Avodah Mailing List

Volume 12 : Number 024

Thursday, October 23 2003

• Re: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• Re: new birth control?
• aylonis
• Contiguity in Krias Hatorah
• Re: gut shabbos
• Ibn Ezra?
• Allegorization of Scripture
• Re: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• RE: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• Re: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• Re: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• Re: Basics for Philisophical discussions
• Ibn Ezra?
• Re: Rambam and Creation
• Re: Rambam and creation
• Re: Rambam and creation
• Re: Hashgocha Pratis - finale

From: Micha Berger <micha@aishdas.org>
> On Wed, Oct 22, 2003 at 06:36:28PM +0200, Arie Folger wrote:
>: Thus, allegorization of these two seminal events is conflicting with
>: faithfulness to halakhah, more so than that of any other aspect of
>: the Torah.

> Mima nafshach:

> Either the methodology is flawed, and there are no grounds to question
> the mabul.

> Or you believe the method is valid, and there are grounds to doubt
> yetzi'as Mitzrayim. That you have religious objections to that doubt
> has little to do with whether it's correct.

> What you are offering me is a motivation for that choice, not support
> for it being reasonable. You would need to give a criterion which
> distinguishes the *effectiveness* of the attempt to disprove one vs that
> to disprove the other.

The distinguishing feature is the question of revelation. The mabul
as a geographical event is described in broad strokes. The revelation
involved is personal -- between Hashem and Noach. The revelation is not
impacted by the scientific truth of the flood [how long, location etc.].
There is a rainbow and the story is in the Torah and therefore any idea
that does not contradict the content of the reported story is possible.

Yetzi'as Mitzrayim is a public revelation which encompassed thousands
of humans. If I were to to the members of Avodah and say:

Yesterday, we got on our spaceship we landed on Mars, where we heard a
Shi'ur from the Malbim. From there we went to Jupiter to hear a shi'ur
from the GR"A. They were wonderful shi'urim and we now know better how to
understand certain philosophical issues and some halachot and we intend
to keep the halachot based on the Shi'ur of the Gra.

You would all laugh at me, and suggest that I wake up. This is the basis
of the Kuzari proof. If Yetziat Mitzrayim is a "tall tale" then someone
should have gotten up and said: that's a nice tale, but my grandfather,
who lived at the time, never told me about it -- so where do you get
this tale?

This is also why the creation is treated by Chazal as "Sod". There is
more information missing from the report in the Torah than available.
So anything that does not contradict the reported Torah history --
is possible.

Shoshana L. Boublil

Kenneth G Miller <kennethgmiller@juno.com> wrote:
> R' Harry Maryles wrote <<< One may not marry an Aylinis precisely because
> there is no way she can have children.>>>

> Even as a second wife? Suppose he already has children. Would marriage
> to an aylonis be assur even then? Just wondering...

To be honest, I do not recall. My memory stems from learning those Sugyos
during the Daf Yomi cycle. You may very well be right.

HM

R' Harry Maryles wrote <<< One may not marry an Aylinis precisely because
there is no way she can have children.>>>

RAM:
>Even as a second wife? Suppose he already has children. Would marriage
>to an aylonis be assur even then? Just wondering...

mutar. see Rema S"A Eh"A 1:8

Shlomo Goldstein

The Krias Hatorah on the 2nd day of Rosh Hashonoh is found in the Sefer
Torah not long after that of the 1st day.

That of Yom Kippur Mincha is near to that of Shacharis.

On Tisha Ba'av morning we do not go far from that week's Parsha.

There are good reasons for all these choices, but is the contiguity
a coincidence?

ER

Saul Newman wrote on Areivim:
>apparently this aversion to greeting another jew even [?especially?] on
>shabbos is prevalent all over. why? what's the pshat?

Here is my theory. R' Yisrael Salanter wrote in his Iggeres HaMussar about
two aspects of the yetzer hara. On the one hand there is the bodily YhR
that draws us to our physical desires and on the other hand there is a
spiritual YhR that draws us to sin even when there is no physical desire.

Since there is a mitzvah to greet others, there is a corresponding YhR
not to do so. This is a difficult YhR to identify because there is no
physical desire barring us from greeting others. That is why so many of
us fall prey to it.

Gil Student

>by God. as for "must beleive" it seems clear that some didn't, e.g. (the
>unbowdlerized) ibn ezra peirush toi the first posuq. however, not wishing

I have the Mechokekei Yehudah. Is that censored? For I saw no indication
of any acknowledgement of any eternity of matter in the IE, only a
discussion of whether "bara" is specific to ex nihilo.

YGB 

RYGB:
> The argument is specious, perhaps Leibovitzian, but incorrect. Basically, 
> what you are saying is that one can allegorize anything that will not alter 
> halacha but not what does affect halacha. Huh? Then in essence you are only 
> restraining yourself at that point arbitrarily. Is this even intellectually 
> honest?

And yet, it's essentially the same point as made by the Meiri on "derashot
shel dofi". And not too far from the second Rashi on Bereshit Bara -
if you can't take the text literally, darshen it allegorically.

   - jon baker    jjbaker@panix.com     <http://www.panix.com/~jjbaker> -

RYGB wrote:
> The argument is specious, perhaps Leibovitzian, but incorrect. Basically,
> what you are saying is that one can allegorize anything that will not alter
> halacha but not what does affect halacha. Huh? Then in essence you are only
> restraining yourself at that point arbitrarily. Is this even intellectually
> honest?

Yes. You read the text of the Torah, and see how heavily the Torah leans
on any particular difficult passage, and see how much you would alter
the internal coherrence by reinterpreting something. Perhaps I didn't
do a good enough job of describing the method, but I don't think that
it fails the intellectual honesty test.

Arie Folger

R Harry Maryles wrote:
> Not unwillingness. Belief. The refusal to cross that line still
> keeps one in the fold even if there is an over reliance on reason as
> the source of all knowledge which causes the rejection of
> traditional beliefs about the Mabul. It is the epistomology of O
> that both reason AND Mesorah determines belief.

Agreed. Which means that if mesorah asserts a truth, and allows you no
wiggle room, and archeological evidence appears to assert something that
contradicts, you have a dilemma.

Unlike ma'aseh bereishis, where the mesorah -- even before anyone raised
questions for non-Torah reasons -- /did/ give us such wiggle room.

And on the other side, accepting scientific interpretation isn't a
question of accepting or rejecting *logic*. Confusing one with the
other is very much a symptom of the epistomology I'm condemning. Often,
particularly as one gets further from the harder sciences of physics
and chemistry, there is wiggle room on that side as well.

Hypothesis is often presented as fact, and just as often shapes the
next person's opinion of what's a signficant finding and what it's
significance.

How is the dilemma resolved?

Do we reject mesorah, and give a new derashah to the pasuq for non-Torah
reasons? Do we assume that archeology as currently practiced is too
subjective to be of value, thereby rejecting the science?

Do we simply live with the problem, either by compartmentalizing our
belief systems so that we never face the contradition head-on, or by
simply assuming that there is an unknown answer somewhere and leaving
the question open? Compartmentalization is simply a psychological trick;
the belief system is still inconsistant. Allowing that there is an answer
somewhere means that you believe that one of the two can be wiggled --
either a new sevarah found from within the Torah, or a new scientific
theory -- in which the problem is avoided. The only difference is that
you are perfectly willing to wiggle either, and therefore can't decide
which or how.

> I am not convinced that reason is the entire source of all C's
> knowledge either. They have some element of Mesorah as well, or they
> wouldn't even say that the Torah was "inspired" by God and would
> reject the Torah's validity entirely. In fact reason alone would
> tend to make one an agnostic.

Reason alone is useless. Without first principles, you have nothing to
reason about. The question is in choosing your postulates. How much do
you weigh some scientific or critical finding, how much do you weigh
the religious experience -- and therefore the mesorah that provided it
for you?

>> Another difference between us and them is that even if we found a
>> ma'amar Chazal to be scientifically wrong we wouldn't simply
>> dismiss it as ignorable. We would look to cull the meaning that
>> made the statement mesorah worthy. No?

> Yes. But it is Mesorah combined with reason, and not Mesorah alone.
> When one finds scientific facts that seem to contradict formerly
> held belief then it becomes necessary to seek a synthesis. If one
> chooses to ignore newly discovered facts in favor of an older
> understanding of Mesorah alone, then one loses intellectual honesty.
> If one chooses to ignore Mesorah in favor of reason we are guilty of
> the arrogance of belief in the superiority our own fallible minds.

As I said, the issue is one of attitude. Does one leave mesorah as
only viable for the gaps in one's other knowledge -- rejected when in
disagreement, redundant when in agreement -- or does one actually have
enough faith to pursue or await an answer?

> For example, scientific eveidence very strongly indicates that the
> universe is billions of years old. Yet our Mesorah teaches that it
> is only about 6000 years old...

Untrue. Yes, that's one mesoretic position. But as is evidenced on
another thread, one can also conclude it's older -- using only First
Principles from the Torah. Mesorah therefore leaves us with multiple
voices on the subject.

> because of unwillingness to cross the line? Or OTOH do we just throw
> out the Torah? We do neither. We seek to find truth by combining our
> newly gained knowledge with our belief in Mesorah using our own
> reason combined with traditional sources to come to a newer and
> deeper understanding of existential reality.

But what if mesorah says "this is meant kepishuto", explicitly ruling
out this option? Which I am arguing is the case by Noach. It's not like
TSBP is silent. Nor does it offer us any pure-allegory shitos or that
which implies such shitos.

>> This comes from the epistomolgy, not necessitated by our
>> difference in TmS. And yet, this lack of faith in the mesorah has
>> much to do with our pragmatic differences.

> I do not think it is a LACK of faith on their part. It is just a
> insufficeint appreciation of the value of Mesorah. They overvalue
> reason to the detriment of Mesorah. But as I said, it doesn't really
> matter HOW they get there. The fact that they are THERE (the lack of
> belief in TmS) is what defines them out of O.

If you get there a different way, you can't possibly always get to the
same "there".

RSM wrote:
> Why is the epistemology inconsistent with O thought? The underlying
> thread here is the belief that O thought and "experiment" -eg,
> current scientific thinking are inherently incompatible - and
> therefore O thought needs to be protected....

I could equally say that your position is that the two are incompatible,
and therefore scientific thought must always overrule. But they're both
dishonest simplifications.

IOW, I would answer that it's not that they're inherently
incompatible. It's that we found something that looks like an
incompatitibility. If you actually give *both* weight, then you don't
reject the results of *either* system of thought because of evidence
from the other.

Which gets me back to the same choices: ignore the contradiction, await
an answer, or find a way to preserve those parts of both systems you
consider inviolate, and wiggle with whatever room that leaves you.

IIUC, to you, only the observance is the inviolate part of mesorah, and
therefore you have HUGE room to ignore mesoretic results compared to the
little room you leave for tailoring scientific theories. The result is
effectively identical to the position I put into your mouth as the top
of this email.

> eg, the
> kuzari's statement that the torah does not require us to accept
> anything rejected by reason - while the nature of what is meant by
> reason is different today, the statement itself is still valid for
> many of us

Again, science isn't reason. Archeological results are a HUGE distance
from a formal logical proof.

> While there is a core minimum of O thought that may need to be
> protected...

The issue is resolving conflicting data, not protection.

One simply needs to give mesorah the weight of data.

>> Another difference between us and them is that even if we found a
>> ma'amar Chazal to be scientifically wrong we wouldn't simply
>> dismiss it as ignorable. We would look to cull the meaning that
>> made the statement mesorah worthy. No?

> The question that we would argue is whether all ma'amre hazal are
> "mesora worthy"....

Or at least, all to be presumed so as an attitude taken when approaching
the text.

> To quote the rambam again
> Moreh Nevuchim (3:14) "Do not ask me to justify everything that
> [Chazal] have said concerning astronomical matters conforms to the
> way things really are. For at that time science was imperfect...."

And the quote is still irrelevent.

The question is not their statements of scientific matters. It's the
looking for the Torah lurking in the cranies of those statements.

And WRT Torah vs science, to jump back to the first O/C border that I
proposed: it's not Chazal's science vs current theory that is being
discussed. It's a conclusion based on what we were told at Sinai vs
current findings and their interpretation.

RMS quoting the Rambam, continued:
> did not speak in this way becaue they had a tradition from the
> prophets...

This touches on something raised elsewhere in a post I moderated but
didn't get to read for content. (If I try to read everything before
posting, I would be delaying my posts forever as more and more comes in.)

The Rambam states here that the statements are rejectable only because
they don't come from mesorah. This is the line I proposed between ma'aseh
Bereishis, where we do have a tradition for allegorizing, and the mabul
for which we're bowing to theory.

>> This comes from the epistomolgy, not necessitated by our
>> difference in TmS. And yet, this lack of faith in the mesorah has
>> much to do with our pragmatic differences.

> The question is how far to extend emunah in the mesora. Clearly,
> in some sense, the unclear boundaries described do have dangers, and
> the maximalist position therefore has attractions - but the
> maximalist position is not the only O one, and we need to be careful
> in thinking that it is.

Again, the presentation of my insistance of symmetric treatment as though
it was off on one edge, while your insistance to give scientific findings
the greater weight as though you were in the middle.

 -mi

 -- 
Micha Berger             I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
micha@aishdas.org        I awoke and found that life was duty.
http://www.aishdas.org   I worked and, behold -- duty is joy.
Fax: (413) 403-9905                        - Rabindranath Tagore

"Shoshana L. Boublil" <toramada@bezeqint.net> wrote:
> To summarize: Not everything can be examined in a lab. This does NOT
> mean that it doesn't exist.

As in... God! This is why belief is more significant than observable
fact. We know the truth of God's existence, yet we cannot observe Him in a
lab. If a fact is defined as something that can only be proven in a lab,
then God is not a fact. But He is the ultimate truth... a truth based
on belief which can be based on Masoretic tradition, rational thinking,
intuitiveness based on indirect observation of God's majesty, or all or
various combinations of these.

HM

> R Harry Maryles wrote:
>> As I said there is much overlap but IMHO the dividing line has to be
>> belief in Torah MiSinai as far as C and O are concerned.

C and O are sociological distinctions rather than halachic ones.
You speak as though they are disjoint sets. In my experience there are
plenty of people who firmly straddle the middle, and most of those who
are firmly in one camp or the other define themselves, not by their
beliefs, but either by their friends or by their actions. Some day
you should skim through Emet V'Emuna, which purports to be a C creed,
to find out how little belief has to do with even the official movement.

I suspect that those of us on this mailing list are peculiar in thinking
that peoples actions are motivated by consistent beliefs. I have a friend
whose favorite examples of this is a quotation from the Hafetz Hayyim,
who said that if people just understand that saying lashon hara was as
assur as eating tarfus they wouldn't do it.

David Riceman

> R Harry Maryles wrote:
>> As I said there is much overlap but IMHO the dividing line has to be
>> belief in Torah MiSinai as far as C and O are concerned.

C and O are sociological distinctions rather than halachic ones.
You speak as though they are disjoint sets. In my experience there are
plenty of people who firmly straddle the middle, and most of those who
are firmly in one camp or the other define themselves, not by their
beliefs, but either by their friends or by their actions. Some day
you should skim through Emet V'Emuna, which purports to be a C creed,
to find out how little belief has to do with even the official movement.

I suspect that those of us on this mailing list are peculiar in thinking
that peoples actions are motivated by consistent beliefs. I have a friend
whose favorite examples of this is a quotation from the Hafetz Hayyim,
who said that if people just understand that saying lashon hara was as
assur as eating tarfus they wouldn't do it.

David Riceman

>by God. as for "must beleive" it seems clear that some didn't, e.g. (the
>unbowdlerized) ibn ezra peirush toi the first posuq. however, not wishing

I have the Mechokekei Yehudah. Is that censored? For I saw no indication
of any acknowledgement of any eternity of matter in the IE, only a
discussion of whether "bara" is specific to ex nihilo.

YGB 

In a large article on medieval thought soon to be published, I said the
following regarding Rambam and creation. This is not a teaching meant
for women, children and simpletons that says-- yes hashem created the
world or no he did not. It is therefore good evidence. Maimonides in
letters and other places calls matter "arura"-- (base and uncreated--
God could not have created it-- because when divine overflows reach
matter they react with it as heat to cold-- opposites.) Here is what I
said-- objections please! I have omitted a ton of notes and references
and here is part of my summation.

zvi basser

"In part 2 of his Guide for the Perplexed Maimonides discusses various
schools of philosophy and their characterizations of the ten intelligences
or spheres that englobe the Universe. Each sphere is guided by an
intellect whose form is capable of particularizing aspects of truth. There
is a process of overflow that allows one sphere to interact with lower
spheres. The overflow of the Active Intellect can interact with the lower
physical world allowing for permanence and decay. Maimonides likens the
effect of the spheres (moved in source by the divine overflow from the
Godhead) to light or heat waves. These so-called waves penetrate the lower
realm of raw matter that is dark, without intellect and unparticularized
by the forms of the spheres, aristotelian intellects. These forms are
incorporeal (even if the spheres embodying them are necessarily of an
ethereal matter) but impose functionality, shape and essence to the raw
matter in which they can be infused.

The nexus of the clash of opposites, divine forms and putrid matter are
portrayed in the Bible as mist. Guide 2:30 says: "In this way it makes
clear to you that the first "water" of which it is said "over the face
of the water" (Genesis 1:2) is not the water that is in the seas. That
part of the water situated above the air was differentiated by means of
a certain form, whereas another part of this water (Genesis 1:7) is here
(situated under the firmament). Thus the phrase "and he divided between
the waters..." (Genesis 1:7) is analogous to the phrase, "And God divided
between the light (Aristotle's forms or Plato's logos) and the darkness
(matter with no imprint of form or idea)." (Genesis 1:4). Thus Maimonides
notes a page or so later that the Bible recounts at the beginning of
creation, the world of lifeless matter is said to be portrayed by the
image of darkness and coldness. When the overflow from the perfect
form world of the upper spheres (analagous to warmth) interacts with
the lower world of base matter, this matter is acted upon to become our
created world. This fusion of form and matter is the process of creation
described in the opening chapter of Genesis "and there went up a mist
from the earth..." (Genesis 2:6). Maimonides observes the Aramaic Targum
translation of Genesis 2:6 stresses that this was at the very beginning
of creation (the biblical account is not chronological here) since the
targumist placed the verb in the equivalent to the pluperfect tense
signifying what had already happened earlier. Maimonides supports his
contention by the fact that this rising mist of Genesis 2:6 is joined to
Genesis 2:5 when "no shrub of the field was in the earth," unquestionably
in the early stages of creation. It is self-evident Scripture cannot be
talking about physical water. Scripture employs a figure (mist, vapor,
and water) to portray the fusion of pure form into base matter."

RYGB asked <<< What is "G-d stuff" if not hagshama?! >>>

I'm not very familiar with the concept of hagshama, but my guess is that
it is something like HaShem actually becoming physical in some way.

That is not what I understood R' Jon Baker to mean when he explained the
idea that "the Universe is made of God-stuff ... the physical universe
has no real existence anyway, but is an illusion ..."

When I read that paragraph, I was immediately reminded of the sig line
used on the pages a few years back by R'n Gila Atwood:

<<< We are pixels in G-d's imagination. >>>

"God-stuff", as I understand RJB, does not mean that HaShem becomes
physical, chalilah, but rather that physicality itself is only one facet
of HaShem's [reality? essence? I dunno. Someone else fill in this blank].

Akiva Miller

R Akiva Miller wrote:
> No proofs either way? Here's the proof that I've always learned, and
> I'd like to know how the Rambam (or others) might refute it:

> 1) If Hashem did *not* create the universe "yesh me'ayin", then the
> universe is eternal.
> 2) Hashem is eternal.
> 3) "Hashem Echad" teaches that there can be only one eternity.
> 4) Therefore, Hashem and the universe are the same, c"v.
> 5) Conclusion #4 must be rejected, therefore supposition #1 is
> mistaken, and it must be that Hashem *did* create the universe "yesh
> me'ayin".

I disagree with step 3. If Yichud haBorei means that nothing else can
be external because He is eternal, than why not argue that nothing else
can exist because He exists? In which case, you could argue that Hashem
didn't *really* create the universe because it is He -- panentheism.

> <<< Beri'ah need not mean yeish mei'ayin. It could mean logical
> priority, and given either an Aristotilian or a Platonic spin. ...
> "Beri'ah" is a loose concept. It only rules out some forms of
> eternalism. >>>

> This could punch quite a hole in the "proof" I offered above. How
> many "forms of eternalism" are there? Where might I find some
> descriptions of them?

I'm not sure where you could find a list, but here are some forms I can
think of:

1- Matter is eternal, but is neither G-d nor emanated, it just
co-exists. Creation refers to the giving of form to substance. This
is Aristotle's view. I would think this is the one position your proof
would rule out.

(To address a point RAM later makes, if matter is eternal then the
universe in which it resides is also eternal. If that matter happened
not to have been organized into atoms, stars, planets, cells and people
until recently, that doesn't mean the universe is as recent.)

2- The universe is made of G-d stuff.

3- The universe is an emanation. Atzilus. To Plato this means that since
G-d always exists, the universe always existed.

I couldn't accept this opinion because it assumes the wrong meaning for
G-d's eternity. "Eternal" could mean two different things: having infinite
duration, or being totally atemporal. Hashem is the latter. Since the
universe has time, for it to be eternal it would have to be the former.

Thinking of it, I think this is also a flaw in your step 3. It would
maken the universe's eternity of a different sort, and therefore not
violate Hashem's uniqueness.

4- Time itself is a creation. Therefore, while G-d is the First Cause, the
connection between that Cause and the universe would not be temporal. IOW,
not only is Hashem outside of time, perhaps creation also is. Hashem
could have created a timeline that extends infinitely in both directions.

 -mi

 -- 
Micha Berger             I slept and dreamt that life was joy.
micha@aishdas.org        I awoke and found that life was duty.
http://www.aishdas.org   I worked and, behold -- duty is joy.
Fax: (413) 403-9905                        - Rabindranath Tagore

>You are 100% correct that I am asserting that it is legitimate for a
>Litvak to ignore the chassidic viewpoint.. I am just surprised that you
>didn't realize that from my first posting. There are people in the world
>whose hashkofa is not based upon the chassidic viewpoint nor do they feel
>a need to apologize or be defensive about it. I think if you investigate
>you will find people in the best yeshivos who do not read Sfas Emes or
>Tanya. There are genuine talmidei chachomim who do not study Rav Tzadok
>or Reb Nachman. They do not feel defensive that the Gra opposed the Baal
>HaTanya. By the same token you will find many profound chassidim who
>don't read Michtav M'Eliyahu, Ramchal, Maharal or even Rav Tzadok, Reb
>Nachman. Its a shame that you didn't write reviews of Michtav M'Eliyahu
>and Sifsei Chaim.

There are two issues that have become conflated here.

RDE, because he is writing a work which ignores the Chassidic viewpoint -
an intellectually dishonest approach, in my opinion - assumed that Rabbi
Levi also ignored the Chassidic approach, and that I was objecting to
the omission.

But that is not what I critiqued in the review. Rabbi Levi is a great,
and intellectually honest, scholar. He brings both perspectives. Rather,
I critiqued his attempt to *reconcile* the perspectives. As I wrote:

I do not dispute the rational character of Prof. Levi's suggestion. I
think it has much merit. But I do not know mi ya'aleh lanu ha'shomyma -
who will go up for us to Heaven to ascertain if God acts accordingly! By
contrast, in Rabbi Yisraeli's work (see note 1 above), on this topic as on
all others, he presents sources to speak for themselves - from Tanach and
Chazal to the Rambam to the Baal HaTanya - and provides explanations and
a succinct and lucid summation. While extensive quotation from sources
is really not possible in a work such as that of Prof. Levi, it would,
perhaps, have been better to acknowledge the great debate and leave it
unresolved. Rabbi Yisraeli does not attempt to reconcile a theological
conundrum which may be beyond human resolution.

I apologize for the confusion.

>> If RDE puts out a book espousing the non-Chassidic
>> perspective and I am zocheh to review it, I will criticize his work in
>> the identical manner.

That was a mistake on my part - I forgot what I had critiqued in the wake
of this debate. When IY"H I review RDE's book, it will be a *different*
critique than the one I had concerning Rabbi. Levi's work,

>Hopefully your criticism will generate enough publicity that I might
>sell a few more copies. I still can't figure out why you insist you have
>a monopoly on knowing how a Jew should think. I have repeatedly asked
>you to explain your point of view. You have never answered my assertion
>that your point of view has no basis in the way hashkofa has been and
>is being taught. I assume you are saving that for Jewish Action. Guess
>I'll have to wait a couple months to find out.

I have no monopoly, but you are not a scholar or saint of sufficient
standing (nor am I) to determine who is right, who is wrong, which view
should be presented, which should not, nor certainly to present your
own view.

>> Moreover, to attribute the Chassidic viewpoint on HP to Chabad is
>> glib, and erroneous.

>Why? Your telegraphic sentences are not useful in educational dialogue.
>I am willing to be educated and be shown the error of my ways - but I
>do have a problem with criticisms that simply keep repeating "your wrong
>and I am right".

I cited numerous other sources that held as Chabad does.

>> A casual DBS search on HP yields august thinkers -
>> including the Ramchal,

>Are you saying that the Ramchal had the view of the Besht?! His statements
>in Derech HaShem do not support that.

But his statement in Da'as Tevunos does...

>> the Pri Ha'Aretz (if there is some contradiction
>> in his approach, well that too merits analysis), the Maor Va'Shemesh,
>> the Todos, the Beer Mayim Chaim, the Arugas Ha'Bosem,Reb Nachman (see
>> above re the PhA) and the Shem Me'Shmuel.

>There is no developed discussion of the Beshtian concept in the above
>seforim nor is there a statement acknowledging that the Besht changed the
>view of HP that had existed previously. In fact the above seforim seem
>to assume that their view always existed. The statements of HP found in
>these seforim could readily be explained to be consistent with the Kuzari
>or the Ikkarim or even the Rambam as explained by the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

Nope.

>oracular pronouncements do not promote understanding and are not much
>use in developing a deeper understanding. It would be appreciated if
>you would explain your objections in a manner that illuminates the dark
>corners of my ignorance rather just saying I am wrong.

You are not ignorant and therefore cannot be educated. You are aware of
other shittos and deliberately choose to ignore them. I think that is
wrong. You think it is right. It is as simple as that.

But this has nothing to do with the JA review.

YGB 

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