Q&A: Our Sages of Blessed Memory
Our Sages of Blessed Memory
Question
If you think that the Sages of blessed memory were mistaken in much of scientific wisdom, and you also don’t see value in aggadic literature (which they certainly did value, of course, since they occupied themselves with it), and your whole way of looking at them is as if they were just ordinary human beings like you and me, etc. and so on—then why do you value them at all, and why do you feel bound by the Talmud?
Answer
They were flesh-and-blood human beings, like me and like you. That does not mean they were simple or ordinary people. It only means they were not angels and not prophets.
Their authority does not stem from their wisdom, but from the fact that we accepted the Talmud upon ourselves. See Kesef Mishneh, beginning of chapter 2 of the Laws of Rebels, and elsewhere.