absolutely loved this material, I'm a person who's had some trouble taking a "rabbi"s word at face value, is there a formula to evaluate if a rabbi is legitimate as in deriving his material from Torah in a correct manner? another thing, I've come into contact with some who seem to me to be 'self-proclaimed' rabbis who seem to use the title solely for personal gain and their weapon of defence is "smicha" so my question is, where does this smicha program come from? how legitimate is it? does it qualify somebody as a rabbi/halachic source of information? am I required to follow their paskin? does it just qualify them in a field of information or does it testify that they are true to their halachic understanding and won't let emotions alter their answers?
