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The Obedient Bride:Patriarchy and JewishReligious FundamentalismArnold Abramovitz aa University of Cape Town (retired),Published online: 10 Jan 2011.

To cite this article: Arnold Abramovitz (2003) The Obedient Bride: Patriarchy andJewish Religious Fundamentalism, The International Journal of Human Rights, 7:2,138-143, DOI: 10.1080/13642980308629710

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- COMMENT -

The Obedient Bride: Patriarchy and Jewish Religious Fundamentalism

ARNOLD ABRAMOVITZ

The biblical Covenant retains a powerful hold on believers around the world. I take Jewish religious fundamentalism to be the consequence of an ardent relationship of subjugation and submission between the God of Israel and his faithful congregation, or Covenant partner, or Bride. Given the Middle East context, I try to arrive at the Bride's own perspective of this unique bond and its political implications. That requires telling the story, as sympathetically as a non- believer can, of what outsiders, both Jewish and gentile, may see as a bewildered casualty of history; a victim who has, directly or through secular proxies, grown powerful enough to violate the rights of those she categorises as sinners, traitors, enemies, or inferiors.

Since I don't share the beliefs of religious fundamentalists' I need to indicate how I regard the source of their inspiration, in this case the Bible itself.

My mentor, here and elsewhere, is Dan Jacobson. Speaking about fictions of various kinds, he refers to the invention of an omnipotent God and his chosen people as 'one of the most compelling and also one of the most catastrophic in human h i~ tory ' .~

YVhat was it, one might ask, that prompted the children of Israel to invent him in the first place? Jacobson gives his answer. 'They invented him, one can say, so that they might be chosen'!'

Creating and worshipping a God,4 it seems, is a little like being involved in a serious, passionate love affair. In each case we find ourselves giving expression to our deepest needs and yearnings and fantasies - all translating eventually into concrete obligations and expectations.

Arnold Abramovitz, University of Cape Town (retired)

The International Journal of Human Rights, Vo1.7, No.2 (Summer 2003) pp.138-143 P U B L I S H E D BY FRANK C A S S , LONDON

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PATRIARCHY AND JEWISH RELIGIOUS FUNDAhlENTALIShl 139

Thus, it is not difficult to identify several points of correspondence between the relationship of the biblical deity to his chosen people, on the one hand, and that of a traditional patriarch to his children and - even more aptly - to his chosen marriage partner, on the other.

Drawing on several of Jacobson's insights, I take Jewish religious fundamentalism to be the consequence of an ardent relationship of subjugation and submission behveen the God of Israel and his faithful congregation, or Covenant partner, or Bride.

The Bride's crrrreut political ttzood, itowever, sterns from the way their partnership has developed i r z only the last few d e ~ ~ d e s . ~

How could one arrive at her own perspective of this unique bond and its political implications?

To begin with, contrast a secular or sceptical stance with the Bride's fervent beliefs concerning the blessings and burdens bestowed on her by her L ~ r d . ~

He is the alrthor alrd arbiter of her being: his pozuer aud his word are absolute. O f d l hro~mnkirtd, she is his one, favotrred possessiorr: be requires both her fidelity arrd her avoida~tce of the imptrre and the rutclearz.' The sacred Coveizar~t they entered into loug ago is still bitrdirtg orr each of theilz - t o the letter. As her reward for slrbserviettce he will protect aud strpport bec she accepts Iter history of ~~risfortrute as jtrstice meted otrt for disobedierzce.

How does her Lord administer his collective punishments? To whom does he delegate the task? To her enemies, of course! They might think that in persecuting her they are fulfilling their own agendas, but in reality they are nothing more than his agents of retribtrtio~t - and will be getting their comeuppance from him afterwards!

Rabbi Richard Rubensteins acknowledged that this was indeed the way true believers made sense of historical adversities. But since Holocaust victims would thereby have been divinely chosen for destrtictiorr he underwent a crisis of faith.

Yet the Sinai Covenant's salient quality of c o e r c i ~ n ' ~ is there for a11 to see and could be summed up as follows:

Szrbnzit t o tny tenrzs or be destroyed.

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140 THE INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUhlAN RIGHTS

Naturally, coercion and compassion, hostility and benevolence, can coexist. Picture a secIuded household of growing children whose single parent dotes on them but is unaware of what is owing to them as persons with rights. To ruhonr cnrr they trint for relief h i t their own, sole, all- powerfitl, lovi~rg, abusive caregiver? Aud zuhot~ else are uzilrzerable dependants likely to believe irr a d enztilate?ll

Similarly, an isolated person can sometimes faithfully bear an endless sequence of abuse from her male partner." This is how she might explain her situation:

In myseIf I am lowly and rootless; what saves me and elevates me (and can arouse deadly envy and resentment!) is that someone who is far above me has singled me out for special trials and disciplines. Not that I don't get the occasional treat: he can be extremely generous - sometimes after an outburst.

Yes, it's true that I don't always measure up to his standards. But I keep doing my best to obey him and please him (and not look at another!), hoping for fewer upheavals and more kindliness. Maybe he'll even remember his promise about, you know, finally moving back into our own place ... O w kind of lo~rg-term irttit~zacy is often disparaged; yet where zuorrld I be ruithozit his nrithority? Arrd where worrld he emoritrter deuotiorr like nri~ze?

In her youth the Bride began to keep a sacred record of his actions and utterances. Their early history is recounted, especialIy her release, at his hands, from centuries of slavery, followed by their exchange of vows at Sinai and their entry into the conquered Land. The texts uphold her Lord's supreme moral authority - even ruhen her eventrral zi~rfaithfilness results in pzitrish~~re~zt by dispossessiorr atzd exile.

There were times during that two-thousand-year banishment when she wondered whether his commitment remained firm. What if the tie between them were to weaken?') Unthinkable! His goodwill could turn; but to indifference, never! Their ideirtities irrterlock, their destinies are yoked.

Then, four millennia after his first pledge, using an insane ex- corporal's band of thugs as his instrument of correction, he acts again; this time with unprecedented severity."

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PATRIARCHY AND JEWISH RELIGIOUS F U N D A h l E N T A L I S h l 141

Bzrt lorrg before she cars cozzze to her serzses a szidde~z reversal of fortzrnes occrirs. Not only does he fulfil his promise to restore the Land to her, the Deed is endorsed - on certain terms - by the highest assembly in the world!

Consider this Bride's lifelong sense of both exaltation and victimhood - now intensified by his most splendid gift being coupled with his most terribIe visitation. Cozrld she have becorrre arzythirzg brrt a bewildered casrialty ?

She could indeed. Having risen in prominence and influence, what she conveys to the world is not, 'I am in trouble', but rather, 'I am owed'. What could that mean? Victim grown strong enough to get her own back?

Her response is immediate:

And why not? Look at the bloodshed whereby the boundaries and sovereignty of the goyim were originally won. Are they not sitting o n piles of skulls, the forgotten price of their sense of security?

Israel's path lies outside history, our rabbis cleaving faithfully to its sacred Title Deed. Yes, sacred. Anything else would have resulted in our dissolution. Their fervent study keeps us whole.ls

From them we learn how his eternal pIan for our Redemption is to be carried out. After near amlihilatiozz zue are to ensrrre his holy ~ratiorz's slirvival and reco~tstrtrctiorr:'~ this time the entire Land will be his - and Ismel's - irz perpetuity ...

She has not always been so forthright. During the years of wandering her rabbis were far less divided." She

foIlowed a strict but clear list of rules. She knew where she stood with him: if she did not keep the Lalo she corrld not have the Laud.

Returning home brought predicaments. There was the ongoing trouble with the neighbours. How did he tuarzt her to act? She had cried out for interpretations that were clear and simple.

With grotuitzg accord she is cot~zrzzartded to prevail. Failing her permnrzent possessiorz of Coverlarzt Lmzd he camot be hirrzself!

To protect his holy name she aims his word and his sword - directly or via secular p r o ~ i e s ' ~ - at her ancient rival, the unchosen seed of Ishmael,

For centuries she has lived to serve her Lord's immutable, rabbinically mediated will.

She will not fail him now.

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T H E INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF HUhlAN R I G H T S

N O T E S

1. See especially I.S. Lustick, For the Land atid the Lord (New York: Council on Foreign Relations, 1994). The adherents of a religious fundamentalist belief system regard its tenets as God-given and absolute; acting on them usually has immediate, far-reaching political consequences. This article is concerned with how key biblical themes specific to Jewish religious fundamentalism have been embraced in an ongoing historical, psychological and poIitical process. All relevant biblical quotations and references may be found in D. Jacobson, The Story of the Stories: The Choserz People and its God (London: Secker & Warburg,l982).

2. Jacobson (note 1) pp.1, 3. As far as the aims and conclusions of this article are concerned it should not matter whether God is Israel's Creator or her creature. The overriding question is, 'How -as Iris otort people see it - has his nature been disclosed through his dealings with them?'

3. Ibid., p.42. What were they chosen for? What favours could they look forward to? No less than military conquest of a prosperous land, followed by secure political sovereignty: undreamt of prospects for a semi-nomadic tribe of former slaves.

4. The ancient Israelites made sure not to design a God that merely gave them what they wanted. They took great pains, in their conception, to include those things that he wanted of tltent. How else could they have shown that they intended to be worthy of his special preoccupation with their identity and destiny?

5. In more secular terms: dramatic changes have taken place in the politicisation of members of ultra-orthodox movements since the rebirth of israel as a State in 1948.

6. To the Bride the 'burdens' are not an imposition. Out of all the nations on earth, to have had 'the yoke of the Law' placed on her neck is seen as a sacred privilege.

7. She is, in his words, a holy nation. Her absolute fidelity to him is logically linked t o her having to be constantly aware of the clean and the unclean, the sanctioned and the proscribed, the chosen and the excluded.

8. The Bride is part of a wider aggregate of co-religionists. She is aware that collective unfaithfulness usually points to elements (the sinners, traitors and reformists of Israel) that have violated his Covenant. Each single individual will receive his just deserts in the fullness of time.

9. R. Rubenstein, After Alrscktwitz: Radical Theology and Cotztenipormy Judais~tz (New York: Bobbs-hierrill, 1966), pp.46-58.

10. Jacobson (note 1) pp.71-97. Apart from specific judgements that follow 'due process', all Israel is threatened with sttrnrnary extrajtrdicial curses. Luridly elaborated, they are four times more extensive than the blessings for obedience.

11. There are several ways of reacting to flawed single-parent control. One is to saj; in effect, 'If the most formidable authority figure in my life hasn't always been "fair" to me, who am I that I should be "fair" to those around me!'

12. Although the curses held over the Bride spelt real disasters, any talk about a God 'abusing' his people would be anachronistic. The inclusion of these threats in the very constitution of the God of Israel undermines the otherwise justifiable claim that it embodies a nascent doctrine of human rights. The Bride contrives t o study, and apply, his elaborate legal code (sometimes even acclaiming its implicit ethic of individual rights) twhile at the sarne tittle nzrrtely serving one or other of his ~rttcociified collective sentences. And she can cleave to her status of victim while banishing any fleeting suspicion that her own Lord might be the primary victimiser. She \\-as, after all, an obscure Cinderella without prospects before his choice fell on her. She has come to terms with the de jure reality that it was on her - over all others - that the King of the Universe had placed his affections and demands. That reality has dispelled any misgivings over his treatment of her down the ages.

13. Her doubts may signify that she feels connected to him most strongly when getting something specific - whether benefaction or castigation - fronz him. Both bear witness to his power: it is the extended abseme of both that may evoke anxiety.

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PATRIARCHY AND JEWISH RELIGIOUS FUNDAMENTALIShl 143

14. Rubenstein (note 9) pp.46-58. As a perceived punishment for what must have been the correspondingly grave sins of the modern European diaspora, the Holocaust was unusually harsh in that so many perished over so brief a period. However, in the context of the downfa11 of the Kingdoms, the loss of the Land, the destruction of the Temples, and the various atrocities and persecutions of the Exile, the Holocattst corrld be seetz (6y biblical fitndmrentalists) as trot fallitrg orrtside the arrzbit of God's dispematiolr of illstice. (Rubenstein tried, and failed, to get his fundamentalist Lutheran colleague to repudiate this notion. I have tried, and failed, to find a single reference to its being repudiated by any ultra-religious source).

15. Veneration of the Hebrew Bible and its accretions over two millennia was the chief way of reinforcing the reality of his major documented prodamation: rightfill occrlpatiott of the Lattd as a rervard for obedience. (Nor, in other words, as the goal of unilateral political activity).

16. E.L. Fackenheim, T/7e ]eruish Bible after the Holocarrst: A Re-reading (Indiana University Press 1990), pp.50f. Co-operation with secular groups began well before the State of Israel came into being. Even atheist Zionists received rabbinical endorsement for wittingly or unwittingly doing the hlessiah's work on the soil of God's 'holy abode' (chosen even before the people).

17. Her religious leaders faced an acute dilemma over Israel's rebirth as a state. Several of them claimed that it went against God's express wish that the Land could be formally taken back before the coming of the hlessiah. The turning point was the victorious 1967 ('Six Day') War. That mas interpreted (by most of them) as a sign of his approval. (His approval is not, of course, seen as extending to Israel's forttt of government: how could he be expected to tolerate anything less than an out-and-out theocracy?).

18. S. Rachlevsky, Tbe hiessiah's Donkey flel Aviv: Yediot Aharonot, 1998). In Israel today Rachlevsky regards fundamentalist alliances with secular forces as actually or potentially exploitative. Ultra-orthodox activists claim to be in the service of the hlessiah, while categorising non-religious fellow-citizens, however important their contribution, as the hlessiah's beast of burden: worthy but subordinate.

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