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PATHS TOWARD UTOPIA

Philip V. Bohlman

in Jewish Music and Modernity

The ontologies of Jewish music changed to reflect a transformation of the past into a utopian future at the end of the long nineteenth century, especially as World War I brought about the end of much ... More

The ontologies of Jewish music changed to reflect a transformation of the past into a utopian future at the end of the long nineteenth century, especially as World War I brought about the end of much traditional Jewish life in Europe. New cultural movements swept the Diaspora, not least among them Zionism, both in cultural and in political forms. Jewish music absorbed the images of the new utopias beyond the crisis of modernity: the paradise of a modern Israel; new forms of settlement, such as the collective kibbutz; the pioneer songs that allowed Jews in the Diaspora to sing in Hebrew about the past that had the potential to be the future. The case studies in the chapter include the attempt to create a canon of national Israeli art songs in the 1930s and the endeavors of the first organization cultivating Jewish music in the Yishuv, the World Centre for Jewish Music in Palestine, in the late 1930s.Less

Commons and legality

AVITAL MARGALIT

in Property and Community

Analyzing the current trend in common property theory to contextualize the relationships between commons and their environments, and suggesting a more sensitive, dynamic, multi-dimensional frame of ... More

Analyzing the current trend in common property theory to contextualize the relationships between commons and their environments, and suggesting a more sensitive, dynamic, multi-dimensional frame of analysis — one that will examine the interaction between internal variables of the commons and external variables stemming from the environments, and do so along a time axis — this chapter incorporates legality into the analysis of commons' governance. Exposing the assumptions underlying current theory regarding the place of law in the reality of the commons, the chapter offers, as an alternative, a cultural approach for the analysis of the relationship between commons and legality. Presenting the case of the Kibbutz as a test case, it concludes by demonstrating the merits of combining old and new insights on commons and legality in promoting our understanding of the fascinating phenomena of the commons and its modes of governance.Less

Equal Opportunity in Higher Education in Israel: Lessons from the Kibbutz

Yaakov Gilboa and Moshe Justman

in Growing Gaps: Educational Inequality around the World

This chapter draws from the experience of the Israeli kibbutz to address the question of why middle-class students are more successful in the competition to enter higher education. The chapter ... More

This chapter draws from the experience of the Israeli kibbutz to address the question of why middle-class students are more successful in the competition to enter higher education. The chapter provides a conceptual framework for measuring equal opportunity in education. It then describes the problem of equal opportunity in access to higher education in Israel. It also provides some background on the organization of the kibbutz and its education system. The last section of the chapter presents the data and the findings of statistical analysis.Less

Property in the Kibbutz: Old and New

Abraham Bell, Gideon Parchomovsky, and Benjamin Weitz

in Legal Strategies for the Development and Protection of Communal Property

In this chapter, we discuss the unique property norms that emerged within the Israeli kibbutz and the challenges to which they gave rise. Originally, the prevailing property regime in kibbutzim ... More

In this chapter, we discuss the unique property norms that emerged within the Israeli kibbutz and the challenges to which they gave rise. Originally, the prevailing property regime in kibbutzim reflected a deep commitment to socialist ideology. All property was owned by the collective and individual members only held licences or permits to use kibbutz property. With time, as Israeli society has moved towards a free market economy and following a series of financial crises, most kibbutzim have abandoned the strict ban on private property and have gradually gravitated towards a system of private property rights. This transition has given rise to intricate legal challenges. It forced kibbutzim to adopt a system of allocating private property rights to their members in assets and has required Israeli courts to grapple with unique property arrangements that existed solely within kibbutzim and effectuate them within the formal legal system.Less

1948 to 1967: From Defensive War to Preemptive War

Reuven Firestone

in Holy War in Judaism: The Fall and Rise of a Controversial Idea

The War of Independence was considered by virtually all Jews everywhere as a war of defence against Arab armies and irregulars who attempted to destroy the nascent Jewish state. Its success after the ... More

The War of Independence was considered by virtually all Jews everywhere as a war of defence against Arab armies and irregulars who attempted to destroy the nascent Jewish state. Its success after the horrors of the Holocaust spawned an upsurge in messianic expectations that soon subsided under the pressure of building a state apparatus where none had existed previously. Much of the ideological fervour that drove the revolutionary movement of Zionism subsided in the face of the need for institution building and the absorption of masses of Jewish refugees from the Holocaust and Muslim lands in the Middle East and North Africa. The old ethos of avoiding war at all costs broke down during this period as well as punitive and pre-emptive military acts were carried out by Israeli forces against Arab militaries and civilian populations. Under the auspices of the military rabbinate, the Orthodox Jewish community begins to consider the sanctity of various portions of the traditional Land of Israel.Less

The 1980s: Holy War and Its Excesses

Reuven Firestone

in Holy War in Judaism: The Fall and Rise of a Controversial Idea

Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook symbolized and crystallized a trend that was developing organically in religious Zionism. He was uncompromising on the essentials of a messianic form of Zionism and popularized ... More

Rabbi Tzvi Yehuda Kook symbolized and crystallized a trend that was developing organically in religious Zionism. He was uncompromising on the essentials of a messianic form of Zionism and popularized a combination of ultra-Orthodox absolutism with an ideology of human activism inherent in modern nationalist movements. This equation produced a militant nationalist messianism (or messianic nationalism). Kook considered the Three Vows to have been cancelled and taught that with God's sanction, the Jewish nation is on the final and inexorable path to divine redemption through building up the Land of Israel – all of the Land of Israel. God not only sanctions this redemptive moment of history but decrees it. Any compromise is a renunciation of the divine plan and a violation of God’s will. The movement that crystallized around Rabbi Kook actually carried the previously moderated and often unspoken messianic ideals of Religious Zionism to their logical conclusion, which resulted in a new contextualization and modern articulation of Jewish holy war.Less

Kehilatenyu – Our Community – The Kibbutz

in No Heavenly Delusion?: A Comparative Study of Three Communal Movements

The Kibbutz has 115,000 members which is much larger than either the 2,500 of the Bruderhof and the slightly more than 1,000 members of the Integrierte Gemeinde. In addition to size, the Kibbutz is ... More

The Kibbutz has 115,000 members which is much larger than either the 2,500 of the Bruderhof and the slightly more than 1,000 members of the Integrierte Gemeinde. In addition to size, the Kibbutz is also a much more varied movement than the other two. One similarity between the Kibbutz and the Bruderhof is that they both take the form of communes. This chapter looks at the history of the Kibbutz and its characteristics as an institution, the kibbutzim, the members' living standards, education of new members and the crisis experienced by the movement in 1985. Finally, it examines the Kibbutz's commitment to Zionism and its relation to the mainstream society of Israel.Less

Our Gang

Oz Almog

in The Sabra: The Creation of the New Jew

The pioneers of the Second and Third Aliyot were not just Zionists seeking to establish a Jewish polity; they were revolutionaries who wanted to create an entirely new and specifically Jewish ... More

The pioneers of the Second and Third Aliyot were not just Zionists seeking to establish a Jewish polity; they were revolutionaries who wanted to create an entirely new and specifically Jewish society. As socialists, they took as their goal the creation of a commonwealth in which relations between people would be based on true equality, mutual assistance, and mutual respect. The economic forces that, so they believed, controlled the structure of human relations in a capitalist society would no longer determine the fate of men and women. This chapter discusses the following: the kibbutz community, the culture of the circle, the group in discourse and language, and Sabra friendship in war.Less

The Village as Military Outpost

S. Ilan Troen

in Imagining Zion: Dreams, Designs, and Realities in a Century of Jewish Settlement

This chapter describes how self-defense became a main concern for Jewish villages in the 1930s. Responding to the increasing outbreaks of conflict and growing competition with the country's Arabs, ... More

This chapter describes how self-defense became a main concern for Jewish villages in the 1930s. Responding to the increasing outbreaks of conflict and growing competition with the country's Arabs, planners gave unanticipated preference to the kibbutz as the instrument for expanding settlement. For approximately twenty years, from the mid-1930s through the early 1950s, the kibbutz was the spearhead of Zionist settlement policy. After the establishment of the state when an army was available to defend borders, the moshav displaced the kibbutz, again becoming the preferred model. Thus, the colony of 100 families was shaped not only by religion, ideology, and economics but, eventually, also by compelling strategic and political considerations that evolved from the growing conflict with Palestine's Arab population.Less

Zion in Babel: The Yishuv in Its Arabic-Speaking Context

Liora R. Halperin

in Babel in Zion: Jews, Nationalism, and Language Diversity in Palestine, 1920-1948

This chapter looks at the scope of Jewish engagement with Arabic in Jewish communities and organizations in Palestine. It addresses four discrete but interlinked ways and settings in which some Jews ... More

This chapter looks at the scope of Jewish engagement with Arabic in Jewish communities and organizations in Palestine. It addresses four discrete but interlinked ways and settings in which some Jews encountered, sought out, or deployed Arabic: community Arabic courses provided to kibbutz dwellers and other agricultural communities in rural regions of the country; Jewish contact with Arabic in the region of Tel Aviv; intelligence and military operations that gathered information about communal goings-on through the use of Jews who knew Arabic; and Zionist Arabic-language newspapers aimed to affect Arab public opinion. It shows that Arabic knowledge and use appeared to be a solution to both the apparent impossibility of future harmony and the loss of a past coexistence.Less

Kibbutzim: The Challenge of Transformation

Raymond Russell

in Contemporary Israel: New Insights and Scholarship

After playing a prominent role in Israeli society, the kibbutz movement went into decline from the mid-’50s to the mid-’70s, resulting in a loss of status and influence. The rise of the right-wing ... More

After playing a prominent role in Israeli society, the kibbutz movement went into decline from the mid-’50s to the mid-’70s, resulting in a loss of status and influence. The rise of the right-wing Likud party in 1977 brought changes in economic policies, which dislodged the kibbutz movement from its previously powerful position. The resulting financial crisis led many kibbutzim into bankruptcy, forcing a radical reorganization that culminated in a renewal effort, which included various degrees of privatization.Less

Serving the Party and at Odds with It “Has the time come to forgive Germany?”

in The Fall of a Sparrow: The Life and Times of Abba Kovner

Kovner returned to Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh when the War of Independence ended, which marked the beginning of almost four decades of channeling his energy into various civilian projects. He was a member ... More

Kovner returned to Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh when the War of Independence ended, which marked the beginning of almost four decades of channeling his energy into various civilian projects. He was a member of Mapam and Hashomer Hatzair, dealing with its leadership and members, and traveled widely outside Israel as an envoy of both the movement and, later, of the Diaspora Museum. Kovner perpetuated Jewish history and the history of the Holocaust in plans he devised for founding museums and other institutions, and integrated Jewish culture into the kibbutz's daily life. He wrote literary works and was deeply involved in Israeli society; he had a family and friends, and continued nonstop until he died, not yet 70.Less

The Kibbutz Rebbe: “I am Alone in the Fields”

in The Fall of a Sparrow: The Life and Times of Abba Kovner

This chapter details Kovner's activities in Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh, where he lived and worked for forty years, from the time he joined in 1946 until his death in 1987. Determined neither to allow the ... More

This chapter details Kovner's activities in Kibbutz Ein Hahoresh, where he lived and worked for forty years, from the time he joined in 1946 until his death in 1987. Determined neither to allow the Holocaust to erase East European Jewish culture nor to permit Zionism and the kibbutz to beget a lifestyle devoid of ceremony and Jewish content, Kovner tried to create a new kind of community at Ein Hahoresh. Beginning in the early 1950s, in a community that in theory was supposed to distance itself from Jewish tradition and create a new lifestyle, he forged his own synthesis between old and new.Less

The McDonaldization of the Kibbutz Dining Room

Nir Avieli

in Food and Power: A Culinary Ethnography of Israel

This chapter addresses the unexpected consequences of the privatization of iconic kibbutz institutions. Based on ethnographic research conducted in the dining rooms of three kibbutzim in different ... More

This chapter addresses the unexpected consequences of the privatization of iconic kibbutz institutions. Based on ethnographic research conducted in the dining rooms of three kibbutzim in different stages of privatization, or “McDonaldization,” the chapter follows the contested meanings of the dining room experience. The food and eating patterns that prevail in these dining rooms are presented as expressions of hegemonic power structures, and their modifications reflect changing values within and beyond the kibbutz. The chapter's findings challenge the common understating of the “kibbutz crisis,” or the understating of failure in general as a consequence of the rise of individualism in contemporary Israel.Less

Thai Migrant Workers and the Dog-Eating Myth

Nir Avieli

in Food and Power: A Culinary Ethnography of Israel

This chapter studies the prevailing total social fact that the Thai migrant workers who make for the bulk of the agricultural workforce in Israel systematically hunt and eat Israeli pet dogs. Despite ... More

This chapter studies the prevailing total social fact that the Thai migrant workers who make for the bulk of the agricultural workforce in Israel systematically hunt and eat Israeli pet dogs. Despite extensive media accusations and widespread public consensus regarding the Thai penchant for Israeli dogs, ethnographic research reveals that Thai migrant workers do not hunt or eat dogs in Israel or in Thailand. The chapter argues that Israel's constituting socialist ethos conflicts deeply with the notion of migrant labor, especially when it comes to agriculture in the “working settlements”—kibbutzim and moshavim—that are the iconic manifestations of socialist Zionism. The chapter shows how this culinary myth defines a particular kind of negative exoticism that facilitated the dehumanization of the Thai migrant workers and justified their ongoing exploitation.Less

Introduction

in No Heavenly Delusion?: A Comparative Study of Three Communal Movements

This book compares three communal movements the roots of which can be traced to the German Youth Movement: the Kibbutz, the Bruderhof and the Integrierte Gemeinde. While all three movements live what ... More

This book compares three communal movements the roots of which can be traced to the German Youth Movement: the Kibbutz, the Bruderhof and the Integrierte Gemeinde. While all three movements live what is known as a ‘common life’, they do not live the same type of common life. The Kibbutz movement and the Bruderhof communities take the form of ‘communes’, whereas the Integrierte Gemeinde members belong to small ‘table communities’. The book explores the impact of the movements upon their host societies as well as their interactions with their host societies. It also considers how they have created an ‘alternative society’ and indeed alternative economy for their members. Finally, it discusses the process by which all three movement rejected contemporary ‘bourgeois’ society and chose to live in non-bourgeois ways.Less