Reform Jewish theology and the sociology of liberal religion in America: The platforms as response to the perception of socioreligious crisis

Modern Judaism

Volumn 20, Issue 1, 2000, Pages 60-77

  Kaplan, Dana E ^a  

^a UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN MILWAUKEE   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 84864478336     PISSN: 02761114     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1093/mj/20.1.60     Document Type: Article

References (67)

1. Brennan R. Hill, Paul Knitter, and William Madges, Faith, Religion and Theology: A Contemporary Introduction (Mystic [CT], 1991), p. 251.
2. Rodney Stark, "The Economics of Piety: Religion and Social Class," in Issues in Social Inequality, ed. Gerald W. Thielbar and Saul D. Feldman (Boston, 1971);
3. "Church and Sect," in The Sacred m a Secular Age, ed. Phillip E. Hammond (Berkeley, 1985);
4. "Do Catholic Societies Exist?" (paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society for the Scientific Study of Religion, Virginia Beach, Virginia, 1990);
5. "Antioch as the Social Situation for Matthew's Gospel," in Social History of the Matthean Community: Cross-Disciplinary Approaches to an Open Question, ed. David L. Balch (Minneapolis, 1991);
6. "The Reliability of Historical U.S. Census Data on Religion," Sociological Analysis, Vol. 53, No. 1 (1992), pp. 91-95.
7. Dean Kelley, Why Conservative Churches Are Growing: A Study in the Sociology of Religion (Macon, 1986 and 1972).
8. Laurence R. Iannaccone, "Sacrifice and Stigma: Reducing Free-Riding in Cults, Communes, and other Collectives," Journal of Political Economy, Vol. 100, No. 2 (1992), pp. 271-92;
9. "Religious Practice: A Human Capital Approach,"Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 29, No. 3 (1990), pp. 297-314;
10. "Why Strict Churches Are Strong," American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 99, No. 5 (1994), pp. 1180-1211;
11. "Risk, Rationality, and Religious Portfolios," Economic Inquiry, Vol. 33, No. 2 (1995), pp. 285-95.
12. Roger Finke, "Demographics of Religious Participation: An Ecological Approach, 1850-1980," Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 28, No. 1 (1989), pp. 45-58;
13. Stark, "Turning Pews into People: Estimating Nineteenth-Century Church Membership" Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion Vol. 25, No. 2 (1986), pp. 180-92;
14. "Religious Economies and Sacred Canopies: Religious Mobilization in American Cities, 1906," American Sociological Review, Vol. 53, No.1 (1988), pp. 41-49.
15. Charles Y. Glock, "The Religious Revival in America?" in Religion and the Face of America, ed. Jane Zahn (Berkeley, 1959), pp. 25-42;
16. "The Role of De-privation in the Origin and Evolution of Religious Groups," in Religion and Social Conflict, ed. Robert Lee and Martin E. Marty (New York, 1964), pp. 24-36;
17. Stark, Religion and Society in Tension (Chicago, 1965)
18. and Christian Beliefs and Anti-Semitism (New York, 1966).
19. Stark and James McCannrfeti "The Weakness of Monopoly Faiths: Market Forces and Catholic Commitment," (paper presented at the annual meeting of the Association for the Sociology of Religion, 1989).
20. William Sims Bainbridge, "Collective Behavior and Social Movements," in Stark, Sociology (Belmost [CA], 1985);
21. Stark and Bainbridge, "Networks of Faith: Interpersonal Bonds and Recruitment to Cults and Sects," American Journal of Sociology, Vol. 85, No. 6 (1980), pp. 1376-95;
22. The Future of Religion: Secularization, Revival, and Cull Formation (Berkeley, 1985);
23. and A Theory of Religion (New York, 1987).
24. Stark, Bainbridge, Robert D. Crutchfield, Daniel Doyle, and Finke, "Crime and Delinquency in the Roaring Twenties," Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 20, No.1 (1983), pp. 4-23.
25. Finke and Stark, The Churching of America: 1776 to 1990 (New Brunswick, 1992), p. 5.
26. On Stark as a sociologist of American religious history, see David G. Hackett, "Rodney Stark and the Sociology of American Religious History,"Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 29, No. 3 (1990), pp. 372-76.
27. For a more critical view, see Philip K. Goff, "Spiritual Enrichment and the Bull Market: Balancing the Books of American Religious History," Religious Studies Review, Vol. 22, No. 2 (1996), pp. 106-12).
28. Goff writes that despite the fact that Finke and Stark write well, their book The Churching of America "is so wrought with problems that readers will invariably distrust the occasions when Finke and Stark are on the mark" (p. 107).
29. Michael Hechter, Principles of Group Solidarity (Berkeley, 1987), p. 27.
30. Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity (Princeton, 1996), p. 175.
31. See the recent essays on this book: reviewers Willi Braun, Burton Mack, and Randall Collins, introduction by Russell T. McCutcheon, "A Symposium on Rodney Stark's The Rise of Christianity," Religious Studies Review, Vol. 25, No. 2 (1999), pp. 127-39.
32. Benton Johnson, Dean R. Hoge, and Donald A. Luidens, "Mainline Churches: The Real Reason for Decline" First Things, No. 31 (1993), p. 18.
33. Michael Goldberg, Why Should Jews Survive? Looking Past the Holocaust toward a Jewish Future (New York, 1995), pp. 136-37.
34. Barry A. Kosmin, et al., Highlights of the CJF 1990 National Jewish Population Survey (New York, 1991).
35. For an interesting collection of articles by sociologists drawing on the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey, see David M. Gordis and Dorit P. Gary, eds., American Jewry: Portrait and Prognosis (West Orange, 1997).
36. Also see Sidney Goldstein, "Profile of American Jewry: Insights from the 1990 National Jewish Population Survey," American Jewish Yearbook, Vol. 92 (New York, 1992).
37. On the Pittsburgh Platform, see Walter Jacob, ed., The Changing World of Reform Judaism: The Pittsburgh Platform, in Retrospect (Pittsburgh, 1985).
38. Also see the review of this collection by Jonathan D. Sarna, "New Light on the Pittsburgh Platform of 1885," American Jewish History, Vol. 76, No. 3 (1987), pp. 358-68.
39. Kohler wrote a number of books, including his masterpiece Jewish Theology, Systematically and Historically Considered (New York, 1918).
40. Many of his essays have been collected in Hebrew Union College and Other Addresses (Cincinnati, 1916);
41. Studies, Addresses, and Personal Papers (New York, 1931);
42. and A Living Faith, ed. Samuel S. Cohon (Cincinnati, 1948).
43. Kohler's lectures were published as backwards or Forwards? (New York, 1885).
44. David Kaufman, Shul with a Pool: The "Synagogue-Center" in American Jewish History (Hanover, 1999), p. 13.
45. Morris Selz, The American Jewish Archives, Manuscript Collection 56, 2/4.
46. Jacob Neusner, "When Reform Judaism Was Judaism," in Dana Evan Kaplan, ed., Conflicting Visions: Contemporary Debates on American Reform Judaism (New York, forthcoming).
47. Michael A, Meyer, Response to Modernity: A History of the Reform Movement in Judaism, (New York, 1988), p. 297. This book is the classic account of the Reform movement.
48. On Hebrew Union College, see Samuel E. Karff, ed., Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion at One Hundred Years (Cincinnati, 1976).
49. Louis Binstock, "Dogma and Judaism," CCAR Yearbook, Vol. 35 (1935), p. 266.
50. Samuel Cohon's writings include What We Jews Believe (Cincinnati, 1931)
51. and Judaism-A Way of Life (Cincinnati, 1948).
52. For an overview of his views of the Reform movement, see his "Reform Judaism in America," Judaism, Vol. 3, No. 3 (1954), pp. 333-53.
53. On his perspective on the theology of the Reform movement of the time and how he felt it should change, see his analysis of the Union Prayer Book, "The Theology of the UPB," CCAR Yearbook, Vol. 38 (1938), pp. 246-94.
54. For an excellent overview of Cohon, see Meyer, "Samuel S. Cohon: Reformer of Reform Judaism," Judaism, Vol. 15, No. 3 (1966), pp. 319-28.
55. Cohon, "Report on the Guiding Principles of Reform Judaism," CCAR Yearbook, Vol. 36 (1936), p. 104.
56. Eugene B. Borowitz, Reform Judaism Today, Book One: Reform in the Process of Change (New York, 1983), p. xii.
57. Reform Judaism-A Centenary Perspective (1976), printed in its entirety in Meyer, Response to Modernity, pp. 391-94. [The Perspective can also be found on the web page of the CCAR; www.ccarnet.org.]
58. Borowitz, Liberal Judaism (New York, 1984), pp. 129-31.
59. Richard N. Levy, "The Reform Synagogue: Plight and Possibility," in Jacob Neusner, ed., Understanding American Judaism: Toward a Description of a Modem Religion, vol. 2 of Sectors of American Judaism: Reform, Orthodoxy, Conservatism, and Reconstructionism (New York, 1975), p. 64.
60. The entire article appears on pages 63-83. Originally published in Judaism, Vol. 18, No. 2 (1969), pp. 159-76.
61. Jack Wertheimer, A People Divided: Judaism in Contemporary America (New York, 1993), p. 96.
62. Walter Jacob, "Standards Now," Reform Judaism, Vol. 21, No. 1 (1992), p. 64.
63. Jacob has continued the work of his predecessor at Congregation Rodef Shalom, Solomon Freehof, who had published a number of collections of Reform Responsa literature. See Walter Jacob, ed., American Reform Responsa (New York, 1983);
64. and Contemporary American Reform Responsa (New York, 1987).
65. Wade Clark Roof, A Generation of Seekers: The Spiritual Journeys of the Baby Boom Generation (San Francisco, 1993), p. 30.
66. Eric Yoffie, "Thoughts On the Ten Principles: Closing Remarks to the Board of Trustees" (presented at the UAHC Board of Trustees meeting, Memphis, Tenn., 5 December 1998 [UAHC Report, "Remarks from the President," p. 6]).
67. Robin D. Perrin, "American Religion in the Post-Aquarian Age: Values and Demographic factors in Church Growth and Decline," Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Vol. 28, No. 1 (1989), pp. 75-89.