LOUISVILLE, Kentucky — More than 220,000 Americans have died of Covid19. On September 10th alone, 915 Americans died. One of them was Steve Silverman, 71, my college roommate and friend for 55 years. An active sportsman, a successful and compassionate doctor, he had suffered for three weeks, alone and hooked up to a respirator. His wife, two grown children, grandchildren and friends “attended” the funeral and shiva on Zoom.
Why?
Why has this pandemic hit, and hit so hard, and what particular significance does it have for Jews? What role does a Jewish God play in the pandemic, what impact does it have on our faith in God, and what have we learned?
One rabbi said he has learned to be frightened.
“Covid has forced me to again confront the notion of a vengeful God,” said the rabbi, who asked to remain anonymous because he felt uncomfortable sharing his views in public. “When I see what is happening in the world, I see a power that is very angry.”
“Angry” describes Covid; it has ended more than a million lives worldwide. Then there are jobs lost, businesses shuttered, education delayed or compromised, weddings delayed or compromised, funerals moved online, informal gatherings, and other lifecycle and ad hoc events cancelled.
Jews have been hit hard – as have all other religious, racial and ethnic groups. Some say Jews have been hit particularly hard.
“What’s clear is that the Jewish rate of death is exponentially higher in the Diaspora compared to Israel and that the virus is devastating the Jewish world,” writes Uriel Heilman in The Times of Israel. “In many places, the infection and death rate among Jews is also far higher than the local non-Jewish population.”
Covid has closed hundreds of synagogues, Heilman reports. Jewish organizations are slashing budgets, and staffs have been cut at Jewish community centers. Jewish camps were closed last summer, Jewish day schools are holding virtual sessions in the new term and kosher restaurants are going out of business. Bar and Bat Mitzvahs have turned to Zoom, along with Shabbat and holiday services. Trips to Israel, including Birthright, are suspended; Jewish organizations, including AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) have canceled conferences.
With no end in sight for the pandemic, it should come as no surprise that there’s an active search for villains, including political leaders, and individuals and groups who have resisted wearing masks and ignored social distancing. Among the offenders were ultra-orthodox Jews who defied restrictions and were ultimately denied permission to hold a wedding in Brooklyn that was expected to attract as many as 10,000 guests – and untold Covid victims.
The ultra-orthodox have been roundly criticized, but they are not alone. How about meat eaters?
“To be clear, the COVID-19 pandemic should never be viewed as Divine punishment,” writes Jeffrey Spitz Cohan in the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, citing biblical verse. “Rather, the pandemic can be viewed as something we were warned would happen if humanity continues to confine, kill and consume animals.”
It’s hard to find much support for that particular pandemic explanation. On the other hand, among Jewish scholars, the more common response to Covid19 is realism and a healthy dose of optimism, spiced with social responsibility.
“Jews are unusually adaptive and creative, and we surely will emerge from this crisis with new strengths and with our core values intact,” said Ira Sheskin, a demographer of American Jewry at the University of Miami. “While some individual institutions undoubtedly will not survive an economic crisis that seems likely to dwarf the 2008 recession, the basic building blocks of American Jewish life will weather this storm: the synagogues, educational institutions and organizations that are essential to American Jewry.”
Along with optimism is another building block of American Jewish life: a message that Jews – particularly under the shadow of Covid — are obliged to help the less fortunate: “The Torah connects our experience of slavery with a command for empathy for all those who are least protected by society,” writes Rabbi Jonah Dov Pesner in reformjudaism.org. “Over and over again, the biblical text connects our experience of slavery with a radical empathy with all those who suffer.”
Mijal Bitton finds a similar lesson in the Book of Ruth. Dr. Bitton, a Fellow in Residence at the Shalom Hartman Institute of North America, notes that the story begins with a famine that Bitton directly compares to the Covid19 pandemic:
When we think about our communities and neighbors, we can approach them as carriers of contagion, as dangerous, or as fellow beings created in the divine image. We can become indifferent and callous, invested in only preserving ourselves and ours.
But we have an alternative. We can orient ourselves to double down on our commitment to see each individual and their particular needs and experiences beyond being potential threats to us. Doing so will help us include others, especially the most vulnerable, in our moral imagination and allow us to work tirelessly for the common good.
Rabbi Pesner finds an imperative in that viewpoint.
Our tradition requires of us shared empathy and solidarity in the face of danger. The coronavirus is sweeping across a broken world. Defeating it will require us to see the humanity in one another and commit to fight for justice during this unprecedented moment of need.
As we plunge into this unknown together, may we take comfort in the knowledge that our people have been here before. Not only have we made it through the wilderness intact, we’ve done so while holding on to God’s mandate of justice and mercy for all.
Ranen Omer-Sherman agrees. A professor and holder of an endowed chair in Judaic Studies at the University of Louisville, Prof. Omer-Sherman offers a heartening perspective as someone who has lived extensively in Israel and the United States.
I applaud the bold and generous sacrifices made by many Jewish synagogues and institutions (primarily Conservative, Reform, secular and some Modern Orthodox) in shuttering their doors for such an extensive period. I am proud of the tremendous numbers of rabbis and cantors who have had to work so hard to adjust to the demands of our new virtual reality and unfamiliar technologies. That shows a great deal of creativity and resilience, the attributes that historically have distinguished Judaism as a whole.
At the same time, Omer-Sherman condemns Ultra-Orthodox communities in Israel and the U.S. for behaving with “jaw-dropping irresponsibility,” holding mass weddings and un-masked synagogue attendance without social distancing.
“All of us need to understand the interconnections between us and that a healthy society, and indeed the planet, requires that we come to terms with our obligation to others,” he concludes.
Natalie Polzer, a colleague of Omer-Sherman, has a different view of the ultra-orthodox, based on her experience of practicing her religion with them. A University of Louisville faculty member in the Department of Comparative Humanities, Polzer views the behavior of some ultra-orthodox in opposition to Covid restrictions as an expression of their powerful sense of community, built upon prayer and threatened by rules of social distancing, such as those in response to the pandemic.
“The resistance simply has to do with the intense social experience that is so very strong,” Polzer explains. “It means when you go to synagogue, the unity you feel with other Jews is because you practice together.”
I’m certain that Steve Silverman took every possible precaution. Judging by the testimonials upon his death, Steve was a compassionate doctor, and – borrowing a cliché – didn’t “deserve” what happened to him. At the same time, millions in the United States and around the world have suffered far more and far longer than Steve. Raised in a middle class family, he led a life of privilege, especially as a White man and a wealthy physician. I’m certain that the medical care he received in his Covid battle also benefitted from that privilege, although it wasn’t enough to keep him alive. May he rest in peace.
If this pandemic leads us to show more compassion toward each other and seriously examine and tackle the injustices around us, maybe that will count as a silver lining to Covid, a coat of many horrors. It’s a view expressed in this section of a poem written by Rabbi Joseph B. Meszler:
Everything you do matters.
And we never know what act or word
will leave an impression or tip the scale.
So, if not now, then when?
For the things that we can change, there is t’shuvah, realignment,
For the things we cannot change, there is t’filah, prayer,
For the help we can give, there is tzedakah, justice.
Together, let us write a beautiful Book of Life
for the Holy One to read.
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Michael Ginsberg is a freelance writer based in Louisville.