The haredi perspective

Many outside the haredi ( ultra- Orthodox) world, looking in, are increasingly appalled at what appears to be the wholesale flouting there of the coronavirus regulations.

Be it the dean of the Lithuanian yeshiva world Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky ordering yeshivot to remain open in March; or a massive wedding of the Belzer Rebbe’s grandson in Jerusalem in August; or a tisch ( gathering around the table) with the Vizhnitzer Rebbe on the night after Yom Kippur attended by hundreds of his hassidim, the response of most Israelis is: “Don’t they get it, don’t they understand that this is serious?”

Numerous explanations have been put forward over the last number of weeks for this seemingly cavalier attitude toward the virus.

Some say it has to do with the importance of community life to the haredi lifestyle. Others, somewhat patronizingly, say the rabbis are worried that if the students are not in yeshivot for just a few months, they will be tempted by all the wonders modern Israeli life has to offer. And others say that the haredi independence on this matter stems from a refusal to ever recognize the authority of the state, as well as the state’s failure to extend its “sovereignty” to the haredi neighborhoods.

Often lost in this discussion is an effort to listen to what the haredim themselves are saying as to why they want to continue to gather in large groups in synagogues and demand that yeshivot remain open.

The rabbis who want to open up the yeshivot are not stupid men who don’t realize that there is a pandemic swirling around them. Nor do they want to endanger the lives of their followers. So what gives?

In recent days, two leading haredi figures – one a veteran politician and another a widely esteemed rabbinic judge – addressed the issue of haredim and the virus. The politician, United Torah Judaism’s Yisrael Eichler, did so from the Knesset podium on Monday, with his audience being the general public. The other, Bnai Brak’s Rabbi Moshe Shaul Klein, pre- taped his comments that were broadcast last Thursday night on the haredi Kol Hai radio

station. His audience was the haredi community.

It was a tale of two completely different explanations, the sad part being that Eichler’s oration – angry, hostile to the state and its

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