How the Middle Way Can Save Us

Can compromise save Israel from the Israelis?

Many would question my authority to write this piece. With Israel under sufficient threat and in such turmoil, I am overcoming my shyness to toss my hat into the ring.

I believe the only way to resolve the acrimonious differences in the Israeli Jewish community is to acknowledge the merit in the complaints of each sector of our nation and to chart a course of compromise between them. If we are to survive and overcome our present challenges, we must find some common ground.

I will outline what I think is the time-honored Middle Way, which perhaps even Maimonides might have endorsed.

Healing the secular-religious divide in Israel

Secular and national religious Jews have a right to resent the refusal of most Haredim to serve in the army and their participation in the “black economy,” allowing those wishing to, to evade paying national taxes. They have a right to object to the absence of most Haredi men from the workforce, men who refrain from significantly supporting their large families and contributing in varied ways to the prospering of the nation.

Not all the young men engaged in full-time study in yeshivas and kollelim are suited for it or are giving it their all. No less an exalted source than the Chovos HaLevavos in Sha’ar HaBitachon explains that God distributes talents among human beings widely but differently so that all the needs of a population can be fulfilled by its members.

As Israel is treated like more and more of a pariah, we will need to depend on ourselves for everything. That Israel suffers from a shortage of doctors, for example, in unconscionable, when healing is a sacred, essential vocation. Some of those young men who are uninspired by full-time Gemara learning have talents in science, engineering, and other fields. There should be God-fearing professionals in every sphere; their labor, while keeping halakha (Jewish law) and making time for regular Torah study, is eminently holy according to our traditional sources.

Mutual flexibility for the greater good

So, what is the Middle Way of compromise in education?

Let the secular admit Bible and halakha studies to schools nationwide, from kindergarten through high school, to fortify our young people with spiritual strength and self-confidence, and let the Haredim admit enough secular studies to equip their young men who are not motivated or destined to become exceptional Torah scholars, to train for practical work and professions, without compromising their strictly religious way of life.

With state support, Haredi schools can train those who are not expressly suited for Torah greatness to serve the nation with the talents with which they were blessed. The state should offer them a suitable religious environment in which to do so. This is a win-win for everyone that can build Haredi pride in those not blessed with a Gemara “kop,” self-esteem, and communal self-support.

And let the Haredim open opportunities for our multi-talented young women to prepare for more than just a narrow set of jobs allowing them to quickly support a husband in full-time learning.

I submit that a cross-section of young men from all sectors must serve in the army once the environment is rendered fit for Haredi young men. As it is now, the mingling of genders makes Haredi enlistment in most units impossible. Let the army make itself genuinely suitable and then see Haredi enlistment rise.

Haredi, Torani, and Dati Leumi families have a right to resent the pervasive lewdness in dress, speech, and comport in the public square, which poses risks to our sanctity as a nation, to marriage, and to our children’s upbringing. Some nonobservant Jews have precious little respect for the ethic of sexual purity and restraint up until and within marriage that religious families hold dear.

Religious parents have a right to keep their children out of schools which force them to use an internet that seduces young people with a bacchanalian free-for-all before they have the mature neural wiring to step on the brakes. They have a right to shield their children from toxic ideas about gender propelled by the cultural zeitgeist. These ideas lack common sense and disrespect the unique strengths of men and women.

And finally, religious families have a right to repudiate the prevailing Western dogma of atheism and agnosticism, championed by some on the Israeli Left. They have the duty to raise their children to revere the Jewish people’s unique, sublime heritage. Faith in God and the preservation of our Mesorah (tradition) are the anchors protecting our nation’s mental health in the face of the international onslaught of antisemitism.

Can anyone sincerely argue that the world’s zeal to defeat the Jewish State can be explained without appeal to the spiritual and supernatural, when our holy Torah warns us expressly of this painful fate, when we are disobedient to its commands? The entire world has lost its moral compass because the Jewish people is not serving its role on the international stage.

When we return to our own Mesorah, the world will respect us again. It is only faith in God and the fulfillment of our biblical covenant that will offer the Jewish people deliverance from our enemies. It is high time this reality is faced and embraced by the mainstream of our nation at its most fragile, vulnerable point in history.