RICHARD ROSENTHAL

elite. It was this power which these early Reform leaders assumed. But even more, they saw themselves as the leaders of the people in a new age. Like Moses they were on their way in the desert at the border of a new Promised Land.

They saw themselves both as posqim and prophets. In a new age they assumed the authority which allowed them to make the most radical statements. Individuals, such as Samuel Holdheim and Abraham Geiger , had written more radical proposals. But no body of rabbis had actually voted on them. It was radical German Reform which would come into existence here in America . Not for them was the compromise and misdirection of Isaac M. Wise and the reverends who led communities. They would wrest control from them.

These were German rabbis in America . When they issued their call for the meeting, they invited"theologisch-gebildete Kollegen." They did not want Yeshiva graduates and the self­

educated. They wanted men of the university; their ideal was "Bildung"-cultivated men reflecting the cultural ideal of the enlightenment. Their ideal can be described in the same way as Karl Barth spoke of Schleiermacher :"...the fact that Schleiermacher was a theologian did not hinder him in the slightest from also wanting, seeking, effecting, all the things that wisely understood, were best in what the non-theological world of his time was wanting, seeking and effecting...precisely because he was a theologian...he felt himself compelled to be a modern man with all his heart, with all his feelings and with all his strength."

I. M. Wise came to this Conference even though it had been called to oppose him. The Conference agenda had been set by David Einhorn . After passing on a series of general statements expressing a universalist messianic hope, rejecting the distinctions between priest and non-priests, affirming the mission of Israel , negating the belief in resurrection, saying one can pray in any

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