Inside The Growing Jewish Movement Shaking Up Tradition

Most practicing Jews in the United States fall into one of three categories. There are the Orthodox Jews--who are committed to following Jewish law to the letter and who uphold all the traditions set by rabbis over the centuries.


Then there are the Conservative Jews, who still believe in following the law, but allow for a bit more freedom of modern interpretation of that law.

And then there are the Reform Jews who emphasize the spirit of the law over the letter of the law—often appreciating the deep moral tradition of the Torah, while leaving ritual practice up to the individual. 

Now, these are just umbrella terms—all of these forms of Jewish practice operate on wide spectrums--but 63% of American jews were able to identify as one of the three in a 2019 Pew Research Survey. And the majority of Jews who did not identify with one of these three categorizations also do not identify as religious.


But that still leaves around 16% of American Jews as actively religious, but unable to align themselves with Orthodox, Conservative or Reform Judaism. 

So, who are they? Well, the answer is, of course, complicated. There are endless reasons one might not want to ascribe to these three classifications. But, while we can’t discern the spiritual complexity of each individual, one new Jewish movement can help account for a growing number of American Jews who don’t quite identify with mainstream Jewish communities.

They call themselves the Ivri, an ancient word for Hebrews—a name which is fitting for this form of Jewish practice which seeks to call back to ancient traditions and rituals, while also doing something new.

On this week’s episode I spoke with Mira Fox, reporter and culture critic at The Forward, who recently wrote about the thriving new community in an article entitled: There’s a new Judaism in town — or maybe it’s very, very old.