The fact that people are cooped up in their homes is a problem but a manageable one. Our homes are very comfortable. We have electricity, running water, multiple toilets and showers, comfy warm beds [especially if you sleep wth two teddy bears like me], a fridge, freezer, washing machine, dryer, phone, computer, Internet connection, television, netflix, heat, air conditioning etc. etc. With a positive attitude we will make it out of this much stronger people.
The fact that people are dying is heartbreaking but utterly out of our control. We daven and daven, do mitzvos and learn on their behalf etc. etc. but on a concrete physical level there is little we can do.
The fact that so many in our community are sick is also out of our control. I think that by now 99 percent of the Orthodox world has internalized that this is serious business and people are being careful and keeping their distance. That community that had a big wedding a number of nights ago now has some very very sick people among them. They realize that our lives are at stake here. And not like smoking [which some still do] in the long term but within days a perfectly healthy person can be gone. Everyone got the message. So we are doing all we can and can now only hope and pray for the best.
Here is the REAL problem which many of us can rectify in a concrete, physical, this worldly way. In my neighborhood [Givat Ze'ev] and in most other "Charedi" neighborhoods, people CANNOT make Pesach without outside help. It costs thousands of dollars and people don't have EXTRA thousands of dollars. So every years thousands of boxes of food are donated to people who simply would not have food without the donations. People also need to buy clothing because their children are growing and a ten year old boy can't wear the same pants he wore when he was five. Women also need to buy a new outfit from time to time because they are women and Yom Tov is when the Halacha mandates that the husband make sure his wife has what she needs.
THIS YEAR [because of the precarious financial situation, lost employment and the fact that so many people have already lost tons of money in the stock market] THE DONATIONS ARE NOT FORTHCOMING AND THERE COULD CONCEIVABLY BE A SITUATION WHERE THOUSANDS OF FAMILIES GO HUNGRY TO VARYING DEGREES THIS PESACH [both in Eretz Yisrael and abroad]!!!
To make things yet worse - many people have lost their jobs [such as women who take care of little children - "מטפלות", and teachers] and have recently lost a lot of income - and have none coming in the future on which they could borrow now.
So I am using this forum to plead with everyone reading to do WHATEVER YOU CAN to make sure that people don't sit at the Seder with nothing but Matza and Maror [not the food but the feeling]. You can't feed them all but every person is a whole world and every little bit helps. I PROMISE YOU - IT WILL BRING YOU BRACHA. HASHEM SAYS SO IN HIS TORAH AND HE CAN BE RELIED UPON!!!
Hard for me to conclude the post without quoting from my beloved Rebbe, the Rambam ['שביתת יו"ט ו י"ח]:
כיצד הקטנים נותן להם קליות ואגוזים ומגדנות. והנשים קונה להן בגדים ותכשיטין נאים כפי ממונו. והאנשים אוכלין בשר ושותין יין שאין שמחה אלא בבשר ואין שמחה אלא ביין. וכשהוא אוכל ושותה חייב להאכיל לגר ליתום ולאלמנה עם שאר העניים האמללים. אבל מי שנועל דלתות חצרו ואוכל ושותה הוא ובניו ואשתו ואינו מאכיל ומשקה לעניים ולמרי נפש אין זו שמחת מצוה אלא שמחת כריסו. ועל אלו נאמר זבחיהם כלחם אונים להם כל אוכליו יטמאו כי לחמם לנפשם. ושמחה כזו קלון היא להם שנאמר וזריתי פרש על פניכם פרש חגיכם.
What is implied? Children should be given roasted seeds, nuts, and sweets. For women, one should buy attractive clothes and jewelry according to one's financial capacity. Men should eat meat and drink wine, for there is no happiness without partaking of meat, nor is there happiness without partaking of wine.
When a person eats and drinks [in celebration of a holiday], he is obligated to feed converts, orphans, widows, and others who are destitute and poor. In contrast, a person who locks the gates of his courtyard and eats and drinks with his children and his wife, without feeding the poor and the embittered, is [not indulging in] rejoicing associated with a mitzvah, but rather the rejoicing of his gut.
Pretty soon, HOPEFULLY, our money will mean nothing to us, as Yeshayahu prophecies:
יט וּבָאוּ בִּמְעָרוֹת צֻרִים, וּבִמְחִלּוֹת עָפָר--מִפְּנֵי פַּחַד יְהוָה, וּמֵהֲדַר גְּאוֹנוֹ, בְּקוּמוֹ, לַעֲרֹץ הָאָרֶץ. כ בַּיּוֹם הַהוּא, יַשְׁלִיךְ הָאָדָם, אֵת אֱלִילֵי כַסְפּוֹ, וְאֵת אֱלִילֵי זְהָבוֹ--אֲשֶׁר עָשׂוּ-לוֹ לְהִשְׁתַּחֲוֺת, לַחְפֹּר פֵּרוֹת וְלָעֲטַלֵּפִים.
On that day, man will cast away his silver idols and his gold idols, which they made for him, [before which] to prostrate himself to moles and to bats.
Rashi:
to prostrate himself to moles: Heb. לַחְפֹּר פֵּרוֹת, idols in the likeness of moles, a species of rodents who dig in the earth, called talpes in O.F. [taupes in modern French].
and to bats: kalbe soric [chauvesouris in modern French]. Alternatively, this may be interpreted to mean that man will cast his idols that he made for himself, before which to prostrate himself, into pits and ditches that he finds before him when he goes to escape and hide.
Metzudos:
"לחפור פרות - מוסב על מלת ישליך לומר האלילים ישליך אל החפירות העמוקות ואל חורי העטלפים"
BI-AHAVA RABBA and my bracha for a חג שמח וכשר,
Me 😊
[If anyone wants me to be there shaliach, I will happily do so and it goes without saying that every penny you give will go directly to the needy families. I take "zero percent" for my part in the deal. I am embarrassed to even say it but I fear someone might think that I am looking to get a percentage chas vi-shalom. I don't want your money - I want poor, fine, upstanding, hard working people with sweet children, to have food to eat].
