A Life of Courage

A Life of Courage: Sherwin Wine and Humanistic Judaism

Compiled by Dan Cohn-Sherbok, Harry Cook & Marilyn Rowens, A Life of Courage is both a biography of and a tribute to the remarkable life of Rabbi Sherwin T. Wine. founder of Humanistic Judaism. Wine began the movement of Humanistic Judaism in the early 1960s at The Birmingham Temple in suburban Detroit, Michigan, with the belief that secular Jewish culture and Jewish history shape people's identity as Jews, rather than their belief in God.
"Shulamit Aloni is an attorney, teacher, writer, and journalist. She was a member of the Israeli Knesset from 1965 to 1969 and from 1974 until 1997. Originally a member of the Labor Party, Ms. Aloni founded the Ratz Party, Israel’s civil rights and peace movement. She served as Minister of Education and Culture and Minister of Communications, Science, and Arts. Ms. Aloni founded the Israel Consumer Council and Bureau of Civil Rights. Her publications include Children’s Rights in Israel and Women As Human Beings, as well as a political autobiography, I Can Do No Other. Khoren Arisian is Minister Emeritus of the First Unitarian Society of Minneapolis, where he served from 1979 to 1997. He is currently senior leader of the New York Society for Ethical Culture. Dr. Arisian helped found both the North American Committee for Humanism and the Humanist Institute. He was the associate dean of the Humanist Institute from 1990 to 1996, and he continues to serve on its board of governors. He is a distinguished member of the Humanist Institute faculty. Yehuda Bauer is a world-renowned Holocaust scholar. He was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia, and immigrated to Palestine in 1939. He served in the War of Independence and joined Kibbutz Hoval in 1952. He was historical advisor to Claude Lanzmann for the film Shoah and to Abba Eban for Heritage. He is the academic advisor at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. His books include My Brother’s Keeper, The Holocaust in Historical Perspective, Out of the Ashes, and A History of the Holocaust. His most recent book is Rethinking the Holocaust. Adam Chalom was a rabbi at the Birmingham Temple with Sherwin Wine, and currently is the Rabbi of Kol Hadash Humanistic Congregation in suburban Chicago. He is also Dean for North America of the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism. Rabbi Chalom was raised as a Humanistic Jew at the Birmingham Temple and went on to receive a B.A. in Judaic Studies from Yale University, rabbinic ordination from the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Hebrew and Jewish cultural studies from the University of Michigan. Joseph Chuman is currently the leader of the Ethical Culture Society of Bergen County, New Jersey, where he has served for twenty-eight years. He is visiting professor of religion and human rights at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences of Columbia University. He teaches at the United Nations University for Peace in Costa Rica. He is a member of the faculty of the International Institute for Secular Humanistic Judaism, and he is on the board of the Humanist Institute and the International Humanist and Ethical Union."