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I don’t have any need to bicker about what you said or didn’t said. If you agree we should treat him as an apikores, that’s good enough for my purposes.
I’m not sure what you mean. Are you saying that people put words into my words based on the context, or are you saying that that is what I actually said/meant?
The former (I won’t pretend to know what you meant better than you do), but I’m also trying to help you understand how I think that happened.
As far as that second point is concerned, what I tried to tell you earlier is that the fact that the accepted psak in klal Yirsroel is that certain beliefs are apikorsus is proof that they are false. Hashem does not insist that we believe in things which are not true. He would not allow Halacha l’maaseh to develop in such a way that one would be liable to be punished for believing something which is true. Hence, the fact that we pasken (through normative halachic means) that Moshiach will come, is proof that he will. There is indeed dissonance in the position that believing a truism is heresy, hence, we entirely disbelieve the rejected opinion.
“He would not allow Halacha l’maaseh to develop in such a way that one would be liable to be punished for believing something which is true”
That’s assuming that there can be a psak halacha l’maaseh.
But for the moment if I grant that there can be a psak, what happened before the psak was accepted? If you say that everyone was excused then there was no need for a psak. Besides it doesn’t really make too much sense because according to this we are worse off now that there is a psak – before the psak everyone could just believe what they thought but now they would be apikorsim. Also it sounds as if you are saying that it would be impossible for the wrong psak to be accepted. Do you know of any source for such an idea? And if people had tried to make the opposite psak become accepted what would happen?
That’s assuming that there can be a psak halacha l’maaseh.
I thought we agreed that Yanklowitz is definitely an apikores. That’s only true if we pasken that way.
Do you know of any source for such an idea?
I think your kasha night be a good enough source.
And if people had tried to make the opposite psak become accepted what would happen?
They would not have succeeded. Hashem is more powerful than people.
“I think your kasha night be a good enough source.”
No because there is a much simpler answer: There cannot be any mandated-on-pain-of-heresy beliefs if the Gemara did not record a unanimous tradition on the matter (which obviously the Rambam disagrees with). (I’m not saying that this is what I actually believe.)
“They would not have succeeded. Hashem is more powerful than people”
I understand that he is more powerful, but that doesn’t mean he would take away their choice.
No because there is a much simpler answer: There cannot be any mandated-on-pain-of-heresy beliefs if the Gemara did not record a unanimous tradition on the matter
But we don’t pasken like your simpler answer.
I understand that he is more powerful, but that doesn’t mean he would take away their choice.
It does, considering the untenable alternative.
“But we don’t pasken like your simpler answer”
But according to my answer there is no such thing as paskening.
Right, so the fact that we do disqualify people as apikorsim proves that wrong.
Or it proves that you shouldn’t disqualify people
We are going in circles. We pasken that we do disqualify people. We don’t drink the wine of a kofer, or eat from his shechita, etc.
Are you denying this? Are you trying to change it? Or, was popa right, and you’re just trying to be contrariant?
“The Maggid Shiur you mentioned who lambasts Daas Torah based on his Rebbi’s final decision (and who quotes his Rebbe reverently about all types of non-Torah topics), also holds that when it comes to the 13 principles there is a Psak, for some reason”
Obviously there are people today who say that there is a psak. He quotes his Rebbe reverently but that doesn’t mean that he agrees wih him on everything (although that is really more relevant to the Daas Torah thread). Also, for the record, I have never heard him say that there is a psak (and I’ve listened to a bunch of his shiurim). Do you have a specific place where he says this, or are you just assuming?
I am not discussing what the minhag haolam is to do. I am discussing what the halacha should be to do. According to many non-Rambamists, we would trust them. Again it depends on the specific case and the person’s intent, so don’t bring up anything about this particular individual. I don’t know anything about him. He might be an apikores but I don’t know and therefore I won’t offer an opinion on the matter.
PAA: What DY is saying is actually very Mistaber and, moreover, removes your question. If we assume that once there is a consensus on an Ikkar Emunah that that means that HKBH would not have allowed a wrong view to become consensus and, therefore, the consensus view is the right one, there is nothing wrong with having argued before the consensus. Yes, those arguing may have been wrong in an Ikkar Emunah, but it wasn’t K’firah because they had no proof that they were wrong. It’s a Machlokes in a M’tziyus that they could not be M’varer, so the Machlokes stands. Nowadays, though, that we know the M’tziyus (by virtue of the consensus), arguing on the M’tziyus of an Ikkar Emunah would be Apikorsus.
(That being said, I don’t know that the Chazon Ish having a Shittah and every 5th-7th grade Rebbe teaching the Chazon Ish and ignoring the other Shittos counts as a consensus, which is what basically happened with a few of the opinions about some Ikkarei Emunah in the last 50 years. But everyone agrees that belief in Mashiach is an Ikkar Emunah, so that’s not relevant here.)
“If we assume that once there is a consensus on an Ikkar Emunah that that means that HKBH would not have allowed a wrong view to become consensus”
Even according to what you guys are saying, before the consensus, there are no taynas on someone who got it wrong. So you can’t use the fact that there is a consensus as a proof to who is right on the basis that HKBH would never let the consensus be wrong, because there wouldn’t be any problem if the consensus would be wrong – it would be the same as those who were wrong before the consensus.
In other words, your whole hechrech is that it is inconceivable that HKBH would allow the consensus to hold of heretical views yet that is not actually so inconceivable because there wouldn’t be any taynas on them for having the heretical views.
I don’t think before and after are the same; we are not merely talking about which beliefs are right or wrong, we are talking about which beliefs are forbidden.
It is inconceivable that it is forbidden to believe the truth.
I never said that it would be forbidden to believe the truth; just that the hechrech for why the consensus has to be correct is not a hechrech because even if the consensus was wrong and everyone believed the wrong thing they would be no worse than those before the consensus.
PAA, like I said — stop with your lawerly convoluted arguments. Admit the truth.
“We Pasken the belief is Apikorsus, with all of the practical results that come from that Psak. Who really cares what the objective reality is?”
Because then it can come out that you have to beleive be’emuna shelaima something which is false, and the knowledge of this possibility almost by definition makes emuna sheleima impossible.
I never said that it would be forbidden to believe the truth
You didn’t say it, but it is the effect of your position.
Gavra, I agree with PAA’s response to you.
??? ????? ???? ??? ?? ??????? ?? ???????
Even more, though, I don’t think it’s conceivable that HKB”H would command us to believe something which isn’t true, even were it possible. The tanur is tamei or tahor based on the decision if the rabbim. It might be possible to say this about Moshiach (the psak “forces” Him to bring Moshiach), but not about whether he has a ???.
“You didn’t say it, but it is the effect of your position”
No it’s not. It’s the effect of gavra’s position. The effect of my position is that anything that is known to be true via a unanimous tradition can be an obligatory belief, and regarding anything else, (if you want to avoid the possibility of H’ allowing you to get messed over) you are safe.
PAA,
Why does it need to be unanimous? We have a halachic process which leads to accepted psak, even universal, despite a position not having been always unanimous.
Gavra,
If it’s possible to not be objectively true, it’s impossible to believe that it is definitely objectively true.
Unless you’re saying that the chiyuv isn’t to believe that it’s objectively true, rather, that the chiyuv is to believe that I’m mechuyav to believe it. That makes no sense, though.
And I disagree about the tanur. I don’t think there’s a “klapai shmaya galya” about the objective reality the same way there is on ???.
PAA, in fact the Gemorah says that R’Hillel needs forgiveness for what he said. It was not just stam an error.
DY: I disagree here also. If the Rambam didn’t take such a prominent place in philosophical history in Yiddishkeit, it’s entirely possible that standard Jewish thought would be quasi-corporealist (certainly Mekubalim would have a much easier time than just calling everything a Mashal, when concepts like Shiur Komah and Heichalot are relatively prominent). Most of Kaballah is probably K’firah according to the Rambam anyway. The point is that as history moves on, Judaism has had beliefs that are accepted and aren’t accepted. The Rambam changed what those are (quite drastically if you were an Ashkenazi), and we have slowly changed away from some of the Rambam’s. Which is fine. We are Noheg what we assume to be acceptable beliefs, which is how we can “Pasken” on these Inyanim and why those Psakim aren’t necessarily K’vuim L’olam Va’ed. (Someday maybe I’ll tell the story about the Rav from Lakewood who thought that Spinoza’s theology of pantheism was closer to Emes than K’firah.) This is what PAA refuses to acknowledge. He thinks if something was ever not-K’firah, then it has to remain not-K’firah L’olam Va’ed. You are the opposite extreme. You think the definitions of K’firah always remain the same but the P’sak about them sometimes can change (e.g. before a consensus is reached). P’shat is probably like GAW. There is an objective M’tziyus. If we’re being honest we have to admit that there is some dispute as to what it is. However, we are not obligated (nor are we capable) to discover it. We believe the current consensus of what K’lal Yisrael has accepted throughout the generations because to do otherwise would be to be Motzi ourselves from K’lal Yisrael. And if it turns out that the minority opinions (which have since been rejected) were correct on some Ikkarei Emunah, that’s okay. HKBH doesn’t expect us to discover the M’tziyus when we have no ability to do so. He expects us to do what we can.
As far as I know, the only Rishon whose Shittah precludes any Machlokes in matters regarding Ikkarei Emunah (sort of, he has two different types of Ikkarim in this regard) is the Rambam’s. Needless to say, we don’t hold like him in that regard.
I don’t know what the hypothetical possibility of a navi greater than MRA”H has to do with this.
That is hypothetically possible, just not true. It it not possible, even hypothetically, for Hashem to have a guf (although this is a side point). And, no, I don’t need to prove it, and I haven’t, but I need to reject any other possibility in order to fully believe it.
Hypothetically and possibly are two different things. I could hypothetically be a billionaire, but it’s not possible that I am. As far as I’m concerned, it is possible that you are.
Back to Hashem’s non-corporeality; even if it were hypothetically true (and I don’t think so, because Hashem’s essence is what it is and cannot be different), I must believe it’s not possible to be true. Once I accept the possibility, meaning the legitimacy of another opinion, my belief is not “sheleimah”.
I think tanur shel achnai is actually useful as a contrast. Even if there is an “actual reality” in terms of “klapai shmaya galya” (and in a sense there is; I’m kind of nitpicking on the terminology, and I think it’s an interesting discussion on its own, but I’ll agree not to disagree, at least for now), there is no chiyuv to believe it, so I can accept the possibility that klapai shmaya galya it’s one way, but since lo bashamayim hee, we practice differently.
When it comes to the halachic aspect of “Who is an Apikores?”, it’s the same, the problem is that it’s also a chiyuv to believe. I could accept the notion that halacha could dictate that I treat someone a certain way despite a “klapai shmaya galya” to treat him differently. However, in the realm of belief, it is simply impossible for me to accept that Hashem wants me to believe something which is not true.
“Why does it need to be unanimous?”
Because otherwise we have no way of knowing definitively that it is true. Amid great trepidation I would go a step further and say that my answer has to be right because since you can’t prove definitively your idea about H’ forcing the psak to reflect the truth, that means that there is always a possibility that my answer is right and therefore there is a possibility that anything (that there is a machlokes on) is incorrect and therefore it becomes impossible to have emuna sheleima in any disputed matter.
Gavra:
It’s very simple. Do you claim that you can definitively believe something to be absolutely true while still acknowledging the possibility that it might be false?
Sam, I think I hear what you’re saying, but I think we run into a roadblock, which I’ll repeat (but subdivide for clarity):
I think it is:
A) logically impossible to unequivocally believe something when you know your opinion may change (stirah minei ubei)
B) “theologically” (for lack of a better word) untenable to accept that the ratzon Hashem is for us to unequivocally believe something which is not true.
I just don’t see how to get past these, once we pasken that there is a chiyuv to believe.
“PAA, in fact the Gemorah says that R’Hillel needs forgiveness for what he said. It was not just stam an error”
That is an entire discussion in it’s own right. What did he need forgiveness for? Pashtus of the Gemara is that what he did wrong is that he went against the nevuah of Zecharia. The Gemara doesn’t mention anything about him violating an ikkur. If that is the case then it has no bearing on any other case where there is no explicit nevuah. If he needs forgiveness for the actual belief then that would disprove the psak thesis because R’ Hillel did nothing wrong if it hadn’t been paskened yet.
“This is what PAA refuses to acknowledge. He thinks if something was ever not-K’firah, then it has to remain not-K’firah L’olam Va’ed”
It depends what you mean by that. I definitely say that the objective truth of any of the matters can never change. If you just mean that something can become labeled as kefira even though it might not be kefira then I might agree somewhat (see my past posts).
“And if it turns out that the minority opinions (which have since been rejected) were correct on some Ikkarei Emunah, that’s okay. HKBH doesn’t expect us to discover the M’tziyus when we have no ability to do so. He expects us to do what we can.”
In which case there is no point in labeling somewhat an apikores if he really thinks that he has the Torah truth.
I think DaasYochid and I actually agree on something – namely the impossibility of completely believing something you simultaneously acknowledge as not necessarily true.
If he needs forgiveness for the actual belief then that would disprove the psak thesis because R’ Hillel did nothing wrong if it hadn’t been paskened yet.
Not necessarily; there may have been some flaw in his thought process (you suggested going against the nevuah, but it could be something different).
PAA: In theory. But such a person would have to be a Bar Hachi of disagreeing and be able to give Ra’ayos to defend it. Joe Schmoe can’t come off the street and say he wants to Pasken like a rejected opinion. R’ Shteinman can prove why a rejected opinion might not be K’firah. Shmuely Yanklowitz can’t. And certainly not in this case where he just asserts it and doesn’t even attempt to give a Torah backing to his opinion.
PAA and DY: “Emunah Sh’leimah” is just a phrase they put in the Siddur. The Chiyuvim (which differ slightly by each Ikkar because some Ikkarim lend themselves to absolute proof/knowledge more than others) are to believe they are true, whether or not we can contrive hypotheticals to the contrary.
Gavra,
I don’t see any reason why the RBSO could not expect us to follow the rules as put out by Him, to whatever conclusions that those rules lead us. In fact, that is the core of what “Lo BaShomayim He” requires from us.
I don’t see how that shtims with your agreement with me on point “a”.
I think we are splitting hairs. One can believe (and that requires the exclusion of all other possibilities), while still noting that if not for the belief, the hypothetical possibility of the opposite of such belief does exist. That does not make the opposite belief “legitimate”.
Agreed. The fact that I think His non-corporeality isn’t even hypothetically true is not related to the argument at hand. It’s a side point.
PAA,
and therefore it becomes impossible to have emuna sheleima in any disputed matter
Correct, which is the point which proves you wrong, since Hashem does not demand the impossible from us. Again, ??? ????? ???? ??? ?? ??????? ?? ???????.
I think DaasYochid and I actually agree on something – namely the impossibility of completely believing something you simultaneously acknowledge as not necessarily true.
Absolutely, we’re just drawing vastly different conclusions.
Gavra,
“A” I agree with, “B” I do not.
I think “A” should be enough for you to agree with my essential argument, cf. this post:
IOW, you should be agreeing with my chilluk between issues of emunah vs. other halachos.
“Correct, which is the point which proves you wrong, since Hashem does not demand the impossible from us. Again, ??? ????? ???? ??? ?? ??????? ?? ???????.”
It doesn’t prove me wrong because according to me everyone would have the status that people before the psak had according to you.
Gavra and Sam (and maybe DY but I think he already agrees with this):
Let’s use mashiach as a simple example. If you agree that there is no way to determine the objective reality of whether there will be a Mashiach (and assuming there was no nevuah or unanimous tradition) how would you believe that Mishiach will come. If you acknowledge that there is a deiah that there won’t be mashiach, and you acknowledge that there is no way to determine the reality then the best you can do is to think Mashiach will come or to be more noteh that he will come, but you can’t absolutely believe it.
Does anyone argue with the Ramba”m about what their status is?
DY: Whose status? Apikores Sheta’ah Mitoch Limudo? The Ra’avad certainly does.
Sam, I meant the status of a kofer b’bias goel.
PAA, says kefirah. Enough is enough.
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