nourished Reform. Like Solomon Schechter, with whom he worked
closely on the reorganization of the Conservative school, he preferred the
concept of “Catholic Israel” to denominationalism. A seminary that taught
“reasonable” Orthodoxy yet, “with tolerance to all views,” permitted its
graduates to fashion their own religious behavior was his ideal. He ex-
plained to one graduating class that while he rejected an Orthodoxy that
isolated itself from modern conditions, he looked to JTS to produce well-
trained traditionalist rabbis.^44
Personal sentiments also attracted Schiff to Conservative Judaism.
Raised by his parents as an Orthodox Jew, he admitted to “a certain Ortho-
doxy in me.” He confessed to Israel Zangwill that “the familiar words of
the Orthodox prayer book have... the peculiar charm for me, which the
reminiscences of one’s early references and surroundings are so apt to call
forth.” A man who was equally at home in an Orthodox synagogue as in a
Reform temple and one whom Mayer Sulzberger called a “conservative re-
formed” Jew, he often said that a good Reform Jew first had to have been
an Orthodox Jew. Publicly, Schiff described himself as a Jew who was much
attached to tradition and who would “do naught to help to destroy the rea-
sonable fences, which have been erected in order to maintain the integrity
of our faith.”^45
Like his friend, the Reform theologian Kaufmann Kohler, Schiff aban-
doned the teachings of Samson Raphael Hirsch, their Orthodox mentor in
Frankfurt, but he was never as extreme as Kohler or as ready to slough off
traditional observances and ritual. He wrote despairingly to one Reform
rabbi: “Unfortunately, the large mass of American Israelites have become a
law unto themselves, doing what appears right in their own eyes without
reference to the Law of Moses and tradition.” Not an indifference to tradi-
tion but social reasons had led Schiff to affiliate with Temple Emanu-El,
the “cathedral” of Reform, and Temple Beth El, where Kohler officiated.
His friends and associates were members, and he doubtless was well aware
that Reform symbolized Jewish affluence and social status.^46
A close associate and biographer, Cyrus Adler, concluded that Schiff’s
religious behavior was as much a product of his own judgment as of Reform
influences. A Jew who knew some Hebrew and who liberally peppered his
remarks with biblical and rabbinic verses, Schiff recited the daily morning
prayers, and he regularly attended Sabbath services. His observance of tra-
ditional Sabbath rules grew more lax over time, but since he regularly ab-
stained from work on that day, J. P. Morgan was once forced to cancel an
important business meeting scheduled for Saturday. On Friday evenings,
always a family occasion at his home, prayers were said, candles were
lighted, and, according to tradition, the children were blessed. Schiff did
not keep the dietary laws, but he fasted on Yom Kippur, conducted the fam-
ily seder on Passover (once even in Japan), and lighted Hanukkah candles.
100 Jacob H. Schiff