A way I like to put it is that we don't know why an Aleph is shaped as it is, or why Tefillin are black with a four-headed Shin on one side. Chazal *did* understand these details (and no, they are not just arbitrary constructs). When we know all that they did and still have these questions - which at that point, presumably we won't - then we'll be able to say that they erred. But in my limited experience, as well as the experience of those far greater than me, the likes of Rashi and the Gra, the opposite ends up happening: the more we understand truth and what the world is really about, the more enlightening Chazal's words become to us.
If you were at all familiar with Rishonim discussions on how the gemara paskens you would know these rules. A couple examples are Rav B'Issur. Shmuel B'Momonos. Holchin Achar Basra. Abaya vs Rava outside of Ya'el Kagam. etc. I did not mean only rules. Sometimes, as in the case of Rashi you quoted, it is the reconciliation of two separate Gemaros that seem to conclude different rulings. Look at some of the Hakdamos to the Rif and Ran for one example of such discussions. Not sure why your kollel years would not have exposed you to any of this. Did you never learn a Sugya L'Halacha?
Oh man you are all over the place and slowly revealing your learning ability, finally! I was wondering when I could chavrusa with you a little.
Everybody being able to make mistakes was acknowledged in my point, so you repeating it and yelling EVERYBODY, does not constitute a response.
Rashi Beitza 33a- Please tell me you are not referencing the muktzeh one? Did you confuse Rashi claiming the rules of Gemara themselves mean the Gemara itself is telling us not to follow these Amoraim, for Rashi claiming the Gemara made a mistake? It appears you are the one mistaken. It is an absolute rule that Rishonim do not argue on Gemara's conclusions (albeit the recognition that mistakes can theoretically occur). When they argued on Hilchasa it was because they held Hilchasa was not from the Gemara, or they held the Gemara was telling them in other ways not to pasken that way (Like Hilchasa V'TeUvta, or the case of Rashi you brought up).
You also know this to be true as there is a reason you could not find a source of a Rishon saying a gemara made a mistake and you are left with a couple heretical sounding remarks but only sounding that way to an ear that has not the ability to hear them accurately.
Your head seems to be set in stone. Be better, or be less Kofery. The unintelligent kofer guy is the worst look.
"The Torah is ... is a vast, interconnected system that is supposed to, in theory, be internally consistent and coherent. This is obvious from the many branches of halacha, ... each of which the Gemara spends countless pages attempting to reconcile and make internally consistent. ... In other cases, the Gemara makes no such comparisons, or explicitly distinguishes between different halachic subjects."
Seems to me that that's true pretty much by definition of any legal system. You can't have 2 contradictory commands without some means of adjudicating between them. Secular law has all sorts of canons of construction as well. https://jm919846758.files.wordpress.com/2020/09/rlilt.pdf
Some of them are very similar to 13 middos. E.G. "32. Ejusdem Generis Canon Where general words follow an enumeration of
two or more things, they apply only to persons or things of the same general
kind or class specifically mentioned (ejusdem generis)."
If I were to say a stiroh in rashi was caused by human error, an elderly man writing by candlelight, one contradictory place written decades after the other, does that make me an apikorus?
Tosfos clearly does not ascribe mythical supernatural intelligence and infallibility to Rashi. He simply says over and over again Rashi got it wrong. I am not sure why we need to ascribe supernatural intelligence to Rashi.
To put in another way do you genuinely believe Rashi had in mind all those given complex lomdishe resolutions to the stiras? Many talmidei chachomim believe not. They shrug their shoulders, say those shticklech answering the contradiction is nice torah (or not, as the case may be) and a stiroh remains a stiroh.
Forget about kfira, more like complete ignorance. (Well I guess that is what all kfira comes from, come to think of it.)
For our tiny perspective, Rashi *was* supernatural. But Tosafos were also, so they could argue. We are little nothings and try to understand both sides as best as we can. Tosafos arguing with Rashi on his plane says very little to demote Rashi. Besides that the very Tosafos who argue sat at his fit and drank his every word.
To paraphrase what a wise man once said, "Many times, after much difficulty, we attain some comprehension, which is like seeing the light of the sun after emerging from a cave, or uncovering a treasure at the bottom of the ocean."
But who told them they were supernatural? The rishonim spanned a 400ish yead period. Who told later rishonim in the end of the period they could argue with rishonim from the beginning? Why didn't they say yeridas hadoros, chutzpah, the early rishonim were MORE supernatural than us etc etc. Without nevious how did they know?
The answer is of course they didn't have these hang ups.
There is no evidence that rishonim were 'supernatural'. Made up yeshivish nonsense.
Probably when they spent hours and hours delving into Hashem's Torah and they felt like actual מלאכים and were able to use their עיניים שכליים to see the world of רוחניות around them, they knew. נבואה is a מדריגא even higher than רוח הקודש but the latter is still applicable. I promise you they were different than you and me. Don't project your (our) blind world onto them.
There is nothing in the writings of the rishonim themselves to remotely hint at what you are saying. Nor in the acharonim. Yes, some Rabbis may have written so, or said so. But that doesn't make it fact. Your derech is to repeat yeshivish cannon over and over again. That is not a mekor.
Please see what the Meiri has to say about Rashi. This is found in his introduction to his commentary on Pirkay Avos. It is a long writeup, briefly describing the history of the Torah sheBaal Peh, and who the major gedolim were in each generation. See what he has to say about Rashi. He clearly had a MUCH higher opinion about Rashi than you do.
The grumpy old man is setting up a straw argument. Don't fall for it.
Rashi had 'supernatural intelligence' so Tosfos couldn't argue. He didn't consider for a second that perhaps Tosfos too had supernatural intelligence. Or that nobody even claimed that Rashi had supernatural intelligence, rather a towering intelligence. Tosfos admitted that, yet was not that much lesser than Rashi not to be able to argue with his.
When a loser on the comments section casually dismisses a Rashi, or a tweed jacketed tenured chair warmer in an obscure Talmud department is too lazy to actually work on the subject, he is treating Rashi as casually as an op-ed in the daily paper.
That is the reason to point out their superior intelligence.
A. תוספות wrote about דברי רש"י because he was the towering giant of תורה. They didn't bother with lesser מפרשים.
B. When תוספות are מקשה on רש"י, they don't think that he was "an elderly man writing by candlelight". They think that his מהלך is wrong vis a vis the סוגיא. No different than any other מחלוקת.
Firstly, I'm talking about stiros. Secondly re your point A, I think you have missed mine.
If Rashi was a talmid chochom blesses with supernatural powers, how could tosfos even question him. My point is that you see throughout shas and rishonim they treated each other as normal human beings, complete with insults and jokes and very human taivos. This idea that they were superhuman is of recent origin.
I'm not sure what you mean by that. We have seforim on klalei hashas. We have lomdishe seforim which are pretty systematic, like shev shmaytsa and sharei yosher. And with regard to drashos, the malbim in his hakdama to vayikra even provides 613 rules for how they're derived from the text.
Poskim wouldn't be able to pasken about new technologies if chazal's system were such a complete black box.
I'm sure the Shaarei Yosher understood the klalim much better than we do, but I doubt he would claim that he understands even טיפה מן הים of what Chazal understood.
The poskim do the best they can, יפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו.
If you think the Malbim's 613 rules will enable you to understand all or even most of the drashos of Chazal, be my guest. You can start with אמר רב חסדא למדנו מציאה ממציאה ומציאה מחיפוש וחיפוש מחיפוש וחיפוש מנרות ונרות מנר (Pesachim 7b).
"I'm sure the Shaarei Yosher understood the klalim much better than we do, but I doubt he would claim that he understands even טיפה מן הים of what Chazal understood."
I agree with that. But I think he would say that that's due to yeridas hadoros. Not as you stated, "This isn't necessarily because Chazal were smarter than us, but because they were 2,000 years closer to Matan Torah, and had the literal Torah sheBaal Peh, rather than the mostly frozen text format that is in our hands." (Although, truthfully, I'm now not entirely sure what you mean by that statement.)
"The poskim do the best they can, יפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו."
Obviously. But there wouldn't be anything for them to do if they didn't have an understanding of the underlying principles. The chazon ish lived a long time after the gemara's text was frozen, yet he clearly felt he had enough of a handle on the conceptual underpinnings of boneh to apply it completing electrical circuits. R Moshe did the same. He clearly believed he understood the concept of ain adam oseh be'ilaso be'ilas znus well enough to exclude civil marriage from it.
"If you think the Malbim's 613 rules will enable you to understand all or even most of the drashos of Chazal, be my guest."
I don't claim *I* understand it that well. My point was that the *malbim* thought they were logical and that he could trace them. Which he clearly did. His whole pirush to vayikra is an application of the system he laid out.
I'm not sure if yeridos hadoros means something different than my statement about Chazal being closer to Matan Torah. Are you sure it means having bigger brains and a higher IQ? If it does, I have no idea if Rav Shimon Shkop subscribed to that notion or not.
When I talk about an understanding of the underlying principles, I mean the following: If the Chazon Ish was missing the page of the Gemara about בשר מן החי (Chullin 102b), would he on his own, with the understanding of the principles he has from the rest of the Torah, be able to figure out that בשר מן החי from a living non-treifah animal is considered a lav of treifah? I have no idea, maybe he would. But just from my limited perspective, you would need an understanding of the Torah that goes well, well beyond what we have in our frozen text to figure that out.
Or, if the Malbim was missing a page of the Toras Cohanim, would he be able to derive the drashos for those pesukim based on his 613 principles? Again, maybe. But it seems unlikely.
That doesn't mean that they don't have a good enough understanding , on their very high level, to be מדמה מילתא למילתא and decide the halacha of electricity. But I think that their understanding is necessarily very limited compared to Chazal.
Can you flesh out what you mean by that? What's the difference between what you're describing versus cases in the gemara where amoraim were unaware of things? Gittin 6B אֲמַר לֵיהּ אַבָּיֵי: אַטּוּ כֹּל דְּלָא יָדַע הָא דְּרַבִּי יִצְחָק, לָאו גַּבְרָא רַבָּה הוּא?! בִּשְׁלָמָא מִילְּתָא דְתַלְיָא בִּסְבָרָא – לְחַיֵּי; הָא – גְּמָרָא הִיא, וּגְמָרָא לָא שְׁמִיעַ לֵיהּ.
What should they search for in yerusholayim and do you believe the situation is any better in Chareidiland? Have we learnt the lessons? Go ask all those people without money and power in Chareidiland how they are 'mucked about" in Beis Din when the other side has power and/or money. Or even when they don't. It's an unregulated Wild West.
Of course social sciences is science. It is just a softer science. If it is rigorously measured with data, it is a science. You seem to think science is just beakers and test tubes.
Ok, I checked in the Rambam and it seems that he uses your terminology of excluding gzeiros from the term "Torah sheBaal Peh". However, the Rabbeinu Yonah says everything in the Mishna is included in "Torah sheBaal Peh". The fact that כותבי ברכות כשורפי תורה also seems like this. If you don't like my terms, use "the Mesorah" instead, or any other term you like.
I geuss Rava and Rav Ashi are school kids who do not understand because in Yoma 28b they refer to Eruv Tavshilin (See Rashi there who speaks out it is a Takana DeRabanan) as Torah Sh'Bal Peh. It is really of poor choice to make such sweeping statements about Torah because unless one is a Baki in all of Torah they are most likely to be mistaken. I just happened upon this source, and I am sure it is not the only one. But, it is certainly enough that it should cause you to retract your statement, and hopefully be wary of saying such things in the future.
Very important post!
One comment- not all faculty and students in every Talmud Dept. are כופרים.
Some (and in at least in one Talmud Dept. - most) are מאמינים בתושבע"פ completely, and would certainly agree with your post.
That is true, I over-generalized a bit.
Great post! (and great title;) Really well said.
A way I like to put it is that we don't know why an Aleph is shaped as it is, or why Tefillin are black with a four-headed Shin on one side. Chazal *did* understand these details (and no, they are not just arbitrary constructs). When we know all that they did and still have these questions - which at that point, presumably we won't - then we'll be able to say that they erred. But in my limited experience, as well as the experience of those far greater than me, the likes of Rashi and the Gra, the opposite ends up happening: the more we understand truth and what the world is really about, the more enlightening Chazal's words become to us.
“I was only too happy to oblige, but I wouldn't want to bore you with such details.“
I’ve seen many accusations hurled at you, never that you’re a bore. Lay it out.
If you were at all familiar with Rishonim discussions on how the gemara paskens you would know these rules. A couple examples are Rav B'Issur. Shmuel B'Momonos. Holchin Achar Basra. Abaya vs Rava outside of Ya'el Kagam. etc. I did not mean only rules. Sometimes, as in the case of Rashi you quoted, it is the reconciliation of two separate Gemaros that seem to conclude different rulings. Look at some of the Hakdamos to the Rif and Ran for one example of such discussions. Not sure why your kollel years would not have exposed you to any of this. Did you never learn a Sugya L'Halacha?
Oh man you are all over the place and slowly revealing your learning ability, finally! I was wondering when I could chavrusa with you a little.
Everybody being able to make mistakes was acknowledged in my point, so you repeating it and yelling EVERYBODY, does not constitute a response.
Rashi Beitza 33a- Please tell me you are not referencing the muktzeh one? Did you confuse Rashi claiming the rules of Gemara themselves mean the Gemara itself is telling us not to follow these Amoraim, for Rashi claiming the Gemara made a mistake? It appears you are the one mistaken. It is an absolute rule that Rishonim do not argue on Gemara's conclusions (albeit the recognition that mistakes can theoretically occur). When they argued on Hilchasa it was because they held Hilchasa was not from the Gemara, or they held the Gemara was telling them in other ways not to pasken that way (Like Hilchasa V'TeUvta, or the case of Rashi you brought up).
You also know this to be true as there is a reason you could not find a source of a Rishon saying a gemara made a mistake and you are left with a couple heretical sounding remarks but only sounding that way to an ear that has not the ability to hear them accurately.
Your head seems to be set in stone. Be better, or be less Kofery. The unintelligent kofer guy is the worst look.
"rules of Gemara" Where is this rule in the gemoroh?
"The Torah is ... is a vast, interconnected system that is supposed to, in theory, be internally consistent and coherent. This is obvious from the many branches of halacha, ... each of which the Gemara spends countless pages attempting to reconcile and make internally consistent. ... In other cases, the Gemara makes no such comparisons, or explicitly distinguishes between different halachic subjects."
Seems to me that that's true pretty much by definition of any legal system. You can't have 2 contradictory commands without some means of adjudicating between them. Secular law has all sorts of canons of construction as well. https://jm919846758.files.wordpress.com/2020/09/rlilt.pdf
Some of them are very similar to 13 middos. E.G. "32. Ejusdem Generis Canon Where general words follow an enumeration of
two or more things, they apply only to persons or things of the same general
kind or class specifically mentioned (ejusdem generis)."
I never meant to prove from this that TSBP is Divine. Just that it has guiding principles, most of which we have very little understanding of.
If I were to say a stiroh in rashi was caused by human error, an elderly man writing by candlelight, one contradictory place written decades after the other, does that make me an apikorus?
Tosfos clearly does not ascribe mythical supernatural intelligence and infallibility to Rashi. He simply says over and over again Rashi got it wrong. I am not sure why we need to ascribe supernatural intelligence to Rashi.
To put in another way do you genuinely believe Rashi had in mind all those given complex lomdishe resolutions to the stiras? Many talmidei chachomim believe not. They shrug their shoulders, say those shticklech answering the contradiction is nice torah (or not, as the case may be) and a stiroh remains a stiroh.
Anything is possible, I never heard anybody being called an apikores for suggesting Rashi was חוזר, but it's certainly not the best answer.
Forget about kfira, more like complete ignorance. (Well I guess that is what all kfira comes from, come to think of it.)
For our tiny perspective, Rashi *was* supernatural. But Tosafos were also, so they could argue. We are little nothings and try to understand both sides as best as we can. Tosafos arguing with Rashi on his plane says very little to demote Rashi. Besides that the very Tosafos who argue sat at his fit and drank his every word.
To paraphrase what a wise man once said, "Many times, after much difficulty, we attain some comprehension, which is like seeing the light of the sun after emerging from a cave, or uncovering a treasure at the bottom of the ocean."
But who told them they were supernatural? The rishonim spanned a 400ish yead period. Who told later rishonim in the end of the period they could argue with rishonim from the beginning? Why didn't they say yeridas hadoros, chutzpah, the early rishonim were MORE supernatural than us etc etc. Without nevious how did they know?
The answer is of course they didn't have these hang ups.
There is no evidence that rishonim were 'supernatural'. Made up yeshivish nonsense.
Indeed, ראשונים from the end of the period usually do not argue with ראשונים from the beginning
See for example Darchei Hatalmud here https://www.sefaria.org/Darkhei_HaTalmud.5.6?lang=he&with=all&lang2=he
Not quite mainstream, but also not "made up yeshivish nonsense".
What exactly are you pointing me to?
Probably when they spent hours and hours delving into Hashem's Torah and they felt like actual מלאכים and were able to use their עיניים שכליים to see the world of רוחניות around them, they knew. נבואה is a מדריגא even higher than רוח הקודש but the latter is still applicable. I promise you they were different than you and me. Don't project your (our) blind world onto them.
There is nothing in the writings of the rishonim themselves to remotely hint at what you are saying. Nor in the acharonim. Yes, some Rabbis may have written so, or said so. But that doesn't make it fact. Your derech is to repeat yeshivish cannon over and over again. That is not a mekor.
Please see what the Meiri has to say about Rashi. This is found in his introduction to his commentary on Pirkay Avos. It is a long writeup, briefly describing the history of the Torah sheBaal Peh, and who the major gedolim were in each generation. See what he has to say about Rashi. He clearly had a MUCH higher opinion about Rashi than you do.
The grumpy old man is setting up a straw argument. Don't fall for it.
Rashi had 'supernatural intelligence' so Tosfos couldn't argue. He didn't consider for a second that perhaps Tosfos too had supernatural intelligence. Or that nobody even claimed that Rashi had supernatural intelligence, rather a towering intelligence. Tosfos admitted that, yet was not that much lesser than Rashi not to be able to argue with his.
When a loser on the comments section casually dismisses a Rashi, or a tweed jacketed tenured chair warmer in an obscure Talmud department is too lazy to actually work on the subject, he is treating Rashi as casually as an op-ed in the daily paper.
That is the reason to point out their superior intelligence.
Well, Tosfos didn't.
A. תוספות wrote about דברי רש"י because he was the towering giant of תורה. They didn't bother with lesser מפרשים.
B. When תוספות are מקשה on רש"י, they don't think that he was "an elderly man writing by candlelight". They think that his מהלך is wrong vis a vis the סוגיא. No different than any other מחלוקת.
How can think he is wrong? He supposedly had ruach hakodesh. Are you suggesting rishonim can make mistakes?
Firstly, I'm talking about stiros. Secondly re your point A, I think you have missed mine.
If Rashi was a talmid chochom blesses with supernatural powers, how could tosfos even question him. My point is that you see throughout shas and rishonim they treated each other as normal human beings, complete with insults and jokes and very human taivos. This idea that they were superhuman is of recent origin.
I'm not sure what you mean by that. We have seforim on klalei hashas. We have lomdishe seforim which are pretty systematic, like shev shmaytsa and sharei yosher. And with regard to drashos, the malbim in his hakdama to vayikra even provides 613 rules for how they're derived from the text.
Poskim wouldn't be able to pasken about new technologies if chazal's system were such a complete black box.
I'm sure the Shaarei Yosher understood the klalim much better than we do, but I doubt he would claim that he understands even טיפה מן הים of what Chazal understood.
The poskim do the best they can, יפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו.
If you think the Malbim's 613 rules will enable you to understand all or even most of the drashos of Chazal, be my guest. You can start with אמר רב חסדא למדנו מציאה ממציאה ומציאה מחיפוש וחיפוש מחיפוש וחיפוש מנרות ונרות מנר (Pesachim 7b).
"I'm sure the Shaarei Yosher understood the klalim much better than we do, but I doubt he would claim that he understands even טיפה מן הים of what Chazal understood."
I agree with that. But I think he would say that that's due to yeridas hadoros. Not as you stated, "This isn't necessarily because Chazal were smarter than us, but because they were 2,000 years closer to Matan Torah, and had the literal Torah sheBaal Peh, rather than the mostly frozen text format that is in our hands." (Although, truthfully, I'm now not entirely sure what you mean by that statement.)
"The poskim do the best they can, יפתח בדורו כשמואל בדורו."
Obviously. But there wouldn't be anything for them to do if they didn't have an understanding of the underlying principles. The chazon ish lived a long time after the gemara's text was frozen, yet he clearly felt he had enough of a handle on the conceptual underpinnings of boneh to apply it completing electrical circuits. R Moshe did the same. He clearly believed he understood the concept of ain adam oseh be'ilaso be'ilas znus well enough to exclude civil marriage from it.
"If you think the Malbim's 613 rules will enable you to understand all or even most of the drashos of Chazal, be my guest."
I don't claim *I* understand it that well. My point was that the *malbim* thought they were logical and that he could trace them. Which he clearly did. His whole pirush to vayikra is an application of the system he laid out.
I'm not sure if yeridos hadoros means something different than my statement about Chazal being closer to Matan Torah. Are you sure it means having bigger brains and a higher IQ? If it does, I have no idea if Rav Shimon Shkop subscribed to that notion or not.
When I talk about an understanding of the underlying principles, I mean the following: If the Chazon Ish was missing the page of the Gemara about בשר מן החי (Chullin 102b), would he on his own, with the understanding of the principles he has from the rest of the Torah, be able to figure out that בשר מן החי from a living non-treifah animal is considered a lav of treifah? I have no idea, maybe he would. But just from my limited perspective, you would need an understanding of the Torah that goes well, well beyond what we have in our frozen text to figure that out.
Or, if the Malbim was missing a page of the Toras Cohanim, would he be able to derive the drashos for those pesukim based on his 613 principles? Again, maybe. But it seems unlikely.
That doesn't mean that they don't have a good enough understanding , on their very high level, to be מדמה מילתא למילתא and decide the halacha of electricity. But I think that their understanding is necessarily very limited compared to Chazal.
Can you flesh out what you mean by that? What's the difference between what you're describing versus cases in the gemara where amoraim were unaware of things? Gittin 6B אֲמַר לֵיהּ אַבָּיֵי: אַטּוּ כֹּל דְּלָא יָדַע הָא דְּרַבִּי יִצְחָק, לָאו גַּבְרָא רַבָּה הוּא?! בִּשְׁלָמָא מִילְּתָא דְתַלְיָא בִּסְבָרָא – לְחַיֵּי; הָא – גְּמָרָא הִיא, וּגְמָרָא לָא שְׁמִיעַ לֵיהּ.
What should they search for in yerusholayim and do you believe the situation is any better in Chareidiland? Have we learnt the lessons? Go ask all those people without money and power in Chareidiland how they are 'mucked about" in Beis Din when the other side has power and/or money. Or even when they don't. It's an unregulated Wild West.
"All of these are subject to empirical investigation and are therefore theoretically under the purview of science"
You really do have a weird definition of science. I can prove by emperical observation that that the kosher stores are busier on erev shabbos.
Are you suggesting that is 'science"?
Of course social sciences is science. It is just a softer science. If it is rigorously measured with data, it is a science. You seem to think science is just beakers and test tubes.
A lot of people going shopping on erev shabbos is not 'social science'.
If you measure it rigorously, of course it is
As I wrote, a weird definition of science.
only weird if you know nothing about science
So does the sun go through a window in the sky at night? Travel above the sky and go back in through another window at sunrise?
Yes or no?
I was talking about halachos
It is connected with halochoh. Mayim shelonu according to some rishonim.
Mayim shelanu doesn't require a window. The opposite in fact.
I didn't say it 'requires'. I said 'connected with'.
Everything is connected with everything. Karate is connected with Shabbos. Who cares.
No talmid chochom refers to hilchos chanukah and other takonos d'rabbonon as "torah sh'pal peh". School kids do maybe, who don't properly understand.
Actually, Megillah is not, it is b'ksav. I will correct that. Bu what do you think Chanuka is? Torah she'Bsav? Of course it is Torah sheBaal peh.
Chanukoh is a mitzva d'rabbobon.
Tefillin must be black is torah sh'bal peh. As is hagromoh and shehiya in shechitah. And mimochoros hashabbos does not not mean Sunday.
Mitzvos d'Rabonon are part of the Torah as well. They are generally baal peh, however. Unless you are counting Megilas Taanis as b'ksav?
Mitzvos d'rabbonon they are not what is known as 'torah sh'pal peh'. Repeating yourself again doesn't make it correct.
Ok, I checked in the Rambam and it seems that he uses your terminology of excluding gzeiros from the term "Torah sheBaal Peh". However, the Rabbeinu Yonah says everything in the Mishna is included in "Torah sheBaal Peh". The fact that כותבי ברכות כשורפי תורה also seems like this. If you don't like my terms, use "the Mesorah" instead, or any other term you like.
Where is the rabbeinu yonah?
I geuss Rava and Rav Ashi are school kids who do not understand because in Yoma 28b they refer to Eruv Tavshilin (See Rashi there who speaks out it is a Takana DeRabanan) as Torah Sh'Bal Peh. It is really of poor choice to make such sweeping statements about Torah because unless one is a Baki in all of Torah they are most likely to be mistaken. I just happened upon this source, and I am sure it is not the only one. But, it is certainly enough that it should cause you to retract your statement, and hopefully be wary of saying such things in the future.
"that is supposed to, in theory, be internally consistent and coherent."
Not correct. The talmud, for example, states clearly that some aspects of hilchos chol hamoed are not consistent with each other.
It doesn't say that
Sorry, I'm not sure if I am able to tell you