Zionism and the Jewish Religion (Classic Reprint) | Released: 27 Nov 2018

Excerpt from Zionism and the Jewish Religion

I In Rabbinic phraseology. The good of all nations share in the world to come. 5 Exod. Xix. 5.call the modern way of looking at religious ideas approximates to the highest conceptions of Judaism, as stated for example by Maimonides. Maimonides above all Jewish thinkers regards God as absolute; he goes so far, when he is in his highest philosophic mood as to refuse to postulate any posi tive attributes whatsoever in regard to the Godhead, and he finally defines God in terms of negative attributes only. If we adopt this as the ultimate Jewish standpoint, we must conclude that when any relationship between God and man. Is spoken of, the process of change implied in such relationship can be referred to man only and not to God. A revelation from God to man, then, put into the language of philosophical theism, means a particular state of mind on the part of man, by which he is brought into some sort of special but indefin able contact with the Absolute perfection called God. The prophets, sages, and saints of Israel, who have been in the old language the vehicles of revelation, become in the new language those in whom the soul of the Jewish people, which is one aspect of the spirit of God, has most mightily manifested itself.

This conception of Israel's national destiny, of a special relationship between God and the people of Israel, which only imposes upon it higher duties because the national sense of God in Israel is truer than that of other peoples, finds its classic expression in the Book of Amos. The history of Israel is neither more nor less a part of the Divine plan than is the history of any other nation Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt and the Philistines from Caphtor and the Aramaeans from Kir (ix. 7) But Israel has known God as no other nation has known him, and it must take the consequences of that knowledge for good or for evil: Only you havei known of all the families of the earth, therefore will I visit upon you all your iniquities (iii.

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