Intermountain Jewish news., 1926-07-15
my Religion: A Definition
By RABBI LOUIS I. NEWMAN
Temple Emanuel, San Francisco

Temple Emanuel, San francisco
A recent little volume entitled "My
Religion" contains the opinions of
many leading Enelishmen concerning
the fundamental doctrines of faith.
Arnold Bennett is frankly agnostic;
Conan Doyle is a spiritualist: Israel
Zangwill is a Jew racially and re-
ligiously; each writer expresses HIM
self according to the particular bent
of his mind. The booklet is reve-
lation of the belief and disbelief of
modern intellectuals. 1t demonstrates
the inescapability of the duty to
formulate ones philosophy of life.
We may not wish religion, but we
are compelled by the urHings of our
spirit and of life itself to frame one
Religion, it seems to me. depends
upon fourfold set of principles: a
belief in a Personal God; belief in
the existence and Immortality of the
soul; belief in the efficacy of prayer /;
and belief in the freedom of the
will. We may add other doctrines
peculiar to the special creed we ac-
cept; without, however, the four
tenets relating to God, Immortality,
prayer and free-will, there is little re-
ligion in the usual sense of the term.
do not believe that the concept of
Personal God is invalid today. We
cannot pray to electricity; we pray to
a Person. We are not machines, au-
tomato, but reasoning and experienc-
ing individuals. We behold in our
selves matter, energy and personality I;
we see in the universe matter and
energy Can we not rightly conclude
that if we possess personality, the
universe must likewise possess it?
Can a human being be characterized
by quality which the universe lacks?
/ believe that Gods personality is
linked with our own, and that He is
the "Ueberseele," the "Oversoul" of
the universe.
Man has mind, will, purpose, senti-
ment, consciousness of himself and his
relation to the world. Can we not call
the totality of these qualities the soul?
Many men content themselves with an
Immortality of memory and influence
/ believe in Individual, personal i'm
mortality comparable to the individ-
ual, personal and unique nature of our
mortal life. If each person counts for
one on earth, must we suppose that
this individuality is destroyed with
the decay of the body? We may re-
ject the mechanistic pseudo-proofs of
spiritualism, but we hunger for faith
in the undying life of love, of self
hood, of communion between the de-
parted and the living.
Prayer is an inevitable occupation
of mankind. An oath is an inverted
prayer. Weak and puny man con-
stantly turns to a Power outside and
beyond himself for understanding, CO.
operation, and fellowship. Through
prayer, man links himself with the in
finite. We may not desire to pray,
but with spirits attuned TO the beauti-
full, the true and the right, prayer is
the natural mode of self-expression.
If we can pray through nature, we
can pray through the poetry and lit
urgy OF the religious institution.
Man is not satisfied to think Of him
self as slave to brute, machine-like
forces. We may not be wholly free,
but we are not wholly bound. We re
jert fatalism and its antithesis, over
weeniDg confidence. In the pro-
cess of evolution whereby the future
is built, man co.opcrates with fath
and God. God and man are partners
in a common task.