[Avodah] Discovered text

[Micha Berger]

On Fri, Mar 11, 2022 at 06:38:20AM -0500, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> I can't imagine what "test" you might be referring to. Could you be
> suggesting that if we were to find a genuine text written by a genuine
> authority, but it had been only recently discovered, we should treat that
> text as an evil temptation?

Like Rabbeinu Chananel and the Meiri. Works we knew from quotes and
citations they existed, but we didn't have the text themselves and the
vast majority of what they said until the 20th century.

> A related question is how much weight to assign to those discovered texts.
> If it was written by a rishon, for example, but discovered nowadays, do we
> treat it as a rishon, despite missing out on centuries of vetting and
> comparison with other writings? This is way above my pay grade, and I will
> not attempt to answer it.

In the other direction, it definitely interferes with halakhah kebasrai
when the latter authority couldn't have seen the former's work.

On the other hand, we don't have various acharonim arguing peshat in
the Meiri the way we do for Rashi and Rambam. We have much more clarity
about what they said, or more importantly -- what potential meaning of
what they said is to enter the discussion.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 Problems are not stop signs,
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   they are guidelines.
Author: Widen Your Tent              - Robert H. Schuller
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