Mordechai Kaplan on Religion

Kaplan is one of the great Jewish philosophers and theologians of the 20th century often referenced in the same sentence with the likes of Martin Buber, Abraham Joshua Heshel, etc. Among the many issues he wrote on, an overarching theme was writing about Judaism in the context of American, and the "modern" world. He is also the foundational thinker/Rabbi for the Reconstructionist movement which I grew up in, and still identify with at times. I really enjoyed this paragraph on a vision of a universalist notion of religion and wanted to share it with you. Love M.

"It should not be difficult to render Jewish religion viable in the modern cultural climate. All that is necessary is to accustom the modern-minded Jew to realize that religion is fundamentally a type of human experience which derives from an affirmative and hopeful reaction to life as a whole. So viewed, religion is basically the acceptance of human life as having meaning, that is, as capable of entering into ever-increasing webs of relationship with the rest of reality and of being dominated by purposes of its own choosing. Religion is the ability to discover creative possibilities in the most unpromising aspects of human life. The mystic doctrine that "the sparks of divinity" inhere in all things is what all religion should seek to verify. If we regard human life as deserving that we give it the best that is in us, we necessarily regard it as sacred and divine. If we accept life in that spirit, we are not only religious in the truest and best sense of the term, but we also attain the insight which enables us to appreciate what mankind has sought to achieve through religion. We then begin to understand religion as a dynamic and evolving process, and not as a fixed system of beliefs and ordinances to be either wholly accepted or rejected"

I don't think this quote necessarily captures all of what religion is (how could any one quote, book, or writer do that?) but for me, where I am with my spiritual journey and facing the rigid binary of religious/secular Jews in Israel, it was a breath of fresh air to hear religion and Judaism described as such.
Have an amazing week!