[Avodah] avelut after 12 months

[Micha Berger via Avodah]

On Wed, Jul 29, 2015 at 10:37:27PM +0000, Kenneth Miller via Avodah wrote:
: I have written on several occasions, about my belief that Chazal often
: exaggerate, and this misleads those who are not used to their style of
: speaking. I think we have here another example of the same thing. There's
: a tendency to take Chazal at literal face value. We need to be more
: careful when reading the poetry.

Tanakh sometimes does something else with a similar effect, and it may
be what Chazal are doing here.

Lei'ah, rather than being described as "less loved" is "senu'ah". It's
not necessarily exageration as much as a language norm to express a
relative statement uing the same terms as absolutes.

Here too chazal are making a comparison. Was the reader expected to know
it's guzma, or was the norm in mishnaic Hebrew as well to use the term
for the end of the spectrum to mean "less mourned than"?

My problem with this is the parent of the MIA who can't let go for years
or decades, and then it's found out that the chayal r"l was killed upon
capture (or their body was taken after petirah for a bargaining chip).

We have no experimental evidence of parents having that mystical knowledge
of their children's state, and quite a bit of evidence otherwise. Perhaps
Yaaqov avinu, or even someone with "just" ruach haqodesh is that aware
of what's going on on the plane of souls without learning about them
through normal olam hazeh means. But I do not see it being true of the
majority of humanity.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The trick is learning to be passionate in one's
micha at aishdas.org        ideals, but compassionate to one's peers.
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