It seems that our 'world' has completely lost itself. There is no respect for doctors, no respect for rabbis, no respect even for the explicit law "Thou shalt not murder.".
In Israel, large and important communities act as if there is no coronavirus. Synagogues in Bnei Brak on Rosh Hashanah, thousands of Hasidim without masks, without social distancing. And we see how many Jews die every day in the Land of Israel. It is a disaster.
Here in the Crown Heights neighborhood, on Yom Kippur Eve, I prayed in the Rebbe's room upstairs. I wanted to go down to the Zeal downstairs to see if the 'Kol Nidrei' had begun. I went down through the office of the late Rabbi Leib Gruner - and I was shocked.
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770 was blown to bits, you couldn't even fit a pin in. I didn't even see one with a mask.
Who takes responsibility for this behavior? No more rabbis? No more doctors? No Torah? What's going on here?
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And here's another story that happened here in the Crown Heights neighborhood: On the Sabbath before Yom Kippur, a guy who was supposed to be a cantor at Kol Nidrei, a musaf and a locksmith at one of the synagogues in the neighborhood, a large minyan, felt like he had lost his sense of taste and smell by the Sabbath. He went to the doctor and got tested for coronavirus. He only received the results after Yom Kippur, and on Yom Kippur, he prayed all the prayers in the minyan!
How insolent! Where do you get the courage to do that?
After Yom Kippur, when the positive results came, of course, Dr. Rosen sent a message to all worshippers asking and begging them to all go into two-week isolation.
And then the people say to him: What? Have you gone crazy? Sukkot in isolation? Simchat Torah in isolation? Never.
Dr. Rosen is shocked. What's going on here? Where are we going? This is literally murder, God forbid!
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And now regarding Simchat Beit Hashoeva: Those who built the stage at the intersection of Montgomery and Kingston, in preparation for Simchat Beit Hashoeva, this is utter lawlessness, I don't want to use harsher expressions. This borders on outright murder.
Don't tell me they're Hassids, that this is an attachment. They're nothing to me. Just unparalleled rudeness.
