The period in which European Christianity faced the Protestant challenge to the Catholic tradition was long and saturated with blood. It culminated in the Thirty Years’ War, in which religion and politics were mixed. It was a religious war, which opened when Catholic emissaries were thrown from a castle window in Bohemia. It was an increasingly political war. And it ended with the Peace of Westphalia, when a new era — of nation states — began.
This long introduction is background to reflect on the poignant words of ultra-Orthodox Knesset Member Moshe Gafni who declared that the social-political upheaval in Israel is in fact a religious war. “We are in the midst of a religious war! … their war is neither economic, nor about security nor social, it is a religious war,” Gafni said. And here is the response of opposition leader, Yesh Atid chairman Yair Lapid: “No, Rabbi Gafni, we are not in a religious war, because we have the same religion. We are Jews”.
Lapid would be advised to refresh his history lesson: many religious wars were a result of a dispute between people who, at least initially, also thought they had the “same religion.” Muhammad’s Islam was the common religion of the slaughtered and slaughterers in the battle of Karbala, in 680. This is the battle that laid the foundations for the division between Sunnis and Shiites. The Christianity of Jesus was the religion of the leaders of the Reformation, which resulted, as mentioned, in a long and bloody religious war.
So “we have the same religion” is not a guarantee against a religious war. Now let’s turn to Gafni.
“This is a religious war,” Gafni stated, and one might learn from it that he attributes a religious position to the opposition camp. A religious war is in most cases a war between those who hold one religious position and those who hold another religious position. They can be Catholics and Huguenots (late medieval France), or Zoroastrians and Muslims (early medieval Persia). Does Gafni believe that the Israeli center-left is a religious camp? This goes against the tendency of many coalition leaders to state that the political battle waged in Israel is between those who want a “Jewish state” and those who do not want a Jewish state. In Gafni’s version, like Sunnis and Shiites, like Catholics and Huguenots, what we see is Jews fighting for the correct interpretation of their religion.
A second possibility is that Gafni also forgot his history class, and that when he said “religious war” he did not mean a religious war but a war against religion. That is, an attempt to prevent Jews from realizing their religious belief and practice.
In this case too, it is necessary to be precise with the definitions. Does Gafni refer to an ambition (in his eyes, of course) to turn Israel into a non-Jewish state? A significant share of the ultra-Orthodox believe that a Jewish state means the state of the Jewish religion – but in all other population sub-groups the dominant interpretation of a Jewish state is the state of the Jewish nation. In other words: in the eyes of most Jews, even an attempt to cancel Israel as a Jewish State would not be a “religious war” but rather a “national war.”
So, I bet that this was not Gafni’s intention either. He probably meant the desire — which he attributes to the other side — to prevent religious people from maintaining their faith. If this is what is happening in Israel, it will be a world precedent, because in the current era there is no country that has attempted to abolish the right of people to have religious beliefs and practice. The only trend that we see in certain countries is one aimed at weakening the power of religion in public affairs.
A war for a degree of separation of religion and state is not a religious war. Separation has diverse models, and the one in Canada is not like the one in Japan or in the U.S. or in France. But in no case is this a classical religious war.
There is no religious war in Israel. Most of the opposition do not seek to abolish Israel’s identity as a Jewish state. An overwhelming majority do not intend to prevent Jews from keeping and practicing their faith.
There is no religious war in Israel either. Most of the opposition do not seek to abolish Israel’s identity as a Jewish state. An overwhelming majority of them do not intend to prevent Jews from keeping and practicing their faith. Most of them have little, if any, interest in a pointed debate concerning different interpretations of theological matters. But yes — some of them — perhaps most — do want to reduce the imprint of religiosity on public life. Translated to historical language we can also present their position as follows: if Catholic emissaries would not insist on coming into the castle – there will be no need to throw them out of the window.
Something I wrote in Hebrew
The new Annual Assessment on the state of the Jewish People by The Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI) includes new statistics about the number of Israelis who have, or seek to have, foreign passports. Based on these numbers I wrote the following:
In recent decades, there has been a steady trend of immigration to Israel (that is, the number of arrivals was greater than the number of departures), and this was evidence of economic and cultural strength … Such trends do not usually change within a short period of time, unless a disaster occurs … it is impossible not to recognize that this year there were also some worrying signs in Israel. They raise the possibility that socio-political polarization sharpens the question for quite a few Israelis about their desire to continue living in Israel.
A week’s numbers
Israel’s Chief Rabbi stirred a controversy by saying that eating non-Kosher food makes people dumb. He isn’t the only Israeli who see a connection between beliefs and wisdom.
A reader’s response:
@Ehrliche_Yid tweeted in response to my last week’s column: “The only folks that would show up for this hypothetical scenario [a fictitious org. ‘Progressive Head’ trying to hold a mixed gender Yom Kippur prayer in the city square in Bnei Brak] would be agent-provocateurs while in any city in Israel there are many that would be elated with genuine Jewish Legacy.” My response: Would you care to try? I bet you wouldn’t … I bet it would not be tolerated even as a test, which proves the point I was trying to make.
Shmuel Rosner is senior political editor. For more analysis of Israeli and international politics, visit Rosner’s Domain at jewishjournal.com/rosnersdomain.
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