Tikkunhas in its twenty-five years availed itself of many different sorts of voices, some more prophetic and others more rabbinic (sage-like) in their tone. It is helpful to keep in mind the essential difference between these two modes of communication in our current discourse.
Since prophets and sages are the two sources of inspiration in the Jewish tradition, one might expect these two types of teachers of Torah to reinforce each other. In a sense they do, since the sages try to interpret the words of the prophets. Nevertheless in a very important way they are not compatible. The prophet is duly instructed to speak only and all of the words that God “puts into his mouth” (Deut. 18:18). Basing itself on the biblical teaching of Leviticus 27:34, the Talmud infers that “no prophet is at liberty to introduce anything new henceforward” (Megilla 2b). The prophet is the...
