Historian Marc B. Shapiro blogs:
Saudi Arabia is not a theocracy.
When the State was established there was no automatic assumption that the status quo in all religious matters would carry on (see R. Herzog’s constitution and the correspondence published there) Had the religious Zionists in 1948 argued that compulsory religious marriage was not a good idea, it never would have carried over.
I don’t know if I am pessimistic about them taking over. I was simply dealing with the scenario if the DO take over, which is what they are hopeful of. It could be that when the government decides to let them work without going to the army that this will moderate them, since they will be out of the yeshiva and integrating. If that happens, then everything will change.
As for the interesting fact that the Knesset representation has not changed, surely you don’t think if the haredi percentage was say 20 percent, that this would not affect the Knesset representation.
There are 120 members of Knesset and 5 are part of United Torah Judaism. If you assume that 2 Shas representatives represent a real haredi electorate, you still have less than the seven percent that we are told = the haredi population. But if the haredi population moves up percentage wise, you can expect representation to move up, not to exactly to parallel it.
…I agree with Sanhedrin. Let me also add, responding to comments above, that people don’t realize that democracy is the best thing for religion. Any time religion is connected to government is ends up hurting religion, as religion becomes identified with repression etc. Look at how strong religion is in the U.S. vs. Europe, which suffered under repressive religion for so long, and this led to strong anti-clerical feelings.
Religion can only thrive when it is freely chosen, not when it is compelled.
