Reconstructionist Thought

The Kaplan Blog

Rabbi Shai Gluskin — Wed, 07 Feb 2007 13:27:23 -0500

Grainy image of Mel Scult and Mordecai Kaplan meeting in 1972.The Kaplan Blog brings to the web a small portion of the material which will be used in the second volume of Communings of the Spirit: the Journals of Mordecai M. Kaplan edited and with introductory material by Dr. Mel Scult. Dr. Scult is providing us with a unique opportunity to look over his shoulder, so to speak, as he interacts and compiles the material for the next volume.

Image of Dr. Mel Scult and Rabbi Shai GluskinWe are presenting Dr. Kaplan's entries seamlessly integrated with the other materials presented on this web site as if they were just written. We hope this format will help readers to reflect on the relevance of Kaplan's comments for today. We encourage readers to comment on the entries by engaging with Kaplan in a "dialog." For each entry Dr. Scult will be the first to respond.

Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881-1983), founder of Reconstructionism, is perhaps the preeminent American Jewish thinker and rabbi of our times. Obsessed by the need to modernize Judaism in order to save the Jewish people, Kaplan confided his impressions, wrestled with his conscience, and recorded his experience in his journal with passionate intensity and uncommon candor. Kaplan's journals consist of some Some 10,000 pages and twenty-seven volumes.

Head shot of Dr. Mel ScultMel Scult is a professor of Judaic Studies at Brooklyn College and a professor of History at City University of New York, Graduate Center. He is the author of Communings of the Spirit: the Journals of Mordecai M. KaplanHe is the co-editor of Dynamic Judaism: The Essential Writings of Mordecai Kaplan and The American Judaism of Mordecai Kaplan, and author of Judaism Faces the Twentieth Century: A Biography of Mordecai Kaplan. He also wrote the introduction for Kaplan's The Meaning of God in Modern Jewish Religion.

Dr. Scult is a member of the West End Synagogue in New York. His Web site is www.melscult.org.

Pirkei Avot Teachings from Omer Study 2005

Rabbi Shai Gluskin — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 15:36:15 -0400

According to Jewish tradition, Jews are instructed to count the days of the "omer" -- the barley sheaf -- until the fiftieth day, which is when the first barley crop would be harvested. The fiftieth day is the Jewish holiday of Shavuot when, the rabbis tell us, Jews received Torah at Mt. Sinai. During the Omer period, reading Pirke Avot (Ethics of our Ancestors) -- the most popular and accessible part of the Talmud -- is also a traditional part of these seven weeks. Pirke Avot is a source of ethical teachings codified around the year 200 C.E.

In 2005, Shavuot also corresponded with the 50th birthday of the Jewish Reconstructionist Federation. To celebrate our 50th birthday, JRF invited everyone to share in the study of Pirke Avot together. Reconstructionist Rabbis and educators presented three Mishnayot (sections) from one perek (chapter) of Pirke Avot on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday of each week.

The teachings were:
Chapter Date Teachers
1 May 2, 2005 Rabbis Fredi Cooper, Jeffrey Eisenstat, Shai Gluskin
2 May 9, 2005 Deborah Eisenbach-Budner
3 May 16, 2005 Rabbis Shawn Zevit and Fredi Cooper
4 May 23, 2005 Rabbi Richard Hirsh
5 May 30, 2005 Rabbi Steve Segar
6 June 6, 2005 Rabbi Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer

See http://63.115.67.94/pirke-avot/index.html for more information.

What Do Jews Believe?

Lisa Tuttle — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 14:23:07 -0500

Rabbi Richard HirshIn an article in the Jerusalem Post this week, entitled What Jews Believe, Andrew Silow Caroll, editor of the New Jersey Jewish News, posed a question to four rabbi frends that was directed to Republican presidential candidates by an audience member holding up a Bible at their debate: "Do you believe every word of this book? And I mean specifically this book that I'm holding in my hand. Do you believe this book?"

Among Caroll's rabbinic respondents was Rabbi Richard Hirsh, executive director of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association. Read his reply.

"I don't like the way the question is worded. It is, as Lenny Bruce might have said, a "goyish" question. First, whether traditional or modern, Jews assign different degrees of sanctity to the Pentateuch than we do the entire Hebrew Bible (gee, I'd love to hear that in a debate: "Rev. Huckabee, do you believe in the TaNaCH?"). The Prophets and the Writings contain sacred literature, but tradition does not claim Sinaitic origin for them. Second, Jews don't "believe" in the Torah, we try to live by it as it is interpreted and applied. The whole point of Halacha is to spell out what it means - for example, to honor one's parents, or to observe the Sabbath, or what constitutes "murder" as in "Thou shalt not murder" (note to those who can't read "The Bible" in the original language: It's "murder," not "kill").

Third, since the Tanach is an anthology of collected writings of human beings over a period of a thousand years, we should not expect and will not find consistency, and we often find contradictions, which sort of makes it hard "to believe" in every word. And last, there are parts of scripture from which I happily dissent, such as stories that imagine God commanding the Israelites to commit genocide (see Deuteronomy 20:17) or parents to stone a rebellious child (Deuteronomy 21:18-21). A better question would be "What rights and respect should a president ensure for those Americans who do not believe in this book?"

Thanksgiving Day 1942 Thoughts on Evil from Kaplan and Steinberg

Mel Scult — Wed, 21 Nov 2007 10:59:39 -0500

Below you'll find a selection which reveals another place in the Kaplan diary where he discusses the problem of evil and the way to cope with it. I noted in the previous selection dealing with Kaplan's reactions to the play on the Diary of Anne Frank that Kaplan's impulse is to always focus on ways to cope with suffering even if we cannot explain it. Here he comments on a sermon by his most brilliant disciple, Rabbi Milton Steinberg.

It was in the middle of the war and Steinberg gave a sermon on Thanksgiving that was astounding to say the least. Steinberg mentions the rabbinic dictum that we should bless the evil along with the good and applies this to the War. Neither Steinberg nor Kaplan knew the full extent of the Holocaust but they knew enough to make the reaction here all the more surprising and provocative.

It is easy to consider both Kaplan and Steinberg naïve in their looking for the positive, but we need the hope that is assumed here in order carry us though our own difficulties both collective and individual.

The center of Steinberg's Thankskgiving sermon was the rabbinic dictum that just as we bless the good we must learn to bless the evil. The blessing which we say at the passing of a loved one is “Baruch Dayan Emet” (Blessed is the Righteous Judge). Steinberg interpreted it to mean that we must learn to discern God in evil as well as in the good, by assuming that there is no evil which does not possess or cannot be made to yield some good. By applying this principle to the war, he argued that it possesses a redeeming element in that it compels us to break the traditional patterns of life thereby rendering human life capable of being molded afresh after our heart's desire.

Kaplan reacts to Steinberg but in reality gives us a reaction not that different from Steinberg. Kaplan's typical attitude toward evil is that it is not "part of the divine." We must find a way to cope with it. Here is the kaplan statement from Kaplan's diary, November 27, 1942. Volume 11f (right at the end).

On the other hand, if we accept the modern rational approach we would have to say, that there is no evil which we should not feel driven by the divine urge in us to redeem. In other words, the divine is in us and not in the suffering itself. The essence of the divine quality consists in not permitting any evil, whether of sin or suffering, to be exempt from the need to discover some potential from the standpoint of the good.

Goodness is our Fortification Against Evil

Mordecai M Kaplan — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 16:54:46 -0400

Mordecai M KaplanDecember 29, 1955. vol 18a.

[Read Dr. Scult's intro first.]

Last night I went with my granddaughter Miriam to see the play Anne Frank. I thought it was marvelously well done, from every standpoint, but it left me extremely depressed. It embittered me against mankind for having made it possible for such a cold-blooded, calculating demonic crime to be perpetrated against millions of innocent men, women, and children to be enacted, and what is worse, to be erased from the conscience—if that crime made the least impression on it.

Because one good and virtuous man like Job was struck by misfortune, a fine poet poured out the vials of his wrath against God. Would such a poet have found words adequate to express his wrath over the myriads of Jobs who were subjected to unspeakable torments of body and mind before their lives were snuffed out in the gas chambers?

Every time I go through such experience, and that happens quite often, I become despondent and feel like—I'd rather not say it. Certainly, all desire to teach and write in the hope of making some dent, or working some improvement in human character, my own included, oozes out of me completely. I am left altogether limp mentally and physically. Such were the thoughts with which I fell asleep last night.

When I woke up this morning, however, the first idea that came to my mind was the statement in Anne Frank's diary to the effect that she had faith in the intrinsic goodness of human beings. That helped me to lift me out of my depressed state of mind. It occurred to me that the reason for Anne’s faith in human goodness was probably the fact of the Dutch couple’s daring to hide the Jews in the attic of their house and obtaining food for them at the risk of their own lives.

That despite all the cruelty which exists in the world there are human beings like that Dutch couple is, or should be, a source of hope and faith. The existence of such goodness is not merely a proof of the existence of God but a veritable manifestation or revelation of God. That is the only plausible basis for the will to make the most out of life and to keep on working and fighting for reason, justice and peace against the most discouraging odds.

Introduction from Kaplan biographer and editor of his diaries, Dr. Mel Scult.

Many wonder about Kaplan and the problem of evil. He seems to have no adequate theory about the origins and nature of suffering in the world. The issue of the problem of evil is of course central to any theology and it is complicated. Part of the problem with Kaplan is his innate optimism and the centrality of hope to his ideology. The way his mind worked he was moved to focus on the good in any situation and not on the evil. His first reaction to suffering is to think what can be done to alleviate it.

In our obsession with the Holocaust we continue to look for explanations and understanding. Perhaps at the end of the day, because the suffering is so monumental we will never find an adequate explanation.

In any case, we should understand the way Kaplan‘s mind worked. The selection below illustrates his propensity to look for the good in any situation. He went to see the play The Diary of Ann Frank with his grand daughter and here he muses on Ann Frank’s final optimism with which he identifies. Of particular interest here is the fact that Kaplan keenly feels the pain and suffering of those who perished. His innate optimism which comes out at the end of the selection is bound together with a strong sense of horror at the suffering. For Kaplan hope is of the essence of the divine.

Translating the Claim of Divine Authorship

Rabbi Shai Gluskin — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 10:12:05 -0400

View from Mt. Sinai on September 20, 2007: from Shar's PhotostreamHere is an excerpt from a recent article I wrote on my blog:

If the expression, "the written and oral Torahs are the words of God delivered to Moses on Mt. Sinai" cannot be read literally, then what does it mean? I believe the Rabbis of the Talmud are pronouncing the deepest respect possible for the received tradition.

One of the reasons that the language of reverence needed to be so powerful was precisely because of the radical innovations which the Rabbis themselves were facilitating in the development of Jewish law. The Rabbis were masterful agents of change.

Read the article...

Gluskin Posts on "What is Torah"

Rabbi Shai Gluskin — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 11:09:51 -0400

Students Hold Unfurled Torah at Adat Shalom, Bethesda, MD Here is an excerpt from a piece I just wrote for my blog:

The claim that sacred texts were written by human beings, not God, is most commonly thought of as serving a secular agenda.

For me, acknowledging the human hand that touches sacred texts strengthens my religious tendencies and feelings.

Summer 2007 Reconstructionism Today

Lisa Tuttle — Thu, 23 Aug 2007 13:32:10 -0400

Now read RT online!

The Summer 2007 issue of JRF's magazine, Reconstructionism Today (RT) - "a voice for creative Jewish living" - is now online. This issue will not be mailed as we experiment with a new way of publishing that we hope will have many benefits.

Pursue Justice: Rabbi Me'irah IliinskyIn this issue:

Congregation-Based Community Organizing: A Reconstructionist Approach to Living a Godly Life by Rabbi Shawn Zevit with Brian Fink
From Education to Identity: The Potential for Reconstructionist Innovation by Dr. Carl Sheingold
On Our Evolving Liturgy: A Response to Dan Cedarbaum by Elaine Moise
Its Time Has Come: Of Taoism, Space Aliens, and God-Language by Rabbi Jeremy Schwartz
A Responsible Life: The Spiritual Path of Mussar reviewed by Rabbi Nancy Fuchs-Kreimer
Of Mark Rothko, Jewish Identity and Reconstructionism: Launching the "Recon Salons" by Barry Nove
Curaçao's Mikve-Israel Emmanuel turns 275 by Ruth Wegner and Jonathan Markowitz
JRF Welcomes its Newest Affiliate: Temple Israel of Duluth, Minnesota

and more!

Click on the attachment below to download and read the issue. You are welcome to forward this publication.

"We-Consciousness" is the Road to God

Mordecai M Kaplan — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 14:21:16 -0400

Mordecai M KaplanWednesday, October 3, 1951

[Read Dr. Scult's intro first.]

Every time I preach a sermon, the substance of which I had given to the men in the sermon seminar, I realize how much more difficult it is to speak from the pulpit than to teach in class. The more important the idea expounded, the greater the difference in the amount of care that has to be given to the development and illustration of it.

When I had distributed to the men at the sermon seminar the outline on How to Seek God, I was sure that I could give a repeat performance of it from the S.A.J. pulpit on Rosh Hashanah, without giving it any more thought.

When the time came for preaching it approached, and I looked over the notes, I realized that, while it succeeded in driving home the thought that we must look to those traits in man which are reflected in the divine attributes of Avinu Malkeynu, Moshiyenu [Heb. Our father our King, our savior ] to give us a sense of the reality of God, and that those traits are still only inchoate and that God is therefore to be sought in the future of man, I had not indicated how we can recognize godhood or divinity when we so experience it.

The need for answering that question led me to discover again, but this time with greater clarity than ever, that the moment we transcend our own egos and identify ourselves with one other person we are on the way toward God. God is thus the reality experienced as we-consciousness, in the same way as the self or soul is the reality experienced as I- or self-consciousness.

But, and this is the most important fact to reckon with, just as the true self or soul is rarely identified or experienced, because of our tendency to treat some particular drives or impulses and their satisfaction as constituting our true self or soul, so we mistakenly regard as the experience of godhood any one of the many self-identifications with others, with family, friends, city, state, nation or class, stopping short, far from the limits of mankind as a whole. All these experiences are valuable as on the way to God, but misleading and a source of evil, when considered as the reality of God. That is fundamentally the implication of the unity of God as proclaimed in our Shema.

Introduction from Kaplan biographer and editor of his diaries, Dr. Mel Scult.

Kaplan was tireless in helping his students even after they became rabbis. Every summer he conducted sermon seminars for Conservative rabbis in order to help them with their High Holiday preaching. He would give them ideas which they discussed together.

Here we see Kaplan being like the rest of us in thinking he can take his notes from the seminars after the passage of a month and simply use them to deliver a Rosh Ha-shannah sermon he had worked on before. Perhaps more importantly , he shares with us a thought from the sermon, that the connections we make with the other are the route to the divine. This thought is much more familiar from Buber or Levinas than from Kaplan but here it is simply and powerfully stated. Kaplan goes beyond the identification with the other and cautions us to remember that such identification is only the beginning of our search for the divine.

We might also note the last paragraph where Kaplan implores us to continue our search for the divine beyond the highest ethical ideals we hold.

To Believe in Sinai is Unethical

Mordecai M Kaplan — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 10:09:42 -0400

Mordecai KaplanJuly 11, 1943

The problem of Judaism would not be so acute if the traditional doctrine of revelation were merely obsolete. The trouble is that to cherish that doctrine is as unethical as being guilty of bigamy. To believe that we are in possession of the authentically revealed will of God is incompatible with religious tolerance to say nothing of religious equality.

[Kaplan biographer Mel Scult writes: Kaplan was truly a revolutionary and I would like to maintain that we have not yet begun to understand the radical nature of his theological commitments. The central event of Sinai which we celebrate on Shavuot is not reinterpreted here or put into language that is more acceptable to us. It is rather dismissed as unethical because it assumes the existence of some eternal truth, a doctrine that Kaplan dismisses. Many moderns are in the same situation but they refuse to face it squarely and to see our situation for what it is.

Kaplan challenges us to face the fact that we cannot grasp the eternal and that whatever the basic truths are they are changeable and not the special property of any group. It is not easy to accept such ideas and make them part of a religious commitment but if we are followers of Kaplan that is what we must do. It is also clear that pluralism and tolerance for the beliefs of others is more important to Kaplan than any supposed revelation. . —Mel Scult]