Wednesday, February 22, 2023

Halacha and Arizal

The following is a transcript I wrote from memory about 2 weeks after I spoke to Rav Shapiro regarding various topics including whether I should publish my sefer Daas Torah. He was very generous with his time and very patient with my questions and poor Hebrew. I added footnotes to clarify what the issues were. This transcript was never reviewed or approved by Rav Shapiro and he obviously should not be responsible for my limited understanding and recall. I thought it was appropriate to publish on the day of his levayah 


23 comments:

  1. I've actually just written an essay on the tension between the Ari's interpretation of Zohar and "traditional" Orthodoxy - in particular from the perspective of R' Hirsch:
    http://marbitz.com/rabbi-hirsch/hirsch-kabbala.html

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  2. Strange explanation of the Rambam regarding witchcraft. The Rambam seems to reject it on all levels, not on the level of "absolute truth."

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  3. Sorry, should read: Strange explanation of the Rambam regarding witchcraft. The Rambam seems to reject it on all levels, not only the level of "absolute truth."

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  4. Very interesting. Thanks

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  5. Is there any way to make this downloadable without having to sign up to Scribd? Thank you

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  6. The document is set for downloading. So if you still are being told to join I guess you must. I think if you upload some documents you get downloading privilges

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  7. Interesting that he says of one particular Maharal that it is "a unique shitah which is a chiddush", but seems generally to accept Maharal's derech in pshat even though the whole derech is unique and a chiddush.

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  8. Was Rav Shapiro fluent in Yiddish?

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  9. You wrote you were concerned about speaking to him due to your poor Ivrit, so I was wondering if speaking to him in Yiddish might have been an alternative.

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  10. You wrote you were concerned about speaking to him due to your poor Ivrit, so I was wondering if speaking to him in Yiddish might have been an alternative...

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  11. No - that was not an option for me

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  12. try downloading now - I think I finally got it set properly

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  13. Despite the strong words of the Gaon directed at the Rambam, it always seemed compelling to me that the Mechaber in quoting the Rambam clearly shows that he has no issue with his position. It does not seem credible that he even remotely agreed with the Gaon yet quoted him. Some, including Rav Shlomo Miller, have tried telling me that the Mechaber is paskening the halacha of the Rambam but doesn't necessarily agree with his position regarding the efficacy of the lachash. Again. hard to believe.

    I had a talmid of Rav Berkowitz ask him and he agreed that the Mechaber's position seems to be like the Rambam.

    Add to this the fact that the Mechaber was a great Kabbalist and the Rambam is vindicated!

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  14. Did you ask about R Avraham's Ma'amar al aggados? And about Rashi in kesubos 'chad mi'nayhu mi'shakri?

    Also, what is 'pure truth'? As opposed to what? I'm having a bit of a hard time grasping some of RMS's points.

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  15. No I did not mentioned R Avraham Ma'amar al aggados nor the Rashi. Regarding pure truth -

    Rashi (Kesubos 57a): There are two types of disputes. Where the argument is over what had been said by someone else, it is impossible that two opposite opinions can both be correct and therefore at least one must be false. However, when they differ in terms of logical analysis than the fact that only one opinion is the Halacha does not mean that the second opinion is false. Eilu V’Eilu means that the second opinion can be valid somewhere else because with even slight changes the situation can be reversed. However, both opposing opinions are not valid for the present situation.

    Regarding pure truth - see the Introduction of the Ktzos as well as the chapter about truth in my sefer Daas Torah

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  16. Rav Ovadiah Yosef ztl disagrees with the notion that we always go with the Arizal. of course Arizal was excellent, but there are other poskim, and there's the shulchan t.

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  17. What did he say and where is your source?

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  18. My source is my memory -
    The question was why or if he ever paskens differently from the Arizal, and he answered that the Arizal was only one posek, and that the mesorah has many other poskim as well, so why only follow the Ari?
    This is well known, in that he was trying to return to the Shulchan Aruch and disagree with Ben Ish Hai on paskening like Arizal. Even the nusach of his siddur is slightly different from that of the Ben Ish Hai followers, eg Rav Mordechai Eliahu

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  19. Source at bottom of page
    https://dafaleph.com/home/2016/7/18/halacha-and-kabbalah-part-4-when-kabbalah-supersedes-the-traditional-halacha

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