[Avodah] the Brisker derech

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Dec 30, 2020 at 06:48:03AM +0000, Rich, Joel via Avodah wrote:
> My guess is the Brisker derech is not the final approach to Talmudic
> analysis. (For me, it's too Boolean in trying to explain the underlying
> halachic data.) I've been thinking that a more multivariate approach
> will eventually be constructed; perhaps with some assistance from AI,
...

I don't know about AI... AI today requires training data sets, and
doesn't explain how a new example is more like one side of the "learned"
distinction or the other. So, if you have a data set but you can't
articulate how to divide it into categories (eg which of these are
"a"s in various fonts) what is called AI today could implement many
such categorizations. You can come up with more examples of an existing
distinction, or perform different behaviors by categorizing the current
situation is on this side or that of a distinction. But you still don't
get an explanation of that pattern. I'm not sure how its usable in
this context.



But there already is a derivative of Brisker Derekh that is less binary.

It is common to focus on the difference between Brisk and Telzhe with
the truism that "In Brisk they ask 'Vus?'; in Telzhe they ask 'Fahr vus?'"

In Brisk, halakhah is one's first principles. You use halakhah to
explain the world, and would never use the world to explain halakhah.
So, to a stereotypical Brisker, baalus is defined by the set of halakhos
of qinyan, geneivah, yerushah, han'ah and issur hana'ah, etc...

Very different than the beginning of Shaarei Yosher shaar 5. R Shimon says
that property is a concept inherent in the human condition. The halakhos
of baalus are about navigating that pre-existing concept in a holy way.

But there is a second difference... Hitztarfus. Brisk focuses on chaqiros
and tzevei dinim, and ways of dividing up the din or shitos by finding
which one factor drives each position. And so much of Brisker Derekh is
about tools for identifying those factors.

But R Shimon also discusses halakhos that emerge from the hitztarfus,
the convergance of factors.

See RYGB's examples at the tail of <https://www.aishdas.org/rygb/derachim.htm>:
shi'abud haguf (personal lien) and acharekha.


Between the added ability to inspire by letting halakhah tie to experience
and the zeitgeist's move away from reductionism there are grounds for
giving more attention to this alternative.


PS: I called R Shimon's derekh a derivative of Brisker Derekh because
when R Shimon got to Volozhin, he attached himself to a chaburah run
by this bachur 6 years older than him that was generating so much
excitement. And only later became closed to the Netziv. So, R' Shimon
learned Brisker derekh early on -- early for both him and the derekh.

I see R Shimon's derekh as taking what he learned about lomdus from
the future R Chaim, and translating it from the worldview RYBS depicts
in Ish haHalakhah into that more at home in Mussar and Mussar-derived
hashkafos like that of Telzh. Where Da'as (as Telzhe shaped the word)
and thus "Fahr vus?" play a central role.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 The Maharal of Prague created a golem, and
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   this was a great wonder. But it is much more
Author: Widen Your Tent      wonderful to transform a corporeal person into a
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF    "mensch"!     -Rav Yisrael Salanter