What follows from your words:
1. The Hazon Ish, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, Rabbi Lichtenstein, etc., have no advantage over us at all, since our closeness to Mount Sinai is more or less equal to theirs.
2. It is recommended (but not obligatory) to accept the words of the great sages of Israel, especially when there is broad agreement on the matter, such as the World to Come, the coming of the Messiah, divine providence, and more.

1. Rabbi Sh., how did you infer that? That inference suffers from a serious logical fallacy. Wisdom has an advantage, but age and generation do not. The advantage of the Hazon Ish, Rabbi Moshe Feinstein, Rabbi Lichtenstein, etc., is precisely because of their wisdom, not because of the generation in which they lived. In my remarks I am not comparing an ordinary person to a Torah scholar, but Torah scholars from different generations.
2. Indeed, correct: it is recommended (but not obligatory) to accept the words of the great sages of Israel, even when there is broad agreement on the matter, such as the World to Come, the coming of the Messiah, divine providence, and so on. Only what was received from Sinai is authoritative; but reasonings, even those of wise people, can go either way.
As a side note, I would add that in general no one has authority in matters of fact. If I have reached the conclusion that some fact is not true, what good does it do me that all the sages in the world think it is true? At most they may convince me that I am mistaken, but as long as I have not been convinced, authority has no meaning. Authority exists only with respect to norms, because regarding norms one can demand that I do something even if I do not think it is halakhically correct. But no one can demand that I think differently from what I think. Not because it is immoral, but because it is impossible, since that is what I think. Therefore the only question with respect to facts—and all the issues you raised here, redemption, Messiah and the like, are facts—is whether I am convinced they are right or not, not whether they have authority. Take careful note.

1. That is why in the original question I wrote, “no advantage over us, or at least over any top-level scholar today.”
By the way, it would be interesting to examine how many years/generations create a significant difference regarding closeness to Sinai. It sounds to me as though even one hundred years is not much relative to the years since Sinai (about 3%), so the great sages of our time have nothing to fear in disagreeing with the Mishnah Berurah and Arukh HaShulchan, for example. It seems to me that there is a blind spot here, but perhaps it stems from their conception of the decline of the generations as a broad phenomenon.
2. I intentionally gave examples where the Rabbi disagrees with the view held by the overwhelming majority of the sages of Israel, or is at least doubtful. If it is recommended to accept their words, I assume the Rabbi has a good reason that overrides this recommendation. Lack of evidence for the existence of the World to Come, for example, is not a sufficient reason. Rather, it would seem that the Rabbi sees himself as expert enough in these topics and has a very strong gut feeling about them. All this should not be meant to persuade your readers or listeners, since a gut feeling cannot be transmitted—only rational argument can. Still, the impression is that you demand or write in public in order to persuade/teach, and not merely to reveal personal feelings from a diary. In the absence of contrary evidence, and in light of the above recommendation, perhaps fairness would require sharing your view/feelings and then recommending to the public not to accept your words, because from their perspective—where they have no feeling one way or the other, are not expert in the topic, and are not fluent in logic or rational discourse—it is more reasonable that the many, who are closer to Sinai, are right in their dispute with a lone contemporary individual.
3. I hear the logic in what you say, but what can I do when positive commandments 1 and 2 and prohibition 1 in Maimonides command us what to believe and what not to believe? What shall we say—that we were commanded in the commandment of self-persuasion regarding God’s existence?

1. And therefore I answered that indeed there is no difference, and one may disagree with the Mishnah Berurah and Iggerot Moshe without any problem. And even those who do not disagree with them do not necessarily refrain because of their greatness, but because in their view the public accepted the Mishnah Berurah upon itself. Just as the authority of the Sages of the Talmud does not stem from their greatness but from the fact that we accepted them upon ourselves (as the Kesef Mishneh writes at the beginning of chapter 2 of Laws of Rebels).
And you are absolutely right that not every generation creates a difference. We plainly see that tannaim from different generations disagreed with one another, and amoraim from different generations disagreed with one another. But amoraim do not disagree with tannaim, and medieval authorities and geonim do not disagree with amoraim. So you see that periods are sealed off when there arises an assessment that an era has ended and we have lost the intuitive capacity that our predecessors had.
2. I do not have a clear position, and all I claim is a skeptical claim. Since I have no indication that these things were received at Sinai, I see no necessity to accept them. And here it has nothing to do with closeness to Sinai or intuition. Either there is providence or there is not. Either there is a World to Come or there is not. I of course write again and again that my words should not be accepted merely because I said them. I express a position, and whoever wishes and is persuaded may accept it.
3. There are various explanations for this, but even if I had no explanation at all, such commandments are impossible. This is a logical argument, and nothing stands against logic. At most I would remain with the matter unresolved, and say like that amora in Hullin: “By God, even if Joshua son of Nun had said it, I would not obey him.”

But didn’t you teach us, our Rabbi, that there is no certainty in the world at all, and that we must adopt what seems most probable while at the same time being ready to be convinced in the future that we were mistaken?
And therefore, since things like the World to Come stand in broad horizontal agreement (in the present) and vertical agreement (throughout the generations) among the sages of Israel, is that not enough
to adopt the existence of the World to Come as highly plausible? Especially since, as I understand it, there really aren’t substantive arguments against it.

Indeed, except that the question is what is most probable. If many people think so, does that make it true? Why? As long as it is not presented as a law given to Moses at Sinai, I see no necessity to accept it. The argument against it is that there is no way to know such a thing apart from a tradition from Sinai. The very fact that it is convenient to think this way provides fertile ground for claiming that it was invented. But as I said, I do not know about this one way or the other. I am speaking about the very existence of the World to Come. As for the details, it is quite clear to me that they are baseless nonsense.

It’s not just many people. It’s all the sages of Israel throughout the generations, people with strong Torah intuition as mentioned. Add to that traditions from other religions that support the idea. Add to that the immortality of the soul being pointless if there is only this present fleeting world. Add to that extra phrases in verses that the Sages interpreted as referring to the World to Come, and otherwise each one of them has to be explained. Even so, is there still an evenly balanced doubt here?

It does not have to be evenly balanced. But there is significant doubt. Ancient beliefs held many other things too, such as demons and spirits. Do you suggest believing in those as well? Or in the ancient remedies that appear in the Talmud? Since when is agreement a consideration? If it is not a tradition from Sinai, it carries little weight in my eyes.
I can make the considerations about the persistence of the soul on my own, and I do indeed see substance in them. But the added value of agreement among the sages does not exist here.

So Rabbi, are you claiming that the reward will come in this world?
Rabbi, could you explain the statement from Hullin: “By God, even if Joshua son of Nun had said it, I would not obey him”?
Something logically doesn’t work for me. You claim that a law given to Moses at Sinai you accept one hundred percent, but most of the words of our sages in the Mishnah and Talmud you do not necessarily believe are correct. What kind of religion is that? Why did they mostly believe this and you don’t?
I’m sure it’s logical to argue and believe that there is a World to Come. But you remain in doubt? Why?

I did not claim that the reward will come in this world. I do not know what the story is with reward and punishment. In fact, it seems that there is no reward in this world.
The statement from Hullin means exactly what it says: even if Joshua were to say it, I would not accept it. What is unclear here?
I assume that the Holy One, blessed be He, knows what is going on. If He tells me there is a World to Come, I of course accept it. But when people say it—I am not sure I accept it. People can make mistakes in their reasoning. And even if it is logical, I already explained that you accept it because it is logical, not because everyone said it. So there is still no acceptance of authority here.

Regarding the statement I asked about, I wanted to understand the meaning of the word “By God” at the beginning—why was it written? Is it relevant?
We’ve made progress. Suppose I now come to someone who honored his parents for twenty years and then bam, I land a blow straight in his face, he dies on the spot. So that’s it—you agree with me that he won’t receive his reward in this world anymore, right? So he must receive his reward in the World to Come.
You said, “In fact, it seems that there is no reward in this world.”—fine, so they also said “the Holy One, blessed be He, pays the wicked in this world.” It follows from here that there must also be a World to Come. And there must be reward and punishment, and you still don’t know? It’s really logical.
There are thieves, murderers, rapists, and many more—who were never caught and lived many years—so that’s it, they’ll be exempt from punishment because they weren’t caught? Clearly they will pay their due in the World to Come, necessarily, because the Holy One, blessed be He, does justice. And He gives us free choice in this world and offers us to choose the good.
If it is logical, then not because everyone said or believed it, but because the demand of the situation leads to it. See the cases I illustrated.

Moshe, I already answered you on all this. The reasonings do indeed sound sensible, and that is the reason I have a side inclining that it may be true. But we still have not gone beyond mere reasoning. On the contrary, precisely because it sounds so logical, the sages decided it was true, and that strengthens my claim that this conclusion came from their own reasoning and not from tradition. But many arguments can be made in every direction, and no clear conclusions should be drawn from them, and certainly one should not see here a consideration of authority for the words of the sages.
I suggest we stop here.

To the Rabbi,
“Go out and see” is the handling of doubt from the Talmud.
I recall that the Rabbi cited the agreement of Christianity and Islam as support for the argument that there was a revelation at Mount Sinai.
The ancient remedies have not been accepted by the sages of Israel for several generations already.
If the existence of demons and spirits had such broad agreement across and throughout the generations as the World to Come does—which is apparently not the case—then I would definitely incline to accept their existence.

This is mixing apples and oranges. The agreement of Islam and Christianity regarding the revelation at Mount Sinai is broad testimony about a historical event. When there is broad testimony, that gives extra force to the claim that the event occurred. Who ever said otherwise? But if there is broad agreement that demons exist, or that the world is made of earth, wind, water, and fire—the agreement of the whole world from Aristotle through the Middle Ages—what use is that agreement? No one claims to have seen them; they only believe in their existence. The same applies to the World to Come.
Regarding the existence of demons, think about what a sage living in a period when people still believed in demons was supposed to do when he decided to come out against the broad consensus and give up that belief. After all, the current broad consensus that there are no demons is a state that arose as a result of those earlier authorities who decided to abandon this belief without broad agreement—in fact, against the agreement that prevailed in their generation. So your argument defeats itself. It reminds me of what Rabbi Blomtzweig once said, that custom is the solidification of deviation. It begins as a deviation from what is accepted, and then the deviation becomes a binding norm from which one may not deviate.

A custom, in my opinion, is doing something on the basis of something that presents you with data showing that this is what should be done or believed. In other words, the custom changes according to the deviation (because of the data) and becomes fixed. And when the deviation changes again, the custom will no longer be binding..
Rabbi, in connection with which specific custom did Rabbi Blomtzweig say this line?

So in summary, how would you sum up the advantage of our sages?
Like this: so what if our sages said X—I am not obligated to believe it.

Or like this:
I am obligated to believe only God, and if He didn’t say something, then I will remain in doubt until the end of my life.

Or like this:
both.

Every custom is like that. It does not specifically depend on data.

They have no built-in advantage other than the fact that we accepted their authority in the areas of Jewish law. In areas of thought that are factual matters, there is no room to speak of concepts of authority at all.

I completely understand what you’re saying—this requires clarification, not analysis.
It has to be connected to data, Rabbi, because I’m not talking about the customs (manners) of mute animals, whose custom is to chase cats without understanding the essence of a cat or its definition.
Custom is one thing—and belief is another.
When is there no connection between data and custom? Only when the real data are known and the custom still isn’t changed. To me that contradicts the definition of custom you presented, because custom is the solidification of deviation.

If there is no change in the data—there is no deviation. If there is no deviation—no custom is created.
I would summarize it like this:
We believe in the authority of the Sages of the Talmud and their determinations only in purely halakhic matters, whereas regarding facts we are not obligated to accept their authority.—Makes sense, very nice.
Question:
If it were to become clear to us today with certainty that they were mistaken in a certain halakhic ruling whose authority we accepted—what would we do?
I would be glad for some example of an area of factual thought.
Meanwhile, I’ll ask: what category does resurrection of the dead belong to?
What is a built-in advantage?

Whether the Holy One, blessed be He, exercises providence over every creature or only over groups is a factual question. Whether He can or cannot change His mind is a factual question. Almost all questions in Jewish thought are facts. So too the question whether there will be resurrection of the dead, and how.

One needs to define more carefully what it means that it has become clear to us that they erred in Jewish law. After all, “it is not in heaven.” If we are talking about a Jewish law ruling that was established on the basis of a factual mistake, then in my opinion it is void. If it merely seems to me that they interpreted or reasoned incorrectly in plain reasoning, the Talmud has authority even if it erred (and not because it never errs).

I understood that if the Sages of the Talmud erred in a factual basis for Jewish law, then it is void—but how does that get voided? Not everyone has a sensor that can detect this, so how would the publication of the factual error actually happen in practice?
If the Talmud erred, or interpreted something mistakenly, and its authority was given to it even to make mistakes—then what happens? Do we have to live with that mistake?
Once I saw that you made a nice comparison between a rabbi and a doctor, and you said that one should listen to the expert (it is advisable), but let’s say you discovered that the expert was wrong (you researched it, etc.). So what would we now say in comparison to the mistaken rabbi (the amora or tanna)? That we live with the mistake? How does that work? How does the Holy One, blessed be He, solve this? How does He allow the “spiritual doctor” to make mistakes? That is an exceptional burden/overreach.
I understood that “it is not in heaven,” but that we should live with the mistake because they made a mistake—that I did not understand! Where is His providence over His Torah? And His promise that these laws, etc., will not depart (in my own words).
Is this only theoretical?

I already wrote this, and I’ll repeat it again. There is a difference between facts and norms. Incorrect facts are incorrect no matter who said them. Incorrect norms can still obligate, but only because of authority. Thus when the Knesset makes a mistake, its law is still binding because it is a norm. But the Knesset cannot determine that day is night, and even if it does determine that, it will not make it night.
Human beings make mistakes, and there is no promise that the Talmud or the Sanhedrin do not err. What exists is authority despite the mistake.
The comparison between a rabbi and a doctor is correct regarding a rabbi who has no formal authority. There he functions as an expert, and therefore it is advisable to listen to him even though one is not obligated. But the Talmud and the supreme religious court have formal authority, like a legislator, and therefore that applies even if they make a mistake.

What I don’t understand is not that they lack formal authority, but how there is no protection for the formal authority in case future mistakes are discovered, even in a generation far removed from the Talmud.
Why isn’t there a law that would require “correcting” the mistake! After all, even if we only think they are mistaken according to our perspective and our innovative conventions, that’s one thing—but if we live with it, people will laugh at us.

I didn’t understand. The two paragraphs seem like opposites. In my view, there is a law that requires correcting the mistake and not living on the basis of demonstrable mistakes. That is exactly what I said.

Does correcting the mistake, in your opinion, include changing all the Talmud texts in future editions where there are mistakes or inaccurate things?
Who would determine the wording or the omission of the mistaken material?

Why in the world would one correct the text? Since when do we correct mistakes in other people’s books? What would be the point of that?