by Eliyahu Teitz

In February 1986, a heated debate ran through net.religion.jewish over the authority of the Talmud. A Christian poster argued that the Talmud could not carry the same weight as the written Torah, since it was a human document — oral tradition, codified by rabbis. Eliyahu Teitz, a researcher at Albert Einstein College of Medicine/Yeshiva University in New York, responded. His answer quickly left the debate behind and became something else: a clear, systematic account of how religious authority is transmitted, how interpretation works, and why the most famous story in the Talmud is also the most important — the day G-d's own voice was overruled by a majority vote, and G-d laughed.

G-d gave us the Torah — the Five Books of Moses. The rest of the Bible, the writings of the prophets, were not necessarily the word of G-d in the same direct sense. They might have been the prophets' own words, written at G-d's command. The Torah, on the other hand, was G-d's own work, in His own words. (See the introduction of the Abravanel to the prophet Jeremiah for a more in-depth discussion of this matter.)

G-d also gave to Moses, on Mount Sinai, some specific laws not mentioned in the Torah itself, known as Halacha l'Moshe miSinai — laws given to Moses at Sinai. These laws were passed down, generation to generation, from Moses to Joshua, to his student, and so on, until the time of the writing of the Talmud. On these laws there are no debates or arguments. There can't be. They were given to Moses by G-d.

Unfortunately, G-d didn't tell Moses all that much. He didn't want to. What G-d wanted, as He told us in the Torah, was for us to figure out the laws for ourselves. G-d, in Deuteronomy, said: Lo bashamayim he — "It, the Torah, is not in the heavens" — meaning it is up to us to interpret the Torah.

One of the things that G-d did give Moses was a set of rules by which to interpret the Torah. With those rules in hand, Moses and every Jew could interpret the Torah. Unfortunately, we do not have these rules available to us today. And even if we had them, we wouldn't be able to use them — only people who were deemed knowledgeable could. Moses gave this distinction to Joshua, and he to his pupil. This chain continued, unbroken, until the time of the Talmud. This is why the Talmud is as binding as the Torah itself: because G-d told Moses that He wanted the Jewish nation to apply these rules to interpret the Torah. These interpretations were written down in the Talmud.

Now you can ask: there are contradicting opinions in the Talmud — which do we follow? The answer is, we follow the majority opinion. (At the time the Talmud was being compiled this did not always apply. If a person had one teacher who was deemed worthy of interpreting — by his teacher, and his teacher's teacher, back to Moses — then he could follow his teacher, even against the others. The Talmud relates many such cases. One quick example: whether chicken is considered meat or not. One of the rabbis deemed it neutral, and in his city they ate chicken with milk, even though the law was eventually decided that chicken was indeed meat. Even after the decision, a person from that rabbi's city could still eat chicken with milk, because he followed his rabbi's interpretation. We cannot pick and choose; since we came after the fact, we must follow the majority opinion — which is why we consider chicken to be in the category of meats rather than neutrals.)

The chain of generations was broken at the time of the compiling of the Talmud, when it was decided by the few who had the right to interpret that there was no one worthy of continuing. And rather than lower their standards, they simply discontinued the chain. This led to significant problems. Judaism would not be dynamic anymore. It would have to remain, for the most part, in the form it was at that time. All that could be done from that point on was to apply the laws written in the Torah and the Talmud to cases that didn't arise until much later — which is how we can decide problems such as using electricity on the Sabbath.

To illustrate what G-d wanted with the Torah, the Talmud relates what happened when some rabbis got together to decide a certain case. One rabbi was of one opinion and all the others were against him. He — Rabbi Eliezer, I believe — to prove that his was the proper ruling, called upon the trees to prove his assertion. And a tree uprooted itself and moved. The rabbis said that trees were no proof. He brought other proofs, all of which were rebuffed by the majority. Finally he called upon G-d to prove him correct. And a heavenly voice declared that indeed he was correct. At which point Rabbi Joshua stood up and said: Lo bashamayim he — the decision is not in G-d's hands. Once He gave us the Torah, it is ours to interpret, according to the rules He set down; G-d has no right to impose His interpretations upon us. (Pretty strong words.) The decision went against Rabbi Eliezer, and followed the majority. The end of the story relates that Eliyahu the prophet visited one of the rabbis. The rabbi inquired what G-d did when He heard Rabbi Joshua speak. Eliyahu said that G-d laughed and said: Nitzchuni banai, nitzchuni — "My children have won me; they have won over Me."

I am not saying you have to believe this story literally. The point of the story, though, illustrates what I have said. G-d gave us the Torah to interpret as we see fit, using His guidelines of interpretation. We, living in the twentieth century — and for every century since the fourth or fifth — do not have those guidelines. Therefore we must rely on what was discussed in the past, when the rules were known and in use. The day may come when G-d will reveal these rules once again, and we will be able to set up our own laws. But for now, we must use what was set down, and that is what is binding upon us.

Colophon

Written by Eliyahu Teitz ([email protected]), Albert Einstein College of Medicine / Yeshiva University, New York. Posted to net.religion.jewish and net.religion, February 27, 1986. The Talmudic story of Rabbi Eliezer and the heavenly voice appears in Bava Metzia 59b; the phrase Lo bashamayim he quotes Deuteronomy 30:12. The Abravanel (Isaac ben Judah Abravanel, 1437–1508) was a Spanish-Portuguese biblical commentator and statesman.

Preserved from the UTZOO Usenet Archive (news039f1.tgz, batch b59) for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026. Original Message-ID: [email protected].

🌲