[Avodah] Machlokes in Mishnayos, why?

[H Lampel via Avodah]

Date: Sun, 10 Sep 2017 13:11:04 +0300 From: Marty Bluke 
>> By "in existence," the Rambam means when it functioned properly. R'
>> Yitzchak Isaac HaLevy in his work, Doros HaRishonim develops the sources
>> that there were periods of persecution during which the Beis Din Gadol
>> could not operate normally, including the time when Beis Shammai and
>> Beis Hillel were unable to unite.

> The second Beis Hamikdash lasted 420 years. Was there no time during
> those years that the Sanhedrin functioned normally? While there may have
> been disruptions there were certainly times when it did function and if so,
> why didn't they decide all of the machlokes that had arisen like the Rambam
> says?

They did so on most issues. The first long-term unresolved machlokess
was the one between Yosay ben Yoezer and Yosay ben Yochonon. This was
when Eretz Yisroel was under Greek rule and influence (c. 3450-3700),
when the disturbance leading up to the Chanuka battles began. In 3704,
while Sh'maya was the Nassi, the Romans banned the Sanhedrin, his
disciples Hillel and Shammai were forced to keep their schools separate,
and they found themselves in dispute over three new issues without the
ability to meet, discuss, and vote. More disputes developed afterwards.
There were sporadic times that allowed for gathering to have all sides
meet and take a vote, such as at the home of Channaniah ben Chizkiah ben
Garon (see Rambam's commentary on Shabbos 13b), where Beis Shammai were
the majority. After the Temple's destruction, there was a major effort
in Yavneh to unify practice, where it was decided that halacha follows
Beis Hillel.

Paradoxically, by the way, the very concern for uniformity can be a cause
of machlokess. Sometimes all could agree that a halacha actually could
have been equally fulfilled in any of a number of ways.Yet for the sake
of unity, to eliminate the /appearance/ of discordance, the sages saw
fit to choose just one form of practice as the standard, universal one
for all Jews. Machlokess could arise over which practice should become
the standard one.

All the same, it seems form the sources I cite in /The Dynamics of
Dispute, The Makings of Machlokess in Talmudic Times/, that whereas
machlokess is a great thing as a vehicle to reach the emmess, that
the goal is to reach the emmess and eliminate divergent practices, and
probably divergent /hashkofos /as well (as in the 2-1.2-year machlokess
between Beis Shammai and Beis Hillel [/Eruvin /13b] over whether noach
lo l'adam shenivra yoseir mi-shelo nivrah [which I never understood...]).

Zvi Lampel