Hostname: page-component-745bb68f8f-g4j75 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-03T22:46:01.211Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Religion and Communal Life in an Evolutionary-Functional Perspective: The Orthodox Kibbutzim

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 June 2009

Aryei Fishman
Aryei Fishman
Affiliation:
Bar-Ilan University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

My purpose in this study is to refine understanding of the functional role of conventional religion for the viability of communal life (Bainbridge 1985). I shall endeavor to do this by broadly coordinating Talcott Parsons's evolutionary perspective of human society (1966, 1971) with that of Robert Bellah on religion (1964), and applying them to the formation and development of the Religious Kibbutz Federation (RFK) in Israel. By examining the historical experience of the groups that formed religious communes during the Mandatory period in Palestine, I shall attempt to demonstrate that religion can play a dysfunctional as well as a functional role in a communal system.

Type
Communal Strengths
Information
Comparative Studies in Society and History , Volume 29 , Issue 4 , October 1987 , pp. 763 - 786
Copyright
Copyright © Society for the Comparative Study of Society and History 1987

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

REFERENCES

Abrams, Philip and McCulloch, Andrew. 1976. Communes, Sociology, and Society. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Andrews, Edward D. 1963. The People Called Shakers. New York: Dover Publications.Google Scholar
Bainbridge, William S. 1985. “Utopian Communities: Theoretical Issues,” in The Sacred in a Secular Age, Hammond, P. E., ed. Berkeley: University of California Press.Google Scholar
Bar-Giora, Naftali. 1956. Sdei Eliyahu. Jerusalem: Zionist Organization. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Becker, Howard 1946. German Youth: Bond or Free? London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.Google Scholar
Bein, Alex 1952. The Return to the Soil: A History of Jewish Settlement in Israel, Schen, I., trans. Jerusalem: Zionist Organization.Google Scholar
Bellah, Robert N. 1964. “Religious Evolution.” American Sociological Review, 29:3, 358–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bennet, John W. 1967. Hutterian Brethren: The Agricultural Economy and Social Organization of a Communal People. Stanford: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Berger, Peter L., ed. 1981. The Other Side of God. Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books.Google Scholar
Breuer, Mordechai 1970. The Torah-Im-Derekh Eretz of Sampson Raphael Hirsch. Jerusalem: Feldheim.Google Scholar
Buber, Martin 1958. Hasidism and Modern Man, Friedman, M., trans. New York: Horizon Press.Google Scholar
Buber, Martin. 1960. The Origin and Meaning of Hasidism, Friedman, M., trans. New York: Horizon Press.Google Scholar
Carden, Maren L. 1969. Oneida: Utopian Community to Modern Corporation. New York: Harper Torchbooks.Google Scholar
Cohen, Erik 1976. “The Structural Transformation of the Kibbutz,” in Social Change, Zollschan, G. K. and Hirsch, W., eds. New York: John Wiley.Google Scholar
Durkheim, Emile. 1964. The Division of Labor in Society, Simpson, G., trans. New York: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Eisenstadt, Shmuel N. 1973. “The Implication of Weber's Sociology of Religion for Understanding Processes of Change in Contemporary Non-European Societies and Civilizations,” in Beyond the Classics? Glock, C. Y. and Hammond, P. E., eds. New York: Harper and Row.Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1971. “Judaism in Its Relation to Empirical Reality; Max Weber's ‘Active Asceticism’ in the Framework of Jewish Religion in the Modem Era.” Molad, 26 (03), 684–90. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1972. “On the Influence of Hasidism on the Initial Social Doctrine of HaPoel HaMizrahi,” Bar-Ilan Yearbook, 9, 392–412. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1978/1979. “On the Formation of the Religious Kibbutz Movement.” HaKibbutz, 6/7, 69–86. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1982. “ ‘Torah and Labor’: The Radicalization of Religion within a National Framework.” Studies in Zionism, 6:2, 255–71.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1983a. “The Religious Kibbutz: Religion, Nationalism, and Socialism in a Communal Framework,” in The Sociology of the Kibbutz, Krausz, E., ed. New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction Press.Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1983b. “Judaism and Modernization: The Case of the Religious Kibbutzim.” Social Forces, 62:1, 9–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fishman, Aryei. 1986. “The Religious Kibbutz Movement: The Pursuit of a Complete Life within an Orthodox Framework,” in Studies in Contemporary Jewry, Medding, P., ed., Vol. II. Bloomington: Indiana University Press.Google Scholar
Fishman, Aryei ed. 1979. HaPoel HaMizrahi 1921–1935 (Documents). Tel Aviv:Tel-Aviv University. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Foster, Lawrence. 1981. Religion and Sexuality: Three American Communal Experiments of the Nineteenth Century. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Grunfeld, Isidore. 1956. “Samson Raphael Hirsch—The Man and His Mission,” in Judaism Eternal, by S. R. Hirsch, I, xii–xlvii. London: Soncino Press.Google Scholar
Herz, Rudi. 1934. “Tora wa'woda.” Zion (Berlin), 6 (10–12), 74–80.Google Scholar
Hirsch, S. R.. 1956 [1854–56]. Judaism Eternal, Grunfeld, I., trans. 2 vols. London: Soncino Press.Google Scholar
Hirsch, S. R.. 1971 [1867–69]. Explanation to the Pentateuch, Levy, I., trans. Vol.I. New York: Judaica Press.Google Scholar
Hostetler, John H. 1974. Hutterite Society. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Infield, Henrik F. 1946. Cooperative Living in Palestine. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.Google Scholar
Katz, Dov. 1975. The Musar Movement, Oschry, L., trans. Tel Aviv: Orly Press.Google Scholar
Knohl, Dov. 1958. Siege in the Hills of Hebron. New York: Thomas Yosellof.Google Scholar
Krone, Moshe, ed. 1938. Orhot: Vignettes-Benchmarks-Fragments of Thought. Warsaw: HaShomer HaDati. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
The Kvutza. 1924. Tel Aviv: General Federation of Labor. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Landshut, Siegfried. 1944. The Kvutza. Jerusalem: Zionist Organization. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Laqueur, Walter Z. 1962. Young Germany. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar
Lidz, Victor. 1982. “Religion and Cybernetic Concepts in the Theory of Action.” Sociological Analysis, 43:4, 387–405.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Michaelis, Eugen. 1938. “Zur Entwicklung des Tora wa'woda Gedanken in Deutschland.” Chayenu, 23 (01), 6–8.Google Scholar
Noyes, John H. 1870. History of American Socialisms. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott.Google Scholar
Parsons, Talcott. 1961. “An Outline of the Social System,” in Theories of Society, Vol. I, Parsons, T., Shils, E., Naegle, K., and Pitts, J., eds. New York: Free Press.Google Scholar
Parsons, Talcott. 1966. Societies: Evolutionary and Comparative Perspectives. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Parsons, Talcott 1971. The System of Modern Societies. Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Peter, Karl A. 1983. “The Certainty of Salvation: Ritualization of Religion and Economic Rationality among Hutterites.” Comparative Studies in Society and History, 25:2 (04), 220–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Porter, Judith. 1973. “Secularization, Differentiation, and the Function of Religious Value-Orientations.” Sociological Inquiry, 43:1, 67–74.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Religious Kibbutz Federation. 1944. Towards the Third Council. Report of the Secretariat of the Religious Kibbutz Federation 1941–1944. Tel Aviv: HaKibbutz HaDati. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Schmalenbach, Herman. 1977. “Communion—A Sociological Category,” in Schmalenbach on Society and Experience, Lueschen, Guenther and Stone, Gregory P., eds. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Scholem, Gershom. 1961a. Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism. New York: Schocken Books.Google Scholar
Scholem, Gershom 1961b. “Martin Buber's Hasidism.” Commentary, 32:10, 305–16.Google Scholar
Slater, Philip E. 1966. Microcosm: Structural, Psychological, and Religious Evolution in Groups. New York: John Wiley and Sons.Google Scholar
Swidler, Ann. 1973. “The Concept of Rationality in the Work of Max Weber.” Sociological Inquiry, 43:1, 35–42.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Talmon, Yonina. 1972. Family and Community in the Kibbutz. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Troeltsch, Ernst. 1931. The Social Teaching of the Christian Churches, Wyon, O., trans. 2 vols. New York: Macmillan Company.Google Scholar
Unna, Mosche 1934. “Die jüdische Formdes religiösen Sozialismus.” Zion (Berlin), 6 (01), 4–7.Google Scholar
Unna, Mosche. 1956. In the Paths of Thought and Action. Tel Aviv: Moreshet. (In Hebrew.)Google Scholar
Weber, Max. 1949. The Methodology of the Social Sciences, Shils, E. A. and Finch, H. A., eds. and trans. New York: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Zablocki, Benjamin 1980. The Joyful Community. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar