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Dina is a doctor, secular, and a long-time Tel Avivan. Ten years ago, after a traumatic event in her family, she looked for some organization or setting to study Judaism in. Not that she had turned religious, far from it; religion, rabbis, all the rite and ritual left her cold. What she wanted was a pleasant, friendly, free setting, where she could sit down with people like herself to hear lectures and discuss issues relating to Judaism’s past and the development of Jewish thought, and most of all find answers to help her define and understand her own identity. She looked for months and found nothing. Everything offered her was either overtly or covertly religious. I met her last month at the Community seminar at Ephal College, a regular convention which brings together scores of organizations in a mass ‘happening’ on Jewish issues. Short and dynamic, she popped up all of a sudden from the thousands there to ask for help in choosing from the sea of events, lectures, and debates on offer. “There’s so much here, such an abundance …it’s simply incredible”, she exclaimed after describing the frustration of her previous searching, and then exclaimed, half statement, half question: “…and after this they still say that Judaism does not belong to us…” and ran off so as not to miss a debate entitled “What do secular Jews believe?”.
She is quite right. Anyone who looks through the newspaper columns of announcements and advertisements and compares what is on offer today with what was on offer a few years ago will at once notice the great change that has taken place in seculars’ attitudes to Judaism. Week in, week out, there are dozens of conferences, public meetings, lectures and events aimed at the secular public and designed and set up by organizations and bodies with a completely secular outlook. Without publicity, hundreds, perhaps thousands, of study group sessions and khevrutot convene each year in public buildings and private homes, in almost every part of the country. The past alienation from Judaism, the avoidance of everything ‘Jewish’ is still with us, the nihilism and the ‘now-ism’, the post-modernism and the post-Judaism, but now there are also great numbers of seculars for whom Judaism is no longer a pejorative term, much less something belonging to other people. They are full of curiosity about the subject and looking for something positive. Some of them take the initiative and join existing study settings or set up their own.
At the very time that the universities hardly have a handful of students in Jewish Studies, over the last decade dozens of bodies and organizations have sprung up with the declared objective of promoting Jewish Studies among the secular public. Against the reality of a Ministry of Education, controlled for decades by religious political parties, a trend for more and more sections of religious Jewry to go over to Ultra-Orthodox extremism, and of a public perception that secular Jews want nothing to do with Judaism in any form, here we have these groups and organizations flourishing in their efforts to meet a real and widespread need — the need of people who want to clarify and spell out what makes them Jews and what it means to be Jewish.
In these past ten years, the organizations working in the field of secular humanist education have built up impressive resources of knowledge, expertise, experience, programs and projects, and most important of all, have assembled a body of superb personnel, who know Judaism, possess a firmly-founded worldview, and are equipped with the intellectual compass and ability to provide a modern interpretation for the secrets of the past and for what is happening in the present. In the frantic and fierce competition from all directions, which is Jewish culture today, they stand their ground calmly and knowingly, appreciating the realities of contemporary Jewish existence, feeling no need for apologetics, and commanding the experience and skill to bring Judaism alive for a young audience. They believe that Judaism belongs to all of us, because each generation has to shape Judaism’s character and qualities anew in its own image and likeness. The key task, they know, is to find the right way to link up secular students with their past, with their Jewish inheritance and identity.
The rest of this article is given over to a listing and brief description of the secular organizations currently working in the field of Jewish education. Together, their activities constitute an impressive achievement of thought and scholarship, program design, teacher training, group study, devising new activities and ceremonies for celebrating gala days and festivals, and work with students of all ages and backgrounds. Together, they represent a new and powerful phenomenon in Israeli society.
JUDAISM IS MORE THAN JUST A RELIGION
EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS AND ORGANIZATIONS TEACHING JUDAISM AS A CULTURE AND CIVILIZATION, OF WHICH THE JEWISH RELIGION IS PART
THE ADAM COLLEGE (Midrasha) FOR DEMOCRACY AND PEACE
Jerusalem Forest, P.O. Box 3353, Jerusalem 91033
Tel: 02-6448290 Fax: 02-6752932
E-Mail: adam@adaminstitute.org.il
The Adam College develops and applies syllabuses and courses, designed to promote education in democracy and peace. It also organizes in-service training courses, study days and seminars for various sections of the public.
ELLUL - BET MIDRASH
8 Bustanai St., P.O. Box 8158, Jerusalem 91081
Tel: 02-5619436 Fax: 02-5619425
E-Mail: elul@netvision.net.il
Ellul is a cultural-educational center based around a bet midrash (house of study). It was established by a group of secular and religious Israelis, with the aim of creating a secular-religious alliance, founded on joint study and mutual acknowledgement. The method of study employed combines traditional Jewish formats with new texts and insights. The full program of activities includes: a general bet midrash, a bet midrash for teachers, workshops on a range of subjects designed for various audiences, lessons and workshops for new immigrants, plus a center which devises new ceremonial for life-cycle events.
BINAH - THE CENTER FOR JEWISH IDENTITY
Ephal Seminar, Ramat Ephal, 52960
Tel: 02-5342513 Fax: 02-5346579
E-Mail: binatak@inter.net.il
Binah’s concern is to explore issues of Jewish identity, Hebrew culture and Jewish thought. It offers the general public batei midrash (long-term study groups) which go deep into aspects of Jewish spirituality, as well as a lecture program and occasional study days. It also organizes in-service training courses for school teachers and a wide range of in-school activities for students.
BAMIDBAR - A COLLEGE IN THE DESERT
P.O. Box 380, Yerukham 80500
Tel: 07-6580150 Fax: 07-5690324
Bamidbar is a bet midrash housed in Yerukham Community Center (in the Negev desert) and sponsored by all Local Government Authorities in the area. It brings together Jews of all denominations and communities, from Yerukham itself and the surrounding kibbutzim and moshavim, new immigrants and veteran Israelis, men and women, to study the Jewish sources from the Bible to the present day.
GVANIM
P.O. Box 346, Sderot 87013
An urban kibbutz providing educational services to children and adolescents and disabled persons in Sderot and the South.
THE MIDRASHA AT ORANIM
Oranim, Tivon Postal Region, Kiryat Tivon 36006
Tel: 04-9838753 Fax: 04-9830232
E-Mail: midrash@macam.ac.il
The Oranim midrasha is an educational center for seculars. Its program reflects its educational philosophy that Judaism is a living, developing culture and that the sources of Judaism are sources of inspiration, not of authority. It is active in promoting joint activities with religious people open to a cultural-spiritual dialogue. Midrasha educators, who continue their own studies in the khevruta format (traditional Jewish informal study group), run a range of community activities and design new ceremonial for the festivals and life-cycle events.
THE COLLEGE FOR JEWISH CULTURE
P.O. Box 4030, Haifa 31040
Tel: 04-8235661 Fax: 04-8235661
Active in Haifa and the North, the College provides in-service training courses for school-teachers and youth leaders, as well as lectures, debate forums, guided tours, lessons, secular-religious encounters, etc.
THE CENTER FOR JEWISH EDUCATION IN THE DIASPORA, HAIFA
Haifa University, Har Hacarmel, Haifa 31905
Tel: 04-8249834 Fax: 04-8249060
E-Mail: yemina@research.haifa.ac.il
The Center, one of Haifa University’s research institutes, organizes congresses, study days, in-service training courses, and creativity workshops in Jewish art for teachers and educators in Israel and the Diaspora. It also publishes scientific articles and educational materials, maintains conctacts with Jewish communities outside Israel, and organizes community activities in Israel to promote pluralism within Judaism.
KHAMAH — NETWORK FOR SCIENTIFIC HUMANISTIC EDUCATION
P.O. Box 93415, Tel Aviv 61393
Tel: 03-6353789 Fax: 03-5353653
E-Mail: hama@barak.online.net
Khamah’s goal is to get education made the nation’s number one priority and to reflect progressive, scientific and humanistic principles. A subsidiary objective is to amend the State Education Act and to get a larger budgetary appropriation for the General State Education sector [one of the five state-supported but autonomous sectors of the Israeli education system; of the remaining four, three are religious and one Arab]
MEITAR, COLLEGE FOR JUDAISM-AS-A-CULTURE
21, Herzog St., Jerusalem 92387
Tel: 02-5611820 Fax: 02-5611359
E-Mail: meitr@netvision.net.il
MEITAR is a center for secular education: its paramount goal is to convince the Jewish public that Jewish culture and tradition is fundamentally pluralist. Its educational work is aimed at making all sections of Jewish society more equally informed about their tradition and culture and its multiple sources. It does so mainly by designing and disseminating interdisciplinary syllabuses and courses in Judaism, in which Judaism is understood as the pluralist culture of the whole Jewish people.
MEITAR’s main areas of activity, reaching every part of the country, are:
Taking MEITAR-designed educational projects into schools, in the form of in-service training courses for teachers and special syllabuses, courses and projects for students and parents. For the general public and new immigrants, it provides education and general enrichment, a range of lectures, seminars, workshops, study days, and long-term study groups on Judaism-as-a-Culture themes. At the academic level, it develops and applies study tracks in Judaism-as-a-Culture in partnership with Haifa University and Akhva College. MEITAR has also been instrumental in publishing 11 books in the field of secular humanist Judaism.
MELITZ - INSTITUTES FOR JEWISH ZIONIST EDUCATION
19, Yishai St., Jerusalem 93544
Tel: 02-6733441 Fax: 02-6733447
E-Mail: info@melitz.org.il
Melitz organizes a range of activities on the issues, both of immediate and fundamental relevance, which concern Israeli and Diaspora Jews. Its educational work is designed to strengthen links between Jews in Israel and overseas and to emphasize the centrality of culture and democracy in our lives. Melitz staff are drawn from all sections of Jewish society in Israel and the Diaspora. Its programs include: short and long-term workshops, study days, curricular programs, field trips and summer camps.
THE BENIGN CIRCLE (Ma’agal Tov) COLLEGE
5, Antigonus St., Jerusalem 93303
Telefax: 02-6789946
This is a community college, operating from the premises of the Gonen High School and involving Gonen students, leaders of local Hashomer Hatza’ir youth groups, other Jerusalem students, and teachers and parents.
NEOT KEDUMIM
P.O. Box 1007, Lod 71100
Tel: 08-9770777 Fax: 08-9770766
E-Mail: gen_info@neotkedumim.org.il
Neot Kedumim is a 250-hectare national park and nature reserve near the town of Modi’in. It displays the flora and fauna of the biblical Land of Israel together with passages about them from the Bible, Mishna, Talmud, and Midrash. Visitors can thus see and experience the same sights and landscapes that their forefathers daily saw around them in biblical and talmudic times, and also see in use the crafts and implements typical of the agriculture of those times. As well as catering to the general public, the park also arranges special educational tours for school-teachers and students.
ALMA — HEBREW COLLEGE
4, Betzalel Yaffe St., P.O. Box 36069, Tel Aviv 71100
Tel: 03-5663031 Fax: 03-5663033
E-Mail: alma-heb@inter.net.il
Alma, a college for advanced study in the humanities, focuses on research into Jewish cultural studies and the critical assessment of the forces and factors shaping Jewish civilization and culture, past and present. The College offers: a variety of interdisciplinary teaching methods, study in bet midrash format of a wide range of texts from the Jewish heritage and world culture, a design center for life-cycle ceremonies, in-service training courses, study evenings, external study programs for the general public, lectures, and public debates. Its teaching staff is drawn from both the academic and bet midrash worlds, as well as from creative writers.
THE KVUTZAT REUT ASSOCIATION — KIBBUTZ BET YISRAEL
P.O. Box 11232, Jerusalem 91111
Tel: 02-6760580 Fax: 02-6768412
Kibbutz Bet Yisrael is an urban kibbutz (in the Gilo neighborhood of Jerusalem), founded in 1993 by people who had left other kibbutzim in the belief that their efforts were more urgently needed on the social front. Secular and religious, they work together to realize a vision of a just and pluralist society. Their program of activities combines community and educational work for the general public with help for the disadvantaged and new immigrants in the neighborhood. Kibbutz facilities: a regular child day-care center, activity programs for children during the holidays, help with homework, communal festival celebration, and a preparatory pre-army-induction course (designed to help develop a new cadre of religious and secular community leaders).
THE OREN PROJECT
Oranim
Tel: 04-9838729 Fax: 02-9832277
The Oren Project builds educational programs designed to clarify and reinforce Israeli and Diaspora Jews’ Jewish identity. It has designed special programs for English-speaking and Russian-speaking new immigrants, as well as a community leadership development program for young people born in Israel.
KOLOT — A MIDRASHA IN SHA’AR HANEGEV COLLEGE
Sha’ar Hanegev College, M.P.O. Box Hof Ashkelon 79165
Tel: 07-6801407 Fax: 07-6899412
E-Mail: davnurit@hotmail.com
An education center aiming to help people cope with questions of identity and of response to the sources of Judaism and Zionism. Its method is interdisciplinary small-group study combining practice and theory. The midrasha has made it a priority to respond to the particular needs of population groups across a wide social spectrum.
KOLOT BA’AM
17, Rahel Imenu St., P.O. Box 8434, Jerusalem
Tel: 02-5638460 Fax: 02-5638461
E-Mail: kolot@netvision.net.il
The Kolot Association designs and implements leadership training projects, aimed at people in business and the communications industry. The aim is to make them part of and contributors to a renewal of Israeli Judaism, and to altering the values and content of Israeli society and culture. The Association’s staff of secular and religious men and women all share the same interdisciplinary teaching approach, which emphasizes that its subject matter must be directly relevant to contemporary social issues.
THE CENTER FOR COOPERATIVE STUDY - KIBBUTZ TAMMUZ
P.O. Box 4566, Jerusalem 99500
Tel: 02-9918872 Fax: 02-9918874
E-Mail: yiftahgol@netvision.net.il
Tammuz is an urban kibbutz founded in the town of Bet Shemesh in 1987. It runs study groups for those young people and adults (kibbutz members and Bet Shemesh residents) interested in setting up socio-cultural dialogue through studying together texts from Jewish and world culture. A second aim is to nurture new local community leaders, who will work to help disadvantaged groups by stimulating community organization and self-help.
SHORSHIM - JUDAISM, CULTURE AND SCIENCE
P.O. Box 7588, Jerusalem 91074
Tel: 02-5666231 Fax: 02-5631004
Shorshim’s main activity is to organize encounters for study and discussion between religious and secular, tradition and modernity,Torah and secular studies. Its lecturers, who represent all sectors of Jewish thinking and society, wish to establish a Jewish mindset which does not fear dialogue with science and research, a Judaism which seeks out questions and questioners. Shorshim organizes seminars, study days, study trips, ‘nights of vigil’, festivals and courses in all parts of the country. One of the highlights of its year is the annual Jewish Studies festival at Kfar Blum.
DIALOGUE IN THE GALILEE PANHANDLE
Har Vegai, Kibbutz Dafna 12235
Tel: 06-6942320 Fax: 06-6959039
A secular organization for Jewish renewal, working to encourage North Galilee residents to create a modern Jewish culture. It organizes long-term study groups and runs a center teaching young people about the Jewish festivals and Holy Days.
SHITTIM - THE KIBBUTZ JEWISH FESTIVALS CENTER
Kibbutz Bet Hashitta 18910
Tel: 06-6536344 Fax: 06-6532683
E-Mail: chagim@bethashita.org.il
The Jewish festivals archive was founded on Kibbutz Bet Hashitta by Arieh Ben Gurion in the 1940s and has expanded since then into a cornucopia of materials on the Jewish festival calendar and the celebration of life-cycle events. Out of the archive has grown the Festivals Institute, which now organizes combined guided tour-study days on biblical episodes linked to the surrounding Jezreel Valley, on themes linking the festivals with the countryside and nature, and on a century of Zionist settlement in the Valley. The aspiration behind the activity is to provide a Jewish foundation to contemporary Israeli culture and to create understanding between Jews who have diverging approaches to their Jewish heritage. The Institute distributes kits of information and materials on every festival and Holy Day, as well as articles and pamphlets on how the life-cycle events are celbrated in Jewish tradition.
HAMEORRER
Kibbutz Ravid, Tiberias Postal Area
Tel: 06-6787807 Fax: 06-6787806
E-Mail: meorer@inter.net.il
An organization founded by ex-youth movement leaders and members with the aim of encouraging young people to take an active part in shaping the new Israeli society. It organizes trips to Poland to discover the roots of the Zionist revolution there, and also tours of local Galilee museums.
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