Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site masscomp.UUCP
Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!masscomp!trb
From: trb@masscomp.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Fence around the Torah
Message-ID: <200@masscomp.UUCP>
Date: Tue, 28-Feb-84 13:30:42 EST
Article-I.D.: masscomp.200
Posted: Tue Feb 28 13:30:42 1984
Date-Received: Wed, 29-Feb-84 09:36:43 EST
References: <198@masscomp.UUCP> <786@ulysses.UUCP>
Organization: MASSCOMP, Littleton, MA
Lines: 70

Steve Bellovin claims

	Andy, I think you're deliberately misusing John's phrase "a
	fence around the Torah".  Surely you know what the rabbis mean
	by that!  (And I assume that John does, since he used quotation
	marks.)

Nah, I was just ignorant.  The phrase was vaguely familiar, I must
have run across it before, but I didn't grasp the implication that you
two had in mind.  Seem to me that the fence around the Torah here is
much like the fence that makes good neighbors.  It protects the Torah
and therefore Judaism but also makes it somewhat unaccessible, eh?
I don't deliberately misuse other's phrases over netnews, with such a
large audience, it's far to easy to get caught - I don't go out of
my way to look like a fool, I can look like a fool even without
straying from what I feel is the right path.

I think that we should make our gentle readers aware of the fact that
Jews do not just believe in the Torah (the "Old Testament"), they believe
in the Torah and a whole body of associated law.  Whereas devout Christians
seem to spend much of their time studying the Bible, Jews usually
study the Gemarah (usually pronounced "Gemorah," hard G, don't forget),
which is a commentary on the Mishnah, both of which comprise the
Talmud, which is essentially an extension of the Torah.  The Torah
itself is pretty inscrutable as a source of law (or history for that
matter), the Talmud is inscrutable too, but at least it's possible to
find the information you need without guessing if you have sufficient
training.

It is the Talmud which some say forms the "fence around the Torah." One
must realize that the laws of the Talmud are usually not open to
debate, as far as mainline Judaism is concerned, you don't have a
choice about whether or not you can eat a kid even if you're sure it's
not cooked in its mother's milk.  Likewise, Byron Howes asked Steve
"what about eating eggs with chicken" and Steve said he didn't have an
answer to that one.  I have an answer to that one.  The Talmud says
it's ok.  That's the answer.  Again, these laws are not based on common
sense.  You may, you must use common sense to interpret the laws which
exist, but you cannot use your common sense to decide that the laws as
they exist are wrong.  This concept has analogs when dealing with
modern systems - you need common sense to properly program a computer,
but if a computer architecture has what you perceive to be flaws in its
design, you can't just reason them away, they exist and you must deal
with them.

Do I think that the fence around the Torah is too protective?  Well,
I'd be happy if Judaism was based on the practices of Andrew
Tannenbaum.  That would be akin to shooting an arrow into a wall and
then drawing a target around where it lands, no?

Let's say we walked up to a tree.  You might ask

	Is this tree acceptable?  How could we make it better?
	
I might answer

	Well, the trunk isn't quite straight, the bark is a bit beaten
	up, the foliage isn't well formed.  On the other hand, if we
	performed the necessary improvements, I don't think that would
	make it a better tree.

	These attributes in Judaism aren't like bugs in a computer
	program, they don't make Judaism non-functional, they just make
	it the way it is.

That's kinda how I feel about Judaism and the fence around the Torah.
I have to say that I like Judaism the way it is.

	Andy Tannenbaum   Masscomp Inc  Westford MA   (617) 692-6200 x274
	just a hymie from old hymietown