hte) : 
 Sart erery ss 
 Sets gees 
 the 
 
 pe | Aye 8 be 
 CLAS RUT ata tiar 
 
 ESS 
 
 eek Carens: 
 y) Buigo a! 
 
 ester 
 
 gn 
 
 Ory 
 \ a 
 
 9 
 
 i 
 Py HN eb 
 iy Levine nba ds 
 
 the: 
 pal} 
 
 wane 
 
 EN, 
 
 eee Wage hs 
 Wy 4 AR 
 
 ay 
 
 
 

 
 Library of The Theological Seminary 
 
 PRINCETON + NEW JERSEY 
 
 
 
 
 
 <>): 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 PRESENTED BY 
 
 John Stuart Conning, D.D. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 BS Te KZ LORS 
 
 Kaplan, Mordecai Menahem, 
 1881- 
 
 A new approach to the 
 
 
 
 
 
 
wie 
 i a Wee; 
 
 
 
git aT 
 ve ate ia 
 
 Beaten: 
 
 :] i te ANuteava wee ayy yr ay af FD eat MS 
 : hy Ds dau Wak ae dd RN NAY ie Bp 4! 
 ied yy : 
 
 Paha > 
 Claw 
 
 ' he i: iy 
 vy 
 
 
 
Br %, 
 a 
 af . 
 
 A NEW APPROACH TO“LHE 
 PROBLEM OF JUDAISM 
 
 By MORDECAI M. KAPLAN 
 
 
 
 THE SOCIETY FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF JUDAISM 
 NEW YORK CITY 
 
Copyright, 1924, 
 The Society for the Advancement of Judaism 
 New York City 
 
FOREWORD 
 
 As adherents of Judaism, we are faced 
 with a condition that does not let us live 
 at ease. It compels us to readjust our- 
 selves socially and intellectually. To 
 leave that readjustment to chance is to 
 invite moral chaos. We cannot afford 
 to wait until a Sanhedrin, possessed of 
 universal wisdom and representative of 
 the multifarious shades of Jewish belief 
 and practice, will agree upon some 
 happy formula that will satisfy the 
 whole of Israel. Nor do we look for- 
 ward to any new gospel or revelation. 
 There is only one way of saving Juda- 
 ism, and that is to engage in associated 
 endeavor with the avowed purpose of 
 making Judaism function as a way of 
 life. It is true, we have congregations. 
 But membership in a congregation is 
 
 prompted, for the most part, by the need 
 III 
 
“to belong.” We must cultivate a type 
 of collective effort which is impelled by 
 a desire to advance the cause of Juda- 
 ism. The two essays included in this 
 booklet try to set forth the spirit in 
 which a society for the advancement of 
 Judaism must approach its task, and the 
 prerequisites which such a society must 
 meet, if it is to accomplish aught in the 
 way of rendering Judaism a potent fac- 
 tor for individual and social regenera- 
 tion. 
 
 IV 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 A New Heart and a New Spirit...... 
 
 The Meaning of Torah 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2022 with funding from 
 Princeton Theological Seminary Library 
 
 https://archive.org/details/newapproachtoproOOkapl 
 
A NEW HEART AND 
 A NEW SPIRIT 
 

 
 j i Lal 
 Pr Uptog gt ’ 
 el | 
 y ‘ 
 ats , 
 Pi 
 a) 
 J 
 : 
 : ‘ 
 iy v 
 ba 
 
 
 
 ry hoe 
 
 by Pita nee 
 
A NEW HEART AND A 
 NEW SPIRIT 
 
 HE business principle that nothing 
 NEY, succeeds like success has led many 
 
 well-wishers of Judaism to make light 
 of its present crisis. That principle is 
 by no means infallible. There are occa- 
 sions when nothing succeeds like the 
 
 truth. That is especially true in matters © 
 Spiritual. Judaism is far more likely to 
 win out in the end, if those who speak 
 in its behalf will have the courage to tell 
 the truth concerning its present status, 
 instead of inflating the significance of a 
 few sporadic evidences of its function- - 
 ing. The truth is that Judaism is dis- 
 integrating. So rapid is the process of 
 disintegration that unless it is stopped 
 betimes Judaism will be past recovery. 
 
 _ The most heartbreaking disillusion- 
 
 ment which we Jews have experienced 
 
 in our entire history has been the one 
 1 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 following the removal of our political 
 and civil disabilities. The least we ex- 
 pected was that we would henceforth 
 find it easier to be Jews. The fact is that 
 it never was so hard to be a Jew as it is 
 nowadays. 
 
 The Emancipation has complicated the 
 problem of Jewish living a hundredfold. 
 We rejoice that we are no longer segre- 
 gated from the rest of the world. But 
 we have not yet learned how to prevent 
 social contact and intercourse with the 
 non-Jewish population from effacing 
 our Jewish individuality. We have 
 much more to apprehend from the 
 changes that are going on in the social 
 institutions and the thought life of the 
 world about us than any other people. 
 The new world outlook which merely 
 shakes our neighbors out of their men- 
 tal complacency gives our men of ability 
 and influence an excuse for turning their 
 backs on Judaism. The industrial revo- 
 lution, which is forcing the rest of the 
 world to abandon its ancient political 
 
 2 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 and economic standards, is reducing the 
 social organism of the Jewish people to 
 a human detritus. And, when we add 
 to the disruptive forces, to which Jews 
 are subject in common with other 
 eroups, the demoralization which must 
 result from the mere uprooting of mil- 
 lions and transplanting them from one 
 continent to another, we begin to realize 
 the unprecedented character of the 
 problem of Judaism. 
 
 In the meantime, the destruction of 
 what we were wont to regard as Jewish 
 traditions, Jewish standards of duty, 
 Jewish ideals, goes on apace. Scarcely 
 a Jew to-day but suffers from some kind 
 of mental complex, usually the inferi- 
 ority complex, due to spiritual malad- 
 justment. The situation is becoming 
 unbearable, and some way out must be 
 found. There are those who choose the 
 easiest way. They make up their minds 
 to forget the Jewish past, to break with 
 all Jewish associations, to immerse 
 themselves completely in the life of the 
 
 3 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 majority. We have no moral right to 
 condemn such a course as cowardly and 
 treasonable to the best interests of man- 
 kind, unless we can prove that Judaism 
 is equal to the task of liberating in the 
 Jew the highest intellectual and spiritual 
 forces that are latent within him. 
 
 Judaism cannot possibly release the 
 highest potencies in the Jew unless its 
 teachings be made compatible with fear- 
 less freedom of thought, and unless its 
 institutions and practices are revised 
 with a view to their utmost ethical effec- 
 tiveness. 
 
 WHY THE REFORM MOVEMENT 
 HAS FAILED 
 
 We are aware that the Reform Move- 
 ment has tried to remold Judaism in 
 accordance with those purposes. The 
 leaders at least may be credited with a 
 sincere desire to save Judaism from de- 
 struction. Have they succeeded? The 
 criterion of a successful Jewish reforma- 
 
 4 
 
The Reform Movement 
 
 tion would naturally be, Does it tend to 
 make the Jew more Jewish? Who will 
 venture to claim that result for the 
 Reform Movement? It should not be 
 difficult by this time to diagnose the fail- 
 ure of the Reform Movement. Two 
 factors have contributed to that failure, 
 one negative and the other positive. The 
 negative factor was the omission to pre- 
 pare the laity for changes in Judaism. 
 To be capable of adapting any social or 
 Spiritual institution to new conditions 
 of life and thought, we must evince new 
 moral energy, an energy that expresses 
 itself in a readiness for self-denial. Oth- 
 erwise, convenience is liable to be given 
 priority over principle. This has been 
 the experience of the Reform Movement. 
 It has allowed considerations of political 
 and social status to dictate what shall 
 or shall not be Judaism. It should have 
 reformed the Jew before it attempted 
 to reform Judaism. It should have in- 
 spired him with a new self-respect. It 
 should have disciplined him into a 
 sterner regimen of Jewish duty, at the 
 5 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 same time that it modified the content 
 of Judaism. 
 
 The positive factor that has contribu- 
 ted to the failure of the Reform Move- 
 ment has been its complete misconcep- 
 tion of the nature and function of Juda- 
 ism. Itclaimsthat Judaism's a religious 
 system of life, a system which God has 
 enabled the Jew to evolve for the good 
 of mankind. To communicate that sys- 
 tem of life is the Jew’s destiny and 
 mission. That conception of Judaism 
 involved changing the status of the Jews 
 from that of a people yearning for its 
 lost homeland into an international or- 
 ganization at home everywhere. The 
 function of that organization is to 
 preach the unity of God, and to further 
 the brotherhood of man. Such a mission 
 would pledge us to active propaganda 
 against trinitarian Christianity and 
 against all forms of privilege and mili- 
 tarism. If that were taken seriously, it 
 would be more dangerous to be a Re- 
 form Jew than to be the most violent 
 
 6 
 
The Reform Movement 
 
 radical. Only a few daring spirits would 
 venture to belong to an international 
 organization of that kind. By setting 
 up an impossible goal for the Jewish 
 people, the Reform Movement has re- 
 duced Judaism to an absurdity. 
 
 The failure of the Reform Movement 
 should not daunt us from trying again. 
 Since most adjustments in human life 
 proceed by the trial and error method, 
 we should not be discouraged because 
 the first trial happens to be an error. 
 By avoiding the two fundamental mis- 
 takes of the Movement, we might hit 
 upon a workable and satisfactory solu- 
 tion of the problem of Judaism. 
 
 Our first object must be to prepare 
 ourselves mentally and morally for the 
 necessary reconstruction of Judaism. 
 We need a new influx of spiritual energy 
 to be in a position to appreciate the 
 implications of our problem. Unless we 
 can get the Jewish layman to see in the 
 problem of Judaism a challenge worthy 
 
 7 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 of his highest powers of intelligence and 
 will, nothing that rabbinical conferences 
 or institutions of learning can do is of 
 much avail. To manifest that interest 
 in a perplexing spiritual problem, the 
 Jew must effect a complete volte-face 
 in his attitude toward the things of the 
 spirit. Otherwise, all efforts to vitalize 
 Judaism are like trying to get one to 
 breathe in a vacuum. The time has come 
 when the Jew must give heed to the plea 
 of the prophet Ezekiel, “Make unto 
 yourselves a new heart and a new spirit. 
 Wherefore shall ye die, O House of 
 Israel?” 
 
 A NEW HEART AND A NEW SPIRIT 
 
 To acquire a new heart and a new 
 spirit means to make new demands on 
 life. If we experience wants that have 
 been unknown to us, if we miss things 
 we never missed before, we are, in a 
 sense, newly born. In the realm of 
 things material, we are content with 
 little less than the very highest stand- 
 
 g 
 
The Hunger for Truth 
 
 ards of excellence and comfort, whereas 
 in things spiritual we are unduly modest 
 in our demands. A minimum schedule 
 is all that we legislate for ourselves, and 
 in practice seldom live up even to that 
 minimum. So long as we are smitten 
 with a morally deadening wantlessness, 
 we had better leave the problem of 
 Judaism alone and attend to the Jew. 
 
 As a prerequisite to the revaluation 
 of Jewish values, we should begin to feel 
 the gnawing pains of spiritual hunger. 
 We are not asking for that rare quality 
 of soul which is found only in those who 
 are attuned to cosmic harmonies that 
 escape the average person. The hunger 
 which we regard as the forerunner of a 
 revitalized Judaism is inherent in every 
 normal man and woman, except that we 
 fool it with unwholesome sweetmeats. 
 
 THE HUNGER FOR TRUTH 
 
 There are various manifestations of 
 Spiritual hunger. Its most familiar ex- 
 9 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 pression is the desire for knowledge, not 
 of business, or of machines, but of 
 human life, of nature, of the world, of 
 God. How seldom one hears our peo- 
 ple deploring the fact that they have no 
 time or patience to read a serious book, 
 or that they are unable to keep up with 
 the march of thought! 
 
 We have reached a stage where any 
 large publishing house would hesitate 
 to put out a book of Jewish interest, be- 
 cause it is common knowledge that we 
 do not read anything that deals with 
 Jews or Judaism. There is not a single 
 periodical of Jewish interest that could 
 survive long, if it were not for anti- 
 Semitism and the social column. Do we 
 maintain even one publication that in 
 dignity and seriousness is on a par with, 
 let us say, the large number of Catholic 
 and Protestant weeklies and monthlies? 
 The “Menorah Journal,’ which is the 
 one illustrious exception to intellectual 
 aridity in Jewish life in this country, is 
 
 10 
 
The Yearning for Faith 
 
 forever struggling between life and 
 death. 
 
 There are, alas, too few among us who 
 can be reached by an appeal to conserve 
 our spiritual possessions. The general 
 principle seems to be that a Jew to be 
 worth saving must be stranded, sick or 
 dying. Any movement that attempts to 
 bring to our youth the knowledge of 
 Judaism is doomed to inadequacy of 
 support. At the present time, Jews have 
 the opportunity of making important 
 archeological discoveries in Jerusalem 
 and other places in Palestine. We look 
 in vain to our people to finance research 
 expeditions and to give the Jewish schol- 
 ars an opportunity to contribute to the 
 knowledge of Jewish antiquities. 
 
 THE YEARNING FOR FAITH 
 
 Another form by which we identify 
 spiritual hunger is the never-despairing 
 hope to discover the inherent rightness 
 and goodness of life. When we make 
 
 11 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 that discovery we acquire the deep abid- 
 ing faith, without which the soul knows 
 no peace. Not every one is blessed with 
 that faith, but we can all at least yearn 
 for it. The yearning itself exerts a hu- 
 manizing influence. 
 
 If we have no longing for inward 
 peace, if the very worth of a serene soul 
 escapes us, what interest can we have in 
 receiving from Judaism the gift of faith 
 in a benign Power that shapes our ends? 
 It is almost impossible to live in an occi- 
 dental civilization, with its drive and 
 headlong impetuosity, without being 
 caught up and made to fall in step with 
 its vast cohorts. That is all the more 
 reason why we should yearn for that 
 self-command which might enable us 
 to hold back at times and let the swift 
 procession, with its futilities and its 
 ephemeral excitement, pass us by and 
 leave us secure in the possession of our 
 souls. Many of our people imagine they 
 are following the American ideal of 
 “the strenuous life’ because they are 
 
 12 
 
The Awakening of Conscience 
 
 “all nerves” about something or other. 
 They have become ashamed of serenity, 
 as though it were a sign of effeminacy 
 or weak-mindedness. This caricature 
 of the American ideal must give way to 
 a desire to return to Judaism’s ideal of 
 the simple life, to a life of inward calm 
 and self-control. 
 
 THE AWAKENING OF CONSCIENCE 
 
 The same secularizing process that 
 has led to the abandonment of the 
 ideal of inward peace has, in a large 
 measure, also dulled the edge of con- 
 science. We live in an age when a 
 powerful reaction has set in against the 
 exaggerated sense of sin under which 
 mankind labored in the past. But the lay 
 mind is too preoccupied to draw the dis- 
 tinction between removing the incubus 
 of imaginary transgressions and de- 
 stroying the very sense of sin. Having 
 learned from hearsay that much of what 
 was formerly regarded as sin was merely 
 blind prejudice and unreasonable tabu, 
 
 13 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 the average person readily jumps at the 
 conclusion that sin is one of those anti- 
 quated ideas that ought to be thrown 
 into discard. 
 
 Or, if our sensitiveness to sin has not 
 been deadened quite to that extent, we 
 have become adepts in the fatalistic 
 philosophy that we are not our own 
 masters. Armed with a few phrases 
 about our helplessness and our inability 
 to change either the world or human 
 nature, we put conscience to sleep. Is it 
 not evident that mankind would be 
 thrust back into the chaos from which it 
 has been painfully struggling to emerge 
 if it were to lose the sense of sin? If the 
 Jew is to play his part in bringing light 
 and order into the world, he must rein- 
 state the sovereignty of the conscience. 
 As a prerequisite to such an achieve- 
 ment, he must dread callousness to 
 wrong-doing, and realize that moral in- 
 sensibility is a form of paralysis of the 
 spiritual nerve centers. To yearn for 
 the stirrings of conscience, to be able to 
 
 14 
 
The Awakening of Conscience 
 
 pray devoutly with the Psalmist, “Cre- 
 ate in me, O God, a clean heart, and re- 
 new within me a steadfast spirit,” is an 
 evidence that one’s soul is still alive. 
 
 Furthermore, if Judaism has taught 
 us anything, it should have imbued us 
 with the truth that man is not only an 
 individual soul, but also a member of 
 society. Judaism denies us peace either 
 with ourselves or with God, unless we 
 live on terms of peace and co-operation 
 with our neighbors. Let us be honest 
 with ourselves and analyze to what ex- 
 tent Judaism functions in our lives as a 
 stimulus to fair play, to what extent it 
 makes us revolt at extravagance that 
 wastes goods and services whereby 
 thousands might be kept from starva- 
 tion. Does the Judaism we profess 
 provoke us into rebellion against the 
 orgy of materialism which places a 
 higher value upon the production of 
 things than upon the conservation and 
 improvement of human life? Do we take 
 the teachings of our prophets seriously 
 
 15 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 enough to assume the slightest responsi- 
 bility for averting the disaster which 
 must come with the next war? Does 
 Judaism really make us anxious, desper- 
 ately anxious, to banish war from the 
 earth? 
 
 THE WRONG NOTION OF JUDAISM 
 
 Are we, then, to infer that Jews are 
 deficient in spiritual qualities, that their 
 souls are less sensitive to the finer things 
 of life than are the souls of their neigh- 
 bors? Who will deny that a people 
 which, under the most adverse handi- 
 caps, furnishes modern civilization with 
 a physicist that eclipses Newton, with 
 a philosopher that dethrones Aristotle, 
 with a psychologist that outstrips James 
 and Ribot, with a host of poets, painters, 
 sculptors and authors of first magnitude, 
 that such a people is gifted with a 
 greater share of spiritual capacity than 
 any other nation upon earth? But the 
 great misfortune is that practically none 
 of that genius is applied to Judaism or 
 Jewish life. To what is that due if not 
 
 16 
 
Wrong Notion of Judaism 
 
 to the erroneous idea which has been 
 given currency that Judaism is a religion 
 only, a matter of creeds and precepts, 
 which you either obey or ignore, but 
 which affords no scope for the wealth 
 of intellectual and social interests that 
 comprise modern culture. 
 
 What does Judaism mean to the aver- 
 age layman? A few stories from the 
 book of Genesis vaguely remembered, 
 the duty of believing in one God, keep- 
 ing away from ham and shellfish, at- 
 tending synagogue at least on the High 
 Holy Days, and saying Kaddish after 
 a departed parent. In the natural course 
 of things even these few duties grow 
 irksome. From that state of mind to 
 the conclusion that Judaism is alto- 
 gether superfluous is but one step. 
 
 Is it conceivable that what is Judaism 
 to most of us should have moved two- 
 thirds of mankind to give up their own 
 cults and worships, and acknowledge the 
 God of Israel as the only true God? Are 
 
 17 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 we to imagine that for the sake of the 
 few misunderstood ideas and mechani- 
 cal habits that comprise our conception 
 of Judaism our ancestors braved exile, 
 torture and death? Is it possible that for 
 the sake of that unorganized medley of 
 ill-digested doctrines, that for the spas- 
 modic intermittent religiosity which we 
 nowadays designate as Judaism, many 
 more generations will be willing to en- 
 dure the vexations and annoyances of 
 being Jews? The prevalence of the dis- 
 torted notion of Judaism accentuates the 
 second fatal mistake of the Reform 
 Movement. It is the Reform Movement 
 that is largely responsible for that mis- 
 conception, because it took a rich, 
 cultural and social life and boiled it 
 down to a platitudinous religious phi- 
 losophy. Even if that philosophy had 
 something new to say it could not be 
 expected to make itself felt in the life of 
 the ordinary Jew. We hardly need 
 Reinach to remind us that you cannot 
 have a people of fifteen million philoso- 
 phers. 
 18 
 
Wrong Notion of Judaism 
 
 Moreover, Judaism is not a religious 
 philosophy but a religious civilization. 
 It is a cultural and spiritual complex of 
 language, literature, history, customs, 
 social institutions, organized about a 
 conception of God which has the most 
 far-reaching social and spiritual impli- 
 cations for human life of all times. 
 
 A civilization is a spiritual entity. It 
 is the soul of a people. But as every 
 Spirit is the spirit of something, and a 
 soul, the soul of something, a civilization 
 cannot subsist without a people. Hence, 
 there can be no Judaism without a 
 Jewish people. The conviction which is 
 essential to being a Jew consists, accord- 
 ingly, in voluntarily identifying one’s 
 self with the living organism of the Jew- 
 ish people. 
 
 A literary critic proposes a fourth 
 dimension to Criticism. Hitherto, Criti- 
 cism has been wont to ask about litera- 
 ture, “Is it good?” “Is it true?” “Ts it 
 beautiful?” The critic suggests a fourth 
 
 19 
 
 ~S 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 question, “Is it alive?” The same may 
 be said of Judaism. It must be more 
 than true, good, and beautiful. It must, 
 first of all, be alive, and it is alive only 
 to those who live it as a civilization. 
 
 JUDAISM AS A CIVILIZATION 
 
 Judaism is the spirit of a nation, and 
 not the cult of a denomination. When 
 we accept Judaism as a cult only, we 
 consider it our duty to help maintain a 
 synagogue, to attend services occasion- 
 ally, and to refrain from intermarrying 
 with non-Jews. But when we accept it 
 as a civilization, we cultivate the know- 
 ledge of Israel’s past so as to make that 
 past an integral part of our personal 
 memory; we dedicate ourselves to the 
 furtherance of Israel’s career, beholding 
 in that career our own personal future; 
 we accept, as far as in us lies, the re- 
 sponsibility for the material and spirit- 
 ual welfare of all of world Jewry. To be 
 a Jew in that sense is to be imbued with 
 a Jewish consciousness that reaches 
 
 20 
 
Judaism as a Civilization 
 
 down into the secret places of the sub- 
 conscious. 
 
 At no time in the past was Judaism 
 treated by Jew or Gentile as anything 
 else than a civilization. The confusion 
 as to the true character of Judaism is a 
 by-product of the Emancipation. Out 
 of fear lest we be charged with hyphe- 
 nated loyalty to the country of which 
 we are citizens, our timid leaders and 
 teachers have tried to reduce the Jewish 
 civilization to a cult. 
 
 We now realize that their fear was 
 totally unwarranted. The social and 
 spiritual life of the normal human being 
 consists of many loyalties. We are loyal 
 to our parents, to our homes, to our 
 friends, to our business associates, as 
 well as to our country. It is only in case 
 of conflict that the question arises as to 
 which loyalty shall have precedence. 
 But the Jewish people to which every 
 Jew must give his allegiance is a people 
 that has no raison d’étre unless it finda 
 
 21 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 peaceful way of composing all its differ- 
 ences with the rest of the world. Why, 
 then, deny the true character of our 
 spiritual heritage for the sake of im- 
 possible contingencies? Judaism must 
 remain what it was, the civilization of 
 the Jewish people, or admit that its day 
 iS OVEr. 
 
 PREREQUISITES TO JUDAISM 
 AS A CIVILIZATION 
 
 There are, however, a number of con- 
 ditions which must be fulfilled before we 
 can think of Judaism in terms of a civili- 
 zation. First, we must participate in the 
 renascence of the Hebrew language and 
 literature; secondly, we must give un- 
 stinting support to all forms of Jewish 
 scholarship; and, thirdly, we must accept 
 the rebuilding of Palestine as the fore- 
 most religious duty of the hour. 
 
 CULTIVATION OF HEBREW 
 
 No one who has the right instinct 
 about the needs of Judaism at the 
 22 
 
Cultivation of Hebrew 
 
 present time can fail to note that the 
 knowledge of Hebrew has become indis- 
 pensable to being a Jew. The rabbinic 
 precept that a parent must teach his 
 child to speak Hebrew from early 
 infancy must henceforth be the under- 
 lying principle of Jewish education. The 
 Jew to whom Hebrew is “Greek” is the 
 father of an indifferent Jew, and the 
 grandfather of an apostate Jew. There 
 is something about the Hebrew language 
 which gives the Jew a “Neshamah- 
 Yethera,” an oversoul, for in that 
 language are stored the joys and the 
 sorrows, the triumphs and the defeats, 
 the gropings after truth, and the struggle 
 for the light, experienced by the Jewish 
 people in the course of thirty centuries. 
 
 Our problem is, to a large extent, how 
 to get the “feel” of the Jewish people, 
 how to visualize its reality. Ordinarily, 
 it is a land that impresses us with the 
 reality of a people. In the past we 
 succeeded in keeping alive this sense of 
 our people’s reality, even in the Dias- 
 
 23 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 pora, by living segregated from the rest 
 of the world. Men and women of the 
 older generation still remember the 
 Jewish Ghettos in which they were 
 raised. That contact with Jews in the 
 mass will keep them Jewish more than 
 all abstract teaching and preaching. But 
 what can we do to give our children 
 whom we bring up in neighborhoods 
 where one sees little of Jewish life a 
 sense of intimacy with the Jewish peo- 
 ple? The very term Jewish People is 
 to them an abstraction. The only instru- 
 ment at our disposal to compensate for 
 the loss of Jewish contacts is the Hebrew 
 language. When we teach the child a 
 language, he instinctively senses the 
 reality of the people to which the 
 language belongs, and at the moment 
 that he pronounces a word or sentence 
 in that language he feels himself at one 
 with that people. 
 
 The Hebrew language can supply the 
 element of unity that is fast disappear- 
 ing from Jewish life. Until the Eman- 
 
 24 
 
Cultivation of Hebrew 
 
 Cipation, all Jews practically thought 
 alike and acted alike. Such uniformity 
 cannot be re-established, and, perhaps, 
 would no longer be desirable, if it could. 
 Yet, without something to hold together 
 the different elements in Jewry, the 
 Jewish people would soon pass out of 
 existence. For a time, the pogroms may 
 act as a unifying force. Or, it may be 
 that Jews will federate locally to main- 
 tain their poor. But is Jewish unity for- 
 ever to be buttressed by suffering and 
 poverty? Given, however, the Hebrew 
 language, and all Jews will know them- 
 selves as one people, no matter how they 
 differ in mental background or religious 
 belief. 
 
 We were wont to glory in our past 
 achievements, and to regale in dreams of 
 our future; but what use are we making 
 of our present opportunities? Mere de- 
 pendence upon the past is spiritual para- 
 sitism. Mere reliance upon the future is 
 a spiritual gamble. Unless we possess 
 the vitality to turn to good account the 
 
 25 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 opportunities which the present offers, 
 we may as well bow ourselves off the 
 world’s stage. No one can gainsay the 
 fact that Jews, as individuals, have taken 
 advantage of the freedom to give full 
 play to their powers, and that the num- 
 ber of those who have achieved distinc- 
 tion in life-walks from which Jews had 
 hitherto been shut out is legion. What, 
 however, have the Jews as a people 
 done within the last hundred years to 
 place beyond doubt their possession of 
 spiritual energy? Have the Jews as a 
 people created anything cultural or 
 Spiritual since the days of the Emanci- 
 pation? Is not the revival of the Hebrew 
 language the sole proof that Israel’s 
 vitality is still unexhausted? How 
 abashed we should stand before the 
 world to-day, if we had not the renas- 
 cence of the Hebrew language to point 
 to as a guarantee of our spiritual pro- 
 ductivity, especially as we have created 
 nothing which is specifically Jewish in 
 art, ethics, philosophy or religion dur- 
 ing the last century. 
 26 
 
Cultivation of Hebrew 
 
 The renascence of the Hebrew lan- 
 guage is typical of the power of self-ad- 
 justment which the Jewish people still 
 possesses. It is the most incontroverti- 
 ble evidence of the vitality of the Jewish 
 spirit. Modern Hebrew has succeeded 
 where Jewish law and ritual have failed. 
 It has demonstrated the possibility of 
 Jewish life remaining identical and con- 
 tinuous while assimilating the best that 
 there is to modern thought and civiliza- 
 tion. Out of the ancient threads, mod- 
 ern Hebrew has woven new textures 
 of truth and idealism adapted to the 
 intellectual and spiritual needs of the 
 most progressive men and women of the 
 present day. 
 
 In the words of Zangwill, “Language 
 is the chief index of life. As no man is 
 dead so long as the mirror put to his lips 
 reveals a breath, so no race is extinct so 
 long as there comes from its lips the 
 breath of speech. A people that speaks 
 is not dead; a people that is not dead 
 speaks.” 
 
 27 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 THE TASK OF JEWISH SCHOLARSHIP 
 
 A second prerequisite to the function- 
 ing of Judaism as a way of life is the 
 encouragement of Jewish scholarship. 
 Recent developments in the thought 
 world have made it necessary to place 
 the stimulation of Jewish scholarship 
 on a par with the renascence of the He- 
 brew language and the upbuilding of 
 Palestine. We refer to those develop- 
 ments which threaten the continuity of 
 Judaism. What makes Judaism con- 
 tinuous if not the fact that our life as 
 Jews is determined by our mind-pic- 
 ture of Judaism’s beginnings? Until 
 recently, it never occurred to us to ques- 
 tion the truth of the mind-picture which 
 tradition has transmitted to us. But 
 with the advent of Higher Criticism, 
 that mind-picture has been reduced to 
 a dissolving view. So far, only the neg- 
 ative conclusions of biblical scholarship 
 have trickled through to the popular 
 mind. Every tyro is ready to tell you 
 that the spiritual genealogy of Israel 
 has been impugned. Our Jewish intel- 
 
 28 
 
Jewish Scholarship 
 
 lectuals, who otherwise know nothing 
 about Judaism, are somehow aware that 
 the traditional account of its past has 
 been challenged. Hence, it is urgent 
 that Jewish scholars and_ thinkers 
 throughout the world be immediately 
 drafted to apply themselves to the task 
 of formulating an intelligible, reliable 
 and relevant account of the actual ori- 
 gin and growth of Judaism. Only then 
 will we be in a position to know what 
 methods to employ in its further de- 
 velopment. 
 
 Our history falls into three millennia. 
 As arule, Jewish scholars have occupied 
 themselves with the last two millennia. 
 We cannot be grateful enough for what 
 they have done to give us a picture of 
 Jewish life during the long night of 
 Exile which, in most people’s minds, is 
 remembered chiefly as fit material for 
 lamentations. Their task is far from 
 complete. The vast store of Genizah 
 fragments and manuscripts of Jewish 
 interest throughout the great libraries 
 
 29 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 of the world are still waiting to be de- 
 ciphered and interpreted. But of imme- 
 diate importance to Judaism is the task 
 of reconstructing the history of our 
 people during the first millennium of its 
 existence. It was then that our people 
 was creative spiritually. That is the 
 most significant part of the Jewish past. 
 Our claim to spiritual achievement is 
 based primarily upon what we accom- 
 plished then. We can, therefore, ill af- 
 ford to evade the issue which has been 
 raised by Higher Criticism with regard 
 to what actually occurred during the 
 first millennium of our history. 
 
 How shall Judaism meet the chal- 
 lenge of Higher Criticism? Merely to 
 protest against its methods and infer- 
 ences on the ground that they are in- 
 spired by hatred of Judaism will not add 
 to the prestige of our faith. After all, it 
 is that same method which, when used 
 by scholars like Krochmal, Rappaport, 
 Zunz, Graetz and Schechter, has brought 
 to light episodes and personalities in 
 
 30 
 
Jewish Scholarship 
 
 Jewish history that had almost fallen 
 intooblivion. Itishightime that Jewish 
 scholars should not be afraid of know- 
 ing the Bible. When Jewish scholars 
 will know the Bible, the true story of 
 the Jewish past will be told. And when 
 that story will be told, the Jew will have 
 no less reason to be proud of the Jewish 
 past than were his ancestors who needed 
 miracles and theophanies to convince 
 them that Israel was the favorite of 
 God. Other things being equal, the 
 Jewish scholar is likely to have a keener 
 and more sympathetic insight in mat- 
 ‘ters that concern the Jew than the Gen- 
 tile scholar, and should therefore be bet- 
 ter qualified to appraise at.their_ true 
 worth the forces that made it possible 
 for Judaism to play the great spiritual 
 role in the history of civilization. The 
 masses of the people may not at first be 
 able to appreciate the untiring labor and 
 devotion that is involved in restoring 
 our spiritual genealogy. Let, however, 
 the seminaries, the University in Jeru- 
 salem, and other Jewish institutions of 
 31 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 higher learning make solid contribu- 
 tions to the knowledge of the Jewish 
 past in all its manifestations, and the 
 entire intellectual world will take notice. 
 We would no longer be characterized 
 as the pariah of the nations. And what 
 is even more important, our own young 
 men and women would regain their Jew- 
 ish self-respect. One thing is certain: 
 we would at last have an authentic 
 account of the beginnings of the Jewish 
 people which we would not hesitate to 
 put into the hands of serious-minded 
 Jews who, if they are to reckon with 
 Judaism, want facts and not fiction. 
 
 PALESTINE THE GUARANTEE OF 
 JUDAISM’S FUTURE 
 
 Most indispensable, however, as a pre- 
 requisite to reckoning with Judaism as 
 a civilization is to feel convinced that 
 the Jewish people has a future. To be 
 sure, the type of future upon which we 
 can pin our faith is other than that for 
 which our fathers yearned when they 
 
 32 
 
The Upbuilding of Palestine 
 
 found themselves in a state of helpless- 
 ness. The future for which they hoped 
 was scarcely of this earth. It was some 
 dream of heavenly bliss which was little 
 more than a psychic compensation for 
 their deprivations and sufferings here 
 
 on earth. They dreamt of a personal : 
 Messiah coming on clouds of glory | 
 
 amidst the trumpetings of hosts of an- 
 gels, and of Israel being brought back 
 to its ancient home by the nations of the 
 world, who would repent of their rebel- 
 lion against Israel’s God, and of their 
 cruelty to His chosen people. In place 
 of what, at best, is only idle dreaming 
 and, at worst, nothing more than pious 
 babbling, we should zealously strive to 
 make Palestine the home of a Jewish 
 civilization. The yearning to re-estab- 
 lish the Jewish people must come as the 
 logical consequence of a frank and hon- 
 est facing of the fact that Judaism can 
 no longer function, that it is certain 
 
 to perish from inanition, unless it be 
 
 rooted once again in the soil whence it 
 sprang. 
 33 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 If our interest in Judaism goes no fur- 
 ther than to wish that there should al- 
 ways be a number of individuals in the 
 world who will be known as Jews, we 
 may depend on it that our wish will be 
 fulfilled. But if what we want is that 
 those who will be known as Jews should 
 enrich the world with their ideas, their 
 ideals, and their example, and do so not 
 only as individuals but collectively, by 
 reason of their Jewish life, then it is 
 futile to expect that kind of Judaism 
 ever to thrive in the Diaspora, either 
 here or elsewhere. That kind of Juda- 
 ism is possible only where Jews can 
 maintain their group life and social au- 
 tonomy, and where, by reason of their 
 being in the majority, they can enjoy 
 cultural predominance. That kind of 
 Judaism is feasible only in Palestine. 
 
 A few dreamers, like Dubnow and 
 Kallen, look forward to emancipated 
 Jewry becoming socially autonomous 
 in the Diaspora. This is as little possible 
 as that the sun should rise in the 
 
 34 
 
The Upbuilding of Palestine 
 
 west. It presupposes that the Occidental 
 nations will adopt the philosophy that 
 the State is a federation of cultural 
 groups. That runs counter to the trend 
 of political development in most coun- 
 tries, particularly in the United States. 
 The case of the Poles, the Czechs, or the 
 Irish is not to the point. They all have 
 their own territory upon which they 
 have lived as distinct nationalities for 
 many centuries. And even they do not 
 expect to develop their own culture any- 
 where except in their own land. The 
 Jews, however, can claim no territory as 
 their own anywhere in the Diaspora. 
 They must, therefore, become integrated 
 with the various peoples among whom 
 they live. The Jews cannot ask any 
 nation, that on principle refuses to be- 
 come acommunity of cultural or national 
 communities, to reverse its policy. To 
 become a nation of cultural common- 
 wealths, America would have to forget 
 her past and start life anew. And she 
 dreads nothing so much, and perhaps 
 justly, as to invite the dissensions that 
 35 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 have convulsed those European com- 
 monwealths which consist of multitudi- 
 nous cultural groups. 
 
 One must, indeed, be wilfully blind 
 not to see the hand of Providence in the 
 opportunity that has been given us to 
 save Judaism at the very moment that 
 the process of attrition is beginning to 
 menace its existence. But to believe in 
 Providence is to become its willing in- 
 strument. And to become the instru- 
 ment of Providence, we must strive 
 zealously to make Palestine the home 
 of a cultured, spiritual and progressive 
 Israel that will evolve the kind of civili- 
 zation which will be recognized by all 
 as the kingdom of God upon earth. 
 
 Twenty-five hundred years have 
 elapsed since Ezekiel pleaded with the 
 Jewish people, “Wherefore shall ye die, 
 O House of Israel?” Apparently his 
 plea was not in vain. Among the exiles 
 that had wept by the rivers of Babylon 
 
 36 
 
The Upbuilding of Palestine 
 
 there were some, at least, who did not 
 say, “Our bones are dried up, and our 
 hope is lost.” The faithful remnant that 
 did not know what it is to despair or 
 surrender still survived. They did not 
 sit with folded arms. They did all they 
 could to save and augment the civiliza- 
 tion they had brought with them. They 
 took every possible measure to prepare 
 Israel for a second chance to make his- 
 tory in the domain of the spirit. When 
 that chance came, it found the Jewish 
 people possessed of a new soul that was 
 forever rid of its pagan proclivities. 
 
 The experiences we are passing 
 through bear a strong resemblance to the 
 experiences of our ancestors who were 
 within hearing of Ezekiel’s voice. There 
 are many among us, too, who say as of 
 old, “Weare clean cut off from the House 
 of Israel.” But there are still more who 
 affirm, “I shall not die, but live and 
 declare the works of the Lord.” They 
 who have faith in Israel’s future will 
 
 37 
 
A New Heart and a New Spirit 
 
 give themselves no rest until the cause 
 of Judaism will be bound up with the 
 cause of human progress and idealism, 
 and Israel will be ready to take its place 
 for the third time among the peoples of 
 the world as the standard bearer of a 
 new spiritual civilization. 
 
 38 
 
THE MEANING OF TORAH 
 
yee 
 vA . 
 ‘ 
 j 
 : 
 ‘ 
 . 
 ‘7 
 . 
 i 
 / 
 4 
 i‘ 
 « 
 . 
 
 
 
 
 
 “f 
 
 Ade) 8 
 340 
 er A : 
 
 ee eG 
 
 its an i 
 ie py 
 
 tie GA 
 
 y ip 
 Al RA Doe 
 
 aii 
 { ' 
 
 
 
 bs T 
 hi]! rn Pi’ i 1g, a. 
 Daler Wht aa Ra A 
 
 4 
 
 Ae ae 
 e v takes Lures 
 ’ they aha ia 
 
 < > Neal 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 gf Otis tied ah 
 | 
 
 a 
 
 ¢ 
 
 
 
 dy 
 
 j ' 
 
 A a 
 7) ee 
 Cie) 7 
 
 
 
 | 
 
 ¥ 
 
 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 HEN we speak of Torah to the 
 average Jew, he thinks of the 
 
 large parchment scrolls that are dressed 
 in velvet and adorned with silver crown 
 and breastplate, and that are deposited 
 in the synagogue ark built specially for 
 them. He probably recalls his nervous- 
 ness when he was honored by being 
 called up to the “Almemar.” The fear of 
 forgetting the benediction or making a 
 “faux pas” in the Mi Sheberakh is still 
 vivid in his mind. When we allude to 
 “Talmud Torah,” which, literally trans- 
 lated, means the study of the Torah, his 
 mind goes back to some dingy Heder 
 where little boys would rush in pell-mell 
 to take their turns in reading a few 
 verses out of a much-fingered prayer 
 book or Bible. Those who still remem- 
 ber Jewish life on the lower East Side 
 connect the study of Torah with a grimy 
 Beth Hamidrash, where a number of old 
 
 41 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 men sway back and forth over large, 
 exotic volumes of Hebrew text, repeat- 
 ing in a quaint singsong some incompre- 
 hensible lore. Such mental associations 
 are little more than a caricature of the 
 real significance that the Torah had for 
 the Jew until recently. 
 
 CULTURE AGLOW WITH PASSION 
 FOR RIGHTEOUSNESS 
 
 We have to go back to Jewish life of 
 the past to appreciate what the Torah 
 meant to the Jew. Torah then repre- 
 sented all that we now understand by 
 moral wisdom. It embraced everything 
 that we now distinguish as history, 
 poetry, religion, philosophy, ethics and 
 law. It signified culture aglow with a 
 passion for righteousness. The study 
 of Torah was the worthiest occupation 
 in which man could engage. No wonder 
 that one of the ancient sages, describ- 
 ing the Torah in Platonic hyperbole, 
 said that when God wanted to create 
 the world He followed the plan laid 
 
 42 
 
The Passion for Righteousness 
 
 down in the Torah, thereby making 
 moral order and purpose the basic law 
 of the world. 
 
 Neither creed nor ritual of the most 
 exalted kind could have saved the Jewish 
 people from disintegration. If the 
 Torah had not occupied the same place 
 in the life of the Jew that culture occu- 
 pies in the life of the modern man, the 
 sole effect of persecution would have 
 been to stamp out whatever idealism 
 kept the Jewish spirit alive. It was a 
 Spiritual inheritance which helped to 
 develop in the Jew the highest human 
 and social faculties. The Torah was the 
 chief humanizing element in his life. 
 
 From being synonymous with culture 
 in its most comprehensive sense, Torah 
 has shrunk for most Jews to a mass of 
 antiquated writings which have no rele- 
 vance to life. This is why only about 
 one out of every five Jewish children has 
 some inkling of what it is to be a Jew. 
 This is why it is only the exceptional 
 
 43 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 parent who takes an interest in the Jew- 
 ish education of his child. This accounts 
 for entire congregations not having a 
 single member able to recite the benedic- 
 tion over the Torah. To this miscon- 
 ception of Torah we owe the ignorance 
 of Judaism on the part of some of the 
 most prominent communal leaders. 
 This failure to appreciate the true func- 
 tion of Torah is responsible for rabbis 
 being compelled to become second-rate 
 reviewers of the latest novels and plays, 
 instead of first-rate Jewish scholars. 
 
 TORAH AS LIFELONG MORAL 
 EDUCATION 
 A Torahless Judaism may hang on to 
 life for a generation or two, but its end 
 is inevitable. Hence, our problem is 
 what to do to reinstate the Torah in the 
 life of the Jew. To be sure, we cannot 
 any longer expect the Torah to be util- 
 ized by the Jew as the sole humanizing 
 and civilizing agency. We may, how- 
 ever, SO interpret its scope and function 
 as to give it first place among the ethical 
 44 
 
As Moral Education 
 
 and cultural influences that shape his 
 life. Why limit Torah to the study of 
 texts, all important as those texts are, 
 when in reality Torah represents a liv- 
 ing and continuing process rather than 
 a final attainment? Torah should re- 
 mind us of the truth that Judaism can 
 function as a way of life only so long 
 as the Jew is engaged in a lifelong 
 process of moral education. The 
 duty of Torah should signify the duty 
 of treating life as an art which it is our 
 business to keep on perfecting. Like all 
 arts, the art of life can be perfected only 
 by taking thought. When our people 
 will accept this larger significance of 
 Torah, they will inevitably go back to 
 the classic literature of the Jewish peo- 
 ple; for, you cannot touch upon any 
 phase of the problem of life without 
 reckoning with the wisdom and experi- 
 ence of Israel as embodied in our Sacred 
 Writings. 
 
 This truth that lifelong moral educa- 
 tion is the paramount religious duty of 
 45 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 the human being is far-reaching enough 
 to constitute a world mission, if we 
 are looking for one. No one takes us 
 seriously when we boast that we are en- 
 trusted with the mission to teach right- 
 eousness. But if we were to adopt as 
 our mission the learning of righteous- 
 ness, we would, no doubt, render a much 
 needed service to the cause of civiliza- 
 tion. 
 
 THE IDEAL OF TORAH AS APPLIED 
 TO THE CHILD 
 
 This conception of Torah would revo- 
 lutionize most of our present notions of 
 moral and spiritual education. It would 
 open up new vistas, and reveal new op- 
 portunities for the character training of 
 our children. Instead of regarding the 
 religious school, with its milk-and-water 
 curriculum, with its namby-pamby 
 moralizing, as the primary, if not sole, 
 agency in developing ethical conduct 
 and a wholesome outlook upon life, our 
 eyes would be opened to the fact that 
 there is not a moment in the waking 
 46 
 
As Applied to the Child 
 
 life of the child when he does not re- 
 ceive impressions which determine the 
 bent of his character. We would at 
 once proceed to overhaul the religious 
 schooling we give our children. We 
 would demand that their religious 
 studies should have relevance to their 
 every-day life, and to the role that they 
 will have to play as Jews and as citi- 
 zens. We would make it possible for 
 the Talmud Torah schools to engage 
 teachers who do not adopt teaching in 
 Jewish schools as a stepping-stone to 
 more remunerative professions, but to 
 whom imbuing children with a love and 
 understanding of Judaism is a sacred 
 calling. It would never occur to us to 
 postpone the religious education of our 
 children until a few months before their 
 Bar Mizvah or confirmation, and then 
 stuff their minds with a number of unre- 
 lated historical facts, some creeds and 
 moral truisms, or make them drudge for 
 several months in learning how to chant 
 mechanically a portion from Scripture. 
 This is what many parents consider giv- 
 47 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 ing their children a good Jewish train- 
 ing. 
 
 We should then learn to evaluate 
 aright the significant part played in the 
 shaping of our children’s character by 
 the home environment and by their play- 
 mates. If parents were aware how the 
 most casual remarks and opinions which 
 they pass about people exercise a greater 
 influence than a good deal of formal 
 instruction in ethics and religion, if 
 parents realized that by their example 
 they are apt to nullify the effect of the 
 most efficient character training which 
 their children might receive outside of 
 the home, they would be much more 
 wary of what they say and do. The 
 choice of companions for our children 
 on the basis of wealth would give way 
 to choice on the basis of moral worth. 
 We would probably lose the taste for 
 social climbing; for nothing works such 
 moral havoc upon children as the eager- 
 
 ness of parents to shine in the reflected 
 48 
 
The Discovery of the Child 
 
 light of those that have more money 
 than they have. 
 
 THE DISCOVERY OF THE CHILD 
 
 But by far the most important effect 
 of the ideal of Torah upon our concep- 
 tion of child training would be that we 
 would begin to comprehend what the 
 child means for the civilization of the 
 race. Such appreciation would be tanta- 
 mount to the discovery of the child. We 
 may be said to discover the child when 
 it dawns upon us that in the child God 
 gives humanity a chance to make good 
 its mistakes, and to fulfill its fondest 
 dreams. As soon as we make that dis- 
 covery, we place the child at the focus of 
 all spiritual and social endeavor. This 
 is in accord with the spirit of Judaism 
 which has ordained numerous rites and 
 moral provisions with an eye to the de- 
 velopment of the child. The Torah is 
 especially interested in having the child 
 recognize the power of God. In placing 
 such emphasis upon the proper upbring- 
 
 49 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 ing of the child, Judaism proves its in- 
 tuition of the child’s contribution to the 
 development of human society. It is 
 now recognized that the child, by means 
 of his prolonged infancy, brought into 
 being the institution of the family, 
 which is at the basis of all civilization. 
 It will, no doubt, again be the child that 
 will serve as the stimulus to a peaceful 
 reorganization of the social order on a 
 basis of freedom and justice. 
 
 In order that this may not remain an 
 idle dream, the State, which now claims 
 the prerogative of compelling and con- 
 trolling the child’s education, must be 
 made to discharge its educational func- 
 tion in a manner that is conducive to the 
 furtherance of the highest spiritual in- 
 terests of the child. The ideal of Torah 
 should compel us to place ourselves in 
 the vanguard of every movement that 
 would utilize the system of compulsory 
 education as a means of bringing about 
 a new day and a better world order. No 
 civic duty can be more important than 
 
 50 
 
The Discovery of the Child 
 
 joining in the demand that every child 
 be given an adequate schooling. We 
 must urge that the public schools utilize 
 their vast resources, their immeasurable 
 opportunities, their rich subject-matter, 
 to teach our children the art of living. 
 The crusades that break out spasmod- 
 ically to introduce, or to abolish, the 
 mechanical reading of a few verses from 
 the Bible are totally devoid of educa- 
 tional import. It were far more honest 
 and profitable to insist that the public 
 schools should make a serious effort to 
 cope with the problem of character 
 training. 
 
 Our children are taught history, geog- 
 raphy, civics and kindred subjects ap- 
 parently with the purpose of indoctri- 
 nating them with the view that the 
 status quo is the millennium, and that 
 competition, intolerance, national boast- 
 ing and bigotry are the last word in 
 patriotic virtue. Educational authorities 
 should be made aware that, more than 
 anything else, parents want their chil- 
 
 51 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 dren to acquire during the years of ele- 
 mentary training the qualities of hon- 
 esty, fair play, moral courage, and, 
 above all, kindness and consideration for 
 human beings, regardless of color, creed 
 or nationality. This is the inarticulate 
 prayer of every father and mother. If 
 this prayer were heeded, our entire 
 national life would undergo in a single 
 lifetime a transformation such as all the 
 religious bodies and all the social reform 
 organizations would never dream of 
 bringing about in a century. 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE ADOLESCENT 
 
 Assuming that the moral education of 
 the child has been well taken care of, a 
 new problem confronts us when the 
 child passes into the youth. When the 
 physical and mental powers mature, per- 
 sonality, with all of its mysterious forces, 
 comes into being. The phenomenon of 
 adolescence, with its need for readjust- 
 ing the ideas acquired during the years 
 of childhood, is probably accompanied, 
 
 52 
 
The Problem of the Youth 
 
 especially in the case of sensitive youth, 
 by severer mental struggle in modern 
 times than was ever the case in the past. 
 Adolescence, which spells a storm and 
 stress period in the life of the Gentile 
 youth, is nothing less than a dangerous 
 crisis in the life of the Jewish youth. 
 The former has only himself, his ac- 
 quired habits and ideas, to contend with; — 
 the latter has, in addition, a hostile en- 
 vironment to contend with. 
 
 THE PROBLEM OF THE JEWISH YOUTH 
 
 The Jewish student is the Jewish 
 problem incarnate. No wonder the Yid- 
 dish writer “Sholom Aleichem” in dram- 
 atizing his theme “It is Hard to be a 
 Jew” took as his main character a Jewish 
 student about to be graduated from a 
 University. “Sholom Aleichem” gives 
 us, however, only one half the story of 
 that young man’s life when he depicts 
 all his troubles as due to anti-Semitic 
 prejudice. If he had penetrated more 
 deeply into the young man’s soul he 
 
 53 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 would have discovered a raging conflict 
 of violent emotions. Inwardly, the Jew- 
 ish youth is tormented by doubt as to 
 the truth and worthwhileness of the re- 
 ligious and moral ideals he had been 
 taught, in his childhood, to respect. 
 Outwardly, he is exposed to the baneful 
 influence of evil companions who hold 
 up his scruples to ridicule. His studies 
 at college are by no means calculated to 
 strengthen his faith in tradition and in 
 the authority of moral standards. The 
 college regards its task as ended when 
 it imparts objective and scientific in- 
 formation, and pays but little attention 
 to the effect which that information has 
 upon character. Thus left without guid- 
 ance in the evaluation of the knowledge 
 received, the young man converts his 
 half-comprehended information into 
 slogans that give sanction to all sorts 
 of wild escapades. 
 
 With no responsible Jewish com- 
 munity or institution to make provision 
 for the youth’s spiritual development 
 
 54 
 
The Problem of the Youth 
 
 during those critical years, what else is 
 to be expected than that he should be 
 graduated as a confirmed iconoclast, to 
 whom nothing is sacred, who holds all 
 virtue in derision, and who makes mock 
 of piety and self-control? What use can 
 he have for the Jewish people when he 
 is convinced that Judaism is a misfor- 
 tune? In fact, he is something of an 
 anti-Semite himself. He cannot forgive 
 his fellow-Jews the vexations and an- 
 noyances that he had to endure on their 
 account during his student career. His 
 self-centered, materialistic and vulgar 
 attitude toward life, in turn, furnishes 
 the college authorities with a standing 
 excuse for wanting to cut down the 
 number of Jews at college. 
 
 The experience which the Jewish stu- 
 dent goes through is typical of what all 
 Jewish young persons have to encounter 
 in the various walks of life. They all 
 come out from the struggle morally 
 scarred. The iron enters their soul at 
 an age all too young. Disillusioned 
 
 55 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 sooner, by far, than other youths as to 
 the sincerity of men’s professions of 
 idealism and good-will, the Jewish youth 
 becomes a hardened cynic. He adopts 
 the swagger of the man of the world, 
 and boasts of indulging his appetites 
 without let or hindrance. 
 
 It will be said that this attitude of the 
 Jewish adolescent is confined to those 
 who have received no spiritual training 
 whatever in their childhood. This, how- 
 ever, is not the case. The most conspic- 
 uous instances of revulsion against reli- 
 gion and morality will oft be found 
 among those who, as children, received 
 an intense and careful religious up- 
 bringing. Many parents recall the re- 
 markable piety which a son or a daugh- 
 ter displayed as a child. They love to 
 harp upon the eagerness with which 
 their child would seize every oppor- 
 tunity to recite a benediction, or to at- 
 tend the synagogue. But as soon as the 
 child grew up and left the parental roof, 
 there was no trace left of that piety. 
 
 56 
 
New Jewish Content Needed 
 
 This almost universal experience of par- 
 ents should by this time have taught 
 them that nowadays the responsibility 
 for their children’s spiritual develop- 
 ment is augmented on the day that their 
 children are confirmed or become Bar- 
 Mizvah. 
 
 The recognition of this fact, which is, 
 in a sense, the same as acknowledging 
 that Torah as a process of moral educa- 
 tion must be resumed with greater vigor 
 during the years of adolescence, imposes 
 upon us a twofold task of stupendous 
 proportions: One is to organize new 
 subject material for Jewish youth edu- 
 cation; and the other, to create the ma- 
 chinery whereby Jewish education might 
 be carried far into the years of adoles- 
 cence. 
 
 WE NEED NEW JEWISH CONTENT 
 
 At present we are sadly deficient in 
 both material and men. The material at 
 our disposal is not in a condition to an- 
 
 57 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 swer the practical need of inspiring and 
 guiding youth. It has to be reorganized, 
 reinterpreted and rendered palatable. 
 Let me make clear what is meant by the 
 need of new subject matter. Until re- 
 cent years, there was no material in the 
 field of Jewish history that might serve 
 as a source of both information and in- 
 spiration. Came along the Jewish his- 
 torians, of whom Graetz is the best 
 known, and created Jewish history in 
 the modern sense of the term. The 
 gathering of historical material has only 
 begun. Even what we have has to be 
 worked over into more tractable form, 
 and presented with more careful regard 
 for scientific accuracy and new social in- 
 terests. And what is true of the outward 
 facts of Jewish life is still more true of 
 the norms and ideals of Jewish life. 
 Seven hundred years ago Maimonides 
 found it necessary to write “A Guide 
 to the Perplexed’’ to deal with the out- 
 standing philosophical problems of his 
 day, and a compendium of Jewish prac- 
 58 
 
New Jewish Content Needed 
 
 tice to present in systematic form the 
 duties incumbent upon the Jew. How 
 much more are we, to-day, in need of 
 systematic presentation of the case for 
 Judaism, or of compendia of the duties 
 essential to leading a Jewish life? 
 
 More important even than the produc- 
 tion of commentaries and adaptations 
 of the ancient material of Judaism is new 
 Jewish content. Such content cannot be 
 made to order. Creative effort cannot 
 be called forth at will. It takes the 
 happy combination of favorable social 
 conditions, urgent demand on the part 
 of the people, and the presence of cre- 
 ative genius to produce new cultural 
 subject-matter. The modern Hebrew 
 literature, which is the initial product of 
 Jewish creative talent in modern times, 
 is an indication of what rich literary 
 content could be added to the treasures 
 of Jewish thought, if there were the 
 slightest evidence of popular interest in 
 the cultural phase of Judaism. 
 
 59 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 JEWISH YOUTH EDUCATION TO BE 
 GIVEN PRIORITY 
 
 The success in creating the agencies 
 for the moral training of youth will, in 
 the last instance, depend upon our hav- 
 ing something to give them that will 
 hold their interest by reason of its cul- 
 tural value and relevance to life. We 
 need not, however, wait that long. Much 
 may be accomplished even with our 
 present agencies, if the synagogues, Jew- 
 ish centers, Y. M.H.A.’s and kindred 
 institutions will give to the problem of 
 Torah for the youth priority over all 
 their other activities. The main object 
 in providing Jewish educational facili- 
 ties in any of these institutions should 
 be to influence the youth spiritually and 
 Jewishly. Young people’s classes in re- 
 ligious and ethical subject-matter should 
 be established everywhere. Rabbis and 
 educators should be exempted from 
 many of the social duties and needless 
 speechmaking, so that they might de- 
 
 60 
 
Re-education of the Adult 
 
 vote the greater part of their time and 
 ability to the task of educating the 
 youth. By these and similar means we 
 might succeed in making the duty of 
 moral re-education during the years of 
 youth a practical norm of Jewish life. 
 
 RE-EDUCATION OF THE ADULT 
 
 With all that the youth may have 
 learned about life and its duties, by the 
 time he attains manhood and has to 
 make his place in the world, he is face to 
 face with situations that do not seem to 
 fit the rules and principles which he has 
 come to accept as authoritative. Every 
 day brings with it some variation, at 
 times slight, at others pronounced, upon 
 what he had been taught to regard as 
 the usual course of life. When that oc- 
 curs, what is there to guide him in ad- 
 justing himself to the niceties of each 
 new situation as it arises? Now that he 
 has to shift for himself, life is no longer 
 a matter of theory and abstract ideals, 
 but of concrete and oft harsh realities 
 
 61 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 which are apt to render him oblivious to 
 all the delicate weighings of right and 
 wrong. Hence, Judaism’s behest that 
 Torah be the occupation of the man no 
 less than of the youth or child. 
 
 Joshua, long past the age when he 
 acted as aide-de-camp to Moses, and 
 about to embark on his life’s task, was 
 commanded, “The book of the law shall 
 not depart out of thy mouth, but thou 
 shalt meditate therein day and night.” 
 
 These words imply that in waging the 
 battle of life we should consult the 
 teachings of the Torah. The real op- 
 portunity to reckon with those teach- 
 ings arises when we are engaged in the 
 business of living. The Jew, therefore, 
 to whom Torah signifies the call to a life 
 of social responsibility enters upon a 
 second stage in the process of re-educa- 
 tion as soon as he takes his place in the 
 world of practical affairs. The mere 
 reinterpretation of traditional views in 
 terms of the modern world outlook is 
 
 62 
 
Re-education of the Adult 
 
 not enough for the contingencies of the 
 workaday world. What the individual 
 man or woman needs now is to know 
 how to apply the general principles of 
 religion and morality to the specific sit- 
 uations as they arise from day to day. 
 
 We must always be at school. Itisa 
 mistake to believe that once a person has 
 received a considerable amount of for- 
 mal instruction as to what is right, or 
 has been brought up in an ethical envi- 
 ronment, he can be relied upon to do the 
 right thing without further thought or 
 study. Virtue which represents nothing 
 more than the momentum of early train- 
 ing is liable to exhaust itself in pious 
 wishes which never bear any fruit in 
 action. There are always enough new 
 problems that come up from time to time 
 in the home, in the shop, in the office and 
 in the market-place that render all prece- 
 dents inadequate and that demand 
 deeper insight and greater initiative 
 than can come from mere habit. 
 
 63 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 This second stage in the moral re-edu- 
 cation may take the form of detailed 
 study and discussion of the specific ethi- 
 cal or spiritual problems which we en- 
 counter in our daily work and dealings 
 with others. We should learn to take 
 counsel together, in order to know how 
 to translate the desire to do what is right 
 into the actual terms of the new situa- 
 tion that we confront. No ethical prin- 
 ciple is of much value at this stage of 
 mental development, unless it come 
 down to earth. It should deal with the 
 relations of employer to employé, of pro- 
 ducer to consumer, and of buyer to 
 seller. It should go far enough to help 
 in the fixing of just prices and in the de- 
 termination of a fair scale of wages. It 
 should throw light upon such a problem 
 as that of engaging and dismissing 
 labor. It should aid in deciding what is 
 legitimate and what illegitimate in our 
 methods of attracting trade. There is 
 adequate ethical material in our domes- 
 tic life for “Sheeloth and Tshuboth,” the 
 
 64 
 
Re-education of the Adult 
 
 kind of “responsa”’ Judaism will have to 
 produce in the future. The professional 
 callings, no less than business, are in 
 need of having the ideal of service trans- 
 lated into concrete “Thou shalts” and 
 “Thou shalt nots.” Wherever such 
 codes have been formulated, it should 
 be the function of Judaism not only to 
 make a gesture of assent, but to urge the 
 conscientious conformity to those self- 
 imposed standards. 
 
 At first sight, it seems that our per- 
 sonal conduct scarcely affords enough 
 material for continuous study. The 
 greater part of it is so routinized that 
 there appears to be no place in it for 
 moral reflection. This is the very rea- 
 son most of us after twenty vegetate 
 spiritually. If we were accustomed to 
 subject our conduct more frequently to 
 intelligent scrutiny and judgment, we 
 would discover that it possesses aspects 
 which might enlarge our mental and 
 spiritual horizon. 
 
 65 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 TORAH AS ENLIGHTENED OPINION 
 
 Moral education is not meant to be 
 confined to social and spiritual problems 
 which fall within the narrow range of 
 personal experience. Our actions are 
 determined by the opinions we hold con- 
 cerning matters to which we are related 
 merely as spectators. Nothing human 
 should be foreign to the one that studies 
 life from the standpoint of Torah. Study 
 which embraces every human interest 
 enables us to exert a healthy influence 
 upon public opinion. The understand- 
 ing of the economic, political and social 
 issues of the day from an ethical point 
 of view is conducive to enlightened 
 thought and action in human society. 
 The invisible force of public opinion is 
 a deciding factor in the fate of nations 
 and empires. Whether human society 
 is to be plastic to the ideals of its seers 
 and prophets depends upon enlightened 
 opinion, the only remedy that will save 
 humanity from all forms of mob hys- 
 
 66 
 
Torah as Enlightened Opinion 
 
 teria. But enlightened opinion is pos- 
 sible only when we are armed with 
 adequate information, and when we are 
 trained in properly sifting and apprais- 
 ing the facts at our disposal. Both of 
 these requirements make it incumbent 
 upon us always to be students of human 
 nature and of worldly affairs. 
 
 The re-education of the adult does not 
 necessarily have to be carried on by 
 means of formal study. Unless it as- 
 sume the form of recreation, it is not 
 likely to be carried on at all. We 
 should acquire the habit of reading 
 not merely for the sake of killing time, 
 but to become better informed as to 
 what is going on in the world of thought 
 and of action. Members of large fami- 
 lies that come together frequently 
 should once in a while replace their small 
 talk with reading from some of the 
 world’s great literary treasures. They 
 might stumble in that way upon the lit- 
 erary treasures of the Jewish people. 
 The custom of arranging costly card 
 
 67 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 parties, which is in vogue in many of our 
 homes, might be interrupted at times 
 by gatherings at which, under proper 
 leadership, a matter of vital import to 
 the life of the nation would be the topic 
 of discussion and reading. Is it too vis- 
 lonary to expect that Jewish men and 
 women of average mentality should for 
 a moment consider breaking with their 
 deadening routine of futile activities and 
 pleasures? Nothing that ought to be is 
 impossible. With this as a basic as- 
 sumption, Judaism has been able to 
 achieve wonders. 
 
 Informed discussion, even of matters 
 that have but an indirect bearing on 
 personal conduct, has a profound moral 
 value. We can accustom ourselves to 
 find as much interest in discussing the 
 League of Nations, the race problem in 
 America, or the outlawing of war, as 
 in dilating upon swinging a golf stick, 
 the intricacies of bridge or mah-jong. 
 Discussion of political and social prob- 
 lems has long ago been recognized as a 
 
 68 
 
Torah as Enlightened Opinion 
 
 potent factor in civilization. In olden 
 times Socrates, and in modern times 
 Bagehot, advocated discussion as a 
 means of clarifying our ideas and social- 
 izing our activities. A people that lacks 
 the capacity to discuss intelligently its 
 every-day interests and problems is in- 
 capable of self-government. Emotional 
 condemnation alone will never cast out 
 the war spirit that has taken possession 
 of mankind. If that evil spirit is ever to 
 be exorcised, it will come about through 
 the conscientious study and frank dis- 
 cussion of the great and terrible ques- 
 tions that agitate the modern world. 
 
 The success of ethical study and dis- 
 cussion will depend upon our being able 
 to identify them as Torah, and to ap- 
 proach them with that same spiritual 
 attitude as our fathers did the study of 
 Scriptural and Rabbinic texts. If the in- 
 struments of study, the personality of 
 the teachers, and the atmosphere where 
 such discussion is carried on are calcu- 
 lated to inspire the heart as well as in- 
 
 69 
 
The Meaning of Torah 
 
 form the mind, we may look forward to 
 the reawakening of literary activity 
 among Jews that will exert as potent a 
 spiritual influence in the future as the 
 Talmud did in the past. 
 
 “Then they that feared the Lord 
 Spoke one with another; 
 And the Lord hearkened, and heard, 
 And a book of remembrance was written 
 before Him, 
 For them that feared the Lord, and that 
 
 thought upon His name.” 
 Mal. iii. 16. 
 
 70 
 
ore 
 
 ba i 
 ihe + 
 
 
 
ry a 
 
 
 
 ae 
 
 | i ye 
 
 
 
 a 
 ah: ah. . 
 
 ae) 
 
 “y Wisi 
 
 ihe ite 
 afd 
 
 
 
 
 
os 
 
 4a! 
 
 ‘ 
 
 is 
 bie 
 
 if Sa any My i 
 
 Bit eH ai