One question came to mind when Rabbi Chaim Steinmetz was talking about the opinion of the Ran that we wouldnt be able to have a law abiding society if we didnt accept one witness on many matters..
It made me wonder - if the Ran is correct, how did Hashem, or the Gemara and Chazal, set up a system of not accepting one witness, until the Ran came along, expect society to exist and function when not allowing one witness? How were we supposed to do it before the Ran came up with his idea?
Along a similar vein, in general how was society expected to maintain itself as a law abiding society without anarchy when the rules of beis din seem to be so difficult to convict or punish anyone, by not accepting one witness, no women testifying, not believing children, needing warnings, etc. There are so many rules that seem to make it impossible to keep society in line because everyone knows that they will not have to fear being punished in beis din because it will be impossible to prosecute them. Especially on crimes committed in private against another person, though perhaps public crimes might be more controllable.
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Perhaps the admonitions of the Torah would be enough to prevent the vast majority of sins, and actual court punishments would be needed only in rare cases.
ReplyDeleteinteresting supposition. I doubt it holds water though. The gemara even talks about times when murder was rampant. If murder was rampant at times, I am sure other attitude towards other crimes couldnt have been all that great at times...
DeleteYou may be forgetting that the courts could do wherever they felt was necessary to enforce halakha (סנהדרין מכין ועונשין שלא מן הדין).
Deletefirstly, it's been proven that the accuser in this case was not telling the truth. There were so many obvious holes in it and that is why the whole thing was a sham. Secondly, in Yahadut, we have 'teshuvah'. What a young man/woman might even have been guilty of in his youth (school kid) has no bearing to what he eventually turned out to be after 35+ years. The whole situation was a disgrace.
ReplyDeleteFirst, it is absolute nonsense that anything has been proven in this case. If anything, what was proven is that Kavanaugh lied repeatedly about his drinking habits during high school and college, making his recollections more suspect. Second, teshuva is relevant only if the person does teshuva. If Kavanaugh would have said that he does not recall the incident, but he drank to excess in high school and may not remember it, and apologize for any pain he might have caused her, that would be one thing. But he did not go that route. He lied about his drinking and summoned up some righteous indignation to gaslight people (in your case, successfully) into believing that he was a pure choir-boy who never did anything in school other than have a couple of beers, study hard, and train for the football team.
DeleteThat is exactly why the Ran has the idea of a parallel justice system run by the king which does not have these limitations.
ReplyDeleteso before the Ran came up with this, how was it supposed to work?
DeleteTo Yehoshua: no one is suggesting that he made teshuvah but it was already proven in many ways that the accuser was definitely lying in quite a few areas. For instance, her never having taken a polygraph test when she had instructed someone on how to take it and pass. There has been much written on her whole testimony. Her answers were noticeably to most quite inconsistent .
ReplyDeleteYou are wrong. Do your research (not just on Fox News and Breitbart).
DeleteYou're asking the wrong question. How can we have set up a system where one witness can ruin a person's life, by singular false accusations?
ReplyDelete'VeDarashta beteiv' means you must identify when and where, which she fails to do. This is specifically not testimony that can be subject to 'zimum'. No need to resort to 'alternate justice systems'.