FOCUS I B'nai Moshe Continued from preceding page officials expect to sign an agreement with the Jimmy Prentis Morris Jewish Community Center to use that facility for services, Roth said. The offer does not include office space so the synagogue plans to rent an office in West Bloomfield. But the fight to provide the synagogue with a new per- manent home in West Bloomfield continues. Oakland County Circuit Court Judge Hilda Gage has yet to set a hearing date to decide whether B'nai Moshe can build a new facility on a 15-acre parcel on Drake Road, south of Maple Road. The synagogue filed suit after West Bloomfield Township trustees denied the congregation's building plans in November. The synagogue's option to purchase the parcel expires Feb. 21. Roth said it is too costly and will not be renew- ed. He said options already have been renewed three times, costing the synagogue a total of $9,000 for each new contract. The congregation's board has a meeting Feb. 20 to decide whether to let the op- tion expire or to purchase the land. Roth would have liked to have the court case decided before the option expired, but that looks unlikely. "Obviously the whole situation is frustrating," Roth said. ❑ [NEWS I New York Rabbi Angry At Reconstructionism david Gains • closet designs 20% off custom closet installations A ■ ■ .1 .1. IOW MD eismam• 1111111111111•111 111 • • 11 ammilimimis412111111 ANINE111 O 11111111Q ■11. mom-_ ••• ■ •••~1"" 1b112115. ..zook.,mAinA •DX1102/1Q .e.- 0 call for details 441.4504 • .11 Ell Mb MUNE& MIMIS - anis= .I I* 941144 T T TT 10 . 1.1 4 1 1 11 GNI VA fl■ ;y; -YOUR CAR IN ISRAEL - ek/on 7-M11 - rrown RENT-A-CAR 331 FROM &RAI Monthly Rates from se49 Incl. C.D.W. USA & CANADA RESERVAT & PREPYMNT A Skilled Nursing Care and Supportive Residence 6950 Farmington Rd. • West Bloomfield, M148322 • 661-1700 52 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1990 800-533-8778 IN NY: 212-629-6090 VAUD FROM 6/1 TO 3190 New York (JTA) — At a time when Reconstructionist Jews are heralding the movement's new prayerbook as a milestone in innovative theology, the spiritual leader of the movement's flagship synagogue is ad- vocating a return to tradi- tional texts. Rabbi Alan Miller of Manhattan's Society for the Advancement of Judaism re- cently gave a three-part lec- ture series in which he pierc- ingly criticized the Reconstructionist prayer- book and the ideas of the late Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of SAJ and of Reconstructionism and au- thor of the movement's first prayerbook in 1945. "Why was Kaplan in such a hurry to denude the prayerbook of things that are enormously important?" Miller demanded, alluding to Kaplan's abandonment of such classic talmudic con- cepts as chosenness and res- urrection. Reconstructionism, found- ed by Kaplan in 1935, sought to merge Jewish tra- dition with then-modern ideas such as rationalism and pragmatism. In the last generation, younger Reconstructionist activists have incorporated feminism, environmentalism and New Age ideology into their theo- logy. The new Reconstructionist prayerbook, restores some of the traditional ideas in deference to the movement's new openness to mysticism. At the same time, it is fill- ed with many contemporary concepts as well: It avoids re- ferring to God as "He," lists matriarchs as well as patriarchs, and contains "alternative" prayers, visu- al aids for personal medita- tion and new English trans- lations. The British-born Miller, an urbane and, by his own admission, "abrasive" rabbi, was ordained at an Orthodox seminary and was a longtime Reconstructionist stalwart until "five or six years ago, when the move- ment decided to accept patrilineality" — meaning that it accepted children of Jewish fathers and non- Jewish mothers as Jews without requiring conver- sion. "I have enormous respect for Kaplan," Miller said. "He created the free pulpit. Even during the McCarthy period, any rabbi could say whatever he wanted from this pulpit. It was he who enabled me to talk this way." However, Miller lam- basted Reconstructionism for propagating what he termed "Jewish kitsch," charging that the movement over- simplified and thereby distorted Jewish texts. "I question God; I question the mitzvahs, but I don't question that the Torah is the book of the Jewish peo- ple," Miller said. "Kaplan puts stress on Jews not being the chosen people. I don't think Jews are better, but we are different. The em- phasis must be that the Torah is not superior, but it is ours. It is our havdalah —that which makes us diff- erent."