Some may find it surprising that a phenomenon resembling religious “excommunication” exists among Jewish religious groups in Israel and elsewhere, particularly within ultra-Orthodox Haredi communities. Yet the issue has existed for decades and has become one of the clearest manifestations of fragmentation within these movements and Israeli society more broadly.
The idea is not new. Rejecting others and excluding them from the wider Jewish collective dates back to the early Zionist project, which was opposed by a number of rabbis who regarded Zionism as heresy and a departure from Jewish religious law.
Today, however, this tendency has become part of a much deeper internal fracture. The idea of declaring others outside the legitimate religious, social or national community can become one of the most destructive forces within any society, because the concept of the “enemy” can gradually shift from an external adversary to an internal one.
Once that happens, society risks turning its attention away from external threats and towards an “enemy within”.
What Does “Excommunication” Mean in Rabbinic Judaism?
To understand what is happening inside Israeli society, it is necessary to distinguish the Jewish religious concept from the Islamic understanding of takfir.
In Islam, takfir means declaring someone outside the religion altogether and severing their association with Islam’s doctrinal and conceptual framework, with theological and legal consequences that vary according to jurisprudential school and context.
For this reason, takfir has historically been treated as an extremely serious matter in Islamic scholarship, and Muslim scholars have approached it with considerable caution.
Rabbinic Judaism, by contrast, does not have a single term performing precisely the same function at every level.
Because Jewish religious identity is also bound to an ethno-national affiliation, with a person born to a Jewish mother regarded as Jewish, exclusion can operate through several layers.
These may include accusations concerning belief, such as heresy, religious deviation or apostasy-like concepts. Such labels are among the most common used between different Jewish religious currents.
Other forms involve social or ritual exclusion, denial of Jewish national legitimacy, or a much more serious form of religious-political condemnation in which a person is effectively classified as an enemy of the Jewish people.
Religious Jewish groups, particularly extremist ones, apply these categories especially towards secular Jews.
Although religious authorities have traditionally attempted to restrain followers from using force against those who reject their worldview, the strengthening of the Religious Zionist current over the past three years, together with the widespread distribution of weapons among its supporters, has increased fears that such restraint could collapse into violent internal confrontation.
From Anti-Zionism to Pragmatic Coexistence With the State
Historically, ultra-Orthodox Haredi currents and rabbinic authorities regarded Zionism as heretical. Some still do, including Neturei Karta.
However, after the establishment of Israel on the eve of the Nakba, a significant number of religious authorities adopted a pragmatic form of Haredi accommodation with the state.
Israel came to be viewed as a political reality dominating Jewish public life, something that had to be dealt with as a kind of “necessary evil”, rather than embraced as a state possessing inherent religious or national legitimacy.
From this emerged Haredi communities that belong administratively to the Israeli state while regarding it merely as a reality imposed upon them, rather than as the embodiment of Jewish religion or of a religiously legitimate national project.
One of the central reasons for this attitude is that Israel itself was established largely by secular Zionists, not by religious Jews. The early state was based on “respecting” certain Jewish religious observances rather than committing itself to Jewish religious law.
This planted the seeds of confrontation between different groups in Israeli society, particularly between the dominant secular current and religious communities that were initially a minority within the state.
The “Captured Child” View of Secular Jews
Accusations of heresy and religious deviation are therefore not new. They were present from the birth of Zionism itself, which divided Jewish communities around the world.
For much of Israel’s history, however, religious condemnation of secular Jews was often accompanied by a paternalistic sense of sorrow.
Many religious Jews regarded secular Israelis as what rabbinic tradition calls “captured children”.
The expression derives from ancient Jewish law concerning Jewish children who had been abducted or raised in captivity and were therefore never taught the Torah or the foundations of Jewish religious law.
From the perspective of these religious groups, secular Israelis resemble such children because they were raised in secular conditions and were never properly taught Torah or religious law.
This paternalistic approach is rooted in the concept of a national religious family, based on the belief that Jews collectively descend from Isaac and Jacob and therefore belong to the people of Israel in a religious-national sense, rather than merely in the modern political sense.
A well-known phrase in the Babylonian Talmud expresses the principle that even when a Jew sins, he remains part of Israel.
Examples of this mindset can still be seen today. Videos occasionally circulate showing religious Jews attempting to persuade Israeli soldiers to repent, warning them with intense concern that they could die in Gaza or Lebanon.
From Paternalism to Religious Condemnation
A more radical approach has emerged within other currents.
Some religious groups classify opponents of strict religious doctrine as “Apikorus”, a rabbinic term found in the Talmud and derived from the Greek philosopher Epicurus. In religious Jewish usage, it broadly denotes a heretic who rejects or treats Torah law with contempt.
Among extremist circles, these labels can go far beyond theological condemnation. They can be used to justify treating opponents as threats to Jewish religious law, the Jewish people and the fulfilment of redemption.
Some rabbis apply the term broadly to secular Jews.
Rabbi David Hai HaCohen, head of the Netivot Yisrael religious school in Bat Yam, has even used it in relation to David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first prime minister, on the grounds that Ben-Gurion fought against religious Jews while establishing the Israeli state.
The Dangerous Concept of “Rodef”
Another far more radical religious category used by extremists is “rodef”, meaning “pursuer”.
It is among the most serious religious concepts applied to political opponents by radical Jewish groups.
The concept is based on a Talmudic ruling concerning a person pursuing a victim with the intention of causing grave harm. Under that ruling, the pursuer must be stopped in order to save the victim, even if stopping him ultimately requires killing him.
Applied politically, labelling someone a “rodef” therefore means regarding that person as a direct danger to the community who may be forcibly stopped.
Another term sometimes used is “Erev Rav”, or “mixed multitude”, which extremists employ to portray an opponent as an alien element or even a “false Jew”.
Some radical religious figures use the label to strip Jewish political opponents of spiritual and national legitimacy, depicting them as elements working against the Jewish people or obstructing the path towards redemption.
Rabbi Dov Lior, rabbi of the Kiryat Arba settlement in Hebron, where Itamar Ben-Gvir lives, has expressed this exclusionary approach in one of his religious rulings.
Referring to secular Jews who, in his view, disparage fundamental principles of faith, Lior stated:
“Whoever disparages one of the thirteen principles of faith is completely excluded from the community of Israel.”
Rabbi Shmuel HaLevi Wosner similarly argued that secular Jews should not be treated under the category of “captured children”, because they see religious Jews around them and are therefore capable of choosing religious observance.
The Haredi Rabbi Yaakov Yosef described them as “Apikorsim”, or heretics, and linked this classification to the old rabbinic ruling expressed by the phrase “they are lowered and not raised”.
This is a severe legal category historically associated with the idea that certain individuals excluded from the religious community are not to be rescued from destruction.
When Religious Labels Become a Licence for Violence
These terms can, among extremist groups, develop into arguments for permitting violence against opponents on the claim that they threaten Jewish law, the Jewish people or the process of redemption.
The most notorious example is Yigal Amir, who assassinated Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995.
Amir invoked the concept of “rodef”, arguing that Rabin’s political actions posed a danger to Jewish society and therefore had to be forcibly stopped. In Amir’s reasoning, stopping Rabin meant killing him.
Today, this tendency is increasingly visible among parts of the extremist Religious Zionist movement, particularly among settlers in the occupied West Bank and Jerusalem.
For such groups, Palestinians are no longer the only people regarded as enemies. The circle of hostility has expanded to include secular Israelis, leftists and anyone who rejects their interpretation of the conflict or their belief that prophecies of redemption must be implemented in the present era by force.
Nor are secular Jews the only targets.
Haredi religious Jews can also fall into the category of ideological opponents because major Haredi currents continue to denounce extremist Temple movements and the incursions by their members and political figures such as Ben-Gvir into Al-Aqsa Mosque.
They regard such actions as violations of Jewish religious law and of rulings historically issued by senior rabbinic authorities.
Secular and Religious Israelis Increasingly See Each Other as a Threat
Religious authorities within these communities have generally worked to restrain followers from using violence against ideological opponents, particularly secular Israelis.
Yet the strengthening of Religious Zionism over the past three years, together with the distribution of weapons among its supporters under Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, has made those restraints increasingly fragile.
The secular and religious camps do not see themselves as equal partners within the state.
Many secular Israelis view religious Jews who refuse military service and seek to impose rabbinic law as a burden on the state.
Religious extremists, meanwhile, can view secular Israelis as responsible for bringing divine wrath upon the Jewish people.
The question raised by these deepening divisions is how far internal fragmentation can go.
Could ideological hostility ultimately develop into armed confrontation?
And could Israeli settlers and religious extremists repeat the logic used by Yigal Amir in assassinating Rabin, declaring political opponents to be “rodfim” who may be forcibly stopped, even to the point of death?
