Editing Reconstructionist Judaism (section)

==Origin==
{{Jews and Judaism sidebar|Denominations}}
Reconstructionism was developed by [[Rabbi]] [[Mordecai Kaplan]] (1881–1983) and his son-in-law, Rabbi [[Ira Eisenstein]] (1906–2001), over a period of time from the late 1920s to the 1940s. After being rejected by Orthodox rabbis for his focus on issues in the community and the sociopolitical environment, Kaplan and a group of followers founded the [[Society for the Advancement of Judaism]] (SAJ) in 1922. Its goal was to give rabbis the opportunity to form new outlooks on Judaism in a more progressive manner. Kaplan was the leader of the SAJ until Eisenstein succeeded him in 1945. In 1935, Kaplan published his book, ''[[Judaism as a Civilization|Judaism as a Civilization: Toward a Reconstruction of American Jewish Life]]''. It was this book that Kaplan claimed was the beginning of the Reconstructionist movement. ''Judaism as a Civilization'' suggested that historical Judaism be given a "revaluation... in terms of present-day thought."{{sfn|Raphael|1984|pp=[https://archive.org/details/profilesinameric00raph/page/180 180–181]}} Reconstructionism was able to spread with several other forms of literature—most notably, the ''New Haggadah'' (1941), which for the first time blended Kaplan's ideologies in Jewish ceremonial literature.

Although Kaplan did not want Reconstructionism to branch into another Jewish denomination, it became apparent that such an outcome was inevitable. At the Montreal conference in 1967, Reconstructionist leaders called for a rabbinical school in which rabbis could be ordained under the Reconstructionist ideology and lead Reconstructionist congregations.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Musher |first=Deborah Ann |date=1998 |title=Reconstructionist Judaism in the Mind of Mordecai Kaplan: The Transformation from a Philosophy into a Religious Denomination |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/23886435 |journal=American Jewish History |volume=86 |issue=4 |pages=397–417 |jstor=23886435 |issn=0164-0178}}</ref> By the fall of 1968, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College was opened in Philadelphia. Along with the establishment of the college, the Reconstructionist Rabbinical Association formed, which gave rabbis a strong network in the religious leadership of Reconstructionism.{{sfn|Raphael|1984|pp=[https://archive.org/details/profilesinameric00raph/page/192 192–193]}} The founding of these institutions were great strides in it becoming the fourth movement in North American Judaism ([[Orthodox Judaism|Orthodox]], [[Conservative Judaism|Conservative]], and [[Reform Judaism|Reform]] being the other three).

Reconstructionist Judaism is the first major movement of Judaism to originate in North America; the second is the [[Humanistic Judaism]] movement founded in 1963 by Rabbi [[Sherwin Wine]].

Reconstructionist theology is a variant of the naturalism of [[John Dewey]], which combined atheistic beliefs with religious terminology in order to construct a religiously satisfying philosophy for those who had lost faith in traditional religion.{{cn|date=May 2025}} [See id. at 385; but see Caplan at p. 23, fn.62 ("The majority of Kaplan's views ... were formulated before he read Dewey or [William] James."<ref name=":0" />)]