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DIED. Mordecai Kaplan, 102, founder of the Jewish Reconstructionist movement, which sees Judaism as an evolving civilization and not just as a religion; in New York City. A professor at Manhattan's Jewish Theological Seminary (1909-63), Kaplan was Orthodox by upbringing, but came to believe that Judaism is a synthesis of religion, race and culture. The practical effect of this view was to see the synagogue as a center for Jewish communal life that stressed the humanistic rather than the solely religious aspects of heritage. Kaplan's ideas were viewed as a divisive force by many Orthodox Jews, and in 1945 a panel of Orthodox rabbis issued a religious ban against his Reconstructionist Sabbath Prayer Book, which excised references to the Jews as a chosen people and to the divine revelation of the Torah. His influence was widely felt in the Reform and even Conservative branches of the faith, not least in the perception of the role of women; in 1922 Kaplan introduced the bat mitzvah ceremony for 13-year-old girls, giving them a larger role in religious practices.