The Importance of Being Part of a Community

The Torah forbids counting Jews head by head, and so Kohanim drew a lottery by counting fingers, and we count a minyan with the ten words of a pasuk. Everyone says Ayin Hara, but does that really explain it? Rabbeinu Bechaye gives a different reason, one that runs from Pesach Sheini to the Shunamis to how we daven for the sick. For the Nine Days, it asks what protects a person simply by standing inside a community. A man shaken by a plane crash he missed gets a surprising answer from the Chazon Ish.