The Case for Religious Naturalism

How can religion speak to the millions of men and women who have irretrievably lost their belief in a supernatural God? This is the fundamental challenge that all of the great religions of mankind face in the twentieth century. Rabbi Cohen responds to the challenge with a carefully reasoned analysis. Cohen also lays to rest some popularly held misconceptions about the nature of religion and treats the concept of God with a clarity altogether lacking in current theological writings. He demonstrates that religion, far from being identified with supernaturalism, must now function with a naturalist view of reality and of human existence. ""A familiar assumption is that religion, and particularly Judaism, depends on belief in a conscious source that exists outside the universe yet acts upon it. This important and incisive book argues convincingly against that widespread view."" --Steven M. Cahn, City University of New York Graduate Center Jack J. Cohen (1919-2012) was a Reconstructionist rabbi, educator, and philosopher. Born in Brooklyn, New York, he graduated from Brooklyn College, was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, where he later taught, and received a PhD in Philosophy of Education from Columbia University. A leading student of Rabbi Mordecai M. Kaplan, the founder of the Reconstructionist Movement, Rabbi Cohen served as the rabbi of the Society for the Advancement of Judaism, the synagogue established in New York by Rabbi Kaplan. Later, Rabbi Cohen moved to Israel, where he was a founder of a Reconstructionist congregation in Jerusalem and served for more than two decades as director of the Hillel Foundation at the Hebrew University.