Five-and-a-Half Myths about Ultra-Orthodox Jews

Aharon Ariel Lavi’s essay, “Are the Ultra-Orthodox the Key to Israel’s Future?” is a welcome contribution to what has become a crowded field. Indeed, the ultra-Orthodox (haredi) community in Israel has become something of a Jewish obsession of late—and for perfectly understandable reasons. Living for the most part in insular neighborhoods, wearing exotic clothes and adhering to exotic practices, this large and rapidly growing group of strictly traditionalist Jews provides a tantalizing subject for journalists as well as filmmakers, fiction writers, and television producers. The news media are particularly committed to exposing the foibles—the more salacious, the better—of the so-called “haredi world.”

Academic interest in the haredi community has likewise blossomed, not least out of a recognition of its growing significance for the shape of the Jewish future. The result has been a proliferation of papers about all aspects of haredi life—from birthrates to beliefs, from family life to politics, and from social and religious norms to variations thereof and deviations therefrom.

But this outside infatuation with the haredi community has also given rise to many a myth, intermingled (as is the way of myths) with facts or partial facts. And these, taken together, have contributed to obscuring rather than clarifying haredi reality. All the more reason, then, to be grateful for Lavi’s deeply informed and thoughtful essay. In my comments here, rather than responding directly to his points, I’d like to round out his account by focusing on five of the most prevalent myths about the haredim in Israel, plus a half-myth that I offer tongue-in-cheek.