The State Department recently issued its Annual Report on International Religious Freedom. Observant Jews in Israel have a special classification: “ultra-Orthodox.” There are no “ultra-Catholics” in Ireland or “ultra-Protestants” in the United Kingdom. The report didn’t find any “ultra-Muslims” in Saudi Arabia. But Jews who make a concerted effort to follow the traditions of Judaism in Israel are a special category in the eyes of the US government: “ultra-Orthodox.”
The bulk of the Israel section of the report challenges the classic positions of Jewish tradition. Russian immigrants who are not defined as Jewish under Jewish law are being denied “their rights.” Religious Jews who provide educational opportunities for secular Jews are chastised for proselytizing. Christian groups who masquerade as “Messianic Jews” are said to be having their freedoms denied. Religious courts that follow three thousand years of Jewish legal precedent in the administration of issues of Jewish identity are labeled as bigoted.
It seems the greatest bias is at the State Department itself. To them anyone who looks a bit too Jewish is deemed “ultra.”
I have been trying to understand for a long time what the qualifications are for this unique classification. Do you need to have a black hat and beard? If you eat glatt kosher you’re ultra and if you trust Hebrew National you’re not? If you connect to the rest of the world via the Internet or a BlackBerry does it propel you into modernity and eliminate your “ultra” status?
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