Pluralism and Tolerance, Lecture 1
This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
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Table of Contents
- [0:01] Opening: Pluralism and tolerance in Jewish law
- [2:04] Moving beyond the halakhic perspective – the Talmudic text in Eruvin
- [4:51] Tosafot and the debate over the methodology of decision-making
- [21:59] The debate over the rules of decision-making and voting
- [26:05] Interpreting the heavenly voice: Jewish law follows Beit Hillel
- [28:37] The advantage of a sage over most people
- [29:40] Deciding according to the majority of people
- [31:48] The Sanhedrin and halakhic decisions in testimony with many witnesses
- [33:42] The decision-making process in a religious court according to Maimonides
- [35:05] The Talmudic text and the ruling of Jewish law according to Beit Hillel
- [38:22] Rabbi Yosef Karo’s monistic reading
- [44:21] Theoretical truth versus practical truth
- [53:29] Pluralism and academic writing
- [55:49] Conclusion and continuation
Summary
General Overview
The text presents tolerance and pluralism as concepts that have become foundational modern values, yet they evoke a sense of threat among conservatives and a sense of apology among liberals. It argues that mixing them together blurs distinctions to the point of reversing their meaning. It opens with a reading of the passage “These and those are the words of the living God” in Eruvin and proposes understanding the Talmud’s appeal to a heavenly voice as a ruling about the rules of decision-making themselves, when there is a “meta-debate” about methodology, rather than as an ordinary halakhic ruling that contradicts “It is not in heaven.” Later it distinguishes between a pluralist reading and a monistic reading of the heavenly voice’s statement, suggests that Rabbi Yosef Karo reads “they were pleasant and humble” as an epistemic justification that leads to truth, and builds a principled reservation about substantive pluralism both on logical grounds and on grounds of fidelity to the sources. Toward the end it shifts to a critique of academic “justiciable” writing that does not present a direct position, arguing that a pluralist agenda enters through it either by attributing pluralism to authorities or by presenting a full “tree of opinions” from every direction in order to hint that all positions are legitimate.
Tolerance, pluralism, a sense of threat, and the need for definition
The text argues that tolerance, pluralism, openness, and inclusion are treated as interchangeable concepts even though some of them do not overlap and may even be opposites. It describes a two-sided defensive posture in which a conservative worldview feels threatened by the outside world, while a liberal worldview feels compelled to justify why its own system does not obey these values. It argues that one must begin by examining the definitions of the concepts in order to discuss their application to Jewish law afterward.
Eruvin: “These and those are the words of the living God” as an opening to a halakhic discussion
The text presents the initial impression that the Talmudic text in Eruvin conveys a pluralistic message, and asks how that fits with the sense that Jewish law is not very pluralistic. It describes the long dispute between Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai and the heavenly voice that says, “These and those are the words of the living God, but Jewish law follows Beit Hillel,” and highlights the internal difficulty between the “both” component and the component of decision. It compares ambiguous statements to a mechanism in which “the Oracle at Delphi” is always right because every outcome can be read into its words, and presents the question of how to interpret the statement in the Talmudic text as a principled problem.
A heavenly voice versus “It is not in heaven” and deciding the rules of decision-making
The text raises the question asked by the medieval authorities (Rishonim): why was there any need for a heavenly voice if “It is not in heaven”? It notes that Tosafot in Eruvin offers three answers, but proposes a different answer based on Tosafot elsewhere. It argues that the dispute got stuck because there was a disagreement about methodology: Beit Hillel were more numerous, while Beit Shammai were “sharper,” and therefore a “meta-debate” developed over which majority counts—the majority in number or the majority in wisdom. It explains that when the dispute is about the rules of decision-making themselves, the rules cannot be used to decide it, and therefore precisely in such a situation there is room to turn to heaven to decide the rules. It interprets the heavenly voice as deciding that one follows the majority in number, not as an ordinary halakhic ruling that contradicts the principle of “It is not in heaven.”
Majority in number versus majority in wisdom: continuation of the dispute and its implications
The text points to the continuation of this dispute in later periods through the Sefer HaChinukh on the commandment “follow the majority,” which cites a dispute between Rav Hai Gaon and Nachmanides in the case of “one who is learned and understands, and two who are learned / understand” on a religious court. It describes the question whether a numerical majority prevails even against the central Torah authority, and formulates it as a choice between “counting feet or counting heads.” It argues that the accepted view is that of Nachmanides, namely that the decisive majority is the majority in number, and explains this by the desire to achieve peace and practicality and avoid endless disputes over who is wiser.
Rabbi Chaim, nullification in the majority, and the role of the majority in a religious court
The text presents Rabbi Chaim’s question of how the law of nullification in a majority is derived from “follow the majority,” and distinguishes between the statistics of majority and a case in which “you definitely ate something prohibited” and yet “the majority overcomes it.” It brings Rabbi Chaim’s answer that in order to satisfy the requirement of three judges, the minority opinion “is nullified and becomes like the majority,” so that there are, as it were, “three judges saying X,” and compares this to “Stalin’s methods for dealing with minorities” by means of “re-education.” It notes that Tosafot in Bava Kamma 27 says that the minority is “as if it does not exist,” not that it becomes the majority, and it presents criticism of Rabbi Chaim’s assumption that a verdict must emerge “from three mouths,” as opposed to the position that it is enough to have a panel of three even if the decision is 2 against 1.
“I do not know” in a religious court and the Rabbi Sherman story
The text describes a rule according to which a judge who says “I do not know” leads to the addition of two more judges, and tells a story from the High Rabbinical Court in which Rabbi Sherman was in the minority on the issue of the validity of a conversion and then said “I do not know” in order to bring about the addition of more judges. It presents a dispute over whether the move was legitimate and states that there are sources that validate it, and that this is his own position as well. He uses this to illustrate that when the rules of the game allow maneuvering, “whoever is smarter” can exploit them, and he returns the discussion to the tension between wisdom and rules of decision-making.
Majority, minority, and the political image of decision-making
The text argues that in most practical situations, not following the majority means, de facto, following the minority, especially in binary situations of “yes or no,” such as taking money or making a criminal ruling. It uses the image of a “constitution” that requires a special majority to change a law, and defines that as a situation in which the minority “imposes” its position because the previous ruling remains in force despite a new majority against it. It explains that the absurdity is not in having a mechanism of stability, but in the fact that requiring a special majority turns the default into the power of the minority against a regular majority.
Aharon Barak and the dispute over the rules of decision-making
The text describes the period when Aharon Barak served as president of the Supreme Court and argues that he was perceived as an imperialist, but presents Barak’s own claim that he was “arranging the rules” so as to allow public debate to take place. It argues that in some cases the dispute was not over content but over the rules of decision-making themselves, and over the question of how public norms in the state are determined. Therefore, saying whether a majority does or does not help is itself taking a position in the debate. It concludes that when the argument is about the rules rather than within the rules, a fundamental problem of decision arises, and that this illustrates the logic of the heavenly voice’s intervention in the dispute between Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai.
A pluralist reading of “These and those” and understanding “Jewish law follows Beit Hillel”
The text presents a pluralist reading according to which “These and those are the words of the living God” means a plurality of truths, with neither side being right or wrong. It explains that the ruling “Jewish law follows Beit Hillel” is only for the bottom line, so that “there should not be two Torahs,” for the sake of social order. It connects this to the fact that Beit Hillel were the majority, making it convenient to count feet and avoid disputes over measuring wisdom, and adds that on this reading the advantage of wisdom is weakened because the goal is calm and agreement rather than clarification of one truth. It uses the Talmud’s reason—“because they were pleasant and humble, and they would state the words of Beit Shammai before their own”—as a possible understanding of a “reward for good behavior” and as an educational and social gain not dependent on who is substantively right.
A monistic reading of “Jewish law follows Beit Hillel” according to Rabbi Yosef Karo
The text brings Rabbi Yosef Karo in his book Kelalei HaGemara, where he interprets “pleasant and humble” as a reason that leads to a more correct decision, because someone who presents the opponent’s words first and weighs them seriously reaches a more accurate result. It presents this as a monistic reading that assumes there is a halakhic truth, and that Jewish law follows Beit Hillel because the truth is with them, not merely because of educational or social needs. It adds that this methodology explains how a less gifted side may arrive at better decisions if it takes the other side seriously, whereas talent can actually be a disadvantage when it leads to entrenchment or contempt.
In the future to come, theoretical truth versus practical truth, and the distinction within the concept of “truth”
The text notes the well-known saying that in the future to come the law will follow Beit Shammai, and attributes it to a tradition from the Vilna Gaon. It proposes that the tension may be between “pure truth” and adaptation to reality in this world. It formulates a distinction between theoretical truth and practical truth, and argues that in each sense there is still only one truth, so that even this distinction remains monistic rather than “two truths” in the pluralist sense. It gives an example from the Sha’agat Aryeh concerning the recitation of Shema as a positive commandment dependent on time, to illustrate how what appears to be one commandment can break down into two separate obligatory frameworks, and it parallels this to two frameworks of truth, each of which is univocal.
Critique of substantive pluralism: a logical claim and disagreement with Avi Sagi
The text presents a logical argument according to which adopting pluralism requires one to ask what to do regarding pluralism itself, and argues that pluralists stop being pluralists when it comes to the question of pluralism, in order not to enter a loop. It mentions Avi Sagi’s book “These and Those,” states that he disagrees with much of it, and argues that he knows of no source that speaks about substantive pluralism other than one certain possibility in Avodat HaKodesh by Rabbi Meir Gabai. He states that the monistic reading is, in his opinion, the correct one, grounding this both in the logical argument and in the claim that the sources cited in favor of pluralism do not actually say that.
Academic “justiciable” writing, the absence of position, and the indirect transmission of a pluralist agenda
The text recounts that he was approached to write an article for a new journal of Jewish thought at Ariel University and was asked to make it “justiciable,” but he refused on the grounds that he does not write justiciable things. He defines a “justiciable thing” as a claim that is not the expression of a position but a claim that can be checked, such as “Maimonides was a pluralist,” in contrast to a normative claim like “one ought to be a pluralist,” which is not justiciable. He argues that, ironically, in the academic genre one cannot in principle express positions, and compares this to the fact that a poet would not publish a poem in a journal for the study of poetry, and that one cannot publish philosophy in a journal of philosophical research. He claims that in Jewish law too there is a difference in role between a scholar of Jewish law who maps and analyzes and a person of Jewish law who decides what is correct. He describes two ways in which academics nevertheless convey positions in practice: by consistently attributing pluralism to many authorities in order to hint that we too should be pluralists today, or by choosing an esoteric passage and presenting a full “tree of opinions” of all the possibilities in order to create the message that all positions are legitimate.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It’s worth starting a new topic now and talking a bit about how Jewish law relates to other opinions in general. Yes, pluralism, tolerance, that whole world of concepts.
[Speaker B] I didn’t see it in the email, but okay.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’ll let it go and satisfy the obligation of “the opposite happened” for that. Okay, these concepts—tolerance and pluralism—have been floating around in the air a lot lately and have become some kind of foundational values. And there’s always this sense of defensiveness, distress, from both directions. Meaning, if you have, say, a more conservative worldview, then you feel that the outside world threatens you. If you have a more liberal worldview, then you feel you have to apologize. Meaning, why is the system you believe in not actually complying with these values of tolerance and pluralism and so on? I think we need to examine the concepts themselves a bit, the definitions of the concepts themselves, in order to better understand the distinctions in this area, and then we can try to discuss how they apply to Jewish law. And I think that a lot of the time these mix-ups between the concepts turn them into almost interchangeable concepts. Tolerance and pluralism, openness, I don’t know, inclusion, all kinds of things like that—they’re almost interchangeable concepts, that’s usually how people perceive them. And I think some of them have meanings that are simply the opposite of one another, not just non-overlapping. But to start maybe from the halakhic or semi-halakhic angle, let’s begin with the Talmudic text in tractate Eruvin. Yes, “These and those are the words of the living God.” Because there the initial feeling is usually that the Talmud is conveying some kind of pluralistic message. And the question is how that fits with the not-so-pluralistic attitude that, at least by our intuition, exists in Jewish law. Is that really so, and how does it fit together? So first let’s learn the passage there a little, and afterward I’ll go into the definitions of the concepts a bit. The Talmudic text there says that Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai had a long-standing dispute and did not reach a decision, and in the end a heavenly voice came out and said: “These and those are the words of the living God, but Jewish law follows Beit Hillel.” What explains that?
[Speaker C] The Talmud explains it, not the heavenly voice.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It’s the heavenly voice. This statement has two components. One component is: “These and those are the words of the living God,” which seemingly means both are right. The second component is: “Jewish law follows Beit Hillel.” Does “Jewish law follows Beit Hillel” mean that Beit Hillel are right? So how does that fit with “These and those are the words of the living God”? There’s this feeling that this heavenly voice is kind of like the Oracle at Delphi. Meaning, it says something that in the end you can do whatever you want with, interpret however you want—it doesn’t actually say anything. Why is the Oracle at Delphi always right? Because whatever ends up happening can be fitted into the vague words he said. So that’s no problem—you can reconcile everything. It’s either the Oracle at Delphi or Stalin or Rabbi Kook, with all due distinction. Meaning, each of them speaks in such a vague and open way that whatever happens fits what he said. He’s always right. In any case, the question is how to understand that sentence in the Talmud. Before we get into that sentence in the Talmud, there’s a question that the medieval authorities (Rishonim) already raise: why was there any need for a heavenly voice at all? After all, we know “It is not in heaven,” from the story of the Oven of Akhnai, so how can it be that we rely on a heavenly voice deciding Jewish law? Or maybe we should say: the heavenly voice decides Jewish law. So the medieval authorities—Tosafot there in Eruvin—give three answers. I’m going to suggest a different answer. I think, at least to me, it sounds very plausible, and it’s also grounded in Tosafot that appears a few pages later. Tosafot says that the problem in the dispute—not the Tosafot that answers there, but the Tosafot I want to rely on—says that what blocked the decision between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel was that there was some argument here about the methodology of decision-making. Beit Hillel were more numerous, and Beit Shammai were sharper—they were more incisive, more brilliant, let’s say. Yes, you know that usually the minority is right in arguments. Meaning, there are only a few wise people—it’s a simple distribution, there’s always a pyramid, right? So the wise are few. Therefore where there is a dispute, usually the minority is right. So in the dispute between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, Beit Hillel were the majority, while Beit Shammai were the numerical minority, but they were the sharper ones, the wiser ones, the more brilliant ones, let’s say.
[Speaker D] Was what you said about the minority a political statement?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Every statement is political—our postmodern teachers have already taught us that. There are no non-political statements. In any case, Tosafot is basically saying that this was the reason they couldn’t reach a decision. Otherwise what’s the problem? Let them just vote. “Follow the majority,” it says in the Torah, so why did the dispute get stuck? The dispute got stuck because there was in fact an argument, a meta-argument. There was an argument over which majority counts. Beit Hillel say what counts is the number of people; Beit Shammai say what counts is the amount of talent, let’s call it that, or something like that—the sharpness, in the Talmud’s language, the wisdom, okay? Or I once heard someone define it as: do you count feet or do you count heads? Meaning, yes—does the majority of feet determine it, or does the majority of heads determine it? So now in a situation like that we’re in an inescapable dispute, because what are we going to do about this dispute itself—about which majority counts in votes? Hold a vote? But then that vote too will come out the same way, right? We won’t be able to decide that dispute. Although it could be—seems to me we once talked about paradox and anti-paradox? Didn’t we talk about that? I don’t remember anymore. There could have been a situation where Beit Hillel said the majority of wisdom counts and Beit Shammai said the majority in number counts, the majority of people. It doesn’t have to be that each side thinks whatever characterizes itself is what counts. Of course that wouldn’t solve the problem; it would turn it from an anti-paradox into a paradox. And who decides who is wise? The assumption is that this was apparently agreed upon—that this was common ground. Beit Hillel also accepted that Beit Shammai were sharper. Let’s assume that, at least for the sake of discussion—that’s how it’s presented—so for the sake of discussion we’ll assume there was no dispute about that, everyone agreed.
[Speaker D] Can we get a recording?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, it’ll appear. Okay, in any case, the dispute over how to decide a dispute is itself undecidable, because it itself requires rules of decision-making. And where we’re stuck on the method of decision-making, not on the specific argument between us, then we have a problem. This dispute over whether we go after the majority in number or the majority in wisdom actually continues into later periods too. Sefer HaChinukh, on the commandment of “follow the majority,” brings a dispute between Rav Hai Gaon and Nachmanides. What happens—you know that in a religious court for monetary cases, you can have one who is learned and understands, and two who are learned—or understand—meaning, if you explain to them, they understand. So three such people can sit there. Then the question arises: what happens when there is a dispute in the court? So you follow the majority—but what happens if the one who is learned and understands says one thing, and the two who just understand say something else—they are against him? There’s a majority against him. So do we follow them or not? After all, he is the learned and understanding one, the central Torah scholar there on the court, so how can they go against him when the whole reason they were selected is just that they’ll be able to understand what he explains to them? So that’s a dispute between Rav Hai Gaon and Nachmanides: do we follow wisdom or the numerical majority? Again, do you count heads or do you count feet? The same dispute.
[Speaker C] Why does Nachmanides explain “sharper people” as “wiser”? If they’re less sharp, then maybe the wisdom isn’t with them. I know a lot of smart people who aren’t sharp, right? But there are people who are very sharp and yet have a very…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I completely agree with that claim, but in terms of Tosafot, when he explains the dispute, that can’t be right. Because otherwise, what’s the problem? What got them stuck? Let them hold a vote and the majority decides. They had a dispute over which majority counts, right? That was the argument there. I can agree or disagree with that, but that was the dispute there. And you couldn’t resolve it. If you had explained to Beit Shammai, “Guys, you’re sharper but less wise,” they wouldn’t have accepted that.
[Speaker C] They weren’t wiser.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Doesn’t matter—so not wiser. But then we’re the majority. So if we’re the majority, then follow us. What did Beit Shammai argue against that? Beit Shammai said: what do you mean? We’re wiser, therefore we are the majority. The determining majority is the majority of wisdom, not the majority of people.
[Speaker C] That was the claim. They said it to Hillel, not to Beit Shammai. No, Beit Shammai said: we are the majority of wisdom. You are the majority of people; we are the majority of wisdom—so which majority counts? Because they were sharper.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So this dispute basically continues, and it is commonly thought to have been decided like Nachmanides. Meaning, the deciding majority is the majority of feet—here we are, we’re the majority. And apparently the reason for that is that we want to achieve peace more than truth. Also practical. Yes, in the practical sense. You want to achieve a situation where these quarrels won’t continue forever. So for that reason they decided to go by the majority and not start with, because of course the next stage would be endless arguments over who is wiser. It’s not always all that agreed upon. And therefore we count feet, and that’s it. The number of feet is agreed data. Yes.
[Speaker E] If we were to go by the second opinion—that we go by the majority of wisdom—then in that court of three where one is superior, there’s no point in the other two even sitting there.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, not exactly. You know, that reminds me of Rabbi Chaim. Rabbi Chaim asks—and many later authorities ask—how we derive the law of following the majority from “follow the majority.” “Following the majority” means, for example, a piece of meat found in the street. If there are nine kosher stores and one non-kosher one, then we assume the meat came from the kosher store. And that is learned—the Talmud in Chullin 11 says it is learned from “follow the majority.” So Rabbi Chaim asks: how do we learn that from “follow the majority”? What’s the connection at all? Meaning—no, sorry, not that. That’s another question. He asks how we learn nullification in the majority from “follow the majority.” The Talmud says we learn it from “follow the majority,” but the medieval authorities say that the law of nullification in the majority is also learned from “follow the majority.” Now nullification in the majority is a completely different law. When I have a mixture that is mostly permitted and a little forbidden, I can eat the mixture, all of it, in principle. Leave aside that there’s a dispute in the case of dry mixtures, but in principle you can eat all of it. This isn’t statistics. There are no statistics here. You definitely ate something forbidden. The point is that the majority overrides it—the majority of permitted food overrides the forbidden portion and you can eat it. That has nothing to do with statistical questions or with following the majority. So how is that learned from “follow the majority”? That’s Rabbi Chaim’s question. Rabbi Chaim says: after all, we learn from the verse that three judges are needed to decide a case. Right? The word for judges appears three times in the passage, as the Talmud says at the beginning of tractate Sanhedrin. So we learn that three judges are needed to decide monetary cases. Now if there are two against one and the Torah tells us to follow the majority, then we followed the opinion of two judges. But the Torah wants three. We need to decide the case on the basis of three. Therefore, Rabbi Chaim says, apparently when there is a majority of judges saying X, the minority that says not-X is nullified and becomes like the majority that says X. And now we have three judges saying X. This really goes back to Stalin—the Stalinist methods of dealing with minorities. That is, to re-educate them and turn them into the majority, and then everything is fine. No minorities.
[Speaker C] And therefore the third one who comes out—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The third—
[Speaker C] the one in the minority—is only nullified, not that he says “I do not know,” for example.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If he says “I do not know,” then they add two more.
[Speaker C] If he doesn’t want to be a judge, he—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If he’s not a judge, then he’s not a judge. Fine. But if he says “I do not know”—there was actually a story like that a few years ago, maybe we’ll talk about it sometime. In the High Rabbinical Court there was such a story with Rabbi Sherman. He was in the minority against Rabbi Dichovsky and someone else, who said that a certain conversion was valid, and Rabbi Sherman—this was long before the last conversion storm—said the conversion was not valid. So he was in the minority; later that changed. Then he said, “I do not know. I have no position on this issue.” When a judge says “I do not know,” they add two more judges. Now he wanted two more judges to be added, and then he together with two more would be three against the two who disagreed with him, and then he would decide it by majority. So a huge debate arose there over whether what he did was legitimate or not legitimate. There are sources that say it is legitimate, and I also think it is completely legitimate. But what? If you don’t find the law—if you go after wisdom, it doesn’t matter what exactly you’re arguing: you go after wisdom, and in the end whoever is smarter simply knows how to maneuver it. No, no—on the contrary, even if there’s no need, if in the end you’re smart enough, they’ll follow you. Meaning—okay, this is a very interesting discussion, with many implications, and maybe we’ll discuss it sometime. In any case, for our purposes, Rabbi Chaim says—and now I’m answering your question—that the minority opinion is nullified and becomes like the majority, and therefore there are in fact three judges here. That’s a very strange thing. Tosafot in Bava Kamma—which he cites—there’s a Tosafot in Bava Kamma 27 that says seemingly something like that. Rabbi Chaim builds on that Tosafot. This is Rabbi Chaim’s stencil notes on the Talmud. So Tosafot says that the minority is as if it does not exist, not that it is nullified and becomes like the majority, but as if it does not exist. Tosafot says the opposite of Rabbi Chaim. But people raise difficulties against him from all kinds of directions. What is Rabbi Chaim assuming? That the verdict has to come out of three mouths. When the Torah says three judges are needed, it means that three opinions have to decide this matter—that all three have to agree with the decision. That is by no means necessary. And here’s the answer to what you said. It is absolutely possible—and I think this is the accepted opinion, both among the medieval authorities and later authorities—that what the Torah wants is that three sit on the panel. The fact that in the end, when we vote, there are two against one—that’s completely fine. Saying that three judges are needed means that three must sit on the panel. It does not mean that all three have to state the ruling we follow, that it must be a unanimous ruling. If it had to be unanimous, then in practice we would be following the minority, right? That makes even less sense than following the majority, at least.
[Speaker E] If it needs to be—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A verdict—
[Speaker E] unanimous, then that means—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] that we always follow the minority. And today in politics this is called something like…
[Speaker E] No, there are two against one.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So we don’t go with the two. And also not with—what do you mean “also not”? Assuming it’s binary: either do it or don’t; either he murdered or he didn’t murder. Then you go with the one. Why? Because if you don’t go with the two and there is one, it’s like the paradox of a constitution. What’s the problem with a constitution? When parliament passes a law that in order to change it or repeal it you need a special majority—say 70 percent, just as an example—okay? What is it actually doing? It’s tying the hands of the next generation. In the next generation there may be a majority of 65 percent against that law, but because our forefathers thought otherwise, now we’ll have to behave the way they thought, even though among us there is an absolute majority against the law. That’s absurd. Okay? You need to understand that in many situations where we do not follow the majority, it does not mean we do nothing. It means we follow the minority. Now, someone who says there’s no logic in following the majority—so what, is there logic in following the minority? Is it more logical that the minority should decide?
[Speaker C] Fine, but I’m saying that for our case the example isn’t really an example. Here it’s a specific ruling regarding a certain person. There it’s fundamental things for future generations.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean fundamental things? In those fundamental things the next generation will think differently from us.
[Speaker C] What right do we have to—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Tie their hands?
[Speaker C] Murder or not murder is a different question.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s exactly the question—what difference does it make? It’s a law of rights, I don’t know, patient rights, fine? Then the next generation will think differently. Why can we tie their feet? They decided by majority vote that they don’t want it. So how can we tell them, “Your majority doesn’t count”? Why? Because we decided? What does that have to do with anything? Like the Torah?
[Speaker F] Yes, of course. But I’m saying there’s an absurdity here. There really is. The point of the question is precisely to lock things in so that they won’t come in some situation and…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—locking in is fine where the mechanism you leave to the next generation, or the next phase, is still a mechanism that follows the majority. But where you require a special majority, you’re basically saying you go after the minority. The minority decides. You impose the minority on the majority because a hundred years ago people thought this law was terribly important.
[Speaker C] But today we think differently. Like sages too, same thing, with a religious court… right, why not? Of course.
[Speaker E] I didn’t understand why you say that you’re imposing the minority on the majority. Let me sharpen it. There are two parts here. In the case of changing a Basic Law, what you said is indeed true—the minority determines things for the majority. What remains is what was determined earlier. So the previous decision de facto remains in force because of the inability to change it. And the minority—that is, those 35 percent who oppose the change—determines things. That’s completely clear, because there is already an established position. The discussion is about the power to change the position. In the case of whether the person murdered or didn’t murder, there is no prior position.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of course there is a position. Think about it: two say he murdered and one says he didn’t. What do you do with him?
[Speaker E] I’m saying that it’s possible that if you were to require unanimity, then by that very statement you are deciding that there are many cases with no conclusion.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, so I’m saying—then what do we do now? Two say he murdered.
[Speaker E] Two judges expand the… no, no, no, no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, expanding didn’t help at all. You won’t get unanimity even if you expand, because the one who objects will keep objecting all the time.
[Speaker E] You can add as many judges as you want.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—why would he change his mind?
[Speaker E] Why would those who say he did murder agree with him? They won’t.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And there are two—
[Speaker E] opinions, and therefore there won’t be—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] unanimity and there won’t be a decision. But “there won’t be a decision” means he goes home. “There won’t be a decision” means he didn’t murder. Don’t say this isn’t an example. No—I’ll use exactly this example. I’m talking about a binary case. That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Usually, by the way, these are the examples. Usually these are the examples. To extract money or not to extract money is also a binary example. Tosafot says, after all, that in money matters we don’t follow the majority. So in Sanhedrin, if in money matters we didn’t follow the majority, then how do we extract money based on the majority of judges? So what are you proposing—not to go after the majority? Then it turns out that we leave the money with him because of the minority. It’s almost always like that. It’s hard to imagine a situation where it isn’t.
[Speaker H] What? It seems to me it’s because of the specific rules of the game. For example, because there is a presumption of innocence, so you say that’s exactly what he’s saying. Because there is a presumption of innocence, there is sort of a prior position, and in order to change the prior position you need a majority decision. But if logically, without the…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, logically? I said: maybe you can imagine a case where it won’t be like that. Most practical cases are like that. Most practical cases are that you have two options. And if you don’t follow the majority, then de facto you followed the minority. Meaning, there usually is no way not to follow anyone. That generally doesn’t happen. Fine, let’s—this is a parenthesis. Let’s get back to our issue. So wait, I answered you. Okay. Yes, so the argument was really over the rules of decision-making. And when there is a dispute over the rules of decision-making, then how do you decide it? By the way, maybe one more—there are a lot of current things here. In Aharon Barak’s time, when he was president of the Supreme Court, I had the feeling that there was some misunderstanding of this kind. Aharon Barak, after all, was attacked harshly for being too much of an imperialist. And he kept saying—and I believe him, by the way—he kept saying, “What do you want from me? I’m just arranging the rules so that you can argue. The public debate has nothing to do with me. I’m just organizing it in such a way that it can continue to function in a healthy way.” I’m convinced he really thought so. But on the other hand, what he didn’t understand—and maybe sometimes his critics didn’t understand either—was that in at least some cases the dispute was over the rules of decision-making, not over the content. Okay? The dispute was over the rules of decision-making. The dispute was over the question of how—sorry—how public norms are determined in the state. There are those who say that even if there is a majority, say, there are some basic standards—Jewish ones, for example, according to some people—that no majority can override. Okay? So what is Aharon Barak going to do in a situation like that? He’ll say that yes, a majority can override. But then he has taken a position in the dispute. Once the argument is over the rules and not within the rules, there is a fundamental problem in deciding it, because by what rules will you decide it? Okay? That’s… so that dispute—this is what generated the dispute between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, but it is also what prevented the possibility of deciding it. When the dispute is about the rules, you cannot decide it. Thank you. Okay, so if that’s the case, it seems to me very clear why they appeal to a heavenly voice. “It is not in heaven.” “It is not in heaven”—rather what? “Follow the majority,” right? That is what the Talmud in Bava Metzia says. “It is not in heaven”—rather, follow… But when there is a dispute about “follow the majority,” meaning, “It is not in heaven”—rather what? Go after the majority. But the dispute is: who is the majority? Then you don’t have the option of “It is not in heaven.” And when there is a dispute that cannot be decided through the rules of decision-making, then yes—you do turn to heaven.
[Speaker C] Because the heavenly voice came and decided the rules. Meaning, you can say “It is not in heaven” because the heavenly voice does not decide Jewish law—but here the heavenly voice did not decide Jewish law; the heavenly voice was what had to decide the rules. That’s what it did according to this interpretation. A heavenly voice came out and said, “These and those are the words of the living God, but Jewish law follows Beit Hillel”—you follow the majority in number.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And in a moment we’ll see whether the—
[Speaker C] the reasoning—you mentioned the reasoning earlier—we’ll see in a moment, that even if Beit Hillel had been the minority, Jewish law would still follow Beit Hillel. Maybe, I don’t know. The meaning presented there, when Tosafot explains the dispute, is that Beit Hillel were the majority and Beit Shammai were sharper. That was the dispute. If Beit Hillel had also been—
[Speaker E] the minority, then maybe—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] maybe there would have been no dispute and everyone would have agreed. But are there cases where Jewish law follows Beit Shammai? Yes, there are cases where Jewish law follows Beit Shammai. By the way, it is absolutely possible that in the upper chamber of Chananiah ben Garon there were things decided according to Beit Shammai.
[Speaker C] Because they were the majority?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because they were the majority, right. That is a case where Beit Hillel were the minority. Both explanations worked in Beit Shammai’s favor—both wisdom and heads—and therefore the law indeed followed them.
[Speaker C] So that limits the impact of this?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right—only to situations where there is this kind of conflict between the majority of feet and the majority of heads.
[Speaker C] Apparently Rav Hai Gaon didn’t understand it that way.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, right. As I mentioned earlier, Rav Hai Gaon apparently did not understand the passage that way. It doesn’t appear explicitly in the Talmud. As I said, I’m relying on a Tosafot that says this was the basis of the dispute. But Rav Hai Gaon is also not the accepted halakhic ruling. Nachmanides is. In any case, that was the dispute. Let’s move on now. So what does the heavenly voice say? “These and those are the words of the living God, but Jewish law follows Beit Hillel.” As I said before, there is an ambiguous statement here. On the one hand, both are right; on the other hand, Jewish law follows Beit Hillel. How do you reconcile that?
[Speaker I] First possibility: why does “These and those are the words of the living God” mean “they’re right”? Why are you defining it as “right”?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, that’s what I’m now going to sort out. There’s one possible way to read this, which at first glance seems called for; that’s at least how it could be understood from a few places. One possibility is to say that “these and those are the words of the living God” is a pluralistic reading. There are multiple truths. And then that basically means that there isn’t a right side and a wrong side here; both are right. Or that there is no single right side, however you want to put it. And if that’s so, then of course we have to understand: what is the meaning of “the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel”? Because if I understand “the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel” to mean monism—that is, a conception of one truth, not multiple truths, and therefore the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel because the truth is with them—then the question arises: what about “these and those are the words of the living God”? So what is the meaning of the first part of the statement? So there really are, I think, two readings of the bat kol’s statement. One reading really is a pluralistic one. “These and those are the words of the living God,” ostensibly—I’m saying ostensibly; later I’ll qualify it. A pluralistic reading: there are multiple truths. And then you have to say that “the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel” is some kind of ruling meant to calm things down. Meaning, we follow the majority because there’s no choice, because otherwise we’ll keep arguing forever with no end.
[Speaker J] Like it says in Bava Metzia, so that there won’t be two Torahs.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but if the point is that there not be two Torahs, then why specifically Beit Hillel? Maybe Beit Shammai could have been chosen too? Exactly—that’s what I’m saying. Why do I decide specifically like Beit Hillel? Because Beit Hillel were the majority. It’s easier to count feet than to settle an argument; everyone understands where most people stand. And therefore, from considerations of peace and social calm, there’s logic in following the majority of people and not measuring the majority of wisdom.
[Speaker D] So what do Tosafot do if it’s just the majority? Right, so what do Tosafot do with this Talmudic passage? We decide like Beit Hillel because of their character, because…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Wait, wait—the explanation you’re mentioning I haven’t read yet. We’ll get to the explanation in just a moment. Okay?
[Speaker G] Feet are an objective thing, but wisdom is not objective. A very great sage—even Beit Shammai certainly was wise. Right, right.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, so that’s apparently the reason according to this reading, that’s the reason they ruled like Beit Hillel. Because wisdom can be argued about endlessly, with no end. So even if in that case there happened to be agreement, next time there won’t be agreement. There’s no logic in setting a rule that we follow the majority of wisdom in a place where what you expect is some kind of social quiet—that is, you want calm, you want to achieve peace. You follow the majority of people. And in fact, in the pluralistic reading of the bat kol’s statement, we reach the conclusion that there really is no truth. Meaning, the claim is that there are multiple truths. So if that’s so, then the advantage of Beit Shammai disappears, right? Because in a place where we are not looking for the truth, then what preference is there for the wise person over the fool? There’s preference for the majority of people over the minority, because what we are looking for is achieving quiet and social agreement. So go after the majority of people.
[Speaker F] That’s not precise. Why? Between two wise groups, Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, you decide according to the majority. But that doesn’t mean between a wise person and a fool.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, I’m saying: if your goal isn’t truth, if there is no truth—
[Speaker F] In a pluralistic conception.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But both are correct. I’m not now looking for…
[Speaker F] But bring in a fool—then why specifically? Why?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because… if it weren’t correct, then it wouldn’t be two correct truths. I’m saying no. I’m saying, assuming that the positions of Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai—nobody there was a fool. So Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai are both correct positions.
[Speaker F] So what you said, that there is no advantage—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of the wise person over the fool—here I think you made a mistake. No, no, no. No, I’m saying—I stand behind it—that in a pluralistic reading, that means that both opinions are right a priori, not that they might be right. That’s certainly true. I’m saying both are right a priori. There is no halakhic truth; there are multiple truths. In such a place it makes no difference at all whether we go this way or that way. So then what help is wisdom? Wisdom can determine which opinion is more correct. But if my premise is that no opinion is more correct, that they are equally correct, then what advantage is there—
[Speaker F] To the wise person—
[Speaker C] Over the fool?
[Speaker F] But these two opinions each have a certain truth, while a third opinion would already be…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right now we’re talking about Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel. You’ll get later to completely different opinions. No—Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel. I’m talking right now about disputes of this type. We’ll—I’ll expand on this later. Okay?
[Speaker H] It doesn’t really sit well, does it? What? The two parts of the sentence. If the truth really is pluralistic and there’s more than one truth, then why decide in the end?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So that’s what was mentioned here earlier: so that the Torah not become like two Torahs, for reasons of social order.
[Speaker C] You have to get to a bottom line.
[Speaker H] There are plenty of things that are enough as they are. What’s the problem? So don’t decide. You don’t have to decide. What I’m saying is—no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again. Maybe one more parenthetical remark. There are people whose dream, whose utopia for the messianic future, is that the messiah will come, there will be a Sanhedrin, and it will decide all disputes. For me, that’s my nightmare. Because my dream is that the Sanhedrin should not intervene where it doesn’t need to intervene, not even in halakhic questions. I’m not talking about political questions and all that. Halakhic questions. If there is a halakhic question where it’s possible to conduct things such that there are two opinions and each person can do what he thinks, then let them go on eating in two different ways—what’s the problem? The Sanhedrin intervenes only in those questions where a decision has to be made. If there’s a dispute in the public sphere whether to make some political agreement or not make some political agreement, then what—everyone should do what he wants? One decision has to be made. So there you need some body that makes a decision. But in a place where you’re asking, what do I—
[Speaker H] Do at home, or I don’t know, in other such contexts—the Sanhedrin shouldn’t intervene. That’s what I’m saying. I’m saying that if this is true and that is true, there’s no reason to decide. I’m not—I’m saying there’s no need to make a decision.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, but what if the question is whether to make a peace agreement or not make a peace agreement, okay? And there is no truth. No, but that’s exactly what I’m saying. There is no truth. Both sides are right, just for the sake of the example, okay? But a decision still has to be made. Do you sign a contract with someone or not? You have to decide, yes or no.
[Speaker H] But that’s not the topic; it’s not an essential topic. It’s a matter of legal procedure, so to speak.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is the topic. The topics where we talk about deciding are only topics where a decision needs to be made. Not every topic requires a decision. There are certain topics where the sages see that the public can’t be left divided. Why? Because this one won’t marry that one, for example. Even in questions sometimes involving food. Meaning, not everything that belongs to the individual sphere doesn’t need a ruling. I’m not saying that. But there are things that do. There are things that don’t need a ruling. In those things, indeed they won’t rule—why should they?
[Speaker E] Maybe there is still an advantage of wisdom over foolishness in that, in the dynamic of discussion, it’s not that you just present the facts and everyone votes. There’s a discussion. The wise person can persuade, and there he has an advantage over the fool.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, okay—but after the discussion has taken place. The discussion always comes first. Now we vote. And Beit Hillel are the majority, and Beit Shammai vote with them—what do we do now? No, I’m talking about the voting stage.
[Speaker E] But you said that in a pluralistic reading there’s not even a need…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, so we’ll have to discuss what the meaning of pluralism is. I’ll define it later. But Maimonides, by the way, when he speaks—at least in capital cases—when Maimonides describes the decision-making process in a religious court, he actually says there are two rounds, two sessions, like this. That is, first they deliberate, each one states an opinion and reasons, then they argue back and forth, and then there’s a vote. So these are two stages. In the first stage, wisdom obviously has an advantage.
[Speaker K] What does that have to do with sleeping at night? What? Sleeping and not getting up in the morning, in capital cases… Yes, that “the judgment is delayed overnight and then you convict.”
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. I don’t remember anymore; it could be. In any case, the pluralistic reading of this statement of the bat kol basically says that we are not looking here for what the truth is, because both sides are right. That is an a priori assumption: both sides are right. Fine. So in what sense does the Jewish law follow Beit Hillel? Then we have to say that ruling like Beit Hillel is not because they are right, not because that is the truth, but because that is the bottom line. You have to arrive at some bottom line, and if so then it makes very good sense to go with Beit Hillel. Because through pluralistic lenses, Beit Hillel are the majority of people, and majority of wisdom has no advantage. So for that reason it makes very good sense that in a pluralistic reading, we would also rule like Beit Hillel. This reading… is supported—and now I’m coming to the continuation—this reading is supported by what the Talmud says later. Because when the Talmud explains the bat kol’s statement, it says: why was the Jewish law ruled according to Beit Hillel? Because they were pleasant and humble, and they mentioned the words of Beit Shammai before their own. So in the simple reading of that statement, this is basically a reward for good behavior. Right? That is, you behave politely, nicely, and so on, so therefore we will rule according to you. That is clearly… what?
[Speaker C] Come on, because the halakhic perspective that “ways of peace” is halakhically decisive in the… okay, come on—because beyond the halakhic aspect of the passage we were talking about, there is also a halakhic consideration for character, for conduct, for ways of peace.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, but now you’re already suggesting a different direction. You’re already suggesting a different direction, a direction that maybe I’ll comment on in a moment, okay? Right now I’m speaking through fully pluralistic lenses. So there is no halakhic truth; both sides are right. Since both sides are right, then clearly numerical majority has weight, because it makes more sense to go after the majority. The minority, even if it is wiser, doesn’t matter, because wisdom is not relevant in a place where both sides are legitimate and correct. And for that reason, the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel. And especially since we gain an educational benefit: Beit Hillel behave very nicely, so the public will learn to behave nicely. So therefore we rule like them on the basis of what we might call non-substantive considerations—not in the negative sense, but not on the merits of the dispute itself, rather educational, social, and similar considerations. So seemingly, such a reason, which appears there later in the Talmud, supports the pluralistic reading, because it explains the ruling in favor of Beit Hillel in terms of an educational issue, not because they are right. Meaning, therefore apparently it doesn’t matter who is right. The question is what educational gain we get. Rabbi Yosef, what?
[Speaker L] I think an additional element here is that Beit Hillel thinks more about the other side’s position, so it takes it into account, and nevertheless…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, right. I now—I want to get exactly to that, I completely agree. This is implied by the words of Rabbi Yosef Karo in his book Klalei HaGemara. He has a book of principles, and there when he explains this Talmudic passage, he says: when the Talmud explains why the Jewish law was ruled like them—because they were pleasant and humble and they mentioned the words of Beit Shammai before their own—he explains it there to mean that one who puts his opponent’s position before his own and only then makes a decision will make a more correct decision. Meaning, he basically understood this justification as one that leads us to the truth, not to peace or education. He understands that someone who makes decisions that way has a reasonable chance of being more correct. Again, there are no certainties in anything; it is always possible that the other side is right. After all, we need some broad rule that will be correct across cases. This is the better rule. So we need to follow the one who seriously weighs his opponent’s position; that is the more correct way to make a decision. So first of all, Rabbi Yosef Karo assumes a monistic reading, because he basically assumes that Jewish law is in fact looking for the truth. So when the Jewish law was ruled like Beit Hillel, it was because the truth is with them, not for educational gain. And second, he also explains the Talmud itself—so what does the Talmud mean there, that it was because they were pleasant and humble? Because that is the correct way to reach a true ruling. And that is a fascinating lesson, by the way—again, going back to your question. If the… let’s say the most learned and articulate judge in court, and the two simpler judges, the students, let’s call them, less wise than he is. But if they seriously hear his position and in the end they are not convinced, even though he is a very great sage and their teacher, still they are not convinced—then their opinion has weight, even though he is a greater Torah scholar, because they took his position into account and still did not accept it. It may be that sometimes he doesn’t listen to what they say because—what?—he looks down on them. So for that reason, sometimes the side that is less talented, if it conducts itself according to this methodology, can reach better decisions than the more talented side. Sometimes talent is actually a hindrance and doesn’t improve people’s decisions. This whole idea—that there is here an attempt on the part of Beit Hillel also to try to understand the legal method, the view of the other side, as opposed to each side entrenching itself in its own position… yes, that’s what we’re talking about. Beit Hillel tried to understand the view of Beit Shammai and weighed it, and then in the end they arrived… because they also thought about the other side. And the assumption apparently is that Beit Shammai, especially because they were sharper, apparently did not take Beit Hillel’s view quite as seriously. And because of that, the more correct decision will be that of Beit Hillel and not of Beit Shammai, even though they are less talented.
[Speaker C] There’s a well-known saying about this, that in the messianic future we’ll rule like Beit Shammai.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, a tradition from the Vilna Gaon, and so on. Okay.
[Speaker C] But that sort of says that in some sense they really are more correct.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I think maybe what it means is: on the road, be wise rather than right. So that means that sometimes the very clever decision is not the correct decision. But in a perfect world, the utopia of the messianic future, there is a perfect world. In a perfect world, what is correct will also be what is true. In such a place, there is an advantage to the wise person, a stronger advantage to the wise person. Very often that’s the case, by the way. You have excellent arguments in favor of an opinion, but your gut feeling says: this is not right here. Meaning, this is not how one behaves. I have no arguments against you; I don’t know what to tell you, but it’s not right. It’s obviously not right. So sometimes you have to take into account recognition of reality, a feel for reality, with all the wisdom and logic of the other side’s arguments. A perfect world could be one in which this gap would not exist. In a repaired world, then indeed the truth would also be what appears in practice.
[Speaker F] Does that assume pluralism in such a case? That both are truths, and the question is what is more correct. No, no, there is one truth.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In this specific situation, it is not correct to behave according to the pure truth; you have to compromise because otherwise you will pay other prices. Fine, the question is how you define truth. You could say: that is the truth in this situation—but then again, there is one truth, that one. In this specific situation, that is the truth, not the theoretical truth. So what are we saying?
[Speaker C] If the theoretical truth is the truth—
[Speaker F] Then there is one truth, the one that will be in the messianic future. If the practical truth is the truth, again there is one truth, the one we act on here. Usually disputes, as I see it, even if we bring it down to our own day, are about what better fits reality.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, there are places where the question from the outset is only a tactical, practical one. Fine, so there there isn’t this tension between pure truth and what is done in practice, because the debate is about what to do in practice and that’s it. But sometimes there are ideological disputes, disputes about what the pure truth is before the question of adapting it to reality. There are many such disputes.
[Speaker F] If it’s the pure truth, then you’ve gone back infinitely, because if the debate here is what the pure truth is, then in the messianic future too the pure truth would have been this way and not that way.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, and therefore in the messianic future we rule like Beit Shammai. That’s why in the messianic future we rule like Beit Shammai, because the pure truth is with them.
[Speaker F] But today it isn’t correct to act according to the pure truth. So again you’re saying that then or now, the pure truth still belongs to—
[Speaker C] Beit Shammai, but you don’t act that way? So you’re saying there are two truths?
[Speaker F] No, no—
[Speaker C] I don’t call that two truths.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m saying there is one truth, but—
[Speaker C] You have to compromise with it in this world.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The pure truth and the practical truth. The theoretical truth and the practical truth. One—there is one of this kind and one of that kind. Not two different truths. You know, it’s like the Kesef Mishneh asks about reciting Shema: he asks why reciting Shema is called a positive time-bound commandment, since you have to recite it both in the morning and in the evening. So why is it time-bound? Then the Shaagat Aryeh writes that it’s called a positive time-bound commandment because it is two separate commandments. The positive commandment of the morning exists only in the morning; the positive commandment of the evening exists only in the evening, so each one is time-bound. But the assumption had been that there is one positive commandment that applies both by day and by night. No—it’s two commandments: one only by day and the other only by night, so both are time-bound. Same thing here: there is a pure heavenly truth and there is a practical truth. I’m saying these are two concepts of truth, and each of them has only one answer. That is called monism. You’re right that there are two concepts of truth, two meanings of the concept truth, fine. But in each meaning there is only one truth.
[Speaker F] Right, because Beit Shammai apparently, if they ruled that way, thought it fit our reality today.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, and they were mistaken.
[Speaker F] No, I mean according to this reading—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m saying according to this reading Beit Hillel are right. That’s it. So there is only one truth. For our reality today there is only one truth. In other words, there is someone who is mistaken. Let’s put it that way, not whether there is someone who is right. Is there someone who is mistaken? Yes, there is. Today one should not act like Beit Shammai; we are with Beit Hillel. In the messianic future, the mistaken ones will be Beit Hillel, if they even continue to argue that way. But do you understand?
[Speaker F] So there is one truth. I think the plain meaning of the Talmud supports a pluralistic approach, because “these and those are the words of the living God.” Both of them—meaning, that doesn’t mean—wait… no, no, I haven’t explained it yet. No, no.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The messianic future is a tradition from the Vilna Gaon; let’s not mix that in here.
[Speaker I] Who says that’s even true at all? I’m saying… you’ll be right in the messianic future, yes, exactly.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Good method.
[Speaker I] No, what—
[Speaker F] That it’s not—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, I still need to explain “these and those”; I haven’t gotten to that yet. One second.
[Speaker I] What is the ultimate goal of engagement in Torah? Is it for practical ruling, or is it the engagement itself, Torah for its own sake? Maybe “these and those” is because of the motivation, the engagement.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’ll get there, we’ll get there, okay? I’ll get exactly to that. We’ll get there. I once told students in Yeruham that the argument from which you learn is an argument you lost, right? Because an argument you won is an argument in which the opinion you came in with turned out to be correct—you didn’t learn anything new. Where did you learn something new? When you lost the argument, meaning, you thought one thing and it turned out you were mistaken. Assuming you lost and also agreed that you lost—meaning, then you learned something.
[Speaker C] And that’s exactly what Rabbi Yohanan said, that with Resh Lakish we had arguments and I learned a lot.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And that’s fine, provided they agree, indeed. But I’m talking beyond that: even if they don’t agree in the end, the one who gains from the argument, even when they don’t agree, is the losing side, not the winning side. Because the losing side learned something beyond what he knew before, while the winning side stayed with what he knew before; he didn’t gain anything. I told the guys that they should still be careful about interpersonal decency and also win once in a while—it’s not nice that they should always lose in order to gain, so it’s worth considering the other person and also winning occasionally. But what?
[Speaker H] There are some people who always lose.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, so they always gain. By the way, that’s actually true. Say a person is less talented and also honest—you need both conditions—then in many cases he’ll understand that he lost the argument. But on the other hand, every such argument taught him something more. The assumption is that in future arguments he will lose less, because he is learning. The clever person will remain in his conception all the time because he always comes out right—
[Speaker F] So he doesn’t learn from everything.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, right—that’s the smart-aleck, not the wise person. The one who becomes wise, not the one who merely is smart. Fine, in any case, as far as we’re concerned: according to Rabbi Yosef Karo, we basically have a monistic reading of the Talmud, that there is halakhic truth and we rule like Beit Hillel because they are right, not in order to reach a bottom line and order and tranquility. So here, of course, the question arises—and everyone here raised it—what about “these and those are the words of the living God”? If we are in a monistic reading, as we said: the pluralistic reading has a problem with “the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel”; the monistic reading works with “the Jewish law follows Beit Hillel,” but it has to explain what “these and those are the words of the living God” means. So that still needs to be explained, okay? Now here there are various—or not so various—possible explanations. There is a book by Avi Sagi called These and Those, which deals precisely with these questions. I don’t agree with many things in that book, but “these and those are the words of…” yes, no—and here not “these and those are the words of the living God”; here I’m right and he’s wrong. By the way, that’s one of my claims. One of my claims is that if you adopt a pluralistic conception—I once wrote an article about this—if you adopt a pluralistic conception, then what do you do regarding the question of pluralism itself? Are all sides right there too? It’s not consistent, it’s not consistent. And we see this in life, by the way: when you’re a pluralist, pluralists stop being pluralists when it comes to the question of pluralism itself; there they’re not willing to accept other opinions. Right—and rightly so, by the way, because otherwise you fall into a loop. So what does that basically mean? It basically means that there can’t really be a completely pluralistic conception. What? Non-religious pluralism?
[Speaker I] Pluralism not what?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, so I’ll have to define it, I agree. Maybe I defined it—no, openness is something else. No, that’s not pluralistic. I need to define the terms, so if at all… fine, that’s the next topic. Basically, what I need to do now is explain the first part of the bat kol’s statement, “these and those are the words of the living God,” if we read it in the monistic way. And by the way, I think the monistic reading is the correct reading. The pluralistic reading is not correct because I’m not a pluralist. And there’s the logical argument I just gave; I think it’s a significant argument. Second, anyone who reads Avi Sagi’s book should go over all the sources he brings. He brings different sources for each position. In my opinion, no source really says that. There is no source—I don’t know of a source—that speaks of essential pluralism, except perhaps in Avodat HaKodesh by Rabbi Meir ibn Gabbai—maybe there, he brings some source there, perhaps. It can be understood that way. No one else does. And therefore—you know, this is again parenthetical—today people talk a lot about pluralism.
[Speaker C] And that means that every position, let’s say for the sake of discussion—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’ll still have to define it. People here spoke about the limits of pluralism; I’ll still talk about that. Just what else did I want to say? Ah yes. Once I wrote—time is already up, I can’t start the next topic, so I’ll just finish with this. Once someone approached me—they were founding a new journal for Jewish thought at Ariel University, what later became Ariel University, before it was yet. So the editor approached me and told me he wanted me to write an article. But he told me that it shouldn’t be like the books. So I asked him, in what sense? He said the article has to be peer-reviewable. Fine. So I told him: I don’t write peer-reviewable things, so turn to other people. Seriously. I mean, I respect it, but I don’t deal with that. What is a peer-reviewable thing? This is a very interesting point in the context of what we discussed earlier. A peer-reviewable thing means something that is not the expression of a position. Meaning, if you express a position—fine, you have such a position and someone else has another position—that’s not an academic article. Write that in a newspaper; in journalism you express a position. An academic article that wants, for example, to discuss pluralism cannot write in favor of pluralism. That should be written in a newspaper. An academic article has to explain to me that Maimonides was a pluralist. That is a reviewable claim. He claims that Maimonides was a pluralist—let’s check it against sources in Maimonides and see whether he is right or not. That’s a reviewable claim, a so-called scientific claim, okay? If you say one should be pluralistic, that is not reviewable. Now I think one should not be, so what? That’s not something you can call a scientific claim. Therefore, ironically, in an academic genre you cannot in principle express positions.
[Speaker I] What, the methodology of philosophy cannot express a position?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously. Unambiguously, unambiguously. None of the great philosophers could have published an article in a philosophical journal. Of course not. And by the way, rightly so. Exactly just as a poet cannot publish a poem in a journal of poetry research. You research poetry—that’s an analytical article. You can’t publish a poem there. We study the poem, but it’s not a journal for poetry; it’s a journal for the study of poetry, okay? Or in a journal for literary studies you can’t publish a story. Exactly the same thing: you can’t publish philosophy in a journal of philosophical research. The only problem is that they’re not aware of it, but it really is true. It really is true. There’s the same thing here, by the way, also in Jewish law. Also in Jewish law, I often used to object, but afterward I understood that I was wrong, that in academic journals they always survey opinions. Forget surveying opinions—tell me what you think, bring evidence this way and that way, decide who is right. That is not the role of an academic scholar. An academic scholar researches Jewish law. A halakhic scholar needs to express a position, needs to decide what is right and what is not. The academic scholar will investigate how he decided and what he says and what his opinion is and whether it is consistent with something else, and so on. Therefore there should be some distinction, a difference in roles. Now what happens in practice? In practice, many academics have positions and want to express them—for example, in favor of pluralism. So what do they do? Two methods. One method is to show that Maimonides was a pluralist and Rashba was a pluralist and Rashi was a pluralist—each one is a reviewable claim—but in the end, if they all were pluralists, then you understand by yourself that we too should be pluralists. Right? That is one academic method of expressing a position. A second academic method of expressing a position is this: Jews are smarter than non-Jews—human beings are smarter than any system that tries to force them to be silent. They will never be silent. The second possibility is to take some esoteric issue, however esoteric it may be, and show that in the history of Jewish law every possible position on it was stated. Now that is reviewable. I tell you that Rashba thought it was permitted, and Maimonides said it was rabbinically forbidden, and Rashi said it was Torah-level forbidden, and someone else says permitted after the fact. I draw a map. Except that the map contains all the possibilities on every question, however esoteric it may be, a calf the son of a one-day-old calf. It doesn’t matter at all what question it is. Once you show that all positions are possible, you have conveyed your pluralistic message. You are basically saying that all positions are legitimate. And therefore you find—by the way, I wrote this in a critical article about Avi Sagi—that therefore in academic writing there is a tendency to put on the table the view of Maimonides and Rashba and Rashi and Rabbi Yosef Abu Ali from the genizah, Yosef Abu Ali from the Cairo Genizah, and I don’t know what, some other person nobody ever heard of from some Bedouin tent in Australia, who knows—and you draw an entire tree of opinions, when the goal is of course to fill the tree. The goal is not to survey what Rabbi Yosef Abu Ali thought; rather, you need to find a label for every opinion—someone said it. It doesn’t matter at all what his halakhic standing was, and maybe he was just talking nonsense. That doesn’t matter; someone said it. And the researcher’s pluralistic agenda leads him to this kind of writing, because he can’t say “I’m in favor of pluralism.” So he needs to convey it within the academic medium, and so he simply takes some random issue, works on it, and shows you that all opinions appeared throughout history—and you understand by yourself that anyone who is not pluralistic is out of step with the halakhic tradition. Okay, so that too is a way to show pluralism. Fine, I’ll stop here and we’ll continue next time.