[Avodah] inconceivable-- Ben Sorer uMoreh

[Michael Makovi]

Regarding Rabbi Yehonatan's testimony of having seen the grave of a
ben sorer u'moreh and the ruins of an apostasized city:

My understanding, based on someone's (I forget whose) explanation, is
that Rabbi Yehonatan was speaking hyperbolically. Rabbi Yehonatan did
not spend his days searching for graves and city ruins. Rather, Rabbi
Yehonatan objected strenuously to this attempt to exegetically use
midrash halakhah to wipe these mitzvot out of existence, and his
principled philosophical objection to this sort of exegesis was an
exasperated outcry, as if to say, "These laws are so surely still
feasible, that I **may as well have** sat on the grave and the ruins."

If Rabbi Berkovits holds that midrash halakhah can be used to
creatively by Hazal to effectively write a law out of existence, Rabbi
Yehonatan, according to this interpretation, strenuously disagreed
with such exegetical methods.

Michael Makovi