The Real Problem with Drafting Chareidim

Not what you think

Since the founding of the State of Israel, the chareidi community has refused to send their sons to serve in the IDF. The simple reason is that the army is mostly secular or secularist, and such service would put them at great risk of losing their religion. This would be catastrophic, not only for those communities and their children, but for the entire population of Israel that only survives in the merit of Torah and Mitzvos. Meanwhile, the chareidi (and strict Torani) population preserves the Torah and fulfills Hashem's will, which protects them and everybody else, including the non and anti-religious. This is a good temporary arrangement, and anybody who has faith in the promises of the Torah, Neviim, and Chazal has no cause for complaint. Only the secularists, who do not understand the immense contribution of Torah observance, view the chareidim as parasites or as not sharing the burden.

However, there is another fundamental problem with any chareidi draft proposal. Chareidim do not believe in a country that accepts ALL Jews regardless of faith. They do not believe in liberal democracy. Chareidim are religious extremists by any standard. This includes college-educated, professional-job holding ones like myself. They really, REALLY believe that ideally, Shabbos violators and homosexuals should be dealt with appropriately according to the Torah, morality police should roam the street and fine people who are dressed immodestly, kefira universities should be closed, and all immoral secular entertainment should be shut down immediately. They desire a strict Torah theocracy. Do secularists want to give weapons and military training to tens of thousands of such people? They are already very uncomfortable with the numbers of right wing religious Zionists who are advancing through the ranks. What would they do with tens of thousands of armed chareidim who have values completely the opposite of theirs? There is no doubt that given the power, chareidim would eventually use those tools to carry out their beautiful Torah agenda, hopefully, more gently than the Macabees did with the Hellenists.

So what do the secularists actually envision when they talk about drafting chareidim? Almost all the rhetoric about this issue speaks of chareidim "joining the rest of society”, that is, cultural integration. Any expectation of chareidi military service must necessarily come with the expectation that they will take on or at least be tolerant of the majority secularist values. Secularists obviously believe that the problem of chareidi separatism is something that could be remedied while in military service. Otherwise, from their perspective, giving weapons and training to such extremists would be pure insanity. Naturally, chareidim are well aware of this expectation, and have no wish to be integrated in this fashion.

However, it is probable that as the Shomer Torah population approaches a majority status, the current arrangement simply won't work anymore, for many reasons. Among them is the likelihood that the secularists will not WANT to join the army to protect a majority religious extremist country. And the flipside is that at that point, the Shomrei Torah will WANT to control the military in order to fully realize their religious ideals, which will only work if they wield police power. As much as the secularists complain about "religious coercion" with the current status quo, it will only get 1000 times better when the religious extremists control every institution of force in the country (if ח"ו Moshiach has not arrived by that time, ומלאה הארץ דעת השם). Of course, the secularists should have nothing to fear, as there is nothing as sweet as a Torah lifestyle. Especially as they start experiencing the many benefits Natan Slifkin has spoken of in his "Benefits of Religion" series.

There is one more aspect here, and that is Moshiach. Rationalists are fond of the Rambam, who says the Redemption will be by-and-large a natural process. However, for this to occur naturally, Moshiach would need to be coming to an already observant population. He is not coming to reign over a country of Mechallelei Shabbos and Boalei Niddos. With current demographic trends, it looks like we are indeed on track for a majority religious population in less than a century. May we merit to see the coming of Moshiach and the rebuilding of the Bais Hamikdash, speedily in our days, Amen.