Jewish fundamentalism

Jewish fundamentalism (Hebrew: פונדמנטליזם יהודי‎) refers to fundamentalism in the context of Judaism. The term fundamentalism was originally used in reference to Christian fundamentalism, a Protestant movement emphasizing biblical literalism. Today, it is commonly used more generally in reference to movements that oppose modernist, liberal, and ecumenical tendencies in society and their own religion and is often coupled with extremist ideologies and/or political movements. This is important in the Jewish context because the two movements most commonly associated with Jewish fundamentalism, Religious Zionism and Haredi Judaism, stray far from biblical literalism due to the importance of Oral Law within Judaism. In fact, Karaism, the Jewish movement most known for biblical literalism, is rarely considered fundamentalist.