[Avodah] new editions

[Arie Folger]

RMB wrote:
>On RAF's issue of whether that implies authorship date or
> acceptance date, in the case of the talmud bavli, we follow
> authorship. Even though redaction took generations, giving
> the savoraim a gray area status, there were centuries between
> chasimas hashas and talmud bavli being accepted as The
> Talmud Bavli. We don't consider the geonim of those centuries
> as authoritative as amoraim, though. Even if in their own day,
>  they didn't believe their opinions had to be measured by their
> distance from the gemara's masqanos. We, by accepting shas,
> created a situation where they have to be.

First of all, Geonim continued to innovate and we don't necessarily
reject those innovations (do YOU say hanoten laya'ef koa'h?), even
though these are often pisqei din we usually arrogate to the Talmud
only. Secondly, it is those same Geonim who labored to make the Bavli
be accepted, so in a sense they made themselves into a new era, just
like R' Yochanan essentially created the Amoraic era, by being a
leading proponent on not disagreeing with Tannaim. The people who
belabor for acceptance of a text as establishing an era are always in
a grey area, and they tend to be in sync with the era ending work. So
you can't prove anything from that.

It is my contention that this is a huge grey area and that it must be,
and that any attempt to create firm boundaries is bound to fail. I
challenge you to find any poseq prior to the 20th century who made a
difference between whether a responsum was written before or after
acceptance of the SA. In fact, I am not aware of anyone doing that in
the last 100 years, either.

-- 
Arie Folger,
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