From Kibbutz Trends.

They will not believe you. They will think you are an accident. An invasion from outer space.

Or perhaps that someone is dragging you by the scruff of your neck, that it isn’t your doing. That ghosts from the past are having a go at you. Actually, your youthful spirit is irritating. Haven’t you read the sociological studies and the obituaries, haven’t you heard the compassionate sermons, haven’t they whispered in your ears that you were born too late? Don’t you know that the candle has been extinguished, the dream is over? Haven’t they taught you to dry your tears and confront the world with cheeks still wet and your fists clenched? What are you doing there in Eshbal? Now, at this stage, you dare to come and say that you want partnership, education, a social experiment?

Now? Now you will stand up and face your friends and followers, and not tell them to learn to bow under the yoke as though it were a pleasure, to dream and walk about hypnotized by the glitter of power over others. Won’t you, too, try to put out the sparks of an inner awakening, of the search for togetherness based on the individual? Will you dare to seek meaning in your work, responsibility in your relations with each other? Will you reach out beyond the horizon and to roots nurtured from the depths and learn to act? Will you speak to others equals, boldly yet humbly?

Go your own way, with discerning eyes and candor in your hearts. Don’t be alarmed. You have not been called upon to sacrifice yourselves. Not to a blind idealism, only to the difficult task of building. To bear the barbs of being “contrary to expectations,” bewildered and confused.

Don’t let your striving for the future burn out, nor futile dreams consume you. But do not take the obvious road.

We shall watch you, believing that you and those who will follow you be able to straighten things out somehow, and overcome the fashionable apathy and discord without arrogance, with a great deal of love.

Muki Tzur, Kibbutz Ein Gev

Translated by Hana Raz.