Religious Zionist pioneers found Kibbutz Ein HaNatziv, 1946

Religious Zionism (Hebrew: ציונות דתית, Tziyonut Datit, or דתי לאומי, Dati Leumi) is an ideology that combines Zionism and Jewish religious faith. Religious Zionists are observant Jews who support Zionist efforts to build a Jewish state in the Land of Israel.

History[link]

Abraham Isaac Kook, 1924

In 1862, German Orthodox Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Kalischer published his tractate Derishat Zion, positing that the salvation of the Jews, promised by the Prophets, can come about only by self-help.^[1] The main ideologue of modern religious Zionism was Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, who justified Zionism according to Jewish law and urged young religious Jews to support efforts to settle the land, and the secular Labour Zionists to give more consideration to Judaism. Rabbi Moshe Shmuel Glasner was another prominent rabbi who supported Zionism. Kook saw Zionism as a part of a divine scheme which would result in the resettlement of the Jewish people in its homeland. This would bring salvation ("Geula") to Jews, and then to the entire world. After world harmony is achieved by the refoundation of the Jewish homeland, the Messiah will come. Although this has not yet happened, Kook emphasized that it would take time, and that the ultimate redemption happens in stages, often not apparent while happening. In 1924, when Kook became the Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Palestine, he tried to reconcile Zionism with Orthodox Judaism.

Ideology[link]

Religious Zionists celebrating Jerusalem Day

Religious Jews believe that Eretz Yisrael was promised to the ancient Israelites by God and the right of the Jews to the land is permanent and inalienable. To generations of diaspora Jews, Jerusalem has been a symbol of the Holy Land and of their return to it, as promised by God in numerous Biblical prophecies. Despite this, some Jews did not embrace Zionism before the 1930s and certain religious groups opposed it on the grounds that an attempt to re-establish Jewish rule in Israel by human agency was blasphemous. Hastening salvation and the coming of the Messiah was considered religiously forbidden, and Zionism was seen as a sign of disbelief in God's power and therefore a rebellion against God. Rabbi Kook developed a theological answer to that claim, which gave Zionism a religious legitimation: "Zionism was not merely a political movement by secular Jews. It was actually a tool of God to promote His divine scheme and to initiate the return of the Jews to their homeland - the land He promised to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God wants the children of Israel to return to their home in order to establish a Jewish sovereign state in which Jews could live according to the laws of Torah and Halakha and commit the Mitzvot of Eretz Israel (these are religious commandments which can be performed only in the land of Israel). Moreover, to cultivate the land of Israel was a Mitzvah by itself and it should be carried out. Therefore, settling Israel is an obligation of the religious Jews and helping Zionism is actually following God's will."^[2]

Religious Jews also disapproved of the Zionists because many were secular Jews or atheists, taking their cue from Marxism. Socialist Zionism envisaged the movement as a tool for building an advanced socialist society in the land of Israel, while solving the problem of antisemitism. The early kibbutz was a communal settlement that focused on national goals unencumbered by religion and precepts of Jewish law such as kashrut. Rabbi Kook's answer was as follows:

Secular Zionists may think they do it for political, national or socialist reasons, but in fact - the actual reason for them coming to resettle in Israel is a religious Jewish spark ("Nitzotz") in their soul, planted by God. Without their knowledge, they are contributing to the divine scheme and actually committing a great Mitzvah.

The role of religious Zionists is to help them to establish a Jewish state and turn the religious spark in them into a great light. They should show them that the real source of Zionism and the longed-for Zion is Judaism and teach them Torah with love and kindness. In the end, they will understand that the laws of Torah are the key to true harmony and a socialist state (not in the Marxist meaning) that will be a light for the nations and bring salvation to the world.

Shlomo Avineri explained the last part of Kook's answer:"... and the end of those pioneers, who scout into the blindness of secularism and atheism, but the treasured light inside them leads them into the path of salvation - their end is that from doing Mitzva without purpose, they will do Mitzva with a purpose." (page 222, ¹)

Organizations[link]

The first rabbis to support Zionism were Yehuda Shlomo Alkalai and Zvi Hirsch Kalischer. They argued that the change in the status of Western Europe's Jews following emancipation was the first step toward redemption (גאולה) and that therefore one must hasten the messianic salvation by a natural salvation — whose main pillars are the Kibbutz Galuyot ("Gathering of the Exiles"), the return to Eretz Israel, agricultural work (עבודת אדמה) and the revival of the everyday use of the Hebrew language.

Bnei Akiva youth movement, combining Torah and work

The Mizrachi organization was established in 1902 in Vilna at a world conference of religious Zionists. It operates a youth movement, Bnei Akiva, which was founded in 1929. Mizrachi believes that the Torah should be at the centre of Zionism, a sentiment expressed in the Mizrachi Zionist slogan Eretz Israel le-am Yisrael al pi Torat Yisrael ("The land of Israel for the people of Israel according to the Torah of Israel"). It also sees Jewish nationalism as a tool for achieving religious objectives. Mizrachi was the first official religious Zionist party. It also built a network of religious schools that exist to this day.

In 1937-1948, the Religious Kibbutz Movement established three settlement blocs of three kibbutzim each. The first was in the Beit Shean Valley, the second was in the Hebron mountains south of Bethlehem (known as Gush Etzion), and the third was in the western Negev. Kibbutz Yavne was founded in the center of the country as the core of a fourth bloc that came into being after the establishment of the state.^[3]

Political parties[link]

The Labor Movement wing of Religious Zionism, founded in 1921 under the Zionist slogan "Torah va'Avodah" (Torah and Labor), it was called Hapoel Hamizrachi. It represented religiously traditional Labour Zionists both in Europe and in the Land of Israel where it represented religious Jews in the Histadrut. In 1956, Mizrachi, Hapoel HaMizrachi and other religious Zionists formed the National Religious Party to advance the rights of religious Zionist Jews in Israel. Other parties and groups affiliated with religious Zionism are Gush Emunim, Tkuma, and Meimad. A radical branch of Religious Zionism, Kahanism, was founded by the Rabbi Meir Kahane. Today, Hazit is the leading wing of this school of thought.

Educational institutions[link]

Mercaz Harav, Jerusalem

The flagship religious institution of the religious Zionist movement is "Mercaz haRav" yeshiva (founded by Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook). Other religious Zionist institutions are Yeshivat Or Etzion (founded by Rav Haim Druckman, a foremost disciple of Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook), Yeshivat HaKotel, Yeshivat Birkat Moshe in Maale Adumim,Yeshivat Har Hamor, Ein HaNatziv Women's Seminary and the Yaacov Herzog Institute for Jewish Studies.

Dress[link]

Crocheted kippot

Religious Zionists are often called "Kippot sruggot", referring to the knitted or crocheted skullcaps worn by the men. However, there are also some religious Zionists who wear other types of headcoverings (black velvet kippot, for example), and if a certain person wears a knitted kippa, it does not necessarily mean that he is a religious Zionist.

Politics[link]

Many religious Zionists embrace right wing politics, especially the National Religious Party, but they also the Likud and the National Union. There are also left-wing religious Zionists, such as by Rabbi Michael Melchior, whose views were represented by the Meimad party (which ran together with the Israeli Labor party). Many settlers in Judea and Samaria are religious Zionists, along with most of the settlers forcibly expelled from the Gaza Strip in August and September 2005.

Military service[link]

Religious Jews in Israel are exempt from mandatory service in the IDF, though many choose to serve voluntarily.

Second-Lieutenant Asael Lubotzky, an IDF field commander during Second Lebanon War, prays with Tefilin.

Many religious Zionists take part in the Hesder program, whereby they are able to combine military service with Yeshiva studies. Others attend a pre-army Mechina, delaying their service by one year. 88% of Hesder students belong to combat units, compared to a national average of below 30%. In November 2010 the IDF held a special conference which was attended by the heads of Religious Zionism in order to encourage female religious Zionists in order to join the IDF. The IDF promised it would make sure that all modesty and kosher issues will be handled in order to make female religious Zionists comfortable.

Religious Zionist women also serve in the army, but some choose national service, known as Sherut Leumi, instead (working at hospitals, schools and day-care centers).

Notable figures[link]

• Yosef Burg
• Shlomo Aviner
• Rabbi Chaim Druckman
• Mordechai Eliyahu
• Effi Eitam
• Dov Lior
• Zevulun Orlev
• Avraham Shapira
• Yehuda Amital
• She'ar Yashuv Cohen
• Shlomo Riskin

See also[link]

• Atchalta De'Geulah
• Arutz Sheva
• Religion in Israel
• Hesder
• Torato Omanuto
• Hardal
• Machon Meir
• Modern Orthodox Judaism
• Haredim and Zionism
• Mamlachti dati

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• The Zionist Idea and its variations - Shlomo Avineri, Am Oved publishing, chapter 17: "Rabbi Kook - the dialection in salvation"

External links[link]

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Zionism an Affirmation of Judaism

• Religious Zionists of America
• A Historical Look at Religious Zionism by Prof. Dan Michman
• "Kipa - House of Religious Zionism"
• Official National Religious Party website (in English)
• Religious Zionism And Modern Orthodoxy, Rav Yosef Blau
• Orthodox Zionism, Prof. Eliezer Segal
• Religious Zionism, Compromise or Ideal?, hagshama.org.il
• Religious Zionism: Between Openness and Closedness, Prof. Avi Saguy

v t e Zionism Topics and concepts Zion Land of Israel Aliyah Yerida Homeland (Proposals) Jewish state Law of Return Yishuv Territorialism Promised Land Settlement Negation of the Diaspora Revival of the Hebrew language Hebraization of surnames Judaization Schools of ideology Political Practical Synthetic General Labor Revisionist Canaanism Reform Religious Cultural Federal Post-Zionism Neo-Zionism Christian Muslim Kahanism Green Zionism Organizations Histadrut World Zionist Organization Zionist General Council Zionist Organization of America Religious Zionists of America Jewish National Fund Poale Zion Jewish Agency for Israel Jewish National Council Bnei Akiva Habonim Dror Hashomer Hatzair Haganah World Agudath Israel Irgun Betar Lehi Jewish Resistance Movement Women's International Zionist Organization Green Zionist Alliance History History of Zionism History of Israel History of Palestine Arab–Israeli conflict List of Zionist figures Timeline of Zionism Timeline of Anti-Zionism Related Jewish political movements Anti-Zionism Haredim and Zionism Jewish Autonomism Jewish Emancipation Greater Israel

Yossi Klein Halevi, 2008

Yossi Klein Halevi (1953 - ) is an Israeli author and journalist.

Biography[link]

Halevi was born and raised in New York in a Jewish family. He completed a BA in Jewish Studies in Brooklyn College in 1978, and completed his MA in Journalism at Northwestern University. In 1982, he moved to Israel with his wife Sarah (née Lynn Rintoul).^[1]

Journalistic and literary career[link]

He worked as a senior writer for the bi-weekly magazine The Jerusalem Report from its founding until 2002. Halevi wrote a column for The Jerusalem Post, and wrote regularly on Israeli issues for the op-ed page of the Los Angeles Times, and occasionally for the New York Times and Washington Post. His first book, Memoirs of a Jewish Extremist, was published in 1995. In it, he tells of his youthful attraction to, and subsequent break with, the militant Rabbi Meir Kahane.

In 2001 he published At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden: A Jew's Search for God with Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land. The book tells of his spiritual journey as a religious Jew into the worlds of Christianity and Islam in Israel. Halevi joined the prayers and meditations in mosques and monasteries, in an attempt to experience the devotional lives of his non-Jewish neighbors and to create a religious language of reconciliation among the three monotheistic faiths.

Halevi is a Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute, a Jerusalem-based research institute and educational center. He is Israel correspondent and contributing editor of The New Republic. ^[2] He is a lecturer on American and Canadian campuses, focusing on politics and culture in Israel.

Political activism[link]

Halevi has been active in Middle East reconciliation efforts, and serves as chairman of Open House, an Arab-Jewish educational project in the working class town of Ramle. He was a founder and board member of the now-defunct Israeli-Palestinian Media Forum, which brought together Israeli and Palestinian journalists.

Film[link]

In 1985, the documentary film Kaddish, produced by Steve Brand, which focuses on his relationship with his father, a Holocaust survivor, was released. The Village Voice called it one of the best ten films of the year.

Published works[link]

• Memoirs of a Jewish Extremist, New York-Boston: Little Brown and Company, 1995. ISBN 978-0-316-49860-9
• At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden: A Jew's Search for God with Christians and Muslims in the Holy Land. New York: Morrow. 2001. http://books.google.com/books?id=BQoLcpu5BHAC&printsec=frontcover&dq=Yossi+Klein+Halevi&hl=en&ei=50AGTo-qKIrx0gHsh6nkCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2&ved=0CDMQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q&f=false. ; HarperCollins, 2002, ISBN 978-0-06-050582-0
• Am Eingang zum Garten Eden: Suche nach Hoffnung mit den Religionen im Heiligen Land, ISBN 978-3-8306-7371-2, EOS-Verlag, St. Ottilien, 2009.
• בפתח גן העדן, ISBN 965-07-1539-8, Shalom Hartman Institute, Keter, Jerusalem, Israel, 2007.

References[link]

External links[link]

• About Halevi
• Yossi Klein Halevi, The pattern of Palestinian rejectionism, Jewish World Review, 12/7/2004
• Yossi Klein Halevi, Kabbalah goes Hollywood, Jewish World Review, 30/4/2004