Army Life: Religion in the IDF

BlogCentral would like to welcome a new contributor to the Army Life blog: D.B. He was born and raised in Virginia, USA, and graduated from The College of William & Mary in Virginia in '07 with a degree in Government (Political Science). In September of 2007, D.B. made aliyah and is currently serving as a combat soldier in the Israeli Army, Golani infantry brigade.

I studied in a Jewish seminary (yeshiva) a few years back, and at the time I was just beginning to consider the idea of serving in the IDF. This particular yeshiva is a "charedi" institution - essentially ultra-orthodox. Charedi yeshivas are generally not very 'Zionistic', and their opinion of young men serving in an army instead of spending all day, every day, studying Torah is fairly low. So, when I volunteered to a rabbi that I was interested in the IDF, the response wasn't warm, to say the least.

The rhetoric thrown around was that the IDF is a "bad place for religious Jews." They liked to say that it's hard to be religious there, that it's hard to keep your level of faith, and that there are too many bad influences. At the time, I didn't have any other source of information. I didn't know what it's like to be an Orthodox Jew in the army, so I just took it for what it was worth: hyper-religious Jerusalemites judging what they had no experience in in the first place. I didn't know what to think, but I assumed that they were being slightly dramatic.

And now I know just how wrong they were. I have become even more observant of Torah law in the army. I pray three times a day, as required in Judaism, I eat kosher without exception, and I celebrate all the holidays and cultural events to the max. It's just so easy to be religious in the army. We wake up in the morning, do a gun safety check, and then we are promptly given nearly an hour for the morning prayers. It's either pray or clean the rooms...Easy choice.

Shabbat and the holidays, as well, are just kind of thrown in your face. For example, for Shabbat the entire base eats a festive and special meal together on Friday night. In the beginning we say the kiddush, a sanctification of the sabbath day, with the entire base standing with heads covered in the Jewish fashion. We all say amen together, and inevitably hundreds of soldiers are singing and dancing to Jewish songs. There's also a dvar Torah, or a saying from the Torah - similar to a sermon, but usually a highly specific and interesting tidbit on an aspect of a Bible story.

In fact, the army is such a good place for religious people that I have actually wondered if the secular soldiers are often uncomfortable or offended. We say prayers together, we have to listen to a religious sermon from a rabbi, there is a large synagogue in the middle of the base, the meals are mandatory, and the commanders made it very clear to not disturb the Shabbat observant crowd - i.e., electronics playing music, excessive use of the lights, and so on.

I'm constantly surprised at the religiosity of this organization.