VAERA 5781
Should You Take the Vaccine?
Have you gotten your Covid vaccine yet? I went last Monday and stood on line in Alpharetta for about 2½ hours, but it certainly was worth it—just for the peace of mind alone! You see, in a few weeks I’ll return for my 2nd shot, and hopefully, I’ll be able to begin finding some “normalcy” in my life. If you haven’t already, I hope you all will get the vaccine real soon.
The rollout of the vaccine in has not gone as smoothly as we would have liked. You must go online to make an appointment and most of the time you’re told there are no appointments. But if you keep trying in multiple venues—try Dekalb, try Atlanta, try Cobb county, try Alpharetta, etc.—you’ll eventually be successful. You don’t have to live in a county to be vaccinated there.
It has been suggested that the difficulty in getting vaccinated might just be a good thing. A recent article in the New England Journal of Medicine by Drs. Stacy Wood and Kevin Schulman, discusses the challenge of convincing enough people in to take the vaccine. Recent polls show that there might not be enough people willing to take the vaccine to achieve herd immunity.
And so, the authors suggests that a “behavioral economics” approach may help. One such approach is called, “leveraging natural scarcity.” They write: In consumer markets, scarcity often signals exclusivity and prompts greater interest or desirability. Because of a natural attentiveness to negative outcomes, we’re attuned to goods that might run out or opportunities we might miss. In other words, when people see others trying to get a hold of something that is scarce, it creates a stronger desire to get it as well. Do you remember, not too long ago, when a roll of toilet paper was worth its weight in gold? So, when people see others waiting in line to get a vaccine, they think they need one too.
One of the classic questions posed by this week’s Torah reading is the conflict of the Torah principle of human beings being created with Free Will and the Torah telling us that Gd hardened Pharaoh’s heart after many of the plagues taking away his Free Will. The Meiri (R. Menachem Meiri, Chibur HaTeshuva, Meishiv Nefesh 1:6) suggests that Pharaoh was predisposed to being stubborn—i.e., he was born that way. However, Pharaoh had complete Free Will to defy his natural disposition and change himself. And as long as he didn’t make that change, his tough stance is then attributable to Gd creating Him that way. So yes, Gd hardened his heart—not after any specific plague—but when he was born.
My friends, this Free-Will approach applies to each of us. Gd challenges us with proclivities to engage in various bad behaviors, but we also have the Free Will to suppress those proclivities or harness them for something positive.
The Alexander Rebbe (quoted in R. Yishai Chasida’s Karmei Yisrael, Parashat Bo) on next week’s parsha teaches that with the threat of the plague of locusts after the plague of hail, Pharaoh seems willing to let some people go as he asks Moses (Ex. 10:8-9): Mi vami haholchim (Who will you send)? Moses then responds: Binareynu uvizkeyneynu neyleych (With our young and with our old we shall go).
The Alexander Rebbe suggests that Moses was hinting at what we learn in Pirke Avot (3:28) where it teaches: “Envy, Lust and [the desire for] Honor remove a person from the world.” They all lead to sin and, therefore, its consequences. The Alexander Rebbe explains, Envy is something children struggle with most. Adults struggle most with Lust and older people struggle with the desire for Honor. The way to triumph over these struggles is, as Moses tells us, “with our young and with our old we shall go.” In other words, bring attributes that manifest in you from a different age into your lives now.
For example, a younger person who is jealous of others, or dealing with lust issues, should bring the maturity and patience of old age. An older person struggling with seeking out honor should bring youthfulness into the mix in the form of envy—no, not the envy of destruction, but positive envy. What’s an example of positive envy? Our Sages tell us: Kinat sofrim (the jealousy of scholars). In other words, be jealous of a scholar’s learning so that you’ll work harder to learn more and be worthy of honor. Similarly, be jealous of another’s compassion, kindness and charitable work to motivate you to be more compassionate, kind and charitable and be worthy of honor.
The use of behavioral economics is not limited to encouraging people to take a vaccine. We can use it for motivation in many ways. As I mentioned, Gd challenges each of us with proclivities to engage in various bad behaviors. These challenges are meant to help us grow and expand our souls using the Free Will Gd has also given us to suppress those proclivities…or to harness them for something positive as the Meiri recommends. And so, one who has a proclivity for violence, teaches our Sages, should become a shochet (one who slaughters animals for food), or a butcher. Or, as the Alexander Rebbe suggests, we can use the traits inherent in our DNA—that manifest at different stages in our lives—to counterbalance our struggles. The point is that while life will always present us with challenges, Gd has blessed us with the tools within to overcome them.
My friends, taking the Covid vaccine today seems to be a challenge for many. Don’t listen to the naysayers and don’t be afraid. Israel has already vaccinated more than 2 million—without serious issues. Most Israelis over the age of 16 are on track to have the 2 doses by the end of February.
So, if you qualify and haven’t gotten your vaccine, go online and don’t stop until you have an appointment—even if it takes a couple of hours a day for a few days—and then go. It may literally save your life. Amen!
