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soc.culture.jewish FAQ: Reform Judaism (10/12)
Section - Question 18.5.1: Traditional Judaism Differences: Why does Reform liturgy say "m'chayey hakol" [who gives life to all] instead of

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         m'chayey meytim" [who gives life to the dead] ?

                                  Answer:
   
   There are individual Reform Jews who believe in resurrection "m'chayey
   meytim". However, the Reform movement does not have any creed which
   would require such a belief. By changing m'chayey meytim to the more
   generic m'chayey ha-kol, the prayer becomes equivocal. This allows the
   believer in resurrection to understand the prayer as resurrection
   while allowing those with the more conventional Reform belief to
   relate to the prayer with intellectual integrity.
   
   Note that, in the United Kingdom, the Union of Liberal and Progressive
   Synagogues has produced a new prayerbook, Siddur Lev Chadash. This
   prayerbook has reverted to Mechayeh hamaytim. Rabbi Andrew Goldstein,
   who was on the editorial committee, tried to explain it as a new
   understanding of the Amidah prayer as covering all life, including
   death, and the reintroduction as a way of reverting to a tradition,
   having spent many years disassociating it from its traditional
   feelings of a prayer for the dead.

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