A Statement of Principles for Reform Judaism

This is an official confessional statement issued by the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the rabbinical body of Reform Judaism, in 1999, a primary institutional document rather than a scholarly account of Reform belief. As a primary source it is the strongest possible evidence for what the Reform rabbinate itself formally affirmed at that specific moment, since it is the movement's own statement rather than someone's characterization of it. Its limit is that Reform Jewish thought is intentionally non dogmatic and has issued different statements of principle at different points in its history reflecting real change over time, so this 1999 statement should be understood as one point in that ongoing conversation, not as an unchanging creed, and an earlier or later statement of principles would say some things differently.