Forming a Anti-Zionist Denomination of Judaism

[u/NAHTHEHNRFS850]

Seeing the stickied post regarding people seeking out progressive (particularly anti-Zionist) Jewish services, I wanted to talk about the formation of a progressive anti-Zionist Jewish denomination.

While there are progressive denominations of Judaism (e.g. Humanistic), these denominations don’t explicitly render themselves as anti-Zionist in the fact that they don’t declare “that there should not be a Jewish state”.

A new denomination such as this would need to remove practices phrases, statements and literature making overtures to the Holy Land and focus on community and belief in God. I see this as parallel to how some branches of Humanistic Judaism avoid using theonyms (names associated with God e.g. Joshua).

Thoughts?

[u/allneonunlike]

We don’t need to strip that material from the canon, we just need to make it clear that it’s a spiritual metaphor. Jews spent 2000 years using “next year in Jerusalem” as an allegory rather than a plan to commit genocide and enshrine an evil apartheid state, the problem isn’t in the literature.

[u/specialistsets → u/allneonunlike]

It's not traditionally seen as a metaphor, all Orthodox Jews literally believe that the Temple will one day be physically rebuilt in Jerusalem in a messianic era. "Next year in Jerusalem" is said at Passover and Yom Kippur because those holidays are seen as uniquely incomplete without the associated Temple practices.

[u/malachamavet → u/specialistsets]

Also, even not taken metaphorically, the idea of a state is completely divorced from the idea of physically being somewhere. I can want to move to Paris without wanting to conquer France etc.