Center Field: The Birthright 2.0 challenge

The Jim Joseph Foundation just donated $17.5 million to Birthright Israel. This gift follows Sheldon Adelson's amazing $60 million donation, and hundreds of millions of dollars other generous philanthropists have donated. These contributions constitute one of the greatest gifts Diaspora Jews have given Israel in the past decade.

The Jim Joseph gift designated $12.5 million for "follow-up," Birthright's toughest challenge. Recruitment has been easy. Already 165,000 young Jews ages 18 to 26 have enjoyed these free ten day trips, with another 27, 000 coming this summer. Three-quarters of the participants are North Americans, the rest have come from 53 different countries. The trips themselves have also been easy - hard work but overwhelmingly successful.

Mountains of participant surveys and tearful testimonials testify to the magic of the Birthright equation: 42 + 0 x 10 x 1 = infinity x 2 (il + j).  Usually 42 participants per bus costing participants $0 to welcome all Jews on a 10 day trip to the Jewish people's 1 homeland equals an infinitely deeper, richer, relationship between young Jews and Israel as well as between young Jews and Judaism. One of many unintended Birthright bonuses has been the mifgash (meet-up) program, which links Israelis, mostly in the army, with Birthrighters. The Israelis learn by hosting to take more pride in their own country and about the meaning of Jewish peoplehood.

The question, however, challenging Birthright since it began nine years ago has been "what next?" The prose of follow-up can rarely match the Israel trip's poetry. The trip is ten action-packed, sleep-deprived days; follow-up is real, everyday life - and the rest of a returnee's life. Birthright recognizes that it is unfair to excite participants with new visions of Jewish life, then leave them in the lurch. Birthrighters return to the same Jewish community that may have first alienated them. When he led Hillel, Richard Joel called "the Jewish people" Birthright's alumni organization. But Joel and others recognized that Birthright must provide various platforms to welcome returnees and ease the transition.

Follow-up becomes particularly challenging because of the "infinity" part of the Birthright equation. Birthright is not a Maoist indoctrination camp. The gift comes with no strings attached. One version of Judaism is not imposed. Especially in today's hyper-individualistic world of dizzying possibilities, participants are invited to chart their own Jewish journeys, to forge their own relationships to Israel, Judaism, and the Jewish people.

Mapping the itinerary for each individual's return home thus becomes more complicated than mapping out an itinerary for ten days together in the Jewish homeland. The follow-up riddle entails solving the Israel-Diaspora puzzle, redefining modern Jewish identity, and understanding the twenty-somethings' needs as well as the nuances of modern consumer and computer culture. 

Birthright's follow-up gurus should keep seven principles and challenges in mind while planning both individual programs and broader visions.

1.     Birthright lasts for ten days, Jewish journeys are for life. The Birthright blitz offers a great start, but the real challenge is weaving Jewish values, Jewish rituals, Jewish ideas, Jewish moments, and the Israel connection, into daily life not just a vacation.

2.     The goal of a short Israel trip is to return for a long Israel trip. More is more. Birthright should make it easy for students to return for both formal internships and study programs as well as informal experiences relating to Israel as their second home. If ten days wowed participants, imagine what sustained study, work, volunteer, hanging out, or travel for ten weeks, ten months, or longer can do.

3.     Israel engagement is more than Israel advocacy. Israel provides much of the magic in Birthright. Birthrighters should and do stand up for Israel, but they also should embrace Israel, building real ties with Israel and Israelis. Radical thought:  learning Hebrew, the language of Israel and the Jewish people, should be emphasized. Hebrew is the keystone to Israeli culture, deeper Israeli experiences, as well as Jewish learning and prayer.

4.     Judaism, like Birthright, can be fun, but it requires heavy-lifting, spiritually, intellectually, morally, too. Just as Jacob earned the name "Israel" by wrestling with the angel, young Jews should engage Judaism and Israel seriously. Without learning, without some challenge, without some stretching, all they get is a collection of cultural tics, strange foods, and "gee I didn't know he was Jewish" tribal affiliations.

5.      Birthright, Zionism and Judaism are about "us"; modern life is about "me." Here is one of the great dilemmas facing the Jewish world today: how to customize Judaism so it welcomes members of this extremely individualistic generation without sacrificing the essential communal dimension. More broadly, how much to reflect modern trends, and how much to counter them while empowering young Jews to chart their own journeys?

6.      While there are many ways of "doing Jewish," not every thing Jews do together counts. Yes, Birthrighters should reinterpret the traditional teaching "shivim panim latorah" noting seventy faces or interpretations to Torah, to realize there are seventy or more welcoming ways into Judaism. But we need substance not self-delusion. Watching "Jon Stewart" or "Seinfeld" may make Jews feel good, but it is not seriously engaging Judaism.

7.     The best way to say "thank you" for the Birthright gift is to "pay it forward," giving something of yourself to other Jews. Charles Bronfman and Michael Steinhardt started this visionary festival of philanthropy which the latest gifts continue. Each of us, whether connected to Birthright or not, should imitate these guerrilla philanthropists. Rather than waiting for permission from the Jewish establishment to lead, they pushed the Jewish establishment to follow. They and their partners have invested their time, money, passion, and souls into this program. In the process, they not only transformed the Jewish world, but -- added bonus -- they made the world a better place by triggering a new generation's idealism and altruism.  

Gil Troy is Professor of History at McGill University in Montreal, and the author of Why I Am a Zionist: Israel, Jewish Identity and the Challenges of Today. He has chaired Montreal's Birthright Israel taskforce since 1999.