An excerpt from the beginning of:

CHAPTER I

The object of this book is to offer a few notes and suggestions about a particular phase of a particular religion. The religion is Judaism, and the phase is commonly known as "liberal" or "reform" Judaism. But even this description of my object is not sufficiently limited. It is not liberal Judaism as a separate organisation, or liberal Judaism in its history and development, of which I wish to speak, but that particular and individualised form of liberal Judaism which I myself happen to hold. The personal element is not brought in because the writer attaches any importance to himself, but in order that it may not be supposed that he is speaking in the name of liberal Judaism as a whole, and still less in the name of Judaism generally. No authority attaches to this book. Though statements will be frequently found such as " Judaism teaches " or "Judaism rejects" such and such a particular doctrine, it will be easily seen from the context whether the doctrine is one which is taught or rejected by practically all Jews at the present time, or whether all that is meant is that the Judaism in which the writer believes teaches or rejects it.

We have to remember that Judaism as a living religion is not contained in any book or expressed in any document, but that it is the religion professed by Jews, just as Christianity is the religion professed by Christians. As there are many forms of Christianity, so there are many forms of Judaism. A Roman Catholic would, I suppose, say that the only true and complete form of Christianity was Roman Catholicism, and so, too, a form of Judaism could be found which would say that the only complete and true form of Judaism was itself. Perhaps some other form of Christianity could be found which would also make the same exclusive claim, and perhaps more than one form of Judaism could be found to do likewise.

Again, there is at least one form of Christianity which many Christians would deny to be rightly so called. By this denial they imply that there are certain doctrines which are so essential to Christianity that any person who rejects them cannot properly be called a Christian.

The number of these " essential doctrines " has gradually diminished. Five hundred years ago a person would have been regarded by the vast mass of Christians as not justly or properly calling himself a Christian if he did not believe in many doctrines which he now may reject or explain away, while still being considered by the great majority of educated Christians as rightly entitled to the name. And those persons who, by their rejection of a few " essential doctrines," are still held by most Christians improperly to retain the name of Christian, themselves stoutly defend their position and their claim. They call themselves Christians, and they feel themselves Christians. Is, then, a man a Christian who so calls and feels himself, be his religious beliefs what they may? We should at last seem to come to a palpable absurdity. There must ultimately be some limit where Christianity ceases. The rejection of certain doctrines and the acceptance of others must at last make it absurd for the title of Christian to be any longer used. Its use would ultimately be an abuse.

Precisely similar is the case with regard to Judaism and the Jews. I am not alluding here to the obvious fact that the word " Jew " is also used to describe or denote a person who belongs to a particular race. It is clear that such a person may become a Christian or an Atheist or a Mohammedan, and yet, from the point of view of race he remains, and must remain, a Jew. I throughout use the word Jew to denote a person who holds certain religious opinions, be his race what it may. Such a person may be descended from non-Jewish ancestors, or he may himself have been born a Christian, but in my eyes he is none the less a Jew.

Using the word, then, in this religious sense, and in this sense only, the parallel with Christianity holds. There are some Jews who would say that if a man does not hold certain doctrines and fulfil certain rites he is no longer a Jew. (I add the words "fulfil certain rites," because some Jews lay far more stress on rites than on beliefs.) Just as in the case of Christianity, so, too, in the case of Judaism, the number of these essential and qualifying beliefs and rites has gradually become smaller. But there are persons who call and feel themselves 'Jews, who in the eyes of other Jews are not rightly and properly to be considered Jews at all. Again, as in Christianity, so in Judaism, there must be a point at which the mere assertion that a man is or feels himself to be a Jew is not enough to substantiate his claim. Common sense, for instance, might say that a man who denies that such a person as Jesus Christ ever existed cannot legitimately call himself a Christian...

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