Many Israeli leaders expected that the question of national identity would be settled with the establishment of the State of Israel. They believed that one well-defined group holding cultural and political hegemony could crystallize the emergent society around it, and develop unifying symbols and myths for the new society, based on the past and in spite of it. But their hopes did not materialize. The actual, modern State of Israel does not settle the controversy over Jewish culture and Israeli identity. On the contrary, the new state defines the battlefield, the argument and the dialogue; it provides a concrete dimension for a discussion about questions of memory, hope, outlook, and faith. This should not be surprising. In hindsight, this development flows naturally from the rationale of the Zionist process and is more compatible with it than the aspiration for a common focus and a collective consciousness.
It is possible to see the entire Zionist venture as a stubborn attempt to establish a “covenant of fate” and a communal solidarity, despite the collapse of an all-encompassing agreement about the “covenant of destiny.” Until a few generations ago, the Jewish people could exist as a people without a land, state, or single language because its sons and daughters relied on a common cultural basis: the Torah, commandments, Halakhah [Jewish law], prayer, ceremony, and symbol. All these, in their day, were absolute, obvious facts and were the linchpins of Jewish communities in the West and East. Differences in customs between communities did not obscure the closeness and similarity between them and did not undermine the common basis of Jewish civilization; even territorial dispersion and the absence of a government did not make the effort to live according to one constitution and one law (in the broad sense) more difficult, and did not destroy the foundations of communal self-definition.
But this base has collapsed in the modern era. Even a religious Jew would be hard put today to assert that faith and Halakhah are the factors that unite the entire people. Even he would be forced to admit sadly that
the Jewish religion now splits us no less than it bonds us. In light of this, Zionism arose and offered an alternative solution. It sought to establish a concrete existential base for the Jewish people, to build a common home precisely after the loss of spiritual commonality. In this sense one can see the modern national awakening as a heroic, almost desperate, effort to establish a new national-political focus that could support the collective under conditions of cultural and religious polarization. The ideological split, therefore, is an essential basis of the Zionist reawakening. It is not an obstacle but a defining factor.
The tangible existence of the State of Israel sharpened the controversy and constantly added new arguments. The revolutionary change in the world of the Jews—from being a ruled minority to becoming a sovereign majority; from living a communal life to leading a national life; from living in exile and dispersion to living in territorial concentration—did not allow for a smooth, unbroken transition from the old to the new. The moment the members of the traditional ideological viewpoints gathered together, out of the firing range, as it were, they had to make immediate political agreements and decide on urgent legal issues. They were also faced with specific questions of ideology, values, and culture—questions which had not been raised before or which had been put aside as hypothetical issues. The typical discussion in Israeli society tends to distinguish between political and legal discussion on the one hand, and ideological and cultural discussion on the other. Discussion on each plane is carried out separately, according to its own rules and internal patterns. This collection of essays suggests taking a different tack. It seeks to discuss the connection of every plane with the others, and to examine the direct connections that exist between the planes and their mutual implications.
The articles collected in this volume relate to an array of relevant questions. They consciously range from issues of state and law to issues of culture, philosophy, society, and identity. The collection discusses the relationship between laws and values, between official agreements and principles and traditions. It examines the tension between a nation-state, as defined according to the identity of its people, and a territorial state, defined by its borders. It questions the connection between multiculturalism and multinationalism, between political normalization and cultural uniqueness, between economic privatization and social justice.
The question of the relationship between Judaism and democracy is central to this book. The question covers a wide range of issues. First, it touches upon the tension between the classic Jewish tradition and modern Western culture. Second, it deals with the tension between the state of the Jewish people (including non-Israeli Jews) and a state of all its citizens (including non-Jewish Israelis). And third, it focuses on the discord between various streams of modern Judaism and the demand to impose democratic procedures upon Judaism. The question of Judaism and democracy therefore deals with the connection of the state of the Jews to Western culture, to the Arab presence, and to the Jewish dilemma, and thus hardly any deliberation is not impacted by this question. Despite the broad spectrum of the collection, it is an invitation for future discussions on additional aspects of this question.
This book is not the result of a collaborative effort. The collected articles and essays represent different areas of knowledge, disparate research approaches, as well as different beliefs and individual worldviews. Some of the articles begin from the viewpoint of Jewish tradition, some start from a viewpoint of liberal tradition, and some relate to both traditions at once, contrasting and bringing them together. Nonetheless, the choice in this collection reflects the conscious position of the editors, according to whom the question of the Jewishness of a democratic state is a relevant and inexhaustible question which is only beginning to be explored.
We wish to thank the Israel Democracy Institute and its dedicated leaders and staff: Arye Carmon, President of the Institute, Lorraine Gastwirt, Vice President for Administration, Uri Dromi and Edna Granit, Directors of Publications, and Anat Bernstein and Nadav Shtechman, the dedicated staff of the Institute’s publishing house, who spared no effort in the preparation of this book. We would also like to thank Ronit Tapiero for her fine copyediting. We are grateful to them all.
The Editors
* Translated by Trudy Greener.