The COVID Seminary Symphony

I never fully understood the power of music until this past month, living through an experience whose tune has never been heard before. Seminary in Israel during COVID-19 is a song that makes you laugh, a song that makes you cry. It is a song that makes your heart long to be home while your soul soars because it realizes you are home. It is a song of overcoming fears, creating new friendships, living through untouched history. The more time I spend living the “COVID seminary” song, the more I realize that the music that accompanies this experience comes from within, that there is a song for every great moment and every challenging moment, and that, in Israel, music is created everywhere. 

 Coming to Israel for seminary during the Coronavirus, we had some questions that no other year had to face: Would this world pandemic be the central theme of our year or just a harmonious accompaniment? Would we have a 2.0 version of a typical year or a completely different year altogether?

Now, having been in seminary for a little over a month, I see the pandemic playing two counterpoint melodies: one that unfortunately muffles certain aspects of adventure and exploration and a second that simultaneously amplifies the sounds of seminary and the melody of Israel in ways no other year has experienced.

 In previous years, a main portion of the seminary experience is marching to the beat of a new tune, whether it is through jumping on a bus to explore our homeland and find adventure, or reaching out of our comfort zone to build new friendships. This year, Corona has limited both of these aspects tremendously.

One of the first challenges occurred three days after the mandated 14-day quarantine ended, when the Israeli government instituted a lockdown on the country due to the rising Corona cases. This meant that all the planned tiyulim, the dreams of spending Rosh Hashanah with family, the excitement of davening at the Kotel over Yom Tov or of exploring the historic roads we longed to travel would not be lyrics of our seminary song. Searching to find the positive in every scenario, we hoped that the reality of spending all of the foreseeable Shabbosim and Yamim Tovim in the seminary building would encourage and promote faster bonding and friendship among the students. While some girls did build new friendships during quarantine and are bonding, many girls feel that the Corona regulations limit friendship opportunities. To comply with government protocols and limit the possible spread of COVID, most seminaries are split into “capsules,” small groups of girls who interact only with each other. This division dictates that students can only have indoor interactions with the girls in her capsule, limiting her choice of friends to a group of 35 instead of the usual 100.

Then there are the struggles brought by COVID everywhere: masks concealing smiles, plastic partitions separating students from students and students from teachers, ultimately creating a heightened feeling of loneliness. These aspects of the Coronavirus have silenced many expectations as well as the typically loud volume of adventure, experience, and friendship. 

 Yet this pandemic has simultaneously heightened the beauty of seminary and the song that our Land sings beneath the everyday rush of Israeli life. Seminary is a year of ahavas Yisrael and learning from others. Quarantine is the 14-day metamorphosis of five strangers into friends. Seminary is a year to look within yourself and bring out the best in who you are. Capsules create concentrated opportunities to bring internal goals to fruition.

Truly, the quarantine experience is just the opening act before the concert of friendship and growth that is released within a capsule, teaching us that Hashem has clearly chosen a specific section of an orchestra for our musical voice to emerge. Furthermore, COVID presents an unprecedented advantage for us seminary students regarding our expanding love for Hashem and His land. When else can we cry a river of tears at the Kotel and feel them instantly caught by Hashem, other than when wearing His new version of tissues: a mask? When else does a minyan of chasidim graciously agree to daven in a seminary on Rosh Hashana, other than when a lockdown prevents them from going to shul? When else could the first Kaddish 100 seminary students hear in Eretz Yisrael on Rosh Hashanah night – for some of us, the first Kaddish we have heard in a minyan since the beginning of March – make 18-year-old girls cry like the children we still are, when it resounds from fathers and sons davening specifically for us?

Because of the lockdown, our seminary’s students can walk the streets of Geula with the space and freedom to observe and internalize, without the regular jam-packed hustle and bustle usually crowding the streets. True, this year we don’t hear the songs of crowds in the streets or the tunes of taxis and buses; rather, we have the ability to create a personal melody within the ancient roads, Jerusalem-stone walls, and holy air. The song this year is a song that comes from within. It is the singing of our souls absorbing the kedusha of the Land without the distracting noise. Our song – my song – is the song of seminary in Israel during COVID-19: the sweetest melody of friendship, of growth, of returning home, and of trust in our Father above.