A while back there was an article in the Jewish Week by Gabrielle Birkner, posing the question of whether hipster Judaism is a substanceless fad or a gateway to Judaism for many once unaffiliated disconnected Jews. Ms. Birkner reports:
But some young people echoing the grievances of Jewish communal leaders say the answer to the worrisome assimilation rate in this country is not dance parties, even crowded ones where guests don Jewfros and Gelt Digger T-shirts.
There’s something really appealing about hipster Judaism, but it often seems to be substanceless, said Bari Weiss, a Columbia University junior and the editor of The Current, a new journal of politics, culture and Jewish affairs. I don’t think any project can sustain itself on great marketing. Cool T-shirts aren’t going to save the Jewish people. Good falafel isn’t going to make people think Israel has the right to exist.
But either is studying torah and praying three times a day in shul. What I noticed in my New York City Jewish life is that young Jews are getting involved. It may not be day yomi classes, shabbaton weekends, and devout observant lives -but it may be these things - but young Jews are getting involved in hanging out with each other and just being proud to be Jewish.
Yes, there are Jewish record labels, t-shirt shops, magazines, and a cadre of hipster artists plugging their youth detritus, but, even if all of these hipster Jews were substanceless crap as fleeting as the Pet Rock, young Jews no longer feel ashamed to be Jewish.
Whether traditionalists like it or not, the new Jews are coming with their brand of Judaism that is going to rock the foundations of Jewish idealogy and patriarchalism. Young Jews are mixing and matching, taking what they like about one strain of Judaism and incorporating into their modern lives.
Critics may say that the meat and potatoes of Judaism is lost in the freestylin of today’s younger generation, but young Jews are rapping about Torah, singing about teshuvah and moshiach, and writing from the bottom of their levs and neshemas. They are being true to themselves and from it is coming a philosophy of life that will serve Judaism well. When the fads fade, and the dust settles, the sloughed skin of old Judaism will give way to a stronger interconnected Judaism that is respectful of all Jews.
Matisyahu will be pedestrian in a decade. Heeb Magazine will seem antiquated. You will start to see Jews stretching the boundaries of tradition, while still maintaining a deep committment to Jewish survival. Can you picture Jewish tatooing being as sacred and respected as Asian tatooing? Can you picture transgender Rabbis? Can you picture Orthodox women leading services? Whether traditional Jews like it or not, it is coming.
But we shouldn’t think of these changes as deterioration, but enlightenment. Judaism is moving towards a greater acceptance of all Jews. And this is why I think the hipster Judaism phenomenon will slough it’s skin and give way to an earthier more spiritual religion that will save itself by accepting itself. The Jerusalem Post reports:
For the last several decades, the issue of greatest concern for many non-Orthodox US Jews has been ensuring Jewish continuity, with rising intermarriage rates combining with a growing number of unaffiliated Jews to threaten the community’s survival. Or so it seemed.
A recent study conducted by America’s National Foundation for Jewish Culture appears to indicate that the situation may not be quite so severe - young Jews, it says, are “highly engaged” in Jewish life, though not through traditional institutions. They are attending concerts but not synagogue services, going to clubs but not Jewish Community Centers. They are tired of the “parochial” attitudes of older generations and are looking for a Judaism whose primary appeal is not continuity alone.
“Art and culture are the new generation’s currency,” said Carol Spinner, the president of NFJC’s board. For years, she said, she’s been pushing mainstream Jewish institutions to back the arts as a way of getting young Jews to engage with tradition. Rather than continuing to rely on more traditional, restrictive notions of what it means to be Jewish, the American Jewish establishment is choosing to let the new guard lead, in part because it is increasingly realizing it has no choice. Perhaps unsurprisingly, New York is leading the way in the development of a thriving new Jewish arts scene.
Historically, artists and new thinkers have always been the revolutionaries who have challenged the status quo, when the status quo was not working anymore. It is no different in this case. Young Jews are sick of the stodgy bet-din idealogy, they are sick of the judgemental, restrictive, patriarchal, and unequal results of a religions that, in essence, is quite the opposite. Only human barriers are stopping Judaism reaching it’s true potential to inspire and heal.
The next time some holier-than-thou Jew tells you that you are disgracing Judaism, flick your nose ring in that person’s face, and say “Shalom,” which means goodbye to him and hello to the future.
The future’s so bright I’ve got to wear a black hat.
