Zionism and Jewish Religious Tendencies II. ZIONISM AND REFORM JUDAISM
In the first of this series of articles designed to show what Judaism, as viewed from the varying standpoints of our present religious parties, has to gain by the realization of the Zionist ideal, we showed how, to the Orthodox Jew who gives serious thought to the situation, Zionism must present itself as indispensable to the solution of his religious problem. We propose in the present article to consider the question from the point of view farthest removed from Orthodoxy, the point of view of one who denies altogether the authority of Jewish law except in its most general ethical aspect, who disputes revelation, who does not believe in miracles past or future, whose conception of Messianism, if he has any at all, is restricted to a conviction that the course of human evolution permits us to look forward to a “Messianic era” of universal tolerance and peace, and who believes that Israel’s mission is to work out for the world as well as for itself the ethical implications of the doctrine of God’s unity. Though not all reformed Jews may subscribe to every one of these views they may be taken as fairly representative of a large body of Reform opinion which stands at the opposite pole to the Orthodoxy we have previously described.
IS REFORM JUDAISM COMPATIBLE WITH ZIONISM?
THERE are some—and among them many Zionists— who hold that Zionism and Reformed Judaism are irreconcilable because the very impulse to Reform came from the desire of the Jew to escape the consequences and implications of Jewish nationality lest these stand in the way of their incorporation into the body politic of the nations who made the disavowal of Jewish national unity the condition of Jewish civil and political emancipation. That this motive was potent in giving direction to the Reform movement cannot be denied. It may even be granted that this was the predominant motive that gave rise to the movement. But it would be unhistorical to regard this as the sole motive.
The sudden contact of the ghetto-reared Jew whose intellectual horizon scarcely extended beyond the arba am- moth shel halaha with the most recent developments of scientific and philosophic thought would be sufficient, even if one disregards the significant changes in his political, social and economic relations, to account for the creation of a radical school of thought that would react more or less critically and sceptically to ancient traditions and seek a new definition of Judaism more in accordance with what it understood to be the spirit of the age. Even Christianity, which never experienced the necessity of special adjustment in order to justify its existence in the midst of the nations, can point in modern times to certain developments analogous to the Reform Movement in Judaism. It is, therefore, perfectly consistent for a man to regard himself a Reformed Jew in that he considers traditional Jewish beliefs to be discredited and traditional Jewish standards of conduct invalidated to a greater or lesser degree, and yet to desire to see the People of Israel continue to exist and to lead a self-determined national life. This no doubt explains the attitude of the considerable number of Reformed rabbis who have joined the Zionist movement and whose sincerity both in their Zionism and in their Reform convictions, none has a right to question. Their loyalty to Zionism they have demonstrated by the support they have given to the movement, and if any one requires further evidence than their own statements as to their attitude toward Reform, let him seek the opinion of Orthodox and Conservative authorities and he will soon discover that these do not consider them
in their own group. The most that can be proved with regard to the incompatibility of Zionism and Reformed Judaism is that Zionism is incompatible with the Reformed Judaism of a certain group of Reformed Jews, who have exalted anti-nationalism to the position of a religious dogma, thus exposing themselves to the criticism of the more progressive wing of their party on the ground that they have set up a new Orthodoxy in the place of the old, substituting the“ “Shulchan Aruch’” of Isaac M. Wise for that of Joseph Caro.
WHY HAS REFORMED JUDAISM FAILED TO PROGRESS?
But Zionism is more than merely compatible with Reformed Judaism. From the premises of Reform, it is hard to see how Zionism can fail to aid the Reform movement even as, from the premises of the Orthodox argument, it would seem to aid Orthodoxy. For the Reformed Jew believes in Reformed Judaism not for himself alone. He believes that he has stripped Judaism of all its unnecessary trappings, which being unnecessary, tend to impede Jewish progress, and he is confident that if Judaism is to survive as a world-movement capable of achieving its universal mission, Reformed Judaism must prevail. He cannot, however, overlook the fact, which is even admitted in an editorial in the final issue of that well-known organ of Reform, the Jewish Comment, that Reformed Judaism has not made successful propaganda among the Jewish masses. Even where Orthodox practice is at a low ebb, enthusiasm for Reform seems almost entirely lacking. Unless, therefore, one is ready to assume that Reform is itself a mistake and can therefore not present a convincing argument, which no Reformed Jew can concede, one is constrained to seek an explanation for the fact of Reform’s lack of influence in some extrinsic circumstance.
This may be found in the fact that Reformed Jews, through the accidents of history more even than through the consequences of their theories, have become more or less estranged from the rest of Jewry. They are, so to speak, not on speaking terms with Orthodoxy. One cannot argue with a person who does not speak one's own language. Yet that is what the Reformed Jew who tries to make propaganda among the Jewish masses attempts. We do not mean by this that he does not know Yiddish