“Do not deviate from what [the Sanhedrin] tells you, [either] right or left” (D’varim 17:11). “Even if they say to you that [what you think is] right is [really] left and [what you think is] left is [really] right” (Rashi, based on the Sifre). The message of this verse is that we must follow the rulings and teachings of the Jewish Supreme Court even if we are convinced they are wrong, to the extent that even if they tell us something contrary to what is obvious to us, such as telling us that what we thought was our right arm is really our left arm (and vice versa), we must treat what we thought was our right arm the way we currently treat our left arm (etc.). However, the Y’rushalmi (Horiyos 1:1) seems to say the exact opposite; “if they tell you regarding the right that it is the left and regarding the left that it is the right one might think to [still] listen to them, [therefore] the Torah says, ‘to go right and left,’ i.e. [only] when they tell you right is right and left is left.” How these two statements can be reconciled is discussed by numerous commentators (on Chumash, on Rashi, on the Sifre and on the Y’rushalmi). Before discussing some of the answers suggested, I’d like to pose two additional questions.

First of all, if the verse can be understood both ways (to listen to them even if they say right is left and not to listen to them if they say right is left), then neither can really be learned from it. How can the Sifre say we should listen to the Sanhedrin even if they tell us right is left if the verse could just as easily be telling us the opposite? And how can the Y’rushalmi tell us not to listen to a Sanhedrin that says right is left if the verse could really be teaching us that we should listen to them even in such cases? [I guess we need the Sanhedrin to tell us which way to understand it! (Although that would raise the issue of the Sanhedrin determining their own authority, which creates a catch 22.)] Secondly, the Y’rushalmi seems to be misquoting the verse, which does not say “to go right and left” but not to go right or left. There is no verse that says “to go right and left” (Rabbi Elchanan Adler pointed out to me that D’varim 28:14 does have the words “to go” and “right and left” in it; however, they are in reverse order and belong to different sentence segments, with the verse saying “do not deviate right or left to go after other deities, so the “to go” is not “going” on “right and left”). Why does the Y’rushalmi present a series of words as if they are in the Torah if they aren’t? [It should be noted that when the Torah T’mimah quotes the Y’rushalmi, the word “to go” is omitted.]

There are two other verses (besides the two I already quoted) where Moshe warns us not to “deviate left or right” from G-d’s commandments (D’varim 5:29 and 17:20), but ours (17:11) is the only one referring to not deviating from what the Sanhedrin says. The structure of our verse is unique in that (a) the words “right and left” are separated from the words “do not deviate,” and (b) the words that separate them appear in the previous verse, so shouldn’t need to be repeated to get the message across.Because the words “which they tell you” interrupt between the command “do not deviate” and “right [or] left,” the Sifre understands the verse to mean “even if they tell you right is left and left is right” (see Zichron Moshe, R’ Yaakov K’nizel and Torah T’mimah). This is not the case for the other three verses, though, where the message is clearly “do not deviate right or left from what G-d commanded;” if He commanded us to “go right,” we must go right and if he commanded us to “go left,” we must go left.

I would therefore suggest that the Y’rushalmi is not quoting any specific verse, but relating what these three verses teach us; we must go right when that is what we were commanded, and must go left when we are commanded to do so. And if these verses teach us that when G-d says “go right” we must “go right,” our verse (17:11) can’t be telling us that we should “go left” when the Sanhedrin tells us to if G-d had told us to “go right.” Each of the verses has only one way of understanding them; three of them are telling us to “go right” when G-d tells us to, while one is telling us to “go right” when the Sanhedrin tells us to even if we think G-d wants us to go left. Which brings us back to the original question of how our verse can tell us to “go right” when the Sanhedrin tells us to even when we think G-d wants us to “go left” if other verses tell us not to listen to the Sanhedrin when they tell us to “go right” when G-d wants us to go left. If we must follow the Sanhedrin even regarding something as obvious as which arm is right and which is left, how can there be a case where we “know” what G-d wants and can therefore disregard what the Sanhedrin says?

The most common way to reconcile the Sifre and the Y’rushalmi (see Tzaidah L’derech, Hak’sav V’hakabalah, Amuday Y’rushalayim and Torah T’mimah) is by differentiating between when we think we know what G-d really wants and when we know for sure what He wants; if we aren’t sure, we must listen to the Sanhedrin even if we think they‘re wrong, but if we know for sure they’re wrong we shouldn’t listen to them. However, as previously mentioned, there are few things we can be more sure of than “knowing” which hand is right and which is left, yet we are told to listen to them even if they tell us otherwise. Unless these commentators don’t understand “right” and “left” to be referring to limbs, but to directions that symbolize a course of action (where it need not be so obvious which way to go), it would be difficult to reconcile the two this way.

Taz rejects this approach for a different reason, and instead suggests that even though everyone must always follow what the Sanhedrin says no matter how sure one is that they are wrong, if by being passive one is not violating their ruling while also not going against what he thinks is right, this is what must be done. For example, if the Sanhedrin said something is permitted (but not required), anyone convinced that it is not permitted should abstain. The Sifre is referring to when being passive isn’t enough, while the Y’rushalmi is referring to when it is.

Some (see Gur Aryeh and Amuday Y’rushalayim) discuss the differences between knowing based on a received tradition or based on logic (and when the tradition was how a previous Sanhedrin ruled as opposed to knowledge handed down from generation to generation all the way back to Moshe), with there being several possibilities based on why the Sanhedrin ruled as they did and why the individual thinks they’re wrong. It would be too complicated to go through all nine possible scenarios here, but one possibility is that the Sanhedrin ruled based on their own logic while the individual has a received tradition that goes back to Moshe; the Y’rushalmi telling us to ignore the Sanhedrin’s ruling could be referring to such a case, while the Sifre is referring to a different scenario.

Kikar Lu’uden distinguishes between a Sanhedrin that makes a mistake everyone knows is a mistake (which should not be followed) and a situation where they are not really mistaken, as they know it’s wrong, but issue a temporary ruling allowing it, or don’t think it applies to the case they are ruling about. I’m not sure how “kicking the can down the road,” pushing the dispute to whether a temporary ruling should be made (or whether something applies) makes enough of a difference; the bottom line is whether or not thinking they made a mistake warrants not following them. [There can be different ways to understand even explicit verses, so explaining a verse differently is no exception.] Additionally, it seems strange that “everyone” but the Sanhedrin themselves would know something was a mistake. And what about a mistake that is not “known by all” to be a mistake? Kikar Lu’uden does not address such situations.

I would suggest just the opposite; if the Sanhedrin knows something has always been understood one way, but decides that times have changed so the law should change too, they are calling what was right “left” and what was left “right,” and should not be followed. If, however, the perceived mistake is based on how to apply already-existing principles, the Sanhedrin must be followed in order to maintain consistency. I know it sounds absurd that a Sanhedrin claiming fealty to tradition could decide to move away from that tradition, but unfortunately there are activist courts who try to (ab)use their position in order to bring about social change. Even if their hearts are in the right place, by calling what was always considered right “left” (and vice versa) they are the ones who have deviated, and their ruling should not be followed. There are several verses that tell us not to deviate from G-d’s commandments, and a court that does should be ignored. On the other hand, our verse teaches us that if a court is working within the guidelines and structure that G-d commanded (the way they were always understood), even if we think the way they applied those guidelines is wrong, we must not deviate “right or left,” but use their definitions of what is “right” and what is “left.”