What's a kibutz?

Question

What's a kibutz?

Answer 1

I've actually lived in Israel when i was little in a small town that was right next to a kibutz, and I remember going there very often on the weekend. These communities are always clean and quite. the environment is just awsome!!!

As to the official definition, here is something quite accurate:



A kibbutz is an Israeli collective community. Although other countries have had communal enterprises, in no other country have voluntary collective communities played as important a role as the kibbutzim have played in Israel. Its importance can be traced back to the creation of the Israeli state, and continues to the present day.



Combining socialism and Zionism in a form of practical Labor Zionism, the kibbutzim are a unique Israeli experiment, and part of one of the largest communal movements in history. The kibbutzim were founded in a time when independent farming was not practical. Forced by necessity into communal life, and inspired by their own socialist ideology, the kibbutz members developed a pure communal mode of living that attracted interest from the entire world. While the kibbutzim lasted for several generations as utopian communities, most of today's kibbutzim are scarcely different from the capitalist enterprises and regular towns to which the kibbutzim were originally supposed to be alternatives.



The kibbutzim have given Israel a wildly disproportionate share of its military leaders, intellectuals, and politicians. Though the kibbutz movement never accounted for more than 7 % of the Israeli population, it did more to shape the image Israelis have of their country, and the image that foreigners have of Israel, than any other Israeli institution.

Answer 2

First the word "KIBUZ" means in Hebrew "to getter".

To get things, and people into one place.



That how it is all started.

Zionist people in eastern Europe in the 19 Century brought up the idea of a "Commune", were everyone are even- working and getting all the need under one organization.

In the early days of settlement in the land of what is now Israel many immigrants came from Europe before WW 1 and started to form these kind of settlements and called it KIBBUTZ and in plurals KIBBUTZIM.

They were based on agriculture and with the years the advanced and got into industry, and today you can find few of the leading industries in the world dealing in manufacturing Research and development aside the milk and dairy and fruit and vegetable at the same Kibbutz.

Some did liquidated after doing mistakes and not advancing in the modern world but most of the are doing well and are prospering and the people there are still having their lives spent with their colleges in mutual interest and equality, and prosper.

Answer 3

Well, to sum up what everyone else said...

A Kibbutz from what I expierenced it as, is a very tight "one big family" type of community. We prayed together on the Shabbos- (sabbath) Friday night we ate at the host's home, but the food was from the main dining room, and the children donot normally eat or stay at home with the parents. The children move out of the house at a young age and live with the other children of the kibbutz, and they do odd chores around the kibbutz, you don't really "own" anything of your own, since everyone is living with everyone together. Everything is normally done with everyone participating, for instance the Shabbos meal was eaten together in the main dining room, children served the adults, no matter who you were parents were, and then the children did their own thing afterwards. It's almost as if they are not incharge of their own children. It was a very intresting and exciting expeirence.

Answer 4

Kibbutz in Israel is really part of the past, most kibbutzim had fell apart because of money issues and fights over property among the members. what can you do, socialism is similar to Communism and it does not work so well in the world today... the few kibbutzim that had stay like they were (maybe 25%) are the more successful ones, the ones with industries that make a lot of money and so nobody needs to fight cause they've got plenty!!

Answer 5

I'm not going to repeat what the other people said, it's pretty accurate (even when they disagree, or especially, because that's really accurate)



But I did want to stress that the kibbutzes (that's the English plural) were socialist EXPERIMENTS and they experimented with some crazy stuff. Like in some, parents did not raise their children as in a family, instead the children lived together with each other sort of like at camp.



A less radical communal farm is called a moshav. In a moshav, families live in their own houses, but the farm is worked together as a group.

Answer 6

The word is actually "kibbutz".



Communal settlement in modern Israel. Originally, kibbutzim had an agricultural they focused, on agriculture, but many of them they are now are engaged in a variety of activities including tourism, high-tech ventures, and other industries. Kibbutzim is the Hebrew plural for kibbutz.