Thou Shalt Get Vaccinated

This is the way I’m telling everybody to be vaccinated,
learning from the Torah that we must do this to stay alive.

The Torah tells us that we will not suffer from the plague that God inflicted
on the Egyptians if we follow His wise rules, since He himself will heal
all our diseases, but it never quite explicitly predicted
the covid-19 epidemic: it did not choose to reveal

the vital fact that we should take steps to help God’s task by preventing
the plagues like this one, caused by the dread coronavirus, an important task
regarding which performance sadly not all people are consenting,
not social distancing as they ought, nor wearing – as is most important – any mask;

piling the responsibility for healing on our God who promised He would do
this if all men follow all His rules. Wake up! Not all men do, yet prevention
of the disease is the best rule we should religiously stick to,
with the vaccination, deus ex machina, preventive medicine for menschen.

The rule? It states “You should live by them” Leviticus eighteen, verse five.
Live, not die, as I’ve the Hebrew in the first verse Anglo-Saxonated.

Exod. 18:5 states:

ה  וּשְׁמַרְתֶּם אֶת-חֻקֹּתַי וְאֶת-מִשְׁפָּטַי, אֲשֶׁר יַעֲשֶׂה אֹתָם הָאָדָם וָחַי בָּהֶם:  אֲנִי ה.   5 Ye shall therefore keep My statutes, and Mine ordinances, which if a man do, he shall live by them: I am the LORD

Gershon Hepner 1/13/21

Gershon Hepner is a poet who has written over 25,000 poems on subjects ranging from music to literature, politics to Torah. He grew up in England and moved to Los Angeles in 1976.  Using his varied interests and experiences, he has authored dozens of papers in medical and academic journals, and authored “Legal Friction: Law, Narrative, and Identity Politics in Biblical Israel.” He can be reached at gershonhepner@gmail.com.