Avodah Mailing List

Volume 36: Number 2

Wed, 03 Jan 2018

• 1. Re: Historicity of Aggadta (Micha Berger)
• 2. Re: Historicity of Aggadta (H Lampel)
• 3. Na'ar hayisi... (was Re: The Protection Offered by a Mezuza) (Jonathan Traum)
• 4. Re: truth telling (Akiva Miller)
• 5. Re: FW: Rav Moshe on Smoking (Akiva Miller)
• 6. Birchat Cohanim (M Cohen)
• 7. Re: FW: Rav Moshe on Smoking (Zev Sero)
• 8. Re: FW: Rav Moshe on Smoking (Akiva Miller)
• 9. Re: Historicity of Aggadta (Micha Berger)
• 10. Re: Merchavyah (Akiva Miller)
• 11. Re: truth telling (Rich, Joel)
• 12. Re: Historicity of Aggadta (Mandel, Seth)

On Mon, Jan 01, 2018 at 09:55:13PM -0500, H Lampel via Avodah wrote:
: Fortunately, there is a parallel passage in the Rambam's Hakdama 
: L'Payrush HaMishna that eliminates the mistake that he means that /all 
: the words of the sages/ are really intended only to convey lofty 
: matters. There he phrases the thought:
: 
:     V-al inyan zo ramaz Shlomo b-amro (Mishlei 1:6) "lehavin mashal
:     umelitza, divrei chachamim vechidasam." Umachmas seebos eilu kav-u
:     haChachamim a"h /ess divreihem be-inyanim elokiyim/ beramazim.
: 
:     And to this idea Shlomo hinted/indicated by saying (Mishlei1:6) "to
:     understand mashal and melitza, the words of wise men and their
:     chiddos." And for these reasons (to hide lofty teachings from the
:     undeserving, and to provide material for children and women to
:     develop as their minds mature) the sages, a"h, established their
:     words /concerning inyanim elokiyyim/ [not "all their words"--ZL]
:     through remazim.
: 
: What kind of remazim? The Rambam there elaborates and explains further: 
: /Lofty concepts/ are too precious to be shared with everyone...

IOW, every story that is a remez encapsulates some inuanim elokiyim.

Which for all we know could be every aggadic story. There is no reason
to insist one way or the other for any story.

Yes, the Rambam personally concluded that some stories, eg one version
of Avraham's biography, or the story of dor Enosh, ought to be taken
literally. But not because of any general rule about stories that don't
violate nature or reason. Because they have enough value as-is for the
Rambam to believe they were told for a valuable historical lesson.

Limiting the set of nimshalim says nothing about the set of meshalim.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Good decisions come from experience;
mi...@aishdas.org        Experience comes from bad decisions.
http://www.aishdas.org                - Djoha, from a Sepharadi fable
Fax: (270) 514-1507

On 1/1/2018 10:31 PM, Micha Berger wrote:
> V-al inyan zo ramaz Shlomo b-amro (Mishlei 1:6) "lehavin mashal
> :     umelitza, divrei chachamim vechidasam." Umachmas seebos eilu kav-u
> :     haChachamim a"h/ess divreihem be-inyanim elokiyim/  beramazim.
> :
> :     And to this idea Shlomo hinted/indicated by saying (Mishlei1:6) "to
> :     understand mashal and melitza, the words of wise men and their
> :     chiddos." And for these reasons (to hide lofty teachings from the
> :     undeserving, and to provide material for children and women to
> :     develop as their minds mature) the sages, a"h, established their
> :     words/concerning inyanim elokiyyim/  [not "all their words"--ZL]
> :     through remazim.
> :
> : What kind of remazim? The Rambam there elaborates and explains further:
> :/Lofty concepts/  are too precious to be shared with everyone...
>
> IOW, every story that is a remez encapsulates some inuanim elokiyim.
>
> Which for all we know could be every aggadic story. There is no reason
> to insist one way or the other for any story.
It cannot be every aggadic story. The Rambam is clear (and I thought I 
made that clear) that the remazim he ascribes inyanim elokiyim to are 
specifically implausibles, to keep the concepts hidden form base people 
and to give women and youth material to understand when they develop 
enough to comprehend them. If they are not implausible, they are not 
hidden from the wrong people, and are not inyanim elokiyyim.

And then there are the other points I made.

Zvi Lampel

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On 12/25/2017 03:30 PM, Micha Berger wrote:
> You remind me of a problem I have saying a particular line of Tehillim
> (37:25) with kavanah, and it comes up at the appendix to bentching,
> "Naar hayisi..." But I have seen a tzadiq whose kids miss meals and have
> to beg. Haven't you?
A good explanation I heard is that the "I" of the passuk isn't me, the 
person reciting it, but rather David HaMelech who wrote it. David had 
the wherewithal to see to it that no tzaddik (or at least, none that he 
was made aware of) would not be taken care of. We say the passuk to 
remind us that although we may not have the same resources that he had, 
we must still do what we can.

Jonathan

.

R' Joel Rich asked:

> Thought experiment: As a community, assume we know that we
> could tell a particular non truth to our children and X%
> would stay frum but if we told them the truth (X ? Y)% would
> stay frum. At what values of X and Y (if any) would being
> not truthful be required and/or preferred?

Please note that his precise question contrasts telling a non-truth vs
telling the truth. In the real world one also has the option of
silence, and this is a critical point.

Withholding a truth is very different than telling a non-truth.

(1) Megilla 25 lists several parshios which may be read publicly, but
only without the Targum, for various reasons. And then there's another
category of parshios that may not be read publicly at all. (2) Chagiga
2:1 ("Ain Dorshin") lists certain topics that may be taught only in
small groups, and others that may not be taught at all, even
one-on-one.

The l'maaseh application of those rules can be discussed another time.
My point for now, is that we seem to have strong precedent for the
withholding of certain truths.

In contrast, telling a non-truth could constitute Ziyuf HaTorah, a
falsification of the Torah, which I have heard to be a Y'hareg V'al
Yaavor. There are many examples of this, but the one that comes to
mind is Megilla 9a, where they were forced to translate the Torah into
Greek. The Gemara shows that they made some minor changes, but none of
them were blatant falsifications of the Torah.

So my answer to RJR would be that his thought experiment will not
occur in reality. It is not a binary choice of telling a truth or
telling a fiction. There are many approaches in the middle, such that
one can craft his speech into something positive. (If RJR disagrees,
then please give a more concrete example.)

Akiva Miller

.
R' Zev Sero wrote:
> One has to wonder, then, why he never chose to include this in
> any of the three volumes of IM that he published after this date.

I was wondering this too. I suspect the answer to be this: The
posthumous volumes were created not only from notes that his family
found around the house and beis medrash, but mostly from personal
teshuvos that outsiders mailed to the family. It could well be that
Rav Moshe did indeed change his mind, but left no written evidence to
that effect, except for a very few private teshuvos (perhaps only one)
that had not been sent to the family until now.

Akiva Miller

..One is in Eretz Yisrael and dovens shacharis in a minyan which often does
not have Cohanim to duchen. Is he required to seek a minyan which has
Cohanim? If he isn't required, is it preferable?

Certainly not required. Otherwise it would asur for that reason alone to
skip minyan and doven b'yechidus in EY. Even to doven Neitz b'yechidus wbe
asur. And I don't see this issue mentioned in the poskim that discuss the
req't to doven with a minyan

..If he isn't required, is it preferable?
It w seem so. A brocha from Hashem is a very valuable thing.
(if you can't go, then it w be no different than pple in the fields that do
get the brocha even though they are not in shul)

Mordechai Cohen




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On 02/01/18 06:49, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
> .
> R' Zev Sero wrote:
>> One has to wonder, then, why he never chose to include this in
>> any of the three volumes of IM that he published after this date.

> I was wondering this too. I suspect the answer to be this: The
> posthumous volumes

Are irrelevant.  I did not ask or wonder about them.


-- 
Zev Sero            A prosperous and healthy 2018 to all
z...@sero.name       Seek Jerusalem's peace; may all who love you prosper

Hmm... You're right. I didn't notice that it was dated Elul 1971.

Akiva Miller



On Jan 2, 2018 3:17 PM, "Zev Sero" <z...@sero.name> wrote:

> On 02/01/18 06:49, Akiva Miller via Avodah wrote:
>
>> .
>> R' Zev Sero wrote:
>>
>>> One has to wonder, then, why he never chose to include this in
>>> any of the three volumes of IM that he published after this date.
>>>
>>
> I was wondering this too. I suspect the answer to be this: The
>> posthumous volumes
>>
>
> Are irrelevant.  I did not ask or wonder about them.
>
>
> --
> Zev Sero            A prosperous and healthy 2018 to all
> z...@sero.name       Seek Jerusalem's peace; may all who love you prosper
>
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(To catch up RSM, who I CC-ed, RZL and I are arguing about how to
understand the Rambam's position on the historicity of aggadita.
The part I could use your help with is in his description of the
3td kat. See below.)

On Mon, Jan 01, 2018 at 09:55:13PM -0500, H Lampel via Avodah wrote:
: You are saying that Rambam repeated in a historic context the Talmud's 
: plausible reports of events principally for "a literal point worth 
: making," and not because he assumed them to be actual historical 
: events? But surely you agree that the Rambam? recorded Chazal's reports 
: of the Chanuka victory and oil miracle (Hilchos Chanuka 1-3)...

Thinking about your example for a minute: The story of the Chanukah oil
might not be an aggadic story, as the chiyuv of pirsumei nisa is impossible
without knowing the neis. This is the same reason the Rambam records the
story in the Yad, no?

: https://www.torahmusings.com/2017/01/avraham-finding-hashem-spreading-word/ 

I fail to see the relevency of any of this first piece of your post. You
are arguing as thought I said that the Rambam concidered EVERY aggadic
story ahistorical.

What I said was, according to the Rambam none of them were repeated for
the sake of history. Which then leaves the matter of historicity open
to personal opinion.

I have gone further and noted the implication of the notion that history
isn't the point of the story that spending all this time worried about
historicity is itself against the Rambam's description of what medrash
is about. We shouldn't even bother honing a position about when a
medrashic story is historical or not; Chazal didn't care that much, why
should we?

...
: And I refer you again to my point(posted Tue, 26 Dec 201, Message 10) 
: about the Rambam's felt need to identify which aggadic reports were 
: really reports of dreams and which were not...

He felt a need to reassure the rationalist that his mesorah isn't teaching
things that were disproven philosophically.

: But you are going even further than saying the Rambam did /not say/ that 
: plausible medrashim should beassumed to be literal history. You go on to 
: imply that he indicates the principal intent in all historical reports 
: is for their deepest truths, and that the historical veracity of even 
: plausible medrashim is irrelevant.

Which presupposes your answer on the question you raise next:

:      l'fi shedivrei hachachamim kulam /bedevarim ha-elyonim she-heim 
:      hatachlis/ amnam heim chiddah umashal.

Me, as correctly summarized by RZL:
:     "for /all the words of the sages/ are about lofty matters, which 
:     form the ultimate concern, but they are [all expressed through] chiddah 
:     and mashal."
 
RZL's take:
:     for the words of all the wise men /concerning the lofty matters,
:     which form the ultimate concern,/ are truly [expressed in] chiddah
:     and mashal.

Hachakhamim kulam = all the wise men? Wouldn't that need a "kol", as in
"kol hachakhamim", or for emphasis, "kol hachakhamim kulam"?

And what do you do with the prepositional "be-" in "be'inyanim ha'elyonim"
if it isn't "kulam be'inyanim ha'elyanim" -- there is no noun afterward
either.

And "amnam" is not "are truly" but "but they are".

(Side-note: I believe "tachlis" here refers to THE ultimate concern. As
in, out tachlis as human beings, lefi shitaso.)

So, I CC-ed RSM, in case he has time to check the original Judeo-Arabic
for us.

Let's go back to haqdamah to Cheileq, since your quote is only of part of
what I discussed. Earlier in the description of the 3rd kat the Rambam
talks about "mimah shenimtzah bikhlal, divreihem morim al inyanim
amitiyum me'od".

You agree that mashal is the way of communicating deep stuff -- but it's
ALL deep stuff.

(To the Rambam, apparently, someone who qualifies as a Mishlei-style
chakham wouldn't be discussing anything else. Remez typifies "divrei
Chakhamim".)

But let's go on with your parallel passage:
: Fortunately, there is a parallel passage in the Rambam's Hakdama 
: L'Payrush HaMishna that eliminates the mistake that he means that /all 
: the words of the sages/ are really intended only to convey lofty 
: matters. There he phrases the thought:
: 
:     V-al inyan zo ramaz Shlomo b-amro (Mishlei 1:6) "lehavin mashal
:     umelitza, divrei chachamim vechidasam." Umachmas seebos eilu kav-u
:     haChachamim a"h /ess divreihem be-inyanim elokiyim/ beramazim.
: 
:     And to this idea Shlomo hinted/indicated by saying (Mishlei1:6) "to
:     understand mashal and melitza, the words of wise men and their
:     chiddos." And for these reasons (to hide lofty teachings from the
:     undeserving, and to provide material for children and women to
:     develop as their minds mature) the sages, a"h, established their
:     words /concerning inyanim elokiyyim/ [not "all their words"--ZL]
:     through remazim.

Except that what makes it into aggadita IS inyanim elokiyim, and not
their discussion of snake gestation periods for the scientific value
of it.

In any case, the copy at http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/mahshevt/hakdama/6-2.htm
continues after the quote from Mishlei with:
    Umipenei eilu hasibos, sideru hachakhamim a"h divreihem bidrashos
    al inyan sheyarchikahu sekhel hakesil lefi machavto.

It happens not to have anything about inyanim elokiyim. Just that they
are teachings fools will misunderstand so badly that they would be better
off not being given misleading hints.

But again, to really get to this topic, that diyuq is irrelevent
because to get to our point we don't need sources about the topics of
the nimshalim. We need sources from the Rambam saying they ever write
in the gemara anything but those topics, and thus there could be stories
that needn't be of the mashal - nimshal sort.

AND, we need to separate the question of what is mashal from what is
historic. After all, a historical story could be retold for its mashal
value.

In fact, I am saying it always is; which is why we can't pick out the
historical vs ahistorical by any rule. Nor should we be worried overly
much about the question.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The goal isn't to live forever,
mi...@aishdas.org        the goal is to create so mething that will.
http://www.aishdas.org
Fax: (270) 514-1507

.

I asked why so many Tanachs and Siddurim print "merchavyah" as two
words, when the Gemara clearly says that it is one word. (Or at least,
that's how RSR Hirsch reads that gemara.)

R' Zev Sero answered:
> For one thing, the Keter Aram Tzovah has it as two words.

Someone else (offlist) gave me that same answer, so I clearly failed
to phrase my question clearly. Let's try again...

I acknowledge that this question is a legitimate one; after all, it
was asked by the Gemara itself. Further, I do not want to cast
aspersions on the Baalei Mesorah.

But, l'maaseh, someone who is publishing *must* choose to print it one
way or the other. Why would someone nowadays choose to follow the
manuscripts rather than an almost-unanimous opinion in the gemara?

I concede that the Baalei Mesorah were experts in their field. What I
can't "wrap my head around" is the idea that we would follow them, and
cast aside the psak of R Yochanan, Rav, and Raba. Was their expertise
less than that of Ben Asher?

Akiva Miller

> 
> Withholding a truth is very different than telling a non-truth.
> (Snip)
> 
> So my answer to RJR would be that his thought experiment will not
> occur in reality. It is not a binary choice of telling a truth or
> telling a fiction. There are many approaches in the middle, such that
> one can craft his speech into something positive. (If RJR disagrees,
> then please give a more concrete example.)
> 
> -2--////-////
Agree but it can also mislead. So if ur child comes home and asks about the
proof based on the Torah listing all the 4 animals that have only one
kosher sign and u say nothing.....or his rabbi told him dinosaurs didn't
exist.	U can craft answers but istm as a society many subgroups don't. 
Kt
Joel rich
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I don't know why he divides your and his translation into stanzas.
The Rambam does not divide it in the original, unlike in the Mishneh
Torah, which he deliberately divided into halokhos (which the printers
messed up). But you should know is that the Rambam's Arabic here is
a pleasure to read, precisely written but with no super-erudite words,
and his flow of his argument is crystal clear. If the arguments are about
whether the Rambam is claiming that no aggadta is historically accurate,
it is the flow of the arguments that answers that question conclusively,
not just this sentence. This sentence, from the Arabic, would be:

    "because what all the scholars (or: those with wisdom) say concerning
    these elevated (or: sublime) matters, which is the ultimate goal,
    is indeed metaphor and allegory."

But the context and the line of arguments of the Rambam makes it clear
that anyone who takes aggadta just as historical fact is a fool because
everything in Aggadta is meant to teach a lesson. I believe that the
Rambam would say it is unimportant if it really happened, because Chazal
are not interested in telling historical facts.

Could it have happened that way? Perhaps, but to Chazal that is
irrelevant. They are using Aggadta as metaphor and allegory to talk
about complex things and teach moral lessons, just as Shlomo haMelekh
did b'Ruach haQodesh in Shir haShirim an Mishlei and parts of Qohelet,
as the Rambam says in the very next sentence. There he is explaining why
Chazal always used metaphor and allegory to teach some things, Mussar,
and he says they learned it from how Shlomo haMelekh did it.

So according to Chazal, there never was an actual man and actual woman
in Shir haShirim, it was all a beautiful metaphor. Could there have been
a man and a woman? Why does that matter, just as it did not matter to
Chazal in Aggadta whether the allegory they are using actually occurred
historically.

Chazal are not interested in teaching history.

However, the Geonim had a tradition that some things that Chazal say are
historical, and these are the things that the Rambam quotes, such as
the story of Chanukka. He does not quote the allegories unless he is
using them for his purposes. He also states things that he believes
are historical, such as how AZ developed at the beginnings of Hilkhot
AZ. But even there, he is telling what the reason tells us what happened,
as confirmed by some remarks of Chazal, and he is not really interested
in the dates.

In another section of Perush haMishnayot, he says that just telling over
history is something that may be in the category of "d'vorim b'telim,"
unless you are telling it with a purpose in mind.

Rabbi Dr. Seth Mandel
Rabbinic Coordinator
The Orthodox Union


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