Q&A: Saving Judaism
Saving Judaism
Question
Hello to Rabbi Michi, may he live long and well.
It seems that Judaism is racing toward ruin: on one side there are the Religious Zionists, with a crazy spiritual dryness and 40% going secular; on the other side, the Haredim, a fundamentalist exilic group, and it would be very bad if Judaism were left in their hands. Add to that secularism, which is taking bigger and bigger bites, and the situation really does not look bright.
True, this period could have been an unparalleled golden age: a flourishing Jewish state, tens of thousands of Torah scholars, things we could only have dreamed of a hundred years ago. Even so, ever since the Enlightenment period, Judaism has been missing its opportunities.
I see a critical need to establish an enlightened Judaism grounded in reality, but not a watered-down one, with Torah at its center. That was the original idea of Religious Zionism, but it failed because of lack of interest and long secular rule.
Does the Rabbi have a solution for how to realize this dream, or does the Rabbi even agree with my analysis of the situation?
Answer
First of all, from the vantage point of my age, I have learned not to draw conclusions from phenomena I happen to see around me. The world works like a pendulum: what rises today falls tomorrow. About thirty years ago it was clear to me that the whole world was racing wildly to the left. Today there is an opposite process.
Second, people going secular testify to real spiritual ferment and flourishing. True, there is a price for this: if people choose, they do not always choose correctly, and besides, the good questions they have that receive no answer lead them to leave because we do not address them. But this can lead to major repair. I am actually very optimistic about these processes. If we had just kept droning on as before and remained with the same outlook as the previous generation despite all the difficulties, the changes in reality, and the new information—that would have been a worrying fossilization. There is a promise that "it shall not be forgotten from the mouth of his offspring," and it is not our job to worry. We need to do what we can—and the Holy One, blessed be He, will do what is good in His eyes. And if it disappears—then it disappears. That's His problem. Apparently it has no right to exist.
My goal on this site and in my writing is to try to shift the course in the directions you described. Each person should do the little he can, and I am very optimistic that in the end the truth will make its way. And if not—then apparently this is not the truth, and if so, I am not sorry that it disappeared.
Bottom line, I am not worried at all. On the contrary, I would have been more worried by the Haredi inertia, which despite the foolishness and distortions in it continues on its course without overly great upheavals (though of course interesting processes are taking place there too). All these are welcome processes that arouse great optimism in me. I would have been despairing if I had lived before the beginning of the Enlightenment and everything had remained old and stale as it was.