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Dovid Bashevkin | The Achdus Crisis We Pretend Doesn’t Exist

Meaningful People

Release Date: 07/12/2025

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In this wide-ranging and deeply honest episode, Dovid Bashevkin unpacks one of the most pressing and overlooked issues in the Jewish world today: the fragmentation of the Orthodox community and the illusion of unity we like to project. With humor, vulnerability, and rare clarity, he explores why we’re lonelier than ever despite packed shuls and buzzing WhatsApp groups, how labels like “Modern Orthodox” and “Yeshivish” have shifted from ideological statements to institutional shorthand, and what it would actually take to foster real achdus, not just feel-good unity, but the kind that demands humility, discomfort, and real work.

 

Dovid doesn't just point to problems; he calls for a fundamental shift in how we build community, raise children, and see ourselves in relation to other Jews. He challenges the frum world to stop outsourcing spiritual leadership to secular institutions and to reclaim the responsibility of engaging with the entire Jewish people, across lines of observance, geography, and history. This conversation dives deep into questions of identity, leadership, and personal responsibility, offering a sobering yet hopeful vision for what Jewish life could look like if we stopped waiting for the shofar and started living like redemption is already possible.

 


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Editor: Sruly Saftlas