Considerations

Fourth in an ongoing series

TEL AVIV -- When the early Zionists founded the modern State of Israel in 1948, they aimed to create a country that was based on Jewish ethnicity -- not Jewish religion. They were so-called modernists who, like many of the intellectual elite in Europe the late 1800s and early 1900s, believed that religion was a silly anachronism that would soon disappear to make way for a secular world. The Zionists believed that just as the Frankish people have France and the Germanic people have Germany, so should the Jews have an Israel again.

After witnessing the unfair conviction (later overturned) of a Jewish army officer in France in 1894 on false charges of treason, Theodore Herzl, a Jewish journalist who covered the trial, founded the modern Zionist movement because he had come to believe that European Jews would never stop facing anti-Semitism. To Herzl, ethnic Jews would never be safe -- even if they were secular Jews like he was -- until they had a country of their own.

Fast forward to 1948. After Israel was founded, the country's first prime minister, David Ben-Gurion, needed to form a government -- moreover, he had to form a coalition with other political parties to have a majority in parliament. Although Ben-Gurion was a secular Jew, his party created a coalition with the Orthodox, religious parties based on a compromise: The government would control the affairs of state, and the Orthodox religious establishment would control the affairs of religion and life-cycle events.

Ben-Gurion made this compromise because he had assumed that religious Judaism (along with all other religions) would quickly disappear anyway (probably because of a lack of faith following the Holocaust). How wrong he was. Sixty years later, the direct result of this decision has been the creation of a quasi-theocratic country that is extremely polarized between religious and secular Israelis. The rabbinate, now led by ultra-Orthodox Jews, has effectively become a parallel government that holds a monopoly over many aspects of life here.

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The Jewish Religion

Before I describe religious life in Israel, I need to talk about Judaism because it's a different type of religion than those which are familiar to most people in the West. The other two major, monotheistic religions, Christianity and Islam, are orthodoxic religions -- in other words, the dominant feature of these types of religions is a specific set of beliefs. (Christians believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Son of God who died to save humanity's sins; Muslims believe that there is only one God, and that Mohammed was his prophet.)

Judaism, on the other hand, is an orthopraxic religion -- in other words, the dominant feature of this type of religion is a specific set of practices. (Traditionally, Jews observe the 613 commandments that are in the Hebrew Bible, as well as the countless expansions, interpretations and additions that were codified over many centuries in later Jewish law, the Talmud.) In Judaism, belief is secondary to practice. (I know some Orthodox Jews who are atheists.) For example, five different Jews may abstain from eating pork, but they will have five different, specific reasons for why they do so. (One might answer, "Because God says so in the Bible"; another might say, "Because that is an important part of Jewish culture"; a third might state, "Because it's in the Bible -- and it's there because eating pork in a desert with no refrigeration was unhealthy and dangerous"; a fourth might say, "I never ate it as a child, so it seems disgusting now"; the fifth answer, "I have no idea why.")

This principle is where religious Judaism became pluralistic in Western Europe and the United States. In the 1800s, the Reform movement (like a denomination in Christianity) arose in Germany. This movement decided that individual Jews should be free to choose which commandments they will follow, and Jews should be free to conform more to Western society. So some Reform Jews began eating pork and shellfish, some Reform synagogues began holding Shabbat services on Sundays, and some Reform services were changed to resemble Protestant Christian ones rather the traditional Orthodox ones that had been used for centuries.

Of course, Orthodox Jews were horrified at the Reform movement's interpretation of Judaism. Eventually, a compromise was formed, Conservative Judaism, which allows for individual choice -- as long as tradition is given a large degree of weight when a person decides which commandments to follow. These three branches of Judaism are the major types of the religion in the United States and Europe.

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America and Israel

People in the United States are used to living in a country that is religiously pluralistic: There are conservative Baptists, liberal Methodists, Orthodox Jews, Reform Jews, Mel Gibson Catholics and feminist Catholics, fundamentalist Muslims and moderate Muslims. (You get the point.) This type of society does not exist in Israel. Nearly everyone categorizes himself (or is categorized by others) into only one of two Jewish camps: Completely religious and Orthodox or wholly secular and irreligious. There is no middle ground.

This cultural aspect resulted from Ben-Gurion's decision in 1948 to give monopolistic power to the Orthodox rabbis of the time. As a result, nearly all of Israel's synagogues are now Orthodox. Women cannot become rabbis. Marriages performed by non-Orthodox rabbis (like Reform and Conservative ones) are not recognized by the government. (There is no civil marriage.) People who convert to Judaism in Israel through a non-Orthodox movement are not recognized as Jews. (However, non-Orthodox converts from other countries are recognized as Jews by the government, but not the rabbinate, because of a peculiarity of the law.) In recent years, the rabbinate has become dominated by haradim -- the anti-Zionist, ultra-Orthodox sect that I described in my first letter -- and more secular Israelis have become even more disgusted with religion as a result.

Still, Orthodox Judaism as a whole is the only type of religious Judaism with which most Israelis have been familiar throughout their lives. As a result, many secular Israelis believe that non-Orthodox types of Judaism are not valid expressions of the religion. A secular Israeli will criticize Reform Judaism even though he has not been to a synagogue himself in years. This environment produces only two options for Israeli Jews: To be completely Orthodox or completely secular. If an Israeli is unhappy with Orthodox Judaism (and there are dozens of types) for whatever reason, then he can only give up religion completely. Today, Jews in Israel are roughly comprised of 40 percent Orthodox and 60 percent secular.

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The Two Israels

The end result of such a society is conflict and separation. The purported divide between Red States and Blue States in America is nothing compared to the gulf between what is commonly called "Jerusalem" and "Tel Aviv." There are two sides to Israel, although it might be more accurate to say that Israel exists in two different worlds.

Jerusalem, as you may remember from a previous letter, is the Holy City. The men dress in suits and usually have beards and head coverings (whether yarmulkes, fedoras, or furry hats). The women wear long, loose clothes that usually leave no skin but the head and neck exposed. People wear dark colors. People are generally poorer because the economy is worse. If you drive through certain neighborhoods on Saturday, ultra-Orthodox children will stone your car because driving is forbidden on Shabbat. (Curiously, throwing stones is just fine on Shabbat, I guess.) Religious people on street corners ask passing men if they had prayed that day. Nearly everything is closed on Shabbat (even most of the hospitals). There's a tension in the air because of what Israelis call "the Conflict." The city feels like a separate world that is more pure but just a little bit crazy.

Tel Aviv, on the other hand, is secular, cosmopolitan, city on the Mediterranean Sea. Men and women wear skimpy clothing most of time (it's hot, after all), many of them seem to have tattoos (a violation of Jewish law), most of them like to drink, go to clubs, and smoke pot frequently. Tel Aviv's high-tech industry is responsible for much of Israel's economic growth, so people here drive sports cars, eat at fine restaurants, and have expensive jewelry and clothes. People scoff at religion and admit proudly that they eat pork and shellfish. Whenever they can, many people want to leave Tel Aviv because they can make more money in New York or London. A section of Tel Aviv is Israel's center of prostitution (they are frequently Russian and eastern European girls who are either kidnapped or tricked into coming here and are then held hostage by pimps or the Russian mafia).

Obviously, I am taking this distinction to an extreme to make a point. Some religious people live in Tel Aviv, and some secular people live in Jerusalem. But you'd be amazed at how different this country can feel after just a one-and-a-half-hour bus ride from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv.

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How I Feel

As someone who converted to Reform Judaism in Boston, I sometimes feel frustrated in Israel. Here, religious Jews -- Orthodox Jews, in other words -- either view me as either a non-Jew (because I didn't convert to Orthodox Judaism) or a secular Jew (because I am not religiously Orthodox.) Secular Jews view me as a religious Jew because I'm more observant than they are. To be a Jew in Israel is to feel that one is being forced to pick a side: wholly secular or completely Orthodox. No one here understands that it is possible to be in the middle -- like in the pluralistic, moderate religious atmosphere in the United States.

Religious (Orthodox) Israelis think I'm a hypocrite when I abstain from working on Shabbat but still turn light switches on and off; secular Israelis are confused that I go to bars with friends on Shabbat but do not use my computer on that day.* (All four of these things are violations of traditional Jewish law in Orthodox terms.) If an American man wears a kippah (yarmulke), people here assume he is religiously Orthodox even if he is actually a Reform Jew. If an American woman who goes to a Conservative synagogue wears clothes that reveal her knees, upper arms, or shoulders, people here assume she is secular. This is the mindset in which most Israelis have been raised. This is a Hebrew word -- "masorti" -- for a religious person who is neither completely secular nor wholly Orthodox, but Israelis still always want to classify you into one of the two camps.

Religion in Israel is polarized and extreme. Just like everything else in the Middle East.

(* My reasons for following the specific commandments I do are complex, and it would take a essay much longer than this one to explain. Maybe someday I will, if people are interested. Briefly, I'm closest theologically to Conservative Judaism, but I prefer to attend Reform synagogues because I like the style of their services.)

Prior letter: The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict; Next letter: All About the Palestinians

Now Available: E-Book download: "Let­ters from Israel: An Amer­i­can journalist’s adven­tures in the Holy Land."

Related posts:

1. Letter from Israel: The Meaning of Israel
2. Letter from Israel: What is Israel, Anyway?
3. Letter from Israel: Stories from the Desert I
4. Letter From Israel: The Optimistic Future
5. Letter from Israel: Living in a Chaotic Tribe