These books are all copyrighted. Reading the quotes is for academic purposes only and
not to be construed as unlawful reproduction of the literature.
The Responsa of Professor Louis Ginzberg
p. 88: No. 8 An Interview Regarding Mixed Pews-1926
ed. R' David Golinkin
"And you say, therefore," the Professor was asked, "that
this problem has become in some measure a question of propriety, of
liberalism?"
"Most assuredly," was the reply. "The true liberal is he who
respects views differing from his own. One may respect views similar to one's
own and still remain a thorough bigot. In every congreation so troubled
there are parties for or against mixed pews. The man who insists
on comingling the sexes has arguments of expediency only, not of
religion. He believes more young people will then attend; or that
women desiring to remain with their families will be satsified; or that
some vague spirit of modernism may thus be expressed. The believer
in separation, however, finds the mixed pews incompatible with his
religious convictions-- a far more potent impulse than mere
expediency. Many Jews would refuse to read the Shema in a pew
containing both men and women. It is a matter of earnest principle with
such men. Hence, where this is a minority in a congregation which
protests against such an innovations, the others should respect
their wishes, not on the grounds of law but of true liberalism. The
question is out of the realm of law; it is a matter of sympathetic
judgement of conditions."
--This is a most amazing reply. There are far too many Conservative Jews
that I know who are militant egalitarians. Would they only read and
absorb this and understand that they are being no more liberal than
their adversaries if they stick uncompromisingly to their views.
I consider myself a liberal. I pray in mixed seating or in separated
seating. I find no problem with either. I in fact prefer not to have
certain women near me because *it is* distracting. What I dislike,
is excluding women from the service entirely by large mechitzot (walls)
or out-of-the way women's boxes. BF, 7/2/99
here's some stuff i was reading tonight (4/6/99, further procrastination, but worth it :) it helps to explain
some of the conflict i go through when combating my religious relativism and tolerance with the need to
take a stand and do the right thing-- when every detail of sabbath observance seems strange and
irrational but works together to form a beautiful and brilliant tapestry. sometimes i forget about the
tapestry and think the threads are crazy. this helps remind me of the importance of the whole.
It's in
Mordechai Waxman, Conservative Judaism, 1958
Henrietta Szold, 1902 JTS student on Catholic Israel
For my part, one good reason for not being frantic about making concessions [in Sabbath observance]
is that I have no difficulty in imagining some of those whom we are called upon to pity as victims of
modern conditions as satisfactorily religious from their own point of view as some of the strict Sabbath
observers. There are, indeed, two points, of view, legitimate and religious, though only one of them
Jewish. the seventh-day Sabbath is not the indispensable condition of a religious life. Non-Jews,
Christians and agnostics can and do reach the highest dignity of manhood. They do justice, they love
kindness, they walk humbly with their God or through their ideal. Into this category I am prepared to put
the "Israelites without guile" who believe that the time has come to abandon a distinctive creed and unite
with the majority to attempt the formation of that tiresome brotherhood of man manifesting itself not in
justice and charity, but in uniformity of thought-- an impossible, mistaken, and stupid ideal. All these
may rest and worship on any day with perfect truthfulness. But the Jew who believes that mankind
stands not yet upon Sinai's height, demands of them a guarantee for the future, else each generation
will have to begin the work of civilization anew. Of the Jew with a conscious mission it must be known as
of Abraham, "that he will command his children and his household after him, that they shall keep the way
of the Lord, to do righteousness and justice." For this the historic Sabbath, and, I may add parenthetically
, a number of other Jewish forms of so-called, --with its freight of Jewish teaching, sentiment, and
association marked "not transferable," is an indispensable condition. Jews without the Sabbath may have
a religious spirit, but they are not useful Jews. Their ceremonial laxness incapacitates them for the task of
spreading the mission of Judaism. If we should tamper with the Sabbath ordinances for their sake, they
would not be benefited religiously, and Judaism would be past benefiting, for without the Sabbath its mission dies.
wow, powerful stuff for a hundred years ago, huh?
stuff i read later with occasional commentary:
The Standpoint of the Seminary
Dr. Cyrus Adler, 1923
"These men [JTS founders such as Dr. Morais, Dr. Mendes, Dr. Marcus Jastrow, Dr. Kohut, Dr. Szold,
Henry S. Jacobs, F. de Sola Mendes, Aaron Wise, H.W. Schneeberger, and Bernard Drachman
from such diverse backgrounds as Italy, Hungary, Poland, England, and Germany],
therefore, banded themselves together primarily for the
purpose of maintaining the thesis that the Biblical and Rabbinical
Law as handed down and interpreted by the Rabbis and sages of Israel,
was binding on the Jewish people, and that Judaism was an historical
growth and not a mushroom sect whose character was to be changed
from time to time by platforms or resolutions." p.179
I do believe he is criticizing Reform here...
"It is true that in a section of Eastern Europe, in which the great bulk of the Jews
lived, there had grown up a sort of abnormality-- an abnormal attitude which, as it were, closed the Jewish mind in
and limited it to its own literature, and even to a small section of that; always, of course, excepting a few of the
greater minds, which can never be trammeled by any system.
It was these conditions which Doctor Schechter had to meet and, if possible, overcome.
The Reform movement was showing a constantly increasing tendency to break away from
Jewish history and tradition and base itself upon what it chose to call prophetic Judaism.
The Orthodox party was growing more self-conscious and exhibiting the tendency to revert
to the abnormal attitude of Eastern Europe.... p. 181
The Seminary, therefore, insisted in the first instance, that the
students must be persons who lived in accordance witht eh Jewish law.
From this tradition the Seminary itself has never varied. It has not modified
the prayer book, it has not changed the calendar, it has not altered the dietary laws,
it has not abolished the second day of the holidays, and although some of the founders
and some of its graduates have, without protest from the Seminary, attempted changes
in the ritual, the Seminary itself has never adopted any of these changes.... p. 182
The Seminary recognized that there are and always have been and always will be
divisions in Jewry; that there are always people who call themselves conservatives; that there
are legal minds and rationalistic minds, philosophers and mystics; that some Rabbis
always favor the strict interpretation and others the mild interpretation. This is eternal
and in the essence of human nature. If you take twins of the same family, give them
the same attention, the same nurse, the same education, there is no guaranty that
their minds will be alike. How much less can one hope to standardize the minds of a whole people.
But recognizing all these possibilities of divergence, the Seminary still aims to teach a form of
Judaism to which all people could come, so far as fundamental values are concerned. A common
language, the understanding of a common history and a common literature, are the strongest
factors for keeping together the Synogogue-- stronger in our opinion than any set of resolutions
or platforms. Short of the very simple words of our charter, we have laid down no platform
and adopted no creed, for we are of the opinion that religious platforms, like party platforms,
are more often made to be disregarded than to be lived by, and that the surest guaranty
for the steady maintenance of an enlightened Judaism based upon tradition was the teaching
of the accumulated knowledge and information of the Jewish sages through all the ages. p. 184
Tradition in the Making
The Seminary's Interpretation of Judaism
by Rabbi Louis Finkelstein c. 1937
The events of the past five decades have, however, demonstrated once more the truth of
Bacon's famous aphorism, that "a little philosophy inclineth men to atheism, but depth
in philosophy bringeth man's mind about to God." Today it would be difficult to find
a scientist of high rank who fails to see in religion and the communion with God which
it offers a valid and essential expression of the human spirit, basic to all possible human happiness. p. 188
What would he [Job] have said had he known about the millions of living beings, too small
to be seen by the naked eye, and who yet possess these functions of movement, growth,
and reporduction, which are characteristic of life? In what a magnificent and immortal flow
of language might he not have described the singular truth, which modern science now insists upon,
that all life-- from the cleverest of men, the most mighty of beasts, the most gigantic of trees,
to the tiniest of animalcules and germs-- is descended from a primitive drop of protoplasm,
which was invested by its Creator with the Protean gift of self transformation [I think he misunderstands
Proteus here]; which became the fish and swam, awhich became the bird and flew, which grew intot he mammal
and suckled its young, and finally developing into man, speaks thinks, remembers, and acts. p. 189.
What would Isaiah, who wondered at the blindness of the men of his generation, because they did
not regard the work of the Lord, as it appeared in the simplicity of his day, have said of our
generation, which has been granted so much more complete a revelation, and yet continues in its
unbelief! There is only one parallel in history to such willful blindness, and that is Israel worshipping
the Golden Calf, within a few days after it had been permitted to witness the Revelation of the
Divine Glory on Mount Sinai....
Together with these advances in Biblical study and natural science has come a deeper understanding
of psychology and sociology, those infant sciences which give so much promise for the future of mankind.
The first students of primitive life, finding parallels to Israel's traditions in Africa and India,
were prepared to deny the whole principle of Prophetic inspiration and to see in the
great Prophets merely dervishes who happened to dance in Jerusalem. A deeper study
of the Prophetic religion and life has shown, however, that the Prophets are without parallel
among any of the other traditions and that it may be said, with absolute truth and without
the slightest exaggeration, that the Hebrew Scriptures are inspired in a sense in which
no other literature of the world can be so described. p. 190
The Truth is that we need Law and Discipline in life, but that this law and discipline must take
continual cognizance of the goals which they are intended to serve. p. 193
The Code of Hammurabi can rest unchanged in the Louvre. The Torah endures in
human life and must partake of the vitality, the adaptability, and fluidity of all living organisms. p. 194
The Jewish people must be maintained in order that their traditions may live; it is not the traditions
that live in order that the Jewish people should be maintained. p. 195
Unity in Diversity in the Conservative Movement
By Mordechai M. Kaplan, 1947
Like so many other activities in Jewish life, it [the C. movement] has been propelled less
by any inner vitality than by the galvanic kind of energy which any skillful appeal to organizational
loyalty can evoke. Organizational loyalty should not, however, serve as a substitute for clear,
forthright thought and for the intrinsic enthusiasm which a cause should elicit. When it does so serve,
it generates the surface appearance of activity, beneath which stagnation in ideas and
creative values reigns undisturbed....
The truth, however, is that the very attempt to introduce uniformity by fiat must lead to highly
undesirable consequences. It is bound to lead to a struggle for power among the
various groups within the movement. Any one group which may be in a better position to
assert itself than the others will seek to impose its ideas and its wil on the others and
treat their adherents as second class citizens who should be gla dthat they are at least
tolerated. In the end, this method of dealing with diversity is certain to prove divisive. It
may ultimately drive away the strong minority groups, and hold fast within the grip of a
deadening uniformity those who remain. p. 213
The only legitimate and fruitful conception of the Conservative movement is one
which franky recognizes the excistence of more than one type of approach to the
problem of Judaism. These groupos should get to know themselves and one another
and learn to cooperate in that which they hold in common, recognizing each
other's right to foster their respective differences. For the sake of common action in behalf
of the Conservative movement, it is necessary for them to become fully aware of what differentiates
all of them from other groups, in terms of positive principles and of the many affirmative activities
which those principles call for. Following the recognition of what the groups hold in common,
each group should draw up a clear and comprehensive statement of its own guiding
principles of belief and action. All that I shall attempt to do is to suggest what might
constitute the common affirmative denominator, and to describe the actual differences
in belief and practice that exist among us today, which it would be fatuous to deny and
ruinous to try to supress. p. 214-15
The areas of aggrement amongst us are four in number. They are the following: 1)The indispensability
of Eretz Yisrael for Jewish life in the Diaspora, 2) The primacy of religion as the expression of collective
Jewish life, 3) The maximum possible plentitude of Jewish content, including the use of Hebrew,
and 4) The encouragement of the scientific approach in Jewish higher learning....
It is therefore important to stress that, for us Jews, mere existence as a people is meaningless.
Our collective life as a people must be deliberately cultivated as a means of enabling the
individual Jew to achieve his destiny as a human being. The Jewish way of life must help the
individual Jew to be and to do his best and to experience that sense of at-homeness
in the world which only beneficent religion can give. There are wide divergencies of belief among the followers
of Conservatism with regard to the origin and nature of the Jewish way of life. But whatever its origin or nature,
they agree not only as to its religious funciton, but that without it the Jewish people would be like a
body without a soul. p. 216
When the scientific approach to the study of Jewish tradition is motivated by the purpose of finding
direction for the future, it has a twofold efect. It steeps one in the abundance of Jewish content and
it gives one a sense of historical development. This twofold effect is most congenial to the Conservative
movement. It fosters a feeling of continuity with the past without enslaving one to it. p. 218
A Program for American Judaism
by Rabbi Robert Gordis, 1941
Conservatism has learned much from both Orthodoxy and Reform, but it fels that they are inadequate
to satisfy the spiritual needs of modern American Jews. Its critique of both tehse great movements
may be graphically expressed in a well-known Midrashic parable: "Once there was an army marching between
two roads, one of fire, and the other of snow. If it approaches too closely to the fire, it will be burnt; if it
comes too near the snow, it will be frozen. What is the army to do but walk in the center and avoid
botht the snow and the fire."
Orthodoxy is well symbolized by the road of fire, for it possesses both its outstanding properties-- heat
and light. Orthodoxy has been the great repository of warmth and enthusiasm, marked by zeal
for Judaism and the willingness to bring sacrificies for its cause. Through the years, it has fostered the sense
of brotherhood, linking Jews together throughout the world, in spite of all divisive factors.... [it] has
been the great protagonist of the light of Jewish learning in modern times. It created the yeshibot or Academies....
Yet fire is not only an instrument of good; it may become a scourge. Probably because of its
intense loyalty to Judaism, Orthodoxy has all to often been intolerant of change or deviation from
traditional patterns. Usually it has been unwilling or unable to adapt itself to new conditions and ideals.
Even when it has adopted modern externals, it has remained inhospitable to modern thought and
its implications. It goes without saying that troubled souls seeking the stability of an unquestioning faith
will be drawn to it, especially in days of chaos and unrelieved suffering, because like Catholocism,
it holds out the solace of certainty. But it cannot serve those who wish to live in the modern world, without
the device of the compartmentalized mind.
[O.J. is the inheritor of the ghetto Judaism which developed to deal with intense suffering. C.J. is the inheritor of
all Jewish history and is more akin to the Jews of the Spanish Golden age who were more liberal and open
to questioning the tradition while keeping it vital and thriving. --BF]
On the other side of the road of fire stretches the road of snow, white, gleaming and silent.
What better symbol than snow for Reform Judaism, which brought decorum and refinement into the
synogogue and excluded everything extremem, noisy or grotesque. This insistence on the holiness
of beauty by the side of the beauty of holiness worked a revolution in the modern synogogue.
The importance of this contribution is difficult to appreciate fully, because it has become integral to all
groups in Judaism today. Above all, Reform insisted that Judaism is hospitable to modern thought.
It thus helped to bring the Jewish heritage once more into the main stream of human progress.
But Reform suffers from the defect of its virtues. It negations were emphatic; its affirmations were pale
and colorless. Snow is white and pure, but stoop and touch it-- it is cold. While large numbers
of men and women have found spiritual shleter in Reform, many other have felt it to be lacking in emotional
warmth and intellectual zeal. In practice, if not in theory, it has surrendered to the appalling ignorance
of Jewish cultural and religious values characteristic of so many American Jews in our generation.
The new tendencies in Reform Judaism toward a reutnr to more traditional practices and to a more intensive
type of Jewish education would indicate that the objections would indicate that the objections have
considerable validity.
Conservative Judaism chooses the center path, and eschews both the road of fire and the road of snow.
It recognizes wholeheartedly the contributions that both movement have made to Jewish life. It honors
Orthodoxy for its warmth and light, for the devotion and learning that have characterized it.
But it refuses to accept its denial of change as the law of life, it opposition to modernism and it rerfusal
to grow with time. It is grateful to Reform for its insistence on decorum and esthetic appeal in the service
and its generally liberal attitude toward modern thought. Yet it seeks to avoid, at all costs, the perils
of emptiness of content and spiritual anemia. Therein it parts company with both Orthodoxy and Reform.
But negations are not enough. A program of affirmation is needed if the movement is to avoid sterility
and superficiality. Such a philosophy is now in process of articulation, drawing upon varied modern sources
of Jewish thought. [see Emet Ve-Emunah, Statement of Principles of Conservative Judaism, 1988]
The great German scholar and rabbi, Zacharias Frankel [one of the editors of the popular Vilna edition
of the Talmud, I understand], is generally recognized as the founder of the movement as such.
The circumstances surrounding the event are highly significant. When the Reform movement arose in Germany,
it encountered the uncompromising resistance of the Orthodox rabbis of the time, who refused to admit
the need of the slightest deviation from the accepted pattern [of medieval Judaism as it developed in the ghetto
and was held captive untilt he abrupt, sporadic, and limited emancipations of the 19th century.--BF]....
[At an 1845 conference discussing adpating Judaism to the modern and gentile world] he listened in silence
to the discussions of changing the Sabbath to Sunday, modifying the marriage laws, abolishing circumcision
and similar themes. When, however, the apparently minor matter of the retention or abolition of Hebrew from
the service came up for discussion and it was voted that Hebrew be retained only out of deference to the older
generations, Frankel walked out of the conference....
Frankel was a first-rate creative scholar in the field of Jewish law and history. He was fully aware that
Judaism has never been static, but has evolved continuously throughout its history. he felt that its
survival in modern times demands the acceptance of the principle of historical development. Hence change
is inevitable, but it will be gradual, and not extreme, and will flow from an inner necessity, rahter than from the pressure
of the environment to conform. p.234-237 [Solomon Schechter picked up on this and molded modern Conservative Judaism
as the President of JTS from 1902-1915. Principles of the positive-historical study of Judaism, a devotion to Zionism
were made the norm.] Dr. Louis Ginzberg, Professor of Talmud at the Seminary, and perhaps the greatest living
Jewish scholar in the world, developed critical methods in the study of Rabbinic literature and law with
incomparable brilliance and reudition. He focused upon the social, economic and political foundations of that
great spritual edifice called the Talmud, and showed how Judaism has remained alive by reinterpreting its ideas
and practices throughout its history, never losing touch with changing conditions. p. 240. [Then Professor
Mordechai M. Kaplan came and elaborated a method of re-interpretation of Jewish tradition and emphasized the
civilization and peoplehood of Judaism.]
These men... were far from being in agreement among themselves, but for their students and disciples,
and for American Jewry as a whole, they served to create the program of Conservative Judaism. p. 242
Reconstructionism-- A Creative Program
by Rabbi Milton Steinberg, 1945
I would not be misunderstood. It is not my intention to suggest that in adapting Judaism to its world
setting, one must make it a "religion of reason," an outlook composed only of demonstrable propositions,
in which furthermore, all understones of myserty and mood have been muted. Despite Hegel, reality
is not all reason; despite the classical rationalists, the human personality is not pure intellect. A
religion confined to the logically establishable, and indifferent to teh emotional hungers of men would
both misrepresent the universe and feed its communicants stones for bread. Yet, to say that
there may be more things in this world than are dreamed of in our philosphies is one thing. To maintain
as an article of faith what is contrary to the intellectually probable is very much another. This is not belief
but its abuse. Reconstructionism seeks to obvitate it for Jews
From our definition, then, flows
as the first imperative the retireval of God in Judaism. p. 248-49
To anyone, Jew or Gentile, who views Judaism from without, ritual must appear unimportant, and
preoccupation with it a misdirection of energy. After all, of what consequence can it be whether a Jew
does or does not drive his automobile on the seventh day of the week, whether he partakes of, or
refrains from certain foods. Such thoughts may suggest themselves to persons who stand outside Jewish life,
never to those at home in it.
According to an ancient rabbinic epigram, the voice that sounded at Sinai was never silenced.
What this signifies is that the proclamation of moral truth never ends. Now genius is a sensitive
plant [sounds like J.S. Mill :)] whose budding cannot be predicted or forced. There is no way whereby
any group can guarantee that it will produce scientist, musicians, metaphysicians of the first magnitude.
But every society ought to hope for such a consummation. The Jews, with their tradition of ethical
questing and their present expereience of pain and injustice, constitute a promising seedbed for prophets,
saints, preists, and scribes of the good life. It becomes, then, their duty and privilege to foster the cultivation
of moral perceptions and values. In the past their husbandry in the field proved not unfruitful; it may turn
out equally productive in times to come.
For as any informed and practicing Jew knows, observance looms large in the Jewish scheme of things. So
it has always been, the practices of Judaism having been cherished for two thousand years with the utmost fidelity
and joyousness. So, though far less generally, it is still. The typical professing Jew of our day, like his forebears,
knows well and values highly the Sabbath Eve with its candles, braided bread loaves and cup of Sanctifiction;
the Passover Feast with its multifarious ritual symbols; the ram's horn sounding on the New Year; the
austere solemnity of the White Fast of the Day of Atonement; the keening chant of the Black Fast of the
Ninth of Ab; the prayer shawl; the first binding on of phylactereries after one's thirteenth birthday; the
Kaddish prayer and memorial lamp for the dead; the Scroll of the Torah dressed in embroidered velvets
and adorned with glistening breastplate and crown. These a Jew is likely to remember longest and
most poingnantly; in tehse and through these, faith and ethic embody and trasmit themselves. This
is for many Jews the countenance of Judaism, well known and passionately love. p. 250-51
It is of the nature of a growing thing that it holds on to its past, and yet reaches toward a future.
He who cultivates anything, whether a [sic -BF] historic theology, an ethic or a system of practices, must
guide itself accordingly. Jews, in other words, ought not to play fast and loose with their past, lest
they lose contact with it, the root and strength of their present existence. On rituals as on so many
other themes, the presumption is always in favor of the tradition. p. 253, emphasis BF.
These days, unfortunately, ignorance of Jewish affairs is quite the rule among Jews. Modern Jews,
educated on all matters of general import, are very commonly innocent of Jewish leanring of any sort.
They know no history [see his book "The Making of the Modern Jew", 1948], theology or sociology; not
Bible, Talmud or prayer book; neither prophets, sages nor heroes. Literacy used to be law among them.
Now, of all groups that possess distinguished traditions, they are perhpas the most untutored in their own.
Because knowledge is wanted, the people perish. I would not be guilty of oversimplification. Many of the
ills that afflict Jews and Judaism are totally unrelated to what is present or absent inside Jewish heads.
Thus, were every Jew a Maimonides, anti-Semitism would still be his heartache and dark peril. But
other issues, if they cannot be resolved by information, certainly cannot be resolved without it. The
diffusion of knowledge and understanding may be nowhere enough by itself. But in many situations it is
half the battle , or else a precondition with which the battle can be joined. p. 261. wow! Zil G'mar. Go and learn!
Everything I am trying to say about the indespensibility of knowledge to the Jewish tradition has been
anticipated by the tradition itslef. In myriad epigrams and metaphors, the teachers of Israel from Moses
on insisted that only as Jewry was informed could it be assured of life. But nowhere has this thought
been stated more colorfully than in a legend spun by ancient rabbis.
When Moses descended from Mount Sinai, they relate, he held in his arms, as Scripture informs us,
the tablets of stone engraved by the finger of the Holy One, blessed by He. And such was the virtue
of the inscription, that it was not Moses who carried the tablets, but the tablets that carried Moses.
So it came to pass that his descent over jagged rocks, on the verge of crags and yawning chasms, was
effortles and safe. But when the prophet neared the mountain's base and caught his first glimpse of
the Golden Calf, when God's words and the idol were brought into confrontation with each other, a wonder
ensued. The sacred letters detached themselves from the stone in which they had been inscribed
and vanished into thin air. Moses was left holding a blank, inert thing, too heavy for him. It is not true,
the sages assert, that Moses threw the tablets to the earth, so shattering them. The fact is that he had
to let them go or be crushed. the lettered stone which had carried Moses was, once letterless, too
much for him to bear.
It is not difficult to discern what the ancient rabbis are trying to say in their parable: given knowledge
and inisight, Judaism sustains the Jew; without them it is a crushing burden, too heavy for even the strongest
to withstand.p. 262
Standards for the Conservative Movement in Judaism
by Rabbi Simon Greenberg, 1952
To be sure, there is never any lack of protestation on the part of the individual Jews on the matter
of their longing for a united [people -BF] Israel. But this desire for the unity of Israel is all too often little more
than an impassioned zeal to remake all others into our own image. All too rarely does it appear
as a ceaseless effort to remake ourselves so that we may serve as the core through which differing
and even conflicting elements may experience the sense of their common spiritual kinship....
We never hesistated to admit, --on the contrary, we gloried in --the many things which we had in common
with our brethren on the right or the left in religion, or with our brethren with no religion at all. It is not
that we wanted to be all things to all men. Not at all. But we wanted to equal every man or any group
in devotion to whatever we believed to be Jewishly positive and constructive in their lives. We
wanted and want to match the most ardent Hebraist in knowledge of Hbrew, the most ardent Orthodox
Jew in the practice of piety, the most ardent Reform Jew in determination to make Judaism aesthetically
attractive and the most militant secularist in making Judaism contemporaneous and relevant. I think it is
altogether to our credit that in the eyes of some we appear to be Orthodox, in the eyes of others Reformed
[sic -BF] and in the sight of still others, secular nationalists. p. 269
To stress the difference between us and other groups in Judaism rather than the similarities between us
may, for the moment, appear to be helpful in that it seems to clarify issues and draw clearly defined lines.
It makes easier the creation of slogans and the rallying of follwers to a party banner. But it is an advantage
bought at the rpce of ultimate division [of the Jewish people -BF] and separation.p. 270
The Conservative Movement has thus far remained true to the intuitive insight of historical Judaism which was,
as Professor Ginzberg has said, "National and Universal, individual and social, legal and mystic,
dogmatic and practical at once." It has always seemed to me that the mere fact that in our sacred
Scriptures the book of Leviticus is at the side of the books of Isaiah and Amos, that the Song of Songs is
at the side of the book of Lamentations, that, above all, the books of Job and Eccelsiastes are bound in the same canon
with the books of the Psalms, that this fact, in itself, teaches as much about the profound insight into life
which guided the builders of Judaism, as much about the spirit of our historic fiaht, as anything found
within the books themselves. Life can never be purged of its inescapable inner contradictions. And if,
at times, we appear to harbor within our ranks contradictory drives and impulses, it is but further evidence
of the vitality and the essential truth of our Movement, that is can keep the differences confined within
the boundaries of a larger unity. p. 271-1
A certain amount of uniformity is indispensable if a movement is to have its distinctive character. It is
necessary so that when we meet together we may pray as a congreation, and when a member of one
congregation prays in another he should feel "at home" in the service. But we do not want to encourage
the notion that thereis some magic virtue in the order of the prayers, or in their number, or in their melodies.
The synogogue service is in no way a mysterious magical formula. Its purpose is to inspire, to instruct,
to purify and to exalt. Hence, we want always to make the service relevant to the worshipper even as we
want to make the worshipper more receptive to the service. For only as the service remains essentially
true to its own historical character can it serve as a bond between the worshipper and his ancestors
as well as between him and his contemporaries. p. 273.
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