The Modern God

Where is God in Reform Judaism?

Session 4
The Modern God

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The Modern
Conception of God

Finding God in the modern period means finding God on our own terms, because this is our own period. One of the signal characteristics of modernity is the sense of the Universe’s knowability and our ability to use knowledge to progress. Out of this worldview comes science and secularism and many challenges to religious belief. It also spawned the Emancipation of the Jews of Europe, with the notion of Jewish citizenship. In sum, in the search for God in the modern period, all bets are off.

Speakers

Rabbi Dr. Rachel Adler is the Rabbi David Ellenson Professor of Jewish Religious Thought and professor of Modern Jewish Thought and Feminist Studies at HUC-JIR/Los Angeles. She was one of the first theologians to integrate feminist perspectives and concerns into the interpretation of Jewish texts and the renewal of Jewish law and ethics.

Dr. Sharon Gillerman is associate professor of Jewish History at HUC-JIR/Los Angeles. Professor Gillerman's first book, Germans into Jews: Remaking the Jewish Social Body in the Weimar Republic, was the recipient of the 2010 Book Award from the Pacific Coast Branch of the American Historical Association.

Dean Joshua Holo, dean of the HUC-JIR Jack H. Skirball Campus in Los Angeles and associate professor of Jewish history, publishes on the Jews of the medieval Mediterranean.

Questions and Answers - The Modern God

Speakers

Rabbi Richard Levy is Rabbi Emeritus of the Campus Synagogue and former Director of Spiritual Growth. He is a past president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, in which he shepherded the creation of the Statement of Principles for Reform Judaism in 1999, which is the subject of his book, A Vision of Holiness: The Future of Reform Judaism.