[Avodah] LW MO

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Dec 09, 2009 at 08:16:09AM -0800, Saul.Z.Newman at kp.org wrote:
: http://www.jewishjournal.com/morethodoxy/item/the_ever-narrowing_orthodox_mind_39091208/

Some comments on RYK's blog entry:
: The Ever-Narrowing Orthodox Mind.
: Posted by Rav Yosef Kanefsky

: Another way that we are unnecessarily making Orthodoxy unappealing
: to folks is by tolerating the perception that Orthodox Jews are bound
: by a set of religious dogmas...

We are, though. It's a shorter list and a broader range of beliefs than
those listed, but that doesn't mean we have no dogma. We can't correct
an error in one direction by over-erring in the other. Not only that,
we have more dogmas than those beliefs attested to by shemiras Shabbos
(ie that there is a Borei, that he gave us TSBK and TSBP, including
the halachic *process* and some given dinim, at Har Sinai).

Now, it could just be sloppy language on his part, but given the
trend in Academic O circles toward mininizing dogma (eg R Marc Shapiro's
book), it might not.

Most of the items on his list are ones I personally reject about as
vehemently as RYK does. But that doesn't mean I place them outside eilu
va'eilu. Except for the following:

: (1) Jewish souls have a superior innate quality relative to non-Jewish
: souls. And only the former enjoy the benefits of eternal life.

The 2nd sentence requires ignoring a gemara. The first sentence is
denied by the Kuzari and others.

(Where I get bothered is not when the neshamah of a Yid is played up, but
when the specialness of other benei adam is played down.)

: (3) When tragedy strikes, this is invariably the fault of somebody
: having sinned.

IOW, seifer Iyov is expunged from Tanakh. There is mamash an entire
seifer aimed at denying this thesis.

...
: (9) ["Damaging" in the sense that our intellectual honesty is shot
: by this one..] The book of Tehillim, including the Psalms describing
: events surrounding the destruction and rebuilding of Jerusalem, were
: nonetheless somehow authored by King David. And the books of Mishlai and
: Kohellet were authored by King Solomon - despite the fact that they are
: written in a Hebrew that belongs to the Second Temple period. And the
: issues surrounding Isaiah etc, etc.

The material in brackets is just plain wrong. One may choose to
disbelieve the traditional claims about who compiled seifer Tehillim,
and the list of 10 contributors he pulled from. After all, there is
Shir haShirim Rabba 4:5, and rishonim consequently took bother sides.
(The Malbim personally appears to support both sides; we discussed this
in v17n41-59 or so... RJBaker and RETurkel represented the minimalists,
RZLampel, the maximalists.)

But to take a gemara on BB 14b and call it intellectually dishonest?!

That is as confining as the position he's trying to de-popularize! One
chops out the maximalists, the other the minimialists, and neither allow
for a full range of derakhim with which one may be chanokh lenaar.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             It's never too late
micha at aishdas.org        to become the person
http://www.aishdas.org   you might have been.
Fax: (270) 514-1507                      - George Elliot