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<DIV>RMB wrote: Does one continue to follow a rav, say in our case the
dinosaur-denying<BR>mechaneikh's rabbeim and their rabbeim, when you find that
he labeled<BR>you a kofeir for a belief you cannot (as well as don't want to)
shake?</DIV>
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<DIV>TK: What do you mean by "following" him? If you do not share
his beliefs then you are /not/ following him. I guess you can still follow
his psak in matters of kashrus and Shabbos, but if you fundamentally disagree
with his hashkafos then in what sense could you ever be said to be "following"
that rav? I don't even understand your question.</DIV>
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<DIV>As it so happens, the rebbe in the BeyondBT story only said there are no
dinosaurs. He did not say that if you believe in dinosaurs you are an
apikores.</DIV></DIV>
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<DIV>RMB: Eilu va'eilu works fine when it comes to yom tov sheini shel
galiyos.<BR>It gets messier WRT gittin, since a qulah my poseiq doesn't
recognize<BR>might mean children (from a second marriage) who my children may
not<BR>marry.... <BR></DIV>
<DIV>EvE becomes a paradox altogether when dealing with someone
labeling<BR>something kefirah. Because it applies to ideas, one can close
the<BR>referential loop.<BR><BR></DIV>
<DIV>TK: First of all, Eilu v'eilu does not mean that IN PRACTICE
you adopt two different psakim simultaneously -- keeping and not-keeping a
second day of yom tov, for example. It only means that both views have
some validity, but you still have to choose one or the other for practical
purposes.</DIV>
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<DIV>RMB: Shitah A: A and B are boh eilu va'eilu Shitah B: Shitah A is
kefirah,<BR>and thus outside eilu va'eilu<BR><BR>What does shitah A's acceptance
of shitah B imply about A's belief<BR>in itself?
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<DIV>TK: I think it implies tremendous self-confidence! "I know you
think I'm an apikores, I think you're wrong about dinosaurs and wrong about me,
but I respect you anyway." That sounds like a very unflappable man to
me! A can accept with total equanimity the fact that B considers him an
apikores, and it doesn't faze him a bit. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>There is something slippery about your logic here but I'm having trouble
pinpointing what it is. In terms of EvE, Shita A does NOT accept Shitah B,
it just accepts that there may be some validity or some precedent for Shitah
B. </DIV>
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<DIV>When Hillel accepted some children as non-mamzerim while Shamai considered
them mamzerim, and Hillel still said "eilu ve'eilu," it only meant
that they accept Shamai as being within the pale and not outside the pale of
normative Orthodoxy. (Yes I know I am using the word "Orthodoxy"
anachronistically) It did not mean that they considered the children
in question to be both mamzerim and non-mamzerim simultaneously!
("Schroedinger's mamzer"?)</DIV>
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<DIV>RMB: So I think this poses a real question for adherents of shitah A.
Can their<BR>eilu va'eilu include shitah B and its exclusion of their own
opinion? Do<BR>we say palginan divura -- it's only on the points about which
it's<BR>kefirah that A-nikim reject B? </DIV>
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<DIV>TK: I truly believe you are not thinking logically here at all.
Let's say I, an adherent of Shitah A, believe in dinosaurs -- not only that they
lived, but that they lived millions of years ago. Let's say Ploni, an
adherent of Shitah B, believes that I am an apikores. Let's say I also
believe in EvE. Does that mean that I must now simultaneously believe that
there WERE dinosaurs and at the same time must believe that there WERE NO
dinosaurs?! And furthermore, must I believe that there WERE
dinosaurs and at the same time, must I believe that I am an apikores?!</DIV>
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<DIV>The problem is that you are defining EvE wrong. </DIV>
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<DIV>EvE only means that I, an adherent of Shitah A, accept that those who
believe in Shitah B, yesh lahem al mi lismoch and they are still ehrlicher
Yidden. I do not have to accept that their shitah is CORRECT! I
can believe in EvE while believing that the other side is INCORRECT. EvE
simply does /not/ mean "Both sides are right"!</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Your problem, it seems to me, is not really an intellectual problem, even
though it is couched in intellectual terms. I sense, rather, an emotional
problem -- an inability to accept, emotionally, the lack of symmetry between two
shitos, one of which says, "You're wrong, but you have the right to think what
you think" while the other says, "You're wrong, and you're an apikores."
</DIV>
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<DIV>You seem to think that A has only two choices: accept B and therefore
reject his own self -- stop believing in dinosaurs. OR, accept his own
beliefs -- keep believing in dinosaurs -- but then exclude B from the universe
of acceptable beliefs the same way B excluded A, keeping things
symmetrical.</DIV>
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<DIV>But there is a third way, the way EvE really operates: A continues to
believe in dinosaurs, B believes they never existed. A believes that B is
wrong, but at the same time, he believes that B is an ehrlicher Jew and he
continues to respect him. He knows that B does not consider him an
ehrlicher Jew in return but he loves B anyway.</DIV>
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<DIV>
<UL>
<H2><FONT size=2>"Outwitted"</FONT></H2>
<UL><SPAN>by Edwin Markham</SPAN></UL>
<P>He drew a circle that shut me out —<BR>Heretic, rebel, a thing to
flout.<BR>But Love and I had the wit to win:<BR>We drew a circle that took him
in!
<P></P></UL></DIV>
<DIV><BR> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#0000ff FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"><BR><B>--Toby Katz<BR>==========<BR><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0
face=Arial color=#000000 FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"></B>--------------------
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