Help young, ex-ultra-orthodox Jews to start from scratch!

... you grow up in a community that is completely isolated from the life outside of it. Your entire daily life and your future are strictly planned and regulated from morning to evening. You don't have to worry about anything. At some point you will feel that this is not YOUR life. After years of feeling unwell, you finally leave the community head over heels without knowing whether your family will ever speak to you again, and unknown about what awaits you in the world out there. It feels like in a shark tank: nothing is regulated anymore, you talk to other drop outs who have done similar things in order to find out how "normal life" works. You search for your first job, sleep on the street for the first few weeks until you can afford an apartment. And so you try to start over step by step. Instead of your family, you are now surrounded by people who are, like you, trying to survive. Your cosy everyday life has disappeared. You are now completely on your own - in a completely foreign world. 

 

 

Things like this happened to our student Samuel Levi, among others. Besht Yeshiva has now become a new family for him, here he starts from scratch, learns German and everything he needs to know about "normal" life outside of ultra-orthodoxy: dealing with money, writing applications, planning his own future, being independent. Soon he would like to study - preferably in the field of natural sciences. The Besht Yeshiva Dresden e.V. helps people like Samuel with those issues. 

Nowadays, 8 dropouts live together in a house in Dresden - a place of learning, living a liberal Jewish life and encountering. For them it is often the last chance for a regular life after a long odyssey of trying to cope alone in a completely new world. 

In the Besht Yeshiva they are not alone, but receive support from social workers, psychologists and other volunteers. Although a "Yeshiva" is officially a prayer school for ultra-orthodox men, the Besht Yeshiva is a liberal place, open to diversity, encounters between Jews and non-Jews and to secular life. 

 

The association needs a total of 120,000 euros. This one year is crucial for the future of the Yeshiva and for our dropouts. In particular, the fixed costs of the house as well as meals and German lessons must be covered. 

With your donation you personally help young, Jewish ex-ultra-orthodox people like Samuel to find a new home, to learn German and to start studying or a job training. And on top of that: to make Jewish life more visible and natural again. A small amount of 10 euros can help us already to buy food and books for the German lesson. Help us with your donation!

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