… lets his imagination run wild, and imagines an ultra-altered ultra-orthodoxy. Shouldn’t the fact of their decimating themselves via a vicious virus they – whoops! – didn’t hear about because they think the rest of the world stinks and they never listen to it… shouldn’t that lurid fact prompt some serious thought about their suicidal folkways?
[Perhaps they might reconsider their monolithic] tendency to trust elderly rabbis on questions regarding which they have no clue…
This is a time when there is no external enemy, social trend or abusive regime harassing the community. The Charedi way of life is the enemy.
… The ultra-Orthodox are used to getting odd looks and to having a negative image. But they’re not used to their customs being the enemy. Who is that enemy? The rabbi that irresponsibly dismissed the orders of state officials. The tzadik who insisted on having a minyan of 10 at the synagogue. The funny guy who belittled strange laws of distant government men in suits.
… [M]aybe when the plague is over, Charedi society will no longer be the same. Maybe the Coronavirus will be like the fall of the Charedi Berlin wall. In other words, the plague is a good reminder that the world can turn on a dime. Charedim live in the world, they are part of the world. Change is not beyond them.
But this ain’t the way they think. The enemy is the evil godless haredim, whose viral suffering is god’s punishment for their evil godless ways. God will stop punishing them when they double down.
Ultra-Orthodox people [unlike non-ultra-orthodox Jews] do know Jewish law and therefore when they transgress religious laws it is seen as an intentional act for which divine punishment is much more severe. “The ultra-Orthodox who sin do not do so unintentionally and therefore [God’s] attribute of justice harms the ultra-Orthodox much more,” reasoned [the highest-ranking ultraorthodox rabbi in Israel].
****************
The voice of the ultra-orthodox:
So do what the Good Book tells you to!