Jewish state

The term "Jewish state" is sometimes used to describe the State of Israel and refers to its status as a nation-state for the Jewish people. This concept of an ethnic Jewish homeland is enshrined in Israeli national policy and reflected in many of Israel's public institutions. The concept was codified in the Declaration of the Establishment of the State of Israel on 14 May 1948 as well as in the Law of Return, which was passed by the Knesset on 5 July 1950, and stated "Every Jew has the right to come to this country as an oleh," an "oleh" being an immigrant Jew http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Immigration/Text_of_Law_of_Return.html. This is intended to make citizenship easier to acquire for Jews.

Jewish state or a state of Jews?

There has been growing debate in Israel on the character of the state, if it should enshrine more Jewish culture, encourage Judaism in schools, enshrine certain laws of Kashrut and Sabbath observance within Israel. This debate reflects a historical divide within Zionism and among the Jewish citizens of Israel, which has large secular and Orthodox Judaism minorities, and a majority who lie somewhere between the two.

Related Topics:
Jewish - Judaism - Kashrut - Sabbath - Zionism - Secular - Orthodox Judaism

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Zionism is rooted in a concept of the Jews as a nation. Some Jews believe the Jewish religion to be central to Jewish nationhood, and hold that Israel, as a Jewish state, has a mandate to promote Judaism. Further, a great majority of these people see Israel not as the state of its citizens, but as the state of the Jewish people, including those in Jewish diaspora. In this capacity, they believe that Israel has a mandate to promote Judaism, to be the center of Jewish culture and center of its population, perhaps even the sole legitimate representative of Jews worldwide.

Related Topics:
Nation - Diaspora

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The theory continues that as a people based on religion, having a secular state would be oxymoronic in nature, and do more to harm than to help world Jewry.

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These Religious Zionists say that a secular state of Israel is in danger of becoming merely a country of "Hebrew-speaking Gentiles" who are on the path to abandoning their Jewish heritage, and instead Religious Zionists wish to establish what they see as an "authentic Jewish commonwealth" which preserves and encourages Jewish heritage.http://www.ahavat-israel.com/ahavat/protest/jews.asp

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They also argue, — drawing an analogy to diaspora Jews who assimilated (voluntarily or otherwise) into other cultures and abandoned Jewish culture, — that the creation of a secular state in Israel is tantamount to establishing a state where Jews assimilate en masse as a nation: an anethema to Jewish national aspirations.

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Other Zionists believe that Israel should be a state like any other. According to them, Israel was established according to the Zionist dream of Jews being a people like any other with their own right to self-determination. The reason for such establishment was to have a state where Jews would not be afraid of anti-Semitic attacks and live in peace.

Related Topics:
Self-determination - Anti-Semitic

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Religious Zionists counter that assimilating to be "a nation like any other" without embracing one's culture does what anti-Semites have not been able to achieve for thousands of years, mainly the destruction of the Jews as a people.

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Partisans of the first view are almost exclusively Orthodox, although many supporters are conservative and nationalist in nature, who view Judaism with respect and would not mind more Jewish culture promoted by the state, although not to the point of creating a purely Halakhic state. Partisans of the second view are predominantly, though by no means exclusively, secular. Although the debate has a huge polarity, from radical secularists who believe that Israel should be a secular state for "all its citizens" to theocrats who believe that Israel should be a state based purely on Orthodox Jewish Halakha, Israel has, to date, steered an imperfect course more or less between these poles, waxing and waning between secularism and Jewish identity, usually depending on who controls the Israeli High Court of Justice.

Related Topics:
Halakhic - Theocrats - High Court of Justice

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