[Avodah] evolving ethics?

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Nov 30, 2022 at 05:10:49PM -0500, Micha Berger via Avodah wrote:
> We get a parallel issue in halakhah. Where it looks like the din changed,
> but really some aspect of the situation is new and the old pesaq doesn't
> really apply to the same case. One would not say that precedent is violated
> and the halakhah itself changed; the metzi'us did.

I gave a mashal on my blog.

Following the Torah ought to be like being a Focault's Pendulum. This
is a pendulum, typically found in science museums (or for a while, I had
a small model on my desk) that continues to swing back and forth on the
same plane, but because the world turns, it looks to the observer like
the pendulum slowly changes its axis as the day progresses. And the museum
would put pegs or such for the pendulum to knock down every 15 minutes
or something to illustrate the point.

The Torah itself doesn't change, the world changes under it.

I'm saying it's not the values that change, it's the context we assess
them in. What misleads people is that so much of that context is taken
for granted.

In the blog post
<https://aspaqlaria.aishdas.org/2015/09/03/my-life-as-pendulum>
I linked this to the tannaim who were asked how they merited long life
and answered "miyamei lo..." (Megillah 28) Writing something about
the value of consistency, and what consistency means.

The introduction to the Ein Yaakov has a machloqes about the Torah's
kelal gadol in hiwch (1) Ben Zomas says "Shema Yisrael", (2) Ben Nanas
says "ve'ahavta lerei'akha" and then (3) R Shimon ben Pazi saying it was
a pasuq about the Qorban Tamid:

    Rabbi Shimon ben Pazi says: We have found a more inclusive verse
    than that, and it is, "The first lamb you shall sacrifice in
    the morning and the second lamb you shall sacrifice in the
    evening." (Shemos 29:39, Bamidbar 28:4)
    Rabbi Ploni stood up and said: The halachah is like Ben Pazi, as it
    is written, "As all that I show you, the structure of the Mishkan
    and all its vessels, so shall you do." (Shemos 25:9)

It seems Rabbi Anonymous (Ploni) is saying that we are supposed to
learn our middos from the mishkan's structure and avodah. And that in
particular, RSbP's learning the steadfast consistency to our values is
exemplary of the Torah's central principle.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 You want to know how to paint a perfect
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   painting?  It's easy.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Make yourself perfect and then just paint
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF    naturally.              -Robert Pirsig