Q&A: Home Front Command and Synagogues
Home Front Command and Synagogues
Question
In your view, is it forbidden to go pray in synagogues at this time (I mean for weekday afternoon and evening prayers)?
On the face of it, this is a Home Front Command directive. But does it seem justified to you? Stores are open, people are out and about, but going to the synagogue to pray the afternoon service with a quorum is forbidden? There are a few questions here: Is the directive justified? That may be a question for experts. And maybe there is also a “no distinctions” policy here. But there is another question: even if it is not justified, am I, as an individual, justified in disobeying the instruction?
Answer
I’ll start from the end. If the general directive is justified, then no individual may disobey it. That is the categorical imperative. See column 122.
Without shopping, it is impossible to live. Shopping also does not have a clear marker the way prayers do.
As a rule, there is room for minor bending of the rules in a case of great need. Acts of piety and commandments are not a great need. Be meticulous about the commandment of “guard yourselves,” about the law of the land, about preventing desecration of God’s name, and pray alone. I’ll take that sin upon myself.
Discussion on Answer
You apparently live in a world of your own, and choose to see what you chose. But this really is not a matter of Haredim or Religious Zionists, and it is also not connected to stringency about danger to life. Haredim are stricter about this than anyone else. See column 720.
I didn’t understand. Haredim ignore the instructions, unlike the Religious Zionist public, which is more considerate of Home Front Command directives. I’m asking: even in the Religious Zionist public, synagogues are not totally closed on weekdays. Am I mistaken about the facts?
Following that, I’m asking only whether an intuitive “between the lines” understanding can stand in opposition to what was explicitly written in black and white. But even if the above facts are not correct (maybe I really am mistaken), I’m asking about the principle itself in such a case.
Where I am, it’s closed. Does that count?
Okay. That’s new to me. Thank you very much.
I don’t understand the question. Sometimes people act differently from what they say or write. Or what they say does not reflect what they really think, or there is weakness of will here. All this is simple enough. So what is the question?
My question is whether every Home Front Command directive must be accepted as Torah from Sinai, or whether it is permitted and proper to use a little common sense—and that little bit of common sense also says that even though it is written that it is forbidden, a quorum of ten people near a protected space is not really a problem, and that is not what the command’s experts were talking about (despite what they wrote). And this itself divides into another question: even if it is proper to use a little common sense, since your little common sense leads to a lot of common sense—or, heaven forbid, the opposite—in your friend, then follow the directive as written, full stop. And about such a case it was said: “Do not be overly righteous.”
I’ve written here more than once that there is definitely room for minor bending of the rules with straight common sense. But only in a case of need; otherwise, a no-distinctions rule is preferable, to prevent a slippery slope.
Nice. I liked it. Just one thing: I haven’t seen, not even in the Religious Zionist public that is stringent about danger to life, that synagogues were actually closed. There seems to be some kind of “between the lines” understanding that it’s not really so serious. My question is whether this intuitive understanding has justification even when it apparently stands in contradiction to the direct written instruction.