[Avodah] Those Whose Halakhic Status Is Questionable

[Akiva Miller]

.
R' Jay F. ("Yaakov") Shachter wrote:

> ... I find that we are living, today, lives that are identical,
> absolutely identical in all the important ways, to the lives
> that are described in the Talmuds, and in Josephus, and in the
> Books of Maccabees.  Beyond that I am frankly not sure -- I'm
> not sure if our ancestors in Biblical times (or, more precisely,
> one of the factions among our ancestors in Biblical times, because
> there were factions even then, of course) lived lives that were
> identical, in all the important ways, to the lives that we live
> today.  But at least going back to the late apocrypha -- I
> recognize those people as Torah-observant Jews, they are just like
> me, in all the important ways.

RJF"Y"S doesn't say it explicitly, but it seems to me that his cutoff point
between our "lives that are identical, absolutely identical in all the
important ways" and that of "our ancestors in Biblical times", was Churban
Bayis Sheni.

I have read many articles over the years (but unfortunately I cannot
remember or cite any of them except one, which I'll mention soon) which
talk about how traumatizing that event was. And especially so, once the
chachamim of the time realized that this was no 70-year blip like the first
Churban, but that we were now in it for the long haul. And we are indebted
to them for their foresight in engineering a new Judaism for the new era.

This revision affected many areas of Torah. The one we encounter most
frequently might be the replacement of korbanos with tefilah. This change,
of course, was sanctioned by the pasuk "unshalma farim s'faseinu", but we
are so accustomed to it that we forget (or perhaps never really
appreciated) how revolutionary it was to those who lived through it.

The one citation I can offer regarding this is an article by R' Arnold
Lustiger which was sent to the Mail-Jewish email group in Elul 1995.
(Unfortunately, I cannot find it anywhere on today's internet via Google,
and I'll be happy to email it to anyone who asks. It IS available in print,
on pp 85-102 of Lustiger's "Before Hashem You Shall Be Purified: Rabbi
Joseph B. Soloveitchik on the Days of Awe") It was titled "Rabbi Akiva's
Homily on Teshuva", and was based on Rav JB Soloveitchik's 1973 teshuva
drasha.

He begins by quoting the Rambam at length, with his description of the
kapparah which was achieved by the sa'ir hamishtalaiach, and how teshuva
was a prerequisite to that procedure. And he continues:

> Today, however, during a time when the sa'ir hamishtalaich no
> longer exists, the means to contemporary atonement is described
> by the initial verse cited above by Rabbi Akiva:
>
> "Because *through* this day He will forgive you, to purify you
> from all your sins, before Hashem will you be purified..".
> (Leviticus 16:30)
> ...
> The power of the itzumo shel yom is therefore the essential message
> of Rabbi Akiva. A demoralized nation that could not imagine a Yom
> Kippur without the various Temple rituals was told that a new type
> of atonement> can be readily attained. In contrast to the sa'ir,
> which involved an intricate ritual accomplished by the high priest,
> atonement is no longer mediated: "Lifnei Hashem Tit'haru". The
> itzumo shel yom does not require a high priest as intermediary:
> "Lifnei mi atem mitaharim - Avikhem Shebashamayim".(3,4)
>
> The role of teshuva has thus been transformed after the Temple's
> destruction. Teshuva serves a new function: from prerequisite for
> atonement to atonement itself. Today, teshuva affords the same
> atonement as sacrifices in the Temple period.

I think that we tend to be unaware of how drastic this change was. The
Judaism we have today is "identical, absolutely identical in all the
important ways" to that of Rabbi Akiva -- and very different from that
which Rabbi Akiva grew up with.

(Another difference between then and now: Someone once pointed out to me
that Boaz recognized Ruth's tzidkus from how she was careful about tzedaka
and the agricultural halachos, and not a word appears about her Shabbos and
kashrus.)

On a very different issue, RJF"Y"S wrote:

> (The deviant sect that I worry about, more than I worry about
> Reform Judaism, or Conservative Judaism, or Reconstructionist
> Judaism -- those people are no threat at all -- is Kollel
> Judaism, a deviant sect that believes that you can be paid for
> learning Torah, which is totally contrary to the halakha.
> Those are the people who are seriously threatening authentic
> Judaism, and I do worry a little about that, because I don't see
> them dying out, yet; but still my knowledge of Jewish history
> assures me, intellectually even if not emotionally, that the
> Kollel Jews will eventually shrivel up and die, they will go
> the way of the Sabbateans and the Frankists, whereas authentic
> Judaism will remain.)

I have begun to see some evidence to the contrary. More and more adherents
of Kollel Judaism are opening and attending various schools where they can
get training in other types of employment. My hope is that they will not
"shrivel up and die [in] the way of the Sabbateans", but that they and we
will rub off on each other in the way of the Chasidim and Misnagdim. Lest
anyone misunderstand me, I'll explain that soundbite:

As I understand it, the original Chasidim saw a particular problem in
Jewish life, and they tried to remedy it. The opposition (Heb.: misnagdim)
felt that the Chasidim went so far overboard as to be "a deviant sect". It
took decades and centuries, but it seems TO ME that both groups have seen
some value in the other, and have both moderated their position to the
point where in many cases we get along quite nicely. So too, it is my hope
that even if Kollel Judaism sanctions (or seems to sanction) something that
is (or might be) assur, they have been very successful at reminding the
rest of us how important Talmud Torah is; and in return they are (or seem
to be) moderating their insistence that everyone stay in the beis medrash
forever.

Akiva Miller
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