Q&A: Not Going Back to Synagogues
Not Going Back to Synagogues
Question
Hello Rabbi Michi,
People aren’t going back to synagogues. Maybe that’s actually a welcome phenomenon?
https://www.ynet.co.il/judaism/article/sytaaw00zs
Best regards,
One who didn’t go back
Answer
I don’t deal with the question of whether some phenomenon is welcome or not. A fact is a fact. The more important question is whether there is anything to do, and whether it is worth doing it.
Outdoor minyanim are very dear to me, and I’m very sorry that they were stopped. Like other welcome phenomena that passed with the coronavirus period (such as teaching on Zoom). Here there is a practical implication: to bring it back. I’m completely in favor.
As for the weakening of people’s connection to faith and community, I don’t see the relevance of that question. Is there some proposal on the table? To retroactively cancel the coronavirus from now on? It’s like asking what I think about the fact that we have only two ears and not five.
Synagogues, as built institutions (like appointing a rabbi for a community), express honor for the Torah. And there is nothing more disgusting than a minyan in a parking lot. A minyan in a yard is pleasant in reasonable weather, and terrible in hot or freezing weather. A synagogue (like the Temple) is not only a place for prayer on our part, but also for an encounter with the testimony— in our case, the Torah scroll (in the Tabernacle, the Ark of the Covenant). The term “miniature sanctuary” is precise, because it captures the central functions that exist in a synagogue and that existed in the Tabernacle/Temple—prayer and service on our part, and testimony and Torah on His part. And just as there was an idea of making the Tabernacle permanent, so too with a synagogue there is an idea of honoring it and making it permanent.