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| Vizhnitz last Purim (Ha'aretz) |
It s based on the serious nature of Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur. As though by not saying all the prayers with respect to doing Teshuva we are not really taking Teshuva seriously.
If one is a seriously committed Jew, they understand that Rosh Hashana is the day that God records (so to speak) our fate for the upcoming year Yom Kipur is the day where that fate is sealed. A fate that can be fatal.
The purpose of these two high holidays is to admit our sins, sincerely repent, resolve not to do them again, and to pray that any negative fate God might have had in store for us be turned around for the positive. It is therefore understandable to feel the need to stay in Shul and Daven on those days. For as long as it takes.
I understand that feeling. It is a feeling we should all have this time of year. This is why we begin to say Selechos before well before Rosh Hashana begins. We all want to live and be healthy for the coming year. That is what we hope and pray for. For ourselves, our loved ones and for all the Jewish people.
The problem with these feelings is when taken too far, a sense of myopia that develops - where the forest cannot be seen for the trees. Before we can beg for our lives and pray for our health, we must do what is necessary to stay alive and healthy in the first place. The sages tell us that we may not put ourselves in a Makom Sakanah (a dangerous place) and rely on God to save us. By ignoring the health guidelines we are in essence disobeying that Halachic directive.
And yet that seems to be what is happening in far too many religious communities in Israel. And the Frummer one is, the more likely they are to do it. They seem to feel that Davening in Shul for many hours (on Rosh Hashana) or all day (on Yom Kippur) outweighs the dangers of contracting COVID under crowded and mostly unmasked conditions - believing them to be minimal at most.
In my humble opinion this is based on ignorance about what this virus is still doing. Blaming an anti religious government for picking on them for no reason other than prejudice. They instead believe that despite the rise in COVID cases nationwide, the incidence in the religious neighborhoods is minuscule. and that even among those that get it - they will be mild cases and that no one will die.
This kind of rationalization has given rise to a rebellion. The government has decided to have another lock-down which would encompass all of the upcoming religious holidays. Starting with Rosh Hashana. From the Jewish Press:
For the first time since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, Israel’s Health Ministry announced Thursday night that a record 4,015 new cases of COVID-19 were diagnosed in the past 24 hours. It is the first time the number of daily new cases has passed the 4,000 mark, and a horrific indication of the current situation in the Jewish State. Equally sad, the death toll rose to 1,075, a number that has increased by 22 deaths since the previous day. There are at least 487 very serious cases, out of whom 137 require respirators to survive.
Both Health Minister Yuli Edelstein (Likud) and Coronavirus Czar Professor Roni Gamzu recommended a lockdown – or at the very least, a “tight restraint” – as a means of bringing the exceptionally high level of infections back under control.
And what is the reaction by the Charedi community? Read on:
Former Health Minister Yaakov Litzman (UTJ), who represents the strictly Orthodox population and who currently serving as Housing Minister, has accused Netanyahu of “ruining the holidays.”
Would that this were only an expression of pain that must be endured for the sake of human life. It is instead a harbinger of defiance that is about to take place. Defiance not against the government. Defiance against the Torah’s directive of VeShmartem Meod LeNafshoseichem - God’s demand that we do what is necessary to stay alive and healthy. Why are they rebelling? Because how can we not Daven for our lives in Shul on the holiest days of the year?
They are missing the forest for the trees. From Ha’aretz:
Despite the government’s plan for a general lockdown over the Jewish holiday period beginning on the evening of September 18 and COVID-19 infection rates setting new records daily, tens of thousands of Haredim (with a couple of notable exceptions mostly in Chasidic areas like Belz an Vizhnitz, apparently), many from virus hotspots, have no intention of giving up their mass prayer services on Rosh Hashanah.
The major centers for especially crowded gatherings will be the prayers services in Hasidic communities, officials in local governments in Haredi towns told Haaretz. “Rosh Hashanah in the Hasidic areas is going to be one of the harshest plagues of the coronavirus,” said one official. “There is no way to preserve the ‘traffic light’ framework [for stopping the spread of the disease] and [its wrong] to think there will be only one worshipper for every 7 square meters.”
The major centers for especially crowded gatherings will be the prayers services in Hasidic communities, officials in local governments in Haredi towns told Haaretz. “Rosh Hashanah in the Hasidic areas is going to be one of the harshest plagues of the coronavirus,” said one official. “There is no way to preserve the ‘traffic light’ framework [for stopping the spread of the disease] and [its wrong] to think there will be only one worshipper for every 7 square meters.”
Need I say more? Could their refusal to recognize the real dangers of COVID be more obvious? Is Frumkeit causing them to not heed the word of God about avoiding Sakana?
I see no other explanation for creating circumstances where so many people will be exposed to the very real possibility that someone in their midst will be a contagious carrier without symptoms who will infect many others breathing the same air for many hours - who will later infect even more people - possibly multiplying the disease geometrically!
May God protect them, and all of us, and have mercy on our lives and on our souls.