Shenhav criticizes encyclopedia for exaggerating secular character of Israeli society
September 14, 2007 7:39 am Israeli Culture War, Secularization, Culture Wars, Holy Wars: The Clash within CivilizationsAn incomplete sketch of secularism - Haaretz, September 14, 2007
In 2000 Eliezer Schweid, a professor of the history of Jewish thought, defined Israeli society as “post-secular,” arguing that, according to self-definition, the secular make up some 10-15 percent of the Jewish population in Israel, Orthodox-religious Jews of various stripes account for 20 percent, and the rest label themselves as “masorti” (observant of Jewish tradition) - a group that includes most Mizrahi Jews and members of the Conservative and Reform movements.
It is true that one can turn the tables and argue that only 20 percent define themselves as Orthodox-religious Jews; but the power of the post-secular argument lies precisely in the fact that it makes it possible to recognize both possibilities at once, along with movement in the space between secularism and religiosity, a space that defies clear distinctions. Also, political scientists Charles Liebman and Yaacov Yadgar have shown in their joint research that “secularism” as a self-definition is a default position, not an independent category of identity. They also showed that the “ideologically secular” account for only about 8 percent of the population.