[Avodah] Inconsistencies in following tannaim

[Micha Berger]

[Folding together two threads on nearly the same topic. -micha]

On Sun, May 04, 2008 at 12:31:30AM -0400, Richard Wolpoe wrote:
: You have a mah nafsach at work here:
: Either you hold from closure of an era:
: OR
: you hold from hasima of th Talmud itself and nothing else

: This is the criticism I have about th Orthodox Halachic proceses not
: adhering to a consistent model.

WADR, this is where I came in.

You assert that if a halachic process is well defined, it must be
phrased in boolean terms.

The process does exist, but it involves weighing pros and cons.

Since that doesn't fit your all-or-nothing assumption, it will look
inconsistent to you -- "depending on where this factor relates to
others" is neither "all", nor "nothing".

At this point, I have no idea how else to make that point. I'm going to
have to throw in the towel.


On Mon, May 05, 2008 at 12:15:48AM -0400, R Zev Sero wrote (from
Singapore(?!):
: (The Rogachover did not learn Acharonim at all, but he did learn the
: AR, saying that he was a Rishon.)

I'm not sure how solid of a ra'ayah one can bring from the Rogachover.
While everyone quotes some of his more clever chiddushim, did you ever
see him used lemaaseh or leveraged by another teshuvah? I can't think
of a case.

Maybe he was too innovative to actually influence the flow of halakhah.


On Mon, May 05, 2008 at 10:44:57AM -0400, Rich, Joel wrote about a quote
I posted from my blog:
:>: Someone who changes the weights to find a desired result is no longer
:>: simplifying an Infinite Truth to fit it into this universe. Different
:>: shadows of the same object are each valid. But if you trace the shadow
:>: while changing the direction of the lighting mid-stream, you are left
:>: with a picture something that isn't a shadow of the original. The
:>: weighting can't simply be to justify the result...

: Conceptually (or as my wife likes to say - "In Joelworld") I would agree
: with you.  Practically the empirical data imho doesn't support the
: hypothesis as well as one would like (i.e the simplest explanation of
: many halachik phenomena is that the weighting system was affected by the
: desired ends - which of course is then explained as "halakhos of making
: halakhah" to those who wish to maintain the purity of the system.) In
: this explanation, where does the "halachik heart" fit in (halakhos of
: making halakhah?)

The phrasing of "desired result" is unfortunate. If someone is including
aggadic values among the list of pros and cons to weigh, then they will
have a sense of a result they're trying for. It's not what I was thinking
of when I said "desired", though.

One is having a perspective when analyzing halakhah, tying one's
shemiras hamitzvos to one's approach to AYH.

The other is replacing the whole process of weighing halachic pros and
cons in exchange for using the fuzziness to wiggle in whatever they
simply want to do.

The halakhos of making halakhah are what differentiate keeping the light
still and tracing the shadow vs. moving it around to be able to trace
the shape you want. (Be it a smaller shape than any of the real shadows,
or even a larger one.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Today is the 15th day, which is
micha at aishdas.org        2 weeks and 1 day in/toward the omer.
http://www.aishdas.org   Chesed sheb'Tifferes: What is the Chesed in
Fax: (270) 514-1507                            harmony?