Characteristics of successful living arrangements in intentional communities are presented by examining kibbutz life. The first section discusses four bases for establishing and maintaining an intentional community: interest, justice, cultural flowering, and love (deep interpersonal and intergroup relationships and religious values). The second section tests 26 hypotheses of successful community living against the kibbutz system. The document concludes that the strongest characteristic of the kibbutz is that after 18 months of age children do not live with parents and siblings as a tightly knit family unit. Positive results are that this arrangement in the kibbutz promotes better family relations, provides a high potential for attaining deep relationships among the children, relieves parents of the burden of being the primary socializing agent, and thus promotes a deeper relationship between parent and child, and eliminates sibling rivalry. Children become independent of their parents, learn to make their own decisions, and are good workers. Also, the close contact among all members promotes a higher degree of productivity. Finally, common ownership of wealth and property eliminates the need for self-aggrandizement. Problems include a lack of privacy, confusion and frustration among women in renouncing their traditional domestic roles, and lack of contact with outside cultures. An outline of critical criteria for evaluating intentional communities is included. (KC)