Testing Religion

An increasing number of newly religious Jews in
Israel don't want to throw away their secular life.

LARRY DERFNER ISRAEL CORRESPONDENT

ran was dressed in regula-
tion Tel Aviv hip attire —
black T-shirt, black pants,
red sneakers. His black
Charlotte Hornets cap wasn't
part of the outfit, however — for
him it was a kind of"starter" kip-
Pak
Like an undetermined but
clearly growing number of once=
secular, bohemia-inclined Is-
raelis, Eran is a hozer btshuvah,
or a newly-religious Jew. In the
Diaspora, he would be called a
ba'al tshuvah.
He became exposed to this
world three years ago, at age 20.
He got a job at Tel Aviv's Basta
La Basta restaurant, owned by
Ezra Brautman, leader of a local
group of hozrei b'tshuva who fol-
low the teachings of one of the
movement's "hottest" sages,
Nachman of Bratslay. The Brat-
zlever Rebbe, as he's known, died
almost 200 years ago.
For two years Eran would ar-
gue against the existence of God
with those who congregated
around the restaurant. Then,
about a year ago, he says: "I had
a dream where I was in my room,
and the room was dark but I
could see everything as if it was
daytime. There was a man
dressed in black with silver hair
and dark eyes, smoking a ciga-
rette. I was terrified and I woke
up, and I realized I was praying
words I didn't know. The last
thing I said was, `Shma Yisrael.'
I said that to save myself, be-
cause I know now the man was
the Angel of Death."
Since that dream, Eran has
joined the Bratslavers' Thursday
_ night prayer group. He keeps
Shabbat in the company of a like-
minded group of friends, prays
in synagogue Friday mornings,
"sits in" at yeshiva study ses-
sions. Like thousands upon thou-
sands of hozrei b'tshuva, he
makes the occasional all-night
pilgrimage to the graves of sages
buried in the Galilee. "I believe
that their souls are alive and
well, and when I visit their
graves, I get close to them," he
says.
Dr. Mina Tsemach, Israel's
leading opinion pollster, just pub-
lished a survey in which 17 per-
cent of the 2,255 Israelis
questioned said they had grown
"closer to religion" in recent
years. These people are not con-
fined to hozrei b'tshuva, of course
— they also include secular peo-
ple who have begun keeping
Shabbat, nominally observant
Jews who have grown more reli-
gious, and religious Jews who

have become haredi , or Ortho-
dox.
The most dynamic stream in
the movement is found in Israel's
poor urban neighborhoods and
outlying toWns, where the Shas
(Sephardi Orthodox) party is
drawing masses of young
Sephardim to its brand of hare-
di Judaism.
With the huge funding it re-
ceives from the state, Shas is able
to lure poor Sephardim — who
invariably grew up in religious
or "traditional"Jewish homes,
and are thus open to the party's
message — with generous social
benefits like nearly free educa-
tion, child care, food and even
jobs. The religion is imparted via
the vast network of K-12 schools,
synagogues, yeshivot, indoctri-
nation "seminars," cassettes, pi-
rate radio stations and revival
meetings that are all part of the
world of Shas.
But this stream of the hozer
b'tshuva movement is authori-
tarian, hostile to the secular
world, and emphatically political
with strong right-wing leanings.
The smaller stream of the
movement to which Eran belongs
is more informal and pluralistic,
and gentler. It is made up main-
ly of Israelis who are known as
"searchers" — those who came to
Judaism after trying other spir-
itual alternatives.
"I used to be a Buddhist," Eran
says. "I was always searching for
the truth."
Mr. Brautman, who became
hozer b'tshuva two years ago,
says searchers have to be at-
tracted in a special way: "If you
tell a person, 'If you don't do this
and that, you're going to go to
hell,' he'll laugh in your face. Hell
say, 'I'm bisexual; I did heroin,
don't try to frighten me with your
nonsense.' But if you tell him,
`Come let me teach you what love
is,' he'll listen."
The movement has begun at-
tracting some of Israel's leading
performing artists.
Actor/director Shmuel
Viloszny, once a Tel Aviv city
councilman, is a hozer b'tshuva.
Even comedian Gil Kopatch, who
enrages the haredim with his ir-
reverent commentaries of the
weekly Torah portion delivered
on a Friday night TV variety
show, can be counted among the
hozrei b'txhuva.
These hip devotees haven't
turned away in disgust at their
previous lives and beliefs; they
seem to remain who they always
were, except that they've discov-
ered God.

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