The Maccabaean

ZIONISM does not reject Reform Judaism, but certain leaders of Reform Judaism would excommunicate Zionists. Zionists do not hesitate to criticize certain phases and tendencies of Reform in which they feel they see danger to the Jewish future.

Zionism does full justice to the centripetal forces in Reform Judaism. After all is said and done, Reform has kept thousands faithful to some Jewish interest, which God knows is better than none at all. Membership even in the most radical synagogue association,—just so it be called synagogue and have a Jewish name—is a restraining bond with the old loyalties. Every reform synagogue is a rallying place for some of the forces of Jewish life, but our contention is directed against the insufficiency of these forces. The logic of Reform philosophy, both in theory and in practice, is absorption. Zionism foresees the ultimate danger of the assimilation theory, for despite its inconsistency, e. g., Reform's opposition to intermarriage in the face of its claims to universalism, it is not sufficiency strong to prevent what must inevitably be the result of this theory—the absolute absorption of the Jewish minority in the dominant majority.

Reform is a Via Media; it is both Jewish and non-Jewish. Its unconscious national basis holds its followers to their old moorings. Its assimilationist theory and striving lead them a questionable way. Let it be remembered that one does not go from his Jewish group into a merely human group, but eventually into a non-Jewish, anti-Jewish group, represented by the majority of the environment. There is no third choice. It is frankly either, or. Studying the many who have dared the experiment of voluntary excision, we know that they have staid in an unaffiliated group, at best, for a time. Inevitably they or their children drift back to the Jewish group, or as is most common, disappear in the great indifferentiated body in the midst of which they live. The fact that the first statement of Reform was hailed with such enthusiasm, which then seemed to put a stop to German Jewish defection is not to be lightly treated. But, comparing this with similar manifestations and even supposed benefits of older movements, such as Karaism, one is led by the historical parallel to the conclusion of ultimate danger to the mother body of the Jewish people. Reform Judaism is an unconscious step out, though at the same time its very name holds the less daring back.

Every manifestation of Jewish life is precious in the eyes of the Zionist. In fact just because he will not draw an arbitrary line about one phase of Jewish experience and reject all others, the Zionist is led to the national interpretation of Jewish life. He sees in Reform the first effort of the Jew, emerging from his artificially created and imposed Ghetto, to adjust himself to the demands of the newer life. The mistakes of Reform—and I trust

that even its most devoted advocates will admit that it has made mistakes—have taught the Jewish world a valuable, though a costly lesson. Zionism is big enough to include all shades of Jewish religious and, for that matter, irreligious thought. It assumes religious liberty as one of the bases of Jewish democracy and will reject noman from membership in Israel for lack of creedal conformity. It asks only that whatever religious expression there be in Jewish life, be posited on the desirability of the Jew's continuing through the ages as a definite entity; that the Jew more fully express himself, not for the sake of ultimate suicide but for the purpose of the most complete self realization.

Nor does Zionism reject the idea of the mission of the Jew. To the contrary, Zionism's very insistence upon the desirability of the continued existence of the Jew as a separate world entity is indicative of its belief in the usefulness, in the function of the Jewish people among the peoples of the earth. However, it holds that the method of the realization of this mission shall not be by assimilation, absorption and the final merging of the Jew in his environment as is now increasingly the case in lands where the assimilation theory of Judaism prevails. Zionism holds that the mission of Israel, as a "light-unto the nations," can only be realized by the creation of a Jewish center in which Jews will live so normal a life, so complete a Jewish life that the force of this example will influence not only all Jews, both those of the Homeland and of the Diaspora, but also all the peoples of the world. Zionism expects the Jewish group to become more potent in this wise, rather than less potent. It claims that the one chance for the Jew to realize this mission is not by permitting the constant attrition by which numerous valuable individuals are being lost to the Jewish world, but by integrating their lives and conserving their efforts for the Jew through such a Jewish center. Zionism intends to create an organization which will enable the Jew to be more Jewish and therefore more influential as a Jew among the nations of the earth. Thus and thus only will Jewish ideals be preserved and Jewish idealism be promoted as a world force; not as vague longings but as definite expressions.

the Jewish world, but by integrating their lives and conserving their efforts for the Jew through such a Jewish center. Zionism intends to create an organization which will enable the Jew to be more Jewish and therefore more influential as a Jew among the nations of the earth. Thus and thus only will Jewish ideals be preserved and Jewish idealism be promoted as a world force; not as vague longings but as definite expressions.