[Avodah] [TorahMusings] Picking and Choosing Poskim

[Micha Berger]

On Fri, Jul 13, 2018 at 12:03:15PM -0400, I shared an article on Torah
Musings by R Gidon Rothstein
<https://www.torahmusings.com/2018/07/picking-and-choosing-poskim>:
...
: That's even true of the debates between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel.
: While we today assume we (almost) always follow Beit Hillel, Eruvin 6b
: allows following either. The Gemara there criticizes those who always
: adopt the lenient view of two (such a person is a rasha, an evildoer)
: or the stringent (a kesil, a fool). On the next page, R. Shizvi permits
: following a leniency of Beit Shammai on one issue and of Beit Hillel on
: another as long as the two rulings do not contradict.

Rabbi Shizvi was a student of Rav Elazar ben Azaryah.

Meaning he could have been speaking at a time when the bas qol's
"vehalakhah keBeis Hillel" wasn't yet a rule.

On the other hand, Rabbi Tarfon was scolded for being machmir like
Beis Shammai on taking "beshkhbekho" as not only a time, but a
posture. (Berakhs 1:3)

    Said Rabbi Tarfon: I was once traveling on the road, and I reclined
    to recite [Shema] like the words of Beis Shammai, and I put myself
    in danger because of bandits.
    They said to him: It is appropriate for you to have made youself
    chayav, because you violated the word of Beis Hillel.

And R' Tarfon was an older contemporary of R' Shizvi!

: The rules just stated are for those of us who are not competent halachic
: authorities in our own right. A competent Torah scholar has every
: right to investigate an issue and rule on disputes that have not yet
: been firmly decided one way or other, as long as his lenient rulings
: do not place him in self-contradiction

Even for himself?

Which tanna was it who was an expert in mar'os, but his wife went to
someone else for mar'os because they were afraid of the objectivity of
his pesaq? (I think it's a Y-mi, but without being able to remember
even the name, I don't know how to search for it.)

:                                        [R. Stern does not elaborate,
: but he means such as ruling like Beit Hillel or Beit Shammai before a
: principle was laid down; today, that would likely include not ruling
: against Shulchan Aruch, but might include deciding about current issues
: on which even greater Torah scholars were still in disagreement].

I assume you mean that loosely. We hold like one of the nosei keilim
over the SA quite frequently.

Our fealty to the SA seems more to the order of: If you want to disagree
with the SA, you have to really prove your point. Rather than treating
is as actually binding.

In fact, in practice, the real line between acharon and rishon is between
those who have to justify ruling against the SA, and those one can use
for that justification.

-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Zion will be redeemed through justice,
micha at aishdas.org        and her returnees, through righteousness.
http://www.aishdas.org
Fax: (270) 514-1507