Q&A: Let Him Distinguish and Teach in That Case Itself
Let Him Distinguish and Teach in That Case Itself
Question
There are some really useful expressions in the Talmud for discussion and analysis. At the moment only three come to mind: “whatever way you look at it,” “let him distinguish and teach in that case itself,” and “granted…”
A. Maybe you have some more examples?
B. Is there a sharp Hebrew translation for terms whose very appearance already makes clear what kind of argumentative structure is about to appear? “Let him distinguish and teach in that case itself” is based on “isolating variables,” but this Aramaic term really distills a very concrete form of argument.
Answer
A. I didn’t understand this category.
B. Each expression has to be considered on its own. I don’t understand your formulations.
Discussion on Answer
I’d have to sit down and think about it.
“Shall we say that this is like the tannaitic dispute,” “if you wish, say,” “what are we dealing with here,” “something is missing, and this is what it teaches,” “we learned,” “as it was taught in a baraita,” “this is difficult,” “a refutation,” “so-and-so and so-and-so and so-and-so all hold…” (the law is not in accordance with a view held by a list), “break it apart: the one who taught this did not teach that.”
Why do you need a translation for “whatever way you look at it”? People use that in Hebrew too. In any case, I don’t know of an accepted translation (in logic they call it a dilemma argument, but that isn’t a translation, and people don’t use it to present and formulate the argument itself).
Sorry. I’ll try again.
There are different structures of arguments, and for some of those structures there are special expressions, so that the very appearance of such an expression already tells you what type of argument is about to appear. Even without understanding the content, you can tell from the expression what the structure is.
For example, the phrase “whatever way you look at it” points to an argument that says there are several paths—A, B, C—but they all lead to the same destination. The expression “let him distinguish and teach in that case itself” describes the claim that if the influential variable is A, then they should have kept all the other variables constant and changed only A, in the most minimal way; and from the fact that they did not do so, one may infer that the influential variable is not only A. The expression “granted…” is used for structures that say: according to opinion A the phenomenon is explained, but according to opinion B the phenomenon is not explained, and therefore opinion A is probably correct.
These are argument structures that are used in every kind of discussion in the world, but in the Talmud they coined special terms for them. I’m looking for more such terms (that’s section A). And also for a suitable Hebrew translation of the two terms “whatever way you look at it” and “let him distinguish and teach in that case itself” (section B).