Why a Strong Sense of Religious Community Complements Belief in Limited Government

Taking as his battling protagonists the archetypal liberal, cosmopolitan, and Ivy League-educated Jew “Heidi” and the traditionalist, European-born, Holocaust survivor “Shimen,” Moshe Koppel contrasts their views on the role of state and community. Heidi believes the state, not the community, should be responsible for the social welfare of its citizens, but ought not legislate moral behavior. But she is equally uncomfortable with communities like Shimen’s that enforce moral norms by consensus. She defends her position by an appeal to the philosophy of John Rawls, who argued that people make the best political decisions when they remove themselves from any of their individual characteristics. Thus Rawls imagines that the best society would be one crafted by a group of people who do not know what their race, gender, social position, or communal affiliation might be: