“TU731: Your dismissal of Rishonim’s opinions as being irrelevant today is more than reprehensible. Unless you can prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, that the Metziyus has changed to such an extent that their statements are no longer relevant, then what they say is far more binding than just about anything else we have. To dismiss Rabbeinu Yonah as being outdated is beyond arrogant and misguided.”
Thank you Sam2 for expressing my exact sentiments in such an eloquent way and allowing me not to have to be the one to say it.
I did not simply “dismiss” the opinions of any rishonim. Again, my point is that once there are legitimate people who hold of such a shitta, then you cannot out of ignorance think that your kashas are unanswerable.
Now about rishonim. Firstly, the simple reading is not always the correct understanding. Sometimes rishonim use language that nearly black-and-white indicates one side of a chakira when they hold of the other. That is a general rule of learning. Secondly, even if your understanding is correct, it is not necessary to conform to all rishonim, or even to most, in order to be a legitimate shitta. Now, on this premise, if there is a shitta advanced by legitimate people that disagrees, or seems to disagree, with rishonim, it is not arbitrary dismissal of rishonim for me to say that in this instance that may be pshat. This is because I am only stating such after the fact that the shitta exists. I am not claiming that as a general principle we need not be choshesh for rishonim. I am saying that it could be what the proponents of Mesora suppressing techeiles hold. That is not in any way arrogant. On the contrary, it is both arrogant and naive for anyone to claim that they know and understand the guiding principles of how “bound” we are by whats written explicitly in rishonim and how to interpret what they wrote better than gedolim. And that is true even if these principles themselves are disputed by gedolim/poskim, that you and I do not have a relevant opinion in the matter.