Humanistic Judaism

By Wine, Rabbi Sherwin T.
Prometheus Books, 1978, Hardcover, 123 pp., Out of print, ISBN: 0879751029

According to Sherwin T. Wine, the most interesting Jews of the last one hundred years - Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud, Theodor Herzl, and others - never joined a synagogue nor paid attention to the Torah life-style.

Although not aware of the level, they represented the boldness and excitement of a new kind of secularistic Judaism.

They were the nondeliberate prophets of Humanistic Judaism.

Although Humanistic Judaism is less-well known that Orthodox, Conservative, Reform or Reconstructionist Judaism, it represents many more American Jews than those represented by the official ideologies. Most Humanistic Jews do not know what they stand for. They have never articulated the real beliefs that lie behind their life styles. If they were to do so, they would find a discrepancy between what they say they believe and what they actually do believe.

Sherwin T Wine is the acknowledged religious and intellectual leader of a new movement - Humanistic Judaism. In this important book he helps to define and clarify its meaning. Any religion, he says that is authentic must be based on secular and rational grounds; it must be relevant to reality and not be based on a primitive rural social order that no longer exists. Here for the first time, Rabbi Wine emphasizes a set of beliefs at the core of Humanistic Judaism: the ultimate value of self-respect, the principles of community and autonomy, and a commitment to rationality. He offers an explicit statement that post-moderns - Jews and non-Jews alike - can find relevant to the rapidly changing world.