10/29/2021
As we continue to grapple with our extended exile from our beloved Slifka building (see Uri and R. Jason’s email from last Tuesday for the most recent update), I want to share a text which both clarifies the immense stakes at play and which offers, I hope, a path forward in light of those stakes.
While there are important qualifications, as we will see shortly, it is important that at the most basic level of the halakha it is forbidden to compromise the present structure of a beit knesset, even for the sake of building a new one -- unless, that is, the replacement shul is operational prior to breaking ground (Bava Batra 3b):
אָמַר רַב חִסְדָּא לֹא לִיסְתּוֹר אִינִישׁ בֵּי כְנִישְׁתָּא עַד דְּבָנֵי בֵּי כְנִישְׁתָּא אַחֲרִיתִי
"Rav Hisda says: One may not demolish a shul until a new shul has been built."
The Rema stresses that this applies not only to complete rebuilds but to partial renovation projects as well: “Even if they wish only to demolish one wall in order to expand the space, the ruling is so” (OH 152:1). No matter the future promised, not one single wall may be compromised in the present.
The gemara offers two possible justifications for this stricture: It is either on account of “prayer” [tziluta] -- after all, the community cannot be left without a space to pray, even temporarily -- or a function of concern for negligence and the inevitable vagaries of construction work [peshiuta]. That is, since there can be no guarantee the construction project will succeed, the community may not wager mortgaging the status quo. On either version, the imperative is that of stability and continuity: It is in the nature of Jewish community, the gemara says, that Jewish communities cannot so much as risk taking time off.
It is obvious that this law is not observable in its strict form, and indeed there have been various halakhic justifications offered for allowing shul renovations when necessary. The most fundamental such reason is put forward in the gemara itself: “This is said only where they did not see in it a crack, but where they did see in it a crack, they may demolish and rebuild” (Bava Batra 3a). There are, then, times when the imperative of safety licenses -- and presumably mandates -- an otherwise prohibited risk to communal continuity. We surely cannot allow our attachment to the past and present to put lives at risk in an unsafe building. And so where renovations must be done, they may be done.
Because that license is in tension with the letter of the law, it comes with a corresponding charge:
כִּי הָא דְּרַב אָשֵׁי חֲזָא בָּהּ תִּיוְהָא בִּכְנִישְׁתָּא דְּמָתָא מַחְסֵיָא סַתְרֵיהּ וְעַיֵּיל לְפוּרְיֵיהּ לְהָתָם וְלָא אַפְּקֵיהּ עַד דִּמְתַקֵּין לֵיהּ שְׁפִיכֵי
"This is as in the case of Rav Ashi, who, upon seeing a crack in the shul in Mata Mahsia, promptly demolished it -- and then moved his bed into the space, not removing it until they completed even the drainpipes."
What Rav Ashi saw was that if the imperative of safety required his taking the initiative to demolish the present communal structure, the imperative of continuity required the relentless sacrifice of his comfort, security, even dignity for the sake of his community. Rav Hisda worried, rightly and authoritatively, that the best laid plans for new construction projects may not come to fruition. Rav Ashi, heeding and honoring that worry as he transgressed it, camps out on the construction site, braving the elements come what may, and refuses to leave until he sees the project through to the very end. The temporary closure of the shul is precisely the reason he must sustain his relentless presence, why he cannot take time off.
I will speak personally. These weeks and months without our beloved building have been painful for me. Things are not as they should be and I hate it. I don’t see you all as regularly, and I know that you do not see each other as regularly, as we used to and ought to. Everything we plan is ten times harder to execute, and even when the results are objectively fantastic, I’m left with the bitter feeling that the experience was still not as fantastic as it ought to have been, and that in any case it certainly should not have been this hard. It’s been rough, and it will continue to be rough. I know that many of you feel this way.
But I am also incredibly, deeply, on-the-point-of-tears grateful for the relentless devotion of this community to both figuratively and literally camping out in the cold and rain if that’s what the imperative of continuity calls for. Not just with building closure of course, but starting a year and a half ago with the pandemic. We’ve had minyan in the heat, we’ve had minyan in the snow. We’ve learned Torah on Zoom, and we’ve shivered over gemaras in bitter cold that even a propane heater at full blast couldn’t overcome. We’ve come together for shabbat and yom tov meals and celebrations, and they have been beautiful. We’ve made so many fires. There has been so much cholent in our basement. We’ve made a backyard into a flourishing beit knesset, and thanks to the devotion of Slifka (and Unidine!), we’ve made what was a beaten-up storefront on Whitney into a genuine makom kedusha -- we have at no point been without a space to pray, or learn, or eat, or mourn, or celebrate. Post-minyan breakfast lives on. YIHY and HSB leadership have stepped up to a degree that is frankly gobsmacking, and the Slifka team is doing everything in its power to see this through and to make sure we have what we need until we get there. Most importantly, we have continued to care for each other, to look after each other, to invent new forms of nourishment for each other, to celebrate the highs and shoulder the lows together. We’ve warmly welcomed new faces/souls into our community without missing a beat. We’ve simply shown up. Thank you. Thank you so much.
Our community may not take a semester off. It may not take a week off, and it may not take a day off. It is, R. Hisda teaches us, too grave a risk. Which is why we have brought our beds out into the cruel night-time cold of a construction zone, and why we will not leave until every last brick is in its place and our shul stands anew.
Shabbat shalom,
Rabbi A
