{"id":72260,"date":"2015-08-07T10:07:02","date_gmt":"2015-08-07T18:07:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=72260"},"modified":"2015-08-07T10:09:37","modified_gmt":"2015-08-07T18:09:37","slug":"the-noble-lie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=72260","title":{"rendered":"The Noble Lie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><A HREF=\"http:\/\/seforim.blogspot.com\/2015\/07\/truth-be-told1-comments-on-changing.html\">Marc B. Shapiro blogs<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>1. Amichai Markowitz called my attention to a talmudic text that I overlooked. Nedarim 23b states: \u201cThe Tanna has intentionally obscured the law, in order that vows should not be lightly treated.\u201d This relates to the issue of the truth not being made available to all. See also Kovetz Iggerot Hazon Ish, vol. 2, no. 78, that one should not reveal to the masses that the Sages forbade things that the Torah permitted.[22]<\/p>\n<p>2. R. Joseph Ibn Caspi writes that at times it is appropriate for members of the intellectual elite to lie.[23] This explains how Joseph lied to his brothers when he accused them of being spies (Gen. 42:9). In support of this view Ibn Caspi cites both Maimonides and Aristotle.[24] The mention of Maimonides no doubt refers to the latter\u2019s notion of \u201cnecessary beliefs\u201d<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;In the next issue of Masorah le-Yosef my article on \u201cnecessary beliefs\u201d will appear. In this article I discuss how Maimonides and other figures say things that do not reflect their true opinion, but are merely \u201cnecessary beliefs\u201d, i.e., \u201cbeliefs\u201d that the masses should accept but which are not really true at all. If these authorities think that the masses can be fed false ideas when it comes to theology, why should halakhah be any different?<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;9. See R. Mordechai Eliasburg, Shevil ha-Zahav (Warsaw, 1897), p. 27-28, who claims that both Nahmanides and R. Jacob Emden recorded things in their writings that they did not really believe.<\/p>\n<p>10. R. Chaim Sunitzky called my attention to R. Israel Weltz, Divrei Yisrael, vol. 3, no. 170, who doesn&#8217;t see such a problem with false stories if they lead people in a good direction.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Marc B. Shapiro blogs: 1. Amichai Markowitz called my attention to a talmudic text that I overlooked. Nedarim 23b states: \u201cThe Tanna has intentionally obscured the law, in order that vows should not be lightly treated.\u201d This relates to the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/?p=72260\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[69,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-72260","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-marc-b-shapiro","category-orthodoxy"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72260","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=72260"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72260\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":72263,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/72260\/revisions\/72263"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=72260"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=72260"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lukeford.net\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=72260"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}