<br><div class="gmail_quote">On Nov 20, 2007 7:25 AM, Arie Folger <<a href="mailto:afolger@aishdas.org">afolger@aishdas.org</a>> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;">
<br><br>Says who? An ultrarationalist. Many would interpret this literally, lo levazot<br>et hamitzvot, even if the 'hallah doesn't know the difference. This might<br>belong to proper religious mannerisms.<br><font color="#888888">
<br></font></blockquote><div><br>In the following cases there are "mystical" explanations and rational ones..<br><br><ol><li>Not eating nuts on RH</li><li>Not Benching Hodesh Tishrei</li><li>Covering mirros at a shiva
<br></li></ol></div></div>I don't know if I am an ULTRA rationalist or not, but I think if there IS a raional explanatoin I would suspect it to be the normative one and the other explanation for the less-educated <br>
<br>See SA harav on #1 and iirc#2 also. He favors the rational explanation. I would not term him an ultra-rationalist.<br><br>I might add that a nieghbor of mine who was not frum made a lot of fun of the "mirror-covering" because some apikoros rabbi belittled the idea of Sheidim etc. I think if a rational alternative had been offered the practice would have been perceived in a better light. I guess that cust both ways, that a ratonal ta'am can be construed as apologetics, but I still think it is healthier to think that way.
<br clear="all"><br>On a tangent, the Gemara in Yoma talks about the case of a mistake about amud hashachar and seeing the moon. It says that this g'zeira could not have been literally been concerning the 10th of Tishre since the moon is in the wrong position, If you live in a world of miracles/magic/muysticismc then why did the Gemara make that assumption?. After all It could have been a supernatural sighting of the moon whilst out of position! It seems that this passage pre-supposes a natural flow of events.
<br><br>I think that super-natural explanations are either used Allegorically or when the text needs to punt because no rational explanation can be found. However, if there is a valid rational explanation it would "naturally" take precedence over the supernatural
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