Professor Adam Ferziger on Students, Teachers, and the Israelification of Modern Orthodoxy

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	Forwarded this email? Subscribe here for more The Quiet Revolution Inside Israeli Orthodoxy Professor Adam Ferziger on Students, Teachers, and the Israelification of Modern Orthodoxy Madlik Disruptive Torah Dec 4   READ IN APP   Beneath the surface, Israel is fighting for the soul of its religion. Not in the way headlines usually tell it — Haredim vs. secular, settlers vs. Supreme Court — but in a quieter, deeper struggle over what Judaism in a sovereign Jewish state is supposed to be. And, if you listen closely, you can hear a very unexpected accent shaping that fight: An American one. This week on Madlik Disruptive Torah, Rabbi Mintz and I sat down with Professor Adam S. Ferziger, author of the new book Agents of Change – American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism. We used Parashat Vayishlach and Jacob’s return from exile as our guide, and then followed that thread all the way to 1980s Riverdale, Bnei Akiva camps, Meimad, Rav Kook, Rav Soloveitchik, and something Ferziger calls Israeli “Moderate Orthodoxy.” What emerged is a story about students and teachers, exile and return, and how ideas born in American Modern Orthodoxy quietly migrated to Israel, simmered below the surface for a generation, and are now emerging as one of the most important forces in Israeli religious life. Jacob Comes Home With Baggage We opened with Jacob. “Jacob comes home with baggage. Not emotional baggage, though he has that too, but literal, visible wealth and experience. He left the land alone and terrified. He returns with flocks, family, and a new identity… I lived with Laban and I acquired.” Genesis 32:6 Jacob’s journey in Vayishlach is, as we framed it, the Torah’s first fully developed story of return from exile: He leaves home under duress. He spends years abroad, in an alien environment. He builds a life – family, flocks, skills, strategies. And then he comes back… different. Once you see that pattern, you start to notice it everywhere: Abraham descends to Egypt in a famine and comes back “very rich in cattle, silver, and gold.” Genesis 13:2 The Israelites leave Egypt not empty-handed, but “stripping” it of silver, gold, and clothing. Exodus 12: 35-36 The return from Babylonia brings back courts, literacy, public Torah reading, and a whole new religious infrastructure. The rabbis push this further: exile, they say, isn’t only punishment; it’s productive. It “gathers sparks,” spreads Torah, builds new capacities gains new followers. What you gain out there eventually comes home. And that’s the bridge into Ferziger’s work: What if American Jews – and specifically American Modern Orthodox Jews – are Jacob coming back from Laban’s house? An Anglo Bubble in Kfar Saba Ferziger and his wife, Dr. Naomi Ferziger, made Aliyah in 1987. They were, in his words, “typical Modern Orthodox” olim: Yeshiva background (two years in Israel, including Yeshivat Har Etzion). American college degrees. Comfortable in both Torah and Western culture. Professionally oriented, ultimately both building serious academic and communal careers. They settled first in Jerusalem and then in Kfar Saba, a very Israeli town adjacent to the more Anglo-friendly Ra’anana. Ferziger served as a communal rabbi for years, then moved into academia, eventually becoming a professor at Bar Ilan University and holding the Samson Raphael Hirsch Chair in the Israel and Golda Koschitzky Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewry. From the beginning, he felt like part of a small Anglo bubble – warm, idealistic, but peripheral. He tells a story from the 1988 Israeli election that crystallized this feeling. Back then there was a party called Meimad. It positioned itself as a moderate, traditional, religious alternative to the increasingly right-wing, settlement-oriented, stringency-focused religious Zionist party that had dominated for years. Ferziger talked to lots of people. Everyone in his circles seemed excited. “It seemed clear that Meimad was gonna get like 5, 7, 10 seats… and it got none. Zero. And I realized after thinking about it that it wasn’t that everyone was voting Meimad… it was that I knew everyone who voted Meimad.” The party, he discovered, was essentially the political expression of a small cadre of Anglo immigrants. The world he came from – Modern Orthodoxy as he knew it from New York, Riverdale, Ramaz, Yeshiva University – was not just a minority in Israel. It was marginal. Even “deviant,” in some eyes. Modern Orthodoxy vs. Haredim vs. Kippah Srugah At this point in the conversation, we had to clarify terms. If you ask most American Jews what religious movements have the potential to influence Israeli Judaism, they’ll talk about: Conservative (Masorti) Reform (Progressive) Maybe Havurah or independent minyanim. Ferziger’s big claim is that these “imports” have, for the most part, remained imports – visible, important in certain niches, but not structurally transformative. Modern / Moderate Orthodoxy, he argues, is different. To understand why, we needed a quick map: Haredim – visible markers: black hats, payot, long coats. Ideologically, they typically see modernity as primarily a threat. Engagement is tactical (economics, politics), not embraced as opportunity. Religious Zionists (Kippah Srugah) – originally a synthetic movement: Torah + nationalism + some elements of modernity. Over time, particularly after the Six-Day War, a specific stream – associated with Rav Kook and later his son Rav Tzvi Yehuda Kook and Yeshivat Merkaz HaRav – became dominant. They: Saw the State of Israel as a messianic stage. Interpreted 1967 as a triumph and kind of redemptive event. Gradually adopted stricter halachic practices, less engagement with secular culture or academia. Produced what is sometimes called “Hardal” – a blend of Haredi personal piety with Dati-Leumi (national religious) ideology. When Ferziger arrived, this Hardal / Kookian camp was very much on the rise: “The people who were considered the spokespeople, the representatives in Knesset, the inspirational figures, were primarily those related to that camp… I studied in institutions where I was exposed to those. They were wonderful people. But as a historian, I experienced that something changed – and I wanted to understand how.” He contrasts this with his American upbringing: In Riverdale, at Ramaz, in shuls led by people like Rabbi Dr. Yitz Greenberg, he had been raised on the assumption that Judaism and modernity are partners, not enemies. He grew up with Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik – the Rav – as the titular figure of Modern Orthodoxy. Soloveitchik, with his PhD from a German university, embodied the Torah u’Madda (Torah and knowledge) ideal. Modern Orthodoxy, in this formulation, doesn’t deny the tension between tradition and secular culture – it lives inside it. It teaches you not to choose one over the other, but to balance, navigate, synthesize. Religious Zionism in Israel began as a derivative of that same integrative impulse. But by the time Ferziger arrived, the dominant strain had become much more nationalist-messianic, more stringent, and more culturally insular. Skirts at Camp and the Religious Zionist Mainstream Ferziger tells a small story that captures this shift. His daughter was in Bnei Akiva, the main religious Zionist youth movement. Summer camps in Israel are short – a week, not seven – but they still have visiting day. When he and his wife came to visit, they noticed something: All the girls were wearing skirts (a marker of more religious modesty). It was a rule of the camp. As he sat with his daughter and wife, eating sushi on a dusty hill, he noticed a few girls walking by in jeans. “I said to my daughter, ‘Hey, that’s interesting…’ My wife said, ‘Adam, you’re not doing research right now.’ But I asked anyway. My daughter said, ‘Oh, they’re from the religious kibbutz movement. They have a grandfather clause because in the 1950s they wore pants, so they’re allowed to. But they’re like, you know, peripheral. They’re not part of the mainstream.’” The message was clear: The center of religious Zionism had moved. The dominant culture was more Hardal, more stringent, more inward-looking. The more open, modern, kibbutz or university-affiliated religious voices were pushed to the margins. Today, says Ferziger, that picture has changed. The religious Zionist community is far more diverse. The Kook/Merkaz Harav camp is still large and influential, but next to it has grown a broad, assorted ecosystem of rabbis, educators, academics, and activists who: Are deeply committed to halacha and Torah learning. Are academically trained (men and women). Are engaged with Israeli culture, literature, politics. Are open to feminist voices, critical study, and complex contact with secular society. The question in Agents of Change is: How did that happen? Agents of Change: Eight American Teachers, Many Israeli Students The heart of Ferziger’s book is a simple but powerful observation: The transformation in Israeli religious Zionism did not start with institutions, parties, or position papers. It started with teachers. Ferziger identifies eight figures, most of them direct or indirect students of Rav Soloveitchik, who began their careers in North America in Modern Orthodox settings and then made Aliyah between 1965 and 1982: Rabbi Dr. Aharon Lichtenstein Rabbi Dr. Nachum Rabinovitch Rabbi Dr. Chaim Brovender Rabbi Dr. Daniel Tropper Rabbanit Chana Henkin Rabbanit Malka Bina Rabbi Dr. David Hartman Rabbi Dr. Shlomo (Stephen) Riskin What they had in common: They were deeply rooted in Modern Orthodoxy: Torah + general knowledge + openness to Western culture and ideas. They founded or led institutions of higher Torah learning in Israel — yeshivot and midrashot for both men and women. They attracted Israeli students, not just Anglos. At first, says Ferziger, these American rabbis and educators were regarded as Martians: To the Merkaz Harav world, they were exotic outsiders. Their approach to halacha, secular studies, and Israeli society was unusual, even suspect. Their institutions were small, fringe, “nice for Anglos.” But something quietly remarkable happened over time: “Their Israeli students studied with them, heard their approach, internalized it… and then did something crucial: they didn’t copy them.” Ferziger insists on that point. This is why he calls the phenomenon “Israeli Moderate Orthodoxy,” not “Israeli Modern Orthodoxy.” It is: Rooted in the American Modern Orthodox experience. Recalibrated for Israeli reality. Developed by Israeli students who: grew up in Hebrew, served in the army, lived in mixed secular-religious cities and towns, and brought their own cultural, political, and spiritual experiences into the mix. Good students don’t become clones; they become heirs. It took time. The “agents of change” arrive by the early 1980s. The visible impact begins, in earnest, only in the 2000s. Why? Because the students needed to grow up: Study. Marry. Establish synagogues, schools, kollelim, midrashot. Publish books and op-eds. Become Roshei Yeshiva, heads of seminaries, public intellectuals. In other words, the real story is not just the eight original American imports. It is the second generation – the Israelis who took their Torah and made it Israeli. Starbucks, McDonald’s, and the Taste of Torah To explain why these ideas eventually took hold, while other “imported” Judaisms (Reform, Conservative, Havurah) mostly stayed on the margins, Ferziger borrows a concept from globalization studies. Some global brands, like McDonald’s or Starbucks, used to simply copy-and-paste the same product into every country. Sometimes that worked. Often, it didn’t. More clever companies learned to localize: Coffee chains tasted local preferences. Fast food brands added dishes with regional flavors. The brand remained recognizable, but the menu changed shape. This transnational model, Ferziger suggests, is what happened with American Modern Orthodoxy in Israel: The first wave – the American rabbis – were like Starbucks dropping into a new market with U.S. coffee culture. The second wave – their Israeli students – were like the local product developers who said: “We love coffee, but we eat hummus, not hash browns. Let’s remix the menu.” Israeli Moderate Orthodoxy succeeds not by remaining a foreign product, but by mixing: Torah u’Madda and Zionism. American pluralism and Israeli intensity. Feminist learning and orthodox halacha. Deep religiosity and full immersion in Israeli public life. The result is something new – not American, not European, not old-school Mizrachi – but distinctively Israeli. Rav Kook, Rav Soloveitchik, and the Problem of “Patronizing” Secular Jews At one point I suggested that the story of this book is really the story of students of Rav Kook vs. students of Rav Soloveitchik. Growing up, I loved Rav Kook. He was poetic, mystical, visionary. He could watch a car drive by on Shabbat and say: Mazel tov, they must be bringing another Jewish baby into the world. He called secular chalutzim (Pioneers) who didn’t keep a single mitzvah the holiest souls in Israel. But as I put it, there is a kind of patronizing embrace in Rav Kook’s approach to secular Jews: they are “holy tools” – klei kodesh – instruments for a grand messianic project. The State of Israel itself becomes a tool to reach a spiritual and redemptive goal… the sens of “tool” as a derogatory slang term in English, meaning someone is foolish, foolishly being used by others, or unintelligent.. fits. Modern Orthodox figures in the Soloveitchik orbit often approached the secular world differently: Not as tools, but as partners. Not just as Tinok SheNishba (ignorant children), but as conscious moral agents with whom one can agree or disagree, but must treat as equals. Ferziger brought a striking anecdote to illustrate this. The late Israeli writer Amos Oz, in his wandering essay-book about Israel, describes the religious use of the category Tinok SheNishba – the “infant taken captive” who doesn’t know any better, and therefore can’t be fully blamed for their sins. Oz’s response is classic: “Call me a rasha (evildoer), call me an apikores (heretic), but don’t call me a baby. I know exactly what I’m doing.” One of Ferziger’s “agents of change,” Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein, quotes this line approvingly in a 2016 volume. Lichtenstein, a son-in-law of Rav Soloveitchik and head of Yeshivat Har Etzion, explicitly distances himself from the Tinok SheNishba framing. He insists on respecting the agency of secular Jews. That difference – between “you’re a tool in my messianic drama” and “you are a moral equals I might profoundly disagree with” – is not just theological. It ripples out into politics, education, and culture. And it’s at the heart of the alternative Religious Zionism Ferziger describes. Immigrant Rabbis as Bridge-Builders, Not Reactionaries We often assume that immigrant rabbis and priests are the guardians of “the old ways,” standing in the way of integration. Ferziger, drawing on research about a Catholic Italian priest in Philadelphia, flips that assumption. Immigrant religious leaders, he suggests, often serve as bridges, not barriers: They give their communities continuity and stability. They allow newcomers to stay connected to their roots while slowly adapting to a new environment. They make integration less frightening, less like a betrayal. The American Modern Orthodox rabbis in Israel did exactly that: For Anglos, they softened the culture shock. For Israelis, they modeled a different way of being religious and modern – one that was neither Haredi rejection nor messianic nationalism. But—and this is key—they did not own the outcome. Their Israeli students did. Those students took the tools and radicalized them in ways their teachers might never have imagined: in feminism, academic Talmud, engagement with secular Israeli culture, new models of rabbinic authority, and more. Kippah Srugah, Kippah Shekufah, and Israeli Judaism Toward the end of our conversation, I made a prediction: If I had to guess where Israel’s next generation of leaders will come from, I suspect many of them will be: Wearing a knitted kippah, or In the case of women, a headscarf. Or, as Ferziger added with a grin, a “kippah shekufah” – an invisible kippah. That term is used in Israel by young people from religious homes who still keep Shabbat, still live deeply Jewish lives, but have stopped wearing a kippah publicly: Not out of embarrassment. Not because they’ve secularized. But because they want to flatten certain social divides, to signal solidarity with their peers in the army, in the workforce, in the street. This, Ferziger argues, is part of something larger that scholars Shmuel Rosner and Camil Fuchs have called “Israeli Judaism” – #YahadutYisraelit – one word. It is: A product of 75+ years of Jewish sovereignty. Built in a context where Jews are a majority, not a minority. Forced to confront questions that classical halacha and diaspora Judaism never had to fully answer: What does it mean to wield power as Jews? How do you govern non-Jews? How do you structure economy, welfare, education, army, in a Jewish state? How do you write law when you are the law? This Israeli Judaism has its own music, liturgy, street culture, and political instincts. You can hear it in the playlists of IDF soldiers, in the piyutim sung in stadiums, and in the way Jewish holidays bleed into national civic life. And it is increasingly shaped by a religious population that is not Haredi and not purely secular, but a broad, varied religious-traditional middle – the very milieu Ferziger is describing. Why This Matters Far Beyond the Dati-Leumi World It would be easy to file Ferziger’s book under “niche interest”: For people who care about Rav Kook vs. Rav Soloveitchik. For sociologists of religion. For insiders in the Kippah Srugah world. But the stakes are much larger. If Israel’s political and cultural future is increasingly shaped by: Religious or traditional Israelis, Who have served in the army, Who are deeply embedded in Israeli civic and professional life, And whose religious worldview has been influenced, in part, by American-style Moderate Orthodoxy, then understanding this movement becomes crucial for: Israeli Jews, who need to know who is really shaping their public square. Diaspora Jews, who worry about an unbridgeable gap between American liberal Judaism and Israeli religious culture. Anyone concerned with democracy, pluralism, and Jewish peoplehood. Ferziger insists that his book is not just for specialists. It is for anyone who wants to understand where Israel is going: “There’s a new product here which is emerging… Israeli Judaism. These are people that American Jews of all stripes can be in conversation with. So much has been written lately about a people divided… but there are also levels of deep connection that are not given sufficient attention. If reading my book helps people think about these areas more clearly – and maybe build something positive out of them – I’d be very happy.” Jacob, Again We started with Jacob returning from exile, and we might as well end with him. Jacob leaves home terrified, alone, unsure. He comes back with baggage: family, flocks, scars, strategies, faith, fear. He comes back changed – and his return changes the land he returns to. We have, as a people, gone out and come back many times: Abraham from Egypt. The Israelites from Egypt. The exiles from Babylonia. The early Zionists from Europe. And now, a wave of Modern Orthodox Jews from America. Each time, we bring back something new: institutions, melodies, pedagogies, theological instincts, political tools, spiritual anxieties. Professor Adam S. Ferziger’s Agents of Change tells one chapter of that ancient story in a very contemporary key: How American Modern Orthodoxy was created in exile, Came “home” to Israel, Passed through teachers and students, And is now one of the quiet forces shaping Israeli Judaism at a crossroad. It’s a story not just about rabbis and parties, but about how ideas travel — and how, in Jewish history, exile has never just been a tragedy. It’s also been a curriculum. 📚 If you want to go deeper: You can find our full Sefaria source sheet, American Jews and the Transformation of Israeli Judaism, linked in the show notes, along with the episode audio on your favorite podcast platform. And yes — the book is absolutely worth reading.   Like Comment Restack   © 2025 Geoffrey Stern 548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104 Unsubscribe