FINE
AT 50
CHAG SAMEACH!
Joan and Ellen Shepp remain local
fashion mainstays.

MARCH 25, 2021 / 12 NISAN 5781
PAGE 22
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM — WHAT IT MEANS TO BE JEWISH IN PHILADELPHIA —
$1.00 OF NOTE
LOCAL Survivor Battles
on at 96
Cherie Goren fights
insurance company
rejection. Page 4
LOCAL Passover Creates
Eating Disorder
Challenges Pandemic adds to
the problem.

Page 6
LOCAL New Friendships
Blossom Despite
Social Distancing
College students
among those who
are adapting.

Page 7
Volume 133
Number 50
Published Weekly Since 1887
Rabbis: Judaism
Discourages Vaccine
Line-Jumping SOPHIE PANZER | JE STAFF
MORE THAN THREE MONTHS into
the country’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout,
states are creating vaccination schedules
that prioritize those most at risk of dying
from the disease.

However, people not yet eligible under
current guidelines are fi nding ways to get
the vaccine ahead of others by lying about
physical conditions or leveraging connec-
tions in health care.

Five local rabbis say the practice goes
against Jewish ethics.

“What we’re talking about is whether
people are going to survive this pandemic,
and Judaism does not dither when it comes
to that,” said Rabbi Shoshanah Tornberg
at Old York Road Temple-Beth Am.

Rabbi Moshe Brennan at Chabad of
Penn Wynne said Jewish law requires a
person to protect their own life when all
dangers are equal, such as being stranded
in the desert with limited water. In situa-
tions where not everyone faces equal risk,
Joyce and Claude de Botton in 1956, shortly before leaving for Philadelphia
Courtesy of Joyce de Botton
Tales of Leaving Egypt
Resonate at Passover
JESSE BERNSTEIN | JE STAFF
“IN EVERY GENERATION,” we read
during the seder, “a person must regard
himself as though he personally had gone
out of Egypt, as it is said: ‘And you shall
tell your son in that day, saying: “It is
because of what the Lord did for me when
I came forth out of Egypt.””
See Vaccine, Page 16
Name: Joseph Levine & Sons
For most Jews sitting down to seder
with their friends and families, this is a
diffi cult proposition, one that frequently
inspires discussion.

What does it mean to regard oneself
as having been redeemed from bondage
in Egypt? Can such a thing even be done?
But for a few families, the instruction
to regard themselves in that way is hardly
See Egypt, Page 17