On Disobedient Sarah Einfeld

The coming out of former Gerrer Hasid Sarah Einfeld, and her movie, ‘Disobedient’, rekindled the old yet welcome debate about that ‘Right course that a man should choose for himself’ (that’s from Chapters of the Fathers, ya’ll).

Sadly enough, there are no surprises. One could divide the backlash against Sarah into the usual genres. The first one nests all those who say that even if the specific Haredi faction to which Sarah used to belong is indeed extreme and leads an ‘over the top’ lifestyle, she could easily find her truth in less disturbed Orthodox Jewish sects, such as other Haredi Hasidic movements or the Religious Zionism. Well, first of all, Ger is the largest of all Hasidic groups in Israel and is arguably the strongest of them all, and within this group, tens of thousands live in a state of totalitarianism.

But more importantly, it seems to me that Sarah just couldn’t see the point of trading large amounts of bullshit for small amounts of it, the totalitarian authority of patriarchic Rabbis for some less totalitarian one, or a culture that aspires to dictate each tiny detail in one’s life for one that dictates only 80% of those. She did not throw out baby with the bath water; rather, she mopped the room, not making a point of leaving dust in some corners.

Other bashers argued that Sarah really did not believe in god in the first place, hence her secularization. Speaking personally again, the idea that someone who believed in god during their childhood cannot get rid of this belief as they grow older seems both depressing and insulting, and more to the point – I know it’s wrong, and I know it first hand.

The process of becoming a secular Jew, at least as I’m familiar with it, is the process of jettisoning the overload of arbitrary, artificial beliefs, which are more often than not the direct result of being born into a certain culture. When your bullshit-detection mechanism starts to kick in, the rational step is to take it to the logical conclusion, putting away all childish things rather than just some of them. If you wean yourself from heroine just to move to softer drugs, you only go halfway.

The incredibly unisonous Haredi reactions only affirm Sarah’s points: the Haredi society is an expert of tightening its ranks and attacking criticizers and deserters, and when real arguments are hard to come by, they resort to attacks on the sinner’s personality or family, strictly observing the mental tradition of the confined Stehtl.

I’ve yet to come across any online comment that elaborated on how the practices described by Sarah’s film facilitate the happiness and psychological well-being of their followers. The attackers did not explain how bringing a multitude of children into crowded, poverty-stricken life improve the happiness of the children as individuals, how whitewashing and silencing actual problems promote genuine solutions to them, or what is the true essence of the rabbinical interpretation to the verse “The king's daughter is all glorious within” (which, in their interpretation, dictates that women should cover themselves). Most online comments came down to attacking Sarah personally, and down to this overwhelming argument: “Secular society is riddled with problems.” Why no, they won’t refer you to any studies. Neither will I. A quick search on the website of the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics gives no numbers sorted by level of religiosity. It seems like we’re left with the anecdotes. Well, if it’s anecdotes you desire, you may listen to Israeli nightly radio shows, where listeners call in to voice their grievance with life. You will find that the percentage of Haredi callers is much higher than their proportion within the general population. Not too shabby for a society that does its best to be isolated from secular media.

To risk an attack on a popular truism, in reality there is no symmetry between the religious world and the secular one. The secular world is less rigid, less dogmatic, and more dynamic and liberated. It’s not a coincidence that the ‘people outside’ are scornfully referred to as ‘free ones’ in Haredi households. Sure, the secular world does have problems, but those are discussed openly. There are abusive secular parents, but the masses do not take to the streets in their defense. Alcoholism and crime are there; the secular media discusses them nonstop, and the public dialogue tries to find a cure for them. Racism is there, but it’s not systematic and inherent enough to turn mixed marriage into exotic curiosity (as it does in Haredi society). True, mutual help in secular society is not as well-developed as the Haredi Gemach, however it might be easier to run such a system of free services when your material well-being already relies on the economic activity of the general society – the same way we used as children to pay invisible money in exchange for toys. Toys that someone else had paid for.

As a non-believer in cultural relativism, I think that some societies are happier and healthier than others. In fact, most of us think so, but we’re deterred from reaching such conclusions when they make us think about fundamental questions regarding our backyard, our Haredi cousins. Most of us would agree that life in Iran, for example, is worse than life in western, liberal countries, and immigration waves leaving traditional countries in favor of liberal ones are evidence of that. Then why, when we start discussing the difference between secular and Haredi societies, are we suddenly quick to find beauty and wisdom in a repressive, petrified culture, and to turn into the champions of relativism, acknowledging the other, and turning a blind eye to the objective plight of hundreds of thousands?

An Imaginary Talk with a rational Israeli (about Gilad Shalit)

What if it were your child?

That being a hypothetical question, I really couldn’t tell. But judging by what I know about human urges, if it were my child, I’d be willing to hide a bomb in our parliament and sneak cyanide into children’s food. This personal, emotional argument is a non-argument, because it takes into account only one perspective. What if it’s your child that will die in a terrorist attack? Would you approve the deal?

We do not know what will happen after releasing terrorists, but we know about a soldier who’s suffering in captivity right now.

Taking into account common sense and history (see Jibril Agreement), we can be pretty sure that at least some of the released prisoners will go back to terrorism, in other words – terrorist attacks. Indeed, the main problem of the Shalit debate is that it cannot be a balanced one – while we have the image of a suffering soldier and a tormented family on one said, we still do not have the faces and names of those who will die in terrorist attacks on the other side; we have yet to see the families of the murdered ones crying over their graves on TV.

All of this doesn’t matter. This soldier served the country, and the country must bring him back.

True, this soldier went there as part of his military service. He willfully chose the role of a combatant, knowing the risks involved. Truth is, in comparison to many other soldiers, he hasn’t been having it too bad. He didn’t get killed, or injured, and apparently is not shell shocked. Soldiers know that they are there to protect civilians. I am certain that Gilad himself wouldn’t want us to turn things around and make civilians his human shield – which is what we’re going to do if we release hundreds of terrorists.

Those are all great arguments, but one cannot conduct one’s affairs by cold reasoning alone. Why, the moment of Shalit’s return to Israel will be a Jewish moment, a patriotic one, the triumph of emotion over reason, as one columnist wrote!

Sorry, I will not participate in this sentimental orgy. You cannot run a country from your guts. If you think you should, how about the names of that Jibril Agreement’s victims for some light reading. What if those were your children?