NEWS FEATURE: New Technology Casting Its Spell On Israel’s Ultra-Orthodox Jews

c. 2000 Religion News Service JERUSALEM _ Sporting a long, reddish beard, black yarmulke and formal suit, Eliezer Ram would fit right into any one this city’s yeshivas, where hundreds of young and middle-aged ultra-Orthodox men like himself sit on hard, uncomfortable benches from morning until night _ studying and debating ancient Jewish legal texts. […]

c. 2000 Religion News Service

JERUSALEM _ Sporting a long, reddish beard, black yarmulke and formal suit, Eliezer Ram would fit right into any one this city’s yeshivas, where hundreds of young and middle-aged ultra-Orthodox men like himself sit on hard, uncomfortable benches from morning until night _ studying and debating ancient Jewish legal texts.

But today, this portly 33-year-old Israeli, a member of the eastern European Hassidic “Belz” ultra-Orthodox sect, spends most of his waking hours in front of a computer screen in a shiny, new office complex. He is working for a high-tech start-up firm developing technology for the wireless, hand-held computer market.


Ram is in the vanguard of a trend social critics say may change the face of Israel’s ultra-Orthodox community, an insular society dedicated to the strict preservation of Jewish tradition, and a life of rigorous religious study.

Driven by economic need, growing numbers of young ultra-Orthodox men and women are entering Israel’s burgeoning high-tech industry.

The unique twinning of religious brainpower with the demands of the high-tech workplace has proven so successful some are predicting it will trigger changes ultimately leading to greater integration of the community into the broader workforce, the military, and mainstream Israeli society.

“This is the beginning of a radical change that will be beyond the control of the rabbis and the government,” said Bar Ilan University Professor Menachem Friedman, Israel’s leading expert on the ultra-Orthodox community.

Ultra-Orthodox Israeli leaders, whose lives are anchored in the preservation of tradition, are themselves often loath to speak in expansive terms of a social upheaval in their community.

But Ram, who immigrated at the age of 16 to Israel from the United States, where ultra-Orthodox men commonly work in professions outside of the yeshiva world, is more forthcoming. “Is a revolution taking place here? Yes,” he said, firmly, flipping to a Web page he recently designed for a Jewish back-to-religion Internet site. “More and more people are looking for ways to go to work.”

Until recently, most young ultra-Orthodox men reaching the age of 18 could expect to spend the next decade or two of their lives nearly impoverished, studying in state-supported yeshivas. Their wives worked part-time as teachers or secretaries, professions barely providing more than a minimum wage income.


“The situation in Israel is really quite unique,” said Ram, who got into computers seven years ago, after studying in a yeshiva for nearly a decade. “In pre-World War II Europe, and in the United States today, most ultra-Orthodox men eventually went to work, and developed professions after pursuing dedicated yeshiva studies for a few years.”

In contrast, college studies and technical training gradually became taboo for a whole generation of Israeli ultra-Orthodox youths who were groomed solely within the walls of the yeshiva. While the ultra-Orthodox sought to create a community of religious scholars, average Israelis saw them as mere parasites.

The perennial quest by rabbi-politicians for bigger educational and welfare subsidies for ultra-Orthodox families has exacerbated the rift between religious and secular society. Particularly over the past five years, secular-religious disputes have regularly destabilized Israel’s government, and hampered the country’s ability to make fateful decisions on broader issues like the peace process.

A controversial new draft law, approved tentatively by the Israeli Knesset this week highlights the efforts of politicians to change this uneasy status quo by providing young ultra-Orthodox yeshiva students with an easier entree into the military forces, the great melting pot of Israeli society.

But social changes are difficult to legislate, said Friedman. In fact, the really profound integration of the ultra-Orthodox into mainstream Israeli society is taking place in the workaday world, rather than in the military.

At 30 years of age, Yitzhak Rafaeli is riding on the crest of the wave. Four years ago, he left the yeshiva to join a novel new educational project, The Ultra-Orthodox Institute for Technical Studies. The institute, founded by a visionary group of religious educators, some of them American-born, opened the gates of secular, higher education to ultra-Orthodox men.


Two years later, Rafaeli and 20 other members of that first graduating class of computer programmers were immediately recruited into jobs by manpower-hungry high-tech firms, earning $2,000 or more a month.

Rafaeli’s new apartment in a sprawling, ultra-Orthodox housing project of stone apartment buildings just outside of Jerusalem is still a relatively modest ultra-Orthodox dwelling with its spare furnishings dominated by large bookcases of Jewish legal volumes. But outside the living room, a ceramic-tiled patio and carefully-trimmed lawn reflect something of the newfound comfort and affluence wage-earners like Rafaeli now enjoy.

“I think studying is important, and I’ll eagerly await the day that I can return to it,” said Rafaeli. “But for a family, such a life is no picnic. You study from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. every night. And you give up a lot of comforts. Besides, it was hard on my wife, who had to support the family largely on her wages as a part-time accountant, while also raising the children.”

(BEGIN OPTIONAL TRIM)

The ultra-Orthodox institute from which Rafaeli graduated now has 1,200 students, including both men and women, studying in four locations around the country. For the first time ever, an academic diploma is also to be offered in the institute, another first in the ultra-Orthodox world.

“We have courses to become computer programmers, software engineers, hardware technicians and network engineers,” said director Rabbi Yehezkel Fogel. “And we also offer programs in business management, accounting, architecture and building engineering.”

Most of his ex-yeshiva students betray a strong intellectual bent, as well as a work ethic that drives them to excel, a combination that gives them the potential to succeed in the high-tech world. But the years of education devoted only to religious law also leaves beginners deficient in basic language and mathematical skills, Fogel said.


(END OPTIONAL TRIM)

And what of those who remain in the yeshiva?

Rafaeli and Ram believe that despite the lure of higher incomes, there will always be plenty of young men who aspire to become religious scholars, reflecting deeply-held ultra-Orthodox values and preserving the traditional shape and structure of the society.

Friedman, on the other hand, is less certain about how things will look in another decade or two.

“Right now we are seeing the entry of a small, relatively select group of ultra-Orthodox into the high-tech world _ people who have the intellectual talent to make the transition from religious studies to high technology at the relatively advanced age of 25 or so,” he said.

“Not everyone is capable of that,” he added. “But the experience of this group, and the fact that they are suddenly earning a lot of money, will trigger a chain reaction in the rest of ultra-Orthodox society, which will eventually seek out similar opportunities.

“Eventually, I believe, parents will demand a more general education for their children, so that they, in the future, can enter a wide variety of professions. And that will generate even broader change. In fact, if it happens, and I think it will, the ultra-Orthodox community will never be the same again.”

DEA END FLETCHER

Donate to Support Independent Journalism!

Donate Now!