For the Perplexed of the Generation – Lesson 24

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[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Who appointed you? How can you? Understand, a generation like, say, the generation of the 1950s, can tie the hands of a generation two hundred years later and cause forty percent to rule over sixty percent. Meaning, a law supported by forty percent will be the valid law, and a law supported by sixty percent will not be valid. Why? Because two hundred years earlier they decided that seventy percent is required. You need a majority of… how can you understand such a thing? Only in this way: that if the collective decided something at that moment, then it’s a decision that binds the collective. Now there’s no choice; they have to enter into a situation where, actually, from the standpoint of fairness, this is something one has to be very careful with. Meaning, to do such a thing, because on the level of fairness it isn’t right that one generation should tie the hands of all the generations that come after it. In that sense I think there is something very unfair about a constitution. Very unfair indeed. When they establish, at least when they establish, a supermajority or things of that sort, there is something very unfair here. The giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai was by coercion; He held the mountain over them like a barrel, right? Yes, even though there was a major legal protest, still afterward the generation accepted it, right? They accepted it anew, right? So why did the generation of Mordechai and Esther accept this constitution again? And that certainly was voluntarily. According to your approach, no—they received the Torah under coercion, and that’s how it’s supposed to remain. But if, in your protest, you consecrate something—I don’t know—but there is a major legal protest; that’s what the Talmud says, the Talmud itself says it. Once you accept something under coercion, you can retract. And when you retract, it’s as if the recipient himself retracted. If he had retracted ten minutes later. Also in Jewish law, in the Shulchan Arukh, there are laws of legal protest, a whole long section in Choshen Mishpat. Very long. Commitments they forced you to accept—what can you do? You’re afraid they’ll kill you. After the people threatening you leave, then you announce: gentlemen, I did not accept this upon myself; you forced me. On the most basic legal level, it isn’t valid. So if I do that after two hundred years, that’s also fine—what difference does it make? After all, it’s the same body; that’s exactly the claim. That after two hundred years these aren’t different people. The same collective itself still exists two hundred years later and says, gentlemen, I do not accept this upon myself, that’s it. So therefore only when they accepted it voluntarily is it really binding on the legal level. So here, basically… the concept of the nation’s acceptance, which appears a lot in Rabbi Kook, also in the context of course of the event at Mount Sinai, but beyond that he also speaks about it in the context of renewing ordination, yes, the innovation of Maimonides, that ordination has to be from one ordained person to another back to Moses our teacher. And therefore, from the moment ordination ceased—I’m talking about ordination of sages, yes—it’s lost; it can’t be renewed anymore. So Maimonides says: then what are we supposed to do, wait for Elijah the prophet to come? What, in the end of days? The messiah will come? What are we supposed to do? How will we have ordained sages? How will there be a Sanhedrin? How will judicial authority return? After all, it is not in heaven; it cannot be that something new will start from scratch—there’s no such thing. What we cannot do with our own tools, we cannot do. That is Maimonides’ assumption. A very interesting assumption, but that’s his assumption. So Maimonides… what? It’s obvious, no? Not entirely, not entirely obvious. To Maimonides it was obvious. I’m not entirely sure it’s really so, but fine, there’s a lot of logic to it. I’m just not sure it’s necessary. But that’s what Maimonides says. So what? He says—so Maimonides says there is no choice but to say that if all the sages of Israel in the Land of Israel gather together—I don’t know exactly where he got that definition from, but that’s what he says—if all the sages of Israel in the Land of Israel gather together and decide to ordain someone, he will begin a new chain of ordination. This is the ordination controversy, yes, that took place in the sixteenth century in Safed, and here too after the establishment of the State there were some initiatives like that—Rabbi Maimon and others—to establish the Sanhedrin. They are all based on this innovation of Maimonides. Rabbi Kook claims that here too, basically, there is the same mechanism of the nation’s acceptance. Meaning, the claim is that the authority that disappeared—there are no more ordained sages—it did not disappear, it did not evaporate. It returned to the public. It returned to the public. Right now there is no one who is an authorized representative of the public. But if the public now decides anew to delegate its authority to someone else, then fine, he has authority. I’m not sure, by the way, that this is a continuation of that authority. It may be a different concept of authority. Because that authority did not begin from the public. That authority began from above. The Holy One, blessed be He, to Moses our teacher, Moses our teacher to Joshua, and from one ordained person to another back to Moses our teacher. There were no democratic elections in this matter; this is authorization from above. And Maimonides introduces a new idea, that there is such a thing as authorization from below. Meaning, the public can decide, “We ordain so-and-so,” and from now on he is ordained. Whereas I’m not entirely sure whether this is a continuation of that chain of ordination, or whether it is the introduction of a new concept of ordination that Maimonides is talking about. Okay, so one way or the other, there is some conception here that there is some kind of collective entity that always exists. It continues to live all the time. This is what Tosafot says: “One generation goes and another generation comes, but the earth stands forever.” From this he learns the matter of a communal offering, that there is no such thing as a communal offering whose owners have died. So he brings this verse from Ecclesiastes. So there is this idea that the collective is completely sovereign. It lives all the time, it makes decisions about itself, it can take powers, give powers, renew new powers. There is here some new kind of existent. And this is basically the concept Rabbi Kook speaks about in several places, which he calls the nation’s acceptance. So also in this matter of the authority of the Talmuds and the Mishnah, here too the root of our obligation to these sources, the canonical status of these sources, stems from the nation’s acceptance. That is basically what Rabbi Kook is explaining here. Basically, the public accepted upon itself not to disagree with the Talmuds and the Mishnah. Once the public accepts this upon itself, it is bound by it. And it seems to me I once also spoke about this, that there is a dispute between Maimonides and Nachmanides about why one is obligated to keep rabbinic enactments. Maimonides says it is by the force of “do not deviate.” And Nachmanides argues that it cannot be by the force of “do not deviate,” because then it would come out that every rabbinic law is really a Torah-level law. If I violate a rabbinic law, then I have violated the Torah prohibition of “do not deviate.” So it cannot be that this comes from “do not deviate.” Of course, that consideration means it also cannot come from some other verse. It cannot come from a verse at all. It makes no difference whether it is “do not deviate” or another verse, right? The argument is the same argument. So the big question is, of course, then where does it come from? Why, according to Nachmanides, does one have to listen to the sages? There are all kinds of attempts at this, other attempts. I think I once heard this from Rabbi Blumentzweig in Yerucham; I’m not one hundred percent sure, but I think so. That the claim is basically that Nachmanides understands that the question of why to listen to the voice of the sages is a question based on a mistake. Because when we stand opposite some authority, we always ask ourselves why listen to it. Why obey the law? Why listen to the sages? Why listen to the Torah? Why—I don’t know—we always, when we stand before some authority, look for some justification. What do you mean? Why does it have authority? By virtue of what can it command things of me? But when the relation between us and the sages… the sages is not a relation of standing opposite. We stand behind. We stand behind; they are our representatives; they speak in our name; they do not stand opposite us. When the sages determine something, basically we determined that thing through their mouths. They speak in our name, as in democratic conceptions, yes—when the government is elected by the public, then there too, in my opinion, all the searches for the sources of governmental authority—I think they may have been correct in a period when there was monarchy. For a democratic period, in my opinion all these searches completely miss the point. In legal theory they speak about this. I think they do not understand the root of the matter, in my view, and not for nothing, because they really do not accept this collective entity that stands in the background of the conception I’m talking about here. In our world it is usually accepted that the individual is what exists, and everything else you can define as one fiction or another—society, collective, corporation—but all that is only legal definitions, which of course require justification. Meaning, you decide that the public accepted these legislators upon itself—okay, the public accepted, but I didn’t; what do I owe them? If you understand that the public is me within it, some kind of entity that can make decisions and obligate all the limbs that are part of this organism, then the questions do not arise. Because when the Knesset speaks, it does not stand opposite me; I stand behind it. And when it speaks, it speaks in my name. It is as if I legislate for myself. So is there a question why I need to fulfill what I legislate for myself? If I legislate for myself, obviously I need to fulfill it. A person should fulfill what he decides. All right? So I don’t need to look for all kinds of explanations and justifications for why one should fulfill it. So here too, the same thing with regard to what Nachmanides says about the authority of the sages. Why should one obey the enactments or decrees of the sages? Because this is not obedience; it is simply carrying out what you yourself are saying. Only you yourself are speaking through the throats of the sages. The sages are basically the representatives of the public. Maimonides too says that you need the agreement of the sages of the Land of Israel, not of all the inhabitants of the Land of Israel but of the sages of the Land of Israel. Why? Because this is basically like representative government. Meaning, these are the representatives of the public, and when they speak it is as if the public has spoken, and therefore there is some obligation to listen to what the sages enact. And for our purposes, this is also the meaning of the nation’s acceptance in Rabbi Kook. The nation’s acceptance means that what the public accepts upon itself, you as part of that public are bound by and stand within. There is no point now in looking for justifications—why, and who says so, and maybe I don’t want to, and so on. It’s not relevant. All these discussions and justifications and searches are based on the point that you simply do not understand that there is some collective entity standing here, but instead you see people as a collection of individuals, and the collective entity as a legal definition, some fiction. But if your ontology is really different, yes, your theory of being is different—who are the entities that exist? The collective too is a kind of existing entity—then these questions simply do not arise. This is the concept of the nation’s acceptance, and I think this is also what he writes here regarding our acceptance not to disagree with the Talmuds and the Mishnah, and once the public accepted it, like a constitution, the public accepted it, then that’s it, now the public is bound. There’s nothing to do; it obligated itself. It’s like the event at Mount Sinai, in a certain sense. But not exactly, not entirely, and he’ll get to that in a moment. It is still a bit different from Mount Sinai. It can be changed. And he’ll get to that in a moment. One can definitely also disagree with the Talmuds if the great religious court decides to do so, and so on. It is possible to do that. He says this explicitly later—yet another of the reasons this chapter was probably censored. In any event, the point that emerges from here is that the basic model Rabbi Kook is speaking about here, for why one really has to obey the sages of the Talmud, say, or the Mishnah, is a model of authority. Meaning, there is no—usually we wrap this in packaging of the decline of the generations, of the divine inspiration of the sages of the Talmud, and the like, that we have no grasp of what they said, and therefore of course there is no place to disagree with them. Here—and this begins already with the Kesef Mishneh, not only here. The Kesef Mishneh is actually the sharpest formulator of the authority-based conception. Meaning, a conception that says, look, I don’t know—divine inspiration, no divine inspiration, are they always right, not always right—I don’t know. We accepted it upon ourselves and therefore it is binding. That’s all. Meaning, without all that, it is a legal mechanism; you don’t need all the metaphysics that wraps around this matter. Now it seems to me that this is true, but still—this is what you asked me, I think, last time—we still need to add something. Because that decision they accepted, not to disagree with the Talmuds—I spoke about this last time too—there was a lot of logic in it. There was a lot of historical logic in it, because if they had not accepted this decision, once the public was dispersed, nothing would have remained of Jewish law. Nothing. Meaning, certainly not among the Jews. Meaning, every five Jews, ten, a hundred Jews, sitting in some village, some town, some city all over the globe—how would anything common remain here if basically every

[Speaker A] religious court in every place could do what

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] it wanted with everything that had been done there in Jewish law up to that period? So the sages of that generation, it seems to me, really did, in a brilliant move from the standpoint of seeing reality, anticipating the future—they established, the sages of that generation; that too is a bit naive. This is something that in perspective obviously took several generations, but somehow in the end this matter crystallized: that one does not disagree with the Talmuds. And overall I think that this is what preserved the whole thing. Preserved all of it through the 2,000 years, or 1,500 years, that have passed since then. Nothing would have survived them had they not made that determination. Meaning, there is something here that needs to be understood—it is very, very powerful, and we will also see it later. This point, which is a point that seems unjustified, because in fact according to Jewish law every religious court in every generation is allowed to disagree with previous religious courts. It doesn’t fit the usual halakhic conceptions. You don’t have to be a greater court in wisdom and number in Torah-level laws; in rabbinic laws you do need that, in Torah-level laws you do not. But if they had not made this determination, nothing would have remained. And I think this thing, this lesson, Rabbi Kook returns to later as well. We need to remember it today too. Meaning, even though we feel all the pressures and that there are things that don’t fit and need to be changed and so on, one has to be careful with changes. This instinct is not entirely baseless, even though I personally really dislike it. But I dislike it, true, yet it still has a very, very important role, because if really everyone does what he thinks, even within the limits we have today, nothing will remain. Nothing will remain. There is something here that needs—this is something delicate, meaning one has to be careful with it. On the other hand, too much rigidity is also a bit excessive. One has to be careful with that too. I mentioned this once: there’s someone in Jerusalem named David Enoch, a jurist from the Hebrew University. He once wrote about the slippery slope. Menachem is supposed to speak about this around Passover sometime. And he said that one of the problems with the slippery slope is the slippery slope. That is, there is a slippery slope in using slippery-slope arguments. Meaning, too often people use the slippery-slope claim and somehow don’t let us do anything.

[Speaker A] They’re always threatening us that if you

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] do this, then immediately we’ll start sliding down the slippery slope and nothing will remain.

[Speaker A] So one has to be careful with that too. Meaning, fine, balance—balance is an art, an art. In any case, that is one side of the picture, but I still think we should complete the other side, the other side of the picture.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The other side of the picture is that there really is some substantive backing for this formal decision. Meaning, apparently according to the Kesef Mishneh this is a formal decision: we accepted upon ourselves not to disagree with the sages of the Talmud, period. Not because they are wiser or less wise, always right or not always right—that is not relevant at all. We do not assume that they are always right; we simply accepted upon ourselves not to disagree with them. This is a purely authority-based model, a formal model. But one cannot ignore all the surrounding discourse: the decline of the generations and the greatness of the sages of the Talmud and all kinds of things of that sort. There is probably really some conception behind it as well. Yes, if the medieval authorities were like angels, we are like human beings—those sayings already exist; they didn’t begin today, of course, though he himself is very “today.” But there is some conception of the decline of the generations that also accompanies this process. Meaning, it is not just some merely formal decision not to disagree with previous generations or with certain periods in previous generations. There is also some substantive anchor here. And that substantive anchor can also be divided into two. Yes, there is the formal model, the formal authority, and there is the substantive model. But even in the substantive model one should distinguish between two wings. One can talk about heavenly angels and exalted seraphim and people who knew how to revive the dead and all sorts of things people say about all the Amoraim and Tannaim, and then kind of place them beyond our reach. Basically we have nothing to discuss with them; they’re not in our league. That is the accepted discourse. I’m a bit skeptical about it—at least in my own honesty, certainly at the intensities described there. I think they were great people, but those intensities sound a little exaggerated to me, and I think what stands behind these things is something a little

[Speaker A] simpler, although it is still

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] in the substantive realm, not merely the formal one. And that simpler something is that there is something in being further from the source. Yes, Mount Sinai is the source; there we received the Torah. Moses our teacher learned it from the Holy One, blessed be He—both the Oral Torah and the Written Torah—he passed it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and it passes somehow through the generations. The farther we get from the source, our ability to understand it naturally declines, regardless of IQ—not because we are so stupid and small, but simply because we are further from the source. And I already spoke about ulpan and a mother tongue. Because they had it intuitively, the categories, and then we need to turn it… yes, exactly, meaning there was some simple intuition; they understood the language. The earlier sages spoke that language naturally, like a child speaks a mother tongue, and someone studying in ulpan has to work with the rules because he doesn’t have that feeling in his ear for when he is speaking correctly and when he is not speaking correctly. That feeling really declines over the generations. That feeling that says: I know this is right, I know this is not right. I think I mentioned this idea that they say in Lithuanian yeshivot, that if the Rosh brings a proof for his words, then one can argue with him, but if the Rosh says “it appears to me,” then clearly he is right. Because his whole intuition, his whole Torah insight, is basically saying it. He doesn’t need proofs for this. In a place where he looks for proofs, that means he doesn’t have that simple intuition, and against such a proof, another proof—fine, with proofs I also know how to manage. It may be that afterward I’ll succeed in disagreeing with him, rejecting his proof. But in a place where he says “it appears to me,” that means: I’m telling you, this is what the Torah says. Meaning, I have no proofs for it, but this is what the Torah says. And therefore in such a place it is even harder to disagree with the Rosh than in a place where he brings proofs. And this expresses what I said earlier, that there is here some distancing from the source that really gives us less access to the language, to this halakhic language. We do not speak it. We learned it in a somewhat artificial way, but we do not really speak it. And I think in this sense there is also some substantive content to the decline of the generations. Meaning, that one does not disagree with the sages of the Mishnah or the Talmud, and there really is an assumption that they are probably more correct than we are. It is not only a formal question. Usually when we think differently from an Amora or a Tanna, he will be the one who is right, even though it’s not certain that he is smarter than we are. But he will be the one who is right. He will be right because he speaks this language. He knows, he has an intuition for how this business works. And we—we live from the rules; we don’t have much intuition for these things. Therefore there is also some substantive anchor for this rule that was accepted, not to disagree with the sages of the Talmud. It is not just a formal determination and nothing more. Another point that still touches on this matter regarding the basic assumption. The basic assumption says that despite the two sides I have just described—the formal side and the substantive side, the decline of the generations, the decline in intuitive ability, in the intuitive grasp of Jewish law—the fact is that according to Jewish law, fundamentally, one can disagree. One can disagree with previous generations. Meaning, that consideration of distance from the source is not enough to forbid disagreeing with previous generations. There had to be a formal acceptance that we would not disagree with the sages of the Talmud. Meaning, that in itself is not enough. Were it not for that acceptance the Kesef Mishneh describes, we would be supposed to act as we understand, even if it is against the Talmuds. Every religious court in every generation is supposed to decide, even if it is against the Talmud. Where is the consideration of the decline of the generations? Why was that acceptance needed? Why without it could everyone in fact disagree? What shall we say—that there is no decline of the generations? I already said earlier, I don’t think that’s true. There is decline—again, not in IQ. I don’t think, at least, that it is in IQ. There is a decline in the intuitive grasp of Torah. One of the strongest proofs is that in rabbinic law, for example, one cannot disagree with previous generations even by law, unless one is greater in wisdom and number; and the assumption of all the medieval authorities is always that the later one is also the smaller one. The Raavad even asks against Maimonides. Maimonides writes that in the case of an enactment whose rationale changed, there too you need a court greater in wisdom and number. The Raavad asks him: what do you mean? We find that Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai canceled the enactment there—that case of the two festival days of Rosh Hashanah there, where the Levites became confused in the song—so he canceled an enactment of previous generations. That is how the Raavad challenges Maimonides: so once the rationale is gone, what do we see? That even a court that is not greater can cancel it. If the reason for the enactment is gone, then even a smaller court can cancel the enactment. Only if the reason still exists, and you nevertheless decide to disagree with the previous court, do you need to be greater in wisdom and number. That is the Raavad’s claim. What will Maimonides answer him? The simple answer is: who says Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai was smaller than his predecessors? Why did you decide that? There is here some clear intuitive assumption—I still have not seen anyone even comment on it at all—that obviously, if he came after them, then that is a sign he is smaller. Why? Maybe he happened to be greater. Why this necessary correlation between your position on the historical axis and your position on the axis of Torah wisdom? There is some self-evident assumption: the medieval authorities and later authorities exchange many blows over this issue—how that one canceled the enactment of that one, and that one came after him. Who spoke about after him? Is it forbidden to cancel something after him? Whenever you cancel someone, you come after him, no? Can one cancel an enactment before it was enacted? Whenever you cancel it, you are after it. Rather, what? You have to be greater in wisdom and number. Fine, no problem—so what’s the problem? The problem is apparently that there is no such thing: whenever you are after him, you are not greater. So this somewhat empties out the possibility of canceling a previous enactment of content. Because if you make it conditional on the court being greater in wisdom and number, and along with that you assume that whenever it is later it is also not greater, then in any case it can never cancel the enactment of a previous court. Fine, but in any event, one way or another, it is clear that there is some intuitive assumption that yes, there is decline. Meaning, there is such decline. Yes. Someone once told me in the name of Rabbi Kook—I don’t remember the source at the moment—that just as there is a conservation law and so on, all the conservation laws, the same is true with wisdom in the Jewish people. Meaning, in the earlier generations there were few people but very wise, and as the wisdom spread from generation to generation there is more wisdom, but the integral remains constant. Fine. In any event—entropy. Entropy. Fine, maybe so they would learn less; there were fewer people, and then we would have to reconstruct the Name again. Maybe if we all stop learning altogether and only one person remains, then he’ll be like Moses our teacher. Fine, in any event—where was I? Yes. So basically there is recognition that there is decline throughout the generations. If there is decline throughout the generations, why is that not enough to forbid disagreeing with a previous religious court in Torah-level law? In rabbinic law it is forbidden to disagree unless you are greater in wisdom and number. Why in Torah-level law is it not enough? Why was there a need there for some special enactment regarding the Talmuds, while on the principled level there is no prevention, and on the contrary? Every religious court has to act according to its understanding. The Rosh, in Sanhedrin chapter 4, section 6, elaborates there on this issue and says: clearly, every religious court in every generation can disagree with anyone it wants, anyone it finds appropriate—including the Geonim. In his period the reference is naturally relative to him, so he says there is no obstacle to disagreeing with the Geonim and with anyone who came before us. About the Talmuds it is something else—we accepted that upon ourselves. But that he doesn’t say explicitly; still, it is implied by his words, because he is not discussing the Talmud. He is discussing only what happens after the sealing of the Talmud, and he says: we are not bound by anyone. And it is implied by him that not only are we not bound, but that this is how it should be. A person should act, or the religious court should decide, what it thinks, even if that is against the decision of previous religious courts. Now, he too agrees that there is decline, only he says: Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation. He himself brings this—Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation. But “Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation” is a problematic rationale. Because “Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation” is a rationale addressed to the public. To the public you say: look, our leaders are not on the level of the leaders from two hundred, a thousand, two thousand years ago, so who says we have to listen to them? So people are told: look, Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation; you have only the judge in your own days. Yes, the judge in your days, you have to listen to him. But I’m asking: what does Jephthah himself do? Not what the people to whom Jephthah gives instructions do. Samuel came after Jephthah. Yes. Fine. What? That saying contradicts the assumption that there is constant decline of the generations. No, no, no. On the contrary. He says despite the decline of the generations, Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation. Because Samuel came after Jephthah. Yes, obviously. But there is an ignoring of the time axis. Clearly the intention there, at least in the uses of the medieval authorities of this midrash, is that despite the fact that our generation is smaller and there is decline of the generations, still this is the religious court of our days. Which, by the way, is where you see that the historical axis got reversed. Yes. Fine, Samuel in any case—there are sayings about him like “Moses and Aaron among His priests,” and so on—Samuel apparently was some exceptional, highly unusual phenomenon. Or to appoint a king, perhaps because… what? Because he had the ability to appoint a king. Fine, maybe. He is the last one. In any event, this rationale is somewhat problematic, because when you say to the citizens: listen, you need to obey the judge of your own days, even if he is Jephthah and not Samuel, because Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation—that’s perfectly fine. There is no other choice; there has to be order. But when you speak about Jephthah himself, about the religious court, and you ask whether the religious court should ask itself whether to disagree with the court before it, even though that court is greater than it or not—what does Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation have to do with it? What is the connection? If he is more correct, then go with him—you are smaller than him. To the citizens you can say: listen, this is not grounds for not obeying a religious court, for not listening to the great religious court. If the great religious court is the court of your days, then that is what you need to do. You cannot obey the previous court; you need to obey the court of now. That is the authoritative court from your perspective. That is when you are addressing the citizens. But when the Rosh speaks to halakhic decisors, the Rosh is speaking to the religious court, not to the citizens, and he says to the religious court: Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation. What does he mean to say? He means to say that Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation is not only a statement to the public; it is also a statement to judges. You have to know that you are obligated to rule as you think, and not as the previous religious court thought, even though it is greater than you. Not because it is not greater—it is. You can see this in the Rosh: there is decline of the generations there, that is clear, therefore he needs this statement, Jephthah in his generation is like Samuel in his generation. But he says that despite the decline of the generations, every religious court in every generation has to decide according to its understanding. Why? If that is really not the truth, if there is indeed also the authority wing, that there is decline of the generations, there are wiser sages, and as history continues the wisdom declines, then there should be a normal legal prohibition against disagreeing with previous generations. Why do we need a special acceptance regarding the Talmud, while in other generations there is no obstacle to disagreeing? Then let us never disagree. So clearly there is some conception here—I don’t remember whether I spoke about this—there is some conception here of autonomy. Meaning, there is an obligation on the halakhic decisor to decide according to his understanding, even if that is not the correct ruling. And he cannot hang himself on another decisor who is greater because that one is greater. He cannot. Meaning, the decisor is obligated to decide: if this is what you think, that is how you must rule. You cannot set aside what you think in favor of a decisor or religious court—another decisor, another court—that is greater. And on this matter one can bring many proofs. There is one example—I don’t remember anymore what I spoke about and where. For some reason it all seems to me like I already spoke about it, but maybe I brought this. The Talmud says regarding Rabbi Meir: why did his colleagues not rule like him? Because they could not penetrate the depth of his reasoning. He was such a genius, and therefore they did not rule like him. But if he was such a genius, then they should have ruled like him everywhere. If you think otherwise than he does, apparently you failed to understand something in him, after all he is ten times greater than you. So what does it mean that you do not rule like Rabbi Meir because you did not penetrate the depth of his reasoning? If you did not penetrate the depth of his reasoning and you understand that, then clearly he is right and you are wrong—so the Jewish law should follow him. Meaning, they did not rule like him. Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua, where a heavenly voice came out from heaven and they still did not rule like him—that is perhaps an even stronger expression of this matter. And the answer is because we are obligated to rule according to what we understand, even in a place where, if you ask me what I would bet on, I would tell you I would bet that I am mistaken, because Rabbi Meir is greater; Rabbi Meir is probably right. I just don’t understand why. I think this is the truth. If you ask me simply, from the standpoint of what the Holy One, blessed be He, thinks—from the standpoint of the Holy One, blessed be He, it is quite clear that I am mistaken and Rabbi Meir is right—and still the Holy One, blessed be He, expects me to act according to what I understand. And that is a value no less important than the value of acting according to the truth. A person must act, of course striving for the true ruling, but he also has to know that he must act according to what he understands the true ruling to be, and not according to a heavenly voice that announces that the true ruling is different from what I think, as happened with the oven of Akhnai—then no, we do not rule accordingly. Why not? After all, that is the truth. Because truth is not the only criterion for halakhic decision. Not because it is not the truth—it is the truth, what came from heaven. But truth is not the only criterion for halakhic decision; there is another criterion: autonomy. Why do we have a rebellious elder? In a place where there is a great religious court, you do not have the obligation or the right to act autonomously, because the great religious court has authority. And it also has both the truth and its autonomy. Only if he teaches a different ruling? No, no, not teaches a ruling. But in a place where there is the great religious court of your days saying something specific, the Torah determines that they have authority. If they decide—we spoke about this already, I think—that if they do not decide… yes, those who dream that the great religious court will return so that it will solve

[Speaker C] all the disputes that exist now, that they will decide all the disputes

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] what needs to be done and what does not need to be done. What kind of dream is this? This dream is a nightmare in my eyes. Meaning, when the great religious court returns, it is only supposed to set the framework. Meaning, there are things in which one needs to decide. If one person won’t eat at another’s house or won’t marry another, then the great religious court has to intervene. In order to establish a fixed standard and so no one will pull tricks—this one thinks this and that one thinks that. But in a place where the matter concerns me, in my own home, and it does not bother anyone and nothing of the sort—if it does not go beyond some boundary, some threshold of reasonableness—there is no reason the great religious court should make a decision on this matter. Let it leave it open: do what you think. Not everything must be adjudicated. As if—not everything; everything can be adjudicated on the principled level, but it does not have to exercise its right to adjudicate in everything. It’s a matter of opinion, unless they want to—meaning, if they want to, it would certainly be within their authority. But I think they won’t; it seems to me—I don’t know whether I hope so or think so. This is a matter of the rabbi’s personal opinion; meaning it’s not that they would have to act this way. I’m saying that when I become the Sanhedrin, maybe I’ll be able to dictate it to them. I’m not—I’m saying this is my opinion; I think this is right. I certainly hope so, but I also think it’s right. That the role of the great religious court is not to decide all disputes. That is simply not right. The great religious court should decide in places where one needs to decide; there it will decide. If some problem arises. If this dispute is not a dispute where everyone can act on his own—like people always talk about the tyranny of the majority in democracy versus majority rule—what is the difference? That regarding the question of whether to sign some diplomatic agreement, it cannot be that everyone does what he thinks, because the State of Israel signs one agreement. It cannot be that everyone does what he thinks, so there is no choice: the majority decides. But in a place where I do something in my house and you do something else in your house, why should the legislator intervene in what I do? So he leaves me to do what I do and you to do what you do, except in very unusual cases where he sees—or at least that’s how it should be—that some problem is created, a social problem, and then he can also get into my plate, into my house. But basically he is not supposed to do that, not because he agrees with me. It could be that I’m mistaken. It could be that most legislators also agree that I’m mistaken. So what? That does not mean they have to intervene there. These are two completely different things. The Torah itself too has many things it expects from us and did not establish as law. So why shouldn’t the great religious court act that way too? There are things beyond the letter of the law—the Torah wants us to do them. So let it write there that it wants us to do them; why does it leave it as something beyond the letter of the law? Because it itself understands that there are circles. There is a certain circle that needs to be established—that is Jewish law that binds everyone. There is a second circle, where it is left to the person’s good will. The Torah wants us to do it; it expects us to do it; but it does not command. It leaves it to us, because it wants us to do it on our own initiative. And in the same way I think there is also room where, when there is a dispute, we leave it open and do not decide it. That is allowed. Do this, as the Talmud itself says—admittedly not in many places, but in at least two places the Talmud says, both in Berakhot and in Shevuot: “One who acted like this master acted validly, and one who acted like that master acted validly.” Meaning, there is Rabbi Yehuda and the rabbis regarding the time of the evening prayer, the time of Minchah and the time of the evening prayer—there is a dispute there, and the Talmud concludes with: one who acted like this master acted validly, and one who acted like that master acted validly. Understand, this is not just a question—it is not merely an unresolved dispute. There are many unresolved disputes in the Talmud. And then the decisors come and decide what to do. Here the Talmud decides not to decide. No decisor afterward can decide it, because the Talmud itself determined that this dispute is not decided, period. That is the decision. Likewise with “the oath returned to Sinai” there in Shevuot; there is a topic there too where it says: one who acted like this master acted validly, and one who acted like that master acted validly. Tosafot in Bava Batra actually says that “one who acted like this master acted validly” applies everywhere disputes were left open. It is a rule that exists everywhere disputes were left open; the rule is: one who acted like this master acted validly. Which is a very great innovation, and there are some comments on this among the medieval authorities. There are medieval authorities who agree, and medieval authorities who do not. But this conception, as if the legislator must determine everything, or the religious court must decide every dispute—why must it decide every dispute? There are several possibilities, and again, not because it has no position. The legislator may have a very clear position, and still leave it open. There was the debate in the Knesset about “do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood.” There was a debate about this law of Hanan Porat. About “do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood,” that one must save a person or help a person who is in distress. When we see someone in a situation of distress, we need to help him. So there was a major debate whether to legislate this law or not. And Hanan Porat and mainly the religious members of Knesset pushed the matter, of course out of a religious agenda, because this was a law with a verse at the top—“do not stand idly by your neighbor’s blood”—and it was very important to them to push it into the law books. And of course for that very reason it was important to some members of Knesset that it not enter the law books. But beyond this idiotic debate, there was also a real debate. There is a real debate here, one that exists all over the world; in other places it is called the Good Samaritan law.

[Speaker C] The debate is over whether it is appropriate to put such a thing into the law books. Now what does that mean? Does any member of Knesset think it is not proper to do such a thing—to help someone who is in distress? There isn’t one such person, as far as those who know them are concerned, I assume. Fine, on the theoretical level. In practice, of course, none of us is perfect.

[Speaker A] On the theoretical level there isn’t a single person who disagrees with that. Obviously not.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The debate was whether to establish it as law.

[Speaker A] The debate was not whether it is right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So by the same token, the Sanhedrin too might think that what he says is correct, even unanimously, and still think that it’s not right to establish that as law. Not right to decide that dispute. That’s all. I don’t see why everything has to be decided. So you leave it open: one does as this master, and one does as that master. Ashkenazic rite, Sephardic rite—everyone longs for the Messiah to come, and then there won’t be any more rites. I’m not crazy about these rites either, but it could be they’ll still remain even after the Messiah comes. You have to take that into account. So what happens is simply: you pray the way you understand, and they pray the way they understand. When Moshe our teacher was around, there was neither Sephardic rite nor Ashkenazic rite. Everyone prayed however he wanted. According to Maimonides, prayer is Torah-level; according to Nachmanides, they may not have prayed at all. According to Maimonides, prayer is Torah-level, but its times weren’t fixed, nor its wording, nothing. So what did they do? Everyone did whatever he wanted. A Torah-level commandment. It’s not that there’s no obligation; there is a halakhic obligation to pray by Torah law—and what? Do whatever you want. Pray like this, pray differently, whenever you want, wherever you want, about whatever you want. I don’t think everything has to be decided. Okay, how did we get to all this? I don’t even remember anymore. Right, the value of autonomy. So I said—asked—why, if we accept this assumption that the generations decline, then why don’t we, why doesn’t Jewish law clearly establish that you can’t disagree with earlier generations? Why do we need the special acceptance of the sages of the Talmud? In principle, strictly speaking, there’s nothing preventing it—you can disagree with Moshe our teacher, with Joshua son of Nun, with whomever you want. There’s no limitation at all; only with rabbinic laws are there limitations. And I’m saying that the answer is that there is actually a very great value here, no less great than the value of truth, and that is the value of autonomy. The value of autonomy says that if you think differently from the court of Moshe our teacher, then you do what you think, not what the court of Moshe our teacher thought. And even if he stands here and shouts

[Speaker A] that you’re wrong, tell him: with all due respect, maybe I am wrong, but that’s what I think. Yiftach in his generation is like Samuel in his generation.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And therefore this value of autonomy exists—not only as a right, but as an obligation. You are obligated to act autonomously; it’s not merely that you’re allowed to act that way. And therefore I think Jewish law allows disagreement even with courts that are better than you—not because it rejects the idea that the generations declined. The generations declined, of course they did—so what? Even if they did, strictly speaking the court has to rule as it thinks. It is the court of the present. “Yiftach in his generation is like Samuel in his generation” was said about the court too, not only about citizens who must obey the court of their own day.

[Speaker A] The court too has to know that it, in its generation, is like Samuel in his generation, and it has to make decisions as it sees fit.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Just as autonomy stands opposite truth, autonomy is part of truth. That’s already semantics. Truth in the sense of what the Holy One intended—yes, that sometimes clashes with autonomy, as in the case of Rabbi Meir for example, or when you stand before a court greater than you and you argue with them, say, about the laws of selecting on the Sabbath. So I ask myself: what did the Holy One intend at Sinai when He taught Moshe our teacher? I assume He intended what they say, if they are greater than I am. And yet, when I study the passage, this is what seems right to me. The clearest case is a heavenly voice, right—exactly, exactly. So that’s not—it can also be said that this too is truth. I spoke there about Rabbi Dessler, with his idea that a falsehood in a place where it is permitted is not falsehood—that is the truth. That’s semantics. In the end, it’s clear that here we are deviating from what the Holy One originally intended in the sense of the laws of the Sabbath. We are not deviating in the sense of how the Holy One expects us to behave. He expects us to desecrate the Sabbath when that is what we think is right to do. And therefore that is perfectly fine. We are still doing what the Holy One expects of us—but not in the laws of the Sabbath, rather in the laws of autonomy. All right, so—this I brought once, I don’t remember when—I once brought a proof for the value of autonomy, an interesting proof. When we look at halakhic disputes and at how Jewish law relates to disputes, that conduct has a pluralistic character. There is a multiplicity of positions. But at the same time it could also express tolerant behavior, not pluralistic behavior. Tolerant behavior and pluralistic behavior look very similar on the practical plane. But on the conceptual plane they are largely opposites. That is, pluralism means a multiplicity of truths. Tolerance exists דווקא where there is no pluralism—precisely where I think I’m right and you’re wrong. Then my tolerance is expressed when I still allow you to behave differently, even though I think you’re mistaken. Because if I think you’re right just like me, that’s not tolerance. If I’m a pluralist, then what place is there for tolerance? Meaning, then you’re right just like me—why would I impose anything on you? That’s just not being wicked. That’s just not behaving senselessly. But if I think I’m right and you’re wrong, and still you act that way—that’s where my tolerance is expressed, if I really leave you your place, if I don’t coerce you. Fine, one can get into this; it’s an interesting conceptual analysis. So why really do that? But I won’t get into that now. I think that behind this value that today is called tolerance, the only basis I can place that value on is the basis of autonomy. Meaning: why exactly do I not force the other person, even though I think he’s wrong? No other justification will hold here. Because if I say, well, maybe after all he isn’t wrong—then I’m a pluralist, not tolerant. If what he does doesn’t cause harm, then why should I care if he does nonsense at home? In any case it causes no harm. Fine—if it causes no harm, then again I’m not being tolerant. Right? Then the act of leaving him to do nonsense at home is not tolerance. Tolerance is where I pay a price for not intervening, right? So all justifications of that kind—and there are quite a few of them—really cannot explain the value of tolerance. I think the only explanation I at least can come up with is that the root of the value of tolerance lies in the value of autonomy. That is, I’m forbidden to interfere in what a person does if that’s what he thinks, even though I think he’s wrong and even though his mistake is harmful, because there is a value of autonomy—that he should act as he thinks. There is such a value: to allow a person to act as he thinks. Exactly as I said earlier about the Sanhedrin—not to interfere in our lives in every single thing, because there is value in allowing us to act as we think. Is there a limit to this? There is certainly a limit, many limits. And that is exactly the difference. One of the indications of the difference between pluralistic behavior and tolerant behavior—which look very similar, because I don’t interfere in the other person’s life whether I’m a pluralist or tolerant—where is the difference? One of the prominent differences is precisely the setting of boundaries. Because a true pluralist should never interfere.

[Speaker D] He’s right just like me—what difference does it make?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But the tolerant person says: look, I allow it because there is a value of autonomy, but on the other hand there is a boundary. Meaning, there are other values too

[Speaker D] that clash with this, and I

[Speaker E] will have to weigh each time the

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] proper proportion, the proper proportionality, as people call it today. And when my child wants to try dangerous drugs, I don’t assume I’ll be tolerant toward that, because I think that harm outweighs the value of autonomous behavior. It’s not that there is no such value—there is such a value—but once that is the basic value, there are other values that can come into conflict with it. If I begin from a pluralist position, I can never intervene; there will be no boundary to it. Because he’s right just like me—in what sense should I intervene? Therefore, someone who has some boundary beyond which he is no longer tolerant—that means he is tolerant and not pluralist. That is one indication. There may perhaps be other indications. Now I’ll give you another indication. What happens if there is a halakhic dispute, and the question arises whether I’m allowed to cause the other person to stumble in something that in my opinion is forbidden and in his opinion is permitted, or the reverse—something that in my opinion is forbidden and in his opinion is permitted. Okay? There’s a piece of meat that he thinks, according to his halakhic approach, is non-kosher,

[Speaker C] and according to my halakhic approach it is kosher.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Now I take such a piece of meat and give it to him to eat—causing him to stumble in a transgression.

[Speaker C] According to my approach it’s kosher, so I didn’t cause him to stumble in a transgression.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But according to his approach it’s non-kosher; he’s forbidden to eat it. The question is whether “do not place a stumbling block” applies in such a case.

[Speaker C] It seems to me this would be a touchstone for your basic positions.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If you’re a pluralist, what do you say? Then is it permitted? He thinks it’s forbidden, I think it’s permitted. Am I allowed to make him stumble? Forbidden—because you must respect his truth, that for him this is stringency. He is as right as you are, so from his perspective the law is that this piece is forbidden. From your perspective the law is that the piece is permitted, fine. But from his perspective the law is that it is forbidden, so he will be committing a transgression. If you’re a monist—monist is the opposite of a pluralist, meaning you think there is only one halakhic truth—then of course you are allowed to make him stumble, right? Because I think this is correct. The fact that he’s mistaken and thinks it’s non-kosher—that’s his problem. I’m feeding him kosher meat; there’s no issue at all. I’m a monist, that’s that. And therefore there would be no “do not place a stumbling block” here. So that is exactly the line that distinguishes monism from pluralism. Now look at something even nicer. In the Talmud, tractate Sukkah, such a situation is described. There is a dispute there about sitting in a sukkah beneath decorations that hang four handbreadths below the roofing. Okay? If the decorations are four handbreadths distant from the roofing, the question is whether one may sit beneath them or whether that counts as eating outside the sukkah. Rav Nachman holds it is permitted, and Rav Huna and Rav Chisda say it is forbidden. Rav Huna and Rav Chisda, of course, came to stay with Rav Nachman, and naturally it was during the festival of Sukkot, and naturally he had decorations hanging four handbreadths below the roofing, and naturally he seated them beneath those decorations. That is what the Talmud says. Then the Ritva says there that from here we see that a person is permitted to cause his fellow to stumble in something that according to his own approach is permitted and according to the fellow’s approach is forbidden. Exactly the question we asked earlier. So what do we see from here? That he is a monist. Right? The Ritva infers it, but it’s in the Talmud. Basically there is a monistic conception here, not a pluralistic one, right? But now look—let’s keep going. The Ritva does not stop there. The Ritva says: but you have to inform them. You have to tell them that they are sitting under decorations that are four handbreadths below the roofing. You may seat them there, but you have to tell them. Now apparently he just undermined the whole point. If you tell them, then you didn’t make them stumble—they decided on their own to sit under the decoration. Not true. In tractate Avodah Zarah, when the Talmud speaks about “do not place a stumbling block,” what is the case? A nazir is standing on the other side of a river, right? In a place where he cannot reach, and he says to me: please give me a cup of wine. Next to me there is a cup of wine, the nazir is standing there, the river is between us. Fine? Like a riddle. Then he says to me: please hand me this cup of wine, I want to drink. A nazir is forbidden to drink wine. He cannot reach the cup, because otherwise there is no Torah-level prohibition here. He cannot. He asks me to pass it to him. I pass him the cup of wine and he drinks. I have violated “do not place a stumbling block before the blind.” Are we talking about a nazir who doesn’t know that this is wine and that a nazir is forbidden to drink wine? Of course not. The nazir knows it’s wine and knows that he is forbidden to drink it. So what if I handed him the wine? He could have decided to pour it out. The fact that he decided to drink it—that’s his problem. What does that have to do with me? The Talmud says: but there is “do not place a stumbling block” here. A Torah-level “do not place a stumbling block.” It is a Torah prohibition to make him stumble. Why? After all, it’s his decision. He could have drunk it, he could have refrained from drinking it. The fact that I enabled him to commit the transgression—enabled, not caused in the way people usually understand physical blindness—but if I enabled him to commit the transgression in a way that without me he could not have done it, then I violated the Torah prohibition of “do not place a stumbling block.” Well then, now let’s go back to the Ritva. Here too I caused them to stumble—I seated them under the sukkah decorations. I told them that the decorations are four handbreadths below the roofing. So what? It should still be forbidden for me to seat them there. The fact that they decide to sit there—the nazir also decides to drink the cup of wine. It is still forbidden for me to hand it to him when he is on the other side of the river. Here too this is the same kind of case—it’s my sukkah. They can get up and leave. I can remove them from there. I don’t understand. The nazir wants to drink the wine; they want to sit under those decorations. But I am causing them to stumble by allowing it. I could have withheld it. It’s my sukkah. They are sitting in my sukkah. It is exactly the same as the wine. They are deciding to commit transgressions just as the nazir decides to commit a transgression. So what? That does not solve the problem of “do not place a stumbling block” just because you tell them that the decorations hang four handbreadths below the roofing. So what is the Ritva doing here? Some kind of strange mishmash. So decide. You say that fundamentally—the Talmud says this, he proves it from the Talmud in Hullin, it doesn’t matter—that one has to inform them. Fine? So how are we to understand this now in terms of pluralism and monism? Pluralism says that in any case I may not cause them to stumble, whether I tell them or not. So it’s not pluralism, right? Monism says I’m allowed to cause them to stumble. So apparently it’s monism. But from monism too I would have expected that I wouldn’t even need to tell them. I’m causing them to stumble in something that from my perspective is permitted. Why should I care that they are mistaken and think it is forbidden? Why do I need to inform them? I think I need to inform them because of autonomy. Exactly. The Ritva says: look, true, I’m a monist, but only a monist can be tolerant. A pluralist cannot be tolerant. Tolerant means that I recognize your right—and even your obligation—to act as you think, even though you are mistaken. That sounds just like Rousseau. Right. Even though you are mistaken—I do. I recognize your right and even your obligation to act as you think. Not because you are right just like me—I’m not a pluralist. You are mistaken, but despite your being

[Speaker A] mistaken

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] you still have an obligation to act as you think. That is exactly truth versus autonomy. All right? Now that is exactly the ruling of the Ritva. Exactly the ruling of the Ritva. What is he saying to them? He says to them: look, there is no “do not place a stumbling block” in making you stumble here, because I’m a monist. If there were “do not place a stumbling block” here, informing you wouldn’t help. It is exactly like that nazir. So there is no “do not place a stumbling block” here. But if I’m a monist, then why inform them at all? If I’m a monist, that’s it, so I can just give it to them. Why inform them? Because this is a different kind of monism. It is tolerant monism. Tolerant monism is monism that says—again, this is the stricter side of things. The more tolerant I am, the stricter it gets. I have to inform them; I’m forbidden to give it to them without informing them. This monism sounds like pluralism. No. If you say to your fellow, you must be faithful to your truth just as I am faithful to mine, then there is no longer one truth—that is pluralism. No, no, no. That is exactly the difference. And that is pluralism. No, it isn’t. That is exactly why I’m bringing this example. Because if it were pluralism, it would be forbidden to give it to them even if I informed them. Therefore this example is so beautiful. Because this example makes exactly the distinction that is so hard to make, like what you just said. Because if I were a pluralist, it would be forbidden for me to give it to them even if I informed

[Speaker A] them. Because I am causing them to stumble in a prohibition. It’s like giving a nazir a cup of wine.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But only according to their approach is it a prohibition. Right, but what difference does that make? That is what determines it—their approach is what determines it. I am obligated to my truth. No—pluralism, pluralism means each person is obligated to what he thinks, right? So now I’m forbidden to cause you to stumble in a transgression. What is a transgression from your perspective? According to my definitions. No, according to your definitions. That’s inconceivable. What do you mean, why not? They’ll learn everyone’s definitions.

[Speaker A] No, no, no,

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] if you didn’t know, then you were under compulsion. That’s irrelevant. Assume you do know. I didn’t say you have to learn all of them. Assume you know. Maybe this specific one you don’t know. After all, if you hold that he should act as he understands, then from his perspective it’s a transgression. So if you caused him to stumble in that—even if from your perspective it isn’t a transgression—you violated “do not place a stumbling block.” The pluralism here is different; that is why this example is so beautiful. Because it shows us exactly, at the highest resolution, that this is neither pluralism nor monism—it is tolerance. And tolerance is monistic in its essence. A conception that says: I am right and you are wrong, and nevertheless I think I should let you act as you think—not only let you, you are obligated to act as you think, and I have to enable that. Now I’m not going to stop you from sitting there, because I’m a monist. I’m a monist; I don’t think this is “do not place a stumbling block.” Meaning, from my standpoint, if you decide to sit there, sit there, because I think it is permitted altogether. So from the side of monism there’s no problem. Except for one thing: I have to make sure that you know what you are doing, because you have to do what you think. Therefore this example is a beautiful example, I think, for showing the tolerant conception that stands somewhere in the middle, between monism and pluralism. And that illustrates here—I’ve expanded far beyond what I planned—this really illustrates that value I spoke about earlier, this value of autonomy. The value that says the Sanhedrin should not decide for us where it isn’t necessary, unless there is some specific need to decide and impose it on everyone. And that is also the reason why in principle one can disagree with every earlier generation, no matter how much smaller I am than them, how much lesser I am than them—on the principled level. At the historical point of the redaction of the Talmud, they made some decision to deviate from that and say: from here on, we do not disagree with the Talmuds or with the Mishnah, for historical reasons and all the other things we said earlier. But fundamentally that is the exception. Fundamentally, one can indeed disagree with every earlier generation precisely because of this point: that I am obligated to act autonomously and not only according to the truth. So even though I am lesser than they are, and there is a good chance that the truth is not with me, my obligation to act autonomously overrides that concern that I may be doing something untrue. Okay then, have a kosher and joyous holiday.

[Speaker E] Hol

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] HaMoed?

[Speaker E] I don’t know, you tell

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] me—fine by me. Welcome, children. All right, goodbye, happy holiday.