In search of the secular

BEVERLEY MAY

The 2005 survey of the South African Jewish community (Bruk and Shain, Kaplan Centre) reported that 12 per cent of all adult South African Jews classified themselves as secular. Extrapolating this statistic to current estimates, between 7 800 and 9 000 South African Jews identify as secular, or to use the Pew nomenclature, Jews of no religion.

The survey also reported that 40 per cent of the South African Jewish community believed that the Torah is the actual word of G-d, 40 per cent that it is the inspired word of G-d but not everything should be taken literally and approximately 20 per cent that it is an ancient book of history and moral precepts recorded by man.

Alongside these measurements of religiosity, were measurements of Jewish identity and observance of ritual. Approximately 92 per cent of South African Jews rated their bond to being Jewish between “quite strong” and “strong” and we can expect that 95 per cent of us will be at a seder table this Pesach.

Taken together, these numbers indicate that Jewish identity and tradition are appropriated by both secular and religious Jews.

A poll conducted by the Central Bureau of Statistics in Israel in 2010 found that 42 per cent of Israeli Jews define themselves as secular.

“Secularism is not permissiveness, nor is it lawless chaos. It does not reject tradition, and it does not turn its back on culture, its impact and its successes.” (The Courage to Be Secular by Yizhar Smilansky, pseudonym – Sameach Yizhar)

Amos Oz and Fania Oz-Salzberger identify themselves as secular Israeli Jews in their book, Jews and Words (2012).

This father and daughter team discuss their secular approach to biblical texts as follows: “To secular Jews like ourselves, the Hebrew Bible is a magnificent human creation. Solely human. We love it and we question it. Our kind of Bible requires neither divine origin nor material proof, and our claim to it has nothing to do with our chromosomes. The Tanach, the Bible in its original Hebrew, is breath-taking. Its splendour as literature transcends both scientific dissection and devotional reading.”

Of Talmud the authors say: “Much of the Talmud is alien to us Israeli-born seculars. It holds vast inaccessible stretches, either because they are in Aramaic, or simply because they seem atavistic, legalistic, or nit-picky. But the Talmud steered a dramatic new road, shifting away from biblical intimacy with divine intervention.

While Abraham argued with G-d and Moses reiterated G-d’s words, the Mishnaic and Talmudic rabbis are in the business of unravelling, elucidating, explaining and counter-explaining G-d and Abraham and Moses.”

Communities are defined by content (shared values) and boundaries (who is in and who is not in the group). Empirical evidence suggests that secularism presents a threat to our community since secular Jews may be more likely to be absorbed into wider society at the cost of their Jewish identity. The Pew Survey (United States, 2013) reported that “Jews of no religion” were less likely to marry other Jews or raise their children Jewish.

Secularism also presents ideologies that compete with a patriarchal, faith-based culture. Feminism is one example and finds itself at the rock face of the friction that results.

Rebbetzen Dina Brawer (Jewish Report, August 2015), says that “secular feminism has brought unlimited opportunities for secular education, careers and so on. Yet, when it comes to the Jewish religious space, women have limited choices. So the talents of 50 per cent of our population are poured into matters outside the religious community.”

Organisations such as the Union of Jewish Women (UJW) and Bnoth WIZO have enabled women to explore secular female empowerment within community boundaries. In an article entitled “South African Jewish women’s search for affiliation, esteem and self-actualisation”, Tzilli Reisenberger and Gwynne Schrire examined the role of these organisations in providing a place for women who were denied participation in traditional Jewish bodies in our early history. These organisations also have a proud history of working for women’s rights, both in our community and in wider South African society.

Secularism also presents a different way of being Jewish; potentially problematic for a community that has had an uneasy relationship with diversity.

Dr Chaya Herman wrote extensively about the South African Jewish community’s attempts to maintain unity and homogeneity by advancing the exclusion and seclusion of groups perceived as being outside of the mainstream (2006).

“The recurring message is that Jews in South Africa either join one of the religious communities, or they may lose their Jewish identity.” She quotes from an article in the Sunday Times (Jews outraged at ban on gay rabbi’s talks, February 27, 2005): “We cannot sustain a middle road anymore. We must move to a more observant path or we will lose our Jewish identity.”

In an article entitled “The closing of the South African Jewish mind” (Benatar and Shain, 1997) the failure of the Jewish community to adopt liberal values that accompanied the democratisation and liberalisation of South African politics, is addressed. The authors discuss a lack of tolerance for religious diversity in South African Jewry that ironically increased after 1994.

In similar vein, Dennis Davis said: “This form of Judaism promotes the group at all costs. The individual is then subsumed under the weight of obligations to the group; Judaism then becomes a custom-made product, and the possibility of individual development implodes.” (2009)

While many community organisations are secular in nature and provide opportunity for secular Jews to participate outside of religious structures, there is no formal representation for this group. So when debates sparked by identity and ideology are being considered, who represents their views? Or to use the terminology of the 2005 Kaplan Survey, who speaks for those of us who are “Just Jewish”?

Beverley May is a Vice Chair of the Cape Jewish Board of Deputies. She has an MBA from UCT specialising in economics and finance and completed her Jewish conversion in 2004. These