The Faith of Judaism (1929)

Abstract

My subject is not the religion but only the faith of Judaism. I do not wish to speak to you about cult, ritual, and moral-religious standards, but about faith—faith taken in its strictest and most serious sense. Not the so-called faith that is a strange mingling of assumptions and cognitions, but the faith that means trust and loyalty. It follows that I do not start from a Jewish theology but from the actual attitude of faithful Jews from the earliest days up until our own time. Even though I must of necessity use theological concepts when I speak of this realm of faith, I must not for a moment lose sight of the nontheological material from which I draw these concepts: the popular literature and my own impressions of Jewish life in Eastern Europe—but in the East there is nothing that cannot be found in the West, as well.