How important is it to listen to the words of our Gedloim? This has been an issue here for a long time. I’ve discussed Daas Torah before. But I want to make note of a of the fact that when it comes to considering the views of those who are looked at as representing Daas Torah …The wisdom of the Torah… there is a very important principle which should not be over-looked: Common sense.
This week’s Parsha of Korach seems to argue the opposite. Korach claimed that common sense tells us a Halacha about Tzitizis. And he tried to appeal to the masses based on his common sense of this Halacha. His approach was indeed logical. But it was wrong. Halacha is not always contingent on common sense. Sometimes the opposite is true. Common sense tells you one thing and Halacha tells you the opposite.
But does this mean we may never apply common sense when trying to determine Halacha? Of course it doesn’t. Often it is exactly the right formula to determine Halacha.
So when we hear a Psak Halacha that does not make sense to us, we have an obligation to ask questions about it. We do not just assume that our individual brains are too feeble to understand the Halacha and thereby just follow it blindly. This of course doesn’t mean we automatically violate it either. But it does mean that we should not automatically believe in nonsense.
And that is something to think about whenever we hear pronouncements in the name of Gedolim that perplex us. We have an obligation to learn everything we can about it and make sure that it isn’t a misrepresentation or an exaggeration of what the Halacha really is. Too often, people take such pronouncements out of context... or a Psak can be issued on incomplete information, or may apply only in a specific situation. No one should fear knowledge. That is what learning is all about.
And no one makes this point better than does Rav Hershel Shachter.
