You once posted about something you called "superstructures of knowledge," which seems to be a similar idea. No? I also made the yetzias mitzrayim connection in comments.
The memory of that event, in our minds and the minds of others, is what generates the reality that we’re married.
You know this isn't halachically true at all. You can go into a 50 year coma and still be married. Marriage (like any kinyan) is a reality and has nothing to do with memory of an event. Methinks you need to re-read Chezkas Habatim (and Eilu Mitzius, and Hagozel (2), for that matter).
Similarly, God was koneh us with Yeztias Mitzrayim. It's got nothing to do with our memories. If all of us violated the positive commandment to remember, we'd still be His nation, and He would still be God.
Similarly, God was koneh us with Yeztias Mitzrayim. It's got nothing to do with our memories. If all of us violated the positive commandment to remember, we'd still be His nation, and He would still be God.
Yes, but what would be the nafka mina, if nobody knew about it? "Hilcheta le'meshicha??"
bill, really? halakhically, how would it be determined that we're married?
try answering this without getting into the halakhic concepts of eidus and chazakah.
let's set up a chavrusa in chezkas habatim, and we'll see where it goes...
bill, really? halakhically, how would it be determined that we're married?
try answering this without getting into the halakhic concepts of eidus and chazakah.
The gemara and poskim are very clear about how to determine if a couple is married...and they speak about eidus and chazaka. So, I'm not sure how I'm supposed to answer the question. (Remember, you asked how halakhically we could determine if we're married).
Do you deny that fact that if someone goes into a coma - he and his wife are no longer married?
Bill - if you want to play theoretical games, then if everybody woke up one morning, including my wife and I, and had our minds wiped of any memory of our being married, then I'd suggest that, halakhically speaking, we wouldn't be married. The coma issue isn't a good example because the perception still remains with others. There's a shared, public perception which is rooted in that collective memory.
Marriage is a bad example because there's really no hypothetical case of a marriage being 'forgotten'. Land ownership is a much better example. And rule #1 of Chezkas Habatim is that we're not trying to determine who is the owner, objectively speaking, rather, who is behaving in a manner most consistent with ownership. If there are two conflicting 'taynas', we don't even try to determine who is factually correct. we look to see who is muchzak, i.e., who has succeeded in creating a 'persistent public memory' of his ownership. ve-acamo"l.
If there are two conflicting 'taynas', we don't even try to determine who is factually correct. we look to see who is muchzak, i.e., who has succeeded in creating a 'persistent public memory' of his ownership. ve-acamo"l.
'Persistent public memory', as you put it, is an indicator of ownership. It's an "anan sahadi". It's not ownership because "everyone thinks it is". It's ownership because this guy must OWN IT, i.e. he bought it, or he was otherwise koneh it (a real kinyan). The proof is, because if he didn't, Yenem would have been mocheh. That's a siman, not a siba.
There's a shared, public perception which is rooted in that collective memory.
I hope you realize where one can take this. If we all got together to make a commune - and all decided that marraiges and kinyanim were not to be respected - according to you, we'd be doing nothin wrong. It's all about perception, baby.
Bill regarding your first point, I suggest you go back and learn that perek. 'Persistent public memory' is not an indicator of ownership. It IS ownership. Ownership is a human construct, and works precisely because there are shared perceptions. When there is a doubt as to what is percieved, judges - einei ha-edah- are called in.
Regarding your last point, if we got together and decided, then it wouldn't be rooted in perception. One can't consciously decide what to percieve at a given moment.
I think you're missing a fundamental point about the nature of perception.We tend to think of it as a reflection of some kind of 'true' reality. It's not. It's an active participant in the construction of that which is percieved. It's not only HOW we see, it's WHAT we see.
Okay. One step further. We establish said commune. After 50 years and three inbred generations, does the concept of marriage and ownership exist within this commune or not? The grandchildren's perception is a true perception - even according to your definition.
My point is, the Torah (and common law for that matter) concretizes ownership. Of course, perception plays a role. But the fact remains that even without our perception, the mechanics of acquiring objects exists.
God is king whether or not He has a kingdom. We are His people whether or not we recognize him.
Adon olam, asher malach b'terem kol yitzir nivra. V'acharei kichlos hakol, livado yimloch nora.
Bill - ein li esek be-nistaros. I don't understand the metaphysics of ownership.
My offer to learn chezkas stands, because I think we're speaking two different languages here.
I think there's some confusion about the two classes of chazaka - there's the kinyan, which is achieved through a demonstration of ownership, and the assumption of ownership, which is only a default used when more impressive proofs don't exist.
It's nice and warm and fuzzy, but it's still inferior to, well, facts on the ground.
I think the communal aspect of remembering is important. Remembering is an individual responsibility, from parent to child. But individuals and their families may lose the tradition of remembering.
Assimilated Jewish families may stop making the seder and retelling the story every year, but the collective memories of other Jews may come in later to help fill in the gaps in the narrative (perhaps somewhat similar to the eidim that help establish whether a couple has been married, in your analogy).
At the same time, if a person's memory of why he is a Jew is wiped out entirely, and he has no concept of what this means -- when he hears the narrative from others, is it still his own narrative?
In other words.. Suppose I grew up with a vague knowledge that I was Jewish, hearing bits and pieces about Torah and various traditions, etc. and then at a later point I sought to fill in the gaps in my "I am Jewish" narrative by relying on our communal memories as relayed to me by practicing Jews -- then indeed I would basically be engaged in reconstructing my own broken narrative. But if I grew up knowing absolutely nothing of my Jewish identity, can I still call the narrative I receive from Aish.com my own?
If you wake up with partial retrograde amnesia, and your wife looks dear and familiar, but you don't quite remember her name or the way you met, she is still your wife and you will eagerly attempt to reconstruct the lost details. But if your amnesia is total, and your wife appears to you as a complete stranger, can the marriage be salvaged, and would there be a will on your part to salvage that marriage?
I guess the mystical answer, and perhaps the halakhic answer, is a 'yes'... but I'm not entirely convinced.
D-
i think that there's definitely a trend - and often a disturbing one - toward filling in the gaps of our own, broken narrative with a popular one. The success of aish.com is largely predicated upon this, i believe. so is the success of Hamas, by the way.
Yerushalmi talks about different types of memory in his book, especially in the lecture appended to it.
on a lighter note, i'd reccomend the movie '50 first dates'.
This is true... The most popular narrative is by definition the most available one. And the narrators that make themselves the most available tend to come from the "right-wing" point of view (Chabad, Aish, Ohr Somayach, etc). I am not c"v comparing them to the Christian right, but in Christianity too you see what the most vocal movements are. There's a catchy quote about the quiet nature of centrism, but I can't remember it.
But your post made me think about the cultural memories of Soviet Jews, and how they relate to their personal Jewish identities. If you went back to USSR in the 1970s, you'll see that Passover was the last holiday that was still being observed among a sizeable minority of Jews. People still got their matzas, and got together for the seder. It's because of, as you say, the inherent link of Passover to our very identity as Jews. This makes Passover unique among all other holidays, and the redemption from the USSR managed to salvage those remaining memories for many -- a few decades later, and those memories would've been lost completely with the older generations.
But then there are people -- maybe for the first time in history? -- who have, in fact, lost that link completely. People who do not have even grandparents and great-grandparents who they can provide even the smallest remnants of their own cultural memory. People who have total absolute amnesia, even if technically they remain Jewish, as evidenced to them by their dark hair or a German last name. I think they represent a very large number of secular Jews today -- not just Russian -- as the years and generations start to add up since the start of Haskala.
And I think that once those memories are lost in this complete fashion, they can no longer be restored. Maybe why there are so many people convinced that we are on the verge of the messianic era.
I find it also significant that the "once-a-year" Jews in America are once-a-year on the most individual/non-cultural of all holidays - Yom Kippur, not on Pesach.
But I could be totally wrong about this.
i think it's instructive that there are only 2 positive commandments that a failure to perform warrants 'karet' - i.e., disenfranchisement from Israel: circumcision and korban pesach (cf. first mishna in kritot). perhaps in the USSR, where circumcision was performed at a great risk, perhaps it makes sense that pesach would have such staying power.
both yom kippur and pesach are generally observed in Israel, where many other traditions have waned in popularity, and even in the US, it's up there with yom kippur and chanukah as the most visible Jewish holidays, and Chanukah only because it coincides with christmas.
the problem that you mention, though, is a key problem that judaism has faced for the last 2 centuries. jewish memory has been disrupted, and we haven't really found a way to reconstruct it.
"i think that there's definitely a trend - and often a disturbing one - toward filling in the gaps of our own, broken narrative with a popular one."
You think that's a recent trend? Oh, the irony of saying that in a post about remembering "yetziat mitzrayim!"
mis-nagid-
it's definitely NOT a recent trend, and i never said it is.
i haven't made the error of confusing narrative with history, which you seem to be conflating. the historicity of yetziat mitzrayim has no bearing on its status as a foundational (birth) narrative of Israel, and the fact modernity has shattered the power of these narratives and fragmented Jewish identity.
"it's definitely NOT a recent trend, and i never said it is."
"Trend" has more connotation of recentness than a word like "tendency" would. But ok, as you wish.
"i haven't made the error of confusing narrative with history, which you seem to be conflating. the historicity of yetziat mitzrayim has no bearing on its status as a foundational (birth) narrative of Israel,"
Ah, so you're not Orthodox. Good to know.
"and the fact modernity has shattered the power of these narratives and fragmented Jewish identity."
That's a funny way of saying "we found out it's not true and people left."
"Ah, so you're not Orthodox. Good to know."
Yeah. Just don't tell my balabatim.
"That's a funny way of saying 'we found out it's not true and people left.'"
Actually, you're putting the cart before the horse. By and large, lack of observance preceded (and usually continues to precede) loss of collective identity/memory. It's the observances which are instrumental in perpetuating the memories. Yerushalmi (Zakhor) reads it this way.
"Yeah. Just don't tell my balabatim."
No joke.
"Actually, you're putting the cart before the horse."
I was just poking to see how you'd respond. Anyway, I didn't say "loss of collective identity/memory." I said "we found out it's not true." Still not really why people left, though it didn't help.
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