Rav Baruch Mordechai Ezrachi, like many of the world’s leading rabbanim, has been overwhelmed in recent months with stories of families whose lives have been overturned by the pandemic.
The situation has become urgent. Recently, 28 of the biggest rabbanim in Eretz Yisroel gathered to discuss the dire need to help the staggering numbers of impoverished people. The group included Rav Chaim Kanievsky, Rav Dovid Cohen, the Vizhnitzer Rebbe, and many more revered religious leaders. Their solution was to form a halachic beis din and to write up a shtar, which is being referred to as a “shtar chaim.”
The shtar reads as follows:
“28 of Gedolei Yisrael sign this Shtar- a Shtar of Life for those who donate for the special fund ‘Vehasiroty Machaka MiKirbecha.’ We opened this fund in Vaad Harabanim in Eretz Yisroel, to save the sick and their families, to heal them and strengthen them for all of their days.
[Donors] will see great salvations everywhere they need, They will save them and the people in their house from all disease, measure for measure. They will merit to make simchas in their house, have nachas from their offspring, with health and financial success in abundance.”
Readers may note that while blessings to the public for charity funds are not wholly uncommon, this particular blessing is especially extensive. The writing up of the bracha, and the coordination of the agreement of all of the rabbis involved, was a major undertaking done because of the urgency of the cause in question.
Those who would like to donate to receive their “shtar Chaim” as well as the epic bracha for yeshuos, health, simcha, nachas, and financial success can contribute via Vaad HaRabbanim’s fund.