On the Corona Homilies in Particular, and Homilies in General (Column 285)

In short, it’s all bullshit, including the claim that it’s all bullshit 🙂
More power to you, and were not Your Torah my delight, I would waste away on Zoom

Wow, you’re really fast (unless you didn’t actually read it).

At the end of the second line, shouldn’t it be zoom instead of zum?

Indeed. Such are the times…

With God’s help, 22 Adar 5780

The lesson to be learned from the coronavirus is, as our master, author of the trilogy, says: “No man has power over the wind.” With every breath a person may, God forbid, absorb or emit infectious viruses.

Therefore the title of the second book of the trilogy should be updated to “Walking Far from Those Standing Still,” and if people keep a distance of four cubits from one another and avoid crowding into enclosed places, then, as our master Popper said, an “open society” is created, in which everyone has “health autonomy” without negative influence from others.

This is the “categorical imperative” established by the “First Existent”! And the more we obey it, together with much “seclusion” and much joy, the more the “First Existent” will be found by us when we seek Him and help us turn the corona into a “voice of rejoicing.”

Regards,, Hap-Tchi, man of La-Wing

“I did not compose this work in order to teach people what they do not know, but to remind them of what they already know and what is already very widely known among them.”

Of course the rabbi is right, and there is no learning of anything new in this kind of homiletics, but people like stories and parables. It’s a way that is comfortable for the human heart, and an effective way to instill behaviors and beliefs, apparently even more than rational considerations.

(Side note and identification: one of the things hardest for me is to sit quietly during a homiletic and foolish Torah talk. A terrible experience.)

In the section on the aggadot of Hazal.
“Women die in childbirth for three things” instead of: “Women die in childbirth for three thngs.”

Thanks. While we’re at it, the whole quote was inaccurate. It should read: Women die in childbirth for three transgressions.

What a column! I’m considering stopping my study of aggadah and enrolling in a proper Lithuanian kollel for women.
Meanwhile, I just want to comment regarding the balance point referred to by the author of the last column you quoted here. You claimed it has no substance, and on that I wanted to ask—the virus is spreading around the world because of mobility—cheap flights—and because of density—life in cities. True, cheap flights and living in cities, and in general turning the world into a global village, have quite a few positive aspects and I won’t elaborate here, and nevertheless, I heard this argument (mobility and density) as an explanation for the global pandemic in a very intelligent scientific lecture by a scientist from the Weizmann Institute in a video providing reliable information about corona that’s circulating on social media.
And if one believes that sometimes (sporadically!) God causes things in the world—for example things on the scale of a global pandemic of historic proportions—then one can argue that the pandemic came to bring about things in the world that God desires (to thin out the world’s population, to change aspects of human culture that will now change, and the like).

And a question for the author: what is new in what you say here? Haven’t you said this countless times? If you are allowed to repeat your “chapter” a thousand times—then others are permitted as well.

Regards, Shatz

On the contrary. We’ll set up a suitable kollel for you (with proper separation of course. 🙂 ).
As for flights, I hear the argument, and still it seems to me that that’s not what she meant. She doesn’t mention flights as a cause but describes a mystical reaction of the world to imbalance on our part. That is exactly the difference between a lecture by a scientist from the Weizmann Institute and a sermon.
I would further note that the transport of medicines and knowledge from place to place is also aided by the globality of the world. That is the counter-kick of the same phenomenon. The gates of homiletics have not been locked.
Beyond that, I’m also not sure that the global world is an imbalance that justifies such a divine response. In my eyes it is דווקא a proper use of technology, and the result (a connected and less provincial world) deserves a great deal of appreciation. I don’t think the Holy One is trying to kick us over something like that. We have worse things that deserve kicks.
As for sporadic divine interventions, they can of course appear in any context. But one needs some sort of indication in order to claim that there really is divine intervention here. I don’t know of any such indications.

To Chayota – greetings,

There is no choice but to enroll in a Lithuanian kollel. It’s the only thing that still hasn’t been closed 🙂

Regards, Shatz

By the way, in the days of Hazal writing materials were not cheap. If they bothered to write them down and preserve them for generations, apparently they thought a significant message was hidden in them…

Indeed, everyone is allowed, and so am I. I didn’t say this column is Torah study. It is in the category of review and sharpening.

And is reviewing what one learned not Torah study? Does one who repeats his chapter not recite the blessing over Torah study?

Regards, Shatz

Review is a borderline matter. Something located a bit before homiletics of type A. On the one hand it doesn’t teach me anything new, but on the other hand it is needed in order to remember the learned material. Without it I wouldn’t remember. Review is not done on something internalized in me but on a novelty—except that it’s a novelty I already saw once. By contrast, preaching sermons in praise of humility and fear of Heaven renews nothing at all. Maybe it illustrates and sharpens, maybe it allegorizes, maybe it only drums it in.
And if we return to my words here, in my opinion they amount to something beyond mere review. Many people who didn’t think this way about sermons can (in my opinion) be persuaded by the arguments raised here. The very fact that my words contain arguments that make claims takes them out of the category of homily, and even out of the category of review in its usual and familiar sense. And if those arguments change someone’s position, then there is study here in the full sense.

For the older ones among us – a sermon by Baba Buba:

Hello and blessings.
In my opinion there is here, essentially, a criticism of art and its influence on human beings. True, there is no new learning here, only internalization of the old, but perhaps that is how human beings are made—to internalize things through experiences in life.
I know you noted this—that there are people on whom it has an effect and therefore it is not invalid. But I challenge the assumption—that there are some who don’t need this.
The underlying assumption in the article is that in order to know and understand things one needs to investigate them with one’s intellect. From where do you get that? Maybe the value of experiential internalization is a general value for humanity, without which a person cannot attain and truly understand..?
True, I didn’t bring proofs for the other side either, apart from one small proof—as you mentioned, very many people throughout history gave this great importance.
Do you have proof for the other side?
Thank you.

For me, a sermon is not opposed to intellectual inquiry but to learning something new.

“You were not careful not to enter within the four cubits of someone praying the Amidah – now you will not enter his four cubits during the entire prayer!” (A quip that came to me during Minchah in a public garden when everyone was far from each other, sitting on swings or on some tree trunk. This is the kind of prayer Hazal had in mind! A geshmak!)

I would add to what Shatz wrote another, opposite reason for the difference between Hazal and the coronavirus preachers. It is based on the argument of Jonah Fraenkel in his groundbreaking books Midrash and Aggadah. He worked to prove the formal and substantive depth hidden in the midrashim. He shows that Hazal’s sermons were transmitted orally for hundreds of years before being put into writing. It’s a kind of natural selection. Not every Friday-night sermon that puts the whole congregation into a stupor was preserved. Only what had depth went viral through constant repetition that lasted for generations. If we don’t say this, we will have to regard them (the transmitters of the tradition, the preachers, and their students) as idiots who remembered every exhausting corona quip and told it to their children and students and passed it from here to there and from Israel to Babylonia (as seen in the variant versions of the same midrashim in the Bavli and Yerushalmi) until it was written down.

Even in the Ten Commandments there was almost nothing new: “I am” and “You shall have no other gods” are the prohibition of idolatry from the seven Noahide commandments; likewise “You shall not murder,” “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not steal,” and “You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor”—these too are explicit in the seven Noahide commandments. “You shall not take [the Lord’s name] in vain” and “Honor your father and your mother” are trivial moral values.

The only novelty is “You shall not covet,” which really is a great innovation relative to the Noahide commandments, because here the Torah brings into the realm of commandment not only the act but also the emotion (which of course you try to empty of content in the well-known column 22 🙂 and I’m getting ahead of you and sparing you the trouble of referring there 🙂

But what can be done—the Torah explicitly explained the purpose of the revelation at Sinai: “so that the people may hear when I speak with you and also believe in you forever,” and “so that His fear may be upon your faces, that you not sin”—which is the very essence of the Torah: to internalize in a person faith in God and fear of Him.

Concerning instilling the love of God in our hearts and in the hearts of our descendants, we were commanded by the Torah’s words, “And these words that I command you today shall be upon your heart,” where the words refer first and foremost to what is said in that section, “The Lord is our God, the Lord is One” and “And you shall love the Lord your God”; except that Hazal explained to us that this command also applies to the commandments not mentioned in that section but elsewhere in the Torah as well—about them too we were commanded, “And you shall teach them diligently to your children.”

“Torah” is not “novelty.” The meaning of “Torah” is “instruction,” both instruction in the path regarding duties of the limbs and instruction in the path regarding ways of serving God, character refinement, and duties of the heart.

About the halakhot it is said: “Hear, my son, your father’s discipline”—the constraints, the boundaries set by halakhah. And about the aggadot that instruct the path to rising in faith, in love of God and of His creatures, it is said: “And do not forsake your mother’s teaching.”

Regards, Shatz

I wrote that my words are not about all aggadot, and neither are his. Folk tales with a narrative structure require a separate discussion. Beyond that, it depends how the transmitters themselves relate to the aggadot. If they hang depths on them, they will always find deep interpretations for them, and in any case will pass that on. The question is whether that imposition is justified.

Shatz, if you read the trilogy, there are answers there.
In the Ten Commandments there is a major novelty: in murder/theft etc. there is also a religious-halakhic problem and not only a moral one.
And indeed, nowadays there is not much value in studying this, because we all already know it. Like studying Tanakh in general.

You briefly wrote that the halakhic midrashim are built in a similar way, and nevertheless you were not troubled by that.
I would ask you to point to a source where you explain the difference, because if we see that, methodologically, Hazal learned in the same way even halakhot legislated for generations, that apparently teaches that they saw in their words something true and binding, despite the millions of question marks that arise in us when reading their words.
And if so regarding the halakhic midrashim, the burden of proof is on you to show that the aggadic midrashim differ from them, despite their obvious resemblance.

Among the enlightened, democracy protects and saves…

https://mobile.kikar.co.il/article/351680

Indeed, an idiot with a diploma. Spouting homiletic quips, except that here it is actually dangerous and not just idiotic.

You surely understand that I sensed the question, since I myself raised it. I wrote that this is not the place to elaborate, and perhaps I’ll do so later. If I had a source, I would refer you to it. There is a bit in the second book, in the chapter I referred you to.
Be that as it may, my claims about aggadah need to be judged on their own merits. At most you may conclude that halakhah too should be viewed that way.
By the way, the similarity is far from obvious. Even the hermeneutical rules are not identical.

The Hasidic group in which the wedding with hundreds of participants was held last night, in Beit Shemesh, is called Chernobyl Hasidism (!) One should still acknowledge the great director’s dramatic-comic sense.

I’m a bit bothered by the term “drumming it in.” (But after getting to know you a bit, maybe you deserve a yasher koach for not saying “nigges”…). For after all, everything you said about Hazal’s sermons could basically also be said about (some of) the prophets’ prophecies. Did God send His prophets “to drum it in”?

Actually, yes. Thus says the Lord in Jeremiah’s mouth (7:25): “From the day your fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day, I have sent to you all My servants the prophets, daily and persistently.”

And the Holy One even notes (like you) that it doesn’t help: “But they did not listen to Me, nor incline their ear; they stiffened their neck; they did worse than their fathers.”

And of course, as One who knows the future, He adds and notes: “You shall speak all these words to them, but they will not listen to you; you shall call to them, but they will not answer you.”

So why all this? Because working on one’s character, faith, and control of impulses is a Sisyphean daily labor, like an athlete’s work to maintain physical fitness. Daily training. That is the purpose of sermons, homilies, and drumming-it-in: to train the soul in the service of God and preserve its fitness. I mention my sins today (what can I do, I’m stuck at home, so I have a bit more time for self-examination…); there are people whose doctor urges them to engage in physical activity for their health, and they scoff. So too Israel scoffed at the prophets’ urgings and rebuke, and wrote mocking columns on the internet about “inferior sermons” and so on, as it says (Hosea 9:7): “The days of reckoning have come, the days of recompense have come; Israel shall know it: the prophet is a fool, the man of the spirit is mad, because of your great iniquity and great hostility.”

Happy is the lot of one who drums it in, for the world of preaching was created for nothing but the drumming-in of fear of Heaven, good character, and good deeds; and were it not for the rabbis who drum it in, the world would revert to chaos and void. (New, renewed, and invented Zohar, there, or perhaps there, or maybe there, and there we haven’t yet been…).

Chayota, for that you deserve a big like. 🙂
In the end I’ll really believe in the director’s intervention.

“It is a positive commandment from the Torah to cry out and to sound trumpets over every trouble that comes upon the community… and this is among the ways of repentance, for when trouble comes and they cry out over it and sound the alarm, everyone will know that it is because of their evil deeds that this evil befell them… and this will cause them to remove the trouble from upon themselves. But if they do not cry out and do not sound the alarm, but instead say, ‘This thing happened to us as part of the way of the world, and this trouble is mere happenstance,’ this is a way of cruelty, and causes them to cling to their evil deeds, and the trouble will add other troubles. This is what is written in the Torah: ‘And if you walk with Me casually, I too will walk with you in the fury of casualness’—that is, when I bring trouble upon you so that you repent, if you say it is happenstance, I will add to you the fury of that happenstance” (Rambam, Laws of Fasts 1:1–3).
Why does Rambam mix an emotional consideration—cruelty—into a purely scientific question: why did the troubles come?

“How does corona show us that there is a master of the palace? What did we see there besides the fact that people suffer and are surprised? Does suffering indicate leadership while pleasure does not? It seems that Lustigman’s God is a cruel being who abuses His creatures.”
Should “being” be corrected to “creator”
?

Rabbi Mordechai, I agree with every word.
The question whether this works and whether it is helpful is one question (and if not—then why do it). And the question whether this is learning is another. I am not against moral exhortation (at least where people are receptive to it). After all, there is the halakhic obligation of “You shall surely rebuke.”
Indeed, the words of the prophets, at least of the type you mentioned (there are others), are not study but moral exhortation. In that sense, this really is homily.

I didn’t understand the comment/question.

If even you acknowledge the pleasure contained in a good aggadic sermon, that is enough for me. (Or perhaps, following my move to the kosher Lithuanian women’s kollel, you’ll enroll in a literature class?).

Where do I sign up? 🙂

You wrote at the opening of the column: “Here I will not again enter the question whether the Holy One really is the One who brought about the corona and whether He wants to teach us something through it. My goal here is to discuss only the nature of the homily in itself, that is, to examine the lessons being proposed themselves and how far they really arise from the phenomena of corona.”
One could perhaps prove from the above Rambam that in his view, when God brings many hard troubles upon a person, the goal is to awaken his heart to repent; and therefore those various preachers of sermons are doing well… and although there is no direct connection between the trouble and the strengthening, the subtext of providence is what links them
or shall we say that Rambam held sincerely that every trouble truly comes because of people’s evil deeds and there is here cause and effect.
Either way, the theological basis upon which these sermon-preachers rely is providence, and so when one comes to discuss them in the column, the main thing is missing from the book

With God’s help, let us rejoice and be glad in You, 22 Adar 5780

To Hannibal – greetings,

You are absolutely right that it is our duty to ask, “What is this that the Lord has done to us?” so that “let us search and examine our ways” to see what we should correct and improve.

The problem is that some of the “corona sermons” and the like focus more on “let us search their ways” – these people got hit because they ate bats that were not properly cooked, and those because they destroyed Carthage, and those because they did not diligently study the Talmud even though it was translated into their language, and those are being hit for their fathers’ sin in expelling the Jews and operating the Inquisition, etc. etc.…

From such explanations we gain nothing for the correction demanded of us. What shall we do—decide to stop eating bats, to destroy Carthage, and to run an Inquisition? 🙂 That sounds like the opposite of “let us search our ways.” Justifying the judgment upon others only increases self-congratulation and distances from us the search for self-correction.

There is value in looking at what happens among others in order to examine effective ways of coping. For example, it occurred to me that in Italy and Spain the spread of corona was greater because of their warm temperament and the abundance of affectionate expression through physical closeness—they hug and kiss at every step. In contrast, the cool-tempered British naturally keep greater physical distance from one another and are therefore infected less.

One should therefore draw a lesson and be more careful to maintain spacing between people and not gather and crowd together. It is no accident that the prayer for “deliverance and healing” is linked with insistence on “space and rescue” 🙂 Let us strengthen ourselves in the path of Fabius Cunctator, who brought salvation to his people precisely by striving not to make contact 🙂

Regards, Shatzius
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Rabbi Michi, if you think there is no learning in aggadah, why do you repeatedly trouble yourself to write columns about it? Is every person who says aggadic or midrashic words necessarily engaged in midrash or aggadah? Hazal were a bit sharper than you, after all, and yet they included aggadot in the Talmud. Do you really think the aggadot of Hazal were intended only to appeal to the ears of ignoramuses, or were they also intended to teach Torah to Torah scholars who have nothing in their world but the four cubits of halakhah?

Another sermon that nicely illustrates all the above elements

Oops.. and now with the link

In Isaiah 26 appears the verse
“Go, my people, enter your rooms, and shut your doors behind you; hide yourself for a little moment, until the indignation passes.”

Take note of the interpretation of the Ralbad on the verse 1400 years ago
(the comments in italics in parentheses are mine)

“In the footsteps of the Messiah, on Passover eve, there is no king in Israel (indeed there is no government), and the plague emerges from the land of Ashkenaz (the virus began in China), and it is from the sefirah of Keter (corona means crown in Latin!) and it goes out and strikes the enemies of Israel and the kings of Persia and Media fall beneath it (it was reported in the media that many in the Iranian government died of corona) and the hand of the Lord strikes the heretics (because of censorship they did not write Christians. The intention is the Vatican, which is in Italy) and Israel sit in their homes and spread fake WhatsApp messages people wake up and get a grip the Ralbad is actually the National Road Safety Authority stop messing our minds with fabrications, I understand quarantine is hard but come on.

I find myself surprisingly disagreeing with the main point.

I would rebrand the homily as rhetoric, since the first two options are such.
(As opposed to the option of drumming it in, which relates more to demagoguery, but that is not our concern here).

Now, rhetoric is not logic, but to claim that there is no learning from rhetoric is not an agreed-upon claim.
One can find quite a few people who changed their minds not because of a new argument but because of encountering a more successful and sharper presentation of the same argument. And in midrash too—the literary presentation allows renewed reflection on the argument, and therefore also to weigh it differently and perhaps indeed be persuaded.

And as a side note regarding both the claim about learning from midrash and the claim about learning Tanakh, perhaps it would be worthwhile to expand on the topic of learning from inspiration—what part comes from outside and what part comes from within, even if the inspiration is only a telephone pole, as in your example there. There is something in me that wonders whether part of the disagreements between you and commenters also relates to this issue (Chayota as an example, and I’d be happy for her to correct me if she thinks otherwise)

Regarding Lucy’s soap experiment:

Here is a quote:

“Soap is able to harm bacteria because it damages their cell membranes, which are composed mainly of fats.”

From:

https://davidson.weizmann.ac.il/online/askexpert/%D7%90%D7%99%D7%9A-%D7%9E%D7%97%D7%98%D7%90%D7%99%D7%9D-%D7%A0%D7%92%D7%93-%D7%A0%D7%92%D7%99%D7%A3-%D7%A7%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%95%D7%A0%D7%94

It is important to clarify that there is a clear connection between what is demonstrated in the video and the known scientific fact (that soap harms bacteria).

With God’s help, 22 Adar 5780

To Ramda – greetings,

According to your claim, studying Tanakh today is unnecessary because everything is already known—if only that were so. The average person definitely needs constant reminding and awakening to the values toward which the Torah directs us. That one must not murder or steal is clear to everyone, but the “primary categories” have many “derivative categories,” which are much less trivial, such as “whoever becomes angry is as if he worshipped idols,” “one who shames his fellow in public is as if he shed blood,” and the duty to be careful with another’s property even regarding unintentional damage, and the prohibition of deception or disturbing another’s rest—all these may also be known and agreed upon, but habit and the routine of life tend to blur them, and therefore the constant articulation of the Torah’s ethical demands sharpens our attention to those things a person may trample underfoot.

But even someone to whom everything is known and clear is instructed by the “Manufacturer,” the Giver of the Torah, to return and meditate on it without ceasing. For who was greater in knowledge of Torah than Joshua, who served Moses our master for forty years, and regarding whom the Torah testifies that he was “a lad who did not depart from the tent”? And yet God instructs him: “This book of the Torah shall not depart from your mouth, and you shall meditate on it day and night.” And the purpose of constant meditation on the book of Torah is not “only” “so that you may observe to do”—not to forget—but also “for then you shall make your way prosperous, and then you shall act wisely.” The more you meditate on the words of Torah, the more deeply you will understand its intention and succeed in understanding one thing from another and finding solutions even to new questions not explicitly discussed in the ancient sources.

Of course this is not a simple task, to stand on God’s will; sometimes one can infer different things from the texts. But that is precisely how the Giver of the Torah instructed: to seek solutions through careful reading of the Torah’s words. When one returns again and again, new questions arise each time and renewed directions of thought are suggested each time, bringing about a “recalculation of route.”

To succeed in fully clarifying the truth, the Torah “complicated” us with an additional hurdle: one must constantly open oneself to different readings and different angles of vision. When you repeat the words of Torah “to your children,” you will hear another line of thought; sometimes the child senses what the adult did not sense. And when “you speak of them while walking on the way,” you will find different lines of thought; and “when you sit in your house,” your wife may suggest an entirely new direction. When you study the matters “when you lie down,” in summing up your day, you will reach one insight; and “when you rise,” after you have “slept on it overnight,” a different understanding will be renewed for you. Thus one approaches the deciphering of the full truth.

Of course, after all the various insights, hesitations, and arguments, one must arrive at some conclusion. For this the Torah gave the answer: “And you shall arise and go up to the place that the Lord will choose.” There, in the place of assembly where the matters are clarified. There are matters in which a decision will go one way or the other, and there are times when harmony will be found between the different views—this one being truer in certain situations and its counterpart more fitting in others. Thus things proceed in halakhah—and thus they ought to proceed in aggadah as well.

With the blessing “Do read,” Shatz

Even according to Rambam, whose words I do not accept, those sermonizers are not doing well, because they do not examine their deeds but hang empty nonsense on all kinds of things. If there is no indication that the corona came because of X, then say one should correct X because it is not right, not because it is the cause of the corona.
That is the meaning of my prefacing that I am dealing only with the logic of the inference without connection to the question of providence. Even if there is providence and the Holy One brings upon us blows like the corona, an inference that attributes the corona to some specific thing still requires justification. And there is none.

And regarding what Shatz wrote here, I’ll only sharpen the point. Even if there is an obligation to search our ways, the problem is not only that people are searching the ways of others, but that the search in question is not notarikonim that connect acts to the plague, but rather probing our deeds against what is morally proper and what is permitted and forbidden halakhically. So for example, if someone speaks slander, the corona ought to cause him to search his deeds and understand that this is not a good act and he should stop it. But not because the corona came because of slander, rather because it is an evil deed.

I didn’t understand the question. My goal is to persuade people of my position. My opinion about the aggadot of Hazal (at least some of them) I wrote in the column. Hazal may have been sharper than I am, but that does not answer my questions. It’s like saying that if I have a question about relativity, I should suppress it because Einstein was smarter than I am. That is not an answer to the question.
If in fact people learn nothing from the aggadot (that is my claim), then the claim that Hazal thought one could learn something from them and that they were very smart does not change the fact. And if, in your opinion, the fact I wrote is not true, then again there is no need to resort to the ad hominem of Hazal. Write that itself.

I didn’t understand. I have written my opinion about rhetoric several times (also in the books). I am the last person to dispute its importance, and I even explained it. But rhetoric is an efficient and persuasive way to present arguments, not a substitute for arguments. My claim is that there are no arguments here and they persuade of nothing. This is rhetoric for its own sake and not a tool for presenting arguments.

I disagree.
First of all, we are talking about a virus, not a bacterium. But the article there also speaks about viruses (at least ours). But the video is still a homily, because it does not demonstrate that viruses contain fat; it relies on that assumption. But once I accept that assumption, the result is obvious. So what does the video add for me? It only illustrates or makes an analogy. Exactly as I said.

Shatz, I agree with all of this.

With God’s help, 23 Adar 5780

To Ramda – greetings,

To determine conclusively that sufferings of a certain kind come because of a certain transgression—that is not in our authority. Still, there are things Hazal pointed to, such as the matter of “measure for measure,” which can focus our search also in directions we had not thought of and fence off those directions as well.

There is logic, for example, in thinking that if we are forced to shut ourselves in our homes, perhaps we should correct this matter and give more attention also to home and family, and suddenly discover that we forgot them a bit because of too much focus on the radiant glitter of externals. Perhaps we failed in the pursuit of honor, and now “measure for measure” we are running away from Covid 🙂

This is exactly the type of con-siderations that count as homily for me. I could have learned from here both a thing and its opposite. These are just quips. One can use the opportunity to improve one’s ways, meaning to look for what we need to correct in general. Without quips that tie it to corona. These are penny-ante quips that are worth nothing.

If you have a question about this or that aggadah of Hazal, then the question is half of wisdom. But if you have a question about aggadah in general,
that is not like a question about Einstein’s relativity but like a question about physics in general, or a question about music in general. Einstein played piano and violin from childhood. And he said that he often thinks in a musical way. If there are scientists who are not musicians and do not understand why Einstein loved classical music so much, what of it? On the contrary, Einstein said that only after seven years of music study did he begin truly to learn music.

Perhaps the profound seriousness with which we are anxious about every remote doubt of possible infection teaches us that we should think seriously as well about protection against spiritual dangers. We ourselves may see ourselves as immune to them, but what will happen if populations less spiritually immune are exposed to those same dangers?

And perhaps the “corona,” whose numerical value is 367, one less than the incense, of which “there were 368 manehs,” arouses us to strengthen ourselves in the quality of the incense, which expresses the unity of all Israel, for if even the galbanum, whose smell is bad, is lacking—all the incense is invalid. Perhaps we should strengthen ourselves in containing the “other,” even if we think of him as “galbanum”?

And in short:
To set in stone that “this happened because of that” — we are not permitted; but to suggest possibilities that will spur us to strengthen ourselves in directions different from the usual — that is certainly fitting.

Regards, Shatz

An idea occurred to me: David instituted one hundred blessings because of a plague that broke out, and on Shabbat, when there are not one hundred blessings in prayer, the hundred blessings are completed through “fragrant spices and delicacies.” If so, we could walk around on Shabbat with a kit containing all manner of the best things—foods requiring Mezonot, Shehakol, Ha’adamah, Ha’etz, Minei, herbs and woody spices—and offer them to whomever we meet; and besides “completing one hundred blessings,” we would thereby increase love and friendship and a good feeling, and even a bit of humor 🙂—that is certainly a segulah for strengthening resilience…

With God’s help, 23 Adar 5780

To Ehud – greetings,

Thank you very much for the information you brought from the Davidson Center of the Weizmann Institute, that soap is more effective than alcohol gel. That makes it much easier to feel that ordinary, readily available soap is enough, and there is no need to bother searching for alcohol gel (whose price is sometimes gouged because of the public’s rush to obtain it).

More power to you!

Regards, Shatz

My question is this: after all, in the laws and halakhot that the amoraim ruled and disputed, you too give interpretive and analytical explanations—how is this different?
Or put differently, is there no difference between amoraim whom you expected to say wise and analytical things, and some anonymous writer you never knew in your life? After all, if a very wise person whose views you regard as reliable and learned were to say those same parables and homilies, presumably you would analyze his words more and take them more seriously. No?

Rabbi,
An illustrative parable in these circumstances is fine. Even if it is not an exact demonstration.
It can cause masses and masses of people who were dismissive of handwashing to start washing.

By the way, I understood that we can’t actually see particles of atoms (though I may be wrong), because they are simply too small.
If so, should I dismiss all the “illustrative parables” of pictures/videos of atomic particles just because they are not an exact demonstration?
In my opinion, absolutely not. One can and should learn from that.

It could be that here we are dealing with exactly the same thing—there is no way to demonstrate unequivocally how soap breaks down virus proteins, or there is a way to demonstrate it but it is very, very complex to do so in a way that will be intuitive to the viewer.
So indeed it is good enough to settle for an illustrative parable.

Besides that, the honorable rabbi even raised the possibility that Professor Lucy is just soaping us up
“I want to believe that the professor isn’t just pulling our leg,” and that suspicion raised by the rabbi, by all opinions, was surely unnecessary . . .

“An illustrative parable” may not be an “exact demonstration,” but it is certainly not “just pulling our leg”

In short, it is very likely that publishing such a video will actually contribute a lot to results in practice.

Maybe. But the sages of our times are also sages, and yet they present dubious homilies. Be that as it may, the fact is that even when people try to extract significant things from the aggadot, they don’t really succeed. Therefore the question of what I would expect to be in the aggadot isn’t really important. The actual reality is very clear.

And a bit from the Ramak (Tomer Devorah, ch. 2) on the attribute of “Keter”:

For a person to resemble his Creator in the secret of the attribute of Keter, several principal forms of conduct are required of him:

The first, encompassing all, is the attribute of humility, because it depends on Keter… thus a person should be ashamed to look upward in pride, but should always look downward, to lower himself as much as he can… and just as He sits and sustains from the horns of wild oxen to the eggs of lice, and does not despise any creature… but oversees and gives His mercy to all—so too should a person do good to all… even the lowliest of creatures should be very important in his eyes, and he should attend to it and do all that is needed for its good…

The second: his thought should resemble the thought of Keter. Just as that wisdom does not cease always to think good thoughts… so he should not turn to any direction other than thoughts of Torah and thoughts of the greatness of God and His good acts, and doing good, and the like…

The third: there should be no hardness at all in his forehead; rather it should always resemble the “forehead of favor,” appeasing everyone. Even when he finds people angry—he should appease them and quiet them with his goodwill…

The fourth: his ears should always be inclined to hear what is good; but falsehood or something shameful should not enter them at all… and he should listen only to good things…

The fifth: his eyes should not look at all at anything shameful. Rather, they should always be open toward the wretched, as much as he is able. And when he sees the distress of the poor, he should not shut his eyes at all, but consider him with his mind as much as he can, and arouse mercy for him before Heaven and before people…

The sixth: in his nose there should never be found any anger at all; rather there should always be in his nostrils life, goodwill, and patience, even toward those who are unworthy. And he should always wish to fulfill desire, answer every request, and revive every downtrodden person. And from his nostrils should always go forth forgiveness of iniquity and passing over transgression; and he should not be angry with one who sins against him, but should always be appeased and desirous of kindness, to give pleasure to all.

The seventh: his face should always be radiant, and he should receive every person with a pleasant countenance… so his facial light should not change, and anyone who looks at it should not find gloom of countenance, and no cause at all should trouble him in this.

The eighth: his mouth should utter only good, the decree of his sayings should be Torah, and the production of goodwill always; and he should not utter from his mouth anything shameful, nor curse, nor raging anger at all, nor idle words… and he should never withhold good; therefore he should not be silent from speaking good of everyone and should always utter goodness and blessing.”

Later the Ramak details the ways of acquiring the quality of humility, and the ways of balancing it with the need sometimes to conduct oneself with the attribute of judgment.

Regards, Shatz

This reminds me of a video I saw many years ago by Christian missionaries
showing a man ordained as an Orthodox rabbi, as it were, and on the basis of all kinds of gematrias and midrashim about the “kosher” pig
trying to say that Jesus was the messiah son of Joseph or something like that.
Not that I’m comparing the two levels of foolishness in the arguments, but with homilies we won’t get anywhere (and indeed there are intelligent people who like to argue this way; in some fields I often find myself spending time with smart secular-traditionalist people who claim that their faith in Judaism boils down to this—that if there is no God, human feelings and revulsion at murder are impossible, and that they don’t keep mitzvot because that’s what rabbis are for; and indeed even among very learned and educated people they like to produce absurdities from time to time—Rabbi Shlomo Aviner is very smart and very learned, and still some of his sermons are a bit foolish sometimes)

“And likewise in gematria:

Rational(ly speaking)” = “very simplistic” 🙂

Regards, Shatz

By the way, they say that the Ponevezh Rav said that “yeshivah” in gematria equals “deficit.” When they remarked to him that it wasn’t exact, the Rav replied that it was “including the kolel” 🙂

Dear Rabbi Michi!

Wonderful 🙂
(the story about the Ponevezh Rav)

Yes?
🙂

However, one should also remember that “relatively rational” = “possessed of a healthy sense of humor” 🙂

The wit of the homily carries a kind of humor that lightens the acceptance and absorption of the serious idea.

Regards, Shatz

Dear Rabbi Michi!
The difference between you and Hazal is that you do not have responsibility for preserving the sacred covenant of the people of Israel with the Holy One, blessed be He. If you had it, you would accept upon yourself to use every tool in order to preserve that covenant. Among other things, to use the troubles that come upon the world and people’s fears for purposes of religious propaganda. To lie from time to time, to frighten from time to time, because the end sanctifies the means. The moment you have such responsibility and complete faith in the Master of the Universe, you will begin to lie like some of the rabbis and Hazal, who believe in our eternal covenant with the Holy One, blessed be He. I do not say this cynically. As you mentioned, today rabbis are more careful because the public today is more educated than in the past {perhaps there is an interest in keeping the public ignorant and unlearned}. May the light of enlightenment increase in the world and purify religion of its dross. I have no doubt that if all rabbis were like you, Judaism would not last a generation.
I have no doubt that you will disagree with me and not agree with me, because human beings have no free choice, and you will certainly respond like a rabbi.
With much respect and appreciation.

And therefore
“Shimshon Zvi Halevi” = “with a bit of humor”
but “Halevi Levinger” = “serious”

You may be right. In the short term certainly so, but in the long term I’m not sure. Openness may be efficient preservation in the long term. And perhaps the most efficient mechanism is to have Neturei Karta types who behave as you describe, alongside little heretics like me nipping at their heels. The cunning of history.

It seems to me a link is missing in the section that talks about the soap and the pepper.

If I may, I’d be glad for a column on halakhic midrashim.

I hope I’ll get to it.

There is a link there

What is homily, aggadah, midrash, and what is halakhah to me—
you all start from the axiom that there is a God and even know exactly what He wants. Etc.
Soon we’ll get to PR (in the Haggadah) – but you are already engaged in PR (public relations) right now, and in general,
for someone who is only “not” (negative attributes according to Rambam).
Or perhaps not?

In my opinion, the rabbit’s clap looks triangular through a halakhic prism.

With God’s help, Saturday night, Vayakhel-Pekudei 5780

The preacher on Friday night in the “Ohel Yosef” synagogue in Rehavia remarked on the irony of the situation in which דווקא in the portion of Vayakhel everyone is shut up in his home and gathering is minimized. But he found consolation in the adjacent portion of Pekudei: although physically we are forced to split apart, spiritually we are still connected through the Lord’s “precepts, which are upright..”

Regards, Shatz

I remarked to him that we are in the situation of “Parashat HaChodesh,” which describes the “Passover of Egypt,” in which each family shut itself up in its home and refrained from going out of the doorway in order to be saved from the plague.

In the “Passover of generations” both aspects come together: its sacrifice was done together—“and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall slaughter it”—but its eating was in closed groups, so that each home is focused on its own personal “and you shall tell your child,” with each child receiving the unique haggadah suited to him—particularization for the sake of integration.

A puzzling homily
Rabbi-veh Akiva Eiger

What are you talking about? It’s Jephthah the Gileadite doing yoga in the Azrieli Mall.

And how do you know that the conservative method—or whatever you want to call it—of lying from time to time or frightening from time to time actually succeeds?
The bitter (and simple) truth in all matters of preventing religious abandonment, apostasy, and assimilation is that no method has really proved itself capable of stopping anything—especially not in the global age, when every person already at a young age has his own worldview (or a desire to shape an independent opinion with doubts about everything society offers)
Therefore I suggest that whoever advocates openness should behave with openness, and whoever advocates seclusion should behave with seclusion (people often like to bring as an analogy the descendants and students of Ramban who became heretical and apostatized, without noticing that Hellenization processes at that time were a plague that it was not really possible to stop)

In general, as rational people we must recognize that every person has desires, thoughts, and views of his own—and much as we religious people dream of the day when all the secular people will wake up and cry out to the Holy One, blessed be He, one has to recognize that people have different patterns of thought, and a person who arrives at a secular/deist/atheist/(or anything else) outlook—and insofar as he arrived there not מתוך תאווה or prejudices (but is truly compelled by his opinion and thinks his way is the right one)—the chance of moving him from there is nearly impossible—and so too the chance of preventing someone from going off the path (in this case, in my humble opinion, precisely if someone leaves only because he saw no other religious mode of thought, Ramda’s views can help; more than once I’ve encountered people who abandoned faith because they were educated into a Haredi mode of thought of sermons and propaganda of various sorts, and here they see something lacking logic)

With God’s help, 26 Adar 5780

The Venetian Republic was a central power in the Mediterranean lands from the beginning of the 13th century until its conquest by the Austrian Empire at the end of the 18th century. They ruled southern Greece for about 300 years until the Ottoman Empire conquered southern Greece from them in 1500, but hundreds of years later the Venetians continued in repeated attempts to take control of southern Greece.

Two important port cities in the southwest of the Peloponnese peninsula (Morea) in Greece were Modon (Methoni) and Coron (Koroni), which, because of their importance for Venice’s international maritime trade, were called “the eyes of Venice” (see Benjamin Arbel’s article, “Southern Greece בעקבות the Venetians,” on the Masa Acher website).

The tribulations of the Jews of Coron are described by Professor Meir Benayahu in his book The Relations between the Jews of Greece and the Jews of Italy—from the Expulsion from Spain to the End of the Venetian Republic, pp. 72–77. The community of Coron went through several waves of conquest, exile, and captivity. In 1532 the city was conquered by the Italian commander Doria and its Jews were taken captive. In the Venetian assault on Coron in 1646, Jews too were taken as captives to Malta. But the community recovered and rebuilt itself.

The hardest blow to the community of Coron came with its conquest by the Venetians in 1685. Some of the Jews were killed in the battle and the rest fled or were taken captive, sent to forced labor on ships or sold as slaves. Their captors raised their prices in order to extort money from the communities of Italy that tried to ransom them, and five years after the event not all had yet been released, and the communities of Italy were still trying to raise funds for their redemption.

The community never recovered from this blow, and thus Professor Benayahu concludes: “The destruction of the houses and institutions of the community of Coron, the dispersal of most of them and the captivity of some of them for several years, dealt the community a severe blow from which it could no longer recover… In the year 1715 the city returned to Turkish hands, but the community was never renewed there.”

Let us wish the Jews of Italy that the merit of the righteousness of their forefathers with their Jewish brothers throughout the world stand by them, to be saved from the distress of the ‘corona’ and every trouble and anguish, and that they may ascend speedily to Zion with everlasting joy upon their heads.

Regards, Shatz

In the last line
… and may they ascend speedily to Zion,,,

Maharal and Rambam disagreed about the meaning of Hazal’s derashot (from verses). In Rambam’s view (in the Guide), derashot are a kind of poetry; it is clear that Hazal did not think there was a connection between the verse’s intent and the derashah, but just as Bialik may use verses to convey a message, so may Hazal. Maharal, by contrast, explains in Be’er HaGolah that there is always some connection between the derashah and the meaning of the verse, and Hazal connected it through divine inspiration.
And regarding corona, the situation reverses—Maharal comes out against foolish or newly invented derashot, but according to Rambam, since they are in any case a kind of rhetorical flourish, one should be more patient, and if the target audience is positively influenced by the derashah, then it is doing its job.
Therefore you too can be more patient.
And as for an actual lesson from corona—it concerns the allocation of resources in the world of science: billions are invested in treatments for diseases like cancer, which are indeed constantly present, but the risk that suddenly a “new strain of cancer” will appear and cause a general crisis is low. Investment in protection against viruses is given low priority, and therefore despite the SARS outbreak (and later MERS) there was almost no progress on the coronavirus issue. People prefer to invest in what is in front of their eyes and not in what has a higher potential risk.

With God’s help, 26 Adar 5780

The rabbit’s “clap” is a sweetening of judgments, for the rabbit got into a health problem when he forgot to close the door and then, poor thing, caught a chill and got a runny nose. A runny nose is not an acute health problem for the rabbit himself, but viewed through the “halakhic prism” the rabbit is under obligation to go to a place of refuge so as not to endanger others, as it is written: “You shall prepare the road for yourself and divide into three parts.”

Therefore the little rabbit adopts the path outlined by the sage when he said: “Four are small upon the earth, but they are exceedingly wise… the rock-badgers are not a mighty people, yet they make their homes in the rock.” And the rabbit goes up to his brothers who dwell in the clefts of the rock so that he not harm others by infecting them. And from the rabbit all the business owners in the Azrieli Mall learn, and they too go home. The mall remains empty, until even Jephthah the Gileadite, who was driven from his home by his brothers, can seclude himself doing yoga in the empty mall.

I do not presume to penetrate to the depths of the rabbi’s mind in deciphering his profound hints. Certainly only a little rabbit can enter the cracks of his subtle theology. But whatever is possible—it is incumbent upon us to open an opening like the eye of a needle.

Regards, a rabbit young of feet

I didn’t quite understand how you write “…for already the Geonim and the Rishonim cast doubt on the importance and meaning of Hazal’s aggadot…” and then bring as an example the Hatam Sofer… Is he among the “Geonim and Rishonim” ??? And even about him you bring only a quote from “Moshe,” who didn’t even answer you when you asked for the source…

I didn’t bring the Hatam Sofer as a source for my claim. He just came to mind in passing. The sources are well known (from the Geonim and Ramban in his disputation). I assume you can find them online in articles on aggadah.

I think the rabbi has a problem understanding the place of the “vort,” and from here comes the abundant criticism of the various homilies as well as of the institution of sermons, utterly lacking criticism, in the Haredi public.
The vort does not pretend to be a brilliant analytical essay like your many essays (which I never stop enjoying), but comes to awaken some point of truth hidden in the totality of its parts and not necessarily entailed by the data themselves—a kind of feeling, something between a joke and art.
Just as you would never (I hope) try to analyze a joke and examine whether it is funny, and the only criterion would be its effects—on you and the rest of the listeners—and if it made them laugh, it is a successful joke,
and just as you would not really want to argue about whether a poem is moving or not, and so forth,
in general, the point at which the vort aims is not an analytical conclusion, and therefore one cannot try to examine its validity with analytical tools, and it would be pointless to do so.
Hoping for a hearing, from someone who appreciates the overwhelming majority of your work, even if not always at one with its conclusions

I agree with every word and understand this very well too. I did not say otherwise.
My claims are two: 1. Notice that vorts are exhortation and not Torah study (one should not recite the blessings over Torah before them). 2. Notice our dismal state, that such lousy vorts really work on us.
But I do not argue with results. It does indeed work on a certain public, and in some cases the success justifies the use of this lowly genre.
At the same time, I am in favor of putting this on the table and trying to elevate the discourse. Or at least, even if we are there and need it, let us not lie to ourselves and see in a joke or satire (as you define it) Torah study. When you take a pill, don’t tell yourself you are engaged in contemplative work.
Of course, you can argue that without this illusion the pill may not work (the joke may not be funny). נכון, and still there are advantages to it. We may lose short-term success, but probably raise ourselves in the long term.

With God’s help, 28 Adar 5780

To Ramda – greetings,

As is known, one recites the blessing over Torah every morning, and immediately after saying it one recites the verses of the Priestly Blessing, the mishnah “These are the things that have no measure,” and the baraita “These are the things whose fruits a person eats in this world while the principal remains for him in the World to Come.” And we rely on the fact that the blessing over Torah in the morning exempts all Torah study that a person will study during the whole day until he goes to sleep.

Therefore Your Honor may be calm: the blessing over Torah has something on which to take effect, and there is no need to bless again before every act of study. The only practical difference is whether one may say a vort before the blessing over Torah, and in this perhaps, according to your view, one may be lenient and say vorts before the blessing over Torah. If it is so hard for you to refrain from saying vorts before Birkat HaTorah—one may be lenient, for for you it is an existential need 🙂

Regards,, the awakeners,

What is true, however, is that after the vort one should say Kaddish de-Rabbanan, for the world stands upon “the sanctity of the סדרא and the Amen, may His great name be blessed, of aggadah.”

In paragraph 1, line 4
… until he goes to sleep.

An interesting article.

A few comments:

1) I personally pay no attention at all to the various homilies on the web—does any person know the calculations of Heaven?
Isaiah the prophet’s statement is enough to pull the rug out from under the entire business of dealing in prophecies.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways, says the Lord.”

2) On the other hand, the Torah world is not only halakhah. There is also outlook, and a person must occasionally raise his head and peek outside the window (and also breathe air). And therefore Rambam writes in the Laws of Fasts (1:1–3):

1] It is a positive commandment מן התורה to cry out and sound trumpets over every trouble that comes upon the community, as it says, “Against the enemy that oppresses you, then you shall sound an alarm with the trumpets.” That is to say, over everything that distresses you, such as drought, pestilence, locusts, and the like, cry out over them and sound the alarm.
2] And this is among the ways of repentance. For when trouble comes and they cry out over it and sound the alarm, everyone will know that it is because of their evil deeds that this evil befell them, as it is written, “Your iniquities have turned away these things,” etc. And this is what will cause the trouble to be removed from them.
3] But if they do not cry out and do not sound the alarm, but rather say, “This thing happened to us as part of the way of the world, and this trouble is mere happenstance,” this is a way of cruelty and causes them to cling to their evil deeds. And the trouble will add other troubles. This is what is written in the Torah: “And if you walk with Me casually, then I too will walk with you in the fury of casualness.” That is, when I bring trouble upon you so that you repent, if you say it is happenstance, I will add to you the fury of that happenstance.

This is not the Baal Shem Tov (with all due respect) but Rambam.
Which is to say that a person is obligated to ask himself what is happening in his world [under the assumption that we do not know Heaven’s calculations (we return to claim 1)]. “And the living shall take it to heart” (following Ecclesiastes).

3) Statements of Hazal require deep study on my part, and I should not be persuaded so quickly by the author’s conception, since it goes against the accepted view.

“Expounders of aggadot say: Do you wish to recognize Him who spoke and the world came into being? Study aggadah. For through this you recognize Him who spoke and the world came into being, and cleave to His ways.” (Sifrei, Eikev, piska 49)

All good and strong health to everyone.

We, the broad public, eagerly await Rabbi’s writing a column on how study in halakhah differs from study in aggadah, which on the face of it looks similar, and one really has the feeling when learning Gemara that Hazal simply invented weak textual supports for laws. Thank you very much

Dear Hezi.
I understand that you were elected by a large majority to represent the entire public. First of all, my congratulations.
For the moment I will only preface by saying that I dealt with this in detail in the second book of the trilogy. I hope to get to writing a column on it, but it will still take time.

With God’s help, 1 Nisan 5780

The value of aggadic homily is a win-win proposition. Since every literary text contains in its phrasing, style, and context additional messages beyond the meaning that emerges in fluent reading, a close reading that pays attention to distinctive phenomena in the text may indeed uncover messages that the author consciously embedded in his words. All the more so is this true of a text written in prophecy or divine inspiration.

But even if the author did not intend to hint through those stylistic features at the ideas we found through studying the text—since these are ideas that make sense and seem fitting to the author’s general approach, they have value in themselves as a “reasoned argument,” and it is possible that study of the texts will bring reasoned innovations that are not trivial.

And even if through homily we arrive at ideas that contain no novelty—still they have value as a “nice hint,” bringing the known idea to be internalized in the heart, and thereby arousing its implementation in thought, feeling, and deed.

With springtime blessings, Kochavi, Shatz

There is also a baraita (of Rabbi Eliezer son of Rabbi Yose the Galilean) of 32 hermeneutical rules by which the Torah is expounded in aggadah, and when one follows modes of study recommended by Hazal, the chance increases that this is more than a “nice hint,” but rather a coming closer to understanding the depth of the text’s intention

Just one note. The thirty-two rules are not only aggadic rules. The author of Keritot pointed this out, and this is not the place.

In any case, the 32 rules of Rabbi Eliezer son of Rabbi Yose the Galilean deal also with aggadah, so there is a methodology for the aggadic exposition of Hazal as well.

Regards, Shimshon who is not from קינון

The corona epidemic
Corona in the Bible code: You won’t believe where the corona virus is hinted at in the Book of Exodus
At a fixed interval of 131 letters, the word “corona” appeared in Parashat Ki Tisa, in the verses describing the sin of the calf. Chilling
Hidabroot | 4 Nisan 5780 | 29.03.20 11:08
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The Bible code is a method for finding different expressions in the Torah by reading them at intervals of letters. Thus one can find the expression “corona” at skips of a fixed number of letters. For example, in a certain verse the letter ק will appear, five letters later there will appear ו, another five later ר, and so on.

In a search done for the word “corona” at the smallest letter skip in the Five Books of the Torah, the result fell on Parashat Ki Tisa, in the verses describing the sin of idolatry, God’s desire to destroy the people, including the plague that broke out among the people, Moses’ plea for mercy, and the thirteen attributes of mercy, and ending with the verse: “And the Lord relented of the evil that He had thought to do to His people.”

The letters of corona are marked in red, and they appear at a fixed interval of 131 letters.

One may take note of the following verses: “They have quickly turned aside from the way that I commanded them”; “And Moses pleaded before the Lord his God and said: Why, O Lord, should Your anger burn against Your people whom You brought out from Egypt; why should Egypt say, ‘With evil intent He brought them out’”; “Turn from Your blazing anger and relent of the evil against Your people”; “And the Lord relented of the evil that He had spoken of doing to His people.”

And the interval between the appearances of “corona” is 131, the numerical value of “humility,” which is one of the characteristics of the attribute of “Keter” (as the Ramak says in Tomer Devorah, ch. 2).

With the blessing “Please heal her,” Shatz

Indeed, chilling.

Regarding the puzzlement over why Hazal attributed the destruction of the Second Temple to baseless hatred and not to some other sin, it seems they were describing the reality (the war of the factions in Jerusalem), and not some “spiritual” cause or another.

Nice. Quite possible indeed

With God’s help, 11 Nisan 5780

Northern Italy at the center of the plague reminded me of the story of how the “health ministers” of the community of Cremona in northern Italy coped and prepared to deal with the plague that was already raging in the towns around them.

Although the plague had not reached their city, the people of Cremona were stirred both out of solidarity with the people of the nearby cities and because of the fear that the plague, transmitted through old clothes from which many Jews made their livelihood. They appointed a committee of “health ministers,” headed by the city rabbi, Rabbi Abraham Menahem Porto HaKohen, who was also a licensed physician (he apparently studied medicine at the University of Padua).

To prevent the spread of the plague, and on the other hand not cause a total shutdown of commerce, the “health ministers” imposed restrictions on trade, and forbade trade in old beds, and in dirty socks and linen garments, which were prone to spreading the plague.

To bring about spiritual strengthening, the “health ministers” required members of the community to gather every night so that one person would read to them from one of the halakhic decisors’ books. Presumably through such focused study each person would find the personal point where he needed to correct and improve. This was still feasible at that stage, since the plague had not yet reached the city. It seems there was also importance in the shared gathering in order to convey necessary communal announcements.

There was one point of “strengthening” that the “health ministers” emphatically sought to prevent, and they banned under excommunication “laughter”—card games and dice games, which bring addiction to idle pursuits, and in the case of gambling also the danger of financial ruin. They stretched the permit to allow chess when not played for money. It develops the intellect and does not waste time and money on vanities.

The obligation to fast and cry out was fulfilled by the “health ministers” through scrupulous observance of the Ashkenazi and French custom to fast on Monday-Thursday-Monday in the month of Heshvan, and they imposed this custom on all the city’s inhabitants—the healthy, of course—as an obligation “until the indignation passes.”

A comprehensive discussion of the episode and its background, the histories of the sages involved, and their letters reflecting the disputes among the sages regarding the enactments—these are written in the article of Professor Meir Benayahu z”l and Rabbi Dr. Yosef Laras, “The Appointment of ‘Health Ministers’ in Cremona in the Year 1575,” Michael 1 (1973), pp. 78–143.

And we, in my humble opinion, may take from it several lessons for ourselves:
to awaken to responsibility even before the plague arrives (as our prime minister did); to seek a way to maintain hygienic caution without completely shutting down economic life. And on the personal level: to strengthen ourselves in the study of practical halakhot so that we know what acts we need to improve; to avoid wasting time on vanities and to focus on useful things; and to strengthen the existing modes of prayer

Regards, Shatz

Paragraph 2, line 2
… and also because of the fear that the plague—which was transmitted mainly through the trade in old clothes from which many Jews made their living—might, God forbid, reach their city as well.

Paragraph 8, line 2
… to awaken to responsibility…

It is worth reading the article: “How Jewish communities dealt with plagues in the past” (on the Arutz 7 website). The article includes an interview with Rabbi Yitzhak Malka, who researched this topic in the communities of Italy in the 16th–18th centuries.

Regards, Livio Negro

With God’s help, 11 Nisan 5780

The Jerusalem sage and physician of the 14th century, Rabbi Raphael Mordechai Malki (father-in-law of the author of Pri Hadash), also discussed medical topics in his huge commentary on the Torah (only part of which survived in manuscript; his writings on medical matters were collected and edited by Professor Meir Benayahu, Medical Essays of R. Raphael Mordechai Malki, Jerusalem 1985).

Rabbi Malki explains the way of dealing with epidemics in relation to the story of Lot’s flight from Sodom:
“‘And they brought him out and set him down outside the city’—from here [we learn] that when there is a plague in a city, Heaven forfend, it is good to leave the city, even in order to dwell outside it among the fields and vineyards, provided that there too he does not leave his house [which is there among the fields. M.B.] to stroll among the fields.

“And he said, ‘Escape for your life’—from here we learn that one who flees the decree upon the city, Heaven forfend, even though he went out and sat outside the city—he is still in danger. And he is not saved until he leaves that district, or enters a place where there is no human habitation and no passersby.

“‘Do not look behind you’—from here we learn that in every place where there is a decree, Heaven forfend, the door of his house should be closed and the windows closed, so that he will not see the air of the world, where harmful forces are found; and he should not raise his voice, but should sit silent… Thus too Noah the Holy One commanded to make an ark and a window in it, and He shut it so that he would not see the calamity.”

(Medical Essays, pp. 139–140)

In short: to distance oneself from human society and from polluted air. Quite similar to what doctors say nowadays.

Regards, Shatz

Apropos corona sermons, one should mention Rambam’s Epistle to Yemen. As is known, this letter was written to the Jews of Yemen in a difficult and turbulent period, full of decrees and persecutions. In any case, in the letter Rambam does not actually calculate the end or the coming of the Messiah, but he dates the return of prophecy to Israel to the year 1212 according to the Christian calendar (Rambam died a few years before then). He does this by means of the gematria of the word “venoshantem” from the well-known verse. It is clear from the epistle that the purpose of the above homily is to strengthen the hands of the Jews of Yemen and cause them to believe that these are the birth pangs of the Messiah so that they hold out, but it is also clear from the epistle that Rambam himself believed in this homily without reservation; he takes pains to emphasize that it is a tradition from his forefathers for generations, and that the return of prophecy is a sign of the imminent coming of the Messiah. Rambam himself had experience in times of persecution when he was young and was forced to flee Cordoba following Muslim persecution, so this homily clearly played a role for Rambam himself as well. In other words, Rambam forwarded the Jews of Yemen a WhatsApp message in the style of a “corona homily.” In any case, prophecy did not return to Israel, and as mentioned, Rambam died before he could see that the prediction had been refuted. It is interesting how he would have dealt with that.