OPINION
Social distancing puts intentional Jewish community to the test RABBI JOSHUA LADON | GUEST CONTRIBUTOR Schools are closing, synagogues are altering service schedules or outright canceling, funerals are limiting numbers to just a minyan. For those of us embedded in lived Jewish community, this moment of social distancing is a rupture to our system of intentional community. But, if we view them right, engaging with the system of mitzvot which draw us into community — what Maimonides prescribes in the Mishneh Torah as the fullest expression of “acts of loving kindness,” like visiting the sick and comforting mourners — has been practice for moments like these, when we need community the most.
This is the time when our social networks are going to have to be real social networks and not simply soapboxes for shouting into the wind. As social distancing becomes the norm and as more people enter quarantine is exactly the time to ramp up our efforts to ensure vibrant Jewish community. I have been thinking a lot about what I will need as a husband, father and rabbi — what my community will need and what I will have to give. It is counterintuitive but clear that if we are going to get through this social distancing, we are going to have to do it together. This is the time when our social networks are going to have to be real social networks and not simply soapboxes for shouting into the wind. All the rabbis I know work tirelessly to visit the sick and make sure the needy in their community are taken care of. In this moment of social contraction, as work is slowing and kids are home, people looking for ways to pass the time can aid in the holy work of ensuring each
member of our community is seen and heard. Here are some ideas to make social distancing a moment of real Jewish community 1. Kids home from school can virtually visit the sick. They can FaceTime with elders of their community, they can make cards, they can make videos where they sing and dance. Rabbis have lists of people who need joy in their life; all the people who used to be sick, are still sick and we are going to have more people in quarantine before this gets better. This should be a moment for connection! 2. Remember phone trees? Communities should make phone or text trees, where everyone in the community is asked to phone or text five people a day, simply to check in, to see if anyone needs anything, to provide an outlet and a reminder that everyone is being thought of. Create the community WhatsApp groups we should have already developed. Parents are going to need serious mental support to get through weeks of school closure. People need to know others are going through similar challenges. People need places to ask for help. Let’s create the networks we wish we always had. 3. Turn yourself into a delivery service. Social distancing does not mean quarantine. And there are plenty of people who will need goods delivered to them. This is a time to make sure everyone in our communities has the food and supplies they need, and to mobilize those who can deliver goods. 4. Rethink rituals. Ritual has always been something that helps us transcend time and space. However, Jewish ritual life assumes some range of communal practice. The technology that connects us today is a powerful tool for us to reimagine communal ritual. We need to think about how to use this technology in synchronous and asynchronous ways. Yes, we can livestream
last week on Polsat TV news from Poland. He Korwin-Mikke declared, “Jews are now is a far-right Polish politician, philosopher and powerful because they had pogroms.” Well, writer. that’s a different way of looking at some things Korwin-Mikke, repelled early by science and that some people did. history, says coronavirus improves humanity’s Korwin-Mikke also claimed that not only gene pool by eradicating the weak through were rabis in favor of pogroms, but they also natural selection. Hmm. I guess that means actually provoked violence because they that the people who died heroically gave up understood that “natural selection” benefits their lives to make the rest of us stronger. from massacres, and massacres are what Regarding pogroms, Korwin-Mikke’s fresh make Jews more powerful. Who knew? approach sees them as a kind of contest. JUNE BROTT | WALNUT CREEK When asked why pogroms were good, he said “because the weak in the Jewish community Illogical use of Torah died and the strong survived.” Aha, now I understand. Before, I naively In his recent letter to J., Mark Cohen quoted believed that my paternal uncle was killed in the Torah parashah Mishpatim, in which Jews a Bialystok pogrom just because he was a Jew. are directed to take care of strangers, and But Korwin-Mikke explains that my uncle was then wonders: “Aren’t these Torah principles shot and killed because … he was weak! … as important to consider as is support for So … uh … his death and the deaths of Israel — if not more so?” (“A Torah-values my murdered grandparents actually have voter,” March 6). improved the stock of the Jewish people? Hmm. Placing support of Israel on an equal footing How self-sacrificing they were. with caring for strangers — and claiming that
Rabbi Joshua Ladon is services, but more so, the West Coast director of we need to think how to education for the Shalom take our rituals at home Hartman Institute. He lives and reimagine them as in Berkeley with his wife communal. and three children. 5. Learn some Torah. Learn Torah with friends on the phone, on video, on WhatsApp. Rabbis, maharats, cantors, teachers — take the leap and put yourself on Facebook Live, YouTube or make a podcast. This is the time to fill the world with Torah! 6. Embody your Jewish practice. Jewish life is not just communal and cerebral, it is also embodied. This is the time to clean for Passover, to draw posters for the Sukkah, to learn how to tie tzitzit or write Hebrew calligraphy, to make an Omer calendar or Rosh Hashanah cards. 7. Get to know your neighbors. I know my Jewish community better than my most immediate neighbors. This is the time — from a distance — to check in and be aware of what my closest neighbors, from all communities, need. If this virus has taught us anything, it’s that we are all deeply connected. 8. Ask for help! This is going to be scary and lonely. We need to commit to be charitable in listening to others’ needs and open our hearts. Lived Jewish community is thick. We eat meals together, visit each other in sickness, sit together in sorrow and laugh together in joy. All of these practices are in service of illuminating the divine light in the world while bestowing dignity on one another. And all of these practices have been practice for this very odd moment, when we have to contract from the world. Perhaps we can fill the space left behind with these acts of kindness, so that we may radiate God’s divine light. n
this is the Torah’s way — could have come only from misplaced priorities. This is just one more application of the old adage of not seeing the forest for the trees. Of course the Torah teaches us “not taunt or oppress a stranger.” But its Five Books of Moses are dedicated to a much greater goal of creating a nation of Israel, its land and ways of life. And this is the only major and magnificent Torah way.
VLADIMIR KAPLAN | SAN MATEO
The importance of print
I get most of my news by watching TV or sometimes by going online. For the past several weeks it has been exclusively about the coronavirus, with very brief breaks for weather and traffic. It’s so overwhelming at times. The bonus of print is that there is something else to look at, something else to read, something else to remind us of what it was like before the “new normal” took effect.
We can’t escape the virus, but we can escape the anxiety and changes to our day-today lives by picking up a printed publication and just turning to the pages not devoted to covid19.
STEVEN PALMER | ALAMEDA
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