Andrew Guckes and Zoe Bell | Staff Writers
In the military, uniformity is key. If you go to Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, you’ll see men and women dressed exactly the same, walking the same way and speaking in the same military jargon.
Uniformity is also taken seriously by many Orthodox Jews. Go to a Hasidic community, and you’ll see men with payot and black frock coats, as well as a mix of black kippot and big dark-colored fur hats called shtreimels. Women wear wigs or other hair coverings and dress modestly.
You might think that these two communities could agree on the need for a dress code. However, there is one part of the Orthodox uniform that now conflicts directly with U.S. military standards, thanks to recent directives from U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth: beards.
New grooming regulations announced by Hegseth in early October call for the elimination of long beards. He said candidly at a meeting with top officers that “if you want a beard, you can join Special Forces. If not, then shave.”
While there are not huge numbers of Orthodox Jews in the U.S. military, they do exist, as do observant Sikhs, Muslims and others whose religious rules require that they not shave.
Hegseth — who is also known as head of the Department of War, depending on which moniker you choose for the U.S. government’s largest agency — has shaken up a lot since being appointed by President Donald Trump at the beginning of the latter’s second term, but no change will affect religious Jewish servicemen and women as much as this one.
Rabbi Sanford Shudnow, a retired Navy chaplain living in Kemp Mill, recalls being told by his commanding officer in 1985 that he was no longer allowed to sport a beard as a service member.
“I was shocked, as a matter of fact,” said Shudnow, who began serving in the U.S. military in 1976. “I had a beard all of these years.”
He also remembers his children, who “cried when they saw Abba shaving.”
“I was required to shave, and I felt and looked like it wasn’t me,” he added.
Shudnow said he is “troubled” by the recent guidelines. “I’m troubled because I think that we’re dealing with people of different backgrounds and different religions, not just Jewish,” he said. “Having a beard for some is very, very significant.”
The Aleph Institute’s legal advisor, Judge Arthur Zeidman, who is a former military lawyer and retired Army reserve officer, spoke about the U.S. military’s current facial hair standards, which he said allow beards for religious observance so long as the facial hair “doesn’t interfere with the military function or mission.”
The new standards, which will make it harder for soldiers to get a religious waiver for long or bushy beards, could potentially affect some Orthodox Jewish service members, Zeidman said, especially Hasidim and followers of Chabad Lubavitch.
“It will affect a lot of the Jewish chaplains who are Chabad — the Chabad custom is to grow the beard and not to trim it at all,” Zeidman said. “Also, if there’s some kind of change in sideburn policy, that may affect even some people who shave their beards but are required to have longer sideburns, or payot.”
“A number of” chaplains began serving in the military only after the 1985 beard ban was lifted, he said, “and then there are others as well who might not sign up if they’re concerned that they wouldn’t be allowed to grow beards.”
Another concern is that the new policy, if strictly enforced, might keep an observant Orthodox Jewish service member in a noncombat role.
“That’s really a career killer to be restricted while you’re a soldier or an airman and you can’t go into combat,” Zeidman said. “That really doesn’t look good on your resume.”
Zeidman, who began growing his beard after retiring from the military, said he was never asked to serve in a combat role during his 28 years in the Army. “So sometimes it works out that way, but to limit somebody to noncombat service — if that’s where it ends up — is not good for your career,” he said. “You have to be available for whatever you can do.”
Having served in the military from 1978 to 2006, Zeidman understands the need for uniformity.
“The uniform is called uniform because it’s supposed to be the same,” he said. “So I understand the concern, and it goes along with Secretary Hegseth’s concern about things like physical fitness: he wants to have a military of warriors, people ready to fight, people physically fit as well as committed in every way to military service.”
Zeidman recognizes this “legitimate concern,” but also wants to ensure that people seeking religious accommodations are still allowed to fully participate in the military.
“If beards are not accommodated, it will have [an] effect,” he said.
He noted that Hegseth’s guidelines so far are just that — guidelines. The defense secretary’s memo called upon the military services to implement the regulations, but none of the branches have formally done so.
“The regulations have not been propounded yet,” Zeidman said. “So we really won’t know until those regulations come out, exactly what the effect will be, if any. It’s a concern, though.”
