Religious Jews in Britain became more attached to the Jewish community during the first year of the pandemic than before it, whereas attachment among secular Jews dipped, according to a new report from the Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR).
Among other findings, Jewish women were less comfortable about returning to in-person events than Jewish men last year.
But JPR cautioned, “Almost three years since the pandemic started, it is still too early to see what the lasting impact on Jewish life will ultimately look like”.
The report, Six takeaways about Jewish life under lockdown, is based on a sample of more than 4,000 Jews in the summer of 2021, building on JPR’s previous research into the social, religious and economic impact of the pandemic on the Jewish community in 2020.
Social restrictions particularly hit the Orthodox sections of the community when synagogues were closed during lockdown.
But even so, the sense of attachment to the Jewish community rose among self-identifying religious Jews during the pandemic - up from 66 per cent to 69 per cent. A similar increase was apparent among the “somewhat religious”, rising from 40 per cent to 42 per cent.
However, among the secular, attachment dropped slightly from 10 per cent to eight per cent: and from 17 per cent to 16 per among the “somewhat secular”.
JPR commented, “This partly reflects the greater Jewish resilience of the religious, and, more generally, may also be an indication that the pandemic widened the pre-existing gap between the more religious and the more secular sections of the Jewish community, if only temporarily.”
While the use of technology on Shabbat and festivals is prohibited in Orthodox communities, two-thirds of United Synagogue members reported using it on Pesach 2020 when social gatherings were banned and more than 80 per cent of members of the S & P Sephardi Community.
Twenty-nine per cent of US members said they had resorted to technology only because of the “exceptional circumstances” of the lockdown when normally they wouldn’t have used it: 41 per cent of Sephardi and 25 per cent of Federation of Synagogues members reported likewise. (Some Sephardi rabbis in Israel gave special dispensation for virtual Sedarim that year.)
Whereas 54 per cent of UK Jews had attended a synagogue service at least once in the couple of months pre-lockdown, the proportion participating in online prayers fell to 42 per cent.
From March to July 2020, a half or more Liberal and Reform Jews watched streamed Shabbat services and nearly a third of Masorti. Merely 10 per cent of Orthodox synagogue members did.
However, between 19 and 39 per cent of Orthodox members took part in services “either side of Shabbat”.
The following year, in May to July, when in-person services resumed, 31 per cent were attending them and 25 per cent participating online. (Some might have done both).
When in-person events became available, enthusiasm for online content waned,“Yet certain online content is preferred over other types,” JPR noted. “Online Jewish educational and cultural content were favoured much more than Jewish social activities and particularly prayer services.
“This not only reflects the challenges of delivering certain types of content online… but also highlights the fundamentally social dimension of Jewish prayer services which does not appear to translate to the online environment as easily.”
While the vaccine programme was under way last year, some Covid caution was apparent. “Jewish women were less comfortable about returning than Jewish men, and while, in general, older people were less comfortable than younger people, it was those aged in their 60s who were least comfortable,” JPR found.
Religious Jews were much more comfortable about returning to physical events than secular ones.
Read more: Entire Jewish community did not lock down early enough
