The Zeitgeist

Haredim on the Front Lines 

On Wednesday, March 12^th the Knesset forever changed the shape of Israeli society by passing a law which will conscript most Haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) young men into the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) starting in 2017.

Heretofore completely exempt from national service, the proposal for this sea change in Israel spurred no end of opposition and protest from Haredi circles. Because Haredi men did not serve in the IDF they also were not allowed to join the general workforce until middle age. This created a huge bubble of Haredi men learning fulltime – the largest number of 24/7 Torah scholars probably ever in the entirety of Jewish history.

The non national service situation also created a culture of pervasive poverty and dependency on the state for basic sustenance that earned the enmity and resentment of the majority of non-Haredi Israelis who had to both foot the bill to subsidize Haredi life and also send their sons and daughters into the IDF to protect the state and everyone in it, Haredim included. Non-Haredi Israelis felt unfairly put-upon in a country that takes much in taxes and asks many for serious national and personal sacrifices.

Some of the more strident charges against military service emanating from the Haredi community were that “the IDF secularizes its conscripts and will strip Torah from our kids,” “the IDF is a completely secular institution” and that “the Zionists wish to destroy our Torah way of life in general.” This visceral revulsion towards serving in the IDF emanates from the 18^th and 19^th Century days in Czarist Russia and Poland where Jewish adolescents were forcibly stripped from their homes and communities for 25 years of military duty and often were never seen or heard from again. That Israel is a Jewish state defending Jews from violent anti-Semites doesn’t begin to dawn on the Haredi consciousness.

The Haredi charges of forced secularization in the IDF completely ignore the near universal participation of National-Religious (Da’ati Leumi) or Religious Zionist boys in the IDF. The National Religious young men (and many young women who do some kind of national service as well) typically are at the forefront of elite IDF units while still wearing their kippot, while still putting on tefilin in the mornings, while still keeping kosher and in many cases while still continuing their Torah studies in the hesder yeshiva program that combines IDF service with yeshiva study. Rather than have their religious beliefs stripped from them by the IDF, many a secular soldier has been inspired and brought closer to Judaism and observance by the example of the Kippa Seruga (knitted kippa) boys. Eighteen years of religious education along with a strong home life have equipped the National Religious soldier to go forth into the world while holding on to his values. Haredim ignore these facts because they don’t consider the National Religious to be authentically Orthodox or Orthodox enough. This is often true in the U.S. as well where the American equivalents of Modern and Centrist Orthodoxy find their legitimacy (and that of many of its rabbis) under passive aggressive assault by U.S. and Israeli Haredi institutions, but that’s the subject of another article.

In defense of their non-service in the IDF (and to a lesser extent, non-participation in the workforce) Haredim have stated that their prayer and Torah study offer supernatural protection to the state that is invaluable and incalculable.

The Haredi justification and rationalization of non-participation in national service (prayer and study) may have some validity but for the fact that Haredi synagogues and yeshivot do not pray for the State of Israel or for the IDF. Their siddurim (prayer books) don’t carry the prayers for the State of Israel or the IDF. Moreover a great many Haredi institutions still reject the legitimacy of the very existence of the State of Israel or of any Jewish state before the coming of the Messiah. Sometimes this rejection is quiet and sometimes overt, but there nevertheless.

This hasn’t stopped Haredim from accepting Israeli citizenship, from taking extensive welfare and child subsidy payments or from also accepting financial subsidies for their schools and other institutions from the state. To keep the money flowing and protect their interests, Haredim have political parties that sit in the Knesset, much as the Arabs too have Members of Knesset who disavow loyalty to and the legitimacy of the state. This also arouses the ire of the average Israeli, even more so than with the Arabs because the Haredim, being Jews, are seen as an ungrateful, parasitic fifth-column.

There is an analogy to the willful Haredi blindness to the fact that Israel is the best thing to happen to the Jewish people in more than 2,000 years, that the IDF is probably the most important existential institution the Jewish people have at this time and that G-d’s miracles can be seen daily around every street corner and turn in the road in Israel – that of Balaam and his donkey. In Bamidbar (Numbers) chapter 22 we find the pagan prophet Balaam en route to curse the Jewish people camped in the desert. His faithful donkey keeps veering off the road, slamming into walls and eventually crouching on the ground. Balaam keeps whipping and cursing the donkey until miraculously the donkey talks to Balaam and tells him he’s strayed off the road because G-d’s angel has been blocking the path with a drawn sword in his hand and he’s tried to save his master from this. Only after this incredible experience does Balaam look up and see the angel. The donkey in contemporary times is a metaphor for the masses of the Jewish people who perceive G-d’s miracles and blessings vis-à-vis the State of Israel and the Haredim are Balaam, blind as they travel down the road to G-d’s redemption of the Jewish people.

Back in ancient times and semi-antiquity, the Torah records that the Kohanim (priests) (who were then our most religious class) went out to battle with the army along with the Ark of the Covenant and plenty of trumpets. The Kohanim would bless the soldiers on the eve of battle. The blessing can be found in the Torah. When the Persians allowed the Jews to return to Jerusalem from Babylonian exile and rebuild the Temple, Ezra and Nechemia had no Messiah with them. They created the facts on the ground, Zionistically if you will, to rebuild the Jewish state. The Maccabees were fervently religious Kohanim who fought a 30 year military campaign to free Judaea from religious persecution at the hands of the Syrian-Greek empire.

There is no authentic Jewish tradition of not standing together with the entirety of the Jewish people, of not supporting the army, of not recognizing the legitimacy of the state. These are recent inventions as is much of Haredi life itself – separating themselves from the broader Jewish community in contravention of the words of the Rambam (Maimonides). In Hilchos Teshuva 4:2 he discuses how people who separate themselves from the broader public have the door to teshuva (redemption and repentance) shut before them.

Not praying for the welfare of the state (in this case Israel when in Israel) also contravenes the injunction of Rav Chanina in Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers) 3:2 where we’re commanded to “pray for the welfare of the government.”

Having Haredi young men enter national service will accomplish two very important things: First, it will slowly start to make Haredim a part of Israeli society so that we’ll be one people again and everyone will share in the responsibilities of citizenship and second, it will expose more secular Israelis to the beauty of religiosity and can only help imbue a greater sense of Jewish traditions and values across all segments of the country.

There’s a long tradition in the U.S. of Quakers and conscientious objectors serving as medics in the armed forces so as to be a part of the great struggle for liberty and freedom even if they were disinclined to fight. There’s nothing wrong with Haredi men serving shoulder to shoulder with their brethren in defense of their homes, wives, children, parents, grandparents and religious institutions. The Iranians, Hamas, Hezbollah and all our other enemies won’t be thwarted by davening (prayer) alone, even though there is a great value to that. There’s an old adage that “there are no atheists in foxholes.” In this case a little foxhole exposure might see Haredi synagogues start praying for the state and the IDF like the rest of the Jewish people now that they’ll finally have some “skin in the game,” i.e., the defense of the country.

The Zeitgeist

In a Free-Market Economy “Income Inequality” will Always be a Fact of Life.

Thomas Jefferson famously wrote in the Declaration of Independence that “We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal.” Only three divine “inalienable” rights were then named, those being “Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”

Ever since the Occupy Wall Street events of a couple of years ago there seems to be a clamoring for an additional sacred right to add to the original troika – that being income equality. The mantra of income equality was recited to great effect by then candidate and now New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio and has subsequently been picked-up by President Obama.

It is true that the overwhelming majority of Americans are not rich. The U.S. Census Bureau reports that in 2010 per capita income was $40,584 nationwide. Even affluent states like New York and California are at $48,821 and $43,104 respectively. While Massachusetts (at $51,552) and Maryland ($49,025) which have even higher income numbers can’t guarantee the good life for all its residents.

The Census Bureau also reports that 42 percent of households in the U.S. have dual incomes which would account for the high percentage of Americans in the middle class and upper middle class. The Census Bureau also reports that as of its 2006 statistics (which will show higher numbers for 2010 and beyond) only the top 25 percent of households earned in excess of $77,500. Further refining this, the top five percent of households earned $167,000 or better; the top one percent had incomes exceeding $350,000, so, clearly, those earning a million dollars a year or more are a very rare breed.

On the tax front it seems that the bigger earners are paying a heavy chunk of U.S. income taxes. For 2009, the top one percent paid 36.73 percent of all federal income taxes. The top five percent were carrying 58.66 percent of the tax burden and the top 10 percent were bearing almost 71 percent of the tax load. So 10 percent of Americans are paying more than 70 percent of the taxes.

According to 2006 Census figures, the top 10 percent of households earn $118,200 or more whereas the top 10 percent of individual earners were at the $75,000-plus level and only 5.63 percent of individuals were exceeding $100K. So what constitutes the “wealthy”? It is really the guy in New York or San Francisco who earns $100,000 a year?

There has always been a top five percent and a top one percent in the U.S. In any free market capitalist society there are always going to be some folks who do exceedingly better than others.

Part of getting into the top five percent or higher is a combination of hard work, education, talent, pluck and luck. And not everyone is going to get there. The percentage of high school and college athletes who get into professional sports is miniscule and these athletes are on the whole very well compensated deep into the top one percent. Very few pretty girls will become a super model or appear in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue.

There are very few aspiring broadcast journalists or actors who will make it onto the big networks and fewer yet who will be in Hollywood’s top 100. and believe it or not, there are very few people working on Wall Street who will crack the finance stratosphere.

The tenth of the Ten Commandments reads as follows from the King James Version of the Bible: “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor’s wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor’s.” According to Merriam-Webster’s dictionary, one of the key definitions of “covet” (and meant in the biblical sense) is “to desire (what belongs to another) inordinately.” Because coveting leads to resentment.

The authors of the Bible put the prohibition on coveting into the top 10 because jealousy of those who have more than you can be both self-destructive and damaging to society as a whole. There will always be someone you know who earns more, has a bigger house, drives a better car, wears better clothes or takes better vacations. There is no way to assure equal money and equal stuff for everyone. They tried that in the 20^th Century. It was called Communism and Socialism and as George Orwell wrote, still “some pigs were more equal than others” which is why it failed.

Yet we currently have a political environment where the term “income inequality” is being bandied about prolifically with the intention of arousing the resentment of the masses against all those who’ve done well for themselves. What American equality has always stood for first and foremost has been equality before the law, equality in voting, equality of opportunity (a country where anyone can become President, for example) and surely equality in education to the greatest extent possible.

What is not guaranteed in life are equal outcomes for one’s life and career efforts and as a consequence, equal incomes. That’s why the Declaration of Independence only guarantees the right to pursue happiness, not happiness itself. Life isn’t fair. We don’t always get what we want or what we deserve. Government has to provide a climate of equal opportunity for all to excel but ought not be fomenting resentment against those who have succeeded or succeeded spectacularly. Government needs to have an impartial, non-discriminatory playing field that doesn’t discriminate or vilify any of its citizens, including those who’ve done well.

The Zeitgeist

   

A Kid’s Memory of November 22, 1963:

The World that Was and is No More.

I was five years old on Friday, November 22, 1963, the day President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Even we kids could perceive the paradigm shift that took place as a result of that horrendous event and recall the somber and mournful tone of the next few days. I was just a year younger than Caroline Kennedy.

My parents and I were living a Mad Men kind of life on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. Like JFK, my dad served in the Navy in World War II (but my father was younger and not an officer) and like Don Draper, he wore those gray flannel suits with skinny ties. Like Jacqueline Kennedy, my mother was pretty, slim, stylish and had jet black hair that she wore in various iterations of the First Lady’s coiffures. In the summer we went on vacations to Cape Cod and the Hamptons. My family was fully a part of the New Frontier.

The first tip-off that something extraordinary had happened was the disappearance from late afternoon television of all the violent and goofy visual fare that we kids ingested before dinner. No Three Stooges, No George Reeves’ Superman, No Looney Tunes’ cartoons featuring exploding devices from the Acme Company. TV was all news all the time at a time when that kind of programming was previously non-existent. The adults were transfixed by the news coverage for the next few days and it seemed like a pall had descended on all the grownups.

It is said that America changed on that day and they’re right. The 50s probably ended on that Friday afternoon in Dallas. In the coming months and years everything really did change. Music changed. Clothing, fashions and hairstyles changed radically. American sensibilities changed. The trajectory of November 22, 1963 would propel us towards the tumultuous 60s and our modern era.

The world of 1963 was a much simpler time without computers, portable phones of any kind, a time without color television (for most of us) or any way to record a show and play it back – and only a few channels to watch, not 200 or more of them; A time of cars and homes without air conditioning; a time without ATM machines – if you ran out of cash on the weekend you were flat out of luck because no one had credit cards either. It was a time when stores were closed on Sundays and most Sundays you saw your extended family who all lived somewhat nearby. It was a time when work really was between 9 and 5 and somehow without working 50-60 hours per week and without typewriters that corrected, without photocopy machines and without calculators, people built things, deals were done and money made.

Maybe it was because I was so young in 1963, but compared to today, it seemed as if so much of the world was young then. People weren’t regularly living into their 80s and 90s. Our parents were young and had us young. The Baby Boom had turned out legions of kids and they were swarming everywhere. No one made play dates in the 60s, you just bounded out of your house and tons of kids could be found in the street or at the playground. You ran-off to play outside for hours on end and no one worried you might be abducted or molested. People were courteous and formal. You addressed people as “Mr.,” “Mrs.” or “Miss” if you weren’t very close to them – and children never called adults by their first names. You got dressed up to go to the movies, to a restaurant or to the theater – even to take a trip on a plane.

In 1963 we were also faced with the very real specter of Armageddon and the Cold War along with the reality of so many diseases that could end our lives in an untimely fashion for which cures or manageability have been found today.

Like Rip van Winkle, I look around today 50 years after November 1963 and can barely recognize the American landscape compared to the way it was then. How much more bewildered and bemused must people over 70 be with America today. Twenty-five years ago most Americans were alive when JFK was shot and could recall where they were that day. Now on the 50^th Anniversary, most Americans here were not born by 1963 and that 60s world is fading slowly into the mists of history in that gauzy way my generation probably thinks of the 20s, 30s and 40s.

Thankfully, no matter the intense acrimony and polarization in Washington these days, we’re not assassinating our Presidents. If the biggest challenge we face today is the nuances of health insurance and not the end of mankind in a nuclear holocaust, then we’re probably doing pretty well. That life expectancy has soared and infant mortality plummeted, that our material comforts and conveniences are unparalleled in the history of mankind means we’ve made a lot of progress since November of ’63. JFK who spoke often about the world of tomorrow, tragically, didn’t get a chance to see any of it.