In response to those looking for tricks to make minyonim, Rabbi Leibel Schapiro, Rosh Yeshiva and Rov in Miami, wrote that “anyone who participates in any sort of minyan, is not doing a mitzvah, and is in fact doing an aveira.”
By Anash.org reporter
In response to those looking for tricks to make minyonim, Rabbi Leibel Schapiro, Rosh Yeshiva and Rov in Miami, wrote that “anyone who participates in any sort of minyan, is not doing a mitzvah, and is in fact doing an aveira.”
“According to the professionals – the doctors – the situation now is that due to actual danger to life, it is forbidden to organize minyanim for tefillah, in a shul, outdoors or in any other location. Since that is the opinion of the doctors, it is forbidden according to Halacha” he wrote in a letter dated 6 Nissan, 5780.
“Therefore, those that take part in those minyonim, is not doing any mitzvah, but rather is doing an aveira,” he wrote, bringing a teaching of the Kotzker Rebbe to explain that in such a situation, doing what might seem praiseworthy is actually the work of the Yetzer Hara.
“Indeed, everyone must feel pained that he can not daven with a minyan and do other mitzvos,” Rabbi Shapiro writes, “however, one must be joyous that he is fulfilling the mitzva of “ונשמרתם מאוד לנפשותיכם” according to the Psak Din of the Rabbonim, based on the doctors, the experts, who the Torah commands us to heed.”
