The Idea of establishing a ” supreme religious center” in Israel has come under severe attack here in the current issue of the official organ of the Liberal Judaism movement in this country.
The magazine insists that there is “no significance in the idea except that it reveals the ambition of Orthodox Jewish ecclesiastics to establish their authority over the religious life of all Jews.” The Liberal Jewish Monthly predicts that this “ambition is destined to defeat.”
It asserts that Orthodox rabbis and their congregations in various countries are not likely to accept the authority of the Israel rabbinate. It also declares that most Jews in the word do not accept Israel Chief Rabbi Isaac Herzog’s orthodoxy, adding that the number of people who do accept it in Israel is small. Only through “political maneuvering” has the rabbinate in Israel been given legal authority, the magazine says.
Commenting on the resection of American Jewry to such an institution, the publication says that in the United States there are “many Orthodox synagogues but comparatively few Orthodox Jews.” The Reform and Conservative Jews will not be influenced by such a religious authority in Israel. Not even among the Jews “who belong to the Orthodox synagogues but do not practice Orthodox” will such a religious authority produce greater conformity, the publication maintains.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
