Q&A: The Effect of a Transgression
The Effect of a Transgression
Question
Hello Rabbi,
Why does the Torah allow relying on a presumption, when there is a significant chance that I am violating a prohibition? One could say that I did not violate any prohibition at all, because the damage involved in a prohibition exists only when I am aware of it. But it seems that if it later becomes clear that I was mistaken, then there is a prohibition, and perhaps one must bring a sacrifice.
Answer
The rule of presumption is a practical rule for conduct. But once you acted that way, you performed a permitted act. True, if it later becomes clear that you were mistaken, then apparently you violated a prohibition unintentionally. There is no contradiction. You might perhaps ask whether there is value in being stringent even when there is a presumption. Maybe yes.
Discussion on Answer
I do not understand what happens in the "worlds." They say that if you acted permissibly, there is no blemish. This could be discussed at length, but this is not the place.
I did not suspect your honor of knowing what is done in the upper worlds,
but from the fact that someone who acts based on the instruction of a religious court, in a case where not all of the Jewish people sinned, brings a sacrifice, it seems that some kind of blemish occurs even though the person is not at fault at all.
So I did not understand the Torah, which permits relying on a presumption, even where the presumption has a major flaw.
Does it not care about the blemish?
Perhaps we should say that since it is possible to repair the blemish by means of a sacrifice, then he will repair it through a sacrifice,
and in a prohibition for which there is no sacrifice, there really is no blemish.
That assumption is really not necessary. The sacrifice could come as education, or to underscore the gravity of transgressions, and not necessarily to repair some blemish that occurred.
It is clear to me that the act is permitted,
just that my starting assumption is that a transgression
is something that has a certain kind of problematic effect, some sort of blemish in the worlds,
and that part is not so clear to me — whether the damage is done
even in a case where I relied on a presumption.
So why did the Torah permit it? And if no damage is done,
then why is there a problem after the fact?