Excerpt #28 from my book, Religion, An Obstacle to Human Progress
A once-a-decade study of American Judaism that found that Jews are better educated and wealthier than the average American and have reached the highest levels of professional achievement was greeted with dread.
Why?
Fewer and fewer Jews are following Judaism.
The study found a growing alienation between Jews who are active in religious life and those who aren’t.
According to the Pew Research Center, roughly four-in-ten U.S. Jewish adults (39%) say they live in a household where at least one person is a member of a synagogue.
Three-quarters of U.S. Jews say they believe in God or some spiritual force in the universe, including 26% who say they believe in “God as described in the Bible” and about twice as many (50%) who believe in some other spiritual force according to a 2021 Pew Research Center study.
Belief in God is much more widespread among Jews by religion than among Jews of no religion.
But even among Jews by religion, 14% say they do not believe in any higher power or spiritual force.
Meanwhile, 44% of Jews of no religion say they do not believe in any higher power.
Nine-in-ten Orthodox Jews (93%) say they believe in the God of the Bible, compared with 37% of Conservative Jews, 18% of Reform Jews and 12% of Jews with no denomination.