Shalom!
This video is about Secular Humanistic Judaism. What prompted me to want to talk about this was the death this week of Rabbi Sherwin Wine, who is the founder of Secular Humanistic Judaism. The paper said originally, he was ordained as a reformed Rabbi, but because of the holocaust, he lost his belief. And he began a synagogue without God, the paper said that instead of saying hear o Israel the Lord our god, the Lord is one. The Shema, they revere all that is best in humankind. In addition to that, there is a book on the best seller’s list of The New York Times, non-fiction, basically suggesting that religion is a net force for evil in the world and we should not have any religion, we should not have any belief in God.
So why not undertake those two issues, whether Judaism can really have no God and it is right to pray to, we revere the best in humankind and whether that in fact, religion has been a net force for evil. Now, you could not make the argument that religion has been a force for evil to some extent, you think about the crusades, the pope-inspired action to fight the Muslims in Jerusalem, led to the mass murder of many Jews, that the New Testament, we believe fictitiously saying that Jews killed, is responsible for the death of Jesus, led to the murder of Jews for many centuries until the pope in 1965 said that was a sin, it was not true, that the Jews killed Jesus. I think about the inquisition with the church, in spite efforts to hurt the Jews, and so on and so forth and then religious persecutions that go on throughout the world, the Protestants and the Catholics in Northern Ireland, etcetera, and etcetera.
Now, on the whole though, it is really true, and I do this in the context of the Torah portion in Deuteronomy called the (foreign language) which we read in the synagogue in this past week which says the Ten Commandments, and the Shema and there view after it. It has the rules, do not murder, do not kill, do not steal, do not bear false witness, do not covet, there should be one God and no idols. That has the paragraph of the (foreign language), you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your might. You should instruct your children in the religion. You should have signs about religion.
Most people in the world are religious. They believe in a power higher, greater than themselves, seems like we are almost hard wired for. But it is in a myth positive? First of all, I like you to think about a world without here is where the Lord our God, the Lord as one. Are we really better off thinking that human beings have all the answers, even the best of human beings.
And then think about the Nazi Ideology? They thought they have the best ideology. They had a superior ideology, racists, and slave owners. They think they are representing the most noble in humankind, who is to say? If you have no power greater than you that when a human being says something, that is the best thing, you could just say “I disagree.” Or “Who is he?”, just another human being. And think about the mass movements of mass murder of the twentieth century, they we are not religious inspired. They were the Nazis which killed 50 million, a hundred million people, Mao Zedong in China, 50 million people, Stalin in Russia, 50 million people; those were all socialists and communists. We believed it was better for the society to mass murder people. They have no God and that is what happened when you take God out of the equation.
Now it is true that we are facing a very daunting challenge from Islamic fundamentalists and that is definitely giving religion a bad name. This whole idea that a woman who wears the wrong thing out of the street can be beat up in arrested by goon squads. That is terrible and religious people doing bad things. But that is all the more so that religion has to be taught. the very values of Judaism, of one God and there is no devil, and so you are responsible for your deeds and the Ten Commandments, and loving God with all your heart, soul and mind, to teach your children diligently to do good, that God above all according to Michael wants to do justice and love, mercy, and wants to walk humbly with God. Imagine a world without those ideas.
Now, there is, in Judaism, something also called Civil Judaism. This is based on a work by Robert Bella about American Civil Religion. So a guy named Richer wrote the following 8 principles about what he called Civil Judaism, and I agree with all of these, I just think, it is almost, except it is leaving out something important. Number one is the unity and distinctiveness of the Jewish people. Well, I agree with that. Two, the result and responsibility of each Jew of the Jewish community collectively put security and welfare of all Jews, I agree with that. Three, the centrality of the state of Israelis a symbol of this unity and mutual responsibility. I think most Jews would agree with that. Four, the enduring worth of the Jewish tradition and the importance of its perpetuation, I agree with that. Five, the persistence of threats, both internal and external, could the survival of the Jewish people and tradition. Six, (foreign language), charity, understood narrowly as philanthropy and more broadly as actions on behalf of justice is a primary mandate of the Jewish Values System, completely agree with that. Seven, the virtue of the act of participation in society with compatibility with good Jewishness. And eight, and this is the one I totally disagree with, but he says most American Jews do believe in, the relative insignificance of classic theological affirmations, and the individual’s freedom of conscience with respect to most traditional norms of Jewish law.
Well obviously, most Americans, most Jewish Americans use their consciousness and their conscience to figure out what laws they want to keep and what laws they do not. That does not mean that that is classical Jewish tradition, but to say that the classical theological affirmations too. I probably would agree with a lot of his sentiments about some of the classic theological affirmations of having relative insignificance. I am not an orthodox and fundamentalist Jew. In fact I know people that say “Tell me that God, you do not believe in and that is probably the God that I believe in.” I do not believe in that God either, that there is a little out of room for discussion about what that higher power is. But the basic idea is, is there some force in the universe that has not a greater brilliance and intelligence understanding of humanity and for humanity than we do. And in some way and part of that and what the process we call revelation. Whether it is as the fundamentalists believe which is word for word the bible, or as the rest of us believe that it was generally inspired and the human beings continue to try to figure out. And so what human beings try and do then classically is to study and study and study, that is why the study of Torah is considered the most important commandment. Too continually and to prove into our hearts and souls the texts and the ideas of Judaism, so that we can become more virtuous. Of course we are human beings and flooded when we make mistakes, that is why we repent, but simply put it on balance. on one side of the world, without the Shema, without the idea of God being unified, without loving God with all your hearts, all your might, without God commanding us to not murder, to not steal, to not covet, to not bear false witness, and if all were left with are revering the best in human kind, or whatever human beings were in control of the time say is the law is the law, then I think we are doomed. And that is why ultimately, I reject the idea that the world is better without religion. Completely reject that thesis. And also that Judaism is better without God, I think that is nonsense.
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