An invasion of secularism in the synagogue in the United States has created a menace which threatens to drive out the Jewish God-idea and bring into Jewish religious life a confusion unparalleled in the history of the ancient Jewish institution. This statement was made by Rabbi Israel Goldstein of New York at the second day’s session of the annual convention of the Rabbinical Assembly at the close of a paper reviewing present day conditions in the synagogue, entitled: “The Menace of Secularization.” Rabbi Goldstein addressed himself particularly to the recent developments in synagogue life and called forth wide applause on the part of the majority of the rabbis in attendance.
Eight factors were enumerated by Rabbi Goldstein as the causes for this threatening condition. They are: a presumptious lay leadership, overreaching building ambition, the institution of the synagogue center, the apotheosis of charity, secular Zionism, secular sermons and cantatas, social distinction in the pew and Babbittry in the pulpit. Rabbi Goldstein stated that the role played by the Jewish laity and its interference with the rabbinate exceeds the claims and the liberties taken by the Christian laity in the Christian churches.
“The rabbinate has never been an ecclesiastical hierarchy, but even without institutional prerogatives the rabbi enjoyed authority at the hands of the laity which respected his scholarship and his piety. It may be that some modern rabbis have forfeited that respect. The whole truth, however, is that with the dissipation of homogeneous ghetto-ized Jewish communal life, the disciplinary forces of Jewish law have become dissipated and conse- (Continued on Page 4)
“The situation offers an ### contrast to the situation in the church. In the Carholic church, of course the authority has always proceeded from the elergy, but even in the Protestant churches, from the Episcopalian down the elergy plays a dominant rule in the determination of policy and program.”
Rabbi Goldstein ### the reversal of the Reform ### on the question of Zionism. Following the lead of the prominent laymen. “For a generation leading Reform rabbis had burial their ### against Zion. When however, prominent Reform laymen, convinced of the justice of the situation and of the claims of Palestine upon the Jewish people expressed a sympathy for the support of Palestine upbuilding, the rabbinare followed their lead, whereas they could have well taken the lead in a mamer so vital to the Jewish people.”
Speaking of the effect of these influences on the main sale of the synagogue and on its histories task. Rabbi Goldstein stated that these influences rend to bellttle the central power of the instruction, the Jewish God-idea.
“The distinguishing characteristic of the synagogue has been the God-idea and ###### the concept of an imminent and per ### Being and woundly the individual’s relationship to God as direct, personal and inundate.
“There is a tendency in some synagogue ### to der### Israel’s Bassic God while ### an heir-an-parent with ###
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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.
