[Avodah] Eishes Yefas Toar and Pruzbul

[Micha Berger]

On Sat, Oct 13, 2018 at 10:31:20PM -0400, R Akiva Miller replied to my
post:
:> So why the difference in approach? Why wasn't ribis permitted
:> keneged YhR, or lending past shemittah, or qinyan deOraisa be
:> when the buyer takes posession of the merchandise, rather than
:> the seller takes the money? Again, all for the sake of keneged
:> YhR?

: Indeed, as you wrote (in the first paragraph that I quoted,) Chazal
: encountered many people who were on a lower plane. Some people were up to
: the standards and expectations addressed by the Torah, but to accommodate
: the more frail humans, Chazal had to help them out. And with that help, the
: fight against the Yetzer Hara is on more level ground.

But that's the converse of my question. I didn't ask why Chazal found
the taqanos they did. Or in the case of ribbis, engineered a solution
using a pre-existing loophole.

I asked why the RBSO didn't. If Chazal knew that people couldn't keep
up the moral standard, obviously the Author of the deOraisos did too.
And therefore, why didn't He allow ribbis for the same "lo diberah
Torah ela keneged YhR" reasons as eishes yefas to'ar.

Once we have G-d  making compramizes for EYT, why did He leave ribbis
to Chazal? Why did Hashem make it that money is qoneh? He knew better
than chazal that it would create situations where a seller is still
holding something he no longer owns, and sometimes that will mean
carelessness in how the item is guarded. Why did Chazal need to invoke
hefqer BD hefqer and totally rewrite how sale works?

(That said, I am almost satisfied with RDR's answer, below.)


: But I've always understood the Yefas Toar to be an unwinnable situation.
: The Bechira Point is off the scale. NO ONE will be able to avoid taking her
: (unless he follows the prescribed procedure)...

Today's militaries assume otherwise.

Avoiding ribis is less of a problem when "money" is primarily a metal or
contract to swap, only a half-step beyond barter. One is "only" losing
opportunity cost. But once we got prime rates etc... so that there is
a difference between present and future value of money can be done in
some settings, avoiding ribbis became something not enough lenders could
afford, and the poor suffered.

Eishes yefas to'ar is similarly situational. Whether it is "unwinnable"
at best depends on the kind of war one is fighting. Maybe when fighting
barbarian tribes. But not as a general rule.

: Alternatively:

: D'rabanans cannot forbid things that are explicitly allowed by the Torah.

But they can allow things explicitly denied by the Torah? If you can
engineer heter isqa into something that covers most of the situations
where ribbis is needed, they could have engineered and issur.

But I also recently encountered while learning Arukh haShulchan something
that may be a counter-example.

There is a gezeiras hakasuv that there are no shevu'os when the dispute
is over qarqa. So, while modeh bemiqtzas (e.g.) about money or metaltelin
requires a shevu'ah deOraisa, if it is about real estate there is no
shevu'ah deOraisa.

However, Chazal still require the nitba to make a shevu'as heises in
order to retain his chazaqah on the land.



And on Tue, Oct 16, 2018 at 11:16:00AM -0400, R David Riceman replied to the
same post:
: It is in general true that the Torah allows multiple regimes, so that it
: is open to differing economic regulation (as you observe). On a technical
: level, however, I don't see how we could permit yefas toar if the Torah
: prohibited it, so that would reduce rather than increase our options.

I am sure the same was said before heter isqa. Chazal were a bunch of
rabbis capable of finding 49 ways to be metaher a sheretz. Our inability
to figure out how they would have created a law like eishes yefas to'ar
doesn't prove it impossible.

For that matter, the gemara apparently concludes that pruzbul was only
enacted because shemittah today is derabbanan. Although I think it's left
open whether pruzbul would not work when shemittah is deOraisa. Or
whether hefqer BD would meant it would work, but they question the
hava amina that Hillel would circumvent a deOraisa like that.

What kind of "you don't" the gemara is talking about would impact your
answer.

That said, I like RDR's "more important point". Repeated here, since it's
been nearly a month -- an eternity as list-time goes:

: But there's a more important point. What's weird about war is that
: it's not a permanent state. One has to make the transition between
: civilian/soldier/civilian, and very different rules apply in those
: different contexts (look again at H. Deos 6:1). When Hazal say "hasatan
: mekatreg b'shaas hamilhama" that's partly because the soldiers don't
: have years of experience internalizing the rules of war.

: But economic change (from Biblical small farmer to Hazal large estates to
: rishonim merchants) was generational, and it is much easier for a person
: to regulate his own YhR internally if his temptations are uniform over
: his lifetime.

: So it makes a lot of sense that k'nagged YhR is specifically mentioned
: in the context of milhama.

The reason why I said above I am only "almost satistfied" is that it
borders on explaining too much. We aren't looking only for a chiluq
between EYT and my sample dinim derabbanan. But also between deOraisa
and derabbanan.

You are left saying there is a whole set of dinim on a tightrope --
they are lifelong challenges and therefore controllable enough for HQBH
not to want to compromize for human nature, and yet history evolved
the situation to the point where they pose impossible challenges that
chazal needed to accomodate.

Well, not necessarily "impossible". At least: by Chazal's day these grew
into challenges that are so rarely met, the usual outcome is more costly
than the din -- such as the poor not being able to get a loan.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             When we are no longer able to change a situation
micha at aishdas.org        -- just think of an incurable disease such as
http://www.aishdas.org   inoperable cancer -- we are challenged to change
Fax: (270) 514-1507      ourselves.      - Victor Frankl (MSfM)