Every single command which Israel accepted at Sinai in joy, they observe in joy to this day. Those which they then accepted without joy they do not now observe with joy. R. Shimon ben Gamliel says: Every command for which the Israelites gave their lives in times of the persecution, they now carry out openly: the others have grown weak among them.
Abraham Joshua Heschel, "Who is Man?"
The authentic individual is neither an end nor a beginning but a link between ages, both memory and expectation. Every moment is a new beginning within a continuum of history. It is fallacious to segregate a moment and not to sense its involvement in both past and future. Humbly the past defers to the future, but it refuses to be discarded. Only she who is an heiress is qualified to be a pioneer.
Rav Joseph Soloveitchik, "Tribute to the Rebbetzin of Talne"
The massorah society was founded by Moses at the dawn of our history and at the point of eschatological fulfillment of our history will be joined by the King Messiah. What characterizes that society? An unqualified dedication to learning and teaching. Its motto is - teach and let yourself be taught. It demands that every Jew be simultaneously teacher and pupil, that every member of the society hold on with one hand to an old teacher while the other hand rests upon the frail shoulders of a young pupil. This society which represents the very essence of Judaism cuts across the ages and millennia and holds the key to our miraculous survival. On the long Sabbath afternoons in the summer, we preface the recital of Pirkei Avot with a declaration concerning our total involvement in the massorah community: "Moses received the Torah from Sinai, and handed it on to Joshua, and Joshua to the Elders, and the Elders to the Prophets, and the Prophets handed it on to the men of the Great Assembly." In other words, Judaism expresses itself through the shalshelet ha-kabbalah, the chain of tradition. Hands are linked; generations are united. One society encompasses past, present and future. As I mentioned before, admission to that society is a difficult and complex affair.
Rabbi Mordecai Kaplan, "Not so Random Thoughts," (1966)
The ancient authorities are entitled to a vote but not a veto.