Parashat Shmini during Covid-19

Parashat Shmini for the Jewish Chronicle

8 April 2020

Rabbi Larry Freedman

What do you do when you don’t have time for the niceties, for the honors and rites you believe should be offered?  You have to make tough decisions.

Moses and Aaron and all the Cohanim and Levites were just about to begin the operation of the Mishkan, offering korbanot before the Ohel Moed as we enter the Torah portion, Shmini (beginning at Leviticus 9:1).  We have concluded the set-up, the preparation, the ordination of the right people to do the right job.  The mission is set, it is time to engage.

And so they engage and no sooner does it begin that Nadav and Avihu rush in and try to offer their own korbanot in, clearly, not the fashion as laid out in the regulations.  They were punished by death for such a breech.  What did they do?  It’s not clear.  Commentators over the years have offered ideas: hubris, improperly kindled fire, whatever.  The point is that they didn’t do it correctly.  Aaron, their father, when faced with this awful moment famously remains silent.  Silent because he doesn’t care?  Maybe not.  Perhaps he was silent prefiguring modern day shiva tradition where the mourners are allowed to be silent in grief with no obligation to make chit-chat.

But Aaron is admonished.  There is work to be done to get the offerings in the mishkan up and running.

I’m writing this as I sit in Manhattan as part of the National Guard’s response to help overwhelmed civilian agencies.  I am working in cooperation with the city medical examiner.  We are not necessarily interacting with those who are covid-19 positive but the virus has caused the system to be swamped.  I’m here as a chaplain, mobilized out of my unit in Newburgh, NY (I’m working on my transfer to Pittsburgh).  My primary task is to be a pastoral presence to the troops who are under high stress.  They need to talk.  I’m also here to provide religious services so I put together a socially distant seder (no crowding at the table) and I bought Easter candy while also arranging for a pastor to video in an Easter Sunday sermon.  There’s a first time for everything. 

Back to Shmini.  You can argue if you disagree that the operation of the mishkan is more important than time for Aaron to grieve but within the context of Shmini, the mission of the mishkan was primary and the proper rituals and rites would have to wait.  Nadav and Avihu were hauled out by their tunics, Moses tells Aaron that now is not the time to sit in silence and the mission goes on. 

This is a terrible situation with hardly a “best” solution but remember this.  The operation of the mishkan was for the benefit of the people, all of the people.  It was designed to have the Israelites and God connected and thus protected.  Proper functioning was for the benefit of all.  One man’s grieving can hardly equate to the safety of the entire population.  I don’t say that cavalierly.  I say that as an objective reality. 

Our work here is not easy but it is holy work.  If we were to slow down or even pause this mission so that full and proper rites could be offered, other people would be neglected.  I am impressed with the professionalism of the civilians and military members I meet who do their best to bring dignity to a process most of us don’t want to think about.  Still and all, there is a certain tempo that must be maintained.  It isn’t rushed but it isn’t slow either.

The streets and highways are all but deserted.  We think nothing of running up to the Bronx and back.  The farthest of Far Rockaway is 40 minutes.  So our troops head out and do their holy work, finish a 12 hour shift, eat dinner, fall into bed.  We are the first step in a process that must be done.  There will be rituals and rites that others will offer in days or weeks to come.  Families will take care of that.  There is a proper conclusion to our work.  We will never see it. 

My condolences, Aaron, upon the death of Nadav and Avihu.  I truly mean it.  But there is a whole thing going on as the mishkan and ohel moed mission is spinning up and there are so many other people to take care of.  Baruch dayan ha-emet.  My team is ready to head out.  I gotta go.

From New York City 15 April 2020

Letter to Parents

If you’ve ever been to New York City, you know how much of the joy here is found in the energy, the constant moving, the stalwart buildings and the creativity coming out of storefronts.  Now it’s almost a ghost town.  David Remnick in the New Yorker wrote that he half expects to see tumbleweeds blow across the avenues.

I came off work visiting troops around the city at 1:00 AM.  I was with a young corporal who hadn’t been to NYC since a quick trip as a 10^th grader.  Coming back into Manhattan we made a small detour to Times Square.  We parked, well, anywhere we wanted in front of any theater you wish on 44^th.  We walked over and there were 4 guys from Con Edison working on something, one police car, four or five other people and us and that’s it.  Times Square completely empty.  It was all lit up.  M&M store with bright colors, Forever21 showing its video on loop for an audience of nobody.  So weird.  That’s all I could say.  So weird.

Before that I was visiting the Queens morgue and a site on the Brooklyn waterfront that will be processing thousands of bodies.  My job is to be a constant presence so that the soldiers and airmen begin to trust me and come talk to me.  We are the tip of the spear in a process that will end in a dignified funeral with attention paid and prayers said.  But before that final honor can happen, we have to enter small apartments of mostly poor or working people, sometimes nursing homes, and recover the bodies. 

The NOICs (higher ranking sergeants) and officers trust my position (and slowly me) so they send troops my way.  No one I meet carries that macho sense of the soldier immune to emotional stress.  They just don’t think it applies to them.  When they see what happens when hospital morgues are overwhelmed, when recoveries in homes don’t happen as fast as they should, our troops are doing okay but they are stressed.  They understand that they are doing good things, important things, holy work.  It’s just that they need to talk about it.  That’s where I come in along with a behavioral health officer.

There is another time they come and talk to me.  What happens when you’re on orders and your mother gets a serious diagnosis and she’s just 17 miles away but you can’t go to her?  The Army will let you.  That’s not the issue.  You can’t go because you worry that you might have been exposed to the virus and don’t want to pass it on.  It’s heartbreaking.

Some days are a little slower.  Some days are a little busier.  We have more help here so the troops aren’t running as hard as they had.  A slower pace is a healthier pace.  And a slower pace may just mean we are entering the other side of the curve.  We are all hopeful.

Just a little bit of what it’s like here.  Today it’s a sparkly blue sky day and my view of the Empire State Building is really cool.  And the streets are still empty and the work still continues.

I’m so grateful to the whole J-JEP community for letting me leave you for a month so I can help my soldiers and airmen and the city and state of New York.