[Avodah] Would Ruth's conversion be rejected today?

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

R' Zev Sero asked:

> The Sifri says that "dor asiri" implies that the 11th
> generation is permitted.  Thus the plain meaning of the
> pasuk about a mamzer would seem to mean that the disability
> is not forever. ...
>
> But this doesn't explain why the Torah couldn't have just
> spoken plainly, said "ad olam" in both cases, and not
> mentioned the 10th generation at all.

As I complained in the thread about exaggeration, rhetoric is a difficult thing. Which is the plain meaning? One must know his audience. What is the plain meaning of Shir Hashirim? Is the plain meaning about two humans, or about G-d and His people?

As for WHY an author (or Author) chooses a rhetoric-laden phrase over a simple one, I don't really know, and I suppose that the reasons could vary with the case, but I would imagine that in general it would be to add emphasis of some kind.

I daresay that the "shot heard round the world" was not heard more than a few hundred yards away, but the plain meaning of the phrase is to illustrate the far-reaching impact of the event.

Perhaps "dor asiri" is an idiom that we're not used to, and that the original audience understood it to connote a time even longer than "ad olam". (I have nothing to support that; it's only an example of how difficult it is to translate rhetoric.)

Akiva Miller

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