Photo Credit: Sraya Diamant/Flash90
Dear Friends,
I am not one to tell anyone why this is happening.
People (unless they are prophetic) who claim they know why Hashem does this or that are not only usually wrong, they always blame someone else’s shortcomings for the calamity and never their own.
Therefore, I certainly can never point a finger of blame towards anyone concerning the pandemic, which currently plagues the world.
As such, I will limit my remarks to my personal feelings.
A part of my life which I cherished and loved is now inaccessible and removed.
The wonderful and rewarding feelings, which are the result of social interaction with friends, congregants, and all human beings, have been relegated to the file named “cherished memories.”
No more can I stop and chat with someone on the street without wearing a mask and insuring social distancing.
 The term “social-distancing” is correct.
By observing it (and we must do it), we become socially “distant” from those who we would want to be close with “socially.”
I prefer to be socially close to you.
I enjoy seeing your full Tzelelm Elokim when I see your entire face.
When we wear our masks, (and of course we should), we deprive others of appreciating that G-dly image in which we all were created.
When I am forced to distance from another Tzelem Elokim physically, I am also distancing myself from Hashem Himself.
After all, if I am distant from the Tzelelm Elokim, I am remote to a certain degree from Hashem.
And that is sad.
Shavuos is coming.
Thankfully I can never remember a Shavuos where I was not in Shul teaching, learning, and preparing Shiurim as we spent the Yom Tov together.
I daven that this will be the last Shavuos we will be forced to be socially distant from each other.
Missing you all and pining to get back home.
Have a meaningful Yom Tov, and may this be the one-and-only-time- we are forced to spend Shavuos apart.
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Rabbi Ron Yitzchok Eisenman is rav of Congregation Ahavas Israel in Passaic, New Jersey. His book, “The Elephant in the Room,” is available either directly from the author or at Amazon.com