With temples closed, Jews celebrate Sabbath at home and online
As the sun set Friday in Jewish homes across the world, the faithful lit Sabbath candles to participate in God’s first creative act — to bring light into the world.
The world was filled with darkness and chaos when, as written in the Torah, God spoke the first words, “Let there be light.”
“Every human being’s responsibility, regardless of faith, is to imitate
God,” Congregation Agudath Sholom Rabbi Daniel Cohen said. “To shine light into the darkness and bring order to chaos.”
In ordinary circumstances, about 500 Jews gather on Saturdays for Sabbath services at Congregation Agudath Sholom. But for the first time, the synagogue stood empty Saturday, closed to help prevent the spread of the novel coronavirus.
In response to the crisis, Cohen and leaders of all Stamford’s synagogues have united to live out the mission to vanquish darkness and chaos caused by the spread of the COVID-19 virus. One way they are doing so is by live-streaming remarks and music they hope will ease minds for shabbat, when they cannot use technology.
“God works in mysterious ways, and there are opportunities with people hunkered down as families to find renewed hope and deeper friendship,” Cohen said. “This is something we didn’t plan for, and it is important to turn moments of hurt into moments of hope and find light in the darkness.”
The novel coronavirus pandemic has killed thousands, quarantined hundreds of thousands, shut down countries and crashed economic markets. People worldwide stock up on supplies, retreat into their homes and forego the gatherings that once punctuated daily life.
Frequent community gatherings in particular characterize the faith life of Jewish communities in Westchester and Fairfield counties. Time together for mitzvahs, funerals, shabbat services, holy days and classes forms the backbone of their shared religious life. But these gatherings exposed about 1,000 people to the novel coronavirus in late February in New Rochelle, the epicenter of New York’s largest outbreak.
“Part of the reason why this hit the Jewish community so hard is that we share so many social spaces,” Cohen said. “All those interactions make the community beautiful, but it created challenges with the current situation.”
To follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s guideline to encourage social-distancing, Congregation Agudath Sholom is closing for the next several weeks, canceling all planned events and asking its congregants to observe at home.
Synagogue president Simeon Wohlberg suggested Cohen move the classes taught at the synagogue online. Cohen “took it and ran with it,” Wohlberg said.
Stamford-area rabbis—representing orthodox, reform, Chabad, conservative and reconstructionist denominations — have compiled a calendar for a daily opportunity to learn Jewish history and scripture.
Congregants are frustrated because the communal aspect of the sabbath, not just prayer but socializing, is taken away, Wohlberg said.
“It takes your individual community of the physical building you’re in, and opens it up to the whole community,” he said. “As this crisis hopefully soon goes away, we continue to find opportunities to continue to work together as a whole Jewish community and not just as individual units within the Jewish community.”
Rabbi Jeremy Wiederhorn of TCS Westport also announced that shabbat services will be canceled, as well as Sunday morning minyan.
He said in times of struggle, as after the shooting at the Pittsburgh Tree of Life Synagogue, and after 9-11, when people need strength and inspiration, they naturally want to find ways to come together.
“But this is different,” he said. “Today, staying away from community could potentially save lives and help us get through this difficult and scary time together.”
Wiederhorn and the synagogue’s cantor sent out Shabbat melodies, thoughts and prayers for solace and inspiration.