Sensitivity To Axioms And Values In Torah And Halacha

Absolute, let's take a few minutes to talk about a crucial aspect or dimension of Mitsvas Talmud Torah. In one of his sefarim, Rav Shachter records a maiseh with a rav that he as tachlis considerations necessitated dismissed something someone had said and that person objected that the people who are advocating this are amei haaretz. And someone asked him as a follow-up to that: But some of the people who advocate such and such are they really amei haaretz they've learned so much? And the rav answered that a person can learn all of Shas and still be an am haaretz. So let's try to understand a little bit of what that meant. It's obviously something of primary importance. Obviously Torah, what Torah shebiksav, the pesukim of kaf daled sefarim, whether Torah shebalpeh, Mishnayos, Gemara, they're the pesukim, the Mishnayos, the blatt Gemara. So all those are before our eyes and black on white. But there are also all kinds of axioms, things which are axiomatic to being able to correctly understand and interpret the divrei Torah. There are meta-halachic principles, there are values, at times context, and without an understanding, a sensitivity, an appreciation, and knowing what those axioms are, what those meta-halachic principles are, what those values are, what when relevant is the context? So then a person can takeh, can takeh know Shas, know obviously in quotation marks, and be an am haaretz. I can also be an am haaretz without knowing Shas. It's an easier thing to accomplish. So let's begin with some sort of easier examples to understand and then maybe try to come to what's maybe a little bit more nuanced. The Rambam writes k'midomeh in Iggeres Techiyas Hamesim, I don't remember whether he says he actually met this person or he heard about such people. I think maybe even says he met the person, I don't remember, that there are people who think, and he makes a point of saying people who learn Gemara, who think that unless you believe Rachmana litzlan that Hakadosh Baruch Hu has a body, you're a kofer. Because it says m'forash in the Torah, הנה יד השם הויה במקנך אשר בשדה. If you don't believe the Borei Olam has a body, so then you're a kofer. You're denying what it says in the Torah. So that's an example, an illustration of what we're talking about. There are certain axioms, there are certain things that are understood. If a person is either the recipient of the tradition that Hakadosh Baruch Hu ayino guf or a person understands it on his own, he recognizes that axiom, and because he knows that axiom, so he realizes that obviously all these descriptions... obviously what isn't real but but on on on some imaginary level be be the biggest baki in Tanakh but obviously know nothing if he doesn't know what the axioms are for for correctly understanding and and interpreting a a pasuk. There are some axioms. The Rambam, maybe come to that later. The Rambam has a similar comment in terms of knowing what the axioms are, what the the premises are. He has a similar comment in the Hakdama to Perek Chelek when he describes different schools of thought and different approaches to understanding Aggadeta. And he says there are some people who consider themselves zealous in upholding the Kavod of Chazal and insist on understanding Aggadeta literally. And he says and in fact they they make a mockery of Chazal because by by attributing to Chazal all the absurdities that that emerge from taking Aggadeta literally, so instead of upholding the Kavod of Chazal they they create incredible bizyonos to Chazal to Torah. Again there's an axiom. What one has to know what what language Chazal are speaking and and what the assumptions and what the axioms are in order to interpret the the language. If if someone tells you it's raining cats and dogs outside you usually don't make an emergency call to the dog catcher and I don't know if there is a position of cat catcher you may not be able to do that anyway but there are certain axioms as to what's intended and how things need to be understood and and and without knowing what those axioms are so then all the all the learning is is undermined. In Halakha so there were there were groups who who made the opposite kfiradike error in in interpreting mitzvos in in metaphorical terms and and not in concrete tangible normative forms in the Middle Ages. So a person has to know the axioms of Aggadeta are not necessarily they're not the same as the axioms of what language the Torah and Chazal are talking about in in in Halakha. Within Halakha, Tosafot in Bava Batra asks a a kasha that the Gemara says I think Rashi alludes to it in in the parashat HaTorah that חמש עבירות עבר אותו רשע באותו היום that Eisav was over shfichas damim and and he was ba'al na'arah me'orasah v'chulu v'chulu. So Tosafot asks a kasha but b'nei Noach בעולת בעל יש להם and arusah ein lahem so וואס ווילן מיר פון אים? from Esav that he was boel a na'ara me'orasa. So Tosafos says but mechuar hadavar. In Halacha, a person has to understand the fact that something is technically muttar vis-a-vis a specific issur doesn't mean that it's the right thing to do. It doesn't mean that it isn't al pi Torah mechuar hadavar and categorically wrong and something which beshum ofan va'ofen shouldn't be done. A person learns Mishnayos, he learns, he learns Mishnayos Kiddushin, he goes, he's mekadesh an isha beviah, it's a mishna in Kiddushin. רב מנגיד אמאן דמקדש בביאה. There are all kinds of axioms, there are all kinds of distinctions, there are all kinds of overarching meta-principles, values. To learn Torah means that we strive, again, not only to learn the psukim, not only to learn the Mishnayos, not only to learn the Gemara, but ultimately all of that is teluy ve'omad, all of that hinges upon learning and mastering what's between the lines, what's axiomatic, what's so basic, what's so fundamental it's presumed, it's assumed, recognizing context. You're all familiar with the famous Chazon Ish in Yoreh Deah, so widely quoted, about how there's no din of מורידין ואין מעלין בזמן הזה. So where does it say that? Doesn't say it anywhere. The Chazon Ish understood. The Chazon Ish understood. How did he know it was true there and not true of ela halachos and not true of some of the axioms are more easily understood, grasped and recognized, and others require gadlus to before they become obvious and self-evident. When Tosafos in Chagiga is discussing the question of whether the issur melacha in Chol Hamoed is d'Oraisa or d'Rabbanan. Big machlokes Rishonim. So Rabbeinu Tam is of the opinion that the issur melacha in Chol Hamoed is mi-d'Rabbanan. Okay, so there are diyukim from Gemaras back and forth, but Tosafos quotes Rabbeinu Tam says, היכא מצינו איסור תורה מקצתו אסור ומקצתו מותר? Rabbeinu Tam says it doesn't have the feel of an issur d'Oraisa. Where do you find an issur d'Oraisa that it's muttar for פועל עני שאין לו מה יאכל, it's muttar for davar avud, it's muttar for tzorchei rabbim, it's muttar for tzorchei moed? It's not a din d'Oraisa. It doesn't have the feel of a din d'Oraisa. You learn Torah, it doesn't have the feel of a din d'Oraisa. The story is told of Rav Chaim, perhaps of others as well, but someone quoted Rav Chaim a Tosafos, a Ran, whatever it was, and Rav Chaim said, no such Tosafos. And he said no, no, no, Tosafos says, and Rav Chaim said, no such Tosafos. Obviously the guy checked and was misquoting. So Rav Chaim said, don't think, don't think that I know every Tosafos, you can take that kind of a story with a grain of salt. Don't think that I know every Tosafos, but I know what Tosafos can say and I know what they can't say. I know what a Rishon could say and what a Rishon couldn't say. So again, there are different degrees of understanding and grasping what the axioms are, what the intent is, what can be, what can't be. You borrow the car and your father tells you he wants you to be home by 10 PM. And then at the wedding you're at, someone's stranded, doesn't have a ride home, has no way of getting home, all alone, has no other possibilities. If you give him a ride home, you're not going to get home until 10:15. If you know your father—if you don't know your father, if you borrow the car from a stranger, nu, itachen that you'll just have to say, I have to be home by 10 o'clock. You know your father. You know what he had in mind when he told you, be home by 10 o'clock. You know that he didn't intend it for this. You know it. Someone who doesn't know your father is going to say, maicha taisi, what are you doing? That was the stipulation, there was a condition imposed that you have to be home by 10. But you know your father. You know there was a context in which he said it. You know what he could have meant and you know what he couldn't have meant. But you have to know him very well. If you borrowed from a stranger, you don't know. Maybe nu, he wants the car back. He wants the car back by 10 o'clock no matter what. Maybe he does. Eino domei. If you don't know the person, you can't—if you don't know the person very well, if you don't know the person intimately, you can't be confident. But you know the person very well. You know him intimately. You can be confident. He meant this; he couldn't have meant that. Reb Soloveitchik once said—he said it more than once, I heard it once—that when Rav Chaim Volozhin was asked why he was founding the yeshiva, what was wrong with the current system? The system before Rav Chaim Volozhin was every town had a Beis Medrash, and the local youth learned in the local Beis Medrash. So what was wrong with that system that he was looking to change things and to found a yeshiva? So this is the way Reb Aharon quotes it. The way we have the printed letter that Rav Chaim Volozhin wrote, it doesn't say this in the letter. So this must have been something that was said ba'al peh, there's an oral tradition of it. That Rav Chaim Volozhin answered, he said, eino domei. The system that the bochurim go to the local Beis Medrash, it works for most Gemara, it works for most masechtos. He said, but there are some, he said, where they need a place where they'll be exposed to Gedolei Yisrael who can tell them what the Gemara means. And what was the example he gave? That the Gemara says in Pesachim that עם הארץ מצווה לנוחרו ביום הכיפורים שחל להיות בשבת. Rav Chaim Volozhin said, you can't learn that Gemara in your local shtiebel. You're not going to know what that Gemara means. You're not going to know what to do with it. That, you need Volozhin to understand what such a Gemara means. Again, some axioms, some overarching principles are easier, and some require gadlus to articulate and to recognize. When people struggle with a particular halacha, so what's the right thing to do? Should we look for every almost legitimate kula we can come up with? No. What we have here is a machloket in in the beginning of Eruvin and in in in the sugyas here about pirtzas. Gemara tells a story where Rav did a maise Rav where he followed the more chumradik opinion. Gemara wants to bring a raya that that's obviously what Rav held and we pasken that way. And the Gemara says no. רב ביקא מצא וגדר בה גדר. Rashi says bika matza:

עמי הארץ היו ומזלזלים במצוות והחמיר עליהם לעשות סייג ולהרחיק מן העבירה כאדם הגודר ביקא פרוצה לשומרה.

So does that mean that that's always supposed to be the response? No. So when is this the response and when do you... you have to have a chush for what your father meant. You have to have a chush for what your father meant when he told you be home at 10:00. So and people are struggling with it, so you tell them 10:15 is okay, or no, you tell them 9:30. Got to be home by... got to be home by 9:30. So which is the right thing? You have to know your father very well to know which is the which is the right thing. Maybe it's the right thing to tell them 10:15, but maybe it's the right thing to tell them 9:30. When when when the Rav said, again now we're talking about sort of maybe the the highest level that this understanding of axioms, context, intent, etc. that that when he would get a shaila, so he could intuit that the answer was muttar, he could intuit that the answer was assur and then later he'd find the Gemara, he'd find the seifer in Shulchan Aruch that that documented it. So I don't know if there's necessarily one person in every generation who can do that. Mistama there isn't necessarily in every generation even one person that can do it. But but that's sort of the highest level of what you're talking about again, that someone is so attuned to what the Rav called nishmas haTorah. He didn't make up the phrase. Someone who is so attuned to nishmas haTorah that he has an intuition of avada this is muttar, avada this is assur. Why? I don't know, I'll I'll have time to think about it, I'll I'll remind myself of of the Gemara or the the Sifsei Kohen in the Shach that that will substantiate it. So how does a person try to develop in in that crucial indispensable area? So for now just very very briefly. Obviously we need to learn a lot, but on the other hand, as the opening story indicates, that that doesn't that doesn't guarantee or assure anything. So lichora the most crucial thing is that a, this is anyway crucial and indispensable for Talmud Torah. We have to have a sense of anavah, a sense of humility. The humility to recognize that that it doesn't necessarily mean what ani hakatan thinks it says explicitly. Again, the father said to be home by 10:00, but he absolutely didn't mean not to give this almanah a ride home and and come home at 10:15 instead. No, but but I know that he meant 10:00. Person has to have the first of all the the very genuine deep humility. And and number two, we need to be mekabbel as much as possible and mekabbel from people who themselves were mekablim, have a mesorah. A person shouldn't put himself in the position of trying to rediscover America or reinvent the wheel. A person has to be מקבל. As much as we can, to be מקבל. Because again, people are blessed with different degrees of intuition. And for some people, they're more naturally attuned and will more successfully and easily intuit what the intent is, what the premises are, what the axioms are. And for others, it won't be as easy. But for everyone, it begins with being מקבל. To be מקבל, a person has to have that humility and to try to be מקבל as much as we can.