Tuesday, January 29, 2019

There are no reconstructionists in fox holes

Just like orthodoxy, it seems to me that reform / progressive Judaism is located in particular sociological and economic circumstances. In the 20th and 21st century it has appealed to middle class or aspiring to be middle class people, with its recasting of Judaism as somehow synonymous with a tolerant, human rights oriented, socially and economically progressive liberalism ( by carefully selecting source texts and omitting or ignoring all of the source texts that are diametrically opposed to these ideas, which are arguably alien to, or unknown to, pre 18th century Judaisms.) 

It seems to me also that poor Jews, Jews living in beseiged societies, or in places where there is endemic or state-sponsored anti -Semitism, will turn more readily - if they turn to a religious identity at all - to a more visceral, irrational, tribal and demanding orthodoxy than they will to the polite, anaemic, politically correct and not really individuated from the broader culture (hence its appeal for Jews in countries where they want to, and are allowed to, belong) reform, reconstructionist and renewal Judaisms.

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