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. ❑ Ahh, the classic seduction scene. Something cozy to relax in. 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