Q&A: Defining Who Is Competent
Defining Who Is Competent
Question
I seem to remember that you said that someone competent to issue a halakhic ruling is a person whose learning is stable, such that he generally reaches the same conclusion when he studies the topic again. (I didn’t find this now in the article in Meisharim, but at least that’s how I remember it from the oral tradition.) I was wondering whether the Rabbi still holds that view.
(This question occurred to me בעקבות the question here about lamentations in connection with the Holocaust.)
Answer
It appears in the article in Meisharim.
As for the lamentations, let me say a few things: 1. This is not a halakhic question. 2. As is well known, only donkeys never change their minds. This is a general criterion, not something without exceptions. 3. Who says I issued a halakhic ruling then? In recent years I’ve been quite stable in my new position.
And as for your question, I still hold that view, because otherwise I wouldn’t be able to issue halakhic rulings (since I change my mind). 🙂
Discussion on Answer
After I answered this morning I thought my answer was missing the main point (I was traveling and only now got back). I’ll complete it, and it will also clarify my relation to your comment here.
The change of view on these matters (the lamentations) did not stem from the fact that I had made some mistake in the previous reckoning or some error in reasoning. My positions and outlook simply changed. Take for example Rabbi Soloveitchik’s shift from vice president of Agudath Israel in the U.S. to president of the Mizrachi rabbis. Because of that, would you not rely on his halakhic rulings?! That certainly can happen, and even often, and there’s nothing wrong with it. Only when I uncover mistakes that I should already have understood back then, but noticed only now, is that a sign that I was not yet fully formed at the time.
In general, I hold positions that change over the years, but to the best of my understanding the change is fairly continuous and in a clear direction (it’s a kind of gradual transition from potential to actuality). Therefore your personal view, which sees a connection between that Michael Abraham and me, is in my opinion correct.
Was the change from a Ph.D. in physics to a kollel fellow in Netivot Shalom also in that same direction?
In any case, I wasn’t the one who proposed the criterion, so the question about Rabbi Soloveitchik shouldn’t be directed at me—especially since he changed his outlook on one specific issue and not on pretty much everything.
But the main thing is that I didn’t understand the distinction. Doesn’t a change in outlook also stem from an error in reasoning or an error in calculation? (I assume there can be both.) I assume you mean to distinguish between an error in reasoning about a particular issue in the laws of Sabbath and a change in reasoning about more fundamental issues, like the attitude toward the “great ones of the generation” (which are mentioned in that article), but I don’t understand why an error in reasoning about more fundamental matters is less relevant.
There was no change there at all, since my doctorate was done in parallel with my studies in yeshiva (Netivot Olam, not Shalom).
As for the matter itself, there is a difference between discovering an error in halakhic thinking in a particular topic and a change in worldview or approach to meta-halakhic principles. In my words above I gave the formula (not really an algorithm): from today’s perspective, have I found that already then I ought to have understood the mistake—that I was insufficiently skilled in halakhic thinking—or is the different result only because of a change in outlook/approach/values that occurred in the meantime? Put differently: already then, could someone more skilled than I was have shown me my mistake if I had consulted him, or could they not have convinced me then, and only now has a change in perception occurred in me? That is not maturation but change. That is the difference between error and change. In short, the question is whether I am discovering a mistake or whether I have changed. I’m aware that the line between these two is not sharp, but it certainly exists.
I once heard that Sephardic halakhic decisors who count medieval authorities count Maimonides’ Commentary on the Mishnah and the Mishneh Torah as two different medieval authorities. The fact that both lived in the one body of Moses son of Maimon changes nothing, since the fact that Moses son of Maimon changed his mind in the Mishneh Torah does not negate the view of Moses son of Maimon in the Commentary on the Mishnah.
On the very issue of who is “competent,” I once read in the name of the Chacham Tzvi that in order to be competent to issue rulings, a person must “uproot the Shulchan Arukh”—that is, have the ability to study the sources from the ground up in a way that could overturn the previous approach before him. And perhaps that is exactly the point here.
Since those who count medieval authorities that way are mistaken, I have no interest in examining how they do it. But it is certainly an amusing anecdote.
The Chacham Tzvi’s statement is brought by his son (the Yaavetz). See additional sources here:
Regarding the definition of “competent,” where the Rabbi writes that it depends on stable inference—meaning that in every study one reaches the same conclusion:
1. I assume this is not the only criterion. What are the additional criteria?
2. What is the reason for this criterion? Could it not be that a person has faulty judgment, driven by some intellectual mutation, personality, or mode of thought, and will always arrive at the same mistake?
Thank you very much.
Obviously there are no mathematical, certain criteria here. These are various indications that add up to a person’s sense that he already understands the subject. Moreover, views can change even long after you are competent (Moshe Dayan said that only donkeys don’t change their minds). Still, stability is a good indication.
I definitely think that the change of view here is welcome (not to say what I think of that article).
I think you did issue a halakhic ruling then to the person who asked. Maybe not regarding abortions, but regarding the prohibition of selecting on the Sabbath.
But the lamentations are only a symptom. I think many people (among those who don’t know you personally) don’t see much connection between Rabbi Michael Abraham of the 2000 model and Rabbi Michael Abraham of the 2017 model. Personally, I actually can see a lot of connection, but the differences are enormous (and it seems to me that in the introduction to the fourth book of the quartet you wrote, “they were regarded as a stranger”).
The feeling is also that this was not a one-day upheaval (since, by your own words, you’ve held your current views for many years already), but a process that it’s not clear has ended (and therefore people tell you what you’ll be in a few more years). And the changes are not only from 2000 to 2017; there were many changes even before that. Of course a person believes in his current views, and just as he doesn’t have to change them because someone else thinks differently, he also doesn’t have to change them because he himself once thought differently. But the question is whether someone standing on the outside has anything to rely on, and here the criterion of stability really does seem reasonable, and it seems not to be met.