[Avodah] "Ancient" Minhagim

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

R' Harvey Benton asked:
> I mean no disrespect to your father, but other jewish
> practices and sects have also survived the test of time -
> including xians and karaites.  That doesnt mean they are
> legitimate.  What if chabads errant beliefs and practices
> stand for CV another 100 years?  Would that legitimize them?
> I feel that my original ? still stands - ie what principles,
> halachic or otherwise, do we have to guide us when new
> practices arise?

This question has bothered me for decades, ever since I begin wondering if I should leave the conservative movement for the orthodox. My conclusion was that no objective principles exist for this, because if such objective principles *did* exist, the errant movements would have vanished long ago.

Even more: This applies not only to Jewish practices and sects, but to the non-Jewish ones as well. Just as none of the "proofs" of G-d's existence satisfy everyone, so too there is no guaranteed way to prove that an errant religion or movement or individual is mistaken.

> what principles, halachic or otherwise, do we have to
> guide us when new practices arise?

None. All we have is each individual's responsibility to do his best to find Truth. Each of us has a different yardstick in this task. Most people accept what they've received from parents and teachers, and judge the new things by that standard. A big problem, though, is how to know whether that received knowledge is valid or not.

R"n Toby Katz wrote:
> My father once commented to me that had he lived at the
> time of the Vilna Gaon, he would never have become a
> chossid.  His basic posture towards anything new was
> similar to that of the Chasam Sofer -- "Chadash assur
> min haTorah." 

With all due respect (and, as one who remembers Rav Bulman from my Ohr Somayach days, I truly mean that) I really wonder if that's how he would have felt. If he had lived at the time of the Vilna Gaon, but in an area that was predominantly Chassidic, and had a Chassidic family, a Chassidic shul, and a Chassidic school, perhaps he would have thought that it was the Chassidim who were the faithful and traditional Jews, and that it was the *Gra* who was bringing a new and objectionable type of Judaism to the world.

Akiva Miller

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