COMMUNINGS OF THE SPIRIT by Mordecai M. Kaplan, Mel Scult (Editor) ( 9780814325759 )

Item Details

Title:

COMMUNINGS OF THE SPIRIT
THE JOURNALS OF MORDECAI M.KAPLAN

Volume:

v. 1

By:

Mordecai M. Kaplan, Mel Scult (Editor)

Format:

Hardback

List price:	£43.95
We currently do not stock this item, please contact the publisher directly for further information.

ISBN 10:

0814325750

ISBN 13:

9780814325759

Publisher:

WAYNE STATE UNIVERSITY PRESS

Pub. date:

1 June, 2001

Series:

American Jewish Civilization S.

Pages:

672

Description:

Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881-1983), founder of Reconstructionism, was a pre-eminent American Jewish thinker and rabbi. His life, which he meticulously recorded, embodies the American Jewish experience of the first half of the 20th century. This first volume covers his early years as a rabbi.

Synopsis:

Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881-1983), founder of Reconstructionism, was a pre-eminent American Jewish thinker and rabbi. His life embodies the American Jewish experience of the first half of the 20th century. With passionate intensity and uncommon candour, Kaplan compulsively recorded his experience in his journal (some 10,000 pages). He confided his personal involvements with prominent Jewish leaders such as Chaim Weizmann, Solomon Schechter and Louis Brandeis, and his impressions of key Jewish historical moments such as the founding of the Hebrew University in 1925. We see him wrestling with his concept of God and the problem of evil. In his journal he railed against the pettiness of his congregants and the difficulties of institutional life. But above all he was obsessed by the need to modernize Judaism's traditional religious categories in order to save the Jewish people. His ideal was a functional Judaism that would flourish in an American democratic society. Twenty-seven volumes long, this diary was previously available only to scholars. This first volume of "Communings of the Spirit" covers Kaplan's early years as a rabbi, teacher of rabbis and community leader.Kaplan, who trained rabbis for half a century, gives us an inside picture of life at the Jewish Theological Seminary, the centre of Conservative Judaism in America. He records his masterful weekly sermons, which were attended regularly by his students. With unflinching candour, he reveals his successes and failures, uncertainties and self-doubts. Undeterred by attacks on his radical beliefs, he never wavered in the pursuit of a more dynamic Judaism. "Communings of the Spirit" is a very human document that should interest scholars and students of American Jewish history and culture, as well as the general reader interested in the evolution of Judaism in America.

Illustrations:

22 illustrations

Publication:

Imprint:

Wayne State University Press

Returns:

Returnable

Some other items by this author:

COMMUNINGS OF THE SPIRIT (HB)

COMMUNINGS OF THE SPIRIT (PB)

DYNAMIC JUDAISM (PB)

JUDAISM AS A CIVILIZATION