Monday, January 24, 2005

GH Classic: Gedolim vs Ketanim

A lot has been written recently about the Science vs Torah conflict. Suprisingly, very few have written on the Gedolim vs Ketanim conflict. Let me be the first ! Here I faithfully reproduce a debate between two imaginary personalities of mine, I mean to say two good friends of mine.

Representing the gedolim, we have Moshe Shmuel Meshuganeh, of Kollel Ayn Torah in Bnei Beserk. On the other side, representing the ketanim, is Rabbi Leatherkippah, of Congregation Modern Orthoprax of Oyvayizmere.

The Debate

MSM: Judaism has always had a very strong notion of trusting the great gedolim. This idea can be traced way back in our mesorah.

RLK: Yeah, all the way back to the first gedolim who said that we have to trust the gedolim. Isn't that a circular argument ?

MSM: Every movement needs leadership. A movement without leadership will collapse. And who is best suited to lead this movement ? Clearly the people who spend all day studying its laws, its history, its ideology. The greatest sages of the generation.
RLK: Yes, but these are also people who waste no time on other matters, cloistered in their own small world without any real connection to the rest of the world.
MSM: We have to trust the gedolim. That's how orthodox Judaism has always been and will always be. Its a fundamental belief, and you can't change it. If you don't like it, fine, go start a new religion, but it won't be orthodox Judaism.
RLK: But the gedolim are out of touch with a major segment of their own constituency. Many, many formerly quite charedi people have bee turned off by this latest ban. If this is the case, surely something is wrong ?
MSM: The only people who are turned off are those whose yirash shamayim and emunas chachomim is suspect anyway.
RLK: But the slifkin ban has shown them to have a complete lack of knowledge about accepted concepts such as science. Statements such as "science is poetry", "science is not metzius", "science is the roof not the foundation" are commonplace.
MSM: First of all, the gedolim have no need for science. Second of all, through learning Torah, they understand all of science anyway.
RLK: But they ban without due process. The whole way this ban was conducted was unfair. They ruined someone's life without even agreeing to talk to him. How could they be so unfair ?
MSM: They are the gedolim. They know what they are doing. You have to trust them.
RLK: They seem to spend a lot of time disagreeing with each other and other parts of klal yisroel. Why do they spend so much time fighting ?
MSM: You have to fight for what you believe in don't you ? That's a mitzvah.
RLK: Their actions don't seem to be the actions of gedolim. Gedolim are supposed to be super saintly people, we see little evidence of that here.
MSM: What do you expect them to do ? Go run soup kitchens ? They are busy leading klal yisroel. They have no time for petty gemilus chasadim. Any anyway, if you read their biographies you will see they are all very saintly.
RLK: They seem to be more concerned with bugs, wigs and heresy than with the major issues of the day. Shouldn't they be worried about Tsunamis, the Middle East, Atheism or some real issues ?
MSM: What do you mean ! Bugs, wigs and heresy are the major issues of the day ! You are just a kofer. You are banned !
RLK: And you are a narrow minded buffoon. You are banned !
Thus this scholarly debate ends.
However I am still conflicted. RLK seemed to have some good arguments, didn't he ? However we can't ignore MSM, can we ? I came up with a few potential answers:
Its not them, its their shomrim.
The gedolim are in actual fact very good, holy and learned people. However they are totally sheltered by their shomrim, who mislead and deceive them. They are so naive as to not realize the true situation. Hmmm.
I am a katan. I will never understand.
I am a katan. I am biased by treife external influences, lack of yiras shomayim, yetzer horah, and general katnus. I can't trust my instincts, or my thoughts, I have to surrender my ability to think. Hmmm.
These are not the real gedolim
The real gedolim are not the ones who signed the ban. They are the ones who didn't sign the ban. The ones who kept quiet. The ones who are still keeping quiet even in the face of a major injustice. Hmmm.
Its just a power struggle in the chareidi world
The whole thing is just a power struggle between the more fundamentalist EY gedolim and the more liberal US gedolim for dominance over the charedi world. Its not for MO consumption and doesn't apply to the MO community. The gedolim have to engage in these kind of power struggles by nature of their leadership. Hmmm.
There are no true gedolim these days
The era of the true godol has long passed. The current crop of gedolim are really just people who have played the game right and are now heads of various institutions, but are not particularly saintly people. Chazal, the Rishonim and the Acharonim are really the true gedolim. Hmmm.
So what do you think ?