Tell me about living on a kibbutz

In My Humble Opinion
1

(I think this is IMHO rather than GQ? If not, please move it).

I’ve been giving serious though lately to living on a kibbutz someday. I’d like to live communally to some extent, in a religious environment, preferably with a job working with animals (but not as a vet). Those things are… a little bit hard to find 'round these parts, whereas I think the odds of finding these things at a kibbutz would at least reach “reasonable”.

On the other hand, I’m terrible at Hebrew (despite years of yeshiva education), have never actually lived away from home for any significant length of time, and have autism and anxiety. Among other concerns.

On the other other hand, if I spend the rest of my life living through New Jersey winters I will go insane, and I mean that in a literal mental health sense. If I’m going to have to move away from everything and everyone I know and love anyway, why not the Galilee rather than Florida or California?

So that’s what I’m trying to research at this juncture: what is it really like, as opposed outdated information or airy-fairy romantic notions? What are the important things to know? What are the important reality-checks (besides “language” and “social support”)? Do you have any relevant experience or anecdotes? What things should I be asking that I haven’t asked?

I hope this doesn’t sound stupid. Like I said, I’m still at the research stage.

2

I knew Isreal set those up when they first got going but I didnt know they still had them.

3

My brother and his family lived on a Kibbutz, circa 1970 to 1980. One thing I remember him talking about stood out:

Of course they have leadership. And with leadership comes politics. And all the issues that go with that: Disputes about decision-making; factions; favoritism (real or alleged); the works.

Here’s what I think I got out of hearing that: It may work well for the first-generation Kibbutzniks, who all went there voluntarily because they believed in the ethic of communal living. But subsequent generations of children who were born and raised there didn’t necessarily have that communal ethic, or not in the same way anyway, and weren’t always so ready to put the common good before their own good.

4

The classic kibbutz no longer exists.
The kibbutz movement flourished for a couple generations, from about 1920 to1970. These were true ideological communes,run with the eqalitarian philosophy of communism, but functioning within a capitalistic economy. The kibbutz was a profit-making business,but the profits were all put into a common pot and every member received an equal share.You could live for weeks on end without touching any money.Everybody was given for free: housing, 3 meals a day in the dining hall, a couple sets of work clothes, a couple packs of cigarettes per week, etc.

The system began to fall apart in the1970’s when Israel developed economically and was no longer a desperately poor country.(food had been rationed until 1953.By the 70’s there were still no shopping malls anywhere in the country, but there was a much higher standard of living).

By the 1970’s and 80s’ Israeli society had developed into a modern western country, with more options available for individuals to succeed,so the communal aspect of kibbutz life became less attractive.The economy went nuts in 1984 (400% inflation), and suddenly the kibbutzim were economically unviable.

So during the 1990’s, kibbutz life changed completely. They had to give up on the communal aspects, and each kibbutz privatized its finances. The members had to pay a mortgage on their house(which they had been living in for free all their lives.), and had to find work outside the kibbutz to pay it. Some of the kibbutz businesses kept functioning ,both agriculture and commercial factories, and many of the residents continued to work there. But they were hired based on their skills, not (as previously) just because they were members of the community.

Today, most of the kibbutzim are similar to small, gated communities, in which the residents all know each other, but are not financially connected to each other. The central dining hall–once the focal point of the community–remains dark, locked and unused. For a few holidays during the year it gets opened up to organize a festive meal (and each resident who chooses to attend has to make a reservation and pay in advance.)
The social atmosphere is an odd combination of extremely close friendships among families who have lived side by side for 3 generations, and more distant contacts with other neighbors who have recently moved into the community because they wanted a cheap place to live in a quiet rural area.
There is some real friction between the two groups.
The kibbutz remains a very,very small community, where there is much less privacy than in a city.
It’s a nice way to live, but it’s not for everybody.

5

You might also consider a yishuv or a moshav. The Nefesh b’Nefesh website would be a good resource in terms of giving you general descriptions, percentages of English-speakers, and religious makeup of various communities. I’m assuming you’d be looking for something dati leumi? The religious boxes in Israel are very fixed and much less flexible than in America.

6

All I know about Israeli kibbutzim I learned from watching Sallah Shabati…

If the classic kibbutz movement is really over and done with in Israel (I can’t imagine that most young Israelis are not sold on the idea of getting rich and owning a TV set, house, car, etc.), perhaps there are still classic collective-living communities in other countries?

As far as the OP’s desire for a religious environment, I would imagine that would narrow things down a lot. Maybe at best the other members would not care too much about religion either way, but you might encounter some leftists who still remember that Marx said “religion is the opium of the masses”, and I could imagine some friction as a result.

7

My understanding of kibbutzim is that most were very secular (but still culturally Jewish), not religious at all.

8

Religious communes are definitely a thing— consider various Catholic or Buddhist monasteries for example — maybe there are some Jewish variants but I would research this carefully.

9

That’s what the woman from Nefesh B’Nefesh said on the phone; I just feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount. I mean, I *did *look, don’t get me wrong.

It depends. The majority are secular, I believe, but there are all flavors of religious communities, and some that aren’t officially one way or the other.
For the record: my parents just came back from a trip to Israel, and they think Sde Eliyahu might be a place I could be happy. It’s definitely at the top of my list for more detailed research.

Thank you all for your help so far.

10

On the langauge thing. What is the most common language in Isreal? Are there many english speakers.?

11

Statistically, a majority of Israelis can speak Hebrew (which is thus in a real sense the most common working language - the native language of nearly half the population; 90% of Jews and 60% of Arabs understand it), and a minority speak Arabic, but in practice it also depends on what town and even what neighborhood you consider. People study English in school as a foreign language, and you would probably not have trouble walking into a convenience store and buying a pack of smokes in English, but I have not heard of sizable communities in Israel where everybody speaks English, it’s just another foreign language there despite the country having been under British control for a number of years.

12

Ramat Beit Shemesh isn’t totally English-speaking but it’s where a lot of American immigrants end up and you can live there happily in the community for years not speaking a word of Hebrew. And there are some very English-heavy neighborhoods in Jerusalem, as well. I don’t speak any Hebrew (I can read it well enough to navigate public transit and that’s it) but have no trouble functioning in Har Nof, for example. Ramat Eshkol is similar.

13

That is kind of interesting. In Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, are there distinct Chinatown, Russia Town, etc., neighborhoods where people can get a job and live for years, without knowing Hebrew or Arabic?

14

You can live in Kibbutz without being a member - plenty of kibbutzim rent and even sell houses. My sister bought a house in a kibbutz and lived there for several years before become members, despite the fact that her husband was born and raised there. In a way, kibbutzim, especially the successful ones,are a bit like co-ops; you have to jump through significant hoops to gain rights to their assets.

The sister of a friend of mine lives in one of those neighborhoods. She’s having real problems now, as her kid has reached school age and doesn’t speak a word of Hebrew. No offense, but as the son of American immigrants who raised me in a regular, Hebrew-speaking part of Haifa, those places freak me out a bit. They’re ghettos, and we shouldn’t live in ghettos.

That said, English education in Israel is excellent, and most Israelis can speak English to one degree or another.

15

I remembering reading how Harvey Pekar was considering kibbutz work, and went to meet with an Israeli rep. The rep wasn’t impressed and practically chased him out of the office. Pekar made one last attempt to salvage his pride, and said he was a music critic. The rep replied “A music critic. We don’t need music critics in Israel.”

16

My limited tourist experience was that most people spoke pretty excellent English. Road signs were in English too. Much easier for an anglophone speaker to get about than even parts of Europe, such as France.

My best friend also spent a summer working on a kibbutz when she was a student - perhaps that might be an option to see if you like it? She did it for a Gap year experience, isn’t Jewish and certainly doesn’t speak Hebrew.

17

That I don’t think is such a problem. Assuming the kid goes to a regular Israeli school, he will pick up Hebrew quickly. Many immigrant children in the US enter school speaking only Spanish or Russian or Chinese and then they quickly pick up English and have the advantage of being bilingual for the rest of their lives. I know olim who grew up in America, made aliyah as adults, put their children into the regular chareidi school system, and their grown kids now understand English well but don’t speak it nearly as well, and the grandkids don’t know English at all.

But Mishpacha Magazine did an article on RBS a few years ago wherein they found adults who had lived there since childhood and still could barely function in Hebrew. Because their parents had put them in private schools aimed at yeshivish chutznikim since Israeli chareidi was too hard-core but they weren’t dati leumi either. And the language of the playground was English, since there wasn’t a critical mass of Hebrew speakers. The school is so important.