[Avodah] Lying to protect the simple of faith

[Michael Makovi]

> > Most importantly, the Gemara
> > itself opines that Yehoshua wrote the end of the Torah - surely Rambam
> > cannot declare Chazal to be heretics!
> > Mikha'el Makovi

> What's the question? Moshe Rabeinu couldn't have written them because that would have
> been not true. But he certainly could have instructed Yehoshua on the exact text to write.
> So the entire Torah is the direct prophecy of Moshe Rabeinu.
>
> Akiva

The Gemara says Moshe could in fact have written them - that's one of
the two (AFAIK) answers the Gemara gives - G-d dictated and Moshe
wrote with his tears.

And yes, Moshe could have instructed Yehoshua on what to write. But
could this Gemara not be read just as well that Yehoshua himself wrote
them independently of Moshe? Unless you can refute my reading, it's
still a valid one. In fact, I'd say my reading is more valid than
yours:

Javing Yehoshua write them literally sitting next to Moshe is
certainly possible, but it is too similar to Moshe himself writing
them, and so I see no reason why the Gemara would offer this as an
alternative to Moshe himself writing it. The Gemara is trying to solve
the difficulty of how a Moshaic Torah could describe Moshe's death -
an obvious problem of chronology; one answer is that Moshe wrote down
his own death at the dictation of Hashem (hence the tears as he wrote,
and with which he wrote), and the other answer is that Yehoshua wrote
it down after Moshe's death (cf. that the end of sefer Yehoshua
describes several deaths, each of which was written by the successor
of the deceased according to the Gemara) - this second answer totally
answers the chronology problem because it says there are post-Moshe
additions to the Torah! Now, if we say that the second answer is
really that G-d dictated to Moshe who dictated to Yehoshua, how is it
a meaningfully different answer, vis a vis the question asked? It IS
possible that Moshe dictated to Yehoshua, but it's really not a
different answer than the first answer, much as saying that Moshe
wrote the pesukim wearing purple boxer shorts is not a different
answer than just saying he wrote them stam, even though it may be true
that he had such boxers.

Mikha'el Makovi