San Diego (special) -- At Shabbat services where they dialogued together, a Reform rabbi and a Humanist rabbi clashed on the theological implications of the Holocaust and debated whether high standards of human morality are possible without God.

Reform Rabbi Jonathan Stein hosted Humanistic Judaism's founder, Rabbi Sherwin Wine, during services at Congregation Beth Israel attended by many Humanists who stood respectfully during the designated times of the service but refrained from participating in certain readings in which God either was extolled or addressed.

Wine, like Stein, is a graduate of a Reform Jewish seminary, but ultimately turned away from a belief in God to a belief that humanity must look to its own ethics and better judgments to make civilization flourish.

Addressing the oft-asked question, "How could God have permitted the Holocaust," Stein said the murder of 6,000 Jews was "evil caused by human beings."

"People did it," he said. "God is not to be blamed."

But Wine parried that "if you see someone being murdered and you have the power to save him, you have a moral responsibility to do that."

"Nobody is denying Adolf Hitler was evil; nobody is denying these people (nazis) were evil," Wine said. "The issue is 'Is God only a spectator? ...if He's only a spectator, why are we spending all this time talking to him?"

Stein said that he sees in the Humanistic viewpoint a "potential for idolatry."

"Belief in God helps you keep your eye on the right values; values that transcend human beings," the Reform rabbi said. "Jewish tradition warns us time and again about idolatry, which doesn't just mean the worship of idols; it means putting anything else, including humanity, before God."

"The only morality that lasts is a morality founded on something beyond humanity, something that gives it transcendence and depth," Stein said. "For Jews that has always been God."

Further, Stein said, Jewish traditions and folk culture which Humanists treasure, "will not make Judaism survive. Jewish humor, Jewish food will not guarantee that our grandchildren and great-grandchildren will remain Jewish. If that is all we are, then I think we are indeed destined to pass off the pages of history."

Wine, in his reply, said it's a mischaracterization to think that Humanism is only about Jewish food and Jewish humor. "A life of courage is not about food; it is filled with Jewish memories, Jewish inspiration and philosophy," he said.

"People feel that you can't have values unless they are endorsed by God," Wine added. "Most religions of the world have values which they attribute to their gods, but you can ask a simple question. I was always told God was good. If God is good; we already know what good is before we know God.. .Good, by the way, arises from the human experience. Ethics and ethical values arise from the struggle of human beings living in society for thousands and thousands of years, and we are still searching."

On one thing both rabbis agreed: belief in God is not the precondition for membership in the Jewish people. "We are a religion and a people and that, in fact, means we look to Rabbi Wine--those of us who are theists--as a fellow Jew. We don't write people out of our community for theological reasons. The definition of who is a Jew is not based in faith but in biology or acceptance of the tradition."

"We are all Jews together," Wine agreed.

Because the dialogue session ran overtime, there was no opportunity for questions and answers from the audience. Toby Dorfman, madrikha (leader) of the local Humanist congregation, told HERITAGE that had there been time, she would have liked to have seen the issue raised why other Jewish religious movements have decided to bar Humanists from the local Synagogue Council, now in formation.

Dorfman's letter to the editor on this subject appears in this edition of HERITAGE.

Helene & Robert Baum assisted in gathering this story.