The Haredim

(From class Wednesday, June 30)
We watched a documentary (made by the same two sociologists who created the film on the Russian immigrants) about the ultra-Orthodox in Yael’s class on Wednesday. Religiously conservative Jews were historically against Zionism: They saw it as an attempt to foil God’s Messianic plan. Jews had no right to “preempt” God’s timing for their return to the Promised Land. In the days of Ben Gurion, he made large concessions with the ultra-Orthodox communities in order to gain their support (or at least prevent their active disapproval). Thus members of the ultra-Orthodox communities have exemption from military service and receive subsidies from the state in order to pursue their daylong Torah studies. Public transportation does not run in Jerusalem on Shabbat and many public cafeterias must keep kosher. Many Haredim do not have income-generating jobs, and thus do not pay taxes.
A note on the origins of the ultra-Orthodox communities: The sect (for lack of a better word) was created as a reaction to increasing concerns over modernity and assimilation. They focused on continued observance of Jewish law, seeing as essential the preservation of Judaism against the changes of modernity. SHALEM became an important acronym for the Orthodox community: SH=shem (name), L=lashon (language), and M=malbush (dress). These three things, determined as critical factors that made a Jew truly “Jewish,” were “frozen in time.” Thus, ultra-Orthodox continue to speak Yiddish (and many believe that the use of Hebrew as a language for everyday life is sacrilegious), dress as they did in Europe at the time, and keep their very-“Jewish sounding” names (as opposed to many Jews of the time, who were changing their names to those more in line with the majority communities among which they were living).
But no community is entirely static. Today, some ultra-Orthodox individuals have cell phones. There are ultra-Orthodox feminists. The community, whether or not it wishes it, is being influenced by the outside world. As a result of this, some of the Haredim fear their community is in serious danger of dying out. Causing further trouble is the large amount of resentment from other Israelis who see the ultra-Orthodox as free-riders on the tax system. But, due to their cultural values and traditions, the ultra-Orthodox are one of Israel’s fastest-growing communities. The other quickly growing community is the Palestinians…
Life will be interesting in twenty years.