ByYoni Birnbaum, Yoni Birnbaum
At its heart, Jewish communal life is not a business. It isn’t a company that can coldly consider the viability of working from home and a life in video conferencing, writes Yoni Birnbaum
June 1, 2020 09:38
Last week, a fleeting crisis enveloped the Jewish community. As with every event at the moment, it was obviously corona related, but in a rather bizarre way.
For a few brief hours, Zoom was down. Scenes of rabbis and communal leaders scrambling for alternatives filled the WhatsApp airwaves. It was as though the only remaining community lifeline had been severed. Thankfully, the Californian techies soon had Zoom up and running again, so it was back to business as usual in this strange world. But, if we are honest, the outage served to demonstrate just how poor a substitute Zoom is for community.
Let me be clear. Zoom has been an essential tool for us over the past few months. It has brought comfort to bereaved families, it has kept those isolated in touch and it has enabled communities to maintain a semblance of continuity. Weekly pre-Shabbat prayer services and educational classes are the obvious elements of this. And there have also been other less-expected moments of communal joy over Zoom. In my own community, we celebrated the musical talents of people on Lag B’Omer. Nearly a hundred tuned in to what was a genuinely moving and inspirational evening.
And yet, as we move towards considering what Jewish life might look like after the lockdown ends, it is essential that we do not fall into the trap of thinking that Zoom remains a significant alternative to a physical presence. Obviously, for as long as necessary, we should provide Zoom options where possible (and halachically viable) for those who are vulnerable and are unable to attend in person. This is a sacred task for any community that seeks to be inclusive.
But, at its heart, Jewish communal life is not a business. It isn’t a company that can coldly consider the viability of working from home and a life in video conferencing. A kehillah is defined by the physical presence of the people it seeks to bring together. That is why the recital of the Kaddish prayer can only be recited with a minyan, and why the furore over rabbinic refusal to ‘‘allow’’ Kaddish to be recited over Zoom was so misguided.
The pain of a child not being able to recite Kaddish for a parent is immense. As with so many others, this has hit far too close to home over the past few months. Watching my cousins recite Kaddish for my aunt, of blessed memory, at her levayah — and knowing that this would be their only chance to do so for months —was incredibly painful. Yet, the very sacredness of the Kaddish prayer determines the halachic impossibility of its recital without a genuine minyan. For a Judaism without a physical kehillah is only a pale reflection of what it is meant to be.
Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch, leader of nineteenth century German Jewish Orthodoxy, expresses this idea beautifully: “It is true that even where Jewish communal life has ceased to exist, Jewish individuals are still capable of accomplishing their mission as Jews… Nevertheless, it is only in and through communal life that Judaism can achieve the highest level of perfection. It is within the Jewish community as a collective unit that the Almighty wishes to be hallowed, ‘v’nikdashti betoch bnei yisrael’ (I will be sanctified among the Children of Israel, Leviticus 22:32) and every Jewish child learns in their very first profession of faith that they have received the Torah from Kehillat Yaakov, the @community of Jacob’’.
It is no coincidence that the Hebrew for “I will be sanctified” has the same root as the word Kaddish. Kaddish is a prayer of exceptional sanctity — and communal holiness cannot be achieved as individuals over Zoom.
This may sound difficult in the present circumstances and I have embraced the necessary use of Zoom as much as anyone. But I have also embraced the fact that Zoom is no more than a temporarily useful tool. I have recognised the fact that it cannot serve as a vehicle for true communal prayer, despite the fact that it can undoubtedly bring us together in a positive way.
That is why I have felt a sense of deep reassurance when Shabbat comes in and Zoom becomes an impossibility. Because it reminds me what Jewish communal life is meant to look like — and what we should work towards rebuilding as soon as it is safe to do so.
The physical presence of the Jewish community may currently be on pause. But, unlike Zoom, it suffers no outages. Rebound it will — and then we will appreciate every single Kaddish even more than we did before.
Yoni Birnbaum is the rabbi of Hadley Wood United Synagogue