Abstract
This article explores the role of music in contemporary processes of change within progressive Judaism in the UK. By analyzing ethnographic research material gathered among progressive Jews in London between 2014 and 2016, it illustrates a burgeoning trend in the Western world today: the wish to combine liberal theology with religious practices that are experienced as increasingly traditional, and the important role played by music and musical forms of expression in this process. Building on theoretical insights from religious studies and ethnomusicology, three research questions are put forward related to the role of music in processes of religious change concerning the perceived relationship between language and emotions, singing as a religious practice, and embodiment as a form of “doing” Jewish. The article also analyzes and discusses the views expressed in the interview material in light of the research questions arising from the literature. As a conclusion, the ethnographic analysis is summarized in a thought-provoking quotation from the interview data, aptly capturing the theoretical implications suggested by the research: “I’m convinced that reading English that you understand is no more helpful than singing Hebrew that you feel.”
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Notes
The interviewees quoted in this article have been given aliases—common Jewish names—in order to guard their anonymity.
“Progressive” is used as an umbrella term for Jewish groups, communities, and individuals who are engaged in forms of Jewish practice that are not Orthodox or strictly traditional. It is not used to denote a specific movement and is not intended as a value judgment.
The first number refers to the so-called “core” population, including persons who self-identify as Jews (religious as well as secular), have Jewish parents, or are converts. The second number measures the “enlarged” Jewish population, which also includes persons of Jewish heritage who have adopted another religion and non-Jewish household members such as spouses and children. The terms are demographic, not normative or halachic (Institute for Jewish Policy Research website).
A union of synagogues representing the country’s central Orthodox movement (United Synagogue website).
In the UK, the Conservative movement is called the Masorti movement (Masorti Judaism website).
“We should accept the past as no more authoritative than the present. It should have the right to vote but not the right to veto” (Kaplan 1958, 28).
For details, see the “Appendix”.
According to Edwin Seroussi et al. (2001), the term “Jewish music” is currently applied to a wide range of research objects, including, for example, the traditional music of all Jewish communities, past and present, liturgical and non-liturgical music as well as contemporary music, folk music, popular music, and art music related to Jewish groups, cultures, and persons in various ways. The scholarly (and popular) vision of a grand narrative of Jewish music builds on the legacy of the classic work by Abraham Z. Idelsohn, originally published in 1929 under the title Jewish Music in Its Historical Development [for a more recent edition, see Idelsohn (1992)]. For a discussion of Idelsohn’s influence on the Reform movement, see Cohen (2010). Reflexive approaches to defining “Jewish music” in practice and in research are also discussed, for example, by Bohlman (2008), Cohen (2010), Kligman (2015).
Borts (2014) offers a comprehensive presentation of the British Reform movement and especially its musical history. For similar discussions on music and change within the Reform community in the US, see Summit 2000, 52–54, 63; Cohen 2009. Liberal Judaism in the UK, including the development of the liturgy and musical practices, is discussed in Langton (2004), Rigal and Rosenberg (2004).
The similarities between the Jewish Reform and Liberal movements, on the one hand, and Christian Protestantism, on the other, concerning ethos, approaches to liturgy, and rationality are noted by many of the interviewees. This interesting and important dimension of the discussion falls outside the scope of this article but has been dealt with in detail, for example, by Daniel Langton (2004).
Niggunim are associated with the performance of repetitive melodies accompanying plain syllables or mantra-like text fragments from the Torah or the Jewish prayer books. Most characteristic are the Hasidic, wordless tunes performed to syllables such as lay-lay-lay or ya-ba-bam (Bohlman 2008, 57). However, melodies referred to and used as niggunim in contemporary progressive Jewish settings have their roots in many different musical sources, e.g., Israeli folk music, popular music, melodies by modern American Jewish composers (e.g., Shlomo Carlebach and Debbie Friedman), and even interreligious sources such as Sufi chants (see Ochs 2007, 17, 26; Weissler 2011, 53; Cohen 2016, 487–488). In the interviews, niggunim are not perceived narrowly as a historical phenomenon tied to the Hasidic heritage but rather as a broad category of wordless songs that have found their way into all sorts of Jewish communities around the world. The interest in niggunim began during the 1960s in the US as part of the Jewish Renewal movement (Wood 2016, 158–161). Today, the tradition is alive within many branches of Judaism as part of a larger upswing toward explorative, emotional, and embodied Jewish practices (Levine 2009, 4–5). For this context, Vanessa Ochs offers the following definition: “The nig[g]un is a Jewish spiritual melody often sung with universal sounds, rather than words. Initially used among Hasidim to warm up for prayer and also as a prayer in and of itself […]” (Ochs 2007, 37). In this study, the term is used in line with this definition.
In fact, as Cohen (2016, 489–491) shows, the tendency among Reform Jews to draw inspiration from Hasidic musical practices, perceived as “authentic” and “spiritual” alternatives to what are felt to be overly rational and uninspiring liberal practices, has a history going back more than a century.
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Leo Baeck College. http://lbc.ac.uk. Accessed 3 Oct 2017.
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Acknowledgement
The author wishes to thank the three anonymous reviewers, who by their insightful and constructive comments greatly improved the quality and analysis of this article. A warm thank you also to Dr. Clive Tolley for language editing the manuscript.
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Appendix
Appendix
Interviews
Twenty-one interviews were conducted in London between July 2014 and June 2016 by the author (some persons were interviewed two or three times; some interviews were group interviews; in all, approximately 30 persons were interviewed). All interviews were recorded as mp3 files and transcribed into text documents by the current researcher. Coding was conducted manually using both inductive and deductive strategies, employing concepts and themes arising from the theoretical framework as well as paying attention to topics of concern expressed by the interviewees.
The interviewees have been given aliases—common Jewish names—in order to guard their anonymity. In transliterating the recordings into text, only minor changes have been made to the spoken dialogue in order to make it understandable and quotable. Thus, the quotations from the interviews do not follow strict grammatical rules but are colloquial in their appearance.
Recordings and transcripts are stored at the Cultura Archive, Åbo Akademi University, Turku, Finland. Archive codes: IF mgt 2014/028, IF mgt 2014/032-040, and IF mgt 2016/009-019.
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Illman, R. Singing in Hebrew or Reading in English? An Ethnographic Analysis of Music and Change Among Progressive Jews in the UK. Cont Jewry 38, 365–386 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12397-018-9252-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12397-018-9252-y