On chocolate pudding, religion and secular values

[rug]

Amalia Rosenblum
Published October 12th 2014

The harsh criticism directed by Karni Eldad (http://www.i24news.tv/en/opinion/46992-141012-what-are-the-screams-of-millions-of-jews-compared-to-cheap-pudding) against secular Jews who praise the comforts of middle class life in countries that are not Israel echoes a story as old as Israel - known as the "parable of the empty cart and the full cart."

In fact this is a story within a story. It starts with a meeting between Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and the spiritual leader of the Workers Association of Israel, Rabbi Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz. Legend has it that the prime minister asked the rabbi how religious and secular Israelis would co-exist. The rabbi supposedly answered that the points of friction cannot be bridged and secular Israelis should therefore be flexible since the ultra-Orthodox cannot compromise on their God-given commandments. The tale of this meeting has an important place in the mythology of the "status quo," the symbol of the dynamic that characterizes the dichotomy between the religious and the secular, between state and religion.

The parable, hidden in this story, involves the way in which Karelitz, also known as Chazon Ish, answered the prime minister: Two wagons traveled along a path towards a narrow bridge on which only one could pass at a time. One of the carts was overloaded, the other was empty. At the end of the story, the Chazon Ish asked Ben Gurion: Which of the two wagons should clear the way for the other? The accepted interpretation of this example is that the rabbi was saying that religious Judaism is the full wagon, loaded with Torah and mitzvot (commandments), whereas the secular cart is empty.

When Eldad says, therefore, "The difference between me and them, and forgive me if I sound condescending, is that I have my ideology, my values, and they don't," is essentially a repetition of the same tale. I have no intention of debating which community is the empty cart and which the full cart. Rather, I want to stress that the way in which these two stories were told and are told to this day is significant to all major sociological and historical attempts to understand who are the Israeli Jews, and in doing so, what is Jewish secularism. This is because not only did these stories create identities (such as the identity of Eldad), but they did so in their capacity as ambassadors of the secularization thesis.

http://www.i24news.tv/en/opinion/46997-141012-on-chocolate-pudding-religion-and-secular-values

The "pudding" article:

http://www.i24news.tv/en/opinion/46992-141012-what-are-the-screams-of-millions-of-jews-compared-to-cheap-pudding

[Jim__]

1. I don't get the point of the article. Do you?

I get Eldad's point. She has a right to her opinion. But, I don't get Rosenblum's point.

More than it expresses a genuine position, Eldad’s article serves as conclusive evidence of how the thesis of secularization guided the understanding and construction of Jewish identities in Israel. It rolls out the same dichotomous (one full wagon and one empty wagon which collide) and hierarchical (one of the carts must make way - the empty cart) worldview and allows fringe identities, such as the one Eldad represents, to define the Jewish majority, which naturally inhabits the center of the field.

She seems to be arguing that this is a false dichotomy. My assumption is that secular Israelis already know that; religious Israelies have no interest in knowing that. So, where does this lead? Is she just trying to start a conversation?

[rug]

2. No, she's really hedging her position behind jargon.

That's why I posted the article she's responding to.

What I do find interesting, though, are how these arguments play out in Israel. On the one hand it's not a theocracy but it is explicitly the Jewish Homeland, complete with the Law of Return.

Yet the Jewish people are both religious and secular. These types of disputes arise a lot (although the reporting is generally more lucid.)

It is enlightening to compare these disputes with the church/state separation issues in the U.S., the actual theocracies in the Middle East, and the explicitly secular governments which require the registration of certain approved religions. It's almost a political/religious laboratory.

But, back to Rosenblum, the best I can discern is that she's saying Israel cannot be described solely as religious or as secular, that the country is far more complex than that simple dichotomy.