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The significance of the distinction between the use of Elijah or Bat Kol in law and in reality

שו”תCategory: Meta HalachaThe significance of the distinction between the use of Elijah or Bat Kol in law and in reality
asked 3 years ago

In several places (including Shabbat Ka and Bashi there regarding fish skin), we find a distinction between receiving heavenly information on the level of knowledge of reality, and between receiving such information regarding the laws of the Torah. I assume that the reference is to the division known from the laws of doubt between legal doubt and realistic doubt.
I would be happy to receive an explanation of the logic behind this distinction, because ostensibly the laws themselves are based on realities, such as whether a certain law is included in the Torah from Sinai or not, or (in more private doubts) that these things arise from doubts about the logical step that must be taken when we come to draw a conclusion from any premises, and this is also a reality (and I will not rely on your doctrine about the truth that logic claims).
What is the difference between material reality and logical or metaphysical reality?


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מיכי Staff answered 3 years ago
I wrote about this once, when I was referring to a dispute in reality. The claim was that every dispute in law is a dispute in reality (what God, the Holy One, said to Moses). The same goes for sufficiency in law and in reality. The very distinction between them means that this is not true. And the explanation of the matter is that the law does not depend on the question of what God, the Blessed, said to Moses, but rather what it seems to us that he said, and this is an interpretative question and not a factual one. Rabbi Hutner, in one of his letters, expressed this in the concept of “the hiding of knowledge.” See for example here: https://mikyab.net/%D7%9B%D7%AA%D7%91%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%9D/%D7%9E%D7%99%D7%AA%D7%95%D7%A1-%D7%95%D7%90%D7%9E%D7%AA-%D7%94%D7%99%D7%A1%D7%98%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%AA

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מנחם replied 3 years ago

From you I learned that the definition of sermons (for example) as creative interpretation is controversial, and according to the Ramban, the correct definition is that of revealing interpretation. In this view, the legal significance of the words of the Lord existed and existed even before the work of interpretation by the sages, and the role of the sages was to best expose it using the best tools of thought at their disposal. If so (according to this view) the correct definitions of the laws of the Torah, its generalities and details, are existing facts (metaphysically?), and what is the difference between heavenly information about them and heavenly information about other realities?
If I have erred in my way of thinking in formulating this question, I would be happy to be guided.

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I don't think it depends on the dispute between the Rambam and the Ramban. Even if the sermons are revealing, it only means that in my opinion this was the intention of the Almighty. But still what is binding is not what actually happened at Sinai but what I think was there.

מנחם replied 3 years ago

It seems that my attempt to refer to the boundaries of the commandments themselves (the “intention of God”) as reality is not acceptable to you (you are only referring to the fact of their transmission, which is a historical reality). Why?

מיכי replied 3 years ago

First of all, because you are making a difficult question and I am rationalizing it. To rationalize it, it is enough to say that there is a possibility that it is not difficult. It is necessary to settle it with difficulty is acceptable, but to make it difficult with difficulty is not.
Beyond that, this is my halakhic perception. Halakhic obligation does not depend on authenticity (the originality of the halakhic law from Sinai). Search here on the site about obligation and authenticity. I elaborated in the third book of the trilogy.

מנחם replied 3 years ago

But I didn't want to discuss authenticity at all. Let's assume that we are based on a commitment to a set of laws. Now I ask: Is it correct to define the definitions that apply to these laws, and the correct conclusions from the rules that accompany them, as 'applicable', as an existing reality? It seems to me that your lessons on the subject of halakhic truth lead to the conclusion that yes, and then I ask again: What is the difference between a being of one kind and a being of another kind, why are non-human channels acceptable (halakhically) in capturing basic realistic information (facts about this world) and unacceptable (halakhically) in capturing information about metaphysical or logical truth.
Thanks in advance (who here is Hallelujah..)

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

🙂
My argument is that the law is indeed built on a metaphysical reality. But what is binding is what we think about the metaphysical reality, not the metaphysical reality itself. Therefore, if there is doubt about the question of what the metaphysical reality is, it is not a factual doubt but a halakhic one. For example, suppose that in a dispute about whether the daughter's relationship is permissible or forbidden, there is a doubt about the metaphysical connection between him and the daughter's relationship. If the connection is X, then it is permissible, and if Y, then it is forbidden. Ostensibly, there is a doubt about the reality of what the metaphysical connection is, but no: it is a halakhic doubt, not a factual one. The doubt is how I understand the metaphysical reality, because that is what determines the law. Even if a voice came out of heaven and told me that the connection was X, if I think the connection was Y, I would reject it according to my method. On the other hand, in a normal factual doubt, if a voice came out of heaven and revealed the facts to me to be true - I would certainly reject it according to the facts that were revealed to me. And so they wrote about it being not in heaven. The claim is that facts can indeed be received from heaven, and about which it is not said that it is not in heaven.

מנחם replied 3 years ago

Thank you very much. You explained it well.
If I may, I will try to translate your answer (at the point where it answers the first question here, not the clarification that understanding is the validating factor in Halacha) into scholarly language:
The concept of ‘halacha’ contains two components: a) Torah arguments b) knowledge of reality. In order to create ‘halacha’halacha’, the arguments must be human (a subject must think them through and logically deduce them from the words of the Torah), but obtaining knowledge of the facts can also rely on non-human channels.
[Example (disordered?): A person received tefillin from heaven, he will not be able to fulfill his obligation in them since they were not made by a human. On the other hand, there is no impediment to performing the obligatory ritual with tefillin brought from Spain to Ashkenaz by R’ Eliyahu the Prophet and his ilk. Perhaps knowledge of reality is considered technical in the creation of halakhah, such as the importation of tefillin.]
Does the rabbi agree?

מיכי Staff replied 3 years ago

I didn't understand anything, especially not the connection to our discussion.

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