Changes in Halacha, Lesson 1

This is an English translation (via GPT-5.4). Read the original Hebrew version.

This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.

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[0:00] Opening: the issue of change and authority in Jewish law
[1:27] The eighth principle: Torah from Heaven
[3:42] Conceptions of truth: the blind man and the wall
[10:30] Supportive derashot versus creative derashot
[12:41] “Gemara gemira lah” — what is the source?
[19:51] The authority of the Sanhedrin and what continued after the destruction
[21:12] Normative obligation without needing authenticity
[25:52] Summary: the question of validity and Jewish law in the modern era

Summary

General Overview

The lecturer opens a series on changes in Jewish law and connects it to two related topics: authority in Jewish law as the other side of the question of change, and the decline of the generations as a conception that places earlier generations at a higher level of halakhic validity. He frames the discussion through Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles, especially the eighth principle about Torah from Heaven and the ninth principle about the Torah not being nullified, and argues that a literal reading of complete transmission from Sinai does not fit halakhic history or even Maimonides’ own words. He proposes a distinction between historical authenticity and normative obligation, so that commitment to Jewish law does not depend on historical proof of originality. From that, the possibility of change also opens up as an internal continuation of the tradition, while raising the question of authority and the limits of deciding disputes.

Opening the Series: Change, Authority, and the Decline of the Generations

The lecturer defines the series as dealing with changes in Jewish law, but from the outset sets two additional focal points that are prerequisites for understanding change: authority in Jewish law and the decline of the generations. He says change is always measured against some authoritative factor, and therefore the question of authority is the mirror image of the question of change. He presents the decline of the generations as a common view according to which earlier generations have a higher standing on the scale of halakhic validity, and this conception too touches on change and authority.

Maimonides: The Eighth Principle (Torah from Heaven) and the Meaning of “Speech”

The lecturer reads Maimonides on the eighth principle, according to which the entire Torah in our hands is the Torah given to Moses, all of it from the mouth of the Almighty, and Moses is like a “scribe” writing down its dates, stories, and commandments. He explains that Maimonides describes “speech” metaphorically, and that no one knows the nature of that transmission except Moses himself. He compares this to the certainty of sight as against a blind person, and argues that someone who has not experienced divine “speech” cannot critique someone who has been in such a state. Therefore questions like how Moses knew are not open to external criticism in that sense.

The Binding of Isaac and Rejecting the Reading that Abraham “Failed”

The lecturer returns to an earlier discussion of the binding of Isaac and brings a claim that some interpretations say Abraham failed the test or should have suspected deception. He rejects this as a claim that goes against the Torah. He attributes the bringing of such Spanish interpretations to Aviezer Ravitzky and says he does not agree with labeling this as a Spanish-Ashkenazi difference. He explains that the certainty of someone who experiences “speech” is like the certainty of sight, and therefore there is no place to assume Abraham should have suspected a deception.

The Scope of “From the Mouth of the Almighty” and Criticism of a Literal Reading

The lecturer emphasizes that in Maimonides there is no difference between narrative verses such as “And the sons of Ham: Cush, Egypt, Put, and Canaan” and faith-statements such as “I am the Lord” and “Hear O Israel”; all of it is holy, pure truth. He quotes Maimonides that anyone who thinks the Torah contains an inner core and a husk, and that some of the stories were said by Moses on his own, enters the category of one who says the Torah is not from Heaven and “has despised the word of the Lord.” He says that in practice it is obvious this reading is not correct literally, notes that there are medieval authorities (Rishonim) who disagree, and raises modern discussions about the authenticity of the Bible alongside hints in Nachmanides, Ibn Ezra, and Sefer Hasidim, while stressing that this is not his area of expertise.

Oral Torah: “Accepted Interpretations” and Supportive versus Creative Derashot

The lecturer argues that the interpretations of the Torah that accompany the text certainly did not “come from there” in the simple sense, because most of the Oral Torah was created over the generations. He suggests that perhaps when Maimonides speaks of the “accepted interpretation” he means a narrow core that was given at Sinai, but says it is not always clear what that core is. He cites Maimonides’ distinction between supportive derashot, which anchor a law already known by tradition in a verse without creating it, and creative derashot, which generate a new law out of the derashah. He adds that Maimonides defines laws derived by creative derashah as “from the words of the Sages.” He brings the Netziv in Kedmat Ha-Emek on “gemara gemira lah” as a tradition whose source is unclear and not necessarily a law given to Moses at Sinai, unlike Rashi, who identifies it with a law given to Moses at Sinai.

Historical Reduction versus Normative Claim: “As if It Came Down from Sinai”

The lecturer proposes that when statements of the Sages sound as though everything is from Sinai, in most cases this is a normative rather than a historical claim. He explains that the normative statement requires us to treat the whole halakhic corpus “as if” it came down from Sinai, because it was built on the basis of what was given to Moses together with authorized tools such as the thirteen hermeneutic principles, and therefore it is binding even if it was not historically said at Sinai. He connects this to the idea that obligation does not depend on authenticity, and that one may even be obligated by a law one thinks is mistaken, when formal authority exists.

Formal Authority, the Sanhedrin, and the Gemara as “Ad Hoc” Authority

The lecturer says that formal authority existed in principle until the Sanhedrin came to an end, and only it had authority in the formal sense. He argues that afterward the Gemara was given “ad hoc” authority as if it were a Sanhedrin, even though there was no ordination and the court was in Babylonia. He says that today, de facto, there is no single halakhic authority, and therefore in practice there is a plurality of authorities and communities, and decisions are reached through halakhic rulings and persuasion rather than by formal obedience to one authority.

Authenticity versus Halakhic Ruling: Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, the Oven of Akhnai, and “It Is Not in Heaven”

The lecturer argues that Torah-level disputes such as Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel show that historical authenticity is not a tool for decision-making, because if one side is right then the other is not what the Holy One, blessed be He, said, and yet Jewish law is decided without archaeology. He uses the Oven of Akhnai to argue that “It is not in Heaven” presents a situation in which even if the heavenly voice is correct, it does not determine practice, because the decision is made within the rules of the system. He distinguishes between the derashah of “It is not in Heaven” as “a prophet is no longer permitted to introduce anything new” and the “It is not in Heaven” of the Oven of Akhnai, and explains that in both cases the point is that Jewish law is not determined by heavenly intervention but through human-halakhic tools of decision.

Torah-Level and Rabbinic: Not Chronology but Method

The lecturer says the distinction between Torah-level and rabbinic is not chronological but methodological. He defines legislation by the Sages as rabbinic law, whereas interpretation by the Sages yields Torah-level law, even if it is done later. He adds that according to Maimonides the obligation to obey rabbinic laws stems from “You shall not turn aside,” so rabbinic law too is binding as part of the system given at Sinai in the normative sense.

Change as Dynamic Tradition and the Fear of Undermining Obligation

The lecturer argues that if the Sages could develop and change things as part of the continuation of the tradition, then in the present too there is room for change that is not deviation but an application of the spirit of things in new circumstances. He brings a story from Buber about the rebbe of Lelov explaining that a father’s customs change from generation to generation as part of continuing the path. He says that distinguishing between historical authenticity and normative obligation arouses opposition because it places a question mark over obligation, but he distinguishes between “doing what I want” and “doing what I think,” and argues that the obligation is to what seems right ethically and interpretively within the rules.

Reasoning as an Interpretive Tool and Caution against Mixing in Personal Convenience

The lecturer says that reasoning has standing within halakhic interpretation alongside tradition, and that this is one of the tools mentioned at the beginning of the meetings. He emphasizes that one must be careful not to smuggle into one’s reasoning whatever is personally convenient, but rather direct it toward what is ethically right and what seems to be the correct interpretation. He presents applying the spirit of the instruction as an act that does not change the will but adapts the will to the framework in which it appears, using the image of a parent and child in changing situations.

The Limits of Change, Electricity on the Sabbath, and the Absence of One Authority

The lecturer agrees that when a new reality arises, such as electricity, there is a need to formulate a halakhic position, and stresses that change can also be toward stringency. He says the question of what is “required” is unavoidable in an interpretive world, and therefore there will be differences of opinion, but there is no way to get rid of interpretation. He connects the lack of formal authority today to the fact that no single line can be imposed, and says that even if a person thinks electricity is permitted on the Sabbath, the position of the majority of later authorities (Acharonim) may affect his ruling, while rejecting the confusion between “wants” and “thinks.”

Conservatives and Orthodox: The Dynamism of Jewish Law as a Correct Claim, and Examining Each Case on Its Own Merits

The lecturer says that the principled view that Jewish law is dynamic and can be changed through halakhic mechanisms is a correct view, and therefore Conservative claims are not disqualified simply because they are Conservative. He says conclusions must be examined on their own merits rather than accepted as a package deal, and also points to the relativity of community boundaries, in that Haredim may label some Orthodox behaviors as Conservative. He describes angry reactions to his claim that “ninety-five percent” of what we have was not said to Moses and never even entered his dreams. These reactions came even from rabbis in hesder yeshivot. He presents the conservative answer as relying on providence that ensured the Sages “reconstructed” a lost tradition, and that different traditions such as Sephardic and Ashkenazic are both “from Sinai,” while saying this is a theory that cannot be disproved.

Maimonides: The Ninth Principle and Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, Chapter 9

The lecturer quotes the ninth principle in Maimonides, that “the Torah of Moses will not be nullified” and no other Torah will come from God, nor will anything be added or subtracted, neither in the written text nor in its interpretation, and he cites the verses “You shall not add to it and you shall not diminish from it.” He reads from Maimonides in Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, chapter 9, on the eternity of the Torah, “It is not in Heaven,” and the rule that “a prophet is no longer permitted to introduce anything new.” He quotes that a prophet who says to add or subtract, or to explain an interpretation we did not hear from Moses, is a false prophet, and concludes that prophets do not come to establish religion but to warn about the Torah and command in optional matters such as war and building a wall, and one who transgresses their words in such matters is liable to death at the hands of Heaven.

A Heavenly Voice, Beit Hillel, Teiku, and Responsa from Heaven

The lecturer is asked why they listened to a heavenly voice in deciding between Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai even though “we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice,” and he suggests an explanation according to which, in a situation where there was no possibility of deciding according to the ordinary rules of decision, they resorted to a heavenly voice. He rejects the common explanation that teiku is an acronym for “the Tishbite will answer difficulties and questions,” and defines teiku as “let it stand,” meaning the topic got stuck. He brings the Responsa from Heaven of Rabbi Yaakov of Marvege and the introduction of Rabbi Margaliot, which discusses how one asks for a decision from Heaven in light of “It is not in Heaven,” and offers a possible answer that Elijah will decide as a Torah scholar, not as a prophet.

Tractate Eduyot, Decision by Vote, and the Struggle between Tradition and the Non-Heavenly Character of Halakhic Decision

The lecturer describes tractate Eduyot as a collection of testimonies and traditions without one central subject, and connects it to a period of leadership change in Yavneh and the ability to decide disputes by voting. He presents the Oven of Akhnai as a foundational argument about the way decisions are made: whether to cling to tradition and the authenticity of a chain of reception from rabbi to rabbi back to Moses, or to accept a decision resting on “It is not in Heaven” and internal decision-making mechanisms. He concludes that for their purposes, the main point is that Jewish law is a corpus with independent standing that does not accept interventions from outside, but is open to action from within, and says he will continue discussing this later in connection with change and authority.

Full Transcript

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Today I want to begin a new topic. What I wrote to you is that the topic is changes in Jewish law, but really it touches on other related topics that I also want to deal with. Let’s say two main ones: the issue of authority in Jewish law, because change is always measured against something authoritative. Meaning, you have to examine whether there is something authoritative here that cannot be changed, or perhaps can be changed, so the question of authority is the mirror image of the question of change. And the second issue, or the second subtopic, is the decline of the generations. What does that mean? Usually people are used to thinking that earlier generations have some higher standing. As the generations pass, we are lower on the scale of halakhic validity. And that too, in one way or another, touches on change and authority. So those are the three things I want to deal with in this series, but I’ll begin with the concept of change, first of all to define it. So I’m starting with Maimonides in the Thirteen Principles. There is what’s called the eighth principle and the ninth principle, or the article, what we call the principles, the eighth and the ninth. The eighth principle is Torah from Heaven: that we believe that this entire Torah in our possession today is the Torah that was given to Moses, and that all of it is from the mouth of the Almighty, meaning it all came to him from God, in a transmission metaphorically called speech. What came to Moses from the Holy One, blessed be He, by means of speech — that speech is a metaphor — came to him in one way or another. And no one knows the nature of that coming except him, peace be upon him, to whom it came, and that he stood in the position of a scribe before whom someone reads and he writes it all down — its dates, its stories, and its commandments — and thus he is called lawgiver. Moses is called lawgiver even though it’s clear that he didn’t legislate these things; rather, he received them from the Holy One, blessed be He. But he is the one who received it from the Holy One, blessed be He; he is the one who understood the meaning of what we today call speech. I once mentioned this when we spoke about the binding of Isaac. We did speak about the binding of Isaac once, not that long ago actually. And I said there are many people who struggle with, or get wrong, how Abraham our father did not suspect that the command of the Holy One, blessed be He, was really some kind of deception, right? Descartes’ deceiving demon. After all, it was so absurd — logically, morally, and it contradicted what the Holy One, blessed be He, had told him before, “for through Isaac shall your seed be called.” How can that be? And then people wonder; some say this was his failure in the test, that he failed this test. I think I mentioned Aviezer Ravitzky, who brings Spanish interpretations like that. He wants to argue that this is a difference between Sephardim and Ashkenazim. I don’t agree with him about that, but there are a few such views — marginal, but they exist. It simply goes against the Torah, against everything… I don’t understand how one can say that at all, interpretively. Now on the conceptual level, why do I think that claim is not a correct one? Precisely because of what Maimonides writes here. As long as I am not in the situation of hearing speech from the Holy One, blessed be He, I have no way to critique someone else who is in such a state. Just as I look here and see a wall. A blind man might come and tell me: how do you know? Maybe your eyes are deceiving you. But he hasn’t had the experience of seeing something. Okay? How do you know? Maybe your eyes are deceiving you. And he’s right — maybe my eyes are deceiving me. Not only in principle, that everything we see could be a deception — that’s the argument of the idealists. Solipsists. But there could even be a local deception, a fata morgana or whatever, visual illusions. So how do you know? Now I can’t explain to a blind man in any way why I’m certain there’s a wall here. The fact that I see means I’m sure there’s a wall here. The certainty that accompanies sight is inseparable; it’s part of sight itself. And in that sense I think it’s the same thing. These questions that ask: how did Moses know that the Holy One, blessed be He, spoke to him? What is this speech? After all, it can’t be literal speech, Maimonides says — though by the way I’m not sure. It can’t be physical speech. Maimonides could have said… the Holy One, blessed be He, could have moved the air, created an acoustic wave that a person hears.

[Speaker C] Maybe the blind man is right. There are people who see and are sure there’s something there…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I said: on the philosophical level that question is valid. I don’t have an answer to it.

[Speaker C] Not only philosophically.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. Pretty quickly you discover that it’s a mirage. And more than that — I’ll ask you afterward, when you see the wall here, do you have any significant doubt whether there’s a wall here or not? Forget it — you know all the mirages and phantoms and all that; it’s all the same family of concepts. A phantom too is something imaginary, right? So you know all that. Do you have any doubt there’s a wall here? There’s some philosophical doubt, but fine — I know there’s a wall here. That’s what I’m talking about. Obviously there are situations where that doesn’t happen. Even a person who experiences a fata morgana knows there are fata morganas; in the end he realizes that’s what it is. But it doesn’t matter. I assume that afterward, when he sees things in ordinary life, he doesn’t cast doubt on them; he understands that what he sees exists. In other words, there are situations in which a person has a certain capacity to perceive things, and other people do not have that capacity, like the blind man and the sighted man. So they say: wait, who says you heard something? Maybe you heard nothing. Maybe it was a deception. And the person knows; he experiences that capacity. We don’t experience it. We can wonder how he knows — maybe it’s just something imaginary or something like that. He says: listen, guys, you’re blind and I see. I know it’s true. So in that sense, speech — they describe it as speech because we know this form of communication, speech and non-speech. If I had to explain to a blind person, say someone blind from birth, what it means that I see a wall here, I might use the term “see,” but when explaining it I would say: it’s like hearing, like perceiving, grasping through the senses. In exactly the same way, when they explain to us the transmission of things from the Holy One, blessed be He, to Moses, they tell us: it is speech. The Holy One, blessed be He, speaks to Moses. You could have said He “kampens” to Moses, I don’t know — just some made-up word, right? I don’t know. But that wouldn’t tell us anything. They want to describe it to us in terms drawn from our world. And there is no difference between “And the sons of Ham: Cush, Egypt, Put, and Canaan,” and “And his wife’s name was Mehetabel daughter of Matred,” or “I am the Lord,” and “Hear O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one”; all is from the mouth of the Almighty, and all is the Torah of the Lord — perfect, pure, holy, true. And one should not make Manasseh into a greater denier and blasphemer than any other denier except because he thought the Torah had a kernel and a husk, and that these dates and stories are of no benefit and Moses said them on his own. And this is what “the Torah is not from Heaven” means. For one who says “the Torah is not from Heaven” — they said this means one who says the entire Torah is from the mouth of the Holy One, blessed be He, except for one verse that was not said by the Holy One, blessed be He, but by Moses himself — and this is “for he has despised the word of the Lord.” May God be exalted above what the deniers say. Rather, every letter in it contains wisdom and wonders for one whom God has granted understanding, and the full extent of its wisdom cannot be grasped; “its measure is longer than the earth and broader than the sea.” And a person has nothing to do but pray like David, the anointed of the God of Jacob, who prayed: “Open my eyes that I may behold wonders from Your Torah.” And likewise its accepted interpretation too is from the mouth of the Almighty. And what we do today — the form of the sukkah and the lulav and the shofar and the tzitzit and the tefillin and the like — this is exactly the same form that God told Moses and Moses told us. And he is only a faithful messenger in what he brought. And the verse indicating this eighth principle is: “By this you shall know that the Lord has sent me… for I have not done them of my own heart.” What is the verse that states this principle? So Maimonides says: the entire Torah in our hands is from the mouth of the Almighty, including the accepted interpretations that accompany it. And anyone who says that even one thing is not from the mouth of the Almighty is a denier, and so on and so forth. Fine — obviously that’s not true, right? We understand that it’s not true.

[Speaker C] There are medieval authorities (Rishonim) who disagree.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously. There are medieval authorities (Rishonim) who disagree. I’m not talking at the moment about the Written Torah. About the Written Torah too you can discuss it, yes?

[Speaker C] A book came out not long ago by…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Brandeis and Tova Ganzel — a group of people who published a book on the authenticity of the Bible. This time they’re Orthodox, so on the one hand that bothers some people a bit, and on the other hand it reassures others. There are Orthodox rabbis who also say this. And there are all kinds of difficulties there, some known and some less known. This isn’t my field, so I’m not sufficiently expert in it. But yes, they talk there about the authenticity of the Bible. Already among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) there are those who speak about things that are not really part of the original Bible. There are famous passages in Sefer Hasidim, and about that Rabbi Moshe Feinstein already wrote that this can’t be, it must be a scribal error or things like that — what people always say when they can’t cope with something. And in Nachmanides there are even hints, and Ibn Ezra. Meaning, there are a number of medieval authorities (Rishonim) who explain to this very day things like when it says “until this day” and the like in the Bible. Fine, you can offer various explanations, saying it addresses the future reader, so it writes it in his language. But in the straightforward sense, it’s not like that; it didn’t come from there. Okay, I’ll come back to Maimonides in a moment. But never mind the Bible — the interpretations that go alongside it obviously didn’t come from there. The interpretations alongside it — after all, most of what we have are things that were created over the generations. A tiny minority… was given to Moses at Sinai. Of course the question is what counts as “accepted interpretations.” It may be that when Maimonides speaks about accepted interpretations, he’s speaking only about that part which really was given at Sinai. But it’s not always clear which part of the interpretations, or what we call the Oral Torah, is that core part, that hard core that came from Sinai, and which part is additions or layers added over the generations. But Maimonides himself writes in a responsum — maybe I mentioned this once, I don’t remember — and in the second root he speaks about the difference between creative derashot and supportive derashot. Supportive derashot are a derashah that takes a law already known, received by tradition, and anchors it somehow in the text. An asmachta? Yes, it’s not exactly an asmachta, because asmachta is usually used for a rabbinic law — a rabbinic law somehow anchored in a verse. Here I’m talking about a Torah-level law, only it did not come out of the verse; rather, it came from Sinai, and the derashah supports it, meaning on the verse, but it didn’t originate in the derashah. Kiddush? Huh? What do you mean by kiddush?

[Speaker F] Kiddush at night is Torah-level, and it’s only from “Remember the Sabbath day to sanctify it.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Ah, okay, but who says that’s an asmachta? That’s an actual derivation. By the way, not certain — it’s a Talmudic passage in tractate Nazir on page 3. It’s not that simple; it’s a dispute among the medieval authorities (Rishonim).

[Speaker G] He mentioned the lulav in the section about “the fruit of a beautiful tree.” What? He mentioned the lulav in the section about “the fruit of a beautiful tree.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. So he says also in the introductions that “the fruit of a beautiful tree” is an accepted interpretation, simply a literal interpretation. But I’m saying: Maimonides himself, in the world of derashot, distinguishes between supportive derashot — I defined that before — and creative derashot. Creative derashot are a derashah that innovates a new law, not a law received by tradition. Meaning, it comes out of the derashah. Maimonides, by the way, calls laws that emerge from a creative derashah “laws from the words of the Sages.” Laws that emerge from a supportive derashah — not emerge, but are outlined in a supportive derashah — are Torah-level laws. Now in the responsum, this is in the second root, Maimonides writes that there are something like three or four supportive ones. Now I assume he means a handful, not specifically three or four; it could also be fifteen, but just a few. Meaning, a very small minority of the derashot are supportive; most are creative. What does creative derashah mean? It means a law that comes out of a verse and was created over the course of history. Right? It did not come from Sinai. The derashah created it; it didn’t support it. A supportive derashah is a law that comes by tradition, perhaps from Moses our teacher. Though even that, by the way, not always. The Netziv talks about this, that “gemara gemira lah” — there is a dispute between Rashi and Maimonides about what “gemara gemira lah” means. Rashi writes everywhere that “gemara gemira lah” means a law given to Moses at Sinai. If in the Talmud in many places it says “gemara gemira lah,” yes, this is tradition. So Rashi writes: a law given to Moses at Sinai. And with Maimonides, in Kedmat Ha-Emek, the Netziv in his introduction to the She’iltot — an introduction called Kedmat Ha-Emek, a very large work — there he talks about the fact that “gemara gemira lah” is not a law given to Moses at Sinai. It is some tradition whose source we do not know. Meaning, some earlier generation stated some law, and we are trying to understand where it came from, and then we say: we couldn’t find a source for it, so “gemara gemira lah.” In other words, we have some tradition whose source is unclear. And it need not come from Moses. So even things about which it says “gemara gemira lah” did not necessarily, according to Maimonides at least, come from Moses our teacher. So what does all this actually mean? How does it fit with what Maimonides writes here, that the entire Torah and its accepted interpretations were given to Moses at Sinai, and Moses is only a faithful messenger — and let’s also talk about the messengers after him, right? Moses received the Torah from Sinai and transmitted it to Joshua, Joshua to the elders, and so on. So all of them are faithful messengers. Then who is it that added all these additions, which are most of the Oral Torah we possess? So when Maimonides speaks here about accepted interpretations, I assume he means that hard core of interpretations that really are supportive derashot or interpretations passed on by tradition as laws given to Moses at Sinai. But most of the Oral Torah does not belong here. Now beyond that, even in the Sages you can see all kinds of expressions like this. Basically, in origin, if you read Maimonides with a bit more sensitivity — and determination too — Maimonides here is speaking primarily about the Bible itself. Most of what he says is “Mehetabel daughter of Matred,” “the sons of Ham: Cush, Egypt, Put, and Canaan.” So he’s talking about the Bible. When he speaks about interpretations, he really means things like “the fruit of a beautiful tree,” very literal interpretations. When the Torah was given, Moses teaches the Torah to Joshua; he has to explain to him what the words mean. So obviously together with the Torah, its literal meaning is fine, yes — that is the accepted interpretation. The simple literal meaning. I don’t assume the Torah was transmitted from one person to another without him explaining at all what it means, and then the next person says, wait, what is this, and invents a new interpretation. Word meanings are generally things that pass along with the text — the usual, simple interpretations. Afterward additional interpretations are also created. So he’s talking about things that are, all in all, quite limited. He says that. Now beyond all this, many times in the Sages too — I mentioned this, I think once we spoke a little about these things, if I remember correctly — when the Sages say: just as the Sabbatical year, its particulars and generalities, are from Sinai, so too all of them, their particulars and generalities, are from Sinai — right? On the opening of the portion of Behar; this is Rashi on the opening of Behar. So what did they mean? First of all, they too are speaking about the Written Torah, not, as people usually understand it, about every subsection in the Mishnah Berurah — absolutely not. Even the dispute between Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Ishmael is a dispute over whether the Torah — its general principles at Sinai and its details in the Tent of Meeting, or everything at Sinai. But that dispute concerns how the Written Torah was given; it’s not talking about the Mishnah Berurah. The Written Torah — the question is whether all of it was given at Sinai or whether it was given scroll by scroll, meaning over the course of the journey in the wilderness through Moses our teacher from the mouth of the Holy One, blessed be He, but not all at Mount Sinai, rather in segments. But beyond that, even where there are places saying that everything a veteran student will one day innovate was shown by the Holy One, blessed be He, to Moses at Sinai — even there, the Tosafot Yom Tov in the introduction writes that there is a difference between “shown to him” and “transmitted to him.” “Transmitted to him” is the thing itself that passes from teacher to student or from generation to generation. And there is a difference: there is a part that the Holy One, blessed be He, showed Moses at Sinai, but did not transmit to him at Sinai — what a veteran student will one day innovate. So if he receives it from Moses our teacher, then what did he innovate? If he innovates it, that means he didn’t receive it, right? Like a creative derashah. So what does it mean that the Holy One, blessed be He, showed it to Moses at Sinai? So the Tosafot Yom Tov says there in the introduction that He showed it to him prophetically: know that they will innovate this way. But Moses did not take it and pass it on to Joshua, and it did not pass by tradition together with the Torah. Fine. I think it is much simpler that most of these statements — even those that refer not to the Bible itself… about the Bible they mean it literally, it seems to me. But regarding what goes beyond the Bible, it seems to me these are normative statements, not historical statements. The normative statements say: one must relate to it as though it were given to Moses at Sinai. And anyone who thinks there is some section of the Torah that was not given to Moses at Sinai — what does “not given” mean? It doesn’t mean he is historically disputing it; rather, he is disputing it normatively. He is saying: this is not part of the Torah of Moses; I am not obligated to it because it was not transmitted to Moses at Sinai. That is the problem. The problem is normative, not historical. And on the normative plane, one should see everything as though it came down from Sinai. Why? Because everything that was innovated over the generations is based on what was given to Moses plus the interpretations of people authorized for that, or who also received the tools in that same tradition to do these things — the thirteen hermeneutic principles and the like. And since that is so, then from our perspective everything is binding. From our perspective everything is part of the Torah even if it was not historically given to Moses at Sinai. It seems to me that’s so to this very day. What? To this very day, yes.

[Speaker H] A lot of times people do that — a rabbi who comes today, what he says is part of this.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, right. Although again, today there is no halakhic authority, meaning there is no one whose voice everyone is obligated to obey. But if he is right, then he is right, even without everyone being obliged to obey him. So in that sense, if he is right, then it’s Torah-level.

[Speaker H] If he is right? How will you decide that he is right? If you think he’s not, then not. So in his circle…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Whoever says that he is…

[Speaker H] Right says he is right, and whoever doesn’t, doesn’t. If his shtibel accepts him… sometimes even his own shtibel will say that’s not right. Depends what kind of shtibel it is.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I was once in Boston, so speaking of shtibels — I went to pray with the Talna rebbe. He was, yes, the Harvard professor, Rabbi Soloveitchik’s son-in-law…

[Speaker G] Twersky, exactly.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I was in his synagogue. Yes, it was a very amusing scene. The gabbai asks me what my name is, like I’m a new guy — Miki Abraham. He introduces me to people as “Dr. Miki Abraham.” I wasn’t a doctor; I was in a master’s program, at the beginning of a master’s. But there you don’t get in if you’re not a doctor — it was a shtibel of doctors, speaking of shtibels. So I assume — I don’t know, maybe not — but I assume that in Talna’s shtibel there were still a few Hasidim who argued with the rebbe. Maybe. Though I could be wrong; sometimes there are such Hasidim too.

[Speaker H] Anyway, what I wanted to understand is: was there a point in our history when everything our Sages said was accepted by everyone? And that’s what we’re talking about, that — yes?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I said: whoever has authority… I mean if it’s an authorized interpretation.

[Speaker H] But where is that point? Meaning, the Torah came down from Sinai with the original interpretations and then continued — until when? When did they say that…? Until when it was given…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’ll get to that when I come to the question of validity. In principle, it’s until the Sanhedrin came to an end. Only the Sanhedrin has authority — authority in the formal sense. Fine, I’ll talk about that more. After that, the Gemara too was given some kind of authority ad hoc, as if it were a Sanhedrin, even though they were not ordained and there was no longer a Sanhedrin — and this was already in Babylonia. Okay, but that’s the question of authority; we’ll get there. So that’s why I say that in principle, at least for me, I treat statements of this sort in a sweeping sense, not in the narrower sense I described earlier, because the narrow sense I described earlier speaks about the historical dimension of these statements. On the historical level, it’s a narrow claim. On the normative level, it’s really a broad claim. And it is a broad claim because obligation does not depend on authenticity. Meaning, I don’t have to prove that this was said to Moses at Sinai in order to be obligated by it. More than that: even if I think it is a mistake, I may still be obligated by it. And if I think it is a mistake, then obviously it was not said to Moses by the Holy One, blessed be He. And still, since there is formal authority — and we’ll still talk about the different kinds of authority — therefore I am obligated by it, like with law. Say in the Knesset too, yes? People sit there who I assume are less wise than Moses our teacher — I hope, at least. For his sake, I hope so. So if that’s the case, still, once the Knesset legislates, according to the rules it has formal authority, and that is the law. It doesn’t matter whether I agree or disagree. There are concepts of authority. Commitment to this system is not conditional on its authenticity. It is not conditional on the truth in it or on its conformity to what the Holy One, blessed be He, says. Often people get very shaken by statements like these that find flaws in the process of transmission — that there are things presented as though they were given to Moses at Sinai and in fact they were not. And the assumption of those whose commitment gets shaken is an assumption that ties commitment to authenticity. And this flawed education, which supposedly comes to strengthen fear of Heaven and commitment and the framework so that no one will deviate from it, is actually damaging education. It is damaging because people understand that once they reach the conclusion that it isn’t true, then they’re no longer these deontologists. So what is there to be committed to?

[Speaker I] So is this the distinction between Torah-level and rabbinic that you’re talking about? Are you still speaking on the Torah-level plane? No?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Both Torah-level and rabbinic. There’s no difference. Both Torah-level and rabbinic. The difference between Torah-level and rabbinic is not chronological. The difference between Torah-level and rabbinic is not the question of when the law was created, but by what method it was created. When the Sages legislate something, that’s rabbinic law. They legislate a new law that comes from themselves. When the Sages function in their role as interpreters, then the law is Torah-level. Now, that legislation could have been done by Moses our teacher, and if it was legislation, it is rabbinic law. But if it is interpretation done today, then the interpretation yields a Torah-level law.

[Speaker I] And that’s what you said earlier too, that both tradition and reasoning are still on the Torah-level plane? Yes, right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But I’m saying the obligation also applies to rabbinic laws, certainly according to Maimonides, since it comes from “You shall not turn aside.” Because it comes from a verse, so it rolls back — there is delegated authority to the Sages, and now there is an obligation to the Torah from Sinai that includes within it the obligation to rabbinic laws. But that doesn’t mean that the Holy One, blessed be He, showed Moses our teacher or told Moses our teacher everything we have, certainly not the rabbinic material — that’s obvious. But not even the Torah-level material. Only a small minority of the Torah-level material was ever said there. If I were to put it this way: if I had to be a film director making a movie about the giving of the Torah, let’s say it wouldn’t look like today’s shtreimels, and not only the shtreimels — not today’s tefillin either. Maimonides says “the tefillin in their form,” what he says here — in my opinion there is no chance, no chance, that the tefillin there looked like our tefillin today. But so what? Fine — it crystallized over the generations, and for us, that is tefillin. That doesn’t undermine anything. That is what has to be done, because in the end this is the tradition that reached us.

[Speaker K] Yes. Two questions. First of all, you said earlier that when Maimonides says only two or three, three or four, I don’t know how many, are…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Supportive derashah.

[Speaker K] Supportive, from that you conclude that most of our laws are specifically not such things, they are… Maimonides says that. What do you mean, “you conclude”? But you’re ignoring the fact that there are many laws that are not derash at all. They’re plain meaning. Maybe the overwhelming majority of laws are plain meaning, and only a small part are supportive derashah, and your statistical inference is wrong.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’ll give you an example: “You shall not kindle fire.”

[Speaker K] That’s not derash; that’s law, it’s explicit.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What is explicit? Wait — what is explicit?

[Speaker K] That it’s forbidden to light a fire.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is not learned from there, you know that?

[Speaker K] It’s plain meaning.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The thirty-nine primary labors are learned from the juxtaposition between the Tabernacle and the Sabbath. And conversely, the Talmud asks why it says “You shall not kindle fire in any of your dwellings on the Sabbath day” and why it says “Let no man go out of his place on the Sabbath day.”

[Speaker K] Fine, but you’re pushing it into a corner.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not a corner. You’re pushing it into a corner. I’m telling you that statistically you’re mistaken. The overwhelming majority of the Torah-level laws we have do not come out… The Talmud itself says there are things called laws that the Sadducees agree with. What does “laws that the Sadducees agree with” mean? These are the ones that when you read the Bible in the simple plain sense, they too accept the Bible. But those laws are so few a young boy could count them — on the fingers of one hand.

[Speaker K] Good. But that’s not the most important question. The second question is: you said, what difference does it make whether it’s authentic or not authentic? That doesn’t release me from obligation. That’s very…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] For Jewish law it makes a difference; for me it doesn’t make a difference.

[Speaker K] Let’s say it has the same authentic authority or not, it doesn’t matter how many mistakes there were, because at the end of the day it’s a tradition that reached me. So on the principled level, imagine a situation where from Moses our Teacher there were examples—and you know them—where in practice several channels of interpretation open up, reaching extremes, like the Christians who claimed for many years, I don’t know if to this day, that they are the heirs of that same tradition. So ostensibly they too are normative, and they too are right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That has nothing to do with whether it’s authentic.

[Speaker K] If you decide they’re right, then they’re right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What’s the question? No, it doesn’t work that way. You’re emptying this authenticity of its divine dimension.

[Speaker K] But there’s also a dispute about the authenticity, so what are you going to do? Incorrect Jewish law is certainly not authentic, right?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you do with disputes in Jewish law? There are disputes in Torah-level Jewish law—whether a rival wife of a daughter is permitted or forbidden, the dispute between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel. That’s a dispute in Torah law. So according to Beit Shammai, what Beit Hillel said isn’t authentic, because it’s wrong. Whatever is wrong, the Holy One, blessed be He, did not say. So what do you do with that? Maybe this one is right, maybe that one is right. What do you do? There is halakhic ruling. Fine, so I’m also telling you that there is halakhic ruling.

[Speaker K] Am I in a worse position than you? No, you’re claiming that authenticity is irrelevant. I’m saying we’re searching desperately for authenticity. But the decision between Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel is a decision on the halakhic plane, because they were easygoing and humble and they mentioned the words of Beit Shammai before their own. Therefore Jewish law was ruled like Beit Hillel—not because they found in archaeological excavations that the Holy One, blessed be He—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —told Moses our Teacher that the rival wife of a daughter is permitted. It isn’t determined by authenticity. The halakhic ruling is what determines what obligates us, not because we know that this is what was at Sinai with Moses—not necessarily. It could be that the halakhic ruling does not fit what actually was there.

[Speaker K] But there are two good candidates for being authentic. As Jewish law, I decided. But I won’t make peace with discovering that something isn’t authentic. I’ll need to change it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You first asked—

[Speaker D] Why, on the halakhic plane—like, because they were easygoing—what does that have to do with authenticity?

[Speaker K] Within authenticity. What does “within authenticity” mean?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But authenticity is either this or that. Authenticity is either this or that; it can’t be that both are inauthentic. One of them is not authentic. The Holy One, blessed be He, said one thing. Right. So go look in archaeological digs. What does “because they were easygoing and humble” mean?

[Speaker K] Because I didn’t find another way.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, you didn’t find one—Torah-level doubt is treated stringently. Follow both. What is halakhic ruling? In its essence, halakhic ruling is not archaeology. Halakhic ruling—on the contrary—this is the oven of Akhnai: “It is not in heaven.” The Holy One, blessed be He, tells you what He said originally at Mount Sinai. A heavenly voice comes out and says—and again, this is aggadic literature, but that’s what the aggadah is trying to say—the Holy One, blessed be He, says to you: I said at Sinai like Rabbi Eliezer. And the sages say: we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice; “it is not in heaven.” What is that? It basically says that we do not pay attention to authenticity. So I think that’s how—at least it seems to me—that’s how these statements about the authenticity of tradition, or about its eternity, or commitment to tradition, ought to be understood. But you understand that if that’s so, then there’s another side to the coin as well. And that’s the side people are worried about when they hear these things. Because if that’s so, then commitment also doesn’t mean that I have to continue what used to be. Just as previous generations could change things and it wasn’t called change—it was called the natural continuation of that same tradition—so I too can do the same thing. The concept of commitment stops being—and then comes the question of authority. Right, fine, I said I’ll get to the question of authority, but I’m giving the introduction here, the framework of the discussion. So this coin has two sides. My interpretation of the past, which disconnects historical authenticity from normative obligation, also projects onto what I’m going to do, and what can be done in the future or in the present. Because then it basically means that the sages too maintained commitment not only to things that were authentic. So if that’s the case, then I can too. Maybe I’m even obligated to, yes. There’s a story I once saw in Buber’s Tales of the Hasidim about the rabbi of Lechovitz; there was a Rabbi Mordechai and a Rabbi Noach, I don’t know who was the father and who was the son, I don’t remember, but when the father died and the son kind of took the seat of the rebbe and started changing some of his father’s customs, the Hasidim asked him: your father’s holy customs—how can you change them? What am I changing? My father also didn’t do what his father did, and I’m continuing his path; I too am not doing what my father did. So in that sense, the description I’m giving here not for nothing arouses objections—I know, this isn’t the first time—because really, and I’m not saying this cynically, I completely understand: it arouses objections because it puts commitment under a kind of question mark. What is the meaning of commitment once you can do with it whatever you want, if in fact you can? But there is truth and there is Jewish law. The answer is basically that of course I’m not going to do whatever I want. I’m going to do what I think. That’s not the same thing. The feeling is—and they always accuse you like this—so you’re doing whatever you want. I didn’t say that. I said I do what I think, not what I want. Unless I want what I think, and then I’m supposed to be committed to what I think, not to what I want.

[Speaker B] What does “what you think” mean?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What the Holy One, blessed be He, said, or what is expected of me by the Torah. That thought, by the way, can be on two planes. On the interpretive plane: what I think is the correct interpretation of the verse. And on the explanatory plane: what I think is actually right. And reasoning too has a status in halakhic interpretation; we talked about that right at the beginning, in the first meetings.

[Speaker D] Why is it called reasoning?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, why is it called reasoning? And that’s part of the interpretive tools. But again, with reasoning one really has to be very careful in using it, because reasoning is not supposed to—I mean, what’s convenient for me is not supposed to slip into it; at least it shouldn’t. We don’t always have control; we’re all human beings. But it’s supposed to be reasoning about what is really right on the value level and on the interpretive level. Yes.

[Speaker B] And if I want—if, say, I want to change things to what the Holy One, blessed be He, wants today, does that mean that the will changed, or that really I’m returning to the track…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It could very well be that not. I think it sounds reasonable that I wouldn’t call it a changed will, but rather a will that is coordinated with the framework in which it appears. Let’s say I want my son to behave in a certain way, okay? So when he is in a different situation, he understands that the instruction should not be taken literally, but that clearly the spirit of the matter has to be adapted to the new circumstances. That isn’t called changing; that’s called applying the instruction. It isn’t called deviating from the instruction. Okay? So we’ll talk more about that.

[Speaker N] Let’s say if your son is in a situation and according to the spirit of things, you—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Know someone like that?

[Speaker N] Yes—and according to the spirit of what you said he wants to do X, but then you come to him, send him an SMS to do Y, what you’d call the heavenly voice in the oven of Akhnai. Okay, so should he ignore you?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If I told him, ignore me and determine everything according to the situation you’re in… then why are you sending an SMS? I don’t understand. I’m sending an SMS because I think—I’m telling you what’s right.

[Speaker N] And do I need to do what the SMS says?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, because I told you that you need to do what you think. The whole story never really involved an SMS—it’s a story, it’s an aggadah—but that aggadah comes to express this idea.

[Speaker N] But Dad, when you say I should do what I think, you mean according to certain parameters. Obviously—according to the parameters I told you. Let’s say, what I think you want me to do.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, so, yes. But now you’re saying what you want. It doesn’t matter—it doesn’t matter what I want now. Why? What matters is what I wanted then.

[Speaker N] Why?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because then I gave you the system of rules, and “it is not in heaven.” That’s it. I told you: act according to that.

[Speaker K] You’re interpreting the aggadah; the plain meaning of the aggadah is completely different. Okay. The sages spent their whole lives, for thousands of years, struggling over what the Holy One, blessed be He, wanted. Now one time He woke up to say: enough, do me a favor—either tell me all the time, or let me run things. That’s what they’re saying to the heavenly voice. Fine, but it’s not because the heavenly voice isn’t right. I didn’t say that—on the contrary! The opposite?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The opposite—I said the heavenly voice is right. What do you mean? The heavenly voice is right; I didn’t say it wasn’t right. I said that what is right does not determine what we do.

[Speaker K] The reason they didn’t take the heavenly voice is that it speaks only once.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So what? An SMS arrived one time—so what happened?

[Speaker K] You still know that that’s what the Holy One, blessed be He, wants. For that you wouldn’t have needed a great Sanhedrin. Ask the Holy One, blessed be He—He would answer.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, but the Urim and Tummim did not—

[Speaker K] —establish halakhot.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of course we wouldn’t listen. Exactly—the Urim and Tummim are not about halakhot. The Urim and Tummim determined very specific things—going out to war. Yes, fine, because that’s an ad hoc revelation of will. No—because it’s anchored in Jewish law that one asks the Urim and Tummim. There it was not said “it is not in heaven”; for that specific matter, going out to war, it was not said “it is not in heaven.” Fine. The mouth that forbade is the mouth that permitted. The mouth that forbade said “it is not in heaven”; it is the mouth that said yes, but this is in heaven—or also in heaven. Fine. And the ninth principle is abolition: namely, that this Torah of Moses will not be abolished, and no other Torah will come from God besides it, and nothing will be added to it and nothing subtracted from it, neither in the written text nor in the explanation—that is, neither Scripture nor the Oral Torah. As it says, “You shall not add to it nor diminish from it.” And we have already explained what needs to be explained in this principle in the introduction to this composition, the commentary on the Mishnah, in the introduction to the commentary on the Mishnah. So basically these two principles, the eighth and the ninth, are the framework within which the discussion is conducted. Because on the one hand there is some very strong statement of authenticity—everything in our hands was given to Moses at Sinai. On the other hand there is some statement that this is also what obligates, and one cannot depart from it. I already noted in the course of things that you can’t take that literally. It can’t work, it never worked that way, and Maimonides himself does not write that way. So what does it mean? There is here, basically, some statement which to some extent is more of a declaration. A declaration of direction, of where you are supposed to be oriented in terms of the atmosphere in which you operate, but it is not really a practical instruction for how to act. And beyond that, it could be that even on the practical level, all these changes that we’ll talk about really are not called a deviation from tradition. They are called the continuation of tradition—the real continuation. It is not a deviation. That is what it means to fulfill the will of God and not deviate from what He says: to do what the previous generation did not do. Because under these circumstances, that is in fact what the Holy One, blessed be He, expects of us. And then that means that the one who remains like the previous generation is the one who violates these two principles. He is the one who does not uphold the tradition, because tradition in its essence is a dynamic tradition. And the one who treats it as static preserves the tradition faithfully—just not the right tradition. He preserves some other tradition. Okay? This is Maimonides’ elephant parable. Someone who errs in—Maimonides writes, in Guide for the Perplexed, that someone who errs regarding attributes and says that the Holy One, blessed be He, has positive attributes rather than negative ones is a great believer—just in the wrong God. It’s like someone who tells you that an elephant has wings. He isn’t mistaken in his conception of an elephant; he’s simply not talking about an elephant. He’s apparently talking about a bird. So there are certain errors that are so fundamental that it’s quite clear this is not a mistake in your conception—you are simply talking about something else. So he says that positive attributes versus negative attributes is an error on that level. It’s not some small miss where you don’t understand exactly what the Holy One, blessed be He, means. You simply are not talking about the right God. You’re talking about someone else. That’s all the kabbalists, of course. From Maimonides’ perspective, the kabbalists were idol worshippers in every respect—and maybe also the reverse, I don’t know. Well, apropos disputes.

[Speaker O] So what do we do with all this?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You have to decide. You know, Amos once asked me—our mutual friend—he was in Pardes Hanna and was answering questions of scribal law. He was a representative of Mishmeret STaM, already an experienced ritual scribe and someone who knew a lot, and there are local representatives of Mishmeret STaM from Bnei Brak who answer questions in matters of scribal law, handling questions that arise in various regions. So he was responsible there in the Pardes Hanna area. So he said to me: look, there’s a question that has already come to me several times. And I know that when I went to Rabbi Wosner he forbade it, and when I went to Rabbi Nissim—Rabbi Nissim Karelitz—he permitted it. So he permitted it. Now what—according to whom I go, that determines the answer. What am I supposed to do in such a situation? So I said to him: what do you mean, what do you want to do? Learn the topic and decide what is right. Answer what you think. Why are you immediately, automatically, going to ask this one or that one? Decide what you think and answer what seems right to you. There is some assumption here that if there are two opinions, it means I’m at a loss. Have a third opinion—or join one of the two opinions. In the end, what I do is something I’m supposed to decide. And the fact that there are people who think differently—fine, so what?

[Speaker P] Fine, but you went pretty far and said that every generation is supposed to change.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In places where the thing is required, of course. You don’t need to replace the Torah every twenty years. I’m saying that where the thing is required, one should not hesitate—on the contrary, one should hesitate not to do it.

[Speaker H] The question is what counts as “where it’s required.” For example, the moment electricity came into existence and until then there was no electricity, a ruling was required—yes or no. But are we talking about things like that? Okay, you agree with that? With what?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] With the idea that when electricity comes into existence, one has to formulate a halakhic position about it.

[Speaker H] But when you say “when it’s required,” that’s so relative that it means nothing.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The whole world of interpretation is so relative.

[Speaker H] Fine—what can you do?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But we can’t get rid of interpretation.

[Speaker H] For everyone something else is required; for everyone, if it reached this thickness or that thickness—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So whoever thinks that, then yes indeed. Whoever doesn’t think that, then not. For each person—right, yes, that’s what I’m saying. On the table. Each person and his Torah.

[Speaker H] But we have to get to authority—it can’t be that—what do you mean?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is no authority.

[Speaker H] But beyond instructive authority, that doesn’t interest us so much.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, it doesn’t interest us?

[Speaker H] That it’s each person on his own—the issue of electricity was something required for the whole halakhic world.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? There are people who think electricity is permitted; there were halakhic decisors who thought electricity was permitted. No, fine.

[Speaker H] Why is that for the whole halakhic world?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are opinions there too. It was necessary to bring… fine, and one person thinks nothing needs to be done, and another says electricity is forbidden—to renew the prohibition. Change is sometimes also toward stringency, not only leniency.

[Speaker L] But there’s the matter of transmitting Torah, traditions. Fine, there’s a need to—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’ll still talk about all that. It touches on the question of authority. But I’m saying that today, de facto, it’s clear there is no halakhic authority. There is no Sanhedrin; there is no halakhic authority today. And even if everyone believes in his own rebbe, that’s still a multiplicity of authorities. You won’t get out of that in any case.

[Speaker K] There isn’t one authority such that if I want to do something that nobody permits—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What does “want” mean? If you think it’s right, or if you want it? Two different things.

[Speaker K] I think it is right to use electricity on the Sabbath, and I look at all the later authorities and they all forbid it. So apparently it’s forbidden.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] About that we’ll still talk, I’m not…

[Speaker H] But still, we need to define some boundaries for development. For example, the Conservative movement says exactly the same thing you’re saying. Right. Right. That Jewish law is dynamic and we can change it, and they have a law committee and they establish—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —new norms. They’re right. What? They’re right. Okay. They’re right. That’s their view. Now you should examine each thing on its own merits, whether you accept it or not. I’m not saying it should be accepted for granted as a package deal. But there are things they argue for that are absolutely right, and things that aren’t. The fact that there are certain things Conservatives say doesn’t automatically mean it’s wrong. There are things that are, but it also doesn’t automatically mean it’s right. You know, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not after you, as they say. Meaning—fine, the fact that it’s Conservatives doesn’t mean they’re not right. They may be right despite being Conservatives.

[Speaker D] Yes, but in the end we won’t sit on the same bench.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why not? Why not? I don’t agree with that. But we’ll still talk about that; with God’s help we’ll get to all these things.

[Speaker D] Okay, let’s continue. Just look even here in our country, what is accepted in the community—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Some of the Haredim—ask the Haredim how they relate to what you do; from their point of view it’s completely Conservative.

[Speaker D] Meaning, you—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —go around without an undershirt, without this—what do you mean—they’ll talk to you—

[Speaker D] Will they come to minyanim, join your prayer quorum?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. Everything is relative. Everything is relative. Okay, we’ll still talk about that. 11. So that is the framework of the discussion. Maimonides also in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah—don’t say he forgot this only in the commentary on the Mishnah—in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah at the beginning of chapter 9 he writes: It is clear and explicit in the Torah that it stands forever and for all eternity. There is to it neither change nor subtraction nor addition, as it is said: “All the matter that I command you, that shall you observe to do; you shall not add to it nor diminish from it,” and it is said: “The revealed things belong to us and to our children forever, to do all the words of this Torah.” From here you learn that all matters of Torah we are commanded to do forever. And so it says, “An eternal statute for your generations,” and it says, “It is not in heaven.” From here you learn that a prophet is not permitted to innovate anything from now on. This is really fascinating. There are two “it is not in heaven”s. There is the “it is not in heaven” from which they derive that a prophet is not permitted to innovate anything from now on. That “it is not in heaven” basically means everything is from Sinai. Any innovation, even by a prophet, doesn’t help at all. That too, by the way, is not the correct interpretation, because the meaning is a prophet and not a sage. A sage can innovate, but a prophet cannot. But the connotation is a conservative connotation. Yet the “it is not in heaven” of the oven of Akhnai is the opposite “it is not in heaven.” “It is not in heaven” meaning: we have an argument about what happened at Sinai, the Holy One, blessed be He, tells us what happened, and we disagree—we do not do what He says. So “it is not in heaven” in the opposite direction. Therefore this verse can, of course, point in various directions. Only, as I said, even the “it is not in heaven” that says “a prophet is not permitted to innovate anything from now on” is talking about the “it is not in heaven” of a prophet, because the prophet’s innovation comes from heaven. From heaven, things cannot be innovated now. A sage can innovate things even now because that isn’t from heaven, and therefore that is indeed the proper interpretation. Okay? And both interpretations go in the non-conservative direction. Again: the second “it is not in heaven,” that “a prophet is not permitted to innovate anything from now on,” sounds like the conservative interpretation of “it is not in heaven,” but that’s not true, because the Talmud there says that it is speaking about a prophet, not a sage. A sage can innovate things; a prophet is forbidden to. Why? Because the prophet draws his innovation from heaven—“it is not in heaven.” A sage can innovate things; on earth things are innovated all the time. So basically what is said here is the opposite—this is not a conservative statement.

[Speaker K] What I’m saying is like the “it is not in heaven”—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —of the oven of Akhnai, right?

[Speaker K] It basically—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —means leave it, it’s not in heaven—not the Holy One, blessed be He, not by way of prophets, not in heaven. What we think is what determines things, and if we innovate that is perfectly fine—on the contrary. If we innovate, that is what—

[Speaker L] —obligates, even if some conservative voice from heaven comes and tells me that in heaven they think differently. So these two statements basically go in the same direction. I didn’t understand how—

[Speaker E] —they interpret—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —“it is not in heaven” about a prophet, if it’s… Because the prophet innovates from heaven.

[Speaker L] When he wants to innovate something he says, “They told me from heaven that this is what should be done.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, heaven does not determine what should be done. What? But it comes from heaven—the speech to the prophet comes from heaven. Right, but in Jewish law it has no validity. “It is not in heaven.” In Jewish law it has no validity. The prophet is like Rabbi Eliezer. If a prophet comes and says—exactly, like Rabbi Eliezer. I understand the concept; I’m asking about the derivation—how did they derive it? A prophet is not supposed to—because “it is not in heaven.” Meaning, if something comes from heaven, don’t listen to it, because “it is not in heaven.” This has to be managed on earth. So if a prophet comes—just a second—if a prophet comes and tells you something in the name of heaven about what is halakhically right to do, you do not need to obey him. The sages determine it. If the prophet tells you ethics or says things like the prophets say, then yes—that is his role—but not in Jewish law. Teiku is teiku. The initials of “the Tishbite will resolve difficulties and questions”—teiku is not “the Tishbite will resolve difficulties and questions”; that’s just a saying. Teiku means: it stands. What? It stands. When the Talmud brings—exactly—the Talmud, teiku in literal translation is “let it stand.” The meaning is that the topic stood still; we have no decision. That is what teiku means. It does not mean that Joshua will come, or that Elijah will really come. Now Rabbi Margaliot, in the introduction to the responsa From Heaven—you have it? do you know this responsa? There is Rabbi Yaakov of Marvege, one of the Tosafists. Troyes or Marvege, it’s not clear exactly there. Troyes is Rashi’s city. So he wrote a book called Responsa from Heaven. And in this responsa he asks questions in heaven—various halakhic doubts that he has, he asks questions in a dream. And he reports what they answered him there. It’s like the oracle of Delphi. The statements are always very vague; it’s also not clear what they’re saying there and it needs interpretation. Even after he wrote it it’s not clear, so Rabbi Margaliot below also gives interpretation. The moment it’s interpretation, then you understand it’s not from heaven but that we decided. But never mind—so that’s the “from heaven,” that’s why it’s called Responsa from Heaven. So there is an introduction, and in Rabbi Margaliot’s edition that he published, he gives a very long and beautiful introduction about the question of how one can listen at all to halakhic rulings from heaven, since “it is not in heaven.” There, among other things, he discusses your question: if this tradition is that the Tishbite will resolve difficulties and questions, how can Elijah decide halakhot? He wants to claim that—I say the question is not really a question, but he does ask it—that the Tishbite, Elijah, was also a Torah scholar. He will come there as a Torah scholar and not as a prophet.

[Speaker J] So—

[Speaker B] —that—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But still, his assumption is that a prophet cannot do that job. One way or another.

[Speaker B] Maimonides, when he talks about the king, he says that he will come and— and establish a Sanhedrin and resolve—I think, no?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] About the king—yes, when he talks in the Laws of Kings there, when he talks about the Messiah. I don’t remember.

[Speaker B] That he will come and establish a Sanhedrin and he—you know, all the—no, the Sanhedrin, yes, the Sanhedrin, not the king. Not the Tishbite. Ah, of course.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So that’s like in tractate Eduyot. The whole tractate Eduyot was said—maybe we talked about this once too—was said in one day. That was the day when Rabbi Eliezer replaced—when they deposed Rabban Gamliel. There was all the—what is Eduyot? Not Rabbi Eliezer, no—Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah, sorry, yes. What was there? Rabbi Eliezer was actually the opposite. What was there? Why is the tractate—what is tractate Eduyot? Tractate Eduyot is a tractate with no subject. It is a collection of traditions, a collection of testimonies: they testified regarding an oven that it is pure, they testified regarding this, and so on. What does that mean there? This collection of traditions had, at some stage, say, gathered into two blocs—Beit Hillel and Beit Shammai. And the Jerusalem Talmud describes that they killed one another. There was no way to decide disputes. Then a heavenly voice came out and said that Jewish law follows Beit Hillel. Why did they need a heavenly voice? Because there was no other way to decide the dispute. They were unable to decide it. Even by vote it didn’t work because in those wars there—I think we talked about this—voting didn’t work because Beit Shammai say you count heads and Beit Hillel say you count legs. So yes, it was impossible to decide that dispute. And therefore a heavenly voice came out. Tractate Eduyot is a collection of all those traditions. Why? Because after they deposed Rabban Gamliel and kicked out his brother-in-law—yes, Rabbi Eliezer there in the oven of Akhnai—the younger people took over Yavneh, the Sanhedrin: Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah, “like a man of seventy years,” was young, the younger generation. So what happened? They brought all the traditions to the study hall and held a vote and decided. That was the great innovation. The great innovation was that until that stage it had been impossible to decide. Because the discussion could not come to an end; there was no agreement on methods of decision. And the great joy on that day was that they scattered the elders in all directions and seated younger people in their place, and they managed to decide between all those traditions. How did they decide? By vote. Because the oven of Akhnai—that was exactly the argument there, over how one decides a dispute. Rabbi Eliezer says: I’m telling you what I received from my rabbi, I forgot nothing, this goes back to Moses at Sinai. And they said: we don’t accept that; it doesn’t sound logical to us. Even though it doesn’t sound logical to you, I’m telling you what Moses our Teacher said. And that was exactly the argument. The argument was whether you follow authenticity, tradition, or whether you follow what “it is not in heaven.” And therefore a heavenly voice comes out and says “it is not in heaven.”

[Speaker B] Although there Rabban Gamliel was on the other side.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Rabban Gamliel was on the traditionalist side; that’s why they threw him out.

[Speaker B] And Rabban Gamliel in the oven of Akhnai was against Rabbi Eliezer.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—what are you talking about?

[Speaker B] In the end, when he came back—“I did this not for my honor and not for the honor of my father’s house.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that was after he repented. Well, I’ll talk about that sometime. He repented—Rabban Gamliel is described there in Berakhot. And then they restored him in rotation to be nasi with Rabbi Elazar ben Azariah.

[Speaker B] Not the return in the oven of Akhnai.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I’m saying—it depends at what stage you’re looking. It’s all in the same—I don’t know if day—but in the same period, yes.

[Speaker R] And if we decide to do another debate between the prophet—some major Haredi figure as smart as you, let’s say equal weight—and you present all this now, what’s their side? Meaning, what would they say? Because they have millions following them, who don’t—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You don’t need Haredim. What—most people, most people would not say what I’m saying. I wrote—I wrote—there was an interview in Makor Rishon where someone interviewed me, and among other things I said something like: ninety-five percent of what is in our hands, Moses our Teacher neither said nor even dreamed of, and neither did the Holy One, blessed be He. Then angry reactions came—not from the Haredim; Haredim generally don’t read Makor Rishon. The angry reactions came from hesder yeshivot, from some people you know.

[Speaker E] Because it’s provocative?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it’s not provocative. It’s the plain truth. So angry reactions came: we can’t send students to a place like this, what do you mean, what kind of education are they getting? That wasn’t from Haredim. And not from the hardline Haredi-national camp either—no, not that either. Rabbis from hesder yeshivot—you know at least one or two.

[Speaker J] But what’s the opposite point to what you’re saying?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The opposite point is that everyone interprets literally that everything was given to Moses at Sinai and one must not deviate. But what can you do—look in the Talmud, look in the medieval authorities (Rishonim), look in the later authorities (Acharonim). Then the explanations begin: what they innovated was actually the tradition; they reconstructed the tradition. How do you know? The whole tradition was lost; they had to reconstruct it. How do you know that it came out authentically matching the tradition? The providence of the Holy One, blessed be He, guarantees that if they reconstructed it that way, it’s apparently correct. And what do you do when there are two paths people follow—Sephardim practice this way and Ashkenazim practice that way? Then God’s providence means that both are correct and both were given to Moses at Sinai. Fine—an unfalsifiable theory; you can’t deal with it.

[Speaker K] God’s providence—is that also what you’re saying? What?

[Speaker H] Ninety-five percent of what is in our hands was not given—what do you mean?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I mean it was not given historically.

[Speaker H] And that obligates? But what kinds of things, for example?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Tefillin? Anything you can think of. Everything.

[Speaker H] Ninety percent of the Shulchan Arukh?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Whatever you can imagine. Everything. What was given? Only laws that the Sadducees also admit to, or halakhot given to Moses at Sinai, which is a collection of very few laws. That is the tradition in our hands that was given to Moses at Sinai. Everything else is additions, interpretation, derashot.

[Speaker H] The Oral Torah was not given?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Certainly not. What was given there at Sinai was a few basic foundations, like methods of derivation and things like that. Maimonides writes this, by the way; it’s not my innovation—Maimonides writes it.

[Speaker L] Okay, what did the sages think when they invented these things? Did they think that this was really the—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. It could be they thought what sages today think. But I’m saying in retrospect, it’s clear to me that it isn’t true even if they thought that. Well—they live inside, you know, this is a somewhat modern consciousness. Meaning, you look at things and check them through context. In earlier times people weren’t aware of context unless it was like that. As my uncle says, obviously the patriarchs and prophets learned in Yiddish—they knew how to learn, after all. Meaning… Now he said that half-jokingly, but in the conceptual sense he really means it: that they learned, and went around with a gartel and a shtreimel—this he says seriously, that they went with a gartel and a shtreimel.

[Speaker L] No, but I think—I’m asking a somewhat different question. Did they think this was what the Holy One, blessed be He, would have—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no. They thought this was what the Holy One, blessed be He, gave to Moses. Not what the Holy One, blessed be He, wants from us. What He gave to Moses. That’s what they thought? Yes—that there is providence, and even if we innovated it, basically we hit upon the mind of the Holy One, blessed be He; this is what He already said to Moses. There were just distortions along the way. That is also why they don’t accept the possibility of scientific mistakes in the Talmud—we talked about that once—scientific mistakes in the Talmud, because everything was given to Moses at Sinai. What—the Holy One, blessed be He, doesn’t know physics or biology or whatever?

[Speaker L] But that is different from the Conservatives. The Conservatives think this is what is right to do; there is Jewish law—not that this is what we think the Holy One, blessed be He, thought in the Torah to do.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously, obviously, right—and I’m saying, and I think they were right. In the principled conception they were right. That I don’t agree with every one of their interpretations is another matter, but in the principled conception it is clearly correct. By the way, there are also quite a few Orthodox people who think this way—you just have to draw them out.

[Speaker S] Yes, Moshe Feinstein is an Orthodox person who thinks… Huh? That’s not Orthodox?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, I think there’s no such thing as Conservatives—on the contrary, there’s no such thing as Orthodox. The Conservatives are also Orthodox. They are Orthodox who at a few points perhaps think differently from most Orthodox, and one can discuss whether they are right or not. But when you read their halakhic responsa, they have halakhic responsa that, all in all, operate through halakhic mechanisms.

[Speaker L] I’m not sure that’s the current situation.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, I’m not talking about the public. I’m talking about, say, the layer of halakhic decisors—Golinkin, yes, the only one there who knows how to learn is Golinkin. So everyone—I once saw a responsa volume of theirs—in the responsa, all the time each one writes, or one woman writes, they write a halakhic responsum and at the end thank Golinkin for all the sources and help. So I… well, never mind. I’m saying that on the principled level I agree with the conception. That doesn’t mean I need to agree with their halakhic conclusions. Each issue on its own merits. But I’m not frightened by the fact that it comes from Conservatives, that doesn’t…

[Speaker Q] Okay, let’s say this—not “Sabbath peace,” it’s not exactly Conservative. Yes, someone—someone is trying to ask a question. Yes. What… there’s a kind of paradox in the view that the heavenly voice says “it is not in heaven.”

[Speaker E] Mendy, there’s a paradox here: after all, the heavenly voice says that it is not in heaven?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, not the heavenly voice. The sages said “it is not in heaven”; the heavenly voice did not say that. The sages say “it is not in heaven,” “we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice.” Therefore they reject the words of the heavenly voice.

[Speaker E] So what about the heavenly voice?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Sorry—the heavenly voice… the heavenly voice said: “Why do you dispute with Rabbi Eliezer my son, seeing that the Jewish law is like him everywhere?”

[Speaker E] Sorry, I got confused—the heavenly voice that came out saying the Jewish law is like Beit—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —Hillel, okay, like Beit Hillel in that dispute.

[Speaker E] So why isn’t that a problem there?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Tosafot already asks that. Why in the dispute of Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel did they listen to the heavenly voice there, since “we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice”? So in the course of things I said the answer that I think—Tosafot brings three answers there, and I think they are not reasonable. In my view the more reasonable answer is simply because it was impossible to decide otherwise. “It is not in heaven” means: if you have halakhic rules of decision, go with them. Why are you going to heaven? Where the halakhic rules of decision are stuck, what am I supposed to do? There is no alternative.

[Speaker K] So that resolves teiku. “The Tishbite will resolve difficulties and questions” doesn’t bother me, because here specifically I got stuck. No—hold a vote; what do you mean, you got stuck?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Hold a vote. With Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel they couldn’t even hold a vote, because there was a dispute over which majority counts—the majority of wisdom or the majority of people. So they couldn’t even vote.

[Speaker K] In the Talmud they didn’t—the Talmud’s own reasoning, when it reaches teiku, isn’t based on a vote. Right, and therefore that mechanism in that place didn’t manage to decide. So he says—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But no—but then teiku also doesn’t obligate me, whichever way you look at it. What—because they said teiku, so what? If two sages now argue and conclude teiku, because of that I now have to remain in teiku? Then I think like both.

[Speaker K] Obviously, the halakhic decisors rule.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s what I’m saying, no, with a teiku you don’t issue a ruling. Not with a teiku. A teiku is the authority of the Talmudic text; it says the ruling is teiku. And then the law is that of doubt. You simply may not rule in a case of teiku; all the halakhic decisors agree on that. Okay, I see I already need to stop here, but I’ll just finish reading this passage from Maimonides; at least let’s finish that. Therefore, if a man arises from among the nations, or from Israel, and performs a sign or wonder and says that God sent him to add a commandment or to subtract a commandment, or to interpret one of the commandments with an interpretation that we did not hear from Moses, or if he says that those commandments which Israel was commanded are not forever and for all generations, but were commandments only for a particular time—such a person is a false prophet, for he comes to deny the prophecy of Moses. In short, a prophet cannot introduce new halakhic innovations. And his death is by strangulation, because he intentionally spoke in the name of God that which He did not command him; for He, blessed be His name, commanded Moses that this commandment is for us and for our children forever, and God is not a man that He should lie. Jewish law 2: If so, why does the Torah say, ‘I will raise up for them a prophet from among their brethren, like you’? Why do we need prophets? He does not come to create a religion; he does not come to express a halakhic position—that is not the role of a prophet—but rather to command regarding the words of the Torah and to warn the people not to violate it, as the last of them said, ‘Remember the Torah of Moses My servant.’ And likewise, if he instructs us regarding optional matters, for example: go to such-and-such a place, or do not go; wage war today, or do not wage war; build this wall, or do not build it—it is a commandment to obey him, and one who violates his words is liable to death at the hands of Heaven, as it is said: ‘And it shall be that the man who will not listen to My words that the prophet shall speak in My name, I will require it of him.’ So a prophet, in short, does not deal with Jewish law. For our purposes, that’s what matters. Jewish law is basically a corpus that has some independent status. That doesn’t mean it’s authentic, but it does mean it has an independent status; there are no interventions from outside. From within, there are. We’ll continue talking about that.

Changes in Halacha, Lesson 1

Table of Contents

Summary

General Overview

Opening the Series: Change, Authority, and the Decline of the Generations

Maimonides: The Eighth Principle (Torah from Heaven) and the Meaning of “Speech”

The Binding of Isaac and Rejecting the Reading that Abraham “Failed”

The Scope of “From the Mouth of the Almighty” and Criticism of a Literal Reading

Oral Torah: “Accepted Interpretations” and Supportive versus Creative Derashot

Historical Reduction versus Normative Claim: “As if It Came Down from Sinai”

Formal Authority, the Sanhedrin, and the Gemara as “Ad Hoc” Authority

Authenticity versus Halakhic Ruling: Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, the Oven of Akhnai, and “It Is Not in Heaven”

Torah-Level and Rabbinic: Not Chronology but Method

Change as Dynamic Tradition and the Fear of Undermining Obligation

Reasoning as an Interpretive Tool and Caution against Mixing in Personal Convenience

The Limits of Change, Electricity on the Sabbath, and the Absence of One Authority

Conservatives and Orthodox: The Dynamism of Jewish Law as a Correct Claim, and Examining Each Case on Its Own Merits

Maimonides: The Ninth Principle and Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, Chapter 9

A Heavenly Voice, Beit Hillel, Teiku, and Responsa from Heaven

Tractate Eduyot, Decision by Vote, and the Struggle between Tradition and the Non-Heavenly Character of Halakhic Decision

Full Transcript

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Table of Contents

Summary

General Overview

Opening the Series: Change, Authority, and the Decline of the Generations

Maimonides: The Eighth Principle (Torah from Heaven) and the Meaning of “Speech”

The Binding of Isaac and Rejecting the Reading that Abraham “Failed”

The Scope of “From the Mouth of the Almighty” and Criticism of a Literal Reading

Oral Torah: “Accepted Interpretations” and Supportive versus Creative Derashot

Historical Reduction versus Normative Claim: “As if It Came Down from Sinai”

Formal Authority, the Sanhedrin, and the Gemara as “Ad Hoc” Authority

Authenticity versus Halakhic Ruling: Beit Shammai and Beit Hillel, the Oven of Akhnai, and “It Is Not in Heaven”

Torah-Level and Rabbinic: Not Chronology but Method

Change as Dynamic Tradition and the Fear of Undermining Obligation

Reasoning as an Interpretive Tool and Caution against Mixing in Personal Convenience

The Limits of Change, Electricity on the Sabbath, and the Absence of One Authority

Conservatives and Orthodox: The Dynamism of Jewish Law as a Correct Claim, and Examining Each Case on Its Own Merits

Maimonides: The Ninth Principle and Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, Chapter 9

A Heavenly Voice, Beit Hillel, Teiku, and Responsa from Heaven

Tractate Eduyot, Decision by Vote, and the Struggle between Tradition and the Non-Heavenly Character of Halakhic Decision

Full Transcript

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