Mordecai M. Kaplan’s Orthodox ordination

Abstract

As our book* will document in great detail, Kaplan was already moving away from Orthodoxy before he met Rabbi Reines on that summer day in Frankfurt. One safely suspects that had the venerable European sage not depended on the recommendation of his old friend and, instead, probed a bit deeper, he would not have found any reason to make an exception from his policy regarding rabbinic ordination in this case. The die for Kaplan and Orthodoxy was already cast. (from Conclusion)=====*

*A modern heretic and a traditional community : Mordecai M. Kaplan, Orthodoxy, and American Judaism / Jeffrey S. Gurock and Jacob J. Schacter. Columbia UP, 1997.