Communings of the Spirit, Volume II

The Journals of Mordecai M. Kaplan, 1934–1941

Mel Scult

• Publisher: Wayne State University Press
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780814341629
• Topic: Teología y religión
• Subtopic: Teología judía

Mordecai M. Kaplan (1881–1983), founder of Reconstructionism, is the preeminent American Jewish thinker and rabbi of our times. His life embodies the American Jewish experience of the first half of the twentieth century. With passionate intensity and uncommon candor, Kaplan compulsively recorded his experience in his journals, some ten thousand pages. At times, Kaplan thought his ideas were too radical or complex to share with his congregation. What he could not share publicly he put into his journals. In this diary we find his uncensored thoughts on a variety of subjects. Thus, the diary was much more sophisticated and radical than anything he published while living.While in the first volume of Communings of the Spirit, editor Mel Scult covers Kaplan's early years as a rabbi, teacher of rabbis, and community leader, in the second volume we experience through Kaplan the economic problems of the 1930s and their shattering impact on the Jewish community. It becomes clear that Kaplan, like so many others during this period, was attracted to the solutions offered by communism, notwithstanding some hesitation because of the anti-religious nature of communist ideology. Through Kaplan we come to understand the Jewish community in the yishuv (Jews in Palestine) as Kaplan spent two years teaching at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and his close circle of friends included Martin Buber, Judah Leon Magnes, and other prominent personalities. It is also during this time that the specter of Nazi Germany begins to haunt American Jews, and Kaplan, sensitive to the threats, is obsessed with Jewish security, both in Europe and Palestine.More than anything else, this diary is the chronicle of Kaplan's spiritual and intellectual journey in the early 1930s and 1940s. With honesty and vivid detail, Kaplan explores his evolving beliefs on religious naturalism and his uncertainties and self-doubts as he grapples with a wide range of theological issues.

1

June 3, 1934–March 24, 1935

On the Flyleaf of Volume 7: Kaplan Quotes from Books He Is Reading¹

“How can I be substantial if I fail to cast a shadow? I must have a dark side if I am to be whole.”

—C. G. Jung, Modern Man in Search of a Soul, 40. [Copied] May 14, [19]34

“Unless he is proficient, the man who claims to be modern is nothing but an unscrupulous gambler. He must be proficient in the highest degree, for unless he can atone by creative energy for his break with tradition, he is merely disloyal to the past.”

—Ibid., 229. [Copied] May 15, [19]34

“Those who live experimentally must suffer great pangs and great terrors; others can live comfortably in comparison.”

—Henry N. Wieman, The Wrestle of Religion with Truth, 65. [Copied] June 2, [19]34

The Sabbath and Salvation

JUNE 3, 1934

I believe I have struck a capital idea in making the Sabbath symbolic of the striving after salvation. That coincides with the rabbinic interpretation of the Sabbath as a foretaste of the world-to-come. The next problem is to find a good working conception of salvation. I believe I have also solved that problem by making salvation synonymous with the synthesis of individualism and collectivism with the achievement of a maximum of cooperation plus a maximum of individual self-fulfillment. From that standpoint the holiness of life would mean the assumption that there are elements in the universe, which if properly reckoned with, are in rapport with the achievement of that synthesis. I was helped by Wieman’s² definition of God. His definition would have proved much more fruitful if he had applied it, as I do, to holiness. To be sure, the concept of God is a precipitate of the quality of holiness, but as a substantive concept it obscured the denotation of quality.

On Accepting Failure

JUNE 5, 1934

It was only something I happened to read yesterday in Wieman’s The Wrestle of Religion with Truth that made me go to the siyyum hazman³ of the Friedlaender classes.⁴ I refer especially to the chapter, “How Religion Cures Human Ills” and especially the sentence in it “To know how to accept failure is quite as important as to be equipped for mastery. For some undertakings in every man’s life must certainly fail” (page 114, Wieman). The primary reason for my wanting to attend the siyyum hazman was undoubtedly the lack of anything specific to say. I know that it is very hard for me to speak when I am in that state of mind. Nevertheless, the sense of duty and my obligation to Chipkin⁵ impelled me to disregard the possible failure I might incur. Undecided as to what I was to do, the passage from Wieman’s book turned the scales and I went. The speech wasn’t any too good, but it wasn’t altogether bad either. But I am spared at least that terrible sense of maladjustment which overcomes me whenever I shrink from performing an unpleasant task.

Salvation and the Sabbath

TUESDAY, JUNE 12, 1934

Of the many things I want to work on, the interpretation of the Sabbath and Festivals seems at the present time to attract me most. The suggestion that the Sabbath should serve as a symbol of salvation as the aim of life simply fascinates me. But now comes the question, What shall we understand by salvation? The first idea that comes to mind is that the various answers given to that question constitute the history of man’s spiritual development. That history has taught us that one of the most tragic errors has been the assumption that salvation must mean the same to all human beings who want to achieve it. Especially was that the case in the days of other-worldly religion. But even nowadays social reformers assume that there can be but one objectively true conception of salvation.

The lesson to be derived from the past is that a scheme of salvation which is imposed from above is bad, but not that we can afford to get along without some scheme of salvation, which is the result of cooperative study and thought. In fact, if the Sabbath is to serve as a symbol of salvation, it should be so not in the sense of holding up some fixed and final conception of salvation but rather as a reminder that we must keep on constantly thinking and planning cooperatively if we want to know what salvation means and how to achieve it. The Sabbath day should be chiefly dedicated to that kind of thinking and planning. That will make of the Sabbath Day a means to spiritual growth.

Milton Steinberg Has Ambitions of His Own

JUNE 14, 1934

I have been asked by Rabbi Samuel Cohen to prepare a series of special prayers similar to those I worked out for the Rosh Hashanah of last year. The request has been confirmed by a letter from [Louis J.] Moss, the president of the United Synagogue. In order to facilitate the task for myself, I invited Rabbi Milton Steinberg to collaborate on it with me.

Much as I like him, I must admit that he irritates me with his persistent refusal to cooperate with me. He is ambitious to achieve a scholarly reputation by getting his Ph.D. for an academic piece of work. Although he has allowed all kinds of interruptions to interfere with his work on his thesis, he uses his desire to get done with it as an excuse for refusing to collaborate with me every time I ask him. This is the third time he has turned me down.

An Unproductive Sabbath and Ambivalence Toward Henry Rosenthal

SATURDAY NIGHT, JUNE 16, 1934

It is already ten o’clock at night. The whole day passed away without my having anything to show for it. At this morning’s service there were about fifty people present. I couldn’t allow them to leave without having them feel that they had learned something. Today’s Sidrah being Korah⁶ I gave them the rabbinic portrayal of Korah as a demagogue who tried to prove to the Israelites that Moses and Aaron exploited the people, especially the poor, using the divine sanction for their purpose.

For some reason or other, no matter how little I exert myself at a service, I feel tired when it’s over. That together with the Sabbath meal makes it necessary for me to take a long nap after lunch. After that I managed to read a few pages of Magic Mountain.⁷ At 4 [Henry] Rosenthal and his wife came. A little before 5 Ira and Ella Kaplan came and stayed till 7:45. Supper till about 8:30. Not having had any exercise the last few days, I thought it advisable to take a three-mile walk.⁸ And so the whole day went.

Rosenthal came at my request. I suggested to him that he collaborate with me on the formulation of the prayers I have been asked by the United Synagogue to prepare. He too turned me down. He has been at work for some time on a novel, and he wants to use every minute of his free time during the coming weeks solely on that.

Strangely enough, I seem to have gotten to a point where I wanted him to refuse. Something within me hoped that he would not accede to my request, though I went on making it and advancing arguments why he ought to work with me on the prayers. It is probably the less worthy self in me wanting all the glory for itself that did not cherish the idea of his sharing credit with me. Perhaps—and I believe this is the more plausible reason—it was the fear that Rosenthal’s name appended to the prayers might prejudice some of the Conservative or Orthodox diehards who have no particular liking for Rosenthal.

The Seminary Students and Faculty—A Sickly Bunch

TUESDAY, JUNE 19, 1934

At the Seminary Faculty meeting [Cyrus] Adler reported that out of the twenty-five Seminary students who had been recently given a medical examination, only three were reported as of normal health. All the others had either ear trouble or gastric disorders or chronic bronchitis; one was cardiac, and nearly all were flat-footed. It turned out that those who had been reported as doing poor work had something physically wrong with them.

How symbolic of the general decay in Jewish life—an old sickly and decrepit faculty of nine members appointed to train two dozen more or less diseased youngsters of very mediocre mental ability as spiritual leaders in an age of great turmoil and crisis!

Walking Around the Reservoir with a Pebble in My Shoe

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 20, 1934

As I walked on the cinder path around the reservoir this morning and one pebble after another got into my half shoes, at first scraping the foot and then working their way down under its arch, I thought of the petty irritations and annoyances that vex us and to which we manage to adjust ourselves after a while.

A Modern Reading of Psalm 27

JUNE 22, 1934

It has just occurred to me that a fitting theme for a prayer at the beginning of a New Year would be one based on the 27th Psalm, which is traditionally recited during the penitential season. To have that psalm yield a theme that might prove fruitful to the modern way of thinking, it is of course necessary to exploit its metaphorical implications. By this I mean finding equivalents in our present-day ethical thinking for the various elements that constitute the experience of the psalmist. Thus there figure in it (1) the enemies: these should serve as metaphor for the main causes of our fear and anxiety, viz., privation, sickness, failure, bereavement, temptation, disillusionment, and death; (2) God: He represents the sum of the forces, conditions, and relationships in the world that make for the enhancement of human life in the individual and in the group; (3) the sanctuary to which the psalmist looks for shelter; the equivalent of this is the inner act of thought and will whereby man divests himself of his self-centered ego and identifies himself in intention and activity with all those forces that spell God.

A New Prayer for Rosh Hashanah

JUNE 26, 1934

The ideal form for creative writing is poetry. But, unfortunately, I have no gift for rhyme or rhythm. The next best is poetic prose in the style of Also Sprach Zarathustra.⁹ But how shall I acquire that style? It occurred to me while I was taking a walk today around the reservoir, that I might adopt the following procedure: (1) work out a regular sermon outline; (2) develop an antiphonal prayer on the basis of that outline; (3) convert that prayer into apostrophic form. Let me try it with the Yom Kippur Eve Prayer which I have recently formulated.

1. In the conscience of mankind, God has revealed Himself to you; without such guidance you would be like lost and forsaken wanderers in a trackless desert.

2. Each Atonement Day He lovingly pleads with you to Cast away all your transgressions and make you a new heart and a new spirit; why will ye die, O House of Israel; pray that He grant you the wisdom to grasp the full import of His message and the ability to pattern your lives in accordance with its behests.

3. If you but knew Him aright, you would know His will; and knowing His will, you would not fail to recognize your transgressions.

4. Human beings have mistakenly sought to discern Him in the blind play of directionless forces and in the whirl of chance events; they have read His intent into the arbitrary doctrines of self-deluded guides.

5. Human beings groan under the weight of sin each time a flaw would mar the rites they performed to placate some god of their imagining; but sensed no wrong in depriving men of their due and despoiling the weak and the defenseless.

6. No qualms troubled them when grinding the faces of the poor, or when shedding human blood; no scruples mingled with their remorseless use of power or their pitiless torment of the innocent.

7. Be grateful that this criterion of sin no longer obtaineth; and that in its place a worthier standard has been vouchsafed to you.

8. For you know that against God you sin most grievously when you darken the lives of his children; and when by your selfishness you extinguish in them the light of faith and hope.

9. You sin against Him when you profane the person of a fellow being by using Him as a tool for the fulfillment of your desires.

10. You sin against Him when you allow envy of a neighbor’s good fortune to breed in your hatred and spite and when in your pride you humiliate those of fewer possessions and lesser achievements.

11. You sin against Him when you besmirch a good name and gloat over the downfall of those you deem your rivals.

12. Pray to Him to help you root out your degrading habits and break the shackles of pernicious custom, to fashion your hearts anew and redirect your will in accordance with his purposes.

13. Else, you whom He called to proclaim His law of righteousness would forfeit both the right and the reason for being, and become an aimless and forlorn clan, the shattered ruin of a once glorious sanctuary of His spirit.

14. Let a new spirit of compassion move you to banish from your hearts evil purposes and cruel designs you harbor against one another; let a new spirit of lovingkindness unite you all in the endeavor to establish...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• Introduction
• Chapter 1. June 3, 1934–March 24, 1935
• Chapter 2. April 2, 1935–August 12, 1936
• Chapter 3. August 22, 1936–September 22, 1938
• Chapter 4. November 12, 1938–February 19, 1939
• Chapter 5. February 20, 1939–October 8, 1939
• Chapter 6. October 9, 1939–March 14, 1940
• Chapter 7. March 16, 1940–July 10, 1940
• Chapter 8. July 12, 1940–August 30, 1940
• Chapter 9. September 21, 1940–April 25, 1941
• Chapter 10. April 29, 1941–October 16, 1941
• Chapter 11. October 17, 1941–December 30, 1941
• Time Line of Kaplan’s Life
• Glossary
• Index