[Avodah] Who is Orthodox?

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Aug 17, 2011 at 03:16:47PM -0500, Lisa Liel wrote to areivim:
> So what's the solution?  Have no boundaries at all?  What would you  
> suggest as a line over which a person can't cross without being  
> considered other than Orthodox?  Is there such a line?  Eating on Yom  
> Kippur, I imagine, right?  But there must be something less dramatic.

Let's go back a step... in what situation does the concept of "boundary"
have or need rigor? Sociologically, groups often have broad gray areas
at the edges, not boundaries. So if the question were one of society or
culture, we could just leave things as being more or less mainstream,
and get on with life. But I think that here in Avodah territory, there is
need for rigor -- because how I relate to other Jews depends on whether
they are koferim, not koferim because they are not rebelling but still
hold beliefs that are kefirah, or are maaminim, and on whether they
are mumarim or observant. These are now halachic categories, and there
"shiurim" will at times have to be defined and applied.

Well, the Rambam gives /his/ definition for who is "Yisrael" WRT who
has a cheileq le'olam haba in Peirush haMishnayos, and it closely
parallels the sum of his definitions of apiqoreis, kofeir and min in
Hil' Teshuvah pereq 3. Shifting from published pesaqim to how I see
things being applied lemaaseh, we loosened those 13 iqarim, accepting
pretty much anyone whose beliefs can be fitted to some definition of the
presentations in Ani Maamin or Yigdal. And what I see of today's poseqim,
if asked a question about a candidate for geirus or for stam yeinam
(espectially among those who hold that a tinoq shenishba who happens
to hold kefirah poses a stam yeinam issue), would toe this particular
line. So that's where I would start.

Others on-list, eg R' Dr Meir Shinnar, believe that that's too
restrictive, and hold than only those beliefs necessary to justify
following halakhah are definitive.

In terms of practice, there are only a few cases where the aveirah is
so bad that a mumar for that particular davar echad is tantamount to
being a mumar lekhol haTorah kulah. The only two that come to mind at
the moment are AZ and a mechalel Shabbos befarhesia because he is a
meshumad lehach'is.

I think that someone who doesn't violate any of the above, no matter how
dangerous, wrong or assur his beliefs may be, simply can't be defined
as michutz lamachaneh on a halachic level.


The second issue might be avoiding ideas that within the machaneh,
but you yourself find dangerous enough to want you, your children,
perhaps -- depending who the "you" is -- your talmidim or your qehillah,
should avoid. IOW, let's not hang out with adherents of X, because
their methodology WRT halakhah is not only wrong (as our poseqim define
"wrong") but is too likely to lead to a total unravelling of the concept
of halakhah. I think someone should be more capable of separating judging
an idea from judging its adherants than that.


As for those who hold now-rejected opinions of rishonim (eg they believe
that hashgachah peratis [HP] is propostional to yedi'ah, tzidqus, or
whatever, rather than being universal)... How "dangerous" can they be,
that there is today a need to ban them? If the IE managed to be the IE,
or the Ralbag was able to be the Ralbag, or the Rambam, or R' Saadia Gaon,
or.... while holding this allegedly dangerous belief, how dangerous can
it really be?

And if it's neither kefirah lehalakhah (as per my first point), nor
required by the logical need to avoid spiritual danger, what grounds
are there to ban it? And if it is being banned, can that ban actually
be a halachic issur?

Then we get into issues like universal HP vs HP only on all people. There
we have current belief vs ALL rishonim. No rishon holds of HP on
non-people; the Gra's talmidim say it's his chiddush, the LR says it's
the Besht's. Does an acharon (or "post-acharon") even have the authority
to actually pasqen that something permitted by all rishonim, never mind
advocated by them, is assur?


In sum, the tzad hashaveh in all three points, is that I think this
is all hullabaloo caused by not separating strategic statements made
belashon guzma from actual din. But from a halachic level:

1- you can judge ideas without judging people, and in fact we are obligated
in most cases to avoid judging people

2- where we are required to judge people, there are clear halachic guidelines,
and what they believe is proper halachic process or how long maaseh bereishis
took, or whether or not HP is universal, aren't among any of the shitos for
those guidelines.

KNLAD.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             When you come to a place of darkness,
micha at aishdas.org        you don't chase out the darkness with a broom.
http://www.aishdas.org   You light a candle.
Fax: (270) 514-1507        - R' Yekusiel Halberstam of Klausenberg zt"l