only Jewish neighbors and gentiles in EY (gerei
toshav), not gentiles in chu"l.

> Truth is, universal love with no differentiation is the same as
> non-love. Picture this marriage proposal:
>    Tom: Cindy, will you marry me?
>    Cindy: But Tom, do you love me?
>    Tom: Of course, I love everyone!
>
> R' Micha

Ze'ev Maghen in "Imagine: On Love and Lennon" (Azure.co.il) makes the
same example, except in his, Tom concludes by asking "by the way,
what's that excruciating pain in my groin?" Excellent essay,
summarized by R' Nathan L. Cardozo in Thoughts to Ponder no. 2.

> Also, how could we not be expected to love every tzelem E-lokim? Would
> it be possible to have full ahavas Hashem and not love that which is
> similar to Him? AFAIK, that's not how love works. It's just that this
> love happens not to be /this/ chiyuv.
> R' Micha

But then why make a chiyuv to love your neighbor? If the fact that G-d
created man is enough to tell you to love the gentile, then it's
enough to tell you to love the Jew. What I'm troubled by then, is why
there's not an explicit chiyuv on either both or neither. It's the
disparity that troubles me.

So I agree that G-d's creating us all means we should love gentiles,
but the problem remains despite this.

> : b) The Gemara says v'ahavta l'rayacha kamocha = Jewish neighbor, but
> : perhaps this is a drash and not a kabbalah. ...
> Mikha'el Makovi

> But in any case, we're supposed to follow the pesaq. That's Judaism...Your speculation
> doesn't make *Judaism* any more universalist.
> R' Micha

I realize the problems involved (viz. following a minority view of
TSBP, unsupported speculations, no effect on halacha l'maaseh even if
I'm correct), which is why I put it as number two. It's more a way by
which I, as a last resort, customarily relieve any cognitive
dissonance; it goes something like "If it's a kabbalah, then the
logic/rationale/explanation/justification/derivation doesn't matter
and it doesn't matter if it makes sense to me or even seems to
contradict the pasuk, and it's a drash, then if the
logic/rationale/explanation/justification/derivation doesn't have make
sense, and if it seems to contradict the pasuk, then I can disagree in
my mind while I still act kach v'kach". Every single base is covered!

We can even take this logic further. Imagine if a person wants to
insist that basar v'chalav means davka a mother and her kid. I'd
reply: if Chazal are correct, by way of kabbalah, then whatever you
think the pasuk means is irrelevant. OTOH, if Chazal are wrong, and
our maskil correct, then I'd simply reply that apparently, Chazal
either made an authoritively-binding-but-not-necessarily-objectively-correct
drash, or they made a gezerah to extend basar and chalav beyond the
d'oraita, and in time, the original d'oraita was forgotten due to
Roman persecutions and the like (cf. the Gemara asking when Kriat
Shema is d'oraita or d'rabbanan). So either which way you cut it,
Chazal are correct and binding and the practice of basar and chalav is
a correct one.

I use this logic not infrequently, which is part of why I love Rav
Glasner and Rav Berkovits so much. Prior to my learning them, I had
the same ideas as now, but no one with which to back them up. At
least, I can claim some sort of authority behind me so that I'm not as
much of an apikorus.

Mikha'el Makovi