1.
The world's population is divided into two main groups in terms of suffering from the coronavirus pandemic. No, not young people versus old people, nor people from risk groups and those with underlying diseases versus the perfectly healthy.
I'm talking about people who wear glasses versus those who don't.
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True, all of humanity is going through a challenging period of social distancing, of economic hardship, of lockdown, of children stuck at home, each with their own struggles. But those who don't wear glasses can see these days. It's amazing. They go out into the street in the morning, the mask is oppressive, the social distancing sucks, but Baruch opens the blind. They open their eyes and look. At the view, at the sidewalk, at the people passing by. Blessed are they.
In contrast, a very significant portion of the world's population - whose exact size I don't know, but it must be in the millions - wakes up in the morning, gets dressed, gets organized, puts on a mask, leaves the house, and suddenly their field of vision becomes completely blurred. Their breath rises from the mask and fills the lenses of their glasses with steam.
Why did I suddenly remember this now, after nine months of Corona?
Because while in the spring and summer, a little of the fog would be cleared by lightly wiping with a tissue, cold and rainy days exacerbate the problem by tens of percent blurring. You wipe the lenses and they fill with fog again. Imagine that you are driving a car, it is cold outside, hot inside, the windshield fills with fog and there is no way to turn on the air conditioner in a mode that defrosts the fog. How can you drive like that? How can you walk like that?
I know, optical stores have been selling special cloths like these lately that prevent fogging, and they do a pretty good job. The problem is that they leave a kind of coating that creates stains on the lenses. There's no vaccine yet that completely solves the problem.
So if you've met me on the street in the last few days, said hello to me and I didn't say hello back, don't take it personally. I just don't see you from a distance.
2.
In recent weeks I have noticed a fascinating theological phenomenon: many Jews around me, those I know as serious and thorough people who take the easy as the serious, are becoming traditionalists. Tradition is a wonderful thing, of course, ask Tuvia the Milkman. But I mean traditional in a bad way. Not fully committed, flippant, not serious.
Look, the fact that there are groups in the population who from the very beginning did not strictly follow the instructions of the Ministry of Health regarding Corona, of course I know that. I know and I am ashamed. Especially when it comes to religious and ultra-Orthodox Jews who are supposed to be an example of caution and care for others. But I am not talking about them now. I am not talking about delusional Corona deniers either. I am talking about completely normative people, people who for months have followed the instructions, and even now they are quite observant, they have nothing against it, they have no ideology or systematic change, it's just that over time they have become lite. Less strict. Why? Because there is no strength, enough, enough. Converted to appetite.
And I don't know what's worse - those who decided they were smarter than the epidemiologists and health experts all over the world, or those who know very well that Corona is not the flu and that they must be careful, but what can they do, they don't have the strength to cope. Slowly they deteriorated spiritually and became traditionalists. Corona guardians at heart.
In recent days, in various places, I've come across more and more people like this, and it surprises me to discover that they're not ashamed of their new way of life. On the contrary, some of them even laughed at my strictness and tried to convince me to stop being such a pistachio fanatic. They didn't have any special reasons. Just sentences like "How heavy you are" or "Come on, you're taking the coronavirus too seriously, calm down," and a host of other non-serious sentences.
3.
It is forbidden to generalize. Even among those who observe tradition, there are different shades. Not everyone is the same. For example, there are those who are careful to wear a mask but do not maintain contact. They will insist on hugging you. Especially at celebrations. And again, I am talking about those who are largely observing. They do not break the law. Their event is divided into small capsules, they strictly observe proper distancing, but then as soon as a guest arrives at the celebration that they are really excited to see, they approach him, fall on his neck, breathe on his neck, while they emotionally mutter "Leave Corona now, bring a hug!".
As if the coronavirus isn't contagious in exciting celebrations. As if the coronavirus isn't contagious – especially! – in exciting celebrations.
How proud I am to be in these moments the annoying bum who stands still and ruins the moment. Yes, I'm careful. No, I didn't take the coronavirus too seriously, I'm not hysterical, thank God. I sleep well at night. I simply do what needs to be done - I don't take off my mask for a moment and maintain social distancing even in exciting encounters. This is my minimum contribution, and also my maximum, to the global war in the fight, to saving the elderly, to helping medical teams, to protecting those suffering from underlying diseases. And it's so simple and doesn't require any special sacrifice (certainly for those who don't wear glasses), that it's hard for me to understand those who recently decided to unburden themselves just because they were fed up.
And amidst this frustration, there are also amusing moments with the new traditionalists. For example, hearing them use the word "capsule" as a kind of trump card. "It's okay, it's okay, we're from the same capsule," they'll say, and then hug a fourth cousin. No, my squeamish, you're not from the same capsule. Unless you live with your fourth cousin in the same house or study with him in the same class in the closed yeshiva. Otherwise, you're just squeamish. "We're from the same capsule" is the new "eat, eat, everything in the "Badatz".".
4.
Last week I wrote here about this great miracle: thousands of minyanim, three times a day, all over the country, all taking place in what is called "the public space," many of them in distinctly secular areas, and with the exception of a very specific case in north Tel Aviv, of some loud neighbor with an allergy to prayers, no story about a significant incident of civil war between worshippers and neighbors has reached the media.
How do I know it didn't come? Because if such a story had come, the media would have published it with a loud bang, as they know how and love to do.
It is very possible that in certain places there was tension or discomfort around holding prayers, that is natural, but things were resolved by agreement and mutual consideration between the neighbors. And by the way, I am sure there are stories to the contrary, of neighbors who came closer to each other and to prayers thanks to the yard minyans, but they will never reach the media.
Last Shabbat night we went to the open area with the most minyanim in the world: the Western Wall. Go there too. The Wall is an example and a model of how it is possible, with a little thought and proper planning, and demarcation, and ushers, and a little public discipline, to continue on with life. Each group of worshippers is directed to its own area, and as soon as it fills up, those who come in line are directed to another area. At first, there is a pang in the heart to see the Wall divided into pieces. It is not the Wall we knew, but we get used to it pretty quickly. There is even something in this new arrangement that makes it easier to focus, that centers it, that delimits it.
As I was leaving the Western Wall, after receiving Shabbat and Arriving, a nice Jew approached me - I later realized he was the rabbi of a synagogue in Ramat Gan, Rabbi Eliezer Magen - and shared with me his feelings regarding what is happening now with prayer. Not at the Western Wall, but throughout the country.
Tomorrow in the parasha, he told me, we will read about Jacob who dreams a dream and when he wakes up from it he says: "Surely there is a God in this place and I did not know it... How terrible is this place, this is none other than the house of God." We all know this verse by heart, but actually, how was holiness born in this place? Where did it all begin? In the dream with the ladder and the angels? No, much earlier. The dream was only a sign that there was holiness in this place, it was not the cause of it. But where did holiness come from? Chazal tell us that in the place where Jacob slept, a hundred years earlier, exactly a hundred years, our father Abraham bound Isaac, and later, there in this place, Isaac went out to pray ("And Isaac went out to sleep in the field," the Tosafot in Tractate Berakhot say that it was on Mount Moriah). In other words, when our ancestors performed an act of mitzvah, of self-sacrifice, of prayer, it left an impression of holiness in the place for generations.
5.
And here Rabbi Magen directed me to an amazing quote by Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin. He writes that wherever a person goes to recite Torah, he leaves an impression of holiness in the place. Every person. Not just our father Abraham, not just our father Isaac, but every Jew, including my father and Isaac: "But the Holy Torah, wherever its light and holiness shines and appears once – it will have eternal holiness, and it will always remain in its holiness" (Nefesh Ha-Chaim, Shaar 4).
In these days of the Corona pandemic, Rabbi Magen finished the personal Shabbat night sermon he gave me on the steps of the Western Wall. We find ourselves praying and reading the Torah in all kinds of different and strange places.
According to Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin, it is possible that there is a divine move here to apply holiness to the streets and courtyards. That holiness will not only be within the synagogues but throughout the entire Land of Israel. Perhaps this is what we were promised by the prophet, "And the earth will be filled with the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea.".
In the current reality, we see how the land is being filled with knowledge and connection to God, the Almighty, on balconies, in streets, in parking lots, on roads. Places in the land where people have never prayed are being sanctified and are essentially becoming the house of God. The light of the Torah sanctifies more and more new places, and this holiness, the holiness of the world, will remain there long after the Corona pandemic is over.
• The column is published in the newspaper 'Bisheva''
