It all started when the Government announced that public gatherings were to be limited to 100 people. In order to take to the pressure off of the shuls, our building was able to borrow a sefer torah. An Aaron Kodesh was even built to store the sefer torah. Shabbat davening took place in the lobby of our building. It was convenient but I did miss going to shul.
The minyan continued during the week. The social distancing protocols were put in place and those davening kept their 2m distance. There were 3 minyanim in the morning, hashkama, regular, youth in order to keep the numbers down. As I walked Bailey through the 6am minyan, I realized that it was not a safe place for me to be. I have 2 high risk members in my household and keeping us all safe along with everyone around is our top priority. I also stopped taking Bailey for his morning walk, to avoid being in close proximity to others due to a minyan.
That week more lock down rules were brought into effect, limiting public gatherings to 10 people. My former shul, immediately announced that they were closing. The minyan continued. The organizers showed a psak of how minyan could have up to 19 people without violating the 10 person rule. As soon as there were 20 people, the minyan would split.
That Thursday, more restrictions were announced. I was left with the understanding that private minyanim were no longer being permitted in Israel. This impression was also supported by friends who live in different cities in North America, where their local Rabbanim had said as much. In a discussion of the rules on Facebook, two of my friends got into an argument. My friend in chul was saying kaddish for a number of people. He was frustrated about having the ability to say kaddish taken away and how it was becoming almost impossible to find a private minyan, even when every effort to be careful with social distancing was being done. My friend in Israel, basically said that davening in a minyan was assur and he should just get over it. I know my friend in chul was very hurt by the tone of the conversation.
On Friday night I was sitting at my dining room table, davening Kabbalat Shabbat, while contemplating the fight between my friends. Suddenly, I noticed beautiful singing coming from outside. I could here davening from 3 separate minyanim. The one in our lobby, the overflow minyan outside our building and the minyan on the other side of the parking lot. Our building faces a building with nice courtyard in between. The next buildings on the other side of the parking lot are mostly a duplicate design. I was drawn out to my mirpeset by the singing. Even though I felt the minyan should not take place, I joined in anyways. I figured, that the minyan existed whether I was there or not and from my mirpeset, I couldn't put anyone else at risk. Davening during the day, was inside, so I davened on my own.
After Shabbat, my Facebook feed was filled with people talking about the beautiful davening from Friday night in their communities. Some had balcony minyans, some had Zoom Kabbalat Shabbat davening before Shabbat started. I found the updated ministry guidelines. It turned out that the minyanim from our building was in compliance with competent Rabbanim and the Health Ministry.
During the week, one of our neighbours complained that they were tired of the fact the entrance to their home has become a full functioning shul. The decision was made to start davening outside. The next day, indoor minyanim were banned as part of the lockdown. This presented me with a tough delemma. Should I daven with the minyan from my mirpeset? There were a few factors that I took into consideration: the minyan would happen with or without me, it was in compliance with the Ministry of Health, it was following a valid halachic opinion, a senior doctor from a local hospital was part of the minyan, the doctors boys were running the youth minyan. I decided to join. It was a positive experience for me and it added some structure into the day. On Friday night, we had too many people. The minyan broke into 2 minyanim as required. On Shabbat it was nice to have Shlomo come out and daven with me, while remaining safe in the confines of our home. Wipes were on hand to deal with issues of contact during Torah reading.
Last week, public gatherings were reduced to a maximum of 2 people. There was some enthusiasm as they tried to arrange a proper balcony only minyan. In the end the logistics were too difficult to overcome. That afternoon,the minyan continued in a section of the parking lot with a mostly obstructed view, parking spots marking off social distancing. Technically, I could have joined, as I could see them from my kitchen window. I didn't want to have anything to do with them. The minyan lasted one more day before being disbanded.
On Friday, Shlomo got excited as people were gathering to daven mincha. As I looked out my window, I noticed that they had a proper balcony minyan. As we davened people started to gather downstairs. We ended up with enough people for their own minyan downstairs. I decided to not let the walk up crowd ruin a beautiful davening.
There was promise that the next day Torah reading would be done in an appropriate manner. Something about people going up and down.
Shlomo and I were outside when we got to Torah reading. They brought out a sefardi sefer torah. It made sense as this new minyan was being run by Moroccans. As it is read standing up, I thought it would also work better for social distancing. During the first aliyah the person had his tallis wrapped carefully around his face. 2nd and 3rd aliyah had people putting in a half hearted effort to cover their face. After that, all precautions were out the window and I had an anxiety attack. Once I regained control, I finished up davening on my own and came inside. I decided that it was a pretend balcony minyan, with way too many people on the ground.
That minyan continued. This morning at Shacharit they only had one person on the balcony. The Vaad Bayit from our building sent a warning to our two buildings that they were breaking the law and endangering everyone's health. Should it happen again, the police will be called. This afternoon Morrocan minyan moved to the park across the street.
I have consulted with a Rabbi on how I should have acted as the rules keep changing. I keep running into new situations that I did not anticipate. Living in lockdown is hard. I never would have guessed that the biggest moral/ethical challenges would be davening in the most convenient minyan I have ever had in my entire life.
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