Re: My Weekly Drash - Vayera


<moshes@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:2005Nov21.133941@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> "Dan Kimmel" <daniel.kimmel@xxxxxxx> writes:
>
> >> > while I said I prefer to know the purpose of a law.
> >>
> >> Is that ever fully possible? G-d's Torah is One with Him. Just
> >> as He is unknowable" so, in the final analysis, is the Torah.
> >
> > Fully? Perhaps not. But if there are additional reasons for not
> > putting a stumbling block before the blind other than that it's
> > cruel to the person and it coarsens the society, I don't think we
> > really need to know in order to obey.
>
> How about selling food to a person where the tithes were not removed?
> It's not cruel, it does not coarsen society and the buyer has the
> option of removing tithes himself.

I'm not sure I follow, but then I'm not up on all the laws regarding
sacrifices. :)

If I understand your point, you're asking what reason there might be for a
rule requiring the tithes to be removed by the seller if the buyer can do it
himself later on.
One answer, to my mind, is that conformity makes it easier for the system to
work. If it is the seller/original owner who must always remove the tithes,
there won't be any question later on by the buyer, leading to consumption
without tithing or double tithing.

> >>
> >> > There are other times when questioning authority and requiring an
> >> > explanation may be the right response.
> >>
> >> Example?
> >
> > I suppose one of the classic examples is the stoning of the recalcitrant
> > son. I seem to recall the rabbis coming up with all sorts of
> > interpretations to make it impossible to enforce (like the mother and
father
> > literally speaking in one voice) and concluding that the law had never
been
> > enforced. Now I understand that there are some who would argue that
this
> > law was a challenge in just that fashion (i.e., the rabbi's response in
> > effectively nullfying it was the correct one) and I can't say I
understand
> > the reasoning behind *that*. Nonetheless, questioning this law was the
> > appropriate thing to do.
>
> But they didn't "question" the law (no matter what spin you may have
> heard). There is no mention of "Hey, this law should be abrogated".

Obviously they DID question the law, or they wouldn't have gone through the
process of rendering it inoperative. Questioning doesn't have to mean
harshly critical or skeptical.


> >> > Knowing the difference is important. As Lot's wife found
> >> > out, the consequence of choosing wrong may be fatal.
> >>
> >> Umm if choosing wrong could be fatal, wouldn't simple prudence make
> >> one be _extremely_ careful?
> >
> > Absolutely. As I tell my students when it comes to writing, rules
> > are made to be broken, but if you can't come up with a real good
> > reason for breaking it you ought to follow it since it's there for
> > a reason. (Not a perfect analogy since I'm not arguing that halacha
> > is meant to be violated, but I hope you get the point.)
>
> LOL. Glad you qualified. That may be another difference between our
> viewpoints. I see the rules as G-d-given so there is benefit in
> observance without a glimmer of comprehension. You see them as
> man-given (if I'm wrong, please accept my abject apologies) and thus
> feel you can *also* voice an opinion, question, and perhaps not obey.

No apologies needed. I don't know if I've spelled out my personal take on
this before. When it comes to the Oral Law, you're right. Whatever oral
traditions, if any, date back to Moses, I believe that much (if not most) is
manmade rabbinic interpretation. I can't see how it can be any other way.

As for the Torah itself, I guess where I'm at is that I believe it is
God-given, whatever the process that put it in our hands. Whether it is
Moses taking dictation or being "divinely inspired," I don't pretend to know
myself.

That said, I don't believe halacha may thus be dismissed if I object. As
time goes on I find Mordechai Kaplan's formulation of "a vote, not a veto"
more and more problematic. But neither do I think mindless obediance is the
answer either. I don't have an earthly king, I have an employee. I've
never been in the military. The idea of automatic observance without
thinking is anathema to me. God gave us free will and brains precisely so
we would not be automatons.

Now if you are at such an elevated level that you can honestly say you have
freely chosen to unhestitatingly all of God's commands (that are within your
power), I have no problem with that. I am not that far along the road, and
there are times I reserve the right to question and prod and wonder. A good
example might be the traditional understanding that Torah bans homosexuality
as an "abomination." I have problem with that understanding, and want those
much more learned in Jewish law to continue to consider ways that we can
understand Torah without having to ignore our greater *human* understanding
of how the world works. We can't ignore halacha. But we can't hide our
heads in the sand either.


> > If there is a time element or a sense of irrevocability, the
> > inclination might be to obey first and question, if at all, later.
> > If one has the time to question, though, I don't see what's wrong
> > with that. In the case of Lot's wife, the price of disobedience was
> > immediate
>
> But did she know that?

Fair question that must be answered, if at all, by midrash.


> Maybe we should also discuss what we mean by "question" the mitzvah?
> If you say it means "Why should I do it?" then I disagree, totally.
> If it means "What lesson can I learn from the mitzvah?" that's fine
> and even laudable. I suspect though, that you mean the former.

Not so much "why should I do it?" (the answer being, of course, because God
says so), but "why does God command us to do it?" We cease work on Shabbat
not like soldiers being commanded, "At ease," but because this one of God's
*gifts* to us.


> >> On a related note, part of the serpent's seduction of Eve was to
> >> impart a (false) reson to G-d's command.
> >
> > But if Noah's neighbors had questioned why he was building an ark, they
> > might have been driven to repent. If Cain had questioned why his
offering
> > was rejected, he might have sought to improve rather than take out his
anger
> > on Abel. You're correct that a false or even incomplete answer might
lead
> > to bad results, but that's not a reason to avoid questioning.
>
> Excellent! I was waiting for such "examples". But the neighbors were
> not _commanded_ to build the Ark, Noah was. And indeed the reason he
> was given 120 years to do it was specifiaclly that the neighbors
> should ask him what he is doing and he would thus warn them of their
> impending doom. Cain was not _commanded_ to bring an offering.
>
> The example of Avraham Avinu is even more striking. When G-d
> _informs_ him about Sodom's immenent destruction he questions,
> challenges, pleads, and begs to save them. When he is commanded to
> bring Yitzchok as a sacrifice, he arises early in the morning! No
> questions asked! Yet he had a _tremendous_ question to ask, as Rashi
> explains at the end of the story. "G-d, yesterday You told me 'for in
> Yitzchak will your seed be called' and today you tell me "offer him
> as a sacrifice"????? Yet Avraham didn't ask the obvious, glaring
> question. Why not? Because when the command _to him_ is to do
> something, simple obedience is required, _not_ "questioning".

I see your point, but I see contradictions even in the traditional
understanding. We're commanded not to carry in the public domain on
Shabbat. But we don't engage in "simple obedience" but come up with the
legal fiction of the eruv so we can comply with the letter while disobeying
the command. I'm not saying that that is wrong or dishonest. I'm saying
that it is not "simple obedience."



.

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