[Avodah] mutav sheyihiyu shoggim

[Akiva Miller]

.
R' Joel Rich asked:
> If a rav says there must be a heter because everyone does it (eg
> reading Jewish newspapers with ads on Shabbos and not worrying
> about shtarei hedyotot) may one rely on that and read the newspaper
> or is it another way of saying mutav sheyihiyu shoggim? if the
> latter should one avoid it or would that be gaava?

The devil is in the details. There's no way to answer your question without
knowing more context, and exactly how HE phrased that which you quote as
"there must be a heter because everyone does it". He may have said that as
a humble psak ("It must be okay even though I don't yet understand why") or
he may have been referencing an unknown lenient opinion (as you wrote
"mutav sheyihiyu shoggim"). A lot probably depends on exactly who he meant
by "everyone". You can probably get more info from R' Micha Berger, and his
analyses of when the Aruch Hashulchan justifies the common practice, vs.
when he rails against it.

If he indeed meant "mutav sheyihiyu shoggim", the meaning seems obvious to
me: Better for THEM to be shogeg, but YOU know what the halacha is.

Regarding your question of gaava, I once asked this of our revered departed
listmember Rav EM Teitz z"l. I was doing something a certain way, and I
asked him if it smacks of yuhara. His answer was that if I had been doing
some sort of chumra, then showing off would be a real concern; but in the
case I was asking about, I was doing the lechatchila and they were relying
on b'dieved, so I had no need to worry.

(The exact case concerned absenting myself from my usual shacharis minyan
during the winter, when Hanetz would be so late that my regular minyan
would already have said Shmoneh Esreh. People from the regular minyan
sometimes asked why I've been absent, and my question to REMT was how I
should respond.)

Akiva Miller
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