בהדי כבשי דרחמנא למה לך

In our last post we discussed one the first responses I received to the letters I wrote to various prominent תלמידי חכמים. Another prominent rabbi (who shall remain unnamed) responded to me in a very terse letter with the following phrase borrowed from the literature of חזל (ברכות י.):

בהדי כבשי דרחמנא למה לך?

This means that I was being criticized for contemplating the mysterious ways of God, instead of simply minding my own business.

While I did not actually respond to the rabbi in question, as I did not gauge him to be looking for an answer but rather only asking rhetorically, I will yet take the liberty of responding here, as some of my readers may be wondering the same thing. Additionally, I believe it is generally wise to think through why I am taking a particular intellectual path, and what objections may potentially be raised against my thought process.

The brief answer is that I am not simply engaging in lofty theoretical speculation as to the nature of God and his Divine ways; rather, there is a מצוה to be done. Yet, at the same time, there were those who were Divinely prevented from carrying out said מצוה. Our goal is only to try figuring out what said prevention depends on. Once we figure out what said prevention depends on, we can then figure out under what circumstances the מצוה can indeed be performed.

Additionally, the original context of that statement is ישעיה criticizing חזקיה for not getting married because חזקיה saw (through רוה"ק) that his offspring would be wicked (as indeed his son מנשה turned out to be). ישעיה was telling חזקיה that what sort of offspring he would or would not have were not necessarily his business; rather, there is a מצוה to be done, namely that of having children, and חשבונות, however valid they may be, should be not be allowed in the way.

We see from this episode that contemplating the mysterious ways of Heaven should not get in the way of doing a מצוה. Here, however, the exact opposite would be true! If we successfully figure out a satisfactory answer to our puzzle, then we could potentially figure out how to actually perform a מצוה!

Now, normally I hesitate to outright disagree with a scholar of higher rank than myself (as this rabbi is). The most I would do, under ordinary circumstances, is respectfully point out any difficulties I had with halachic reasoning they offered. Here, however, I feel safe to disagree considering of the dozens (literally) of rabbis with whom I have discussed this issue (some of whom actually had an answer to my question; but even those who didn't), not a single one of them besides for this one criticized me for thinking about such matters in the first place (which perhaps would even make this rabbi a דעת יחיד whom I can freely and in good conscience choose not to follow).

לא בשמים היא

We have spent a considerable length of article space and intellectual energy analyzing all the possible reasons why ברכת כהנים should not be performed daily, and concluded (as has the ערוך השולחן, among other פוסקים [1]) that there is indeed no fully satisfying reason not to do so.

To that end, we wondered why it is that those who attempted to remedy this perplexing situation seem to have been punished (or at the very least stopped [2]) from doing so מן השמים.

We then spent another considerable length of article space and intellectual energy demonstrating that breaking an איסור to change מנהגים was not the reason. [3]

To this end, we must offer a counter-suggestion, which we will אי"ה do in forthcoming articles.

Here, however, we will address a different question, namely, why was it that, following the various tragedies that befell them, those who wanted to perform ברכת כהנים daily desisted from further attempts if, according to their (well-substantiated) halachic reasoning, they were doing the 'רצון ה?

The straightforward answer is that, by means of these signs from שמים, they were able to discern that attempting to reinstate daily ברכת כהנים was, indeed, not the 'רצון ה.

The problem is that there is a principle of לא בשמים היא, meaning that 'רצון ה as we are expected to fulfill it is not determined by signs from שמים, but rather by means of the halachic process!-?- [4]

ר יעקב Shapiro (rabbi emeritus, Bais Medrash of Bayswater) answered me in a letter that, indeed, we ordinarily would not pay much attention to signs from שמים, which is why, גופא, these particular signs from שמים manifested themselves in the form of a סכנה: once there is a סכנה, we perforce are no longer able to do whatever it is that שמים is displeased with, even where we otherwise would have based on the halachic process.

In future articles we will בעז"ה explore different approaches with regard to the primary question of why, indeed, would 'ה be displeased with our attempted performance of a מצוה.

Addendum

There is a rather obvious, glaringly troublesome point in that how can we simply disregard that which שמים i.e. הקב"ה tells us, implying that ח"ו we just don't care. -?-

While the plain פשט is that this גופא is a clause within the תורה that the תורה itself allows us, nay, enjoins us, to decide the הלכה for ourselves. That being the case, we are not allowed to reckon very strongly, if at all, with what שמים has to say post-מתן תורה because that would impede the halachic process from functioning normally. We humans must train our minds to the best of our ability in the push-and-pull of halachic reasoning to the best of our ability and, once we do so, it up to us exclusively and entirely to decide correct halachic behavior. [5]

That being said, there is another fascinating approach put forth by R David Nieto in his מטה דן (כוזרי שני) [6]. R Nieto is addressing why it is that we don't pay attention to Heavenly Voices in general, as well as, specifically, why it is not considered a חוצפה to ignore שמים. -?-

He answers (very originally) that there was no חוצפה in disregarding a בת קול, because maybe there is no actual בת קול but rather only a trickster on the roof of a building (or some other high place) that is making his voice sound like a בת קול by using a locutory tube (!). [7]

[1]

או"ח קכח:סד

ר יעקב Shapiro pointed out to me in a letter that these tragedies were not specifically a punishment but rather a sign from שמים that 'ה, for whatever reason, apparently does not want the מנהג to be changed. This is מדויק, he continues, from the language of the ערוה"ש which writes that there was "like a בת קול" revealing what the 'רצון ה was in that particular instance.

[3] In Yeshivos they say over from R Chaim Brisker that first one must learn what not to say, at which point one can then learn what yes to say.

[4] See :ב"מ נט from where we see that הקב"ה gave the right and responsibility to decide halachic matters to the חכמי הדור. See also the first explanation in פתח עינים שם ד"ה לא בשמים היא. 

This was ר ישראל Salanter's קשא, though, were he not to have asked it, we would have been compelled to ask it ourselves.

The only exception to this rule of disregarding a Heavenly Voice in favor of halachic reasoning is the instance of normative הלכה generally following בית הלל over בית שמאי. The reason for this exception is that בית הלל was the more numerous group, so essentially the בת קול is only telling us to follow the majority, which is anyway a halachic imperative. But where a בת קול tells us to follow a minority against a majority, which would run counter to normative halachic practice (only that בית שמאי were sharper, so there was a ה"א that we should follow them). See ריטבא עירובין ז. ד"ה ר יהושע היא דאמר אין  משגיחין בבת קול וע"ע מהרם שם.

Similarly (-ed.), where a sign from שמים tells us to contravene established halachic principles, as it does here, we ought, theoretically, to disregard it. Hence our difficulty.

[5] based on דרשות הרן ה:מב; שם ז:י, יג; שם יא:כא-כב, כה

[6] ויכוח רביעי רצג-ש

מטה ד"ן {דוד ניטו} was written as a sequel the the Kuzari of ר יהודה הלוי in that the original Kuzari focused primarily proving, among other things, the validity of תורה שבכתב. R Nieto wrote his work proving, primarily, the validity of תורה שבעל פה, ostensibly against the Karaites. Considering, however, that there were really no Karaites in 18th century England, one suspects he was using Karaites as a cover for his real target, namely former Marranos who had difficulty accepting the authority of an Oral Tradition they knew little about.

See שו"ת חכם צבי סי' יח for a defense of R Nieto's position on Nature and השגחה פרטית. Note, particularly, the complimentary language used by the חכם צבי in reference to R Nieto.

[7] This is the English translation of the Latin tuba locutoria that R Nieto references.

If someone else were to suggest such an interesting approach, they would likely be viewed as odd, but considering that R Nieto was called a חכם כולל מרומם ונעלה and told יישר כחו וחילו by the חכם צבי (see above note 5), I figure it is worth mentioning here.

It seems, though this point is not entirely clear, that רבי יהושע was indeed able to tell the difference between a real בת קול and an imitation thereof. Us mere mortals, on the other hand, may not be able to, to which end we may not regard any בת קול at all. According to that line of reasoning, however, perhaps there could instead have been some type of גזירה at some later point to that effect once people would no longer be able to tell the difference. On the other hand, however, perhaps this story גופא was an illustration of the existence of said גזירה to begin with, וצ"ע.