Against Method 69
81. See, for example, the essay by Chaim I. Waxman ,“Toward a Sociology of Pesak,” in Moshe Sokol, ed., Rabbinic Authority and Personal Autonomy(Northvale, NJ : Jason Aronson, 1992), 217-237. That the volume is published by“The Orthodox Forum Series, A Project of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, ” testifies just how mainstream and unobjectionable this idea has become. There are, of course, many works devoted to the relationship between social and ideological factors and the development of Jewish law. Among these, the many studies of the late Professor Jacob Katz deserve special mention. One of his essays that I find particularly helpful in setting pesak within its social context is his“Ha’im chidush hasanhedrin hu begeder pitaron?”’in Jacob Katz , Le‘umi'ut yehudit: masot umechkarim (Jerusalem : World Zionist Organization , 1979), 181-190. On Katz ’s contributions to Jewish studies see Jay M. Harris , ed., The Pride of Jacob(Cambridge , MA : Harvard University Press , 2002)
82. See the memorandum on the Chief Rabbinate by S. Z. Shragai, reprinted in his Sha‘ah Venetzach(Jerusalem : Mosad Harav Koook, 1960), 326-336. Shragai describes the Chief Rabbinate as“the fruit of Orthodox Zionist(dati-le‘umi) thought, an institution whose authority is based upon its recognition that the establishment of the state reflects the divine will. Its halakhic rulings must therefore reflect this Orthodox Zionist perspective, in much the same way that the pronouncements of the Council of Torah Sages of Agudat Yisrael reflect the anti-Zionist ideology of that movement. Halakhic decision takes place within this ideological framework,” for an individual must accept the governing ideology of the rabbi before turning to that rabbi as his personal halakhic authority.
83. Perhaps the most comprehensive treatment of this theme is R. Ben-Zion Meir Chai Ouziel, Hegyonei Ouziel(Jerusalem : Hava'ad Lehotza’at Kitvei Harav, 1991).
84. See above, at note 29.
85. I have in mind here Bialik’s classic essay“Halakhah Ne'agadah,” Kitvei Ch. N. Bialik (Tel Aviv : Dvir, 1935), vol. 2, 260-275, which portrays a symbiotic relationship between these two modes of religious expression, albeit in literary rather than in jurisprudential terminology.
86. On the institution of da at torah as a means of expressing Orthodox rabbinical ideology on subjects that do not fit comfortably under the heading of halakhah, see Lawrence Kaplan ,“Daas Torah: A Modern Conception of Rabbinic Authority,” in Moshe Z. Sokol, ed., Rabbinic Authority and Personal Autonomy(Northvale, NJ : Jason Aronson, 1992), 1-60.