Can't we all be in an In-Crowd?

On moving to Hendon in 2007, I soon joined Alei Tzion, a small and young community. To my amazement, my first AGM was almost fun. The few dozen people present were motivated, vocal, and seemed to want to volunteer for everything. In shul, enthusiasm translated to spirited davening, even more spirited social events, and new members. On joining the United Synagogue we declared ourselves “one of the fastest growing communities in the UK”. When I read that in the JC, I beamed with pride.

At the time, I certainly didn’t consider whether fast growth might be anything other than positive. Perhaps though, unlike Stone Age tribes or political parties, our communities are not stronger for having more members. Might they actually be weaker?

The anthropologist Robin Dunbar has a theory which might help us. Professor Dunbar identifies the approximate number of meaningful relationships that one human being can sustain as 150, a figure now known as ‘Dunbar’s Number’. Humans simply lack the mental firepower to manage a greater number. Closer relationships – loved ones and best friends – are nested within this total, and beyond it there is mental room for acquaintances and people we merely recognise. So absolute is this stratification though, that if a group of acquaintances become your close friends, then other friends will inevitably have to be relegated. There is no ill will involved, just the limits of one's cerebral capacity. Counterintuitively, it’s nothing personal; it’s science.

Organisations as varied as the Swedish Tax Authority[1] and the research and development wing of the US Army,[2] have advocated for Dunbar’s Number as the maximum size for groups which can be expected to work closely together.

The social lives of most US members aren’t exclusively based within their local shul community. But some Jewish communities which are burgeoning on paper, with vast memberships, seem smaller or more fragile when viewed up close. Given its wide acceptance then, Dunbar’s Number is a good starting point to begin considering inclusion and exclusion around our shuls.

Within a Jewish community, alienated individuals – perhaps merely ‘recognised faces’ to those at the heart of shul life – will often not make their presence felt, remaining visible only on membership lists. But if alienated people are also strongly Jewishly-engaged, they might coalesce around a point of difference with the core group. They might even break away, sometimes with rancour, to form a new community. The real issue will not be that ‘the young don’t want to daven with the old’, or that ‘there’s too much talking’. The real issue is that social groups, being the sums of their parts, have natural limits.

So what should communities do if and when membership tops 150? Does this ostensible achievement actually mean that a community is only growing towards alienation, or even fracture and division? Can the obstacle of Dunbar’s Number be overcome?

The first response to the main symptom of ‘surplus growth’ – people feeling lost in a crowd – is often to mitigate the symptoms where they first appear. Many communities work hard to be welcoming, offering hospitality and opportunities to get involved. Simultaneously, but from the top-down, rabbinic and lay leadership can inspire individuals and even create a sense of overarching communal momentum that overrides any lack of interpersonal connection among members and papers over community fragility to some extent, uniting even very large and disconnected groups in a cause or shared experience.

Personal enjoyment of a fleeting moment though, group allegiance to an ideal or individual, let alone administrative unity, should not be confused with a community that coheres around personal relationships. A well-led, motivated, warm-hearted and opportunity-generating group of thousands, simply cannot maintain meaningful relationships between everyone. A core fraternity of 150 or thereabouts might be constantly ‘topped up’ and engaged, but its growth capacity is limited.

To overcome Dunbar’s Number, a US community must prioritise opportunities outside the main minyan, literally and figuratively, if they want to make connections happen which have individual and communal significance, potential for longevity, and Jewish meaning. In other words, they must make space for more than one 'core fraternity' within a community; more 'Dunbar's Numbers'. To do this, alternative poles of activity and affinity are required, around which people can coalesce.

Borehamwood and Elstree Synagogue (‘BES’) is the largest community within the United Synagogue, with more than 2,500 members. The community though, is spread across two campuses. At Croxdale Road shul, the Yavneh College synagogue and elsewhere, there are minyanim at different times and for particular demographics and proclivities. In effect, these are sub-communities within BES, all operating within the same infrastructure. There is overlap; people go to different places at different times; families may even split up on Shabbat morning; but the likelihood of any one person being a mere ‘recognised face’ is greatly reduced.

What though, if your community lacks the space for another service, or even the people who might daven? What if there is already plenty going on for men, but not enough for women? What if the caretaker, quite reasonably, doesn’t want to open up at 7.30am for a hashkama (early) minyan?

The success of the US chevrae kadisha[3] offers encouragement. While skill and dedication are required, neither are barriers to involvement in a Jewish communal service which has wide appreciation. The work of the chevras is significant not only to the bereaved, but also to the chevra members themselves, who often develop a significant and long-lasting group collegiality among themselves. To be clear, there is of course substantial and natural overlap between the chevras and regular shul-goers, but shul attendance is certainly not the rule.

Similar dynamics might be created by the creation – whether by a single US shul, across a region or US-wide – of a doola team, bikkur cholim society or simcha gemach (society for lending the necessities for a celebration: linens, crockery etc.). All of these are accessible to involvement from anyone, yet are powerfully and specifically Jewish, and might play a significant communal role. The crucial ancillary would be the opportunities for volunteers to create substantive, long-lasting, Jewishly-freighted relationships.

Membership lists need not be made up of around 150 people who are ‘engaged’, with others classified perhaps as ‘seen at yamim noraim.’ We can overcome our sometimes limited channels of communal involvement.

Many of our communities are already operating creatively to provide opportunities for new ‘Dunbar’s Numbers’, whether consciously or even - dare I say it - in ignorance of the latest theories from brilliant anthropologists. For some readers then, this might be an unnecessary theorisation of the blindingly obvious. However, having once welcomed a guest to my shul – a community which I flattered myself I knew as well as anyone – only to be told that he’d been a member for a year, I will never again grin gormlessly when I hear my community described as “fast growing”.

[1] Swedish tax collectors organized by apes - The Local: https://www.thelocal.se/20070723/7972 [2] ‘Relating size and functionality in human social networks through complexity’ by B. J. West, G. F. Massari, G. Culbreth, R. Failla, M. Bologna, R. I. M. Dunbar, and P. Grigolini, in PNAS August 4, 2020 117 (31) 18355-18358; first published July 20, 2020; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2006875117 [3] The chevra kadisha societies are drawn from US communities and assist the professional US burial staff in preparing the dead for burial. There are volunteer men and women’s chevrae kadisha.