Civil Religion in Israel: Traditional Judaism and Political Culture in the Jewish State

316 Pages·1983·18.874 MB·English

by  Charles S. Liebman, Eliezer Don-Yehiya

CIVIL RELIGION IN ISRAEL

CIVIL RELIGION
IN ISRAEL
Traditional Judaism and
Political Culture in the
Jewish State
Charles S. Liebman and Eliezer Don-Yehiya
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS
Berkeley, Los Angeles, London
University of California Press
Berkeley and Los Angeles, California
University of California Press, Ltd.
London, England
Copyright © 1983 by The Regents of the University of California
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Liebman, Charles S.
Civil religion in Israel.
Bibliography: p. 277
Includes index.
1. Civil religion—Israel. 2. Israel—Politics and
government. 3. Israel—Civilization. 4. Zionism—
Israel. I. Don-Yehiya, Eliezer. II. Title.
DS112.L65 1983 306'.2'095694 82-17427
ISBN 0-520-04817-2
Printed in the United States of America
12 3 4 5 6 7 8 9
For Sara and Drora

Contents
Preface ix
1. Traditional Religion and Civil Religion 1
2. Zionist-Socialism 25
3. Revisionist Zionism As a Civil Religion 59
4. The Civil Religion of Statism 81
5. The New Civil Religion 123
6. Instruments of Socialization 167
7. The Responses of Traditional Religious Jews to
Israeli Civil Religion 185
8. Summary and Conclusions 214
Notes 239
Bibliography 277
Index 293

Preface
Our study is concerned with the impact of Judaism on the
political culture of the modern Jewish settlement in the Land of
Israel—that is, from the period of the yishuv (the prestate
Zionist settlement) until today.
Political culture is such a popular term among political scien-
tists that it is sometimes used indiscriminately. We prefer to
follow Almond and Powell in defining it as "the pattern of . . .
attitudes and orientations toward politics among the members
of a political system" (Comparative Politics, p. 50). Our focus is
on civil religion. A good part of the first chapter is spent
explaining what we mean by civil religion. Our shorthand
definition is the ceremonials, myths, and creeds which legiti-
mate the social order, unite the population, and mobilize the
society's members in pursuit of its dominant political goals.
Civil religion is that which is most holy and sacred in the
political culture. It forges its adherents into a moral commu-
nity. The yishuv and Israel have had more than one civil
religion. Our special interest is the extent to which each civil
religion has appropriated ceremonials, myths, and creeds of the
Jewish religious tradition—consciously or unconsciously, di-
rectly or indirectly, in unchanged or distorted form.
Political systems differ from one another in the role played
by civil religions in their political cultures. From its inception,
modern Jewish society in the Land of Israel has been marked by
the prominent role civil religion has played in its culture and
politics. Hence the study of civil religion in Israel is necessarily
concerned with an important, if not the most important, com-
ponent of Israeli political culture.
IX
X PREFACE
Our study will show that civil religion has declined in impor-
tance in the last few years. This in itself is perhaps the most
important statement one can make about the changing nature of
Israeli political culture.
The first chapter defines terms and explains the setting for
the development of Israeli civil religion. Chapters two through
six describe the various civil religions from the period of the
yishuv until today. Chapter seven is concerned with the dif-
ferent responses of religious Jews to the civil religion—in
theory and practice. The final chapter represents our summary
and conclusions.
The study is very much a joint effort, the product of a
continual interchange of ideas between us. The book does not
include a single major idea for which one of us can claim
exclusiv e credit.
Research began in 1975 under a grant from the Israel Foun-
dations Trustees of the Ford Foundation, to whom we want to
express our gratitude. We were assisted by a typing grant from
the Book Committee of Bar-Ilan University. Sections of the
study, in revised form, have appeared m Midstream, The Journal
of Church and State, Kivunim (in Hebrew), The Jerusalem Quar-
terly, and Modern Judaism.