If a rabbi dies, and has a son who is a Torah scholar, and his other son's son is a Torah scholar, and the community seeks to appoint one of them in his place, which [of them] has precedence?
It seems to me, in my humble opinion, that concerning royalty or presidency, one cannot appoint two kings to serve under a single crown, and therefore precedence is given to the elder. [This is the case even when] the elder son has fear of God but hasn’t wisdom, and the younger is full of wisdom but not fear of God.
But as concerns other appointments, in which two can share one crown, no precedence is to be given to one son or another, or to a son over a grandson, for if they are worthy of filling their fathers' place, this makes them successors. What has being a son or a grandson to do with it…?