By Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel
CHULA VISTA, California — In ancient times, the rabbis knew much about the excesses of piety. In their effort to promote normalcy in the lives of their followers, the rabbis took a strident position toward those individuals.
The Jerusalem Talmud records a remarkable teaching that could certainly apply to today’s time:
·Who is a foolish man of piety? Take the case of man who sees a woman is drowning, but says, “It is unseemly for me to look at her, and therefore, I cannot rescue her.” Some say a pious fool is someone who sees a child struggling in the water, and says, “When I have taken off my phylacteries, I will go and save him” because he does not wish to get them wet. By the time he arrives to rescue him, the child has already died. Who is the “crafty scoundrel”? R. Huna says, “He is the man who behaves leniently toward himself, while teaching others only the strictest rules.”[1]
Piety when alloyed with common sense can prove useful in creating a well-balanced individual who takes his/her relationship with God and humanity seriously. However, excessive piety can easily be misplaced; the attitude of extreme stringency may even convey religious arrogance, which is arguably the exact antithesis of piety. Herein is the problem of today’s Haredi communities in Israel.
The Haredi (God Tremblers”) make up only 12% of the total Israeli population, and yet they make up for about 40-50% of the coronavirus patients at four major hospitals,
These statistics beg the obvious question in the spirit of a Passover question: How are these Haredim different from all other Jews in Israel when it comes to the coronavirus pandemic?
There are many ways we may answer this question. For one thing the Haredi tend to have large families and live in an overcrowded environment. Secondly, they tend to be unfamiliar and illiterate when to comes to a practical knowledge of science and matters of health. Although we take the Internet for granted, the Haredi rabbis take great pride in discouraging, even forbidding the use of computers when it comes to the lives of their followers.
The Haredim not only live in physical ghettos, in many ways they still live in a psychological ghetto as well.
If you talk to them about “social-distancing,” odds are they will ignore you; or they will tell you that God is protecting them because they study Torah. Jewish prayer rituals among the Haredim demand they all show up to services. Weddings are much too important to call off because of some virus. In their world, they have complete trust that God will always protect them, but they neglect to observe one of the most important precepts of the Torah—one that Jewish survival depends upon: רַק הִשָּׁמֶר לְךָ וּשְׁמֹר נַפְשְׁךָ מְאֹד “But be on guard and watch yourselves closely” (Deuteronomy 4:9).
One could just as easily cite four other biblical precepts that deal with the same problem: (1) A person must cover a pit that is exposed to the public (Exodus 21:33); (2) you must not place an obstacle in the way of the blind (Leviticus 19:14); (3) Nor shall you stand idly by the blood of your neighbor (Leviticus 19:16); (4)and lastly: one must make a parapet upon one’s flat roof so that nobody will fall (Deuteronomy 22:8)
Preserving human life requires mindful awareness at all time. The Haredi rabbis have violated some of the most important precepts of the Torah by carelessly and recklessly disregarding the dangers that they are allowing to be unleashed in their communities.
Experts attribute the proliferation of coronavirus among the Haredi to overcrowding and large families, deep distrust of state authority, ignorance of the health risks among religious leaders, an aversion that they believe is mandated by religious law to electronic and secular media, and a zealous devotion to a way of life centered on communal activity.
All of which add up to stiff resistance to heeding social distancing orders that require people to stay home except for vital errands and prohibiting meeting in groups, including for prayer. These rules threaten fundamental activities for Haredi worship, religious study and the observance of life-cycle events like funerals and weddings.
The wildfire pace of infection has inflamed tensions between the Haredim, or “God-fearers,” sometimes disparagingly called “ultra-Orthodox” and other Israelis, as a series of gotcha videos and photos have circulated showing large groups of ultra-Orthodox dancing at weddings or shopping on busy streets, as if doing so posed no risk.
And while it is true most of the young people are comparatively unaffected, one would think enlightened self-interest would prevail. Many of the schools in the Haredi neighborhood are remaining open. But given the mutation capabilities of the coronavirus, the rabbinical leaders are taking a big risk. The older generation has much more to lose here.
While this is going on, a walk through B’nei Brak reveals that the Haredim still continue to hold their minyanim, chasing away anyone wishing to photograph them. And when a large funeral took place, the police did not want to get in an altercation with them.
And perhaps more bizarre than anything else mentioned above, is the belief that this pandemic is paving the way for the Messiah.
To paraphrase a popular expression, you can take the man out of the medieval world, but you cannot take medieval world out of the man. Despite countless centuries of Jewish survival, some of our people just don’t get it. We collectively paid a hefty price for the lessons pertaining to our survival as a people. But much of the Haredi world act as though they have learned nothing about the importance of Jewish survival.
NOTES
[1] JT Sotah 3:4, f. 19a, line 13.
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Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel is spiritual leader of Temple Beth Shalom in San Diego. He may be contacted via michael.samuel@sdjewishworld.com