How Strong is Orthodox Judaism -- Really?
The Demographics of Jewish Religious Identification
Daniel J. Elazar
This is a time of great controversy over the imposition of
Jewish religious norms on the population of Israel, ignited by
sensitive issues such as the definition of "Who is a Jew?" and
the debate over the allocation of public funds to Jewish
religious institutions. When evaluating these issues, comparing
the relative demographic strengths of religious and non-religious
Jews and that of Orthodox and non-Orthodox Jews becomes a matter
of great importance. Indeed, for Israel and the Jewish people, as
for other states and communities in a democratic age, demographic
issues have gained supreme political importance. In an
egalitarian age, political power and the distribution of public
benefits have come to depend heavily upon relative demographic
strength.
Both the Jewish people at large and the state of Israel are
slowly coming to understand that we are no less affected by
demographics than any other people or polity. Claims for Jewish
Agency, World Zionist Organization and Israeli government funding
preferment are increasingly based on decimal percentages of
either the world or the Israeli Jewish population. This method is
most likely used when determining the amount of support granted
to Jewish religious institutions and concerns.
Religious and Non-Religious
How many of today's Jews consider themselves religious? By
"religious." I accept a subjective definition of Jews who see
themselves as being religious - Orthodox or non-Orthodox - and
who actualize their self-perception in some positive way: usually
through membership or participation in a synagogue, minyan or
other religious institution and through some kind of personal
religious observance. Since we have no exact figures, the best
possible estimates and projections based upon the data available
will follow.
It is not unfair to estimate that between 60 and 75 percent
of the estimated 13.5 to 14.5 million Jews in the world consider
themselves religious in this sense.* Let us examine this estimate
in detail. Israel has somewhat over 3.5 million Jews. According
to the best available studies, up to 25 percent, or 850,000,
consider themselves Orthodox while an equal number consider
themselves secular. That leaves 50 percent who consider
themselves traditional. The latter is a declining number,
consisting principally of people from the immigrant generation
who came from traditional religious environments, retaining
religious beliefs and varying degrees of religious observance
while not being ideologically Orthodox. Therefore, let us assume
that only 40 percent of this group, or approximately 1,360,000
Jews, are today traditional in any meaningful way. Thus, at a
minimum, some two-thirds of the Jews of Israel or over 2.3
million, fit our definition of religious, while approximately
one-third or 1.2 million do not.
The largest concentration of Jews in the world is in the
United States. Current Jewish population estimates suggest a
Jewish population of 5.82 million. Recent Jewish population
studies have tended to revise Jewish population figures upward
and this writer believes that there are approximately six million
Jews in the United States. Still, let us use the official figure.
The National Jewish Population Study of 1970 revealed 47
percent of American Jews claimed synagogue membership. More
recent localized demographic studies showed figures ranging from
26 percent in Los Angeles to 84 percent in St. Paul. Taking an
average by population size, it gives us approximately the same
figure as the NJPS.
Other studies have shown that another 25 percent consider
themselves religious although they are not members of a
synagogue. They may indeed be young people whose parents may be
synagogue members but who have not yet joined themselves, or
senior citizens, who are known for dropping synagogue memberships
because of the cost. This squares well with the percentage of
people claiming to maintain at least three Jewish observances:
Passover Seder, Hanuka candle lighting and High Holy Day
synagogue attendance. This means 4.35 million American Jews can
be considered religious as against 1.45 million who are not.
Eleven percent of American Jews defined themselves as
Orthodox in the 1970 study, or approximately 600,000 people. That
figure has remained relatively consistent. The Conservative
movement claims 1,250,000 and the Reform slightly more. Taking
those figures together would give us approximately 3.1 million
religiously affiliated Jews, which comes closer to the estimates
of synagogue membership. The other 1.25 million may include
approximately 250,000 who are members of Reconstructionist,
traditional and other small movement or nonmovement affiliated
congregations and many who consider themselves religious without
really identifying with any one of the Jewish religious streams.
The last Soviet census claimed that there were 1,630,000 Jews
in the U.S.S.R. Again, this is probably a low figure since it
only includes those who directly claim Jewish identity.
Undoubtedly there are many others who have chosen to officially
claim other identities, particularly Russian, but who identify
themselves as Jews, leading to the general assumption that there
are still over two million or more Jews in the Soviet Union.
Since religious observance is very difficult and fraught with
dangers in the Soviet Union, and there is no tradition of
non-Orthodox religion among Soviet Jews, let us assume that
between 5 and 10 percent of Soviet Jewry is religious. This
squares with insiders' estimates and the 7 percent of respondents
who identified themselves as religious in the internal survey of
Soviet Jewry undertaken by Benjamin Fain and his associates in
1976 (Fain and Verbit, 1984). Thus an estimate of 100,000 is
appropriate.
The recent major study of the Jewish population in France
(Bensimon and Della Pergola, 1984) indicates that there are
535,000 Jews in that country, approximately half residing in the
Paris region and half in the provinces. Separate studies have
been done of Jewish attitudes in the Paris region and beyond. In
the studies of Jewish self-definition and observance in Paris and
the major provincial cities, it turns out that just over half of
French Jews define themselves as Jewish by religion, with nearly
58 percent declaring themselves religious in the provincial
cities and only 34 percent in Paris. This difference is reflected
in religious observances. While some 70 percent of Parisian Jews
claim to go to synagogue at least on Yom Kippur, the figure rises
to over 80 percent in the provincial cities. Again, the pattern
seems to be similar to that of the United States: some 50 percent
claim some Shabbat observance - 37 percent in Paris and 57.5
percent in the provincial cities - some 65 percent claim to eat
only matzot on Pesach and some 75 percent claim to fast on Yom
Kippur. In short, as in the United States, some 75 percent of the
Jewish population of France, or 401,000, are religious in some
significant way, and some 50 percent are religiously affiliated.
Religious commitment and observance is much weaker in Latin
America; it is reasonable to estimate that only 20 percent
consider themselves religious in any form. On the other hand, in
English-speaking countries other than the United States, the
figures break down similarly to those in the U.S. and France,
except that the percentage of at least nominally Orthodox is
probably much higher. It is possible to estimate that 50 percent
of the remainder of European Jews consider themselves religious
and about 80 percent of the Jews in both the older and younger
communities of Africa, Asia and Oceania.
All told, this gives us at least eight million Jews in the
world who would define themselves as religious in some way, or
approximately 60 percent. Since the communities in which 75
percent or more of the Jews identity themselves with Jewish
religious beliefs or observances in some way constitute an
estimated 11 million Jews, the total number of religiously
identified Jews may be as high as 9.5 out of 13.5 million, or
approximately 70 percent of the total.
Orthodox and Non-Orthodox
What percentage of that 8 to 9.5 million are Orthodox? Here
we will use three divisions: (1) fully Orthodox in belief and
practice; (2) Jews who identify with Orthodoxy but do not live up
to Orthodox standards in their practice; and (3) Jews committed
to non-Orthodox religion.
Since most of the last group are in the United States, a
generous estimate would be 4 million committed to non-Orthodox
Judaism worldwide, divided as follows:
2.5 million synagogue members in the United States.
1.25 million sympathizers in the United States.
250,000 in the rest of the world.
This is a generous and probably a maximum estimate. It means
that if there are only eight million Jews who identify themselves
as religious, there is an approximately equal division between
self-defined non-Orthodox and self-defined Orthodox. However, if
there are as many as 9.5 million religiously identifiable Jews,
5.5 million of these identify with Orthodoxy whatever their level
of personal observance, giving the latter a 40 percent margin.
Many in both groups are nominal in their commitment. Indeed, when
nominal observance is factored out, the strength of Orthodoxy is
even greater.
The Contrast between the Conservative and Reform Movements
Take the Conservative movement, until recently recognized as
the largest of the non-Orthodox movements in the United States,
and, as a result, probably in the world. Charles Liebman and I
have calculated that there are no more than forty to fifty
thousand Conservative Jews in the world who live up to the
standards of observance set by the Conservative movement. This
means that when the Conservative mass is left out, the movement
is only the equivalent of a fair sized Hassidic sect. It may be
hard to believe, but it is important to note that at the late
1984 wedding of two scions of the Satmar dynasty, the number of
Jews packed into a single Long Island stadium for the nuptials
equalled the whole body of authentic Conservative Jews. There are
seriously committed Conservative Jews who do no live up to those
standards, but who are seriously religious in some way. It is
hard to estimate how many, but a generous figure would be 36
percent of the movement's membership. Thus, at most there are
400,000 Conservative Jews in the world.
The situation is even harder to estimate with regard to
Reform Jews, where standards of observance are low and less
binding, but figures similar to those of the Conservative
movement are probably in order. Moreover, recent studies of
American Jewry show that both movements are in trouble, as
increasing numbers of American Jews tend to identify with
neither. According to the studies, first generation American Jews
tend to identify with Orthodoxy; second and third generation Jews
with Conservatism, and, beginning with the fourth generation,
with Reform or nothing. This accounts for the decline in
Conservative movement membership noted in the recent population
studies and the increase in the Reform membership, but the
non-identified category in the fourth generation and beyond is
around 40 percent.
Orthodox identification, on the other hand, which had been
declining precipitously since the late nineteenth century (before
that, high Orthodox birthrates offset defections), has probably
bottomed out.
Overall, the percentage of Jews who define themselves as
Orthodox has grown only marginally, but there has been a
transformation in the nature of this group. Many of the nominally
Orthodox have fallen by the wayside, and more of those who define
themselves as Orthodox really are committed or want to be,.
Moreover, the increase in the number of seriously Orthodox is
significant, even without taking into consideration the effect of
today's high Orthodox birthrate, contrasted with the very low
non-Orthodox birthrate.
Today there are approximately 600,000 Orthodox Jews in the
United States, plus another 850,000 in Israel, and perhaps
another 750,000 committed Orthodox in the rest of the world. This
means that there are approximately 2.2 million Orthodox Jews who
are indeed Orthodox - that is to say, wholly committed to
Orthodoxy. That does not include several million semi-observant
Jews who identity with Orthodoxy and will not choose to identify
with a non-Orthodox movement, even if they do not intend to
become more Orthodox in observance in their own lives.
Moreover, demographics are working for the Orthodox, since
their birthrate is almost uniformly high. It has been estimated
that in Israel ultra-Orthodox families are producing 5 to 10
children each, while modern Orthodox families are producing 3 to
5 each. It is likely that the same situation prevails in the
Diaspora - at a time when non-Orthodox families are producing
children at less than replacement level. It is said that the
order of the day among ultra-Orthodox is to gain control of the
Jewish community through reproduction, which is given added force
by the extent of assimilation among the non-Orthodox.
Who is Affiliated?
Let us be exact as possible. Worldwide, one finds
approximately 2.5 million affiliated Conservative and Reform
Jews; another 1.5 million who identify with non-Orthodox Judaism
but do little or nothing in an active way to express that
identity; another million-plus traditional Jews who are actively
connected with Orthodox congregations but not with any movement;
plus two million or more who are consciously affiliated with
Orthodox institutions. Thus, there are as many affiliated
Orthodox as there are movement affiliated non-Orthodox, while at
least half of the group in between have not really broken with
Orthodoxy, but simply do not particularly identify with it as a
movement.
The significance of this cannot be overestimated. The primary
assumption of most non-Orthodox is that the situation in the
United States, where Orthodoxy is at most 11 percent of American
Jewry and the vast majority of American Jews are non-Orthodox, is
typical. But the American scene cannot be extracted from the
world scene today, since most of the crucial decisions about
religious life have worldwide impact, especially "Who is a Jew?"
legislation in the Israeli Knesset, patrilineal descent decisions
in the Reform movement, and other similar constitutional issues.
The power of the Orthodox, then, is not the only power of a
determined minority; it is the power that flows from real
numerical strength vis-a-vis the other movements.
Even in the United States there has been a radical shift in
the situation. In raw demographics, the Orthodox may represent a
mere 10 percent, more or less, of the American Jewish community.
The fact remains, however, that no more than 50 percent of
American Jews are affiliated at any given time with any of the
institutions of Jewish life, while the Orthodox are affiliated
all the time. Therefore, at the very least they represent 20
percent of the affiliated. If one goes beyond affiliation to
activism, it becomes clear that Orthodox Jews represent about a
third of the total of Jewish activists within the American Jewish
community, a community in which they are demographically the
weakest.
Implications
These figures suggest that, as opposed to the popular image
of a tiny embattled minority seeking to impose its will on the
vast majority of world Jewry (the usual figures given are 15
percent versus 85 percent), Orthodox Judaism commands the
allegiance of between 33 to 45 percent of all the Jews in the
world and 50 to 70 percent of those who identify as religious in
some way. Conversely, the non-Orthodox religious movements
account for no more than one third of world Jewry and possibly as
little as 25 percent. Hence, if Orthodox claims are strong, it is
not only because they control all of the religious establishment
outside of the United States by law or weight of tradition, but
because they have the numerical strength to retain that control.
It is no wonder, then, that Orthodoxy remains the dominant voice
on the "Who is a Jew?" and other such issues and claims the
lion's share of Jewish public money devoted to religious
purposes.
Note
* For an explanation of the discrepancy, see my article,
"Self-Destruction - Jewish Style," The Jerusalem Post, 24 June
1986, p. 5.
