What Is Going On?

by Paul Shaviv, guest contributor

Protesting the Israeli government in Washington Square last April (+972)

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I am once again pleased to host one of the more intelligent contributors to this blog, Paul Shaviv. Although I admire him and respect his views, I do not always agree with him. In the following essay there are things with which I heartily agree and things with which I do not. I am not as pessimistic about Israel's future as he seems to be. Put another way, I don't think it's time to say Kaddish on Israel just yet. His words follow in their entirety.

Like many of us, I am trying to make some sense of what is going on in the Jewish/Israeli world around us.  Tisha B’Av seems like a good time to stop and take stock. 

The best analysis of the ‘mega-picture’ I have read is written by the somewhat exotic academic scholar of Hassidut (and much else), Prof. Rabbi Shaul Magid.  He asks “Why are American Jews so shocked by Israel's far-right turn?” – you can find it on academia.edu. (At the same time, read his piece on Ben-Gvir; and when you’ve finished that, read this excellent essay by Yehudah Mirsky. If you print out these three they will provide a good session of reading for Tisha b’Av afternoon.)  

Very briefly, Magid argues that Jewish history over the last few centuries has been characterized by a struggle between two rival mega-historical tendencies.  One, with roots in the Jewish mystical-messianic-apocalyptic traditions – think Kabbalah, Sabbateanism, Hasidism; was identified and spotlit by Gershom Scholem.  The other is rooted in the rationalist, Emancipationalist, socially aware (if not socially progressive) movements – think Reform, Conservative, Hirsch, YU, Kibbutzim, Socialist Zionism, classic M.O./ the ‘old’ Mizrachi.   

Israel was the creation of the latter.  But what is happening now is that the former tendency is bubbling to the surface, and an apocalyptic irrationalism is driving the Jewish agenda.  The hilltop youth, the racists, the anti-science and anti-education activists, the purveyors of snake-oil and miracles are in charge.  

In Israel, the right-wing have no interest or belief in democracy.  The ‘judicial reform’ is their first objective; but the list of following legislation tabled by Bibi’s coalition colleagues is hair-raising.  It is anyone’s guess how all of this will be reflected in the next elections in Israel; let alone in the legislative program which will follow.  There are some indications in the last week – the back-tracking editorial in ‘Yeted’ – that the Haredi parties are slowly realizing that their triumphalist rush to support Ben-Gvir, Smotrich and Levin may bring them disaster in the long-term.  (Maybe the Israeli electorate will not sign on to eternally supporting 25%-plus of the population who refuse to work, serve in the IDF or educate themselves?) 

Are we any better off in the Diaspora?  Well, not if you are female, that’s for sure!  Our Orthodox life is marked by determined drives to erase visible female presence and womens’ rights from our community.  I can listen to sixty minutes of podcast on why ordering a cup of black coffee in Starbucks is forbidden; but I am hard-pressed to find sixty minutes civilized discussion on the merits of literacy, or the merits of current yeshivah curricula.  The internal problems of the Orthodox community are legion; but they are ring-fenced by a wall of silence.  Materialism and the awful costs of being observant are rampant, encouraged by hechsher-obsession and ever-increasing ‘chumrahs’ and ‘rising standards’.   This is forbidden and that is ‘ossur’!   First the ‘Three weeks’; then the Sefira; soon the ‘Fifty-two weeks’! 

All of this is taking place against deliberately-fostered, growing ignorance – of Judaism.  Yes, we have stadiums full of committed Jews celebrating Daf Yomi, although the nature and quality of their learning is never assessed.  But a young Haredi Rav recently confided to me that he had never heard of the Books of the Maccabees “until recently” and that for his shiur he had to look up the history of Hanukkah in … “The Little Midrash Says”.   How many rabbis do you know who can intelligently discuss, say, the Dead Sea Scrolls? Or Emancipation? Or the Shoah? Or Zionism? Or the history of the Jews in Eastern Europe? Or – gasp – the history of Jews in Yemen (did you know there was a Haskalah in Yemen?)? Or the halakhic history of, say, kitnios? 

Reader, you are right – I’m not happy.   Nor should you be.